Entangled

by Olivia Stocum

  Entangled

  Entangled

  By

  Olivia Stocum

  Copyright © 2020 Olivia Stocum

  All rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law. Reviewers may quote brief excerpts in connection with a review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidences are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is coincidental.

  What reviewers are saying about:

  The Tangled Moon Saga:

  Lothar, Nick and Danielle are all really interesting characters and the strained relationship between them gives this series a solid foundation to work from. As is the norm with this author’s books, you know from the beginning that you are in for some serious surprises and she doesn’t let you down. There is plenty of action in this novel to keep you whipping through pages, but she also gives you the emotional aspects of her characters and their relationships to one another. Even the side characters come off as important and integral to the overall plot.

  ~Ionia Martin, book reviewer for Readful Things

  I've read a few paranormal romance books. I really enjoyed this one. The characters have well-rounded backgrounds and the werewolf physiology and politics are different from any other book I've read. It adds an interesting complication to werewolves’ love life.

  ~ Goodreads Reviewer, Rose Davis

  Praise for Olivia Stocum’s novels:

  “The research was impeccable and the story is lovely and compelling. I found the relationships well thought out and believable. This type of writing deserves to go on for longer than a single book. I’m looking forward to her next novel.”

  ~Ionia Martin, book reviewer for Readful Things

  "Olivia has crafted an adventurous love story with two unforgettable characters. Her vivid descriptions paint an epic journey of boundless love between two souls who must become one. Her tender and poetic prose reminded me of the book, “Cold Mountain.”

  ~Stan Bednarz, award winning author of Miracle on Snowbird Lake.

  “What do you get when you add the beautiful 1600s Scottish countryside, men in kilts, and the women who love them to a story that features a virile, cloaked defender known only as Blackhawk? An exciting, captivating page-turner by Olivia Stocum, that's what! DAWNING has a home on my 'keepers' shelf!”

  ~ Loree Lough, bestselling author of 100 award-winning books.

  Novels by Olivia Stocum:

  Historic Scotland ~

  Dawning

  Moonstone

  Starlight

  Historic England ~

  Enduringly Yours

  A Worthy Opponent

  The Tangled Moon Saga ~

  Tangled Moon

  Intertwined

  Entangled

  Chapter One

  Kendra Shepard was aware, from firsthand experience, that everything that went bump in the night had a perfectly logical explanation. One ready and waiting to kill her.

  She was startled awake by a scratching sound outside her window. She hated it when her brother was gone overnight. It was great that Greg and Stephanie, the girl who’d only been in love with him since the third grade, were finally together, but did they have to be so into each other that they lost complete track of time? For all Kendra knew the both of them could be dead on the side of the road somewhere, bleeding to death in a ditch, with no one within miles to save them...

  Okay, so maybe she was exaggerating.

  But then again, maybe not.

  “They’re fine,” she told herself. Kendra listened to the sound of her heart beating much too fast for its own good. “He’s probably just staying over at her place.”

  She heard it again, a tapping sound on the glass. Didn’t the tree outside make more of a scratching sound than a tapping one? She knew she should have asked Greg to cut that tree back.

  The chime of breaking glass had her scrambling out of bed. Dressed in satin pants and a camisole, Kendra reached under her mattress, pulling out the knife she kept there. Coated in a rare poison, it was more than sharpened steel. If anyone so much as pricked themselves with it they’d be dead in a matter of minutes.

  Even the undead.

  Her phone on the nightstand went off. At first she ignored the text, but when two more followed she knew she had to check. Kendra grabbed her phone, the knife in her other hand as she looked over the messages that had just come through. They were from the local wolf pack.

  Trouble.

  Stay put.

  Help is on the way.

  “Stay put so I can make a nice easy target? I don’t think so,” she told the phone.

  Tossing it at the bed, Kendra made her way down the hallway and toward the top of the stairs. She stopped, listening. Damn things could be completely silent when they wanted. The only light was coming from a window at the top of the stairs. Moonlight shined palely over the wooden railing.

  A board creaked. There was a shadow on the stairway. She backed closer to the wall with her knife. In the time it took her to inhale, she found herself trapped by a tall, dark body, its back to her.

  Don’t panic if you want to stay alive, she warned herself, remembering what she’d learned from her werewolf friends.

  She smelled the earthy scent of a new leather jacket, mixed in with his pheromones. She’d been sleeping alone since Jason had died and her body became suddenly all too aware of the deficiency. Her cheeks burned with awareness. Despite knowing what he was and that he planned to soon kill her, she still wanted to wrap her arms around him, to lift her face to his and bare her throat.

  Slave vampires scared the hell out of her.

  This vampire… He was a Master.

  She flexed her arm, trapped as she was in the corner by him. Her knife couldn’t pierce his tough skin. It would only work on the most vulnerable area of his body. One with no skin at all. The eyes.

  She tried to get around him but he put his arm out so quickly that she only saw a blur block her path. He turned his face slightly toward her, seemed to be listening for something. He towered easily a foot above her. His skin was olive-toned, hair below his shoulders. Must have been about thirty years old when he’d been turned into a vampire.

  “Let me go,” she said. Kendra didn’t waste her energy struggling. She let her voice do the work.

  His chin lifted as if he hadn’t expected her to say anything at all. He probably figured his pheromones had drugged her and she’d do anything for him. Tough luck there, bud. His brown eyes flicked to her face, then downward. He let off of her for a convenient look. Kendra felt the full force of that assessment. It told its tale all too clearly in his eyes. She really wished she wasn’t braless and in her pajamas.

  “You will stay,” he said in a foreign accent.

  She felt the sway of his powers. He was strong, but she was aware of the games vampires played.

  “No,” she managed, shaking her head.

  He turned further, staring down at her, at once the most beautiful, and terrifying, thing she’d ever seen. His eyes were strangely human. Something in her gave a squeeze. Her heart? No. Not that. Just her libido.

  He spoke again. “You will do as I say.”

  It took her a moment to fight his mind control. “No, I won’t,” she said.

  He looked at the knife in her hand. She flashed it under his nose. His lips peeled back, showing a set of elongated fangs. She tried to get away but he still had her cornered.

  He caught her hand, looking at the knife. “Werewolf venom,” he said
.

  “Yes, and the pack is already on their way. So I’d leave now if I were you.”

  His fangs retracted to reveal a charming smile in its place. “I wasn’t even sure I had the right house, habibti,” he said. “I know the werewolves are coming, because it was I who called them.”

  “You?”

  There was a rustling on the stairs. He turned his back between her and them. Kendra peered around his arm as two vampires, one male, one female, came up the stairway. They were no more than eighteen in human years, matching jeans and hoodies ragged, sneakers untied, laces dangling.

  Metal flashed. The tall vampire guarding her had a knife. It wasn’t hers. That was still in her hand. His movements were so fast she couldn’t tell what he was doing. The young male vampire fell, hissing and clutching his face. The female went down seconds later. They thrashed on the landing by the stairs then stopped moving altogether.

  He grabbed Kendra by the hand and started dragging her past them and down the stairs.

  “Wait,” she said, pulling uselessly again his iron grip. “What do you mean you called the pack? Who are you? And how did you get werewolf venom?”

  “The same way you did, I assume.”

  She missed a step and ran into him. He said something under his breath in a foreign language, then pushed her behind him as they entered the living room. He pulled out another knife. She saw a baldric full of them beneath his black leather jacket.

  A vampire hunting vampires? She’d never heard of it.

  He left the knife in one Slave’s eye, turned, and backhanded a second. He pulled out another knife and stabbed that one too.

  “Come on,” he said. “We’re leaving.”

  “What, with you? No.”

  “Your friends are taking too long. We’re leaving.”

  She planted her feet and refused to budge. He’d have to carry her out, which he probably would in a few more seconds. Kendra knew there wasn’t anything she could do to stop him but that didn’t mean she was going to roll belly up and give herself over.

  “We don’t have time for this,” he said smoothly. He touched her face. His hands were warm. That meant he’d fed recently. “You will leave with me now,” he said.

  She felt herself leaning closer. His palm cupped the back of her head, tipping her face to his. She could smell his breath, sweet, like a warm caress on her suddenly hypersensitive skin.

  Kendra wanted to kiss him.

  She wanted more than that. She wanted him to take her wherever he pleased, do whatever he wanted with her.

  “No,” she said. It was a plea now.

  Hissing, he turned abruptly, killing another vampire. Her head spun—cleared—and then she turned just as a female Slave with long black hair came at her, fangs bared. Kendra lifted her knife, knowing that even though she’d practiced with it vampires were fast and killing one would be a longshot.

  The Slave shrieked as she was tossed aside. The Master vampire picked her back up and pinned her against the wall this time, her feet flailing uselessly.

  “Enough,” he said.

  She stopped, hanging by her shoulders, trapped by one of his hands.

  “Tell your master, Re’Hotep wants to see him.”

  She nodded submissively and he let her go. She collapsed onto the floor.

  “Leave now and tell him,” he said.

  She scrambled to her feet and ran off.

  “How did you do that when you’re not her master?” Kendra asked.

  He turned back, stunning her for a moment with his sheer beauty. “I’m stronger than her master.” He stopped to kill another Slave. “And her master happens to be my son.”

  “Your son? But I thought you guys couldn’t...” she let it trail off stupidly.

  His beautiful smile returned, making her feel weak. “I turned him into a vampire.”

  “Oh.”

  “And now, we go.”

  “No, we don’t go. I’m waiting for the pack. Your mind control won’t work on me. I already know all about that.”

  “Perhaps.” His lips quirked. “And yet perhaps not.” He walked up to her. He was so big that she took a step back. “Kendra Shepard.”

  “How do you know my name?”

  “Because he wants to kill you.”

  “Who does?”

  “Theron De’Sario.”

  She knew that name. “The werewolves are after him. But what does that have to do with me?”

  He reached for her arm but she pulled back.

  “Tell me what this has to do with me?” she repeated.

  “Why don’t we discuss this somewhere a little less crowded,” he said as another vampire crawled in through the broken window. He pulled out a knife and threw it. The Slave fell, screaming. Dismissing it, he turned back to her.

  This time Kendra knew he meant business. His eyes revealed his motives every time. She locked that knowledge away in case she needed to use it against him later. Assuming she lived that long.

  He reached for her and she instinctually turned to run, not seeing the prone body behind her. Tripping, she hit the floor nose first. She pushed herself up and saw blood dripping onto the floor. She was having trouble focusing and her forehead ached.

  She turned to see him bent over her.

  Kendra pushed backwards. His focus changed, seeing her knife ten feet away where it had skidded across the floor. She looked at her hand as it began to burn.

  Her nose wasn’t the only thing that was bleeding. So was her palm.

  She’d nicked it with the poisoned knife.

  This was it, she thought. She was twenty-nine years old. No children. Already a widow. And now she was going to die, just like Jason had.

  The vampire’s hands closed firmly over her arms. She couldn’t fight him as he pushed her back against the floor. Werewolf venom was in her veins, burning. He took her arm, one long-fingered hand clamping hard around her like a tourniquet. She felt his mouth on her skin as he sucked the blood out.

  Wait. Something wasn’t right. Shouldn’t she have felt his fangs? He spat out the blood, splattering it over her white floor.

  “Hey, I just cleaned that,” she slurred drunkenly, lightheaded from the werewolf venom. Ignoring her he sucked out more blood. The burning faded. Her forehead began to throb where she’d hit it.

  “I can’t taste it anymore,” he said. “I got it all. You are fortunate I was here, habibti. Werewolf venom is not for mortals.”

  She laughed at that. “It kills you too.”

  “Only when it is under my skin.”

  She caught the flash of something around his neck as he straightened. A silver crucifix. What kind of vampire wore a crucifix? What kind of vampire hunted other vampires?

  His eyes flicked over her, taking in her body again as his scent changed. She breathed him in.

  He smelled really good. Before she knew what was happening his mouth closed over hers hard and hungry. She yelped. He changed then, was gentle, melding to her like nothing she’d known before, as if reaching under her skin, digging through to the core of her. He trailed kisses over her face and down her throat. She found herself arching automatically to expose herself more fully, felt his teeth grazing her skin.

  She wanted him.

  He stopped with his fangs lightly pressing against the tender skin of her throat. It annoyed her.

  “Make a decision,” she demanded, grabbing his face and holding him to her. “Please.” Do it now. “Please...”

  She felt a sharp pinch, then euphoria spreading from the neck down. He was drinking from her, and she liked it.

  Then she realized what was happening.

  What was really happening.

  She was being eaten alive.

  Kendra pushed on his arms. “No, stop.”

  Another hesitation, then with a groan his fangs released and he lifted his head. Kendra found herself pressed in his arms with no memory of having gotten there. Blurry-eyed, she looked up at him, her palm flat against his chest
as if she actually had the strength to hold him back. She expected to see a monster bearing down on her.

  Instead, she found eyes like liquid honey in a human face. She’d seen that look on a man before. It seemed a lifetime ago, but no. Jason had only been dead for a month.

  “Habibti,” he said. His hands smoothed over her hair, down her shoulders. “I didn’t mean to.”

  He lifted her limply into his arms. She couldn’t move, not even in attempt to defend herself. She felt a blast of cold air and knew he had taken her outside.

  Chapter Two

  It had been years since he’d bitten a human, having long since lived on donated blood, first from the brethren at the monastery, then out of blood banks at hospitals and the Red Cross. He’d been very careful when he’d bitten Kendra. The kind of careful that had only come after centuries of discipline.

  As he looked at her sleeping, wrapped in his coat in his arms, he realized that for the first time in a hundred years he was purposely taking fate by the hand. He needed her as bait to draw out and destroy his son, but why did she have to be so beautiful?

  Why did she have to taste so good?

  He turned his mind forcefully to other things, took out his phone and texted Lothar Ludvitski, an alpha wolf and his contact among the werewolves.

  I have her. She’s safe, he typed.

  As safe as she could be, he finished to himself, the flavor of her still in his mouth, pulsing now through his veins.

  He received a text back. Thank you. Keep me informed.

  For whatever reason, Theron wanted Kendra, probably to use as a hostage against Lothar. If he wanted her, well then, he could come get her himself. When he did, Alessandro would be there waiting for him.