Mated to War

Evernight Publishing ®

www.evernightpublishing.com

Copyright©
2016 Emma Anderson

 
ISBN: 978-1-77233-675-7

Cover Artist: Jay Aheer

Editor: Jessica Ruth

ALL
RIGHTS RESERVED

WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or
distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal.
 
No part of this book may be used or
reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the
case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

This is a work of fiction. All names, characters,
and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales,
organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

DEDICATION

To my readers, I send my full appreciation.
Without your continued support and encouragement I wouldn't have the courage to
continue sharing my stories.

Thank you all!

Happy reading. I hope you like Judge's story.

MATED TO WAR

The Fall of the Four Horsemen, 3

Emma
Anderson

Copyright
© 2016

Prologue

Welcome
to Sin City. Where the stakes are high and playboys are many. A place where
bets are laid and deals are made. The paranormal world thrive in this
environment, wheeling and dealing, living and loving. The Four Horsemen are no
different. The people of Las Vegas feed their hunger without even trying. They
are known by many names—Death, Conquest, War, and Famine—but those close to
them know them as Devil, Viper, Judge, and Chaos. They run their business, Celestial
Desert Paradise Hotel and Casino, the way they live their lives, ruthlessly.
They are unforgiving when wronged and never fail to obtain that which they
desire. As alpha of the local pride of mountain lions and head of security at
the hotel, Judge lays down the rules that are to be obeyed by everyone.
However, nobody told his mate.

Charli ran toward her little
sister’s room just as another scream sounded. Racing through the tiny
apartment, she came upon the closed door. The sight that greeted her when she
opened it had her moving to Emily’s side. Her sister’s delicate, tear-streaked
face was etched with fear.

Pulling Emily into her arms,
Charli asked, “What is it, honey?”

“Hurt, I can’t move,” came the
reply before Emily threw her arms around Charli’s neck. “I’m scared, Charli.”

“It’s just a bad dream, honey.
Why don’t I lay with you while you go back to sleep.”

“No, not a dream. It’s Nurse
Nikki.”

That had Charli’s back
straightening and her worry increasing. Nikki was the nurse who had spent a lot
of time with both Emily and Charli during Emily’s most recent hospital stay.
Charli had come to view her as a friend. She was the only person in Las Vegas
who knew the truth about them. That it wasn’t epilepsy causing the seizures
that had once again landed Emily in the hospital, but her developing psychic
abilities. Both sisters were clairvoyant. It was a gift and curse, offering
them insight but also throwing them into danger.

Running from the danger had
landed them in Las Vegas, where they were lucky enough to meet Nikki. Like
Charli and Emily, Nikki had her own scary past. Her ex-boyfriend had attacked
and raped her. Now with that knowledge in mind Charli had to establish whether
Emily’s dream was picking up on Nikki’s past attack or something more recent.

Rocking Emily, Charli closed her
mind off to everything except Nikki. Darkness enveloped her. An ominous feeling
stirred in her stomach, telling Charli that something was either about to
happen to Nikki, or had already.

Moving from Emily’s bed, she
looked down at her little sister. Worry was evident in her angelic face.
“Honey, I’m going to check this out and make sure Nikki is okay. I want you to
stay here. I’ll go ask Mrs. Evans if she can look after you. Don’t worry about
Nikki. I’m sure everything will be okay.”

Charli quickly turned away from
her sister, hoping to hide the guilt she felt from the lie she had just told.
The ominous feeling turned to dread. Racing next door, she felt comfortable
that her elderly neighbor would be up. She barely slept, claiming that she had
plenty of time to sleep when she was dead.

With Emily now in Mrs. Evans’s
care, Charli sat in the taxi she had ordered, heading toward the only place she
could think of going. It wasn’t her first point of call, but she’d tried
contacting Nikki on the phone number her new friend had given to her, only to
be put straight through to voicemail each time.

Less than twenty minutes later
she was being dropped off in front of the hotel Nikki’s boyfriend owned. It was
a building she knew well, though few people, if any, would recognize her within
it. This time, however, she did want to come to the attention of those who
worked there.

Worry had her racing into the
lobby without coming up with a plan to access either Nikki or her boyfriend,
whose name held no place in Charli’s memory. Pushing through the throng of
people, she headed toward the front desk. On arriving she asked for Nikki only
to be told that she wasn’t available.

“Fine, let me speak to her
boyfriend.”

“I’m sorry, miss,” came the almost
automatic response from the woman behind the desk. “Maybe if you tell me what
this is in regards to I can direct you toward the help you seek.”

“Look, I know you have a job to
do,” Charli said, raising her voice, not caring who heard her outburst. “But this
is a matter of life or death. Now are you going to direct me to either Nikki or
her boyfriend?”

A hand landed on her shoulder.
Assuming it was security, Charli tensed, ready to fight them off. “Maybe I can
help you,” came the soft voice from behind her. “I’m Gabby, Nikki’s best
friend.”

“Oh thank God.” Charli slumped
and turned toward the blonde woman. “You have to help me. I think Nikki’s in
danger.”

“Danger?” Gabby asked. The woman
must have read the urgency in Charli’s eyes because panic formed in her own.
“Shit, come on. I’ll take you up to the guys.”

“Oh thank goodness,” Charli
said, relief consuming her whole body as she followed the woman toward a lift.

Her respite was short lived. As
soon as the doors parted she was yanked away from Gabby by one of the scariest
men she had ever seen. His dark eyes were full of menace. An image of Hades,
the Greek God of the Underworld, popped into her head. Then his true nature
came to her when the man spoke.

“Have you come to steal some
more from us? Well too bad, we don’t allow cheats in our casino,” the man said,
his fangs slowly dropping from his gums.

It would seem that her previous
trips to the casino within this hotel hadn’t gone unnoticed after all. Her
guilt about using her power to win at the many tables downstairs resurfaced,
along with fear. But she refused to show her true feelings to this vampire. She
had long ago learned to hide her fear.

Looking straight into the man’s
terrifying face, she challenged, “You need to prove to me and everyone else that
I cheated first. Since I also won on the roulette wheel, the only way I could
know the outcomes was if your tables were fixed and I had an inside man. And I
bet you re-vetted every single employee and came up empty-handed.”

Another man came storming through
the door behind the vampire. His emotion-darkened face should have scared her.
Instead she found herself wanting to see more of this scruffy-haired,
green-eyed man. Her gaze swept over him, taking in his thick, denim-covered
legs and solid chest. Too shocked by her unusual response to the man, she
almost missed his angry words.

“Get your hands off my mate,
Devil!”

Did he just say what she thought
he had said? She had heard the term “mate” before. Her limited knowledge
suggested that if this fiercely gorgeous man spoke the truth then her life was
about to become a lot more complicated. Could she truly be destined to live out
her life with him as his fated mate?

“Well, I didn’t see that one
coming,” she mumbled to herself in shock. Though she shouldn’t have been too
surprised. Her ability rarely gifted her with insight into her own future.

“Charli?” asked another man. He
was the one she had come to see—Nikki’s boyfriend.

As soon as her attention landed
on him, she was brought back to the reason she had come here. “Please tell me
she’s here, safe,” she all but pleaded.

“She’s at work. Why? What have
you seen?” Nikki’s boyfriend asked.

Before she could respond, the
man claiming to be her mate angrily demanded, “What the fuck’s going on, Viper?
How do you know my mate?” Charli felt his anger. It rolled off of him in
volatile waves.

The man she now knew as Viper
curled his fingers into his palm as he moved his focus away from her. “This is
Nikki’s friend from the hospital. The one who warned her about Watson being at
her house. Now stop interrupting while I find out what the hell she knows.”

He looked back at her and
waited. It was time to find out whether Emily’s vision and her own sense of
feeling were correct. “Can you contact her?”

“I can call the hospital. Our
link has been blocked be her privacy wall.”

Charli focused, forcing all of
her energy on finding Nikki. She once again hit darkness. She was barely aware
of mumbling, “Not wall, unconsciousness.”

Then the answer came to her. A
face flashed through her mind. It was one she had seen before when she’d warned
Nikki of a man’s presence in her house—the same man that had previously hurt
Nikki.

“He has her! His plans are
unclear, muffled by his anger,” Charli informed flatly. The fear and pain she
saw in the not-too-distant future dampened her emotions, leaving her cold.

As she willed her body to allow
warmth once again to be carried by her blood, heating her from the inside, she
became aware of Gabby talking on the phone. All eyes seemed to be on her. Whatever
was being said to Gabby had her distress increasing.

Once she had hung up, Viper
asked, “What did they say?”

“Nikki got a call down to the
ER. There was an emergency out at the prison. Sharon, my boss, didn’t realize
that she hadn’t made it until I asked. No one has seen her,” Gabby said,
turning into the arms of the man Charli had heard being called Devil. It was a
name that suited him. “That was a couple of hours ago. He’s got her, hasn’t he?
He’s going to kill her this time.”

The fourth man present, a giant
by anyone’s standards, asked, “What are you feeling, Viper?”

“Pissed off!”

“No, I meant from Nikki?” the
giant pushed.

Silence followed as Viper tried
to connect with Nikki. Charli felt the nudges against her own mind, but that
was only because she was trying to remain connected to Nikki. Finally his
shoulders stiffened. His back became ramrod and pure fury seeped from every one
of Viper’s pores.

“Charli’s right, she’s
unconscious,” he replied, turning back to her. “What else do you know?”

Once again closing her mind off
to everything that wasn’t Nikki, an image rose in her mind. A dank, empty
building appeared. It looked like the industrial area over near Henderson. Her
job had taken her over there a few times. Thankfully if she was right, it was
only about twenty minutes away.

“I think I can find her,” she
replied. “But I’m going to have to show you. It’s a feeling, nothing more.”

“Like hell you’re putting
yourself in danger, mate,” her supposed mate snapped. He had moved to stand in
front of her. “Paul Watson is dangerous. I won’t have you anywhere near him.”

That pissed her off. She had
sworn long ago that no man would dictate her actions again. And here this
gorgeous yet infuriating man was trying to do exactly that. Standing on the
tips of her toes, she decided to take the fight straight to him, ensuring there
would be no misunderstandings.

“Listen here, you overgrown
buffoon. I consider Nikki a friend—something I have very few of—and I don’t
plan on abandoning her when she needs me just because you said so. I’ve dealt
with danger most of my life. This is nothing new to me!”

“Danger? What fucking danger?”
he demanded. His body began to physically shake, while movement appeared under
the skin on his face. It suddenly dawned on her. He was a shifter. One who was
about to change forms.

“That’s none of your business!”
Charli replied quickly before stepping back toward Viper.

Her progress was halted by
Judge’s hand on her arm. “You’re my mate. That makes it my business!”