Lethal Desire

by Fel Fern

  Joe recalled Lena and Scot, two new pack soldiers, were assigned to this area. He spotted the pair chatting against a nearby tree. Both looked relaxed, but then again, they were far away from the border which separated their lands from the neutral territory where humans, shifters, or Espers were open season. A month ago, the Discipline Squad had dared to kidnap shifters and Espers on the areas near Devil Hills. Since the community kept to themselves, the humans maybe thought they wouldn’t get involved.

  They were wrong.

  The pack made the decision to eliminate those humans who thought no one had the guts to challenge their authority or assumed Devil Hills wouldn’t give a damn if other shifters and Espers who didn’t fall to their protection started disappearing.

  “What about Joe?” Lena was asking Scot. Both werewolves were in human form, rifles shouldered behind them.

  Back in Deacon’s father time, the pack only used their natural weapons. Guns were used by humans, but after seeing their old packmates gunned down like slaughtered animals, Deacon made sure the pack had access to state-of-the-art weapons and knew how to use them.

  Still not announcing his presence, Joe padded closer. What could these two pups be gossiping about him? To be fair, both were in their mid-twenties, but Joe, like most of the enforcers, had been in charge in training promising pack members to fight and defend their land. He saw some of them as a younger family member, not a prospective lover.

  “Well, I won’t mind climbing into bed with our sexy team leader,” Scot was saying.

  Joe growled, making the two of them jump. Scot turned bright red at the sight of him.

  “J-Joe, I thought it was your day off,” Lena mumbled, then remembered her duties. “The patrol’s been silent so far.”

  “In fact, we’re going now,” Scot said quickly, avoiding looking at him.

  They were good pups, Joe mused, but sometimes young adults needed to be reminded to stay on guard. True, the humans hadn’t made a move since Lance led a team to end a kidnapping operation, sending a message to the humans that they couldn’t just poach shifters near their land.

  Still, Joe had been there the day the pack had been nearly massacred. Some of the younger generation only knew about their history but never experienced the pain, anguish, or intense hatred that Joe and the others went through.

  Joe distrusted humans on a deep level, had opposed Deacon’s decision to allow some humans seeking temporary refuge in their lands, even if those humans were hunted down only because a family member was an Esper or shifter.

  He moved on, checking on the other members of his team. It soothed his wolf, being around fellow packmates in the silent woods that he knew like the back of his hand. When Joe neared the border, that sense of momentary peace shattered. He lifted his head and sniffed. Copper in the air. Then a moan. Underneath that, his nose caught the most enticing scent.

  Without realizing what he was doing, Joe broke into a run and sprinted for the direction of the open road, not bothering to howl for back-up. Reckless had never been in his dictionary and yet he threw caution to the wind and went searching for the source of that alluring smell.

  Chapter Two

  Subject 342 shivered, putting his arms around his naked body. Clothes. A warm room. He needed those. The bright afternoon sun seemed to glare down at him. After being kept in darkness for so long, 342 thought he’d welcome the natural light. He was wrong. Raising a shaky hand over his eyes, he looked at the road behind him, at the tire marks left by the van.

  Voss finally made good on his word, finally gave him freedom.

  No, was this some kind of test?

  Cobwebs lingered in his mind. When 342 tried to remember what the hell had happened to him, what Voss did to him, a headache formed in the back of his head, one that would eventually turn into a migraine.

  “I’m not a number. My name is Theo,” he said under his breath.

  Don’t talk to yourself so much, people might think you’re crazy.

  Theo laughed to himself. His mother said that to him once, except he had trouble discerning truth from lies. He had a family once, a brother. Tommy had been important to Voss while he was only the leash Voss used to make Tommy comply to his demands.

  Wait. Were those memories real or implanted?

  Theo couldn’t tell anymore. He dragged his gaze from the tire tracks to the road up ahead of him, at the simple sign on the right side of the road.

  “Warning, you’re entering Devil Hills territory. Uninvited intruders will be killed on sight,” he read out loud. Just great. Maybe Voss decided to toss him to the wolves to die. Why not kill him in the lab, though?

  I have one last use for you.

  Theo began hearing it again, the sound of a ticking clock in his head.

  “I’m going insane,” he whispered, staring at the sign. Tommy was gone. So were his parents. Never mind the peaceful life they’d lived before that, when they’d only been a normal family living in New City. No, they’d never been that. They were always trying to blend in, pretending to be like all the other human families in their neighborhood.

  A shifter needed to change forms occasionally, though, needed to be in his second skin. Tommy slipped.

  What did it matter? If Theo took one step into Devil Hills land, would that guarantee him instant death? A screech from one of the nearby trees made him jump. He snapped his head toward that direction, seeing a fierce bird of prey with red feathers. A red-tailed hawk, he realized, recalling a book he once read in school.

  Were hawks supposed to be that huge? A second and a third joined the first bird. He shivered, guts twisting as he took a step forward. The first hawk lifted its wings and flew away. The others watched him with those sharp golden gazes.

  A warning, he felt it deep in his bones.

  No more. Theo had enough. He was ready to die, except a nagging feeling inside him reminded him he had one last job to do.

  I need to see Deacon Becker, the Demon Alpha of the Devil Hills wolf pack, or his mate, Daryl Rush.

  How did he even know that information? Those words, too, seemed implanted in his head.

  A snarl came from up ahead, making all the hairs on his arms rise. He lifted his gaze, sucked in a breath as he caught sight of the largest wolf he’d ever seen. Fur the color of bronze, the beast was made of pure muscle, and when it opened its enormous jaws, Theo glimpsed sharp, long fangs.

  Not a normal wolf. This must be a werewolf.

  Theo took another step. This time the wolf let out a howl, which paralyzed every bone in his body. The longer Theo stared at the wolf, the longer his examination. This beautiful monster, for it was that, had been built to take down prey with ease.

  He spread his arms open, a gesture of surrender. Another growl. His bare foot crunched on tiny rocks and gravel, but after what Voss put him through, he barely felt the cuts on his feet. The werewolf broke into a run at a speed that seemed impossible for its size. Theo blinked. One moment, he’d been standing, the next, two hundred pounds of muscle collided against him, sending him stumbling.

  His back hit the road. Theo clenched his fists, squirmed when he felt claws digging into his chest, his hollow belly. He shut his eyes. Any moment now, and he’d only feel momentary pain. Then he could see Tommy, his mom, and his dad, except the werewolf didn’t sink his claws into skin.

  “Please,” he uttered, not caring how he sounded or appeared.

  The pressure on his chest and belly shifted as paws turned to human hands. It was no longer a savage monster on top of him, but a dangerously beautiful man replaced the wolf instead. Theo didn’t know what was preferable.

  This werewolf placed his hands on either side of his head, still straddling him. He swallowed, dared look past the man’s face to see miles of hard muscle, skin occasionally marked by claw marks, old scars. This stranger had the body of a warrior and the biggest dick he’d ever seen.

  His dick twitched to life and shock rippled through him. After all he’d seen and witnessed, he’d
never thought he’d ever feel desire again.

  “I’m up here, little human,” said a voice that wasn’t quite human, because a growl accompanied those words.

  Blushing, he looked up, seeing a strong jaw, a chiseled and handsome face with intense pupils that looked like liquid gold under the sunlight. The werewolf had the same hair color as his wolf’s fur, a rich bronze. Theo was tempted to run his hand through that hair, to see how it felt like under his hands.

  He began to reach out, not thinking, but the werewolf gripped his wrist, stared far too long at it.

  Theo realized what caught the shifter’s attention—the numbers inked there. 342.

  The werewolf snarled, and he wondered what pissed the shifter off.

  “Who are you, and where the fuck did you come from?” demanded the shifter.

  “Me? I’m no one,” he whispered. Just a consolation prize that came with the main one.

  “Don’t lie to me. I can rip out your throat if I want.”

  Those words triggered something inside him, the old self that died during his time in Voss’s prison. “I see you rocking an impressive erection. Are you sure you want to kill me, or do you want to fuck me?”

  Shit. No talking back. That had been one of the rules in that place, except he was no longer in his cell but the outside world he longed to return to. Except what was this place? Theo had longed for home, the apartment he grew up in, where he fought for the last double fudge brownie their mom made with Tommy while their dad read a newspaper in one corner, ignoring the three of them.

  Home was only a memory now and he was out here in the Wilderness, naked, half-starved, and the prey of a gorgeous monster that shouldn’t intrigue him on so many levels. The Wilderness. That was what he and other kids Tommy and he grew up with called the areas outside New City, the territories that didn’t fall under the control of the Humans Matter government.

  The werewolf swore, and to his shock, started sniffing the side of his neck before pulling away as if the shifter had an inner struggle going on. It was insane to think the shifter would be interested in a scrawny guy like him. Theo thought he had decent looks, had been referred to by the guys he dated in high school and college as the cute guy next door.

  He had no illusions of what he looked like now—a walking skeleton.

  “Your name?” the werewolf asked.

  “Yours first.” Theo didn’t know why the shifter didn’t kill him on sight, or why he didn’t feel scared around the big, dangerous male. That had been the one emotion he’d been living in for months, ever since he’d been thrown in that cell and told he was only a disposable number.

  “Joe.”

  He laughed, unable to help it. The werewolf narrowed his eyes. “Like, just Joe?”

  The werewolf didn’t laugh, didn't get his joke. “Your turn, human.”

  “Theo Wilmer, and why do you say ‘human’ like that, like we’re a plague or something?”

  Joe flashed him a razor-sharp smile that made him wary. “Humans murdered my parents and my packmates.”

  Shit.

  “But I’m not technically human. My mother was a magpie shifter. The genes are dormant in her and in me, my brother only got the gift.” Why was he revealing all this information so easily? Hell, didn’t Theo plan on ending his life today? Why die when life got so suddenly interesting, though?

  “And where are they now?”

  He looked away from that intense gaze. “Dead. I’m the only one left.”

  “I know this mark, seen it before,” Joe said, lifting his wrist. It struck Theo how the werewolf held his hand up carefully, as if the werewolf was being careful, as if Joe thought he was made of glass. That shouldn’t matter, except the small voice inside him spoke up again.

  Show him you’re made of sterner stuff, that you won’t break easily.

  “Where?” he asked.

  “The pack tangled with Discipline Squad members before.”

  Of course they did. The Devil Hills community had been on the Squad’s special enemy list, special because unlike smaller groups the Squad had no problem wiping out or taking for experimentation, the Squad had trouble breeching this particular territory.

  According to Voss, they even lost plenty of members, even their precious ‘rehabilitated’ Espers. Theo knew this because when Voss did his number on him, Voss liked to talk as if he didn’t exist, like he was a bug Voss could squash anytime.

  “You’re a trap sent by Voss,” Joe finally said.

  He shivered, not denying it, because Theo wasn’t sure of himself, either. That could be the reason why Voss sent his Squad members to drop him here.

  “I want to see Daryl Rush.” The words came out of his mouth before he could stop himself.

  Joe snarled, sharpened teeth too close to his neck. His pupils turned completely yellow, and he knew that a shifter’s eye color changed when they got riled up, or intense emotions rode them.

  “Like hell I’ll let you near Daryl,” Joe said with a hiss.

  “Then kill me,” he said simply. “If I’m that much of a threat, eliminate me.”

  Joe recoiled, as if he were struck. “What’s wrong with you? Did they brainwash you to say those words to me?”

  He thought about that question a little longer. “The first bit, yes, the dying not so much. I want to die. That’s my own decision.”

  “Why are you being honest with me, or is this another ploy?”

  “If you don’t trust any words that come out of my mouth, then why ask?”

  “Sassy little thing, aren’t you?”

  One of the hawks flew down from the trees, and he turned his head, eyes widening as the hawk changed to human. A hawk shifter. He remembered Voss saying it wasn’t just the wolves he had to watch out for.

  Shit. Why did he have to be on guard around these shifters or heed the warnings of the man who killed his parents and Tommy, and tortured him for months?

  Maybe I’m better off dead after all.

  Chapter Three

  “Maybe it’s fine dying at the hands of a scary and sexy werewolf,” muttered Theo underneath him.

  Joe frowned at the words, stumped by the honesty Theo displayed when he admitted to being a trap from the Discipline Squad. Shifters could tell when humans lied, and he only sensed honesty from Theo. No elevated heartbeat or excessive sweat. Theo said those words in a calm voice. Fuck, what was it about this scrawny broken man that called to his wolf, that prevented Joe from granting his wish?

  Claws slid out of his left hand.

  “Joe, Maia, the hawk shifter in charge of watching this road, confirms this human was dropped off by a white Discipline Squad truck,” said the hawk shifter, who changed to human form to report to him.

  Too distracted by the enticing prey under him, Joe forget they had company. Shit. He didn’t the confirmation. The other shifter changed back to animal form and flew away, but Joe knew he and Theo would be watched. Damn it, he wished he didn't howl just now so he could handle this solo.

  He returned his gaze to the human—could he really call Theo that? Theo admitted to possessing dormant shifter genes in him, too. Defeat existed in those hazel eyes. Theo was ready to die. Any enforcer for the pack would eliminate any threat posed to the community, but he hesitated. If Theo truly meant him harm, Theo would have tried something, Joe reasoned, not just laid there, waiting for his next move.

  Joe cursed and tapped his claws on Theo’s pulse point. It would gut him to see blood gush out and witness the life leaving Theo’s eyes.

  Give him a chance, said the predator who lived in his skin, the same wolf who went berserk at the sight of enemies.

  A hawk screeched from the trees. They were probably wondering what the hell he was doing. Joe sheathed his claws, making Theo blink.

  “I thought you were going to kill me,” Theo rasped.

  Joe didn’t know what possessed him to cup Theo’s chin, or why he leaned forward and did the unexpected. He plundered Theo’s mouth, which looked so tem
pting, so luscious. For a moment, Theo stilled, but soon pressed one hand against his left pectoral, kissing him back with a ravenous hunger which echoed his own.

  His dick thickened between his legs, then he remembered Theo probably had been through hell and needed medical attention. A healer. He pulled away, licking at his lips to see Theo looking stunned, silent question in his eyes.

  Joe shouldn’t have done that. It was so inappropriate on so many levels, but both the man and wolf inside him craved a taste. His wolf felt wide awake inside him, pacing restlessly back and forth.

  Keep him. He’s ours.

  Those words rattled him. Truth be told, they scared Joe a little, because very few things unsettled an enforcer of the Devil Hills pack. Theo wanted to see Daryl—a warning. Theo looked confused, probably brainwashed. A sleeper spy?

  Anything was possible when it came to the Discipline Squad, he knew that. Once, Santino fought off a rehabilitated Esper who possessed the ability to cloak the other human Squad members. If it weren’t for Santino’s Esper abilities, those Squad members would have penetrated their territory without anyone knowing.

  What if the Squad purposely created a bait he or another dominant wolf couldn’t resist? Dominant werewolves were born to protect the weaker members of their pack, after all. Theo wasn’t pack but his wolf considered Theo theirs. Why?

  “You’re coming with me,” he said, voice harsh.

  The hawks made protesting noises now.

  “I’ll tell Deacon myself,” he told their avian allies as he got off Theo. He bent down easily but gently gathered Theo in his arms. Theo barely weighed a thing.

  “What are you doing?” Theo whispered as Joe began carrying him into the woods.

  “Taking you, what else?” In truth, Joe didn’t how to answer him, because he was out of his mind, bringing the enemy into their lands. Was Theo truly an enemy, though? Why did the Squad leave a naked and obviously tortured man on the road right outside their borders?