Firestarter (12 page)

Ted’s words were contradictory. First he was offering to let him go, but he wanted to punish Cammie. Then he offered Cammie a chance. Keanu wasn’t sure what their history was, other than that the man had feelings for Cammie that she clearly didn’t return.

“That was the plan.” Ted raised his hand and flames flew from his palm.

“Son of a bitch,” Keanu swore, tossing Cammie over the large rock. “Run, Cammie.”

The flames barely missed hitting him square in the chest. Normal fire wouldn’t burn him, but elemental fire would.

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Sending a fiery ball at the other man, Keanu prepared for the next blow.

“What?” Ted screamed as the blast Keanu threw hit his shoulder.

“I’m your worst fucking nightmare.” Keanu readied another blast.

Ted raised his palms up in a conciliatory gesture. “You’re one of us. That must be why Bob wants you to join our group. We’re going to rule this town first, and then the world.” Ted grabbed his head and shook it like a dog would.

The man was a fruit loop, and not the sweet kind, but a very dangerous one. “Join you in what? Terrifying women?”

“Forget her, she’s nothing. Her family business is nothing. I was going to let her be with me, but she’s not worthy. The bitch should’ve died in that fire.”

Keanu wanted to keep him distracted to give Cammie a chance to get away. “You fucktard, you almost killed us.”

“Collateral damage.” Ted waved his hand. “I didn’t know you were like me. Like us.

Together, we’d be unstoppable.”

Keanu kept the lunatic talking, hoping to give Cammie enough time to make it back down the path. Two fire elementals could cause serious damage to the forest. He could control his blasts, but the other man was an unknown. Cammie’s sudden scream sent all his protective instincts on high alert.

Without a word, Keanu shot his hand forward, and watched in horror as Ted received the blast full in his chest. Ted dropped to his knees with his mouth open, palms pressed to the blaze.

Not stopping to finish Ted off, Keanu vaulted over the rock and came face to face with a huge man, petting the head of the big red beast his love called pet. He stopped in his tracks.

Looking at the man, and then Cammie, he stepped in front of her. A quick look over his shoulder showed Ted curled up in a ball. He sucked in a breath and called the fire back to him.

The stranger didn’t even flinch at the display.

“Hello, Fire-breather. I am Rasmund Masters, Cammie’s father.”

He heard Cammie gasp and reached back to grab her hand. This man was an unknown entity to all of them.

“I am not here to harm my daughter. You may relax, boy.” He gave Keanu a fierce glance.

“What do you want?” Cammie asked.

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Rasmund tilted his head in a very canine way. His nose did this little twitch, making Keanu think of the movie Bewitched, and his pupils seemed to dilate.

“We are not alone.” Cammie’s father stood straighter.

Just great. Keanu now pictured some Stephen Spielberg movie.

Keanu’s grandfather stepped into the clearing with a huge eagle on his shoulder, making the image complete.

“Hello Rasmund, it’s good to see you again.” Alo tilted his head in greeting.

Cammie’s father crossed his arms over his chest and glared at Keanu’s grandfather. This was getting even more bizarre.

“I highly doubt that.” Rasmund’s lip lifted in a snarl.

The interaction between the two men confused Cammie. “What the hell is going on? And

why are you here?”

“Little girl, you don’t talk to your elders that way.” Rasmund’s fist clenched.

“You may have donated the sperm that created me, but you do not have my respect just

because of it.”

Keanu wrapped his arms around Cammie. “Listen, I think we all are a little shaken up and need a little space.”

“Why don’t you come down to the house, and we can discuss this like normal human

beings.” Alo didn’t wait for anyone to agree, but turned on his booted heel and headed back down the path.

“I came to make sure you were unharmed. Now I will go,” said Rasmund.

“Oh, I don’t think so. You can’t just show up, scare me half to death, and pet my dog like she’s yours.”

“She is mine, or she used to be.” Rasmund nudged LeeLee. “She’s part of my pack. I sent her here to look after you.”

This was getting weirder and weirder. Did Cammie’s father just refer to his pack? Keanu stuck his finger in his ear and shook it.

“You sent LeeLee to me?”

Her father gave a jerky nod of his long shaggy red hair.

“Why?” Cammie whispered.

“I wanted to protect you.”

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Keanu tried to keep her behind him, but she stepped out from his bulk to confront her father.

He knew it would be useless to haul her behind him. As a concession, he tugged her into his side.

He could be reasonable when it was called for.

Then he saw that pointy finger of hers lift, and knew she planned to stab her father in the chest with the offending body part. Keanu rubbed his chest.

“You wanted to protect me? Well newsflash, Father dear, you’re like twenty-three years too late. Money and expensive gifts don’t make you a dad. I’m a grown woman and I don’t need your misguided protection. So you can just go ahead and scurry back to wherever you came from. Go ahead. Shoo, little doggy.” She waved her hands after she stabbed him in the chest several times with her favorite weapon.

Her father growled, and yep, his pupils did that freaky dilating thing. Red fur seemed to ripple across his skin, and Keanu gave up and shoved Cammie behind him. Her beloved LeeLee placed her big body between them, and growled back at Cammie’s father.

“I think we all need to calm down, and um, Rasmund? Maybe you can, ya know, retract the fur and shit, because honestly, you’re freaking me and your daughter the fuck out.” Keanu thought it was a major understatement, but who was keeping notes.

“My daughter needs to respect her father.”

“I don’t have a fucking father. I had a single mother and my grandparents. Money and

presents do not make a parent.”

Keanu watched the woman he loved stomp down the path his grandfather had taken, with

her beloved pet trotting at her side.

The tortured look on Rasmund’s face made Keanu pause. “Let’s follow at a leisurely pace, and you can fill me in on what’s going on.”

“You’re an elemental. Why is it so hard to believe there are other beings?”

“Why don’t you explain it to me on the way down? I need to check on Ted first.”

“That would be the guy who tried to hurt you and my daughter?”

Keanu nodded.

“His spirit has left this Earth. I think he is finally at peace.”

“How do you know?” Keanu asked.

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Rasmund waved his hand. “It’s easy to see if you know what you are looking for. Now

come, don’t expect me to spill my guts until we get down. I think I’ll wait and explain it once.”

Rasmund grumbled.

Cammie’s father was full of surprises, and not all of them were the fact that he clearly was more than human. Keanu saw longing in his eyes as he watched Cammie stomp down the trail.

He wondered if Rasmund planned to stick around; if the man was smart, he would wear an armored vest when he spoke with the Hakun women.

* * * *

Rasmund looked over at the mate of his daughter and hid a smile. She could do worse. Of course she could’ve done better if she was a shifter, but it was not to be. With a shrug, he followed the scent of his child and the damn traitor, LeeLee, one of his favorite pets.

At twenty-two, he had been a wild young buck who thought he knew better than his alpha, and the elders of the pack. He hadn’t been ready to mate with the daughter of a bordering pack.

He’d wanted to see the world, sow some oats. Then he’d met the most stunning creature in the world, Dyani Hakun. She had hair as black as night, and milk chocolate eyes that made a man think of tasting her, just to see if she was as sweet as she looked. She had barely reached his shoulders, but had a temper to match his.

He had fallen, and he had fallen hard. Working for the logging company her family owned, he planned to stick around and get married. He decided he didn’t need to be part of a pack. He could live as a lone wolf, as long as he had his Dyani. If only dreams came true that easily. For him, they were shattered a few short months after finding true happiness.

“Rasmund, it is time you return and do your duty,” Alpha Boyd Masters had rasped.

“I’m not going back, sir. I’m home, I have the woman I love, and a family that has
welcomed me with open arms. I’m sorry, have Dez or Luc mate with the girl.”

“She wants you, and a pact has been made. You will do your duty.” The growl would’ve
made most wolves roll over and expose their stomachs.

“No, I will not. I love Dyani.”

“Your love will get her killed. Think about that before it’s too late. You have two days.”

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Rasmund watched his father shift into a big gray wolf, and race off into the night with a
howl.

His father was crazy.

He would protect what was his, and Dyani was his. She had never been with any other man,
and she never would. Rasmund truly believed he could handle what life threw at them. At
eighteen, Dyani was ready to be with him for life. Now he just needed to explain his shifter
abilities.

Two days later… As he walked out of work, he had a spring in his step, a ring in his pocket,
and a woman to propose to. Stopping in his tracks, his canines elongated, his vision turned gray,
and he’d felt his bones pop.

Dyani tugged against the hands holding her. “Rasmund, what’s going on? Tell them to let
me go.”

He saw his father’s two enforcers prepare to shift. Knowing they planned to rip her apart in
front of him, he did the only thing he could.

“You didn’t have to come here. I was on my way home this evening.” He chuckled and
shook his head.

“What do you mean, on your way home? I thought…” Dyani whispered.

Her head swiveled back and forth between them.

There was no question what he had to do. He needed to convince her he was leaving, and
never coming back. She had to believe he had used her and never planned to marry her. If she
ever thought to track him down, her life would be forfeit.

That didn’t mean he would leave them without protection. If the child she carried was a
shifter, both mother and child would be welcomed into his pack. He just needed to buy time.

“You thought I was going to move here, and be with you forever? You were a great

distraction and a fantastic lay, but I’m engaged. I’m sorry, Dyani.”

He’d watched the enforcers release her arms as she lunged for him. He could easily have
deflected the slap she aimed at his face, but he deserved it and so much more. He let his lips tilt
up in a grin that reminded him of his father, licking the blood from the corner.

“I hate you. I never want to see you again.”

The words burned his heart, but until he knew for sure if she carried a shifter child, he had
to make her hate him, for her own protection. “You never will. Have a good life, Dyani.”

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He watched the woman he loved, the only woman he would ever love, run away, taking his
heart with her. Turning to the two ugly bastards, he let loose a growl.

“You will return to whatever hole you climbed out of and wait for me. I will meet you in a
half hour. Make no mistake, boys, if so much as a hair on her head is touched, I will rip you
apart and feed you to your family for breakfast, lunch and dinner.” He shoved between them,
knowing he would be leaving the place he’d found happiness.

Back at his daughter’s mate’s home, he met with a group of pissed off people, which was nothing new to him.

It went against Rasmund’s nature to explain himself. “I assume you are aware of what I am?”

“Of course.” Alo agreed.

Rasmund nodded. “Have you told anyone else?”

“Your secret is safe with me. I will leave it to you to tell your daughter.”

Rasmund respected the hell out of the older man for standing up to him. They both knew he could rip Alo apart in less than two minutes, but the older man didn’t even blink.

At forty-five, he was alpha of his pack, and he was miserable. Looking across the deck, he watched as the most gorgeous woman in the world walked up the steps.

She faltered, and with only a glance in his direction, continued to where their daughter stood. Watching his family embrace, and seeing his mate wipe a tear from her own cheek, he wanted to howl. Dyani Hakun was even more beautiful today than she was when he’d first laid eyes on her. She took his breath away.

“Why are you here?” Dyani asked flatly.

She didn’t even look at him. Rasmund knew he should turn and walk away. He had done it twenty-three years ago; surely he could do it again. Then why was it so hard to make his feet move?

Because he knew leaving all those years ago was the worst mistake, and the smartest thing he could have done. Had he stayed, he would’ve had to fight the men his father sent, and protect her at the same time. If it had only been him to worry about, he would have stayed and fought to the death. But even then, he could smell their child growing in her womb. Leaving was the only selfless thing he’d ever done.

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Now he had choices, and he had a woman to woo back.

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Chapter Seven

It took everything in Dyani not to run into Rasmund’s arms. The man exuded power, and