Page 49 of The Last Sanctuary
She swerved sharply, her legs pumping, and sprinted behind the meat storage building. Pressing her back against the concrete block wall, she peered around the corner. The fog bothhelped and hindered her. What hid Raven also hid any potential skulking Headhunters. She could barely see forty feet ahead or behind her.
The bobbing flashlights drew nearer. She held her breath, waiting for the cries of alarm. Had Damien told them she’d just escaped out the window? Were they hunting her down right now?
Agonizing seconds passed. Then minutes. No shouting. No Headhunters running toward her, guns blazing.
Perhaps Damien had kept his word after all. Relief flooded her, along with another emotion she couldn’t quite name or understand. Now was not the time to examine her feelings. It was time to stay the hell alive.
Raven eased around the far corner of the building, keeping it between her and the group of Headhunters as they drew closer. They weren’t hunting, though. They strolled along the path with their flashlights aimed at the flagstone at their feet.
Heart in her throat, she waited for their voices to dim, for their footfalls to fade into silence.
In her frazzled state, she didn’t remember the hoverboard until she’d started running again. She was too scared to stop. She stayed off the main path and kept to the rear of the exhibits.
Weeds and thorns snagged her pant legs. She ran and ran, legs pumping, adrenaline shooting through her veins, cold breath searing her throat.
She raced past the reptile house, the bonobos, the otters, the eagle, the porcupines, and the ostriches. Then she circled back onto the flagstone path, rounding the bear enclosure where Kodiak and Sage slept soundly. The rear gate loomed in the fog, forty yards away. She reached the narrow space between the bear and hybrid wolf paddocks. Almost there, almost out of the sanctuary and to the woods?—
Sudden voices to her right. Flashlights wavered wildly. Echoing laughter. To her right, several human figures clustered by the timber wolf enclosure forty yards ahead of her.
Instinctively, Raven dropped to the ground to make herself small and invisible. She’d been out in the open, clearly visible if they’d been looking in her direction, if the fog hadn’t obscured her approach.
Grass damp with frost dampened the front of her jacket, seeped through her pants. Cold wetness kissed her cheek. With her face pressed to the grass, she could barely make out their shapes, moving in the mist.
The Headhunters stood between Raven and the rear gate, between her and freedom.
The first gunshot cracked through the air.
Chapter Twenty
One of the timber wolves let out a cry that sounded eerily human, a cross between a pained whimper and an agonized howl. A terrible thump of a wolf’s body hitting the ground.
The men laughed, hooting and yelling in celebration.
The Headhunters were shooting the wolves. For sport. For fun.
Five men leaned over the timber wolves’ paddock, their rifles tucked against their shoulders. They aimed their weapons into the enclosure.
Their backs were turned to her. They didn’t see her lying rigid, numb and horrified on the grass next to the bear enclosure. Though fog swirled thick and dense, she was still too exposed if anyone took a close look in her direction.
She recognized the vague figures of Vaughn, Rex, Dekker, and Scorpio. The fifth Headhunter was half-turned in the other direction. When he swung back toward the enclosure, a flashlight beam caught his face—angled cheekbones, narrow chin, spiky fox-red hair, the gleam of metal piercings.
A sharp bitterness welled in the back of her throat. Damien may not have ratted her out, but he was one of them. A Headhunter. A thug and a killer. Cruel and malicious. Despite his pretty face and pretty words, he was no different than the rest of these repugnant thugs.
Another gunshot rang through the air.
The timber wolves fled into the protection of the trees, desperate to evade the thunderous noise and explosions of pain. Aspen and Titus snarled and growled fiercely. Loki and Suki whimpered. Shika let out a long, mournful howl of despair. She recognized their distinctive howls. The missing wolf was Echo. He was the one they’d shot and killed.
The Headhunters moved around the fence. They shouted insults and laughed gleefully. When they couldn’t spot the wolves, they shot randomly into the underbrush.
Titus burst out of the trees, charging at the Headhunters in a desperate bid to protect his pack. Dekker aimed and fired.
Titus took two staggering steps and fell with a moan. His tail fluttered weakly. He lay limp in the dirt. He didn’t get up.
Vaughn and Dekker jeered in triumph. Rex slapped Dekker on the back. Damien’s expression was impossible to read from this distance. He stood with the others. He didn’t cheer or shoot at the wolves. He stood silently and watched.
Run!Raven’s brain screamed at her. Get up andRUN!But she couldn’t. Her legs were lead. They wouldn’t work properly. She felt dizzy, disconnected, her brain stuffed with cotton.
Where to go? The Headhunters had trapped her. She couldn’t escape out the back now. And she couldn’t head back into the sanctuary, where even more Headhunters prowled among the various enclosures.
