Page 68 of Fighting Furry

“Rowan's aunt's last boyfriend uses it as a hunting cabin in the fall. It's really not as bad as it looks.”

I wiggled out from under Axel's arm. “I for one want to hit that shower before I do anything else.”

Clarissa hopped out and led the way around to the back of the shack. There was a wooden table built from pallets and stained by years of cleaning hunted or fished animals, I would guess. I didn't see a shower. Clarissa pulled a garden hose from a box next to the house.

“That's the shower?”

“Would you rather stay covered in vamp blood?”

I sighed and spread my arms. “Hit me.”

The water was even colder than I'd expected. It was so cold, my skin was bright red and my whole body was shuddering with shivers hard enough to rattle my teeth by the time I was finally clean. “Here,” Axel threw a ratty old towel at me. I dried myself off as best I could while Clarissa hosed him off.

I have to admit, I enjoyed the show. He always looked good enough to eat, even dancing around and cursing about the cold. He smiled at me, even as he shivered and the kindness in his gaze warmed me. I'd do whatever it took to protect him. Whatever it took, even if it meant I had to walk away from him again.

Clean, he grabbed a towel from a pile he'd placed on the hose box and gestured for Clarissa to give him the hose. She took her place on the cracked, cement patio and took her hosing down silently, just shivering and turning when Axel instructed.

Once we were all clean and, mostly, dry, we headed inside. I still smelled like vamp and I wished for shampoo and soap, but I pushed the wish aside. We had far bigger problems to deal with.

The shack wasn’t too bad inside. There was a dusty space heater and a bare cot. Other than the normal accumulation of dust to be expected when a place stood empty for a while, it was surprisingly clean. It was dry and there was even a pantry with pots and pans and a camp stove. There was no food, but there was a suitcase that held hunting clothing. It all reeked of mothballs, but it was clean.

The clothes were a bit small on Axel, but huge on me and Clarissa. We might have looked like we were part of some cult militia group, but at least we weren't naked and, if we had to run into the woods, we'd be well camouflaged. There must have been just the one guy who used the cabin, because there were only about two outfits worth of camo. Axel took the outerwear pants and gave me the matching jacket. Clarissa took the camo coveralls and camo hoody. The jacket was long enough to cover my bare butt, but I wouldn't have minded if the guy had thrown a pair of sweatpants in there, too.

“Okay,” Axel said. “We're safe. For now. What did you want to decide?”

I gave him a little shove, until he was seated on the floor and then I climbed onto his lap. He wrapped his arms around me and pressed a kiss to my hair. If there was a chance in hell that I might lose him, soon, I wasn't going to waste our time together with me on the other side of the room from him. “I think you like me,” he whispered.

“Nope,” I said, at full volume. “I'm just still chilly from that hose bath.”

He chuckled and hugged me tighter.

Clarissa smiled fondly at us. She sat on the cot and pulled her legs up under her. The coveralls didn't look remotely comfortable, but she didn't complain. “Okay, so we know that Darius has got some deal going with the vamps. He wants them to have our territory and our pack, so getting Axel out of the picture would only benefit him. What do the vamps have that he wants?”

“And what makes the vamps so strong?” I asked. “I didn't have much trouble besting Jeremiah, but the vamp holding me was like a steel robot.”

“I don't have any answers,” Axel said. “And even if I did, what would that solve? Knowing why Darius wants the pack isn't going to save me or the pack.”

“Knowing what Darius is up to might give us some leverage,” I said. “Something to use against him in exchange for him letting you live.”

“That kind of leverage doesn't exist,” Axel said. “What just happened is too huge. The council will have to act.”

“Do you have your cell phone?”

He sighed. “It's in the truck.”

Clarissa popped up. “I'll get it.”

She was out the door without even asking what I needed it for. She was good people.

Axel nuzzled my neck and pressed a soft kiss to the spot where Neela had bitten me. “Does it hurt?”

“Not really,” I said. “That vampire saliva is good stuff.”

“Julie, I love that you're trying to help me, but you have to know this is futile. Our way of life depends on secrecy and I've destroyed that. I need you to know—”

I spun in his lap and slapped a hand over his mouth. “That's enough.” If he said what I thought he was going to say, my heart would crack into a million pieces. I needed to hold it together and I needed to save him. Somehow, he'd become the most important person in my life and I'd be damned if I was going to let him go without a fight. “That's bullshit. You said yourself it was only a matter of time before the secret came out and—”

“It came out in the worst possible way. We were filmed ripping the heads off what will look to the world like innocent humans.”

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