by Eva Gordon
Rylee turned her attention to Lev and sniffed. “You smell good.”
The alpha no doubt smelled the tinge of Rachel’s blood essence. Raw buffalo he’d consumed didn’t hide that fact. He smiled. “I showered.”
He turned his attention to Katya, the foreign beta chained by a collar to the wall. The attractive woman wore a pair of gray overalls for prisoners. She kept her head lowered and her pulse raced. Thorn, the assassin, wearing the black operative uniform, stood guard over his prisoner and stared straight ahead. Tall, Lev’s height with a massive frame and always in a brooding state, Thorn had a scar that ran from the corner of his left eye to his neck. He’d heard the serial killer werewolf who disfigured Thorn had lost and, like other oath-breaking weres, ended up buried in the oath breaker’s communal grave. A shameful burial mound, no relative or former pack ever visited. The ghosts of the oath breakers were said to haunt the place. Caught in a dark void of despair that would last all eternity.
Rylee spoke. “Lev, I don’t think you’ve met Thorn.”
Lev and Thorn locked eyes. The alpha primal instinct to challenge for supremacy curtailed by their strict lycan law against bloodshed in pack territory. Nonetheless, a rumbling growl escaped their throats. Lev grinned, baring long fangs in what he often heard Cricket called a fang/dick war. “We should have vodka some time.”
Thorn narrowed his eyes. “No offense, but I don’t socialize.” His southern accent gave him a charming voice despite his cold demeanor.
Lev shrugged. “No worries, I tend to be a loner myself.”
“So I’ve heard.”
“Thorn, you’re excused for now.”
He raised his brow. “Ma’am?”
“Your details about the mission have been recorded, but remain at headquarters. We might need your services.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He glanced at Katya who glared at him. Thorn sneered at her then turned to Lev before leaving. “Careful, this one bites like an ornery gator. Best use that mind control of yours.”
Lev nodded and narrowed his eyes at the big hunter from the bayou. His request to use mind control hinted he had a soft spot for the attractive beta. Or was he projecting his own feelings if Rachel had been in a similar situation? Fortunately for Katya, once under his control, she would speak only the truth. The hunter left and Lev addressed Rylee. “Let’s remove her collar.”
Jesper got up, but Rylee shook her head. “I’ll do it.”
Normally, a criminal werewolf was questioned in a caged interrogation room or bound in an enforcer’s dungeon, but the petite beta had no means of escape. Weaponless and, according to Katya’s profile, her wolf form weighed in at 125 pounds. Cricket was smaller, but not by much. Against Rylee and him, she wouldn’t stand a chance, no matter how tenacious she happened to be.
Katya rubbed her throat and sat where Rylee indicated. “So Kat, ready to talk?”
The prisoner glared at the door Thorn had shut behind him as if still angry at him for her capture. “Yes, I worked for Svetlana, but she is gone. I don’t know where.”
Lev tilted his head. “Your English is good, but your accent hints you are from Southern Ural Mountains.”
Katya shrugged. “I was told I was born in the Urals and spent the first year after the change there, but I only remember waking up in Siberia with no memory of my past. Apparently, I somehow knew English. I did a lot of courier work in America and England.”
Jesper interjected. “Anton’s pack often used drugs to erase memories.”
Katya scoffed. “Who cares?”
Lev furrowed his brow. “You had no desire to find your pack?”
“I was told my pack died in a mining accident.”
Jesper laughed. “And you believed them?”
Katya growled at him.
Rylee towered over her. “Go wolf again and I’ll crate you for a week.”
“Sorry, mistress.”
Lev sat across from her. “Katya, look into my eyes.”
She met his eyes. “Call me Kat.”
Lev locked eyes on her and her pupils enlarged. She stared at him, without blinking. Her defiant facial features smoothed. Her breathing slowed. No longer in a state of fear, but calm. Mesmerized. Vulnerable. A perfect trance.
“Where is Svetlana?”
“I don’t know.” Her voice passive, she spoke the truth.
“What happened on the day you noticed she was gone?”
“I delivered a package across the border to another human Russian mobster known as Genrikh.”
“What was in the package?”
Kat’s breathing quickened, she fought answering the question. Lev spoke in a soothing tone. “We won’t harm you. Tell me.”
“His daughter’s finger.”
Svetlana’s intimidation modus operandi, usually followed by the head. Lev glanced at Rylee, who gave him a nod to continue. Lycans never meddled with human criminal activity, unless it involved pack members. However, Lev would get in touch with his Russian contacts to let them know about the mobster’s kidnapped daughter. “Continue.”
“When I returned, I found my mistress’ soldiers.” She sniffed the air as if recalling. “Dead for about three hours. No sign of Svetlana. The scent of four unknown human men lingered. Her abductors. I followed her scent to the villa’s helipad. They must have taken her by helicopter.”
“Are you sure there were no werewolves in the vicinity of the villa?”
“Positive. I was the only werewolf she kept. My sense of smell warned her of enemy werewolves.”
“Thorn and his team confirmed that,” said Rylee.
Lev glowered at the twenty-something beta who could have—should have—walked away from the bitch. No alpha to stop her. “Why did you stay?”
“I had no pack. My mistress promised she would tell me about my birth mother after a mission to find a rogue alpha willing to create a new criminal syndicate.”
“And did you?”
“No. As much as I wanted to learn my mother’s identity, it was too risky to approach lone lycans. I thought perhaps in another year or so I could search without raising red flags.”
Rylee lifted a brow. “You said your pack came from the Urals?”
Kat sighed. “According to Svetlana, my mother was not from Russia. She met my father while traveling and then they became mates.”
Lev suspected Anton and Svetlana killed her pack. No wolf mother would have left her mate and the pre-change wolflings. Svetlana found Kat’s weakness and exploited her. Typical. “After you realized she’d been taken by helicopter, what did you do next?”
“I broke into her safe, looking for any evidence about my mother. I found nothing. I took 25,000 Euros and made my way out. After I packed, I smelled werewolves. Your team.”
“And Thorn caught you.”
“Not so quickly. I left the money and went wolf.” She swallowed. “I knew he couldn’t go wolf around the town. I on the other hand had been known as my mistress’s black wolf pet. It took him half a day to find me.”
Lev took out a drawing of the tattoo. “Have you seen this?”
Kat gazed at it. “No.”
Lev had only seen it when they stripped so her answer didn’t surprise him. “Do you think the mobster took Svetlana after seeing his daughter’s finger?”
“No. I didn’t find their scent in her villa. Genrikh promised to let her have the cargo with the stolen military grade weapons. I gave him the coordinates where he must do the exchange in person. I sensed he would do anything to save his daughter.”
“Is she still alive?”
“No. Svetlana killed her. It would have been a trap for him. She had ordered her men to kill him and take the cargo.”
Lev swore in Russian.
Kat whispered back in Russian as her eyes moistened.
Rylee furrowed her brow. “My Russian is rusty. What did she say?”
Lev smiled. “Katya said she was not involved with the murder.” He turned back to Katya. “You don’t bel
ieve Svetlana left willingly.”
“My mistress is ruthless, but she would not kill her loyal men. Many of them had served her father and would never betray her.”
Lev and Rylee looked at each other. He sucked in some air to steady his frustration. Rachel’s abductors knew about me. “You don’t know if Svetlana met with other werewolves in the past few months?”
“Since you and the team killed her mate and son, she plotted revenge, but said we should lay low for a few years. Continue pretending she’d been killed.” She nodded to Lev. “Find your weakness, Chernobyl werewolf.”
Rylee paced. “Could be Svetlana brokered a deal with still living members of The Keep to destroy our lycan society.”
The Keep, a global cabal of humans, intent on killing all werewolves was a possibility. Lev nodded. “She would stoop that low.” He glared at Katya. “Did she?”
“No. Never. They were our enemies as well.”
Lev scowled. “Why would she bother telling you, a werewolf?”
Kat conceded. “True. She kept many things from me.”
Lev softened his tone. “What sort of things?”
“She always sent me away before discussing her plans with her men.”
Rylee wrinkled her nose. “Naturally, she’d keep dealings with The Keep from her, but if that’s the case, why take off with them? They’d torture her for information and be done with her.”
Jesper interjected. “Why take her so close to a lunar eclipse, like the others?”
Lev shrugged. “The werewolf abductors would have deemed her too old to bear hybrid children.”
Rylee sighed. “The lunar cycle has to be a coincidence. Even if she was fertile at fifty plus years of age, I doubt the fetus would survive or be normal.”
Unlike she-wolves only fertile in the spring, Stallo women could get pregnant any time of the year with their blood slave. Svetlana often had cosmetic surgery to take years off her appearance, but she had definitely been post-menopausal. Lev turned to Katya. “Who do you suspect took Svetlana?”
Her voice reflected her profound confusion. “I don’t have a clue.”
Lev blew out a long breath. Talking to Katya had not brought them any closer to solving the whereabouts of the mystery rogue pack. He steadied her on the chair, her hands on the table. “Sleep.”
Katya closed her eyes and her head tilted forward. She would have banged it on the table, had Lev not caught her and gently settled her head down. “What do you plan to do with her, ma’am?”
“Not sure. If Anton and Svetlana killed her pack, I’d hate to give her a werewolf lobotomy. She’s more of a victim. It might not be too late to re-educate her.”
Jesper’s softened gaze remained on the attractive beta. Like Thorn, probably smitten with the lone she-wolf. “Can’t we send her to one of our shrinks?” He turned to Lev. “Sir, you can do some sort of mind wipe or apply false memories. Especially since she, through no fault of her own, ended up with a criminal pack.”
Lev smirked. “Does the entire LIA know of my talents?”
Jesper lowered his head. “Sorry, sir. I’m in charge of all Team Greywolf profiles and privy to delicate information.”
“I can with humans, but I can only control werewolf minds for short periods. Even her memories about her past are locked away.” He scratched his head. “But I can try to open them.”
Rylee smiled. “If you can’t reach her mind, Lunara might be able to reach her spirit.”
Lev had never considered studying wolf shamanism and magic until he met Rachel. His connection with her seemed more than just her blood and hot body.
“Brilliant.” Jesper blurted and lowered his head. “Ma’am.”
“I left Lunara a message to get here ASAP.”
Lev lifted a brow. “You still think the attempt to steal Stallo’s bones is related to the rogue wolf pack?”
“My gut says so,” said Rylee.
Lev did not like where this was going. The wolf wizard’s bones and the recent lunar eclipse kidnapping smelled of magic. Did they hope to use Stallo women to bear hybrids with Stallo’s magical powers? Maybe add cloning to the mix. Clone Stallo and have Rachel carry him to term. His blood pumped with rage. Had they invited him to join as a possible mutant stud? Perhaps to enhance the offspring’s powers. A race of mutant wolf mages.
Rachel stared at the collar Cricket held. Black and thick. The type of collar used on a junkyard guard dog or some kinky bondage store. “No way I’m wearing that.”
Cricket tossed it on the sofa. “I don’t blame you.” She laughed. “To think this was your father’s when he first joined.”
Rachel realized she knew next to nothing about Howard. Did he don a harness and muzzle as well, on his knees as Selene planted a black heel on his ass? “Oh, gross. Why would you have it?” She’d spent the last three days with Cricket going over lycan etiquette, which turned out was different than what one saw in real wolf packs. In some ways, more human, but in other ways feral.
Cricket took her on a tour of the grounds. Rachel still felt a shiver as the weres gave her hard looks and sniffed as she was introduced or walked by. Today, Cricket would show her what it meant to be an alpha’s pet. Though, since the last time she’d been with Lev, she only talked to him through her den intercom. He asked her about what she did and how he missed her, but thought it best she learn from her handler before meeting him again. Alone. In her den. Her only companion, Cricket, a snarky werewolf millennial.
“I dug it out of his archive box.”
“You can tell dear old dad, I’ll take his old medical book collection instead.”
“Trust me. If he could, he’d kick my ass if he knew I brought it.”
I wish I could kick your ass. “I had dinner at his and Selene’s den last night and he didn’t wear a collar.”
“He doesn’t have to when he’s with Rylee’s pack or in the field during combat or rescue missions, but if he visits the king’s pack or attends a lycan council meeting then he wears a bracelet.”
“I suppose that’s less humiliating. What does Mia wear?”
“Several beautiful necklaces, but because she has special status as a mother of wolves, like you might someday, she really doesn’t have to anymore.” She smiled. “Although, she likes to wear one similar to that one when they do kinky role play.”
Too much information. Plus, she was getting wet just thinking about Lev as her master. Pretty sure, Cricket’s wolfish sense of smell detected her dark desires. “For now, I’d rather wear a collar like Mia than be kept as a breeder of Stallo hybrids.”
Cricket scowled. “Hey, cool it. My best friend is pregnant with a hybrid.”
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to offend. I’m still suffering from culture shock.”
“It’s cool. Mia had just as bad an experience.”
Rachel paused. “Wait, I thought lycans were only fertile in the spring?”
“Apparently, Dominic’s chemistry because of their blood connection matched hers.”
“I hope Lev is not addicted.”
Cricket gave her a guarded look. “Could be his mutant powers prevent the blood bond addiction? What does your father think?”
“He admitted there is a lot about Lev’s physiology that remains a mystery.” She swallowed. “I never mentioned he bit me, at least not recently.”
“Your bite marks were obvious when I arrived that first morning.”
“Yeah, but by the time I saw Howard, they were gone.”
“They heal quickly. Even quicker from Chernobyl Werewolf.”
“I prefer you call him Lev.”
“No problem.” Cricket quirked her brows. “Did you discuss mating Lev with your father?”
“No. Lev and I thought we should wait until the rogue werewolves are destroyed and it’s safe for me to leave. He wants me to make a logical decision if I really want to be his mate and live with a pack.”
“We all know Lev claimed you. Selene must have spilled the beans to Howard.”
“No hiding secrets around here.”
“Unless, Rylee ordered Selene not to say anything.”
“I don’t know if that’s something you would keep from, for lack of a better term, your mate.”
“Rylee is our alpha so pretty much we’re all her bitches. If she says don’t tell, you don’t tell. Any who, Howard can’t do anything about it since Lev’s claim is forever.”
Rachel lowered her gaze. “I know. Which makes me feel like shit, knowing I can leave him and he’d pine away for the rest of his life.”
“True, but it’s not like he’d be celibate the rest of his life. He might even take a secondary mate.”
Rachel had no right to be jealous, but the thought of Lev with anyone caused her stomach to tighten. “What is a secondary mate?”
“A mate taken with his primary mate’s permission. Someone he can start a family with or as a beloved companion. Most lycans only take a secondary if they are forced to mate with one they don’t love or lost the love of their lives.”
“Naturally, I would give him permission.”
Cricket laughed with teasing mirth. “But you really don’t want to.”
Rachel crossed her arms. “Of course, I would.”
Cricket rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right.”
“Okay, so I’d be jealous, but not letting him go would make me one hell of a selfish bitch.”
“Honestly, based on your physiology, Lev belongs to you.”
“Isn’t there some lycan etiquette about not reading one’s emotions?”
“Sorry. Anyway, it doesn’t matter what he told Howard. Lev’s wolf will do as he pleases, no matter what the man wants.”
“I never brought up Lev when visiting Howard. We mostly talked about Stallo and his odd sort of magic and transgenic manipulation as well as details about lycan society.”
