Alpha Magic (The New York Shade Book 4)

by D. N. Hoxa

  “Don’t be an asshole. You’re always scratching me when you’re bored. I thought that was it.” And he was bored all the time.

  “Where exactly are we going?” Kit said. “Exactly how much danger will we be in on a daily basis?”

  I flinched. “You’re not coming with me, Kit.”

  “Beg your pardon?” His voice was normally very high-pitched, but just now, it was so low, it almost scared me. It sounded like a growl.

  “I said, you can’t come with me. You have little ones now, Kit. They need you.”

  “I know. That’s why we’re all going.”

  “You’re not all going. Do you have any idea what kind of things I’ll have to do?” I didn’t, but they couldn’t be anything good. “It’s too dangerous for them.”

  Kit thought about it for a second, then jumped on my lap because he wanted to see me better. “Good. They need as much danger as possible to learn. Experience is the best teacher, you know.”

  “Kit, I get it. You don’t want to leave me alone, but you don’t need to be with me anymore. You can go, be free, have your own life with your family.”

  My voice shook. I hated it when that happened, and it had happened not even an hour ago when I’d spoken to the girls. I’d even cried. We all had. Just the reminder made me want to start again.

  “I am free. I’ve been free since I came to this place. I have my own life. And my family—which includes you,” Kit said. “Where is this coming from, Sin?”

  I gritted my teeth for a second. “I don’t want you to feel obligated to stick to me my whole life, that’s all.”

  “It was never an obligation, you fool. You really aren’t very bright sometimes.”

  “And you really are an asshole most times.”

  “You’re not going anywhere without me. Without us. We’re all coming, like it or not. So where are we going?”

  I tried to hold myself back. He already thought I was a fool and I felt like it for even having to talk to him about this, but I just wanted him to be free to decide. I felt like I’d forced him to be with me all his life on Earth and I didn’t want to do that anymore. But knowing he wanted to come with me willingly, it made my fucking heart burst. So I grabbed him in my hands and hugged the shit out of him.

  He didn’t like it, but who cares? I didn’t. I still held him tightly against my chest. If I broke something, it would heal. He was a hellbeast, after all.

  He struggled to get away from me for a good minute, trying to push me off him, but I held on tightly. He could take one goddamn hug. His voice came out muffled so I only heard some of the curse words he said, but they weren’t pretty. One of them was, I think, may a snake grow in your stomach and swallow you from the inside—or something like that, but I didn’t get all of it. Who the hell even says that? Maybe they did in the Underworld.

  When I finally let him go, he ran his claws over his fur, still cursing under his breath.

  “I have no idea where we’re going, but I’m glad you guys will be there. I really like the little ones,” I said all innocently.

  He sighed. “Don’t ever squash me like that again. I couldn’t breathe, you monster.”

  I laughed. “Why do you curse people with snakes?”

  “It’s just a saying from back home,” he said, shaking his head, then looked behind him, as if he heard something. I looked, too, heart in my throat, expecting to see Damian walk out of the building, but there was nobody there.

  “Hey, what was your name, by the way, before I named you Kit?”

  “Burtan—that is my name still.”

  “Wow,” I breathed. “Boy, did I do you a favor.” What the hell kind of name is Burtan?

  “Trust me, you didn’t,” he said.

  “I sure did. Kit is a thousand times better than Burtan. What does that even mean?”

  “It means the ruler’s wrath, and no, Burtan is a million times better than Kit.”

  “No, it’s not.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Just no!”

  “Yes, it is.”

  We went at it for a few more times before I let it go and let him think he got in the last word. He didn’t. When I was no longer a hellbeast, and I couldn’t understand him anymore, I told him that Kit was better than Burtan. All he could do was squeak. A total win.

  Eventually, the doors of the building opened all the way, and a soldier dressed in a grey uniform came out. Behind him was Damian.

  My entire body froze for a second as I analyzed him. He was standing. There were no scars on his face. Not that I expected them because it had been two nights since the battle, but I was still afraid. He didn’t look anything out of the ordinary, but I was still too far away to see his face clearly. He wore a black jacket over a black shirt, and his signature black jeans. He looked good. So good heat immediately turned on in my stomach. It was ridiculous how fast the sight of him could turn me on. Yeah, it had been a while.

  The soldier stepped aside and let him through. There was another behind him, but neither of them followed him down the stairs and toward the gate. He didn’t have anything with him that I could see, and he didn’t even stop to look around or smell the air. I hadn’t been in the street at all, and I was high up, which meant it would take him a little longer to figure out I was there, but he wasn’t stopping.

  This was it.

  In the next second, he was going to know I was there. I was going to have to talk to him. Look him in the eye and swallow my guilt and actually talk to him.

  Kit squeaked when Damian closed the gate and turned right without even looking my way. My mouth opened, but it took me a second to actually speak.

  “I hear you made another deal with the Guild,” I said into the night, as loud as I could without shouting.

  What if he didn’t even hear me?

  But he did. Damian stopped walking. He lowered his head and shook it, then he turned toward the alley, and his eyes found mine instantly. My limbs unfroze. Throwing the backpack with my money and a change of clothes to the ground, I stood up and went to the stairs. Kit was already down there, next to the dumpster, but he didn’t join his family. He just stayed there and watched me.

  By the time I jumped, Damian was already at the beginning of the alley. I grabbed my backpack from the ground and slowly went closer to him, already feeling about a thousand different emotions—but guilt was the most intense. I couldn’t even feel the bite of the cold as the wind blew through the alley. I was flushed instead.

  “So it’s true,” I said before I met his eyes because I was still a coward.

  But he didn’t let me be for long. His fingers moved under my chin and he raised my head. A smile played on his lips, one of my favorite looks on him. Who was I kidding? Every look was my favorite look on him, even when his eyes were black and his fangs extended. Right now, they weren’t. The colors in his eyes mesmerized me, just like they had the very first time I saw him. Every time I saw him was like that first time, and I got the feeling it would never get old.

  “It would seem so,” he said. He didn’t look surprised to see me as he analyzed my face. It was like he’d expected me to be here all along, even though he hadn’t.

  “Why, Damian?” I asked in half a voice, the guilt rearing its ugly head. “Why did you give up your life—your freedom? You could have had everything—all of it.” He’d already done it once, damn it. He’d already traded his freedom one time, and he’d hated it. I’d seen that he’d hated working for the Guild. How the hell was I going to live with that? I had no idea.

  Damian stepped closer to me, his hand cupping my cheek. I leaned into it instinctively.

  “The world is just a big prison if you’re not in it, little thief. Freedom isn’t out there. It’s here, where you are.”

  He said it so simply, like it was the absolute truth and he was completely okay with it, like those words didn’t mean more than a thousand worlds to me. There
was a lot I wanted to say to him, things that words would never do justice. I rose to my toes and brought my lips to his, for a second fearing my body wouldn’t even hold me. He stood perfectly still until my lips pressed onto his. I dropped the backpack again and wrapped my arms around his neck. He held me to him until there was no space at all left between us. I loved that he did that, that he held me like his whole heart was into it, even if it was technically dead. Our lips moved in perfect rhythm and the world around us no longer existed when our tongues danced with each other. His hand cupped the back of my head as if to hold me in place, as if he was afraid I’d let go. If he could see inside my head, wear my skin for a second, he would never have that fear again.

  But the kiss couldn’t last forever, no matter how much we both wanted it to, and that was okay. Everything was okay, actually. The fear was sucked out of me, and though the guilt remained, it just wasn’t that heavy anymore. Half its weight was gone, so suddenly it shocked me for a second there, but I should have known. Damian Reed was no ordinary guy, and his ability to make me feel like things weren’t as fucked up as they really were was actually very impressive.

  “I’m sorry I’m late,” I said against his lips because he wouldn’t let go, and I didn’t want him to. It was a nice place there, in his arms. My favorite place in the world. “I had some things to take care of.”

  “You’re here now,” he said, kissing the tip of my nose.

  “Did you think I wouldn’t come?” I asked because for some reason, it mattered.

  “Not for a second,” Damian said.

  I grinned. “So you don’t think I’m actually here to try to kill you to relieve myself of the guilt?”

  That’s what Amina Grey had done, after he’d given up his freedom for her life over a hundred and fifty years ago.

  He laughed. “I’m sorry to tell you this, but you don’t have it in you, little thief. You’ve already tried once, remember?”

  Ah, yes. I had tried to try to kill him once. Ancient history.

  “I know,” I said, hiding my face beneath his chin. “So what do you want to do now?”

  “There are a couple of things I’d like to do, but there’s no time, unfortunately.” His hands moved up and down my back, making me feel like it was a summer night we were living in.

  “Only a couple?” That sounded like very little.

  “So greedy,” he said with a laugh.

  “I can’t help it. I think I might be madly in love with you, Mister Vampire,” I whispered against his neck. He stopped moving for a second, then pulled away to look me in the eye.

  “That’s the best kind of love there is. I’ve always been a lucky guy,” he said, mischief sparkling in his eyes. It made him look different, younger, so full of life it was ridiculous to believe that he was actually a vampire.

  “You do know that you’re going to have to say it, too, right?” His brows shot up. “You will eventually. You’re stuck with me now. I’m gonna follow you to the edges of the worlds and you’re going to tell me everything about you—all of it. You’re going to talk so much your jaw will feel like it’s gonna fall off because I’ve had enough of your I’m-a-mysterious-and-really-hot-dude-who-bites bullshit. You’re gonna have to share everything with me now.”

  His shoulders shook while he tried to hold back his laugh. “Even my deepest, darkest fantasies?”

  “Especially those.” If he had any kind of fantasies, I wanted to know all about them. He shook his head, then rested his forehead to mine.

  “Here’s one for you to set the pace: you are the sun to my moon. I can’t shine without you, little thief.”

  My turn to laugh. He was such a book nerd. “Very romantic, but still not those three words I’m looking for, you know?”

  “Maybe I’m a romantic mysterious and really hot dude who bites. How about that?”

  I rose on my tiptoes again and kissed him. It felt mighty good to do that whenever I wanted, and I was going to want to do that a lot. “I’ll take it for now. You’re gonna crack eventually, I just know it.”

  “Maybe I will if you do that thing again,” Damian said. “You know, where you turn into me.”

  I pretended to be shocked and gasped. “You liked that, didn’t you?” Oh, I could see it written all over his face.

  “I didn’t just like it.” He kissed me again. I was already liking this very much, just not when he stepped away from me. “But we do need to get going now.”

  “Where are we going exactly?” I said, and reached down for my backpack, then tapped my thigh. Kit was somewhere behind me, but he’d hear. A second later, I heard the rumbling while the little ones probably came out of the dumpster. Ugh, I hoped they didn’t smell.

  “New Orleans. There’s a group of rogue werewolves who are hiding in the Shade somewhere when they aren’t robbing banks all over Louisiana, and nobody can find them,” Damian said, and to my surprise, when we turned away from the alley, he put his arm over my shoulder as we walked. I liked that very much, too.

  “And we will?”

  “Absolutely. It will even be easy if you turn into a vampire again,” he said, making me laugh.

  “Wow, you really liked it.”

  “I’ve never been more awestruck in my life,” he admitted. We were out in the street when Kit climbed on the back of my leg and made it all the way to my chest before he squeaked angrily. Then he tried to bite Damian’s fingers off.

  But Damian didn’t seem to mind, if his laugh was any indicator. “I think he wants your arm off me. It’s kind of his territory.” Kit had stayed on my shoulder since the first day we met, and as much as I liked being wrapped in Damian’s arms, Kit was going to make us both miserable until he let go of me. And he did. The little ones were instantly on me, too, climbing on my jacket like tiny little monkeys.

  “Fascinating,” Damian said, looking down at them before he grabbed my hand in his. I don’t even need to say it, do I?

  “So how are we going to get to the New Orleans Shade? Through a Gateway?” I’d used one of those once, and I wouldn’t mind doing it again.

  “No. We’re going to drive there,” Damian said as we walked down the street, hand in hand. I felt giddy, like a teenager, and for the life of me I couldn’t remember why I’d been so fucking panicked just minutes ago.

  “Drive? Are you kidding? It’s going to take us, what, fifteen hours?”

  “Nineteen, actually,” he said with a grin. “I figured it would give us some time. There’s a lot I need to tell you about, apparently.”

  “And show me, too.” There was a lot he needed to show me, and I, him.

  He looked at me for a second and my knees grew weak. It was the look—the I want to eat you look.

  “And show you, yes,” he confirmed.

  “So how exactly does this work?” I asked just to take my attention off him for a second. Looking at the street and the people wasn’t working—I couldn’t care less who was watching me or Damian or the hellbeasts hanging onto me. I’d cared so much for such a long time that I had no trouble not caring anymore at all. It was refreshing.

  “It’s very simple, actually. The Guild contacts us when they have a job, gives us the details. We tell them what we need, then we go in and complete it. We don’t need to talk to them more than to receive the job and report to them when it’s done.”

  “What about time off? Do we get any time off?”

  “Yes, just not a lot. There’s normally a week in between jobs, sometimes more. It all depends on how many people are causing trouble around the world.”

  A week, all alone, with Damian. To do…things. Lots and lots of things. No job to report to, no responsibilities to anyone. It was all I could do not to start giggling like an idiot.

  “And how long will this last? How many years did you give them?”

  “That’s not important, little thief. However long it is, we’ll survive every one of those jobs, and who knows? We might even have fun along the way.” The smile on his face sa
id that we would. We definitely would.

  “And the contract? I’m in it, right? I don’t need to hide from anyone? And Kit and his family…” People were definitely noticing the hellbeasts hanging onto me while we walked in the Shade. Humans wouldn’t see them but supernaturals would.

  “You are, and so is Kit. They were shocked when I made the request tonight to add them to the contract, but they didn’t have much of a choice,” Damian said.

  “Wait, how did you know that they would even come with?” I hadn’t until I’d spoken to Kit just minutes ago.

  “It was an easy guess. He’s very protective of you. I didn’t think he’d want to leave you alone with me.” Kit squeaked as if to confirm Damian’s words. “And, no, you can’t hide from anyone now. Everybody knows already. Information like that travels fast.”

  I nodded. “What about the tracker? Is what that Connelly guy said true?”

  Damian’s smile fell instantly. “It is. They’ve very nervous about this whole situation, and they will not hesitate to activate the poison if you tempt them. Luckily, we don’t plan to tempt them until we learn how to control that thing.”

  “We’re going to learn how to control it?” That was a surprise.

  “Of course. We can’t just leave it to luck. There will be fights and you might even hit it accidentally. We’ll figure out how to deactivate it in no time. There’s a friend in New Orleans who might be able to help with that.”

  “Do you always think everything through?” I wondered out loud.

  He didn’t hesitate. “When it comes to important things, yes.”

  “I’m important things, aren’t I?”

  “More than you know.”

  “So what does that make me exactly? Like your partner? Your girlfriend?” Because I’d never actually had a long-term relationship with someone. I had no idea how to even be somebody’s girlfriend. Guess I could ask Malin for tips.

  “Both,” Damian said, turning to look at me. “You’re also my mate now.”

  “I am?” Shit, I had no idea how to be somebody’s mate! And I couldn’t even ask Malin for tips about it.