Moonlight Hunters: A Reverse Harem Shifter Romance (The Witch and the Wolf Pack Book 2)

by K. R. Alexander

  “That’s right, but you don’t need to be paying that much attention to me either.”

  “I don’t need to. It’s my bliss. When we’re back in Brighton, can I take you to dinner and show you my favorite spots on our beaches? Have you ever seen the white cliffs? Or the Jurassic Coast?”

  Goddess.

  “It isn’t the time to talk about all this, Zar. We need to find Jason.”

  The beaches, yes. Dinner with Zar, though? I had no reason to suppose Zar was capable of eating politely around humans the way Isaac was. Andrew would know the whole routine. Probably none of the others.

  Maybe Andrew and Zar could take me out together, the way this trip was going…

  “We’ll find him,” Zar said, still cheerful. “He’ll call us if they’ve gone too far ahead.”

  Sure enough, in a few more minutes, after we’d taken a turn at a guess, we both heard a short howl. I had my breath back and we ran down a new street.

  Jason had led Kage to the double doors of an apartment building that required a key pass to open.

  He was still sniffing around the seam in the doors, then the handles, as we ran up. I looked questioningly from Jason to Kage. The black wolf turned back to Kage, his tail low, fur standing up, ears back, his eyes wide and teeth chattering: terrified.

  “Well…” Kage looked from him up to the large doors, then around at us. “There’s a wolf living in London after all.”

  Chapter 11

  We couldn’t wait outside the apartment building during the day with a wolf in tow. And we couldn’t come up with any other way to find this wolf by scent. Which left one option: finding him or her by sight.

  I fixed an image of the building in my mind before I returned to the hostel with the others. Andrew had found nothing but the hint of another vampire tunnel, which they had not tried to confirm or explore.

  As always, there was a host behind the front counter at the Midland Hostel when we got in. He was watching something on a tablet and offered us a wave. Earbuds in—perhaps against policy. Fine. We could speak freely in the empty lounge room and just keep it down.

  Not that I would have been much bothered if our host had all his senses handy to pay attention—except that discussing murder was a special situation.

  For all our hiding, casters had gained incredible freedom in recent decades as “weird” grew fashionable and neopaganism became more visible.

  I could never use noticeable magic around mundanes. Ever. I hated feeling that my life was a lie. I’d seen those lies take a toll on my family, making me desperate not to repeat the saga with my own children—change my own ways. Still, we had it easy these days. Conferences beside mundanes, meetings and support groups, or a pack of werewolves and a witch chatting in a public park: we could get away with so much.

  Talk about shape-changing in public and people think you’re live action role-players. Talk about spells and they think you’re using slang. Talk about scrying into distant places and they think you’re New Age dreamers.

  One thing modern mundanes did not think: Oh, my God, that is a real witch sitting across from me on the bus.

  And, if they did, what were they going to do? Tell the police? Tell Twitter? Right.

  It was still always hiding, fake, a secret who I really was. I loathed that. But, as long as I didn’t actually use magic in front of them, and no shifter grew fur, it was downright depressing how much we could get away with in plain sight around mundanes who were already convinced they knew reality perfectly well, thank you very much.

  Even so, in a case involving not just talking about scrying, but murder, I wouldn’t have risked a pause down here to chat without those earbuds.

  I sat in the empty lounge at 4:30 a.m., with most of this little pack around me, and listened to drums on earbuds of my own to help with a light trance. Knowing the building and exactly who we wanted should make it easy.

  I called up the magic, mentally opened my third eye, and looked.

  There she was, plain as drum beats.

  “Female in her late thirties,” I said aloud as I continued to watch with my eyes shut and they listened. “She’s sitting at a window desk, typing on a laptop. Short black hair, olive complexion. She looks a bit like Jason.” With the limited gene pool, she could easily be a close relation. “Pretty, and different looking also. A little exotic. She’s writing all the time, always in a hurry. I don’t know if she’s working at home, or maybe trying to get through emails, or writing books?”

  After a long, clear look, I let the vision slip away.

  “Okay,” I said. “I can recognize her if she comes in or out of that building. But I can’t be back to start watching the place in a few hours. We’ll have to hope for her coming or going in the afternoon.”

  A few of them nodded.

  “Thank you, Cassia,” Isaac said softly. “Without your magic, we wouldn’t even be this far.”

  “While we’re at it, I’ll look at the vampires. Give me a minute.”

  I didn’t talk for this one, asking first to look into the second cold nest that Andrew was pretty sure he’d found east of the London Zoo.

  It was dark, totally black, and I got the smell of death at once. What had I been expecting?

  Too tired for this. Too drained. But try.

  Show me someone there who can help.

  Nothing. Black and stink, a hiss in the dark.

  Show me who, in all London, can help us with information. Goddess, Mother, Nana, magic, self: guide me.

  Instant vision of the mound, the gapped teeth, the obscene smile, black gums, white, dead, horrible face with a few wisps of hair clinging around the skull.

  “Dammit.” I hadn’t meant to speak aloud, had to struggle to look deeper.

  Are there vampires in Brighton? Show me.

  Darkness.

  Show me faces of the killers.

  Darkness.

  Please, help me, Nana. Are new vampires being spawned?

  A flash of motion, glint of fangs, a sense of powerful cold, lightheadedness as if blood were being drained from my body.

  Shivering, dizzy, I pulled myself out of the trance as everything became cold and dark.

  Zar was on his knees in front of my chair. Isaac stood by the arm, where he’d started out.

  Everyone else was still well back, watching me from around the room—besides Jed, who’d not remained with us at all. Their fear of my magic battled their concern for me.

  “Cassia?” Zar sounded worried.

  As I blinked, I shook my head. “It’s Dieter.” I let out a breath. “I’m afraid … we should try to help him. He has information we need. I’m sure of it.”

  “What about some other bones?” Kage asked. “How would he know?”

  “You mean rob some random old grave close to home?” I asked. “It’s not exactly easy to come by human bones in any way, Kage. Unless you’re keeping some buried out back?”

  He curled his lip at me.

  “I suspect he would know,” Isaac said quietly. “I don’t know how…” Frowning.

  “He’s right,” Zar said. “Vampires are magical beings. They have their own ways of seeing.”

  I shut my eyes again. “I don’t even know how we could do it. We can’t fly over there and—”

  “We wouldn’t fly,” Kage said. “Drive.”

  “We’d take the bikes,” Jason said.

  “Dover ferry,” Andrew said. “Drive from Calais, half a day to Germany. Where’s the town?”

  “Munich area,” Isaac said. “All the way across the country.”

  “Far,” Kage said, “but near the Landesgrenze Pack on the Austrian border, isn’t it? We’d have a place to stay.”

  “Would we?” Jason sounded dubious.

  “If Diana asked the favor for us. Can’t just show up.”

  “So you have this all figured out?” I asked dismally. “Even someone to put us up? I’m not worried about accommodations, Kage. I’m worried about going into another coun
try to trespass, grave-rob, and sneak out again with a dead body. Does that not seem like an issue to anyone else?”

  They all looked at me. Andrew appeared amused. Everyone else only puzzled.

  “We’ll be careful,” Zar said, trying to reassure me.

  “Cassia,” Isaac said in that calm voice that made me both relax and wish he had his arms around me. “We have the London wolf to look for tomorrow, hopes of more information there, some clue. Short of that, do you have any other ideas? You just said you felt as if Dieter were imperative.”

  “Yes, I do, but, Goddess, I don’t want him to be. I want to find another way.”

  “There’s the wolf here,” Zar said. “I’ll wait there with you. We’ll watch all afternoon, all evening, we’ll spot her.”

  I nodded. “If someone can speak to other vampires that would be wise also. Even though I didn’t get any clues scrying. If neither leads us anywhere … does anyone speak German?”

  “A bit,” Kage said. “I can swear. My grandfather was half German.”

  “That’s exactly what we need over there,” I said. “To curse at the police.”

  “What we need,” Isaac said gently, “is no contact with the police at all. And that’s what we’ll do.”

  I looked up at him. He smiled and I felt in that smile his logic and his forward thinking and his beautiful table manners.

  If Isaac thought we could do this, maybe…

  “Let’s go to bed.” I only realized as I was speaking that I was still looking at him in particular, addressing the comment to Isaac. Standing up quickly, flushed, I rushed to cover this. “We all need rest to try one more night. If we talk to this wolf, maybe for the next night we’ll actually have a trail to follow. She could tell us anything about wolves here. She may know she’s the only one. Or where the others are. We’ll just have to see.” I made my way to the door, Zar at my heels and the rest following.

  “You’re wonderfully talented,” Zar said, fumbling for his room key to open the door that led to wide metal stairs up to our dorms. He got the door for me while I was putting away my phone and earbuds in my bag.

  “That’s kind of you to say considering how you seem to feel about magic. Go on to bed. I’ve got to shower again after that pit.” As we climbed, I added, “Would you do me a favor and wake me in the morning if you’re up and there’s still breakfast out? I’d like to go down myself. We paid for it and I didn’t mean to miss the experience.”

  “Of course.” That delighted smile again, like he was agreeing to move in with me. “I’d love for you to join me for breakfast.” Making it feel like a date, when all I’d wanted was to not miss hot coffee.

  Upstairs, I collected my things, showered quickly, brushed my teeth, and found Isaac in the hall when I emerged.

  The hostel was dead quiet at this hour, no early airport risers today.

  Isaac had also showered, judging by carrying his towel and khakis and shirt draped over his arm with a little nylon toiletry bag, light hair damp and combed back. He was waiting for me, but not close to the door out of the female bathroom, letting me choose.

  “Moon bless,” he murmured, smiling at me as I saw him. This was their way of saying good night. “You don’t need to go into another silent hive, Cassia. I’ll take Andrew and Kage down to the new one. We know what we’re wanting to ask.”

  I sighed, approaching him. “I’m not usually squeamish. I didn’t mean to freak out about the vampire pit or anything—”

  “If I recall correctly, Andrew was the one who was sick last night and Zar was the one who wouldn’t get anywhere near Dieter tonight.” He smiled gently, his eyes soft. “But it’s not a pleasant place for any of us. You try to find our wolf tomorrow. You’re the one who’s seen her. Take Zar and Jason. The rest of us will look for vampires.”

  “Thank you.” I took a breath. “Do you really think we’ll have to go to Germany?”

  “We’ll know tomorrow. Right now … a few more stones to turn over.”

  I wasn’t sure how we’d ended up so close together in the long hallway, lined in shut doors. I was close enough to see rich green of his eyes and smell something vanilla on him, soap or shampoo.

  “Thank you for lunch today,” I said softly. “That was the best meal I’ve had in England … probably ever.”

  He smiled more. “My pleasure, Cassia. I hope we can do it again.”

  Goddess.

  “Isaac … I’m leaving soon. I’m supposed to fly home in a week.” Speaking in a rush. “My sister already thinks I’m crazy. I’ve been neglecting her and she’s afraid for me because I haven’t told her what’s going on. I need to spend at least a bit of this trip with her and then … go home. Even if I went with you across the Channel, I’d need to get back and … that would be it.”

  He nodded slowly. “I appreciate the sacrifice you’re making to help—”

  “That’s not what I’m talking about.”

  “I know.” His voice was very soft and he still smiled gently. “Even if Germany is our next step, you don’t have to go. And if you do go, you should spend a couple nights with your sister and have a chance to talk. We can wait a day or two to go over.”

  “And tell her what?” I looked away. “But that’s not the problem either.”

  He watched me, his expression serious then. “She doesn’t know any of this? She doesn’t even know you’re a witch?”

  I shook my head, still not looking at him. “No one in my family knows. Not since my grandmother died. It’s not that difficult when I don’t use it. When I’m not involved in anything in the magical world—which is how I live my normal life. Nothing about this trip, though, has been normal.”

  Isaac still regarded me. I thought of him saying he was sorry, about him telling me again that he was grateful to me, and other stuff he or Zar had already said. Maybe he thought about it too. But he didn’t say it.

  He offered his hand.

  I took it, looking at his wrist, the strong fingers, the muscles up his forearm, pale hair, thick curve of his bicep that none of the guys I knew at home could achieve even if they flexed—and Isaac was just standing there.

  I ran my thumb over the side of his warm hand. I’m five-six, try for a healthy lifestyle, good food, but I’m not tiny. That’s how my hand looked in his anyway: small and light and delicate. Belle resting her hand in the Beast’s. But he was no beast. The beast among them…

  I looked up. “Isaac? What about the Beech Pack? That was something else. But I don’t know how to proceed with them at all without Jed’s cooperation and he won’t cooperate.”

  “Have you tried again?” Isaac asked, taking a moment to pull his own gaze from my hand. “Since Cornwall?”

  “I’ve mentioned it. He’s just angry. I don’t know how to approach him. Do you know anything about the Beeches?”

  “I’ve never even seen a member of the Beech Pack. As far as I know, Jed is the only member of the Sables who’s ever spent any time with them in the past several years. The only others would be the elders, and the Beech Pack wasn’t the same then. As to Jed, that anger is probably not directed at you. Jed is unused to spending more than six to ten hours in one stretch in skin. I’m shocked he was willing to come to London at all.”

  I’d had a hint of this information already. That Jed was what they called a stranger, meaning he was a wolf who wanted to spend all his time in fur, none in skin.

  “The only reason I can think of that he didn’t try to get out of being here…” Isaac tipped his head, eyes on mine.

  Me?

  Wildflowers he’d left for me on my trailer step at night? But if Jed really did care, if he really felt some attraction for me, why was he also so nasty? I could get into Kage’s obnoxiousness a bit more than I liked to admit. But Jed?

  When I didn’t answer, Isaac continued. “If he’ll talk to any of us, it would be you. Perhaps you can get him to help by being you, leaving the pack out of it. But don’t worry about them right now. We have other
leads to follow, and Jed … I wish you didn’t have to engage with him at all. He’s dangerous, Cassia.”

  “Why does everyone say that?” Not that he’s not a total asshat. “He swore to protect me. Just like you and Kage and Zar. What is it he’s done?”

  Isaac averted his eyes. “It’s not my place to gossip about my packmates. And I’m still a foreigner in the Sables myself, even after the years I’ve been here, so I can’t pretend to know Jed well anyway. But he has a reputation, and what I do know of him personally confirms it. Anyway, we have other leads to follow.”

  Isaac hadn’t seemed to mind telling me about what happened to Zar and Jed’s alcoholic father. Maybe he found this more personal, though, more one-on-one—gossip—rather than general pack lore.

  “Once I set my mind to a research project…” I started.

  “Maybe you won’t have to research that pack at all.” A slight smile returned. “If we go to Germany—”

  “So it makes more sense to run off to another country before exploring options like the Beech Pack right here at home?”

  He dropped his chin on his chest, still smiling. “You make a logical point.”

  “We can’t just ignore them.”

  Isaac said nothing.

  I sighed and twisted my fingers into his, watching them together. He squeezed my hand, the pressure strong and intense, yet comforting. I thought again of wanting his arms around me.

  I stepped in, wearing only my white tank, blue pajama bottoms, and yellow flip-flops, also carrying towel and clothes and bag in one arm, I felt him much more closely when we kissed than the two times before. He was enough taller than me that this was somewhat awkward, especially with me not even having an inch of extra shoe support.

  All four hands were also already engaged, two together, two on our respective shower things. We took a minute with just the kiss, his mouth and the feel of him against me, my breasts all but naked pressing his chest, nipples stiffening, wanting him to touch me, heart quickening. Then Isaac freed his hand from mine to hold my face, his fingers sliding into my wet hair.

  That touch was as electric as his mouth. When I slipped my now free hand below his T-shirt to feel his abs, he moved in more, holding me tighter. I curved my lips around his tongue, feeling the heat of him as I invited.