Growl (47 page)

 

CHAPTER 6

Blaez ran until his lungs screamed for mercy, and even then he pushed on. Uphill, around sharp bends, down lethally high inclines, through chilly creek water, circling back to where he'd started at the base of the mountain. He relished the burn and tightness in his thighs, his buttocks and calves, felt the sting of air escaping his lungs through his partially opened mouth, and blinked away the sweat that dripped down from his forehead.

She was a Selected.

That had been a surprise. And it was a problem.

The gods and goddesses thrived on their control over all in their domain, the battle for more domains an ongoing quest for them all. But for some the battle wasn't how many they could control, but how best they could try to prevent the constant uprising in the meantime. Selene, the Luna goddess from which the lycans' very strength had thrived, had not been strong enough to stop Zeus's wrath against the king of Arcadia, but she had done something that she'd thought would counteract the new battle the mighty god of thunder had unwittingly begun. She'd Selected specific alpha females to be paired with certain alpha males. The Selected female could never be claimed by any other alpha but the one she was Selected for. These were matches that would enhance them both, creating a mighty force that could hopefully keep the peace among the warring breed. It was said that each one Selene had Selected was marked.

Kira's crescent-moon marking came instantly to his mind.

If she was Selected bringing her into his house was an even bigger mistake than he or the pack could ever have imagined. Kira could not have been Selected for him. That was the last thing Blaez wanted. He'd decided long ago that intimate or emotional connections were not for him. He'd failed the people he'd loved most in this world once; no way was he going to put himself in the position to endure that type of pain and heartache again. Besides that, things were different now—this situation dictated that it be so—and not even a Selected was going to change that for him.

“Let's stop here,” he heard Malec say from just a few steps behind.

With a frown Blaez turned, still running in place to see two of his closest friends, chests heaving in a similar fashion to his, bodies built for this type of brutal exercise, eyes trained on him, etched only slightly with worry.

After breakfast Blaez had gone into his office, locking himself there while he did some research. He'd needed to know where she'd come from, which Hunter packs were closest to their region. Phelan would have already begun similar research, without Blaez having to instruct him to do so, because that was his job within the pack—to know whom and what they were dealing with at all times. That's why Blaez hadn't been at all surprised when e-mails from his second in command appeared while he'd worked on his laptop. Malec, on the other hand, only knew that there was a guest in the lodge. An overnight guest who was most likely going to be there in the long term. True to his nature, as the contemplative one, he'd simply sat at the breakfast table, watching Kira interact with Channing.

The two of them had acted as if they'd known each other for ages, like today was their reunion and Blaez and the others were somehow intruding. Blaez treated the heated ball at the pit of his stomach as hunger, instead of acknowledging what it really was. She'd changed after their tryst in the gym to pants that hugged her ass and a button-down shirt, one that, this time, barely held her voluptuous breasts in place. His mouth had watered the moment she walked into the kitchen, just as it did each time he laid eyes on her. A more alluring female, lycan or human, Blaez had never seen.

There was a grace to her that was unlike that of the slim and sexy vixens he'd usually entertained himself with. A naïveté that both shocked and enticed him. She hadn't been vetted; no agreement had been discussed and sealed before their first meeting. It had all simply happened, so fast and so intensely that Blaez was still wondering what the hell he was doing. She'd obeyed his commands and masturbated, then she'd tried to run away, and then she was lying there, tied down, spread wide for him. Only him. Asking his permission to come. There was fear—he'd sensed it marginally at first—but then there was intrigue and pleasure, the likes of which had almost taken Blaez's breath away. She'd been so beautiful when she'd come, so hot and tight, that it had taken all of his training and living experience to keep from tearing off his pants and fucking her right there in front of those open windows.

It had taken even more control for him to walk away from her moments later. The uncomfortable half hour he'd sat at the breakfast table while she and Channing chatted and laughed, Phelan eyeing him knowingly, and Malec questioningly, had been enough for Blaez. He'd had to be alone. And once he'd found out about her past, he'd had to run.

“There are five of them,” Phelan immediately began when Blaez had stopped running.

A couple feet away from him Malec had already begun his stretching, one leg extended in front of him as he lunged. In addition to being contemplative, Malec was the fitness guru of the pack, constantly getting on Channing about the unhealthy dishes he prepared for them, while also consuming those meals with unabashed fervor. To the rest of them it was humorous, but to Malec eating those meals just meant more hours in the gym for him. More often than not, Blaez figured that was just Malec's way of escaping the group setting, heading off to be alone to work off a debt he believed he owed, to someone who didn't matter worth squat.

“Penn Radney, the alpha. Cody, Dallas, Kev, and Milo. They run an auto mechanic shop in Seattle and live on one of those historic houseboats. Penn's mate was Tora Hepprin from another Hunter pack in the region. She was shot and killed three months ago in the forest near the Olympic Mountains. Penn suspected Devoteds, but the authorities ruled it a possible hunting accident. Kira is Penn and Tora's only child,” Phelan stated as if he'd memorized the recap version of the reports he and Blaez had compiled before coming out here.

“Wait,” Malec said, standing straight and gazing from Phelan to Blaez. “I knew she was from a Hunter pack. But you're saying she's their alpha female now?”

“No,” Blaez replied instantly, his tone clipped, agitated. “She's not their alpha female. She's simply the alpha female in that pack, or at least she was. There are no claimed connections.”

“You sure about that?” Malec asked. “What if getting into our pack is their plan? We're only twelve days out from the full moon; every lycan that's breathing is in need right now. It would be simple to flaunt a female in front of us to get her inside. And then what?”

“Ambush? Maybe?” Phelan asked. “If they knew you were here all along, she could be just what they needed to get close to you. To kill you.”

Blaez shook his head, already having considered this very scenario. In fact, he and Phelan had been discussing it on and off all day. What Blaez hadn't shared was that if Penn knew his daughter was a Selected, if the alpha subscribed to that theory and he was a Hunter, the very last lycan he would want her around would be Blaez, with his pure-blood status. Sure, the Hunters would still want Blaez dead based solely on his bloodline, but Penn certainly would not want to risk his only child being claimed by Blaez first. Connecting a Hunter and a Devoted would be as big a catastrophe as connecting a lycan with a human—at least in their minds.

No, Penn and his pack would come first and foremost because they'd want Kira back. Once they followed Kira's scent to Blaez they would undoubtedly realize who he was, or at least part of who he was. Killing a Trekas, to hit the Devoteds in the very heart of their breed, would be a coup worth bragging about. And then they would celebrate in whoever claimed Kira. Blaez only frowned, because he had no intention of letting any of that happen.

“It's not an ambush if we're ready,” Blaez told them.

“Why don't we just let her go?” Malec asked. “Send her back to them with a message to keep away before the demise of their pack becomes imminent.”

“I can— I'm not letting her go,” Blaez said, clenching his teeth at the thought of what he'd almost said. “She ran for a reason. Letting her go puts her in danger from not only unknown lycans but also most probably the ones she's known all her life.”

“So she's having some sort of temper tantrum and we're going to ultimately pay the price for it? Since when do we settle domestic disputes?” Phelan asked, with a shake of his head. “I don't know if this is such a good plan.”

“It's
the
plan,” Blaez said adamantly. “I will deal directly with her; you make sure all of our security measures are in place. It'll be the night of the full moon, when we're strongest.”

“When we're rabid and horny, you mean?” came Malec's curt reply.

“I mean when Selene's power for once shines brighter than Zeus's and we are the dominating species,” Blaez said, feeling like he had to give them both lessons on their true origin.

Phelan nodded. “Right, the Luna goddess will prevail. She always does.”

Blaze ignored the flippant comment as it was the norm for Phelan, who for so long had held a grudge against the women of their world. As if he had learned nothing from dealing with one of the goddesses of revenge, who had left him permanently scared. While their kind usually healed almost instantaneously, Phelan's scars, both inside and out, were permanent because of the powerful being who had inflicted them.

“And in the meantime, she gets to play house with us and Channing. How do you think she's going to like that, if she didn't like living with her own father's pack?” Malec interjected.

Blaez didn't know the answer to that question. What he knew, and what he wasn't about to relay to his pack, was that there was no way he could let Kira leave, especially not after what had transpired between them earlier today. He wanted her. And for Blaez that was all that mattered at this moment.

“I'm heading back,” he told them without further discussion, taking off at a run, pushing his body further beyond its limits because something about the burn and the strain was keeping him from totally losing control. He had no idea if the others followed and didn't really care. Running was a release; the air upon his face, the wind in his ears, was freeing and almost relaxing. It was another way that he coped.

Still, heat burned inside of him, need pressing against his bones until he felt them threatening to break. Kira's scent was leading him like a besotted puppy back to the lodge, back to her.

*   *   *

Tonight, instead of masturbating and then falling asleep in the wonderfully comfortable queen-sized bed, Kira had showered and slipped beneath the fresh, new sheets. She figured Channing had been responsible for changing them while she'd been enjoying the extensive library located at the far end of the lodge, near Channing's and Malec's rooms.

Channing had clearly taken over the alpha female's role in the pack. This was only slightly surprising to Kira, because in any pack where there was no female one of the betas had to take on that supervisory role, it was just their way. More shocking had been the hard-on he'd unabashedly been sporting when she turned around after leaning over the counter in the kitchen earlier this morning. For a moment she'd thought it would be kind of nice to have a lycan like Channing with his honest good looks and perfectly sculpted body want her.

He'd smiled at her as if it was only natural, which she figured it kind of was for him, and he'd be attentive to her every need both in and out of the bedroom. The lycans were a very sexual bunch, some more promiscuous than others, since they weren't bound by human social protocols. It was nothing to have pack members sharing a female, or a male for that matter. The anything-goes mentality was like their mantra. While Kira had never experienced anything on that level personally, or seen it done for that matter, she'd heard Dallas and the other betas in her father's pack talking about it often enough. In fact, she suspected they'd done quite a bit of sharing themselves.

In the end, she'd simply smiled at Channing and the oddly familial bond she'd felt with him instead of the intensely sexual one she'd felt with Blaez. That's when she'd asked about books or anything she could do to pass the time here. What she really wanted was to see other parts of the lodge to confirm for herself that there was no way out of this fortress.

“If you like to read we have quite a library,” Channing had told her. “I love books. Blaez has a thirst for knowledge too, but other than his personal collection of books, he prefers his computers for research purposes. Malec, of course, favors the gym and Phelan, well, he doesn't like much at all.” Channing had followed that up with a chuckle, but Kira suspected that fact was a little more troubling to him than he let on.

“I love to read. My mother always read poetry to me. I prefer mysteries myself,” she admitted, then clapped her lips shut, hating that she'd said those words to anyone. It was odd talking to Channing as if they were actually friends, as the members of her father's pack only saw her as an object to be claimed, especially in the last few months.

Channing had shown her to the library and left her alone there, trusting her, she thought initially. A few seconds later she realized the trust wasn't necessary, since she'd likely set off a million alarms if she so much as cracked a window in this place. Not that she was even paying attention to the large windows with the same tinted glass that she'd seen in the gym. No, Kira was much more fascinated by the gleaming wood floors and bookcases that matched, reaching up to the ceiling. There were aisles just like in the university library she remembered studying in for the past couple of years. Yet this place had a more elegant touch, curving corners that led to even more books in a room that she'd had no idea was as large as it turned out to be.