Page 68 of Alpha's Redemption

Tatum

Teeth, claws, blood, fur.

Everything is a blur as I try to hold them back. I’m screaming through the link for Valen to get here as a few slip past me. Men call through the link that they’re on the way, yet as one forsaken falls, another replaces it. They seem to just keep coming and I’m taking a beating.

The venom in my system is starting to make my muscles ache and lock. The only thing keeping me on my feet is adrenaline and knowing that Taylor, Valarian, and Casey are in that stairwell. I just hope they get inside the building and aren't sitting ducks in that stairwell.

My back leg is ripped into as two attack simultaneously, snarling. I pivot and twist, nearly ripping my leg off in the process.

Yelps and snarls echo from the stairwell, causing me to become distracted as I try to double back, only to be jumped on. His claws rip through my fur, making my back arch, and his teeth are like a serrated knife as they tear into the back of my neck.

The stairwell. The stairwell,I keep thinking, trying to toss him off as more flood into the stairs, escaping past me while I’m being ripped to shreds. My teeth sink into its front paw and I feel the crunch as its bones break under the pressure of my teeth, forcing him to release me long enough to fling him off. I turn, running for the stairwell, my vision blurring as I go, just as forsaken are suddenly running back out of the stairwell.

My heart jolts at seeing the rabid creatures running from something. One drops as a huge, molten-colored wolf tears into its neck. It takes me a second to realize it’s Claire. Yet, she doesn't look like a pack wolf—she looks like one of the forsaken. Her blood-red eyes are savage, and venom is oozing and dripping from her teeth. Panic courses through me, knowing if she turns on me, I’ll have to kill Everly's mother. Her head twists in my direction and her lips pull back as she drops her head, snarling and stalking towards me—then she runs at me.

I snarl back when she lunges, but she misses. I jump aside, skidding on the slick, blood-soaked floor, only to see her rip into a forsaken that must have been coming up behind me. Four more rush through the barrier and I leap over her, jumping into the fray.

She’s a full-blown forsaken. However, she’s fighting on our side, not theirs, which gives her an advantage, as they keep recognizing her as their own. With the savage gleam and the way she fights, I can tell John trained her himself—she’s just as lethal, but with a vicious edge.

She tears into them, locking her jaws each time and ripping them to shreds, not even flinching as they tear into her back. Relentlessly, she fights, saving my ass twice, and I hers, as we fight tail to tail, trying to hold them back.

My back leg is useless—I’m running on three, the other hanging behind me.

‘We're in the street!’Valen calls, but I can't reply. I’m too focused on the wolves in front of me. We need to try to push them back to the street through the broken roller shutters.

Claire is taking on three, but even she is on the losing end this time. I rip off one on her that’s tearing into her flank, while her jaws lock around another one's neck.

My paw swipes at the other and together, we push them back, herding them up the ramp. Daylight breaks as we keep forcing them further. Suddenly, she lets out a whimper just as we make it out the front of the hotel. Pivoting, I run towards her when a deafening howl rips through the air as she sways on her feet.

Forsaken are swarming her; her throat is torn out. Her front legs buckle. A giant black and gray wolf starts wrenching them off her as another forsaken tackles me. I break the wolf's neck and I turn my head to find the black and gray wolf is John. The three forsaken that had attacked Claire are lying dead around him, and John now stands naked, petting her wolf. Her chest rises and she wheezes as blood pools around her—then her chest appears to deflate. The agonized howl that turns to a wail shakes me to the core when I hear Everly's keening scream ring out above as she feels her mother's link disintegrate.

Everyone stops at the noise—even the forsaken, who are flooding into the street. Valen's wolf is huge and the one beside him is equally big; I recognize the wolf as the Slasher pack Alpha. Marcus' gray wolf rushes past me toward the forsaken, his coat tainted red, and the chaos starts again.

John's angered roar makes my fur stand on end. He seems to erupt as he shifts and barrels towards the forsaken with blind fury, ripping them apart as the bloodshed starts again.

Now an observer, I realize something. The forsaken are only heading here and for the Alpha's homes, making this obviously targeted and well-thought-out. The information I hear coming through the link says the side of the city where the rogue's live and Everly's hotel stands remain untouched. The carnage is only happening on one side.

Nixon has to be behind it. And he’s casting the rogues as the ones starting it.

He’s trying to divide the city.

Pandemonium ensues as we battle. Our men are falling, yet the forsaken keep coming. The four Alphas—new and old—work together, getting right in the middle of the battle. Valen and the Slasher pack Alpha, even John and Kalen, are lethal beasts. They are huge, towering beasts compared to the forsaken. Their coats are dripping in blood, both theirs and the forsaken; there’s not a speck of fur left untainted.

This is what makes them Alphas—pure, lethal muscle, and precision like no other. Despite their massive sizes, they’re fast, running through forsaken like bowling balls knocking down pins. The street's gutters run with rivers of blood, and it stains everything.

They don't stop, but neither do the forsaken. These numbers should not exist! How can they outnumber us? Three packs are fighting, and we arestillsomehow outnumbered.

Suddenly, a tidal wave of snarls shakes the windows. The deafening force of pure rage reverberates around the street and everyone stops to stare down the road, searching for the source of the rumbling noise.

Macey appears.

My heart stops as she runs down the street straight at us with a huge bat in her hands. Fear courses through me and I run toward her. Forsaken take off in her direction, only to start skidding across the ground, trying to stop and double back. What could scare so many forsaken so badly? I stare up ahead of them in shock.

Hundreds of rogues are racing up the street toward us. I stop as she leads her army of rogues to the battle. They are a sight to be seen.

Our men are given some relief as rogues jump into battle without hesitation, saving the very people who shunned them, and cast them out. Pack members and rogues are fighting alongside each other—fighting as one—painting the street red with the blood of the forsaken and proving their innocence in their own desperate need to fight for our city.

Teeth sink into my neck and I’m flung across the road. My head smashes into the gutter, and I can hear screaming in the distance before I feel a violent breeze rustle the fur on my face as her bat smashes into the wolf's skull with a thud.

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