by Tl Reeve
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A Wolf’s Contract
Copyright 2016 by TL Reeve
ISBN: 978-1-61333-989-3
Cover art by Fiona Jayde
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work, in whole or in part, in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.
Published by Decadent Publishing Company, LLC
Look for us online at:
www.decadentpublishing.com
Table of Contents
Dear Readers,
Thank you for picking up a copy of A Wolf’s Contract. I hope you enjoyed it. Kru’s story was fun to write. He isn’t a good guy. Sure he does good deeds along the way, but he’s a hit man. Maybe the moral thread of killing to keep the innocent safe, puts him on the border of good and evil, but to his core, he never felt as though he was redeemable. Enter Gabby. After everything she’s lost in her life, she is a fighter. Which means, she’ll even fight for the man who deep down she knows is wrong for her, but she can’t find the will to leave him. Along the way you’ve met several new characters and they too have stories to tell. I hope you’ll stay tuned to see what happens next in the Black Hills of South Dakota and the Los Lobos pack.
TL
www.authortlreeves.blogspot.com
Dedication
To my Black Hills Wolves family, thank you for letting me be a part of this wonderful series. You guys are awesome! As always, thank you to my beta readers, Rhonda and Robyn. To my parental unit, aka mom, thank you for letting me do what I love. And finally, to the readers, thank you for your support. You guys are awesome.
Black Hills Wolves Stories
Wolf’s Return
What a Wolf Wants
Black Hills Desperado
Wolf’s Song
Claiming His Mate
When Hell Freezes
Portrait of a Lone Wolf
Alpha in Disguise
A Wolf’s Promise
Reluctant Mate
Diamond Moon
Wolf on a Leash
Tempting the Wolf
Naming His Mate
A Wolf Awakens
The Wolf and the Butterfly
Infiltrating Her Pack
Omega’s Heart
Rebel’s Claw
Claiming the She-Wolf
Worth Fighting For
Dangerous
Uncaged
Promiscuous Wolf
Disquieted Souls
A Cougar Among Wolves
Long Road Home
A Mate’s Healing Touch
Another Chance
Broken Silence
A Wolf’s Contract
A Mate’s Redeeming Touch
Winter Solstice Run
Wolf’s Holiday
Winter Magic
Winter Secrets
Winter Solstice Ménage
Wolf in Winter Clothing
Murder in Los Lobos
Scent of Murder
Scent of the Hunt
Scent of His Woman
Scent of Madness
A Wolf’s Contract
Coming Soon
A Mate’s Redeeming Touch
A Cougar Among Wolves
Pleasure Me
Secrets of the Hunt
Craving His Love
Also by TL Reeve
Saving Their Princess
The Bodyguard and the Dom
Their Secretary
Craving Cameo
All or Nothing
Omega’s Heart
Winter Magic
A Wolf’s Contract
A Contract gone wrong.
Kru Hawthorne left home years ago. Unable to watch the abuse his sister suffered at the hands of Magnum and his cronies, Kru hit the road. Chased by the demons of his past, he drifts for years before making a home in the seedy underbelly of Las Vegas, Nevada.
Gabby Salvador, sister to Craven Salvador, President of the Vipers motorcycle club, watched her brother take his last breath. When the devastatingly handsome Kru arrives moments later, she knows something isn't right. Sticking to the shadows, she follows him to Rapid City, South Dakota, and finds something she never expected.
One text that changes everything.
Kru and Gabby's lives collide through a text and an attempt on Gabby's life. Together, they'll have to figure out who put the hit on Craven and why they want Gabby as well. But, with the full moon, Gabby will be faced with an even bigger decision. Trust the man who isn't what he claims to be and take the protection he offers, or hit the road and pray she's never found
A Wolf’s Contract
Black Hills Wolves
By
TL Reeve
Chapter One
Las Vegas
Another day, another dollar. Kru Hawthorne straddled his bike before starting it. Being a lone wolf in a human city came with advantages and disadvantages. Pussy and dick were easy to come by. He had a family who didn’t turn their backs on him—unlike what his pack family did all those years ago.
The Dirty Ol’ Bastards, the motorcycle club he played hard with and worked beside occasionally, lived by one rule. Never stab a Bastard in the back. On the rare occasion someone forgot the rule, they sent Kru to bring the point home. As a freelance killer, he’d spent the last ten years acquiring contract work wherever he could, whenever he could. So far, he’d never been caught. He prided himself on that fact. But he also knew the day would come when he’d have to quit and move on.
Move on…. Bittersweet memories of his past filtered through his mind.
At a young age, a drunk driver killed Kru’s mother on the way home from Custard. Her death left Kru and his sister, two young wolves, to fend for themselves. Their father, who took off before he’d been born, didn’t give two shits about them. So, Fawn and he made their own life.
They stayed in their mother’s home. Made repairs when they had to. Things, though hard, were good for a time. Then his sister met Gill. At first, the guy professed his love. He brought them fresh deer meat when they needed it and helped Kru fix the house. However, things began to change. The happy-go-lucky guy became angry all the time. The first time Fawn came home crying, her lip split and her eye swollen shut, she said it was an accident. By the third incident, Kru knew better.
For so many years, he didn’t do anything to stop Gill. He watched day after day as his sister got the shit beat out of her by her boyfriend and their Alpha. With slim pickings for food—more times than not going hungry so Fawn could eat—he didn’t put weight on or grow like the other wolves had. Weak…a runt in some respects, he’d been powerless to stop the vicious attacks. Between her screams at night while they slept and cleaning her cigarette burns during the day, he couldn’t take it anymore.
Kru grew more and more frustrated as the days went by. After Fawn had healed from the latest attack, he left. Kru didn’t look back. The guilt racking him demanded he keep running. There was nothing
left in those Black Hills for him. Fawn had to be dead, or so traumatized by Gill she’d never recognize her brother even if Kru did return since he’d changed so much. Hell, he didn’t recognize himself anymore. Would she, if she were alive, accept his apology for running away like a coward?
His wolf howled in outrage, ramping his desire to cut away the ties of his so-called new life and go home.
Lately, it seemed to be ever present. His wolf urged him to head northeast. To take his place within the pack who turned their backs on him and his sister. Never. I’ll never head home. Of course, he should know by now to never say never to anything. Those never “things,” he’d been forced to do to protect himself…to keep his ass out of jail…well, it’d make most people’s toes curl and their stomachs sour. Him? All part of his job.
He learned real quick there were two things which made his job easier as well. The first, sex, and the second, torture.
Sex became more of an instrument, a way to relax his contacts and make them a little loose in the mouth region. Male or female it didn’t matter to him. Answers came easily with a little gratification shared between lovers. He also learned men talked more after an earth-shattering orgasm. The old saying, a guy thinks with his little head, not his big head—completely true. Blow jobs made men blubber, particularly when he pushed all the right buttons.
Through his dalliances, he learned different places targets liked to stay—which also led to quick, sometimes painless death. Women, on the other hand, could be vicious little things. Treat a female right—do something their boyfriends or husbands didn’t do, and she’d give all the right answers. Stand the hell back if their asshole ex had cheated on them with their best friend. He’d found more than one of his marks after fucking a vengeful woman. For him, those nights were his best nights. He’d leave the contact’s country club home loose-legged, sated, and with the information he needed to catch his mark.
However, what sex didn’t reveal, torture would.
Long hours spent working over a man did things to him. Made his wolf a little more bloodthirsty. Some days he actually felt his humanity slipping through his fingers, and the part of him that should’ve worried over it didn’t even flinch. He liked clean kills and, whereas blood didn’t bother him, breaking a body did. Each cut. Each stab of his knife brought memories of his sister to the forefront of his mind. On those nights when Fawn pressed at his consciousness, he made short order of the person strapped to his chair. If, after a few questions, Kru didn’t get any answers, he offed the target.
Kru didn’t possess any redeeming qualities. He never worried about redemption. Wolves like him never sought it. Nor did they want it. He embraced his demons, drawing strength from them. They reminded him why he became who he was and would always be.
A stone-cold killer.
He followed the dirt road to the middle of the desert where the plain, almost dilapidated brick clubhouse of the Vipers stood. He switched off his bike and coasted to a stop, hiding in the obscurity of Joshua trees and shadows. Inside, Craven, president of the Vipers, would be busy at work, according to the information Kru had received earlier. He knew some of the Vipers. Even liked a few. When the hit came in through his email with a date, time, and location, of course he did his research. He talked to some of his informants, slept with a few others, and though no one heard any rumblings about any misdeeds Craven had taken part in, he took the job anyway. Later, he’d justify it with the money he made. Ten thousand went a long way.
With no bikes parked nearby and the lights off, he knew the chances of the job being a setup were high, but he also had to get it done. Kru crept around the side of the building. If his op went sideways, and someone tried to get the drop on him, he didn’t want to give away his position. He stepped toward the rear door and paused. His lip curled in revolt. The acrid stench of blood and death assailed him.
His wolf bristled.
Instinct told him to leave it alone. Practicality said he needed the money. Pulling his gun from its holster, he switched off the safety then continued on. The door stood open a few inches. Another scent hit him square in the chest, a familiar made-his-mouth-water aroma. The same scent had driven him insane when he’d smelled her earlier at the charity rally.
Gabby.
He crept through the open door, screwing the silencer in place on the barrel of his Heckler and Kosh 9mm. The metallic stench filled his nostrils. His hands tightened around the grip of the firearm. His teeth descended.
Turn around and go back the way you came. In fact, get the hell out of Dodge.
No. He had to keep going. He had to see what happened. What if someone hurt Gabby? He growled. His wolf didn’t like the idea of her being involved in whatever the hell might be waiting for him. If she was hurt, God help the person who did it. He’d stop at nothing to make them pay.
Each step he took brought him closer to his destination. To death. The putrid smell grew thicker, enraging his beast even more. With each deep breath, the wolf pushed toward the surface. A constant growl rumbled in his chest. He had to gain some control over himself or the wolf would emerge, exposing his true nature to anyone still in the building.
Small drops of blood guided him and, when he stepped around the corner, he sucked in a breath. There, slumped over in his chair, sat Craven. The wide-eyed death stare surprised him momentarily as he took in the small office. The place had been trashed. File cabinets were tipped into each other. Papers were strewn across the floor. Craven’s hands were zip-tied behind him and his ankles were duct-taped to the legs of the chair. His throat had been slit and not very well. The line was jagged, like the person who did it didn’t realize how hard cutting through skin and cartilage was. Blood splatter covered the desk in front of him. His shirt soaked with the thick red liquid, still wet from his killing. If Kru had to guess, Craven had been dead for only a couple of hours.
Again, the floral scent he knew so well wafted above the coopery din of Craven’s blood. Kru lifted his head to draw in the aroma. Unfortunately, he couldn’t distinguish whether she was there in the room or if it was a lingering scent from her time spent in the clubhouse. The miasma of death overrode everything.
Avoiding the pool of blood, he drew closer, taking in the scene. His gaze landed on a K-bar knife sitting on the desk in front of Craven. Etched into the handle was Kru’s name, a gift from the Dirty Ol’ Bastards after his first contract with them. “What the fuck?” Blood covered the blade and hilt, while crimson fingerprints surrounded the weapon. Anger spiked in his system. Someone had framed him. He didn’t want to believe the Bastards, who had been like brothers to him for the last seven years, would let him take the fall for something he didn’t do, but he knew those he considered family before had wrecked his life and his sister’s. Son of a bitch!
Behind him, the clank of steel hitting the floor caught his attention. He spun as a dark figure ran away. “Wait.” He took off after the blur. Bloody footprints headed to the right, and he gave chase. He had to discover who’d been in the room with Craven and why. The deeper he went into the clubhouse, the darker it got, and the floral scent clung to the air, wiping away the putrid odor.
“Stop.” His deep voice echoed off the walls surrounding him. The sound of running quieted.
He sniffed the air as he prowled the corridor until he found an open room. Stale, with a hint of smoke, Gabby’s floral scent lingered in the space. The idea of her doing anything in the room pissed his wolf off, which only served to intensify his ire. Shadows fell over the bed in the corner. On the table next to it sat a lamp. The clatter of items falling to the floor along with a muffled feminine cry drew his attention back to the hallway. He ran, glancing left then right. Shit. This is not good. Not only is your knife here, whoever that was can identify you. The someday he worried about being his demise became the inevitable. He’d been careful. Done his research. This time, he’d let his greed blind him to the facts.
When he arrived at the front of the build
ing once more, he stopped. Whoever had been there couldn’t have gone far. However, he didn’t have time to hunt for them. The roar of motorcycles in the distance forced his hand. He had to run. Kru growled, furious he’d allowed himself to get into the situation. He shoved the front door open, followed the short path to his bike, and jumped on. Fucked royally, he shoved out of his hiding spot and headed in the opposite direction. Unable to grab his knife, he was screwed.
If the Vipers decided to put a hit on his life, there was nothing he could do to stop them. It wasn’t like he hadn’t gone there to kill their pres. He had. Running was his only option. Within twenty-four hours, someone would come looking for him. Any crew he’d taken a member from would gleefully accept the contract for his blood.
The more distance he put between himself and the clubhouse, the easier his escape became. He had to disappear until he had the chance to determine who framed him. There was only one place he’d be able to hide. The one place he didn’t want to go. Home. Back to the Black Hills of South Dakota. Pulling off the side of the road, Kru took his phone from his pocket and hit the one number he’d never thought he’d use again.
“Kru,” the voice grunted in greeting. “’Bout time.”
“Gee,” he answered. “Not really, but I’m coming home.”
“Good. Done playing with the humans?”
“Been done for a long time.” He didn’t know why he said it. Sure, he’d thought it a few times, especially after the hard contracts, but never admitted to himself he was ready.
Gee grunted again. “I’ll let Drew know.”
