Hunter's Need

Table of Contents

 

 

“Some of the best erotic romantic fantasies on the market. Walker’s world is vibrantly alive with this pair.”

 

 

“Action, sex, savvy writing, and characters with larger-than-life personalities that you will not soon forget are where Ms. Walker’s talents lie, and she delivered all that and more . . . This is a flawless five-rose paranormal novel, and one that every lover of things that go bump in the night will be howling about after they read it . . . Do not walk! Run to get your copy today!”

“An exhilarating romantic fantasy filled with suspense and . . . star-crossed love . . . Action packed.”

—
Midwest Book Review

“Fast paced and very readable . . . Titillating.”

—
The Romance Reader

“Action-packed, with intriguing characters and a very erotic punch,
Hunting the Hunter
had me from page one. Thoroughly enjoyable with a great hero and a story line you can sink your teeth into, this book is a winner. A very good read!”

—
Fresh Fiction

“Another promising voice is joining the paranormal genre by bringing her own take on the ever-evolving vampire myth. Walker has set up the bones of an interesting world and populated it with some intriguing characters. Hopefully, there will be a sequel that ties together more threads and divulges more details.”

—
Romantic Times

 

HUNTING THE HUNTER HUNTERS: HEART AND SOUL HUNTER’S SALVATION THROUGH THE VEIL HUNTER’S NEED

 

THE MISSING FRAGILE

 

 

 

HOT SPELL
(with Emma Holly, Lora Leigh, and Meljean Brook)

 

 

PRIVATE PLACES
(with Robin Schone, Claudia Dain, and Allyson James)

Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

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South Africa

 

Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

 

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

 

HUNTER’S NEED

 

A Berkley Sensation Book / published by arrangement with the author

 

PRINTING HISTORY

Berkley Sensation mass-market edition / December 2009

Copyright © 2009 by Shiloh Walker, Inc.

Excerpt from
Veil of Shadows
by Shiloh Walker copyright © by Shiloh Walker, Inc.

 

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

 

eISBN : 978-1-101-15179-2

 

BERKLEY® SENSATION

Berkley Sensation Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

BERKLEY
^®
SENSATION and the “B” design are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

S
TRENGTH.

Some people have it.

Some people don’t.

Analise Morell knew which category she fell into. She wasn’t strong. Not at all. While she might wish otherwise, wishing for something didn’t make it happen. And reaching for that indefinable something didn’t always bring it closer. She’d reached for strength before, and she’d always failed.

Here, she was more acutely aware of just how lacking she was.
Here
being Excelsior, the hallowed home of the Hunters—at least on this side of the world. For four years, she’d trained here, fighting to control her psychic gift, refining her admittedly shoddy shielding ability and working on control. She’d also managed to get her GED and complete the first few years of college courses.

To the mortal world, Excelsior was a private school for gifted and troubled children and teens. Other than her age, Ana supposed she fit into that category well enough.

Psychics weren’t exactly the sort of
gifted
the normal person would expect to find here, no more than they’d expect to find fledging witches, shapeshifters or newly made vampires. Excelsior was a whole different world from what mortals would have expected to find.

Not everybody who came to Excelsior would become a Hunter—Ana wouldn’t, and she was fine with that. But she’d leave it stronger, smarter and more capable of controlling the gift that had damn near controlled her.

She wouldn’t be used again. Not by her gift, and not by somebody else seeking to exploit it.

She may not be strong enough to be one of
them
, but at least she could control herself enough so that she couldn’t be used to hurt them, either.

Hurt him.

As though even thinking of him was enough to make him appear, Duke Lawson came striding into the huge gymnasium, walking with a lazy, feline grace. He’d been born Duke Monroe, but like many of the Hunters, he’d left his given name behind with his old life.

There was a faint, almost unconscious smile on his face, one that faded as she stared at him. He came to a halt and she saw his nostrils flare—

His gaze cut to her and she managed to keep from flinching as his dark gray eyes connected with hers. She lifted a hand, waved hesitantly, but he didn’t acknowledge her. He just turned away and strode across the rubberized floor. She knew where he was going—the training area on the second level. Right now, there was a class in progress for the advanced students; fighting skills, but not exactly the kind of fighting one would encounter at any legit dojo.

Martial arts were definitely taught, but the advanced students, the ones most likely to be approached about joining the Hunters,weren’t just taught basic self-defense. Duke was currently one of the Hunters assigned to help train—she knew, because she did her best to quietly learn everything about him that she could.

As much as she could learn without him realizing it, anyway.

Considering she’d once been party to his kidnapping and torture, she doubted he’d be too happy knowing that she was obsessed with him. None too happy with knowing that she still dreamed about him, more than four years after the night he’d had the bad luck to meet up with her.

 

 

T
oo fucking twitchy for this, Duke thought as he squared off with a young vampire. Young in vamp years anyway. Shawn Lenning would have celebrated his fiftieth birthday in just a few months if he hadn’t been attacked one night. He’d been heading to his car after leaving work. Parked on a side street in a less than respectable area of East St. Louis, he’d heard the sounds of struggle, a woman screaming and he’d gone to help.

But it wasn’t just the average rape he’d interrupted. The woman survived, Shawn Lenning was technically listed as missing and presumed dead and his life would never be the same. Duke could sympathize. He knew what it was like to have your entire life changed in the blink of an eye, although at least Duke had been a little prepared. A natural shifter, he’d known pretty much all his life that there was a whole hell of a lot more to the world than mortals thought.

Shawn had simply been human. Courageous and decent, willing to risk his neck for a woman he didn’t know, but just a human and he hadn’t known a damn thing about natural shifters, vampires, psychics . . .

Pretty blonde psychics with eyes the color of violets and a mouth he could still taste, even four years later.

Life would be easier if he didn’t have to know about that particular psychic, Duke suspected. After what she’d done, it wasn’t a big surprise that every time he saw her, it hit him on a deep, visceral level.

He still had scars from those days, days that ran together in a pain-filled, delirious blur. Just a few days, but even a few minutes under those circumstances would be too much. She’d used him, figured out what and who he was and toyed with him, making him believe she wanted him and convincing him to leave the club with her.

He’d done just that, but instead of taking him to a motel or some dark, quiet apartment where she lived, she’d taken him to hell. To Cat, a feral vampire with a few mental issues. Something about Ana’s gift fucked with his instincts and he’d been blinded to the fact that the house he was following her into was the territory of a feral vamp’s.