Primal Instinct

by Ally Parker

  He owed the females a nice treat. He might shout them a massage in one of those fancy places females seemed to enjoy. “Thanks.”

  Jaxx headed to the fridge and grabbed a plate with three thick steak cuts. Still a little bloody. Just the way he liked it. Putting the plate on the counter, he leaned against the bench. “Saint back yet?”

  Flynn scratched his chest and got himself a beer. He popped the top and took a deep gulp. “Should be back in a wee bit.”

  Jaxx’s mouth watered as the smell of meat filled the room. In need of some serious nourishment, he moved to the table, sat down, and began to eat his steak. Already, he could feel his body respond to the healing nutrients and the smaller wounds start to mend. Screeching echoed down the hall, followed by curse words that made Jaxx’s eyes widen. After years living in Shadow Moon, he could tell the commotion came from the pack’s underground den. Jaxx’s knife and fork clattered on the plate, and he stood abruptly. “What in the hell is that?”

  Flynn shuddered. “I thought it was finally over. Clearly the lass was just takin’ a breather.”

  At Flynn’s easy reaction, Jaxx relaxed enough to sit and continue eating. Then he remembered how Sasha had seen both him and Xavier shift. Jaxx winced. “I take it Sasha didn’t take the news well.”

  Flynn snorted and shook his head, sending dark chunks of hair across his eyes. He swiped them away and laughed. “Understatement of the century. Quinn has his hands full with that bonnie lass. I think he’s sportin’ half a dozen bumps on his head.” Flynn shrugged. “He explained what we are, and the lass is convinced we’re all delusional monsters who have drugged her, givin’ her hallucinations. He had to haul her over his shoulders and lock her up in the den’s cell.”

  “Flynn McKnight!” Taryn’s annoyed voice cut through the air. Flynn tense a moment before easing back into his chair.

  “It isn’t a laughing matter. That human is scared beyond belief, and now she is locked in our ‘dungeon,’ not knowing what fate awaits her.”

  Jaxx finished the last of his meat and picked up a beer. It may have been too early for some to drink, but he’d had one hell of a morning. He cracked the top and took a long swallow. Taryn’s words hit their mark, and Flynn sombered. He cleared his throat. “Och, lass! O’course, I know. It was all but a jest.”

  Being a rare female, any male of their kind would hold Taryn with reverence. The females were somebody’s savior, and it was the male’s duty to keep them happy and protected until their mate could find them. Many times Jaxx wished he could will Taryn to be his mate. She was stunning, tall and lithe, with curves in all the right places. Long black hair fell down her back like a silk cloak. Her tanned skin was flawless, and each time he looked into her dark-brown eyes, they told him she’d kick his ass if he tried any funny business. A damn hot sight. Unfortunately, she wouldn’t keep his beast at bay.

  She nudged Flynn with her hip. “I guess it was pretty funny when that skillet went swinging.”

  They both laughed and Jaxx flinched, knowing firsthand how strong that little spitfire was for a human.

  Taryn met his gaze. “Saint is waiting for you in his office.”

  Jaxx leaned back in his chair and studied Taryn. Her blank face gave nothing away. Finally he asked, “Does he know about Xavier yet?”

  For a split second, pain consumed her features, and she looked to the dent in the fridge before her gaze returned to him. “Yeah, it’s kinda hard for him not to tell something’s up with the broken window, the mess, and all the screeching coming from Sasha.”

  Standing, he gave her a nod and gathered his dishes, placing them in the dishwasher. “Thanks for covering my kitchen duties. I owe you ladies.”

  Jaxx left Taryn and Flynn talking in the kitchen as he walked past the living room and down the hall. Saint had photos of all the pack members littered along the walls. Not all alphas did that. Saint had a bit of something else going for him, other than being alpha, and that was why Jaxx had joined the Shadow Moon pack. Saint valued each pack member; he didn’t use them as pawns to serve his pleasure. For Jaxx, it was a refreshing reminder of what pack meant.

  He paused at a picture of Xavier and Saint. Their alpha had Xavier bent over, almost kissing his own knees, his arms trapped by his sides as Saint messed up Xavier’s hair. By the looks of it, someone had yelled out their name moments before capturing the candid shot. Grinding his teeth together, Jaxx tore his eyes away from the still frame and kept moving to the very end of the hall toward a brick feature wall. He pressed the correct brick, and the wall groaned as it opened, revealing a stone staircase. Thick candles sat in small recesses in the mud-brick walls, lighting the path. He jogged down the stairs into the pack’s underground den that held a private level reserved only for pack members. He and some other members of the pack lived down here.

  He walked down the hall, and the swearing and yelling got louder. When he approached the room Sasha was held in, it sounded like she was throwing herself against the door. Quinn passed back and forth in short bursts across the outside of the room and paused outside the door. “Stop! Sasha, give me a chance to explain.” He ran a shaky hand through his hair.

  “I’ve heard enough. Let me go and stay the hell away from me!” she hollered.

  Quinn glanced at him, and the pain smeared across the male’s face sent a new pang of guilt through him. He stopped in Quinn’s path. “I’m sure she’ll come around. If there’s anything you need… ” He let the sentence hang, and Quinn gave him a weak smile and nodded.

  Feeling awkward, he returned the nod and continued down the hall, Jaxx’s boots hitting the stone, not missing a beat. He passed the training room and headed for Saint’s office. As always, Saint’s door was ajar. Saint may keep his emotions mostly hidden, but he always wanted the pack to feel like they could express theirs. Keeping an open-door policy ensured the pack would know they could come to him anytime.

  Silently, Jaxx moved into the room and was forced to sidestep a nature painting that had been knocked off the wall; paper was scattered over the floor. The bookcase at the back of the room was upended, and the meeting table teetered on the edge against it.

  The office was trashed.

  Saint’s black leather chair creaked as it swiveled from the window-sized television monitors, which showed the back of Shadow Moon lands. Saint turned, his face a mask of calm. Other than the telltale tick of his jaw and the wreckage strewn across the room, no one would know he was upset. Saint cleared his throat. Getting up from behind his desk, he turned back to the monitor and braced his hands on the top of the frame. “I hear Xavier succumbed to his beast and is lost to us now. Not only that, but he’s on the loose.”

  Jaxx stood stock-still in front of the fallen guest chair. If Saint wanted to punish him for his failures, he would accept it like the warrior he should have been that morning. “Yes. I’m sorry, I failed Shadow Moon.”

  Saint continued as if Jaxx hadn’t spoken. “Sasha also saw both you and Xavier shift between your wolf and human form.”

  Jaxx watched Saint’s fingers tighten on the frame. He swallowed his guilt. “Yes.”

  Dropping his arms, Saint turned to face him. His alpha’s eyes glowed the most brilliant shade of blue. Saint sat down, leaning across the desk, his wolf’s gaze measuring every inch of Jaxx. “If Xavier is captured by humans, you realize what this means for our kind, don’t you?”

  Xavier wasn’t the first, or even the only, rogue at large, but it was a never-ending fear for their kind. If humans discovered their existence, he doubted shifters or weres would be safe again. “I—”

  Saint held up his hands and cut him off. “I realize there were extenuating circumstances. We will need to hunt Xavier down fast.”

  Jaxx was momentarily stunned, having expected a serious reprimand. A tongue lashing, or at the very least a physical blow. Just the sort of consequence his father, alpha of the Outlaws, dished out to him and any other in his pack who failed. Over half a century later and damn it if
his scars didn’t run deep. He was just as damaged as he was when he’d clawed his way out from the Outlaws.

  Saint was a damn good alpha. When shit got real, he didn’t lash out, punishing pack or pointing fingers. His focus remained on solutions to their problems. The pack wanted to follow Saint, not because it was forced upon them by fear, but out of respect. There was a very big difference. Straightening his shoulders, Jaxx lifted his chin. “Even as we speak, males are scouting the area. This is a temporary setback. I can assure you, Xavier will be given an honorable passing. I’ll see to it.”

  Saint sighed heavily, tilting his head back and closing his eyes. It seemed almost grudgingly his alpha opened fully human blue eyes to look at him. With a sweep of his hand he gestured to the upturned seat. “Take a seat, Jaxx. I know we’ll hunt Xavier down. At the moment we have other problems.”

  Something bigger than a rogue? With the knot in his gut, he picked up the chair and sat down, and swallowed thickly. “Is it… Did Ryker… ” Sign my death warrant?

  “No. He won’t reveal the photo yet. The full moon isn’t until tomorrow. The bastard is arrogant enough to expect me to meet his demands and hand over the females of Shadow Moon.”

  Saint shook his head. “This isn’t about breaking shifter law. About half a dozen alphas surrounding our territory reported alarming news during the council meeting.”

  Saint leaned forward and grabbed two glasses, and filled them from the decanter of scotch off the tray in the corner of the desk. “It appears weres are going missing. Ryker disclosed that several weres from Dark Falls’ pack are missing. He thought they’d left the pack, but when Darius, Leyton, and Knott reported the same issue, it became obvious we might be dealing with something a little more sinister.”

  Alarm tingled through Jaxx, his thoughts shooting to Lucas; his new were hadn’t reported in. He braced his arms on his knees and frowned, considering the possibility of shifter radicals creating some sort of were sale yard or maybe even killing them to cleanse them out of shifter society. He knew some shifters thought themselves better than weres. At the end of the day, they both had their weaknesses. The moon cycle ruled weres, only allowing them to shift once a month. They also didn’t have the threat of losing all their humanity like shifters did. “Do they think it’s the work of shifters?”

  Saint shoved the glass with three fingers of scotch under his nose. Jaxx took a healthy swallow, appreciating the warmth that slid down his throat.

  “We’ve only just established there’s a problem. Each pack reported around four weres missing.” Saint paused and took a sip of his drink. He placed the glass down, pulled out his laptop from a drawer, and booted it up. “I’m printing off a list of the weres database. Each shifter within our pack who has created weres will need to make contact and report back. I can tell you it’s moments like this I’m thankful we can have only one were at a time.”

  Jaxx tensed. “Shit!” He dug into his jeans for his cell.

  Saint furrowed his brows. “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m not sure. But, I think Lucas might be missing. He was meant to report in yesterday but hasn’t. Ethan was keeping tabs on him during his first visit home, and I couldn’t get hold of Ethan either. I thought there might have been a delay and didn’t think too much of it.”

  Damn it. I should have been the one keeping an eye on him. Saint had to attend the urgent council meeting, which had left Jaxx to run the pack. Ethan had offered to stand in for him so Lucas could still see his family. He patted his pockets. Where the hell was his cell? Probably smashed on the kitchen floor from this morning. As if sensing his need, Saint passed him his phone. Tomorrow was the full moon, Lucas’s first shift. He had every intention to set out this morning and track Lucas down. Then he’d been distracted with Xavier. Not wasting any more time, he thumbed Lucas’s digits into the cell. The line rang out.

  “No answer.” Just like every other time. Shit. Jaxx typed a text to Josh—a human that helped manage Prowlers. He needed the male to look after business while Jaxx took some time off to find Lucas and fix some of the shit going wrong in his life. No matter what he did, trouble seemed to sniff him out. The last thing he wanted was for Shadow Moon to be caught in the crossfire.

  Saint’s mouth flat lined. “Why didn’t you tell me about this?”

  He shrugged a shoulder. “I didn’t know if there was a problem, still don’t. Anything could have caused a delay. Ethan is keeping watch, and he would reported in if there was an issue.”

  Unless the enforcer had been hurt? Jaxx’s jaw worked. Lucas had been attacked at Prowlers, and Jaxx had made a split-second decision, breaking about a dozen laws, to change Lucas into a were. They had to cover it up so the council wouldn’t skin him alive.

  Sighing, Saint lifted his chin toward the door. “Go, check his place out, and see what you can find. I’ll tell the others to check on their weres.”

  Jaxx didn’t need to be told twice. He headed straight out of the office and went deeper into the den, wondering what the hell he’d find when he got to Lucas’s place.

  After driving most of the night, Kenzie’s eyes were gritty and stung every time she blinked. She rubbed them and yawned, reaching for her energy drink. Gulping, she screwed the cap back on and tossed the empty bottle on the passenger floor to go with the wrapper of the muffin she’d eaten.

  She wiggled in her seat for the umpteenth time and focused back on the road. For the last half-hour she had been driving through rocky terrain, long enough that a nest of knots had formed in the back of her hair. Relief flashed through her when the street sign she was looking for popped into view. She slowed her Camry and nosed around the bend. Concrete pillars at least ten feet tall blocked her view. That would make recon challenging.

  There had to be another way to catch a sneak peak inside. Leaving the car in idle, she pulled out the map, searching for a back road to the property. A throttle revved and the metal gates yawned open, spitting out a Harley. The rider jerked his head toward her car and slowed to a crawl as he approached. She sucked in a breath and admired his angular jaw covered in dark stubble and his slightly bent nose. Such a tiny imperfection, and it only amplified the danger radiating from him.

  Not attempting to hide his intentions, he peered into her window, and she was thankful the glass provided some kind of barrier.

  “You lost?”

  Dear Lord, his voice—a deep purr—raised goose bumps along her arm. She shook her head, holding up the map. His lips tugged up at the edges, and wow, he look like that demon-hunting brother off a television show she used to watch. In another life, she might have rolled down her window and flirted. He shrugged, revved the throttle of his bike, and took off down the road.

  Reality—the cold, hard bitch that she was—wouldn’t allow Kenzie creature comforts like companionship. Sighing, she dragged herself out of the what-ifs and back to the task at hand. It didn’t look like there was any easy access point. Studying the map, the property backed onto forestry near Meadowlark Lake. It was a long shot, and with her options dwindling by the second, she had little choice.

  Pulling from the curb, she drove for another half hour until a sign for Meadowlark Lake came into view. Her grip tightened on the wheel, and she veered off the highway and rolled into a graveled parking area. Reaching over, she grabbed the folder and thumbed through the contents, tapping her finger on the file. The picture of a man sat on top of the pile of papers.

  Still, she couldn’t make sense of what the image showed. The quality of the photo didn’t help. The granular pixels left the man’s facial disfigurement looking particularly nasty. “It won’t be hard to find you, will it?”

  For one crazy moment her brain catalogued similarities between the biker she’d seen peeling out from the address she was trying to gain intel on and the man in her photo. His eyes appeared to have the same shape, set, and size, although in her picture the flash had set an eerie spark, making the man’s eyes in her photo glow green. She frowned and studie
d the picture closer. Not only the shape of biker’s eyes resembled the man in the photo, but so did his build. Regardless, the ghost of the biker’s gaze still scorched along her skin. The man she saw today was far from deformed. Even dressed in a leather jacket and jeans, she had noticed his impressive body. Her thoughts stalled. Impressive body? What the hell was wrong with her? Lives depended on her success—both Ava’s and her own; there was no time for thinking about impressive bodies or scorching gazes.

  She shook herself and flipped the photo aside, looking at the sheet of paper outlining her job. Her eyes skimmed over the page—just a cell number where she’d been instructed to send the list of necessary information. It appeared Kali had a particular interest in the people contained within the premises. How many people were there, if they were male or female, if there were couples, plus the layout of the house. Sheesh. Kali wasn’t asking much. “A piece of cake,” she mumbled.

  Tossing the instructions and file in her backpack, she grabbed a map. From her preliminary surveillance, the property couldn’t be accessed from the front, north, or south sides, which left the rear entrance. Worst-case scenario she might have to climb a tree to catch a look. Rifling through the bag, she ran through her mental checklist. Water, energy bars, map, and weapon. All set. She slid out of the car, adjusting her backpack over her shoulder. In the distance people sat along the lake, fishing with their families and friends, laughing among themselves. A pang of longing filled her. She wanted that. The freedom to be able to relax, to share a connection with someone. Her jaw hardened. Any option of a simple life had been stolen. Tearing her gaze from the families, she turned, locked her car, and faced her reality, heading toward the tall bank of trees.

  The crisp lake air seeped through her threadbare sweater. She rubbed her arms, wincing as she ran her hand over the tender area where Kali had gripped her wrist. Her finger wormed through frayed material. Holding the material taut, she found five puncture holes through her sleeve. What on earth?