by Trina M. Lee
HURT
ALEXA O’BRIEN HUNTRESS BOOK 10.5
TRINA M. LEE
HURT
Copyright 2016 by Trina M. Lee
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.
Manufactured in Canada
Editor
B. Leigh Hogan
Cover Artist
Robin Ludwig Design Inc.
Published by
Dark Mountain Books
This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents and dialogues in this book are of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is completely coincidental.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
CHAPTER ONE
Nothing hit the spot after a hellish week like a cold beer and a plate loaded with barbecue chicken wings. I could think of only one other thing I’d rather have. But since Alexa was busy running damage control at The Wicked Kiss and there was no chance of having her wrapped around me any time soon, this would have to do.
The Doghead Bar and Grill was not a welcoming place. Dirty lighting and even dirtier floors made it one of the least inviting bars I’d ever been to, and yet it was starting to feel like home. Rich with the scents of wolves, food, and booze, it was the one place in town that was free of both vampires and humans. It was kind of refreshing.
“It feels so empty in here,” I said, surveying the thinly populated interior. Since the Alpha and his right hand man had been arrested by the Feds, along with nearly a hundred other pack members, the remaining wolves had been keeping their distance. Well, most of them anyway.
Currently there were about thirty of us in the building. Considering our pack had at least three hundred, the numbers showed how freaked out everyone was. People were staying away, and with good reason too. Between the Feds and the vampires, being a werewolf was risky these days.
“Yeah, I can actually hear myself think.” Izzy nibbled a chicken wing, her gaze darting among the various entryways. She was understandably still jumpy, having so recently been in FPA lockup herself.
Right on cue a crash disturbed the relaxed atmosphere. The backdrop of classic rock music and voices in casual conversation was shattered by the bottle a drunken wolf had just knocked to the floor. Everyone stopped to look at the guy who shrugged and staggered to the bar, almost upsetting a table as he went.
“You were saying?” I knew the signs of a drunk troublemaker when I saw them. Years of working in the nightclub industry had taught me as much. Had to say though, I liked having a good reason to throw a right hook. Pretty sure this guy was about to give me one.
“Being drunk and stupid at a time like this is careless. What an idiot.” With a shake of her head, Izzy pursed her lips in judgment. Her wild mane of tight black curls moved like a shadow about her shoulders. “We’re sitting ducks here while Dayne and Owen are gone.”
My gaze followed the guy who slapped a hand on the bar and barked a drink order at Smokey. Big mistake. I might not have been around long but even I knew not to be a dick to Smokey.
It wasn’t just the scar slashing through one discolored eye and down his cheek or the aged tattoos illustrating a wild life lived long before I was even born that made Smokey intimidating. It was the homicidal spark of ruthlessness that filled his eyes, burrowing deep down into his soulless stare. I didn’t need to tangle with him to know it would be a mistake. Apparently this drunk idiot needed to figure that out on his own.
“We don’t have to be,” I said, waiting with anticipation for what I knew was coming. “We just have to be prepared. There’s no sense in being afraid now. It’ll just get you killed.”
“Easier said than done with PTSD. I’m still having nightmares about that place.” With a visible shudder Izzy dropped chicken bones on the plate and sipped from a light beer.
Smokey turned around from where he was wiping down some glasses and fixed the drunk with a glower that would make any sane man turn and walk away. Long black and silver hair hung past Smokey’s shoulders. Despite being well over sixty, he was as spry as a man half his age, muscles bulging under his t-shirt. With a deep frown, he shook his head, refusing the guy another drink. This was where it would get interesting.
“Don’t worry about it. The FPA got what they wanted for now. Alexa won’t let them touch you.” I tipped my beer up, drinking from it without taking my eyes from the altercation about to happen.
Izzy shrugged and grabbed another chicken wing, but she just stared at it. “You have a lot of faith in her, huh? She seems pretty great. I don’t know why Dayne couldn’t just play nice with her.”
There was something in the way she spoke that dragged my gaze to her. A wistful longing perhaps, a deep need for peace amidst a life of violence. She was watching me with deep-brown eyes that reflected the dim lighting.
“Dayne doesn’t strike me as the type that plays well with anyone,” I laughed, trying to keep the mood light. “As for Alexa, she’s pretty much the only person I really trust. We go way back.”
Did we ever. For the last six years, my world had revolved around her. Well, to some degree or another. It would be a gross understatement to say our relationship was complex at times, but since the night I saw her die, I’d chosen to simplify things. I loved her. That was all I needed to know. The rest would have to work itself out.
Of course, she didn’t know I watched Arys kill her that night. I’d been unconscious as far as she knew. I hadn’t told her otherwise. Seeing her die, knowing it had to happen and then having to suffer through her newbie-vamp killing spree… that kind of shit changes a guy.
“How long have the two of you been involved?” Izzy picked at the chicken as if she’d lost interest.
“About a year I guess, though it started long before that. Our relationship definitely isn’t what you’d consider conventional, but we make it work. Kind of.” Complicated didn’t even begin to cover it. It sure as shit wasn’t normal to have the love of one’s life ask if you wanted to date other women.
Alexa had gotten it into her head that Izzy and I had a thing. She couldn’t be more wrong. Sure Izzy was attractive. Flawless dark skin, soulful eyes, and a laugh that could melt the coldest heart. I’d have to be blind not to notice. She was also ridiculously nice. But she wasn’t Lex. I knew what I wanted, and although Lex had tried to push me toward something she deemed normal, I didn’t want normal. I wanted her.
“Romance is one of the first victims after the change. Dating is hard enough. When you’re not human, it’s like a bad reality show.” Izzy gestured to the bar with a finger.
I glanced over to see Smokey grab the drunk guy by the front of his shirt and jerk him close. “All reality shows are bad. And I didn’t date much as a human so I wouldn’t know. I was turned at eighteen. Didn’t really date before that.”
“You’re kidding. I’d have pegged you as a guy who scored a lot in high school.” Her chuckle cut off with a gasp.
Smokey had the guy by the throat. He squeezed so hard I could see the veins popping out on the guy’s forehead from where I sat. The drunk flailed about, fists connecting with the side of Smokey’s head but having little to no effect. When he reached into a pocket and produced a small blade, I shoved my chair back.
Despite a sloppy attack the blade found its way
into Smokey’s shoulder. The resulting snarl and bared fangs was expected. It just wasn’t a regular day at Doghead without a few scraps. But this was going to end in the death of a drunk asshole, and I knew that Hanna had enough to deal with. She didn’t need this piled on to the mountain of shit Dayne had left her with.
“Guys, let’s not do this tonight.” I caught Smokey’s wrist mid-swing as he went to slash the drunk wolf’s throat. “Hanna doesn’t need any more dead wolves to worry about. We shouldn’t be killing each other.”
Smokey’s lip curled up in a snarl. “Get your hand off me or lose it.”
Because I was trying to stop a fight, not get into one, I let him go. Then I shoved both of them apart and stepped in front of the bar to keep the drunk idiot from going at Smokey again. Without giving him a chance to react, I grabbed his arm and twisted until he dropped the knife before sitting him down hard on the nearest chair.
He slurred something incoherent at me and tried to get up.
I shoved him back down, holding him in place. “Sit your drunk ass down. Get up again, and I’ll kick your ass all over this bar.” I caught Izzy’s eye and motioned for her to call a cab. “Don’t move a fucking muscle until your taxi gets here. Got it?”
The guy scowled up at me but made no move to disobey. Smokey had gone back to tidying the bar as if he hadn’t just been stabbed in the shoulder.
“Shaz.”
The sound of my name drew my attention to Hanna who stood in the doorway to her office. With a slight tilt of her head, she beckoned me over. When I joined her she stepped back inside the office, waiting for me to enter before closing the door behind me.
“What’s up?” I asked, glancing about the small room.
It was your typical office: a desk with a swivel chair behind it, two regular chairs across from it, and a couch along one wall. Photos of pack members covered the walls. One of Dayne and Hanna on their wedding day drew my gaze.
They’d been together for a long time. Hanna was blonde in the photo even though now she sported dark auburn hair. I knew from seeing her as a wolf that the auburn was her natural color. The joyful smile on Dayne’s face in the picture was like nothing I’d ever seen on him in the short time I’d known him. A furrowed brow and deep-set scowl was his usual expression.
“Thanks for taking care of that.” Hanna nodded toward the door. “Everyone has been on edge lately. It doesn’t take much for a wolf to snap on a good day, but this is a bad time for us to turn on each other.” She sat in the swivel chair and gestured for me to take a seat. “I don’t suppose you’ve heard anything new from Alexa?”
“Nothing has changed,” I said with a shake of my head. “The FPA won’t negotiate. They don’t want to give Dayne up. Other than storming their building, our options are limited. And I’ve been in that building. We don’t have the manpower to go in there and survive it. Not with our best fighters already inside.”
Naturally Hanna was stressed out about her husband being in lockup at the government facility. Lex had been in there just one night, and I’d refused to leave, waiting outside until she finally made it out. I didn’t like to think about that night. It took me to an ugly place.
“Shit.” Hanna crossed her legs, one foot swinging as she chewed a long nail in contemplation. “Those sons-a-bitches crippled the pack by taking in most of our muscle. I think they know it too.”
The pack was made up of two kinds of wolf. The normals. Those who wanted to live as close to a human life as possible, the nine-to-fivers who did their best to blend in with society. Regular jobs, pack tattoos hidden under inconspicuous street clothes. They were the doctors, lawyers, and soccer moms of the pack. They got to live their normal lives under the protection of the pack. They contributed to the group in safe ways: financial, legal, and medical. Everyone had a job in the pack.
But someone had to do the dirty work too.
The second kind of wolf in the pack was those who shunned normal life, happy to embrace the beast and all it entailed. They were the muscle. The enforcers. The guys and gals who weren’t afraid to get their hands dirty, or bloody, as the case might be. Whatever it took to protect and provide for the pack, they did it. Unfortunately, the FPA had taken most of them in the night they came for Dayne. Because it was their job to protect him, they were often with him. What was left of these wolves was currently sitting in the bar, awaiting Hanna’s call on the FPA.
“We need to do something. The more time passes, the less likely Dayne will get out of there alive.” Hanna studied me, worry and determination warring for dominance in her hazel eyes. “I need you to step into Owen’s role while he’s gone. I know you’re still new and some of the others might not like it, but you’re the most suited for the job.”
It was an ego stroke for sure, but that didn’t mean it was a good idea. “Are you sure about that? I mean, I’m glad you think I can handle it, but like you said, I’m new. This might piss off the others.”
“They’ll have to get over it. Right now my priority is protecting what’s left of the pack and keeping the peace with Alexa.” Her gaze dropped to the desk when she added, “Dayne looked into you when Alexa first approached him about you joining the pack. He discovered your fight in Las Vegas. He let you in because you’re a level-headed guy who knows how to throw down when necessary. I need that on my crew right now.”
I nodded and ran a hand through my hair. It wasn’t a surprise that Dayne had checked me out; the surprising part was that he’d been able to find out about that fight. So much for that whole ‘What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas’ shit.
“I’ll do what I can,” I promised, knowing it was the best I could offer her.
“I think I need to meet with Alexa,” Hanna continued with a sigh. “We’re on the edge of a war with the vampires here, and that is the last thing I want. Can you talk to her? Try to set something up. Tell her I’m willing to look past what happened with her vampire. We need to move on.”
Hanna’s desperation was showing. The pack had grown increasingly restless in Dayne’s absence. Though Hanna remained in charge, they didn’t all respect that, especially since it came out that Arys had killed two Doghead wolves.
A few weeks ago a dozen or more wolves had taken it upon themselves to jump two vamps outside The Wicked Kiss. One of them was now dust, and Hanna feared the escalation of retaliation. The more time that passed since the incident, the more certain she became that it was coming. Based on my experience with vampires, she had good reason to worry.
“I’ll talk to her,” I said. “Alexa doesn’t want a war any more than you do.”
Arys had really screwed Alexa over by hunting those wolves, his pathetic attempt at reliving the night she died. It was sick and twisted. Arys in a nutshell. Like everything else he did, it was all about getting what he wanted.
That vampire was the most selfish, egotistical jackass I’d ever met. All of this shit was going down because of him and his fucked up need to kill the love of my life over and over again. Apparently once wasn’t enough.
Despite Arys’s self-centered tendencies, he wasn’t all bad, much to my dismay. He was responsible for pushing Lex and me to resolve our differences during the hardest times. When I was sure the damage done was irreparable, he pushed us to dig deeper and fight harder. Jackass.
As to whether or not I liked Arys, there was no real answer. There were times when I respected him and even times when I thought I might almost like him, but then there were times when all I wanted to do was slam my fist into his arrogant face. Which, come to think of it, was pretty much every time I looked at it.
“Our enemy should not be one another,” Hanna said, staring at the heavily shuttered window as if she could see out. “If the supernaturals of this city learn how to work together, we would never have to fear the FPA again. They would fear us.”
“I think they already do,” I offered. “They won’t take back one of their own guys because he’s been a demon captive. What we need is a man on the in
side there.”
Hanna fell quiet for a few minutes. When she looked at me again, blatant fear glittered in her gaze. “They’re doing terrible things to my man, aren’t they?”
I didn’t consider myself the nicest of guys. Some might see me as the nice guy because I knew how and when to keep my mouth shut. This was one of those times.
“Don’t think about that, Hanna. Try to stay positive. You’ll just worry yourself sick.” I reached across the desk to touch her hand, hoping the encouraging smile I wore was helpful. I didn’t doubt for a minute that Dayne was getting his ass kicked in lockup. There was a good chance he was a lab rat by now.
“I just miss him so much. We’re a team, you know?” She looked so damn sad. Tired too.
“I do. I know. Why don’t you head home and try to relax? I’m sure things will be fine here without you for a bit.” I felt for her, because I did understand.
When our wolf side formed an attachment to another, it was until death. At least it was for me. Some of the shit that had gone down between Lex and me was enough to drive most lovers apart. We’d done some pretty fucked up shit to each other. Shit that I was deeply ashamed of. Somehow though, it only made the tie that binds even tighter. Like a noose that tightened as the weight upon it grew. That was Lex and me.
“I haven’t slept more than a few hours since they took him. I keep waiting for them to come for me, and I—”
The door slammed open and a tall, lanky guy named Bastian burst in. “Vampires outside. They have one of our guys.”
Hanna and I rose in unison, but I beat her to the door. Bastian turned and headed for the front exit. I was right beside him. We were joined by several others.
Before every wolf in the place could follow I stopped them with a hand and a gruff command. “Stay inside with Hanna. Be ready in case they get past us and make it in here. Watch every exit.”
There was some confusion and questioning among them, but I didn’t wait around to see if they were going to obey. We couldn’t all go rushing outside, leaving our Alpha unprotected.
