“Oh, yes,” she breathed with a significant blush. “Six times, in fact. It’s one of my favorites. Have you seen it?”
“I have the DVD,” he rumbled in his deep voice.
“Lucky you,” she murmured, suddenly seeming a bit shy. “Well, sorry about running into you like that.” She eyed him doubtfully. “I didn’t, um, hurt you or anything, did I?”
The very idea had Dieter doing something he hadn’t done in a very long time. He smiled. “No.”
Angelica laughed then. “Right. Good night, then.”
When Dieter did not attempt to move, Angelica stepped around him. With a final smile and a shy little wave, she was gone, and he was left standing there, watching her until she was out of sight.
He relayed the story in as few words as possible. When he was finished, Derrick looked every bit as stunned as the others.
“Thor?!” Steffen chuckled, unable to conceal his amusement any longer. Christophe tried to hide his smile by turning away. Antoine simply roared with laughter. Even Silas’ mouth turned upward in a half-grin.
“So, she has touched upon each of you,” Derrick said thoughtfully. “What of you, Niko? How does Angelica know your face?”
The dark sentinel stepped from the shadows. He was the most reclusive of all of them. Hair of the darkest chestnut hung haphazardly, framing a face so perfect, it was distracting. Eyes of molten gold, liquid and hypnotic, looked out from beneath impossibly thick, dark lashes.
“Our paths crossed in the night once,” Niko said quietly. Derrick held his breath. Niko was cursed with such beauty, women often found themselves drawn to him. It was one of the reasons he stayed far away from the guests. He performed his daytime duties from within their security office, only appearing outside the walls when there was little or no danger of coming in contact with human females.
“And?”
“And nothing,” Niko said. “She bade me a good and safe eve and went on her way.” Stunning the hell out of him in the process. She had barely glanced at him, or so he had thought. The detailed sketch suggested otherwise.
Derrick shook his head, pinching the spot between his eyes. None of it made any sense to him, but there was little chance he would find the answers he sought this night. Tired and weary, he wanted nothing more than to simply crawl into bed with Angelica and hold her. Yet his pack was clearly looking to him for some guidance.
It was more than a little odd that Angelica had managed to encounter each of them since her arrival less than a week earlier. Even more so that she had created images of them. Their very survival depended upon the ability to keep their secrets.
It was hard to pose the question he knew he must. “Do you believe her purpose among us is a dark one?”
The men exchanged glances with each other. It was Silas who answered. “No. There is not one among us who believes that.”
“We found at least a ream of paper amongst her things,” Steffen added, producing a thick stack. “Sketches of the castle, the grounds, the ocean, other guests. All of this quality.”
“She did all of this since she’s been here?” Derrick asked, surprised as he thumbed through the etchings. They were impressive, so perceptive and crafted with exquisite detail.
Antoine nodded. “She must have. Niko found the receipt for the paper from a mainland shop, dated the day she arrived. That, and an inexpensive set of drawing charcoals.”
“When did she have time to do all of this?” Derrick wondered aloud. All the times she had sat on the rocks or beach, not once had he seen her drawing or sketching.
“At night, perhaps,” Christophe answered thoughtfully. “It appears she did not sleep much. We found a bottle of sleeping pills amongst her personal things, and it contained all but one of the original amount.”
Christophe’s words stirred a vague memory, something she had said to him the night they spent beneath the palms. Night, too, would have been when she ran into Dieter and Niko. “What else did you find?” Derrick asked.
Again, it was Christophe who answered, though he hesitated. “Pain medication.”
“That is not so unusual among humans, is it?”
“Not as such, no,” Christophe said slowly. “But what we found was no over-the-counter analgesic, Derrick. Among her things, she had Percocet, Vicodin, OxyContin, Tramadol, Maxalt, Darvocet, Morphine...”
Antoine whistled. “It is no wonder she did not have much of an appetite.”
“She is a drug addict?” asked Steffen, his voice laced with disbelief.
“I don’t think so,” Christophe said. “Most of them were unopened.”
“A dealer?” The thought was reprehensible.
Christophe shook his head. “No. They were definitely filled for her. Strong enough dosage to take down a bull.”
“Do we know why?” Antoine asked.
Christophe shook his head. “No, but I think we must assume she was not as hale as she outwardly appeared.”
Niko spoke from the shadows, his voice quiet. “Have any of you considered the possibility that Angelica would not want to have been Made?”
Derrick stilled, the room falling deathly silent. “What are you saying, Niko?”
“I only speak the thoughts already in your mind. Whatever ailed the poor woman left her with few choices. Perhaps when she went out in the storm, she had no intention of returning. It would align with what she spoke of with Christophe shortly after her arrival.”
Rage surged through Derrick, but he knew Niko only spoke the truth. The same thought had been nagging at him as well, but he refused to give it substance.
“What’s done is done,” he said, stiffening. “The only thing we can do is wait until she can tell us what it is she wishes. I will abide by her choice.”
Antoine’s eyes grew wide. “You would honor her wish for death?”
Derrick clenched his jaw so hard, it would have cracked had he been just a man. It had been his choice, his decision, not hers. “Yes, if it is truly what she wishes.” But he would do everything in his power to try to change her mind first.
“Do you know what that would do to you?” Silas whispered. “To all of us?” Losing a mate was devastating, and because Derrick was Alpha, the loss would ripple throughout the pack.
“Nay,” said Steffen, shaking his head. “You will do no such thing. For better or worse, Angelica is ours now.”
“You forget yourself, Steffen,” Derrick warned.
Steffen straightened. While they were loyal to a fault, Derrick had chosen each of them based on their strong characters and beliefs. He refused to be surrounded by ’yes men’. He wanted intelligent males who would speak up when necessary.
“I forget nothing. Ending her life at this juncture will destroy you and we are sworn to protect you. We will not allow any deliberate action — by your own hand or any other — that will result in your downfall.”
Derrick sunk down into a chair, giving voice to his worst fear. “What if she does not wish for that which I have forced upon her? What if she hates me for it?”
“She will not,” Antoine assured him, laying his hand on Derrick’s shoulder.
“And she did not kiss any of us, did she now?” said Christophe with a mischievous grin.
“If she has doubts,” Dieter’s low voice rumbled, “we will ease them.”
Derrick looked around at each of his pack mates. “You are all united in this?” he asked, shaking his head slightly in disbelief. They nodded in unanimous agreement. “I was under the impression you would not accept her.”
“Perhaps not at first,” Niko agreed, “but there is clearly much more to her than any of us originally thought.”
“The very fact that she has survived this long proves she is stronger than any of us realized,” Christophe mused with approval.
“Any woman who can resist Niko is all right in my book,” Steffen quipped.
“She clearly is a woman of exquisite taste,” agreed Antoine.
“She likes Thor,” Die
ter nodded.
“She needs us, Derrick. All of us.”
Chapter 8
Derrick stood and stretched. Three weeks had passed and Angelica’s body had undergone the transformation at the cellular level. All of the physical damage had been repaired and now she lay quietly in the depths of unconsciousness, awaiting the next full moon. Only then would they know whether the change had been truly successful.
“She will make it, Silas,” Derrick said, gratefully accepting the tray of food. Antoine had been sending a constant supply of food up from the kitchens to maintain his strength. Supporting his own overactive metabolism as well as providing for Angelica required high quantities of sustenance.
“I hope she does.” The words were spoken genuinely. She had touched each of them in some small way and they were all hoping she would survive the final challenge — not only for herself, but for the happiness of their Alpha, her mate.
Upon the next full moon — now only days away — her beast would attempt to rise. The physical aspect was only part of the shift; Angelica would also have to accept and embrace it. If she didn’t, it would quite literally rip her psyche in two and render her insane.
That sudden duality was yet another reason why the Making was usually a much longer process. In addition to selecting a proper candidate, the one to be Made was typically schooled in the transformation and what would occur. It took weeks, sometimes months, to adequately prepare. Angelica had none of that. She had no idea what was happening to her. But Derrick would be with her, trying to reach through the panic and confusion to guide her.
He’d already spent hours by her bedside, conditioning her to his voice and scent in the hopes that her beast would recognize it when it began to emerge. He’d been explaining everything as well, but he had no way of knowing whether any of it had made it through. While her physical form had been healing, her mind remained in a protective stasis to facilitate the necessary chemical changes that laid the groundwork for the awakening.
“You know nothing about her,” Silas mused, standing over her. She looked so young, so peaceful.
“Not quite true,” Derrick argued with a small smile. “I know she is the first woman to capture my interest in nearly half a millennium.”
“You have been with many women,” Silas noted.
“I said she captured my interest, Silas, not my cock. What she has accomplished is far more difficult.”
“But you will give her your cock as well,” Silas teased.
“No doubt,” agreed Derrick with a grin.
“You will truly make her your mate, then?”
“Yes, in all ways.”
Silas threaded some of the silken gold of her hair through his fingers. If she changed, she would indeed make a stunning she-wolf. Nearly all in their pack were dark. Derrick’s much stronger wolf-DNA should have dominated over her weaker human strands and changed her hair to match his, but it hadn’t.
“She keeps surprising us, this one,” Silas mused. “A most unusual feat, considering we have been around so long. Why is that, do you suppose?”
Derrick had asked himself the same thing many times over since Angelica had so quietly slipped into his life. “I am afraid I have no suitable answer to that, my friend, except perhaps to say Fate or Destiny has decided it should be so.”
“It is unlike you to put so much faith in such an intangible concept as Fate or Destiny.”
“Yes, and yet it rings of truth, does it not? That a human female should command the heart and soul of an Alpha so effortlessly? That she could survive mortal injuries long enough to attempt a transformation? That even now, she continues to display an inner strength that should, by all logic, be impossible? No, Silas, everything about this woman defies logic. And yet, here we are.”
“Here we are,” Silas agreed.
“Do you doubt me?”
His trusted sentinel met his gaze. “No, Derrick. As your pack, we feel your conviction, and as such, share it.”
“You will accept her?”
“We already have.”
Profound relief flooded through him. He had sensed as much, but hearing Silas say it while looking into his eyes was the proof he’d hoped for. The matter was now closed; no further discussion was required.
“Any developments on the Northern Tier attack?” Derrick asked. He had sent Nikos and Dieter back to the site, hoping they might find some missed clue to help them identify those responsible for the slaughter. They had mentally checked in with him upon their return, but Derrick had been preoccupied with Angelica’s care for a full debriefing.
“Nothing good,” Silas frowned. “Niko discovered a cave in which he believes the attackers were hiding. Human males. By the remains, they had been there at least two days prior.”
Which meant they had been watching, waiting for the most opportune moment to attack. “How were they not detected?”
The look on Silas’s face was one of pure disgust. “They covered themselves in the skins of freshly killed animals. It masked their own scent.”
Derrick closed his eyes. It was a trick as old as time itself, and still so perfectly effective. “No sign of the missing?”
“No.”
Derrick knew what Silas wasn’t saying. Not finding the bodies of those still unaccounted for meant they might have been captured. God help them all if the human monsters managed to capture living, breathing Weres.
“Easy, my sweet,” Derrick said softly as he freed her limbs, baring her perfect honeyed skin to the black velvet skies. He had carried her to the most remote section of the island, under cover of darkness and wrapped in blankets, while his men secured the area and stood guard around the castle to ensure no guests unwittingly made their way to them.
Silas was positioned closest to them. As Derrick’s second in command, Silas would be the one to take Angelica down as humanely as possible if the transformation failed. The specialized gun and darts treated with lethal amounts of sedatives to stop her heart quickly and painlessly hung heavily in his pocket. Through their mental connection, Derrick knew Silas hoped he would not be forced to use them.
Derrick reverently placed gentle kisses on her eyelids, her nose, her lips. “It is time. Rise for me, sweet Angelica. Hear my voice. Obey my call.”
She stirred beneath him, her skin glowing in the silver moonlight.
“Yes, Angelica. That’s it. Hear my voice, love. Come to me. Only to me.”
Her body arched sharply, twisting and turning in on itself as the change began in earnest. Her face contorted in pain as she cried out. The sound was like a blade to his chest. Though Christophe had been very specific about the process and what it would entail, Derrick never could have fully prepared himself to see her hurting like this. He steeled himself against it, forced himself to be strong. She needed him.
“Don’t fight it, Angelica. Let it claim you. Give yourself over to it. Give yourself over to me, love.”
She opened her eyes, gasping for breath. Derrick placed himself in her line of vision. “See me, Angelica. Know who claims you. Accept your beast. Accept your Alpha.”
He held his breath. This was it. Either she would accept this, or she would die.
Sensing Silas moving restlessly nearby, Derrick moved fully in front of her. She would make it through this. She would.
Her eyes finally locked onto him and her body stilled. On some visceral level, her inner beast recognized his scent as the source of the power coursing through her veins.
“Yes,” he coaxed, allowing his voice to turn into a half-growl. “Come to me, Angelica. Choose me. Only me.”
She watched intently as he began to unbutton his shirt and then unfasten his pants, removing both until he kneeled naked before her. She rose to all fours, intent, focused as she became more animal than human.
“Derrriiiccckkk,” she rasped, her voice a rough purr. “Yes,” he answered in a husky growl as he began his own shift, waiting until the last possible moment so he could continue to speak to her in th
e way she was most accustomed.
“Your Derrick, Angelica. Only yours.”
Her fangs lengthened, perfect and white, as she threw her head back and howled. Her silky hair spread, covering her entire body until she glistened in radiant gold. A rainbow of silver, gold, and every hue in between shimmered around her as her form changed and shifted, until she stood before him, a perfect she-wolf. Panting heavily, she dropped to the ground, regarding him with glowing amber and gold eyes.
“You are breathtaking,” he breathed, her she-wolf far beyond anything he could have dreamed. Small, yet sleek — perfectly proportioned for speed and grace.
No longer able to contain the change, he shifted into his wolf form in a burst of blue and black. She whimpered, and he scented her fear.
He growled softly — as gently as a wolf could — and lowered his massive snout, nuzzling her. He licked her face, butting her in soft demand until she licked him in return.
Then he rose and stood before her, magnificent and proud. He lifted his head and growled. This time, not in warning, but promise.
* * *
Pain. So much pain.
Angelica awoke in pure agony. It felt as if her body was being torn apart. Blood boiled in her veins, bones popped and realigned themselves, muscles pulled and stretched to their limits. And then, when she thought she could not endure another moment, it stopped just as quickly as it had begun.
Weak and breathless, she dropped to the ground and tried to take in her surroundings.
This new world was so strange. Familiar, yet...not. She recognized things around her: the sand, the palm trees, the wind, the ocean — but they were different. Things looked different, as if someone had just given her a new pair of glasses and she was seeing clearly for the first time. They smelled different, too — a thousand times more powerful than before. In the air alone, she scented a hundred new unique and wondrous things.
And then, there was Him. That magnificent beast with fur like thick black threads of the finest silk and eyes bluer than the clearest summer day. His cold nose prodded her, licked her, and nipped her, until she gave him her full attention — until this new, amazing world consisted of nothing but him.
Black Wolfe's Mate (Paranormal Shifter Romance) Page 5
