Secret Wolves: Supernatural Shifter Academy Series

by Bailey, G.

  I can feel my hackles rising at the implication, and struggle to keep from saying something.

  “You’re not giving Boots enough credit,” Hunter insists, making a warm spot bloom in my chest. “She’s been through hell these past few weeks. It’s not easy living in this world as a hybrid -- take it from me. My family has ties to the community.” There’s a pause, and his tone grows fond and soft. “Millie has done more for us than anyone,” he says.

  “Mille, Millie, Millie…” Edith sighs, sounding like a put-upon parent. “When will you realise that the world doesn’t revolve around her?” There’s a moment of silence, followed by a shifting sound. “I just want you to remember that you have other options,” she says, so quietly that I have to strain to hear her. Her voice is like silk, and the sound makes my blood run cold. “I see you for what you are, Hunter.”

  “I…” I can hear the confusion in his voice, the hesitation.

  Don’t do it, I tell myself, clenching my fists so hard that my nails bite into my palms. Don’t do it, don’t do it…

  “Come here,” Edith purrs to him.

  I clear my throat loudly and walk to the doorway, already preparing some excuse about why I’m here. My words catch in my throat when I see what’s happening. Edith and Hunter are perched on her bed, and she has her hand on his thigh. Her delicate fingers are running through his scarlet hair, and I arrive just in time to see her lips brush against his. I blanch, speechless.

  Hunter is the first to see me, and he quickly springs away from the witch shifter. “Boots!” he exclaims. “How long have you been…?” I can feel tears welling up in my eyes, despite my best efforts. “Long enough,” I reply quietly, and turn on my heel to escape before they can see me cry. I should have been expecting this, but it still hits me like a knife in the heart.

  I can hear Hunter following me. “Millie, wait! Let me explain-”

  But I don’t want to hear his explanations. I don’t want to listen to any more of Edith’s platitudes. My eyes have grown blurry with tears, and it’s all I can do to make it to my room and close the door behind me before I’m collapsing on the bed, my hands over my face. I can hear Edith and Hunter continuing to speak, but I can’t make out the words, and maybe that’s for the best. Their rapport is clear enough for my purposes.

  I don’t know how long I sit on the bed, but Hunter doesn’t come, and I don’t know if that makes me feel better or worse. My throat feels thick, and as ridiculous as this all is, I can’t help it. It’s like the house of cards has finally come falling down.

  After what seems like forever, I hear a knock at the door. I’m about to tell whoever it is to go away when Landon’s voice comes through gently. “Boots? You in there?”

  I sniffle and hurry to wipe away my tears. “Yeah,” I call.

  Slowly the siren shifter enters the room, closing the door behind him. Wordlessly he takes a seat next to me on the bed, putting a comforting arm around my shoulders. “I take it you weren’t asleep for that,” I mumble.

  “Resting my eyes,” he confirms, “but I think I got the gist.”

  I shake my head, turning to look at him. “Am I crazy?” I ask him quietly. “Is this whole thing… I mean…” I sigh, trying to collect myself. “I thought we had something,” I whisper. “Something real.”

  “You do,” Landon tells me quietly. “We do.”

  “We?” Timidly, I look up at him, feeling my cheeks growing hot. For the first time ever, he seems to be at a loss for words. “I never thanked you properly for saving me yesterday,” I whisper.

  “You don’t have to thank me,” Landon says, not meeting my eyes. “I’d follow you to the ends of the earth, Boots. We all would.”

  I can feel my heart beginning to beat faster. “Do you mean that?”

  Landon clears his throat. “I mean… Listen, Boots, I…” Finally, he meets my eyes with his own, and I can see the debate on his face. I only have to wonder for a split second before his mouth comes crashing into mine, and god, I don’t think I’ve ever felt this relieved in my life.

  I sigh, leaning into the kiss as I allow my arms to snake around the siren shifter’s neck. He groans, shifting a little, as his hands move up to let my hair down so that he can run his hands through it. His touch is ginger, delicate, a far cry from what I would have expected from the self-confident playboy. I let my tongue brush his bottom lip, and he gently pushes me back onto the bed, his hands trailing my body with a gentleness that’s enough to make me want to start crying again. Like he doesn’t want to hurt me.

  No, more than that; like he wants to keep me from ever being hurt again.

  My hands go to his shirt, but he stops me, pulling away for a moment to look at me. “Are you sure?” he asks quietly. “I don’t want to-”

  I kiss him again. “Yes,” I whisper against his lips. “Landon, please.” It’s more than a want at this point, it’s a need, and not just because of what I witnessed with Hunter. This has been a long time coming.

  I can feel him smirk against me. “As you wish.”

  I snort, laughing even as I help him get his shirt off. He tosses it to the side, allowing me to admire the planes of his body - for a swimmer, I’ve never seen him shirtless before, and the sight of his golden skin is making me feel weak in the knees. I feel him tug gently at my hair, making me groan, and he grins as he moves his mouth to my neck. “Problem?”

  “Hardly,” I pant as he continues to go lower, hooking his fingers through my belt loops and tugging my shorts off me. I squirm out of my underwear as he continues to lavish my neck with attention, aware that there will probably be a mark there tomorrow, and nearly cry out in disappointment when he pulls away to trail his tongue gently over my exposed skin. “Landon…” I whisper.

  He hums against the skin of my inner thigh, his eyes bright as they watch my reactions to his movements carefully. Slowly he lowers his mouth to my clit, and as he begins to eat me out with a patience that makes my head spin, it’s all I can do to bunch my hands in the sheets and breathe through his ministrations. No one’s ever done this to me before -- I had no idea what I was missing! I can feel a pressure building between my legs, and I can feel Landon’s eyes on me, observing how I react to every little thing he does. When he slips a finger into me, curling it slightly, it’s enough to make me come undone completely, and I come with a muffled cry, shuddering in ecstasy.

  Landon continues to smooth his tongue over me for another few moments, his hands rubbing ginger circles into my thighs. When he finally looks up and smiles at me as he crawls up my body, lining himself up at my entrance.

  “One second,” he murmurs, leaning back and reaching into his trouser pockets on the bed, grabbing a condom. Sliding it on, he settles back on top of me and kisses me as he thrusts deep. I arch my back at how good he feels as he groans, a masculine and deep groan against my lips. It doesn’t take long before he is thrusting faster and I feel another orgasm building up deep within me. The orgasm crashes through me as Landon takes my lips and kisses me deeply, thrusting into me one more time before he comes.

  We breathlessly lie together for a moment.

  The pain is still there, but in Landon’s arms, it might just be bearable.

  Chapter 63

  At some point during the day, Landon and I move out of the room to give Silas and Shade their space back, but I’m not ready to let him go just yet; I’m clinging to him like a lifeline, and the idea of spending the night alone is inconceivable. We end up sprawling out along the large sofa, me with my head on the siren shifter’s chest, a blanket draped over us both. He doesn’t say much about what I saw, which I’m grateful for -- for all his jibes, he clearly reads emotions well, and knows that I just need quiet comfort right now. Eventually, Mollie and the others come back, and although we get some curious glances, none of them give us any flak. They must just be used to me moving from guy to guy by now, and for some reason, that’s not as embarrassing as I once would have thought.

  I make a point o
f avoiding Hunter for the rest of the day, doing everything in my power to not be in the same room as him at any given time. Edith, too, although that’s not much of a change from how things were before. My mind keeps replaying what I saw: her lips on his, that coy smile on her face, her beautiful, tinkling voice… A horrible possibility dawns on me -- did she know I was there? Did she kiss him because she knew it would upset me? Or does she truly have feelings for him?

  I can’t decide which option is worse.

  The tension is palpable when we gather in the common room to debrief. I sit perched on the far end of the couch, Landon’s hand in mine, while Hunter just stands on the other side of the room, smouldering. I can feel his eyes on me, burning holes in my head, as if by willpower alone he can make me look at him. At one point, Edith creeps up to stand beside him, but he shrinks away as if she’s poisonous. Part of me feels bad, part of me feels guilty, but mostly, I’m just confused.

  “The good news is, they didn’t attack us,” Xander says. He’s sitting at the foot of the couch with Hazel’s back against his chest. “The bad news is, they want nothing to do with any of this.”

  “Shit,” Silas mutters, sweeping a hand through his hair. “That figures.”

  Ruby sighs and gets to her feet. Most of us are already changed for another night in, and I can see the exhaustion on my companions’ faces. “They’re scared,” she says flatly. “They don’t want the humans bringing heat down on London, and I can’t say I blame them.”

  “We’re just going to have to keep trying then, aren’t we?” says Shade.

  “We’ll be trying for the rest of our lives, at this rate,” Landon grumbles. I give his hand a gentle squeeze and see the faintest flicker of a smile on his face.

  “That’s another three off the list, anyway,” says Hazel, getting to her feet. She lets out a yawn, her short blonde curls bouncing. “I’m going to turn in, I think. All this rejection is bringing my mood down.”

  “You’re not the only one,” mutters Shade.

  “We should all just rest up,” suggests Mollie. “We can come back to it fresh tomorrow.”

  Xander sighs and follows Hazel’s lead. Silas and Shade, looking a little worse for wear after their duel earlier, exchange a look as the dragon shifter heads into the bathroom. Shade’s grey eyes flicker from me to Landon, and he winks -- how can something so corny be so sexy? -- before turning into his room, shedding his shirt as he goes. I can feel Landon’s grip on me tighten instinctively as the wolf shifter disappears, and just have time to wonder whether there’s some tension there before Mollie bids us goodnight and shuffles away with Edith in tow.

  Hunter is the last one left, and for a moment he just stands there with his hands in his pockets, staring at the floor. “Millie…” he says quietly, taking a step toward me. “Can we talk?”

  “I…” I can feel the emotions welling up in spite of myself and force my expression to harden. “I don’t think there’s anything to say.”

  “Please.” His blue eyes are imploring me to give him a chance, but the wound is still fresh in my heart, and part of me wants to hurt him the way he hurt me. I shake my head silently.

  Hunter opens his mouth to say something else, but Landon speaks up first. “Leave it alone, Hunter. She doesn’t want to talk about it.” I see the vampire shifter’s jaw clench, but then he gives us a stiff nod and leaves the room. Landon turns to me. “You okay, Boots?”

  “As okay as I can be, I guess,” I say, forcing a smile. “Come on, let’s get ready for bed. You and I are up to bat again tomorrow.”

  * * *

  Tomorrow’s plans, as it turns out, are not meant to be, and that’s putting it lightly.

  The first thing I become aware of through the fog of sleep is the sound of a loud banging, like someone on one of the lower floors is moving furniture around. Except it’s two in the morning, and the banging is getting louder…

  I sit up on the couch, rubbing my eyes, and adrenaline rushes through me as I realise the sound is coming from just outside the flat door which is shaking on its hinges. “Landon!” I shake him awake. “Someone’s here!”

  “Mm… what?” The siren shifter blinks at me, but I don’t have time to respond. Suddenly the door flies clean off, landing on the hallway floor with a deafening crash. Lights begin to turn on all over the apartment, but I’m barely thinking now, operating on instinct alone. I don’t see who’s at the door, and I don’t care, already letting my magic take over. An instant later I’m in my wolf form, pouncing on the first of several shadowy figures with a flying leap.

  It feels like the world around me is moving in slow motion as chaos begins to unfold. The others come running out of their rooms just in time for a veritable army of black-clad intruders storming in. How did they get past Edith’s wards? How did they know there were wards there?

  But I don’t have time to think as I snarl down at the man below me and sink my teeth into his shoulder. He yells, and I realise a moment too late that he’s not a human -- just before he shifts into a vampire and throws me off of him with his supernatural strength. I lose my grip on my form as I go flying into a bookshelf, the force of the impact dazing me for a moment as I look around. “Leave her alone!” Hazel yells in her siren voice, drawing the vampire’s attention away. Allowing my hands to turn red with witch magic, I unleash a blast of telekinetic energy just in time to shield Shade from a fireball coming from one of the other attacking shifters. The fire begins to lick at the walls and furniture, and within moments the room is filling up with smoke.

  “We need to go!” yells Landon, dodging an incoming swipe from an attacking wolf shifter. Concentrating, I lift him up with the force of my mind, struggling to hold him in the air long enough for Shade to tackle him to the ground. Even through the haze and chaos, I can just make out the insignia on the man’s jacket.

  The Academy. They found us.

  How?

  It’s not a question for right now. Where is everyone? The fire is making me disoriented, and I have to shout to make myself heard. “It’s the Academy!” I yell, stumbling on an overturned chair with my arms out, struggling to see.

  A strong arm hooks around my waist and helps me up; for a moment I struggle against it before I hear Silas’ calm voice in my ear. “Come on -- this way.”

  We fight our way through the common area, which has suddenly turned into a war zone, but we’ve only made it as far as the entryway when a telekinetic blast, much stronger than anything I’ve done so far, sends all of us -- humans, shifters, and furniture -- flying every which way. I feel a sharp pain in the back of my skull, and when I brush my fingers over my scalp, they come away bloody. My ears are ringing, and the world seems to spin around me. A concussion? I stumble to my feet, fighting against the stinging of the smoke in my eyes and the wound in my head to feel my way to the front door. I fling it open to get some relief from the smoke, realising too late that one of our group is still unaccounted for.

  It’s only as the smoke begins to clear that I see Mollie lying on the ground. There’s a gaping wound in her neck, and I don’t need to be a doctor to see how bad it is. “Mollie!” I cry out, rushing towards her, oblivious to the commotion around me. I’m back in human form before I know it, taking her by the shoulders and pulling her into a sitting position. A jet of fire shoots over my head -- Ruby’s doing -- just as one of the attackers, this one a witch, begins to launch magic in my direction.

  Except it’s not one of the attackers. It’s Edith, fully shapeshifted, her eyes blazing with a hatred I’ve never seen before. “What are you doing?!” I yell. “Mollie’s hurt! Help us!”

  She smiles, actually smiles. “Why don’t you help yourself, hybrid?” she sneers. “You’re the special one here.”

  Hunter lets out a snarl and lunges for her before I can process what she’s saying, blocking her attack from hitting me with his own durability.

  I glance down at Mollie, whose eyes are growing glassy. “No, no, no…” I murmur, trying desp
erately to think of something -- a healing spell, an artifact, something -- but nothing is coming to me. “Mollie-”

  She grabs onto my arm with surprising strength for someone bleeding out on the floor, pulling me close enough that I can feel her weak breath against my cheek. Her voice is barely above a whisper, but I can still make out the one command that she gives me.

  “Run,” my former foster mother says just before she dies.

  Chapter 64

  I want to scream. I want to tear my hair out. I want to cry. But instead, I just linger there as if the flat isn’t burning and we aren’t in the middle of a war zone. It feels like the wind has gone out of me, like I can’t catch my breath, and it’s not just due to the thick haze of smoke that’s filling the apartment. I stare down at Mollie. Her eyes are wide and staring now, and her hand has dropped from my arm, frozen in a clawing gesture that makes me want to explode when I look at it.

  The closest thing I ever had to a parent, and she’s lying dead on the floor in front of me. Because we brought them here.

  There’s a low moaning sound, and it takes me a moment to realise that I’m the one making it. I slump onto the floor in spite of the voice in my head that’s crying out for me to leave, leave now or I’m going to die. The fight has gone out of me. My eyes close for a moment, and when I feel a hand gripping my shoulder, I try desperately to shake it off. “No!” I yell, lashing out with my hands at what I can only assume is another one of the Academy representatives. “Let me go!”

  “Millie, Millie, it’s me!” I recognise Hunter’s voice. Isn’t that just dandy -- the man who broke my heart is now trying to pry me away from my dead foster mother. “Come on, we have to get out of here!”

  “Get off me!” I shout, leaning forward over Mollie’s body as if that will somehow change the outcome.