Trinity Broken

Chapter 1 The silent street unfurled in front of them like black ribbon, cold and glittering as the pair followed the trail. Behind the tract homes, the Nevada desert mocked their slow progress, but neither man nor beast allowed themselves to be hurried in their task. The objective was too important. They had been searching for two very long years for her. They would not rush at this point, only to lose her yet again. Cameron Koster kept his head high, sniffing out the frigid January air for her scent. Every once in a while, he would lower his nose to the road, pausing for a moment as he sought another clue, another fragment of a trail, and when he caught the musk again, he resumed his path, his padded feet silent on the cement. Choosing the form of a German shepherd was proving the best decision he and Josh had made yet on this trip. In this body, Cam could track as easily as breathing. There was no doubt she was here. They could be separated for decades, and Cam would never forget her scent. Josh shivered at his side, the man’s entire body shaking with the force of the cold. He had opted to wear nothing but a thin jacket, but to his credit, he hadn’t made a sound or voiced a single complaint. “Is she here?” Josh breathed. The inability to answer Josh with words was the only disadvantage to shifting. Without breaking stride, Cam closed the distance between them and nuzzled the top of his head against Josh’s hand. Josh’s fingers curled in acknowledgement, his hand resting for a moment between Cam’s ears. “I can’t see a thing.” He wished he could tell Josh he saw perfectly well, but he knew he had to settle for a brief brush of his nose against Josh’s hip before pulling out in front again. There was no time for dallying. The cold was an unforgiving mistress, and he was not prepared to lose Josh too. They had only walked another twenty yards when the trail changed. Cam stopped dead in his tracks, ears sharpening, his heart quickening from its slow pace. Undercurrents of civilization coated the air—motor oil and perfume and human bodies too many to count—but now, a new aroma mingled with hers, something metallic that made his form’s natural instincts come alive. Blood. Hers. He broke into a run. Cam wasn’t worried about Josh. He heard the rhythmic sound of Josh’s breathing and the soft slap of his shoes against the pavement, but Josh couldn’t keep up with Cam’s long strides. Soon, Cam left him behind, following the smell of blood like a bright red rope, winding through the blackness. He stopped short outside an innocuous house that looked like every other house on the long road. There were no lights, no signs of life, no cars in the short driveway, nothing to indicate the house wasn’t abandoned. Nothing except for the sickening, gut-twisting cloud hanging over the entire building—the pungent smell of something more than blood, something darker. Josh caught up with him, his breath coming in shallow gasps. Cam stood at the door, prepared to shift, but Josh put a hand on the scruff of his neck. “Not yet. There could be somebody waiting behind the door.” Cam growled in frustration. Josh had a point, but when they reached her, he wanted to be able to take her in his arms, feel her body against his, hold her as he’d been denied for the past two years. He couldn’t hold her in this form. But if there were others, he would be far more lethal as a German shepherd. With a duck of his head, Cam stepped out of the way, waiting for Josh to get them inside. Josh had anticipated the locked door. He pulled a small case of tools out of his jacket pocket and held a small flashlight between his teeth. Cam paced back and forth while Josh picked the lock, understanding it would be best to slip in and out of the house quietly, but frustrated that he had to wait. Plus, having the flashlight, no matter how small, was a risk. His ears perked forward as the lock clicked, and Josh slowly turned the knob to push the door open. They both braced themselves for an immediate response, but the house remained completely silent. It was also dark. Josh’s hesitation was the only impetus Cam needed to slip noiselessly inside first. He waited on the other side of the threshold for Josh to enter. Though his muscles screamed at him to bolt forward, he didn’t move until he felt the familiar touch at his shoulder, but even then, it wasn’t the frantic pace he would have preferred. He guided Josh through the empty front room, leading him straight for the kitchen in the back. His nails clicked against the tiled floor, but he didn’t stop until they reached the closed door leading to the basement. The trail was strongest here. The scent of her sweat and skin and blood was dizzying, but something else made Cam’s stomach nearly retch. Fear. Josh hesitated for only a second before opening the basement door, but it was a second too long for Cam. Sara wasn’t the only thing he could smell; Josh reeked of adrenaline and sweat in the small space. From the corner of his eye, he saw Josh put his hand down, as though he wanted to touch him again, but he paused, his fingers hovering just above his head before pulling away. Cam realized he probably looked more than a little intimidating, and Josh’s more basic instincts to avoid large, tense, dangerous dogs had probably kicked in at that moment. Especially since Josh wasn’t accustomed to seeing him in canine form. He pushed the door open and stepped aside, allowing Cam to race past him. The first bound almost made him tumble down the rest of the flight of stairs, but he recovered well enough to get to the bottom on his own four feet. Where he’d expected an open room, indicative of any other normal basement, Cam found himself staring down a narrow hall lined with closed doors leading to unknown rooms. It was an obvious construct, probably done after the fact, but he didn’t care about why. She was behind one of those doors. He tensed, ready to go bolting forward to nose out which one, when a flashing light above made him pause. He tilted his head back, aware of Josh descending the stairs behind him. Just because he couldn’t see red in this form didn’t mean Cam couldn’t recognize an alarm going off when he saw one. A man sprung from a nearby door, gun drawn, the barrel pointed at him. Cam barely had a chance to adjust before a shot exploded in the small corridor, reverberating off the walls and making his skull vibrate. He ducked his head automatically as the man in front of him fell face first to the ground, and fresh blood obscured the trail he had been following to Sara. Cam spun around to see Josh slowly lower his arm, his face blank in the revolving light. “Hurry,” was all he said. Fear there would be more men spurred Cam to run. His paws slipped in the blood pooling on the cement floor, and he skidded several feet before he realized her scent was growing fainter. Whirling, he backtracked, but the instant he saw the door opening, he leapt into the air. His powerful jaws sank into the man’s neck before the would-be assailant drew his gun. Cam’s aim was true, and blood spurted from the jugular to coat his muzzle. Though they fell to the ground, the man’s attempts to dislodge Cam from his throat grew weaker with each passing second, until they stopped completely, his thready pulse disappearing altogether. Josh’s thin form stepped between the dead man and the wall, his shoulder pushing the door open to reveal a brightly lit room. Cam forced his way past Josh and barely noticed the way he slumped against the wall, as if somebody had punched him in the chest. The room was nearly devoid of furniture. There was a chair near the door with a discarded Sports Illustrated next to it and a low table bolted to the opposite wall. But Cam didn’t see the furnishings. He saw the thin form stretched out on top of the table. He saw the slack hand resting at its side, the steel cuffs chafing around the wrists to restrain it. He saw the strong jaw, and the dark hair spilling over the pillow, and the steady rise and fall of her breasts as she slept. He saw Sara. On the first step toward her, he changed, almost unknowingly. His need to touch her, to know she was real, superseded the need for the dog guise. The air was cool against his bared skin, but Cam didn’t care. He didn’t care about anything until he’d crossed the room and stood at her side. Then he saw what had stopped Josh inside the door. “Oh, my God,” he murmured. Josh circled to the other side of the table, meeting Cam’s eyes over Sara’s prone body. The woman in front of him and the woman who lived in his memories were not the same person. This version of Sara was pale, drawn, and gaunt, the thinnest shadow of her former vibrant self. The hospital gown barely covered her thighs, but her legs, arms and face told a story of torment, pain and every nightmare he had during the past two years. Josh reached out to touch her, gently brushing his fingers against her cheek. His hand looked much too large, much too strong, against her fragile skin—her stained and bruised skin. The blood covering her wasn’t fresh, it was merely a pink stain, like they couldn’t be bothered to clean her properly. A recent wound on the inside of her thigh slowly seeped blood. “We need to break through these chains,” Josh said, his words matter-of-fact but thin. Cam knew Josh expected him to do something, but the shock of seeing her like this had turned his muscles to lead. It was the embodiment of everything he’d feared; the fact she was still alive was the only thing saving his sanity. “What did they do to her?” The words were barely a whisper. “How could they do this?” “Cam.” He didn’t look up or acknowledge Josh. “Cameron.” The unexpected sting in Josh’s voice caught his attention. “I know. I know. But I can’t get her out of these chains by myself. We need to keep it together right now.” Keep it together. Right. The important thing to focus on was that Sara was alive, and they were here, and they were going to take her home. Where she belonged. Cam took a long, shuddering breath before grasping the cuff around her nearest wrist. Gritting his teeth, he poured all his strength into it, wrenching the metal until it began to scream and beads of sweat popped out on his brow. Josh reached across her body to hold her arm, and as soon as the cuff had been stretched enough, he slipped her hand through the opening. Neither of them could do more than glance at the raw patches where the steel had worn against her skin. They repeated the process with her other wrist and both her ankles, until they freed Sara of all the restraints. Cam panted from the exertion, but she hadn’t moved, not even a muscle. Tenderly, he brushed his fingertips over her cheek. “They’ve drugged her,” he said. “How are we going to get her out of here?” Josh pressed the back of his hand against his mouth and took a deep breath. “I’m going to have to carry her out. You’re going to need to shift again.” “Can we wake her up?” He looked up, and Cam saw his own pain reflected in Josh’s brown eyes. “I don’t think we should spend any more time here than necessary. We can wake her up when we’re somewhere safe.” Cam nodded. Josh was right. Always the voice of reason in the face of a crisis. He had been Cam’s rock for the entirety of the past two years. Turning away, he prepared to shift to the shepherd again only to hesitate and glance back at Sara. “But she’s alive. That’s what counts.” “That’s all that counts,” Josh agreed softly, lifting her into his arms. He held her like she didn’t weigh any more than a doll, cradling her close to his chest. “She feels so cold.” Sara would not survive the Nevada winter dressed as she was. It took only a moment for Cam to march back to the men in the hallway, and only a few more to strip them out of the clothes. They were too big for her and stained with blood, but they would protect her for now. Josh set her on the edge of the table, holding her in an upright position as Cam layered both shirts and both pair of pants on her tiny frame. She looked like nothing more than a child, completely swamped by the outfit. Even the belt Cam cinched around her waist didn’t do much to keep the clothes in place. “When we get her home—” Cam started. “We’re not going home,” Josh said, cutting him off. “Not now. Maybe not for a long time.” “What?” He stared at Josh in disbelief. “Why not?” Josh gave him a look of infinite patience, tinged with more than a hint of sadness. “Cameron, where do you think they’re going to look for us? Whoever went through all the effort to…to take her…they’re not going to let us just walk away with her.” He wanted to argue that nobody was letting them do anything; the two dead bodies in the hall were proof. They had searched for over two years for Sara, and all he wanted to do was get her home where she belonged, where she was loved, where they could take care of her properly. But Josh had a point. Someone had snatched Sara from their lives for a reason, and she still lived for that same purpose. They had no way of knowing if whoever was behind it all wouldn’t try it again, and the easiest place for them to start would be back in Delta. His brain worked, searching for a solution. Josh had done the driving to the tiny Nevada town, following the lead he’d been given. Cam had little idea what options they might have. “What do you suggest then?” he asked. Josh would have the answer. He was so much better at this type of arrangement than Cam was. Josh cradled her again. “Vegas is about three hours away. We shouldn’t have a problem finding a place to lay low. We’ll stay there until…until her condition is stable.” Cam didn’t mistake Josh’s careful terminology. Stable. Like he needed the reminder that someone—or someones—had stolen the woman they loved from under their noses and tortured her until she was a shadow of her previous self. A raw anger he hadn’t felt in months made his heart bleed. “I want whoever did this,” he growled. “I want to find them, and I want to rip them apart until not even the vultures will pick at the remains.” Josh brushed past him, stepping out of the bright room into the revolving light of the hallway. He paused there and looked over his shoulder to where Cam still stood. “We’ll find them. We will.” He didn’t reply. As he followed Josh back to the car parked at the edge of the neighborhood, only one thought consumed Cam’s mind. Someone would pay.