Read Wicked Days with a Lone Wolf Online

Authors: Elisabeth Staab

Tags: #werewolf, #paranormal suspense, #paranormal romance, #paranormal, #suspense, #FBI, #lgbt, #alpha male, #male/male, #gay

Wicked Days with a Lone Wolf (10 page)

BOOK: Wicked Days with a Lone Wolf
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Ash nodded. Anything on the night of the full moon was bad. They’d be lucky if nobody got killed. “Good instinct, brother.”

Jett stayed focused on Kyle. “I can trust you to keep quiet with the pack?”

Kyle’s eyes shot molten fury at Jett. “I’ve always come through before, haven’t I?”

When Jett looked like he might argue, Ash slapped his brother on the shoulder and turned him back toward his car. “He has. Now get out of here.”

With one last piercing look at Kyle, Jett got in the car and peeled away.

Ash gave Kyle a slug on the arm. “I hope you’re giving us the truth, buddy. Since you helped us when the pack messed with Sherri before, that earns you some points. I’d hate to have to kick the shit out of you. Where’s this place of yours, anyway?”

Kyle kicked at the ground, watching the empty space where Jett had driven away. “Ramon doesn’t know. Did some off the books jobs when your dad wasn’t looking. Got myself a tiny place in a little border town called Ojos Dorados
.
I thought I could use it as a hideout, but I probably never will. Someone should.”

Ash felt a pang of sympathy for the young human. “Kyle, if you’re in over your head—”

“Nah, it’s cool. I mean, thanks. But no. Ramon let you and Jett and Zoe stay alive because you guys are family. I’m still not convinced Zoe’s days aren’t numbered. Me? I’m a human, and I know where your dad’s bodies are buried. No way he’d let me go easy.”

Ash had always figured Kyle for nothing more than a pack groupie. Now he realized how much work the kid must have put into escaping, only to give up. He hated to see a guy lose his spirit that way. “Kyle—”

Kyle pointed up ahead. “Here they come.”

“Christ.” Ash had no idea his buddy Rip flew like such a maniac. One second the aircraft was in the sky, the next it was taking a nosedive toward land like there was a bull’s-eye down below. The landing was good—although it couldn’t have been smooth—and the plane taxied only a short way before coming to a stop up ahead.

Ash’s nausea returned when he saw the plane up close.

“Damn, that’s a tiny-ass aircraft,” Kyle mused.

Sherri stumbled out, nearly doubling over with her hands on her knees.

Ash hurried to her, but she held up a finger. He paced with short, fast steps, watching her breathe and feeling helpless. He really didn’t do well with helpless. It made his skin crawl and his hair stand on end.

“One second. Just... give me one second.”

He looked over to Rip. “Nice landing.”

“Not used to having human cargo.” He pointed to Ash. “You fucking owe me for this, dude. That guy better not be dead.”

Ash glanced inside and saw a pale-faced human with a pinched expression sprawled in the seat. His chest rose and fell slowly, but he was indeed still alive. “He’s hanging in there.”

“Great. Get him out of my plane so I can get the fuck back to business.”

Ash waved Kyle over. “Give me a hand. Let’s get him in my car.”

They moved him into the backseat of Ash’s Jeep while Sherri leaned on the plane and looked like she was trying not to lose her lunch. Ash left Kyle with the barely-alive human and went back over to check on her.

He slipped his hands around her waist, grateful to feel her close to him again. Her warmth and her smell—he recognized the familiar peppermint scent that meant her head was hurting. “You have a migraine. I’m sorry.”

She rubbed at her forehead. “The cabin wasn’t pressurized.”

Rip growled. “Coña, those things cost a fortune.”

“I’m just saying—”

Ash cut in. “That’s enough.” He pulled out an envelope from his leather jacket and handed it to Rip. “Ten grand plus some extra for the short notice. Thanks for your help. Now get out of here.” 

“Mmm-hmm.” Rip gave a mock salute.

He tightened his grip on Sherri. “Come on. We have to go.”

She turned, her mouth hanging open as they walked away. “Ten grand. I’m sorry, Ash. I’ll pay you back.”

He squeezed her shoulder. “I’m betting your pal Ryan has hidden reserves around somewhere. He can owe me. Even if he doesn’t pay, I did it for you, not him. You owe me nothing, by the way.”

“It’s a hell of a lot of money.”

As they came around to the side of his Jeep, Ash gripped Sherri by the shoulders, looking her in the eye to make his meaning clear. “I went out of my fucking mind when I heard he’d showed up at that hotel room. I nearly ran to DC on four legs. God knows what could have happened. I would have paid anything to get you home.”

With that he kissed her, a hard, bending over backwards kind of kiss. A teeth sinking into lips, and tongues barging into mouths without permission kiss. The kind that left them both breathless. Ash, at least, was dying for more.

He had to admit to a selfish helping of male satisfaction when he put them both upright again and out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sherri’s ex watching from inside the Jeep. He didn’t know if the guy’s grim expression came solely from pain or from the realization that he had lost Sherri to another man.

Ash hoped it was a little of both. It would serve the fucker right. He lifted his lip in a sneer.

She put a hand to the side of his face. “Hey. Look at me. I couldn’t leave him to die in a hotel room. We’ll get him back where he belongs though, with your help. So thank you for this.”

“Yeah,” he said. He got it. They better fucking get it over with quick. “Now, come on. Let’s get out of here.”

***

L
ane Parker, perpetual fuck up, was fucked once again. This time, he wasn’t only staring down a transfer. For the lie he’d come up with, he could lose his job. Maybe he’d get jail time.

A cop in jail... Yeah, he heard that usually went well. He’d be lucky not to take a shiv to the back in under a week.

He held Zoe’s hand in his, this time determined that she wouldn’t wake up scared. This time he’d be sure to comfort her, to give her the information she needed. To get the information
he
needed.

Her fingers twitched in his. She turned and opened her eyes, blinking sleepily. “You’re still here.”

“I am.”

She’d woken a couple of times before, but whatever sedatives they’d given her had pulled her back under. The doctors had wanted to do an ultrasound on the baby without her flipping out and barreling out of the hospital in jaguar form.

They said they didn’t know what it might do to the baby. Frankly, trying to get his head around the idea made Lane dizzy. When his sister was pregnant, caffeine and heavy lifting was all the kind of shit a pregnant woman had to avoid. Not fucking changing forms.

“She needs to stay human for now,”
they’d said. Human. For now. Jesus Nutcracking Christ.

He leaned down to rest his forehead on the back of her hand. “I’m sorry, we had to put the restraints on you again. They needed to be sure you were safe. For the baby.”

She closed her eyes. Tears slipped out of her eye and onto the pillow. “Baby. How will I raise a baby? What happened to the children?”

“I called a detective who specializes in child crimes to take over.” He cleared his throat, studying her face for signs of distress. “I believe she’ll be working with social services to figure out where they should be placed, or to figure out if they have homes they can go back to.”

“They probably won’t say. Their parents sent them across the border with someone who had ill intentions. They won’t make things worse for themselves by getting their parents in trouble.”

“Or the woman who took care of them,” Lane said as he rubbed her arm.

She blinked and sniffled. “What?”

He smiled. “Ash and I talked to some of the older ones when we found you. They identified the man we found dead by the clothing and tattoos on his body. He brought them over the border, and we heard how he treated them. Before dawn, he was moving them but he started beating a girl who was too tired and hungry to keep up. Next thing they knew, he was fighting with someone who came to help. They can’t be sure who it was.”

Zoe opened her mouth. “I—”

He hurried before she could say anything more. Anything that might incriminate her. “They say you found them later and took care of them until officials could come. That’s all they know. That’s all anyone knows, Zoe.”

She turned toward him as best as she could under the circumstances. It didn’t escape Lane’s notice that she hadn’t pulled her hand away, and he couldn’t say he minded. “You saw me. You followed me to that house.”

Pressure built behind Lane’s eyes. “I know I saw someone running away. I didn’t see a face. It was good luck that I found you at that house. You know, since you were hurt and everything. You needed medical attention, and God knows what would have happened if I hadn’t stumbled across your location while I was in pursuit of an unknown assailant.”

Eyes wide, she whispered, “Why would you do this for me?”

Lane’s chest clenched tight. He answered her question with a question. “The day you kissed me in that interrogation room, what made you do it?”

More tears. “My mother, she never wanted me. You know?” A hard swallow. “Always called me ungrateful. A disappointment. Jojo came along and I honestly thought he’d saved me. What he really did was kill my soul, one tiny piece at a time. I was his mate, so I was his to do with as he wanted, any time. Happy or sad, he could fuck me. Hit me. Shove me. Shout at me, or shut me out entirely.”

Lane’s hand made a fist, dying to swing out at her shitty, dead ex. “Zoe, I’m sorry.” Now, inexplicably, he felt like an asshole. Did she see him as the same kind of guy?

“You though,” she continued. “You sat in that room with me for hours. So mad. I knew you were. Your face got all red, and you yelled, and you sweet-talked, and I didn’t say a word to you. I couldn’t. I’m sorry. I wasn’t ready that day.”

“You’d had it hard,” he said. “It was my job to get you to talk.”

“I know.” She managed a slight smile. “You were so patient. Even when you got angry, you didn’t use your fists.”

He shook his head. “I’ve used my fists plenty.”

“Not on a woman.”

He paused. “No.”

“You wouldn’t hit a woman, would you?”

He tipped his head to the side and grasped her chin, carefully to avoid any of the cuts on her face. “I might be tempted to hit the woman who called you ungrateful and tossed you out to fend for yourself.”

“For all I know, my mother is dead. But I appreciate the sentiment.” She turned away then, crying harder. “God, what am I going to do? I’m pregnant with some potentially damaged half-breed. I didn’t have a mother. How can I be one?

He ran a knuckle along her cheek. “Let me help you.”

“I can’t offer you anything.”

“I’m not asking you to.”

She seemed confused.

“Look,” he said. “If you’re ready someday to be with a man again, I hope maybe you’ll think of me that way. Right now, you couldn’t possibly be. I don’t want you out of some sense of obligation. Anyway, I may not be around. Someone will have to account for what happened with that body and those kids, and I don’t want you having a baby in prison. My house is paid for though, you can sleep on the sofa and get back on your feet. I can help with that much.”

Maybe, this one time, Lane Parker the fuck up could help someone.

Her mouth dropped open. “Detective—”

“Lane,” he corrected. “At the very least, I hope we can be friends. My friends call me Lane.”

A tired smile. “Lane. I can’t thank you enough.”

“Just take care of yourself,” he said. “And for God’s sake, stay out of trouble.”

Zoe nodded slowly. Her eyes drifted shut. Sleep pulled her back under.

A quiet shuffle behind him turned Lane’s head, bringing him around to meet Jett’s stare. For a moment, neither of them moved, and Lane was afraid to ask how much of that conversation his partner had heard.

“We need to talk,” Jett said.

Lane rubbed his hand over his forehead. “Yeah. I know.”

Chapter 11

“A
sh, you’ve been doing this all night and it’s not getting us anywhere. You have to stop.” Sherri put her hands on her hips, facing off against a snarling, pacing, fang-baring werewolf. “Is this how it’s gonna be? You’re gonna retreat into your fur every time things get too heavy? When I’ve pissed you off? I helped Ryan, so we’re not on the same team anymore? What?”

He responded by barking and digging into the floor hard enough to leave deep marks in the wood. Perhaps this was his way of disagreeing. Sometimes she understood him so well in this form. Right now, he was too keyed-up, and she’d hit her limit.

She threw up her hands. “Look. Full moon or not, you’re being unreasonable. You said it was forgiven, and clearly it is not. You have to talk to me.
I don’t speak rabid wolf.

“Is everything okay out here— holy fucking shit, what is that thing?”

Ryan, who looked better but still pasty, gripped the doorframe to Sherri’s right for support. Kyle’s hideout didn’t have much in the way of furniture. A sofa sat in the center of the room where they currently stood, and there was a bed with no sheets in the single bedroom where Ryan had slept.

Sherri hadn’t slept. She wasn’t sure she ever would again. “Ryan,” she said as she eased toward him. “You need to go back in the other room. I’ll handle this.”

Ash made a “whuffle” sound through his nostrils before settling on the floor. Slowly, with a series of grunts and groans, he shifted back into human form. “What he
needs
is to go to a hospital. That man has lost blood. He could have an infection. Internal damage. We have no fucking clue, and I do not want to deal with the shit this will bring down if he dies on our watch. Who’s gonna show up to fill us full of holes first, huh? His psycho lover or the fucking feds?”

“What... the... everloving...
fuck.
” Ryan slumped against the door, wide-eyed and open-mouthed while Ash stood in all his nakedness, breathing hard from the effort of changing back to human form.

“What the fuck? I could ask you the same question, dick-breath. You come here and jack up all of our lives, and you’re thinking you’ve got a right to ask questions?” Ash jammed one foot onto the couch, sending it flying until it thudded against the back wall.

BOOK: Wicked Days with a Lone Wolf
3Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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