by LJ Swallow
The Four Horsemen ~ Books 1 to 3
Legacy ~ Bound ~ Hunted
L J Swallow
The Four Horsemen Series
Reverse Harem Urban Fantasy
(COMPLETE series available now)
Legacy
Bound
Hunted
Guardians
Chaos
Descent
Reckoning
Special Episodes
Sinister and Tricked (Halloween Special)
Bright
The main series is also available as two box sets:
The Four Horsemen Series Books 1-3
The Four Horsemen Series Books 4 -7
Copyright © 2017 by LJ Swallow
Editing by Hot Tree Editing
Cover Designed by Andreea Vraciuu
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This box set contains Books 1-3 only.
Books 4-7 are in a separate box set.
Created with Vellum
Contents
The Four Horsemen: Legacy
Legacy
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Acknowledgments
The Four Horsemen: Bound
Bound
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Bonus Scene: The Secret of the Missing Cat
The Four Horsemen: Hunted
Hunted
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Other Books By LJ Swallow
Books by Lisa Swallow
About the Author
The Four Horsemen: Legacy
The Four Horsemen: Legacy
The Four Horsemen have found their Fifth, and she’s about to change their world.
Verity Jameson's day switches from mundane to disastrous when she runs down a stranger with her car. Fortunately for Vee, she can't kill Death.
Death, who just happens to be one of the Four Horsemen, and he's looking for her.
The Four Horsemen spend life preventing the end of the world, not bringing on an apocalypse. Without their fifth member, the Four Horsemen are losing the battle. Now they've found Verity and what they tell her goes far beyond the conspiracy theories Vee spends her free time investigating.
A new life with four dark, sexy and dangerous men fighting demons, vampires and fae? Not what Vee had planned, but a hell of a lot more interesting than her boring job in tech support.
So what happens when the unbreakable bond of the Five takes control in a way none of them expected?
1
VERITY
Oh crap, I told the truth again.
Victoria’s hand freezes in the air, midway through applying bright pink lipstick, and her stunned expression reflects in the mirror. I stand behind and cringe at her reaction to my words.
“I mean, your hair’s already a lovely colour, and your new highlights look—" Stop, Verity. "I didn’t mean your hair looks bad, just unusual.” I fight chewing on my knuckles to stop myself spouting any more unwelcome truth to my work colleague.
I hate lying.
Absolutely cannot deal with people who lie. Like, lose my shit cannot deal with. My inability to tell a lie myself, even the tiny white variety, kills me too. Why couldn't my parents choose a different virtue to name me after? Hope, Faith, Grace? I'd take anything but the name meaning truth, because I'm sure this cursed me to lose friends due to my blunt truthful nature.
It took me years to realise when girls say "be honest" that this is code for "don’t tell somebody their arse does in fact look big in that."
I glance at Victoria’s sour face beneath her newly coloured hair. Why do girls ask me these questions? Can’t they see I have no interest in all this?
My long brown hair sees a pair of scissor once a year; I've never coloured it and styling equals brushing the thick mane into a ponytail. I'm a jeans and T-shirt girl and avoid high heels at all costs because they draw attention to my taller than average, slim figure. Make-up? I have no clue what suits me so I stick to occasional lip gloss and mascara.
“Well, I like the colour," Victoria replies in a cool voice as she inspects her lipstick.
I calculate how many seconds it would take to vacate the bathrooms as the uncomfortable heat builds inside. These situations make me look bitchy, but I don’t mean to be. I’m not surprised they shun me; I’d do the same if someone was as bloody rude as I am.
Her friend, Charlotte, exits a stall behind me and shakes her blue silk shirtsleeves away from her wrists before flicking on the tap. “What’s wrong, babe?” asks Charlotte as she rinses her hands and shakes water from her fingertips.
“Verity doesn’t like my new hair colour.” She throws me a disdainful look.
The telecommunications company I work for doesn’t have a uniform, and some girls turn up every day looking immaculate and I detect an element of competition. I admire anybody who climbs out of bed an hour earlier than necessary to torture themselves with straightening tongs. I prefer sleep to beauty routines, but everybody is different.
Mostly.
From the back, I can't tell Charlotte and Victoria apart, they're so similar. I believe in a lot of weird crap, clones included, but despite their almost identical appearance, I’m fairly sure Charlotte and Victoria aren’t scientifically engineered. I shake my head at my thoughts. They’re lucky to have a close friend to swap clothes with. Most of what I swap is information—and I don’t know what half of my online friends look like. They could be Vee clones.
“So, lovely, are you coming to Dana’s party tonight?” asks Victoria and looks at Charlotte.
Another side effect of my inability to lie is I have no social life. Partly my fault for staying in the small town I've spent my twenty-one years in, while friends moved away to bigger and brighter lives. The ones who did stay have kids now, and I'm not keen on spending time around happy families.
Nope, I live with my cat in a flat above a shop, where I head home after work and watch bad TV or work on my blog. Some would call me a “conspiracy theorist.” I prefer the term “looking for the truth.”
The corporations and governments present a world they want
everyone to believe exists, hiding the corruption and their interference. Who's really in control? It doesn't matter who we vote for in our democracy, the same background people run the whole show. Illuminati? Yeah, I'm pretty damn sure they exist.
My weird obsession I talk about at any opportunity suggests another reason I'm rarely invited to “'clone wars” or whatever the hell these girls do when they get together.
“I am. Did you invite the new guy to the party?” asks Charlotte.
Victoria rubs her lips together and touches the corner of her mouth. “Seriously? He works with the geeks and never speaks to me.”
Another comment thrown in my direction—the girl buried in the support section who avoids talking to others.
But I know who they’re talking about. I don’t know him per se, but his arrival several weeks ago ruffled feathers and set hormones ablaze. There's no possibility this guy could duck under the radar, if not for his height alone. I haven't stood close enough to him to gauge our height difference, but from a distance, I'd say he's well over six feet tall. Shirt and trousers designed for office work don't equal sexy, but they certainly don't hide his solid muscle.
I admit to sneaking a look at his ass one day last week, which I can also give a big thumbs up to. I bit off the plastic end of my pen in surprise when he turned around to look at me, and I spent the rest of the day with blue ink smearing my lips. Amusement sparkled in his eyes as if he were aware I was perving on him, but his heavy browed face held friendliness, rather than an arrogance often accompanying smoking-hot dudes.
"Well, he finally spoke to me, and I found out his name is Heath." Charlotte throws Victoria a sly smile. "Unfortunately he was too busy to stop and chat for long."
I smile at the floor in satisfied amusement that he's not interested in her flirting.
"So you didn't invite him to the party?" asks Victoria.
"No. I didn't have a chance." Charlotte wipes her hands on a paper towel and picks up her purse. "Maybe next time."
"He said that or you're guessing?"
Charlotte glances at me and leans forward to whisper something in her friend's ear. They giggle, the noise grating like nails down a chalkboard. Without another word to me, the girls walk away. The heavy bathroom door clunks closed leaving me and my candid mouth behind.
2
VERITY
Darkness and pouring rain greet me as I leave work. Not surprising for an English autumn, but as I drive the ferocity blurs my windscreen and the sound drowns out the music playing. The screen mists too, and I crank up the air-con to blast heat at the window. Maybe I should stop until the weather clears a little?
I squint through the misted window, relieved I'm almost home, and take a right turn into the narrow street leading to the parking area behind the building. A dark shape looms in the road before me, and I have milliseconds to register the tall figure's a person before slamming on my brakes. The tyres skid on the wet road as I attempt to switch the car's trajectory. Instead of remaining still, the figure steps in the same direction, and straight in front of the car.
The next noise sickens my stomach and launches me into full-blown panic mode. There’s a bang, and the figure falls from view. I'm stunned for a second, frozen by indecision. Uh, you hit somebody, and you're sitting in the car still? With trembling fingers, I dig around in my purse and pull out my phone, opening the car door with my other hand.
Heart pounding at what I might see on the road, I rush around to the front of the car as I fumble to dial emergency services.
A man sits on the tarmac, hand on the side of his head. Noticing me, he jumps to his feet and sways.
"Shit," he mutters.
In the dark, all I can see is he's tall, wearing jeans and a combat style jacket. His hair, longer at the sides, falls into his face as steadies himself on the car.
And that he stands beside an impressive dent.
I blink away the rain falling onto my eyelashes and soaking my hair. "I'm so sorry. I didn't see you. Are you okay?"
"Who are you phoning?" He speaks in a low voice with a cultured English accent, with no hint of anger—or pain.
"An ambulance."
"I don't need an ambulance."
"I just hit you with my car, at a speed road safety experts suggest would kill a small child."
"Do I look like a small child?" His voice is tinged with amusement. He moves away from the car and straightens, wiping at his damp jeans and jacket sleeves.
"No, but you dented my car." I gesture at the front.
The guy coughs a laugh. "I apologise for the damage."
"No, no. I mean, look at the dent. Why aren't you hurt?"
"The car didn't hit me that hard. Your bodywork must be shit."
"You made a bang. A loud one."
"I made a bang?" His amusement continues.
The rain pours over us as if someone's standing above hosing icy water on our heads. My car headlights shine through the downpour, the only light, as we stand in the dark entrance to the car park. Nobody else is around; a couple of cars are in their resident bays, and others pass along the town street a few hundred metres away.
"I think you need checking out by a doctor. You might have a concussion." I hold the now damp phone against my ear and recoil when the guy steps forward.
He curls a hand around mine to pull the phone away. His face is undamaged; mouth pursed, large eyes fixed on mine. My already panicked heart rate picks up again at his touch, how his fingers are warm against my cold ones. Those lips... exactly the kind a girl could tug into her mouth and bite.
I allow him to take my phone, unable to keep up with the situation. The rain continues to pelt down, soaking our clothes.
I know this man.
Well, his arse anyway.
"Are you the new guy from work?" I blurt.
"New guy?" He peers at me. "Oh. You work at Alphanet too. Don't you?"
He recognises me? "Yes.”
“I'm Heath. Nice to meet you. Kind of." He nods at me, rain dripping from his long fringe and along his cheek. I lick my lips as I watch the raindrops cross his. "You should go home. You look like you’re in shock.”
"I am home," I stammer and point at the building. "Almost."
I step backwards to shelter beneath the building's overhanging eaves. My work shirt sticks to my body, water running down my legs and into my sneakers.
How is he okay? I just bloody slammed my car into him.
"Are you telling me I'm the one who needs medical help here?" I ask.
"Well, I don't." He dips his head and joins me in my sheltered place.
My panicked mind speeds up with stories about people who pretend to be injured, who abduct people and rob them, or worse. Men who charm themselves into women's homes. What if he knows I live alone? Is planning to...
I flinch away from him. "Right. Thanks. If you really are okay, maybe I should go inside. Could I have my phone, please?"
"Seriously, Verity, I'm not about to hurt you." He drops the phone into my palm.
Whoa. I step sideways and eye my car, planning an escape. "First, Mr. Ironman, how do you know my name when you've never spoken to me? And secondly, how do I know you won't hurt me?"
He crosses his arms. "Firstly, Miss Bad Driver, I’ve heard your name at work. And secondly, you have a keen sense for bullshit. Am I lying?"
He's correct. I'd detect in a heartbeat if he lied. I wipe water from my face with cold hands and attempt to make out his features. “You heard my name at work?”
He pulls a lanyard from his pocket. "Yes. Like you said, I’m new to Alphanet."
Keeping my eyes on his, I take the lanyard from his hands and study the card. Heath Landon. His employer number. A criminally attractive photo. The “serial killer” look is standard for everybody, on any photo taken for ID, not his. Seriously, you should see my passport. I look like a freaking zombie.
"Okay. But why are you lurking near my house? Are you stalking me?" I demand.
"Near y
our house? I was crossing the street on my way to the pub, and you mowed into me!"
Again, Heath isn't lying—my strange sixth sense tells me that. Plus, I do live on a street in the centre of town, not far from pubs and shops.
"Right. Sorry," I mumble and hand back the lanyard. "And you're sure you're okay?" The bizarreness of the situation bites. "Really, I feel responsible. Like you might have internal injuries or something. People don't stand and walk away when cars hit them."
"Evidently they do." He drags a phone from his jacket and frowns down at the screen. "You broke my phone though."
"Sorry. I can pay to replace it?" I wrinkle my nose, my wet clothes becoming more uncomfortable as the moments pass. "I need to go inside. Do you want to uh...? I can get you a coffee or... I can take you to the hospital to get checked out by a doctor?"
