Cursed (The Order of the Wolf) (4 page)

“And what do we do when we find her?” Raven asked, his heart suddenly thudding with anxiety. As much as he wanted answers, he didn’t want this woman to come to any harm. In fact, he wanted to find her—yes—as much as the rest of the pack did, but then he wanted to smother her with kisses, make love to her all night long again and never let her out of his sight.
What the fuck?

“What do we do? We force her to reverse the spell.” Mayhem said.

“And if she won’t?” Raven glanced up at Mayhem, his eyes still sore from the ash.

“She will.” Mayhem sneered. “If she knows what’s good for her.”

“But if she won’t?” Raven insisted.

“If the rumors are true, then the only way to break a spell is to kill the witch. If she won’t reverse it then…” Mayhem shrugged.

“No!” Raven jumped to his feet and his legs wobbled. He braced himself against the back of the chair and faced off with his pack alpha. “We can’t kill her. She’s my mate! I need to find her.”

“You believe this woman is your mate, Rav?” Dy asked, eyes wide.

“She can’t be his mate. He would have marked her. She would have felt it too, wouldn’t have left him like she had, wouldn’t have cast a spell on him in the first place.” Mayhem growled.

Raven had a flash of a memory, a tall, gorgeous woman standing before him, lips moving.
You have been marked
. “She marked
me
.”

“Huh?”

Raven shifted his gaze to Jay. “She said my name and then said that I was marked. That must be the spell—she must have marked me as hers in some way.” He sighed as he sank down into the chair, his energy totally spent. “Like some kind of love spell.”

Mayhem scoffed. “Right, a love spell.”

Raven’s mind whirred, a love spell—that had to be it. He’d never fallen for any woman before and now all he could think about was finding this one and claiming her as his. It wasn’t real. It was just a manufactured attraction. That thought alone should have given him some measure of relief…but it didn’t. Not even close.

Chapter Six

Okay, so, Darcy had only gotten as far as the train station by the time night had fallen. Having desperately searched for a counter spell to the curse, despite Annie’s assurances that she was screwed, she hadn’t actually packed a bag and left until late afternoon. Not the brightest plan on her part, but at least when she left, she’d been clever about it—not taking the direct route, switching cabs a couple of times. Annie had said the wolves would use their keen sense of smell to find her, so she’d poured on the most obnoxious perfume she had and hoped it disguised her well enough.

She wasn’t worried…much. She’d be boarding a train in an hour that would take her to the Canadian border, and from there she’d be able to catch a flight overseas, lay low for a few months. Well, that was the plan anyway. It all relied on how much money Annie could scrounge together for her. Darcy had never really been a ‘save for a rainy day’ kind of girl. She was broke, and as much as she wanted to collect on her latest contract, she couldn’t take the chance.

Once she had accepted that any and all magical solutions were out of her immediate reach, she realized she needed to get out of country fast. Annie said she would keep looking for counter spells and advised Darcy to check in every couple of hours. If there was a way to help, she would find it, which gave Darcy a tiny sense of hope that there might,
might
, be a way out of this mess without the involvement of the Order of the Wolf or a Huntress. She wasn’t a killer and had no desire to see Raven, or any other wolf, dead.

Darcy was jittery, practically jumping out of her skin at the slightest strange noise. She’d seen Raven turn into a giant wolf right before her eyes and had no idea what his werewolf status meant for the spell’s effectiveness. Annie had thought perhaps he’d be able to fight some of its hold, but didn’t know to what extent. That was not a good thing. Add to that the fact he had a pack who could all pick up her scent just as well as he could, and she knew it was paramount that she get as far away as possible.

What she did know—and what she was counting on probably more than she should—was the werewolf transformation went according to the cycles of the sun and moon. If Raven turned into a wolf at sunrise, that meant he was most likely trapped in that form for the duration of the day and probably trapped in that hotel room as well, unless he was willing to break down a door and bring a lot of unwanted attention his way. It also meant he was a young wolf, not old enough in his supernatural form to transform at will. If she was right—and that was a big if—Raven would have only just transformed back into his human form an hour ago and it would hopefully take him time to get his wits about him.

It was a lot of
ifs
to count on, but she only had to wait for another hour and she’d be on her way. Plus, she doubted the wolves would think about the train station first. If they lost her trail, they’d probably head for the airport. Made sense, right?

Darcy sighed as she ran her hand nervously through her hair, clenching her train ticket in the other. She wasn’t the only person waiting on the platform, but with just a handful of bodies, she felt awfully exposed. She kept glancing over her shoulder, certain she was being watched.

She’d eyed every single one of her fellow passengers, several times, to the point where she could feel their nervousness at her bizarre behavior reverberating back at her. Would Raven come for her himself or would it be the pack? She knew Mayhem by sight, but the other two bandmates? No, not so much. Although, how hard would it be to see a huge hulk of a man coming her way? Werewolves—they weren’t small by any means.

What was totally weird was the idea of Raven himself coming for her sent her heart into a flutter, like she actually wanted him to. What the fuck was up with that? He was her target after all—the object of her vengeance, not desire…well, not really anyway. She might have enjoyed collecting his semen a little too much the night before, but that didn’t mean anything. The man was as hot as hell and she’d have to be a crazy woman to not react.

Shoving that thought aside, she walked over to a bench and settled, feeling better at having her back to the wall. As far as she could see, on either side of her were normal looking, average people. She was almost in the clear. With another deep sigh, she leaned forward and dug into one of her large bags, pulled out her netbook and flipped it open. She’d made some quick notes in Word from Annie’s grimoire about curse reversal. The biggest issue she had was how she’d bound the lust curse to Raven. Using his semen was equivalent to using cement. Almost indestructible. Almost.

She accessed the train-station’s Wi-Fi and began her search, trying as many different word combinations as she could come up with. In the digital age, many witches had begun uploading their spells, creating a huge network database. Sure, there were a zillion sites dedicated to love spells and revenge spells that were total bullshit, moon worship or nature lover kind of crap, but if you knew what to look for, you could spot the real spells in among the fakes. And she was finding lots of spells—just not any that could offer help in her current dilemma.

After spending a ton of time chasing down dead ends, Darcy was just about to close the laptop and go search for coffee when she remembered one last place to look.

Most of Darcy’s contracts came via word of mouth, referrals in a sense, but there was another place where a witch could pick up a spell contract.
Hex
, a forum-based site that acted as an anonymous black market for witch spells. Darcy had gotten a few jobs from the site, nasty shit usually, much nastier than her usual vengeance cursing. She hadn’t been back in a couple of years. She may have been strapped for cash, but the contracts on
Hex
weren’t your typical kind of curse requests. What these clients were looking for was the really hard shit—like life and death shit. Darcy hadn’t liked the taste those jobs had left in her mouth. At least with her vengeance contracts, she knew the men she was going after deserved what they were getting. And besides, it was just lust, not life or death—just wanting something you could never have. With the
Hex
contracts? Yeah, there were no conscience-affirming reassurances. It was a fine line of morality that she walked, but at least when she dealt vengeance on a cheating husband, she knew she was righting a wrong for someone. And besides, nobody died of unrequited lust.

She quickly logged into the site and scrolled past the contract section. Now, she was after a subforum she’d only glanced at in the past, having had no use for it before now.

Insider Info: Spell trading.
She clicked on it and typed in a quick search.
Lust curse reversal.
Nothing. Okay, Plan B. She clicked to start a new thread and typed what she was after, giving the details of the lust curse she’d used and the bonding agent. At the end of the post, she indicated that she’d be willing to trade for like-information. It was a longshot, but really the only option left.

She checked the computer’s clock before shutting down. Ten minutes to go and then she could breathe a sigh of relief.

“Excuse me, ma’am. Can I see your ticket please?”

Darcy jolted and quickly glanced up to see a train-station employee holding out his hand. She let out an explosion of breath, her heart thumping like crazy. “My ticket? Um, yeah, sure…here.”

He took it, scanned the barcode, then handed it back to her. “Train should be here in a few moments. Do you need help with your bags?”

Darcy smiled as she reclaimed the ticket “No, thank you. I can manage.”

She felt the rumble of the coming train and her tense muscles eased a fraction more. Glancing to the left, she caught the glare of the bright headlights as the train finally came into view. Only a few more minutes.

She bent down and picked up her bags, slung one over her shoulder and grabbed the handle of the other.

The train sailed into the terminal and came to a stop with a smooth whoosh of air. She took a few steps forward and waited for the doors to open.

“That perfume isn’t going to mask your stench, witch.”

Her body went absolutely rigid, the back of her neck prickling with goose bumps as the gruff voice sent another shot of hot breath of over her flesh. “Don’t even think about running.”

“Or casting any of your nasty spells.” A rough hand grabbed her arm.

“I’ll scream…I’ll scream…” She breathed, her voice rising in her panic. They’d found her, oh god, they’d found her.

“No, you won’t be doing that, either.”

Before she could do much more than open her mouth, she felt a tight pinch on the side of her neck, and everything went black.

Chapter Seven

He wanted to see her. Needed to see her. She was in the other room, bound, gagged and totally alone, and all Raven could think about was getting in there to be with her. But Mayhem had forbidden it.

Raven’s heart hadn’t stopped thundering since she’d entered the penthouse, draped over Jay’s shoulder like a sack of potatoes, unconscious and oblivious to the danger she was in. Jay had told the front desk she was his drunken sister who had been out all night on a bender. Of course, they believed him. Staff always looked the other way for elite clients.

“When do you think she’ll wake up?” Dy asked before taking another swig from his beer bottle.

“Shouldn’t be too much longer.” Jay shrugged.

“I’m going to go in there and check on her.” Raven beelined for the door, his body so edgy his hand actually shook as he reached to grip the knob.

“Stop right there, buddy.” Jay was on him in a second, steering him away from the door. “You know you can’t go in there.”

A noise from within stopped them both—a muffled cry and a soft thud.

Raven whipped around, forcing Jay to release him as he barreled into the room. And there she was, lying on her side, having knocked the chair over in an obvious attempt to free herself. She looked up at him, her mocha eyes wide with fear and everything came flooding back.

Her name was Darcy and she was his.

With a growl, he jumped toward her, frightening her more but unable to stop himself. He eased her and the chair upright and quickly began undoing the bonds.

“What the fuck, man?” When Jay made a move toward him, Raven snarled a warning to back off and continued to untie the rope around her wrists.

Jay left the room, bellowing for Mayhem but Raven didn’t give a shit. He needed Darcy in his arms as quickly as possible. To hell with Mayhem’s orders.

She was struggling along with him, shifting her wrists as he untied the rope. “Just hold still, sweets, I’ve almost got you loose.”

She mumbled something and he suddenly remembered her gag. He abandoned her wrists for a moment while he yanked the cloth from her mouth. Freeing her delicious-looking lips.
Oh fuck
. Without a conscious thought, he swooped in and devoured her, sucking on her lips like they were dripping with honey, and they might as well have been because she tasted divine.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, Rav?” Mayhem’s roar came seconds before Raven was roughly yanked up and away from Darcy. Mayhem’s tight embrace pinning his arms down, effectively halting more movement. “She is not what you need, man.”

“Please don’t hurt me,” Darcy cried.

“Don’t hurt you?” Mayhem’s laugh was more like a bark. He twisted Raven to the side and released him, a finger pointed in warning.