Wolf's Temptation (Caedmon Wolves Book 7)

by Kirk, Ambrielle

  I opened my eyes and stood back from the tree, peering up at the voluminous branches. I didn’t understand it. Why couldn’t I remember? Maybe I was being too hard on myself. Many people my age hadn’t retained early childhood memories. But surviving a house fire and nearly being struck by lightning were traumatic experiences I should have remembered.

  I pulled the mysterious letter out of my back pocket, unfolded it, and re-read the vague details. It could have at least included a telephone number. I glanced down at my watch. There was less than two hours before sundown, and I wasn’t staying out here to watch the light leave this place. There were no lamps out here, and I didn’t want to be in total darkness.

  “Dammit,” I exclaimed aloud. “I can’t stay here all evening looking for clues.”

  Was someone supposed to show up? Were they playing tricks on me? Did they stand me up?

  I pulled out my cell and unlocked it. No Service.

  “Great,” I groaned and crumpled up the letter. “This is bullshit!” I hurled it at the tree.

  I turned around and was about to head back to my car when I caught a flash of silver near the ground. I stopped in my tracks to look at it, but nothing else happened. I walked slowly back toward the tree, kicking at the snow as I went. Suddenly, the bottom of my boot scraped across a flat, wooden surface. I shoved the snow out of the way with my boot until I uncovered what looked like a small piece of plywood laid across the surface of the ground.

  I stomped lightly on it and a hollow sound echoed back at me. I bent on the ground and tried to peel the plywood back, but it was stuck among the rocks and packed down in the dirt. I used my bare fingers to dig the dirt and rocks away from the sides and corners. My fingers grew cold and my nails were filled with dirt, but I kept on working until I thought I had loosened it up enough to lift it.

  A tree branch snapped off in the distance somewhere and I lifted my head and glanced around hastily. There was a dense forest off to the right, but I had no plans to go in it. There was very little sunlight left, and I couldn’t remember anything about this place.

  “We found you in the forest, unconscious and soaking wet.”

  I closed my eyes and breathed in and out slowly, but the memory disappeared. I reopened my eyes.

  After no one rolled up in a car or on a broomstick or emerged from out of the forest, I returned my attention to the plywood board embedded in the ground.

  I pulled at the board again, grunting and cursing when it still didn’t give way.

  I knelt down with the soles of my boot planted firmly into the ground and tugged hard. My fingers, now sweaty and full of splinters, slipped and I tumbled backward, landing hard on my ass.

  I rose, hurt and angry, and dusted off my jeans. My hands ached and my fingers trembled. I glanced down at my palms and cringed at the blisters now riddling my skin.

  I sighed in defeat and stared at the plywood—the thing that had defeated me. The sun faded over the horizon, leaving me peering at the ground in the dusk.

  “Choose a normal life.”

  This time, it wasn’t my dad’s voice that came to me.

  “Run, Alessia.”

  The voice was familiar. I’d heard it before. It was the same voice that used to sing to me whenever I lost control.

  “Momma?” I whispered into the air.

  There was no answer.

  An emotionally electrifying charge surged through me, flooded outward into my arms, and gathered into the palm of my hands. Subduing my powers had never gotten me anywhere. Un-identifying with the very thing that made me who I was had never brought me answers. The simple fact was, I was who I was. There was no changing that. How could I live a normal life, when I wasn’t normal?

  I couldn’t run away from this. I had run away from the fire that killed my mom, and I had been hiding all of my life.

  “No more. I won’t live a lie.” I aimed the ball of energy within my palm at the plywood and released it.

  There was a loud crack and the board splintered and broke in half.

  Relief rushed through me at the release of so much tension and I hurriedly dropped to the ground and threw the remaining pieces of plywood aside.

  I pulled a tin box out from the ground, lightly dusting the dirt from it. Apprehension stole over me and I hesitated to lift the top. I didn’t feel like a kid at Christmas time about to open her first present. I felt like a scientist who may or may not have found the missing pieces to her formula.

  Casting all of my reservations aside, I slid the rusted closure up and lifted the lid. The inside was made of pink felt and it was in better condition than the outside. The ballerina doll inside popped up and spun around, but as I would expect from any musical box, no sound came out.

  Inside, there was a handmade necklace with a clear pendant tied to it. At first, I thought the pendant was empty, but a closer look revealed that there was a small seed inside about one centimeter in diameter.

  As I knelt down on the ground, wondering what this could mean or whom the necklace belonged to, I lost track of time. Instead, I got lost in my thoughts. Would Dad know anything about this box or this necklace? Had it belonged to my mother or me? Who had buried this box here under this yellowwood tree? Had the person intended for someone else to uncover it? Why had they locked it up so securely under the plywood?

  Just as I stood up, a growl sounded to the left of me. A huge wolf prowled out of the forest and made a beeline for me. Its yellow eyes glowed in the darkness and his lips were fixed in a snarl.

  The only thing I could read about this wolf was that I was its official target. The aura around it was clouded in nothing but aggressive anger and evil. The wolf before me was a shifter. A male.

  Trust no one. Trust nothing.

  I backed up slowly and nearly tripped over some rocks. A feral bark emitted from the wolf’s mouth and he charged. I spun around and took off, hoping to God I made it into my car before I became his supper.

  I never made it. Two paws slammed hard into my back, mowing me down to the ground. I cried out as I landed on my face and a rush of air expelled from my lungs. The music box went skidding away from me in the snow. I pushed up off the muddy ground and spit out clumps of dirt and snow. I scrambled around to see that the wolf was still taunting me like weak prey as I scooted backward toward my car. What had I been thinking trying to outrun a wolf?

  “What do you want?” I shouted.

  Of course, the wolf didn’t respond. Had I been wrong about it? Was there another soul inside capable of understanding that I was innocent and wasn’t here to cause any trouble?

  The wolf growled and lurked forward. White, foamy spittle dripped from his mouth.

  “Heel!” I commanded, but I might as well have been talking to a brick wall.

  Maybe I had been wrong. Maybe this wasn’t a shifter. Maybe he was a pureblood animal.

  My hand caught on something on the ground and I wrapped my fingers around it. Closer inspection revealed that it was a rock nearly as big as my hand.

  When the wolf came for me this time, baring sharp canines, I threw the rock at his face. He yelped, toppled over to the ground, and then pounced on top of me again. I held up my arms to guard my face, crying out in pain as the tip of his teeth scraped my forearm.

  My life flashed before my eyes. Was this how I was supposed to die, only a few days before my twenty-fifth birthday? By a wolf mauling? And all because I couldn’t accept the fact that I would never know what really happened the night my mom perished.

  The wolf’s putrid breath fanned out across my face. I held my breath and used all my strength to shove him off. His snout was so close to my face now. I kneed the wolf’s underbelly hard, knocking it about three feet to the right of me.

  I propelled myself off the ground, absorbed the ill tension between us to form a mixture of debris and rocks and hurled the energy ball at the wolf.

  After the force hit the wolf, the night went eerily silent. When the dust settled, the wolf lay on the groun
d still and unmoving. I could barely make out his head. A cracked skull, bloody carnage, and brain matter lay in a small pile where his head should have been. That part of the body must have taken the brunt of the blow.

  “Oh…” I covered my mouth as nausea rose up within me.

  My breath rushed out of me and so did the contents of my stomach. I doubled over and wiped the remnants of bile from my mouth with the back of my hand. I tasted my own blood where the wolf had bitten my arm.

  I grabbed the box then turned and ran to the safety of my car, more afraid than I was when I had first arrived.

  Holy shit, I had just killed something. Someone.

  Chapter Twenty

  Alessia

  Distraught and still in disbelief over what had just transpired, I burst into the kitchen from the garage. I already knew there was no way on Earth I could avoid my dad. The time was just a few minutes after 7 P.M. and I knew he’d be around preparing the dinner I had promised him I would attend. At this point, there was no place I’d rather be than home.

  My chest ached with the burden I had carried from 1906 Edgewood Trail, and as soon as I saw my dad I rushed into his arms.

  “Alessia.” He looked mortified. “What happened?”

  “I killed a wolf.”

  A panicked expression passed over my dad’s face. “Oh, my God. Are you okay?” He picked up my arms. “Jesus Christ, Alessia. Do we need to call nine-one-one, you have what looks like bites and scratches all over your arms and chest.”

  He tore a jacket from a chair and draped it across my shoulders.

  “No, please don’t call anyone.”

  “That animal could have had rabies. We need to get you checked out. I’m calling help out here pronto.” He dove for his cellphone.

  “No!” I exclaimed. “I’m fine, really.”

  “Where did it attack you?” He unlocked his cell phone.

  With minimal effort, I used my telekinesis to pluck the phone from his fingers and slide it across the table. I couldn’t even remember the last time I had used my powers against my dad.

  “Alessia…” Dad said in a warning tone.

  “Dad, this wolf wasn’t a normal animal. He was a shifter, both man and wolf.”

  A lump appeared on my dad’s throat momentarily and then disappeared. He sighed audibly. “Agnes had the same superstitions.”

  Agnes. He hadn’t spoken my mom’s name in ages. This was also the first time in years he’d ever talked about my mom and her superstitions.

  “Did she see the wolf auras, too?” I asked.

  “Yes.” Dad slumped his shoulders and sat down in the chair right next to me. “She told me she could detect shifters right around the same time she revealed to me that she was a witch.”

  “I visited the old house today,” I said.

  “The old house?”

  “1906 Edgewood. Remember?”

  “Yes. Was there anyone there?” he asked, slowly.

  I shrugged. “Just the wolf.” I pulled the pendant with the seed in it out of my pocket and placed it on the table. “And this.”

  Dad slowly reached across the table to touch the necklace. “Agnes made this. It’s an amulet.”

  “How do you know?”

  He traced the necklace. “She made them all the time when we were together. She wrapped the wire around the pendant in the same manner each time.”

  “Why would she hide the amulet under a tree?”

  “I don’t know. After our breakup and after I found out that she was pregnant, she cut me off completely. I found ways to check in on her without her knowing, but it wasn’t enough—” a pained expression marked his face “—it wasn’t enough to keep her alive.”

  “If she loved you and you loved her, then why did this happen?”

  “She was betrothed to another man. We thought we could run off together and make a new name for ourselves, but her family caught up with her. They didn’t care that she was already pregnant. Obviously, this union meant more to them than a child being ripped out of its father’s life. She said if I ever came near her that they would kill both of us,” Dad said. “I kept my distance. I swear I did until I heard on the news about the fire. I just couldn’t…” He shook his head and diverted his gaze.

  “And that’s when you found me in the forest, unconscious.”

  “I was very careful about hiring the right people to make sure that no one knew that I had taken you that night or where I had taken you. I also knew in the back of my mind that sooner or later her family would find you.”

  “Her family?”

  “Agnes’s side of the family. They’re all witches, including Agnes’s dad. Their craft is passed on at a very early age. Agnes began to learn at six years old. When I took you in, you had no knowledge of the craft. I figured either Agnes hadn’t taught you, or your memory along with whatever you had learned up until that point when I found you had been erased during the thunderstorm on the night of the fire.”

  “But that doesn’t explain why I’m telekinetic,” I countered.

  “Well, for one, you’re an empath, regardless of your craft. As for your heritage, you’re getting stronger. Agnes was twenty-three when we met. About a year into our relationship, her people came for her. It was almost as if something clicked in Agnes…something turned on…and they just showed up out of nowhere at our apartment complex. She left with them. After that, we behaved like convicts trying to see each other. She said she feared for my life more than hers, but all I wanted to do was love her. One night after we were together, I convinced her to travel out of the state with me to go to a national park to collect some rocks and crystals to make her jewelry. My plan was to get us out of the country. I had plane tickets, passports, new IDs…everything. We were days away from departure, and then she got word that her mother died. She left me so she could attend the funeral. Except for the letter that she sent to me saying that she had chosen her craft, that was the last time I communicated with her before she died.”

  I sighed deeply.

  Dad continued, “Your mom chose to hide out until she couldn’t anymore. She chose her craft in the end. It had always been a part of her.”

  “She couldn’t lead a normal life, but she wanted me to.”

  “You can, Alessia,” Dad said. “That’s what she wanted.”

  “How?”

  “Repeat what I did when I found you after the fire. Take the money and create a new identity for yourself. All connections up until this point must be lost.”

  “That would mean losing you and…” I shook my head. “There has to be another way.”

  “Your mom chose the other option. She took to her craft to protect you,” Dad said.

  “So, I can either run from it or accept it.”

  “You wouldn’t be the first to run.”

  “I’d be on the run like all those other witches we read about in the news who are trying to keep their true selves low-key enough to survive,” I said.

  “Yes,” he said, solemnly.

  “I’d literally have to reboot my life. This could become a never-ending cycle. A cycle where I’d still always wonder what if.”

  “I don’t want to lose you either way. And I want to be there for you always,” Dad said. “But if you’re safer unattached from me, then so be it.”

  “What do they want? My mother is now dead. What more do they want from her or me?”

  “I don’t know,” Dad said quietly. “I wish I knew, but is finding out really worth putting your life in danger? Speaking of…why did you go there?”

  “I found a letter in my mailbox down at the shop. The note directed me to come out to the property alone. Whoever wrote it said they’d show me who I was. I found the amulet near the yellowwood tree—the tree that was struck by lightning,” I said.

  “Alessia, you should have told me. You never should have gone out there by yourself. You could have been killed.”

  “I could have, but maybe another part of me knew that I could fig
ht to live. Just like I did on the night you found me.”

  Dad smiled. “I thank God for you every day.”

  “I’m very remorseful about the way I had to end someone’s life. I’m pretty certain it was a shifter. What I don’t regret, are what little clues I gained, including the amulet. Apparently, to my mom’s family, I’m Alessia Osborne, not Alessia van der Hoeff.”

  My dad narrowed his gaze. “Osborne…I don’t know any. Your mom used an alias.”

  I sighed. “I can’t live without knowing any longer. I have to follow this through.”

  Dad dropped his head and looked down at the floor. He lifted his gaze quickly and said, “I could hire a bodyguard for you.”

  I laughed nervously. Based on the eager glint in his eyes, I could tell he was serious.

  “I’m for real.” He frowned. “I don’t know what happened between Agnes and her family or who killed her, but I’m very suspicious of her family. I haven’t told you this before, but I think they had something to do with the fire.”

  “If that’s true…” I shook my head, not wanting to think about the possibility that I could be walking right into a trap. Maybe the person who wrote that letter didn’t have my best interests in mind. Being attacked by a wolf shifter in a place where they had led me couldn’t be just an unsettling coincidence. Could it?

  Would I be able to confess what I had done? Could Dawson tell me more?

  “There is something else.” Dad focused on something behind me. “Wait here.”

  He got up and walked out of the kitchen and into the living area. I could tell he hadn’t gone far because I heard a noise near the fireplace.

  When he came back, he placed a small metal box on the table. The rectangular-shaped box was dark gray and had a chrome lock attached to it, reminding me of those lockboxes a person would get from their banks.

  “I wanted to wait until Monday like I was instructed to, but I can’t bear making you wait in agony any longer,” Dad said. “I think you’re maturing faster than your mother did.”

  “What is it?” I breathed.

  He waved his hand over the box in front of him. “Remember when I told you that I found a box in your mom’s car after she died?”