Wolf Hunter

by Loveless, Ryan

  Wolf

  Hunter

  Other Works by Ryan Loveless

  Novels

  Building Arcadia (Blueprints Not Included), TVB Publishing

  “This story doesn’t fit neatly into M/M/F or M/F/M boxes; what it does beautifully is show three close friends reacting to the changes in their circumstances and relationships in an honest and loving way.”

  -Cooper West, author, reviewer

  Ethan, Who Loved Carter, Dreamspinner Press

  “A must read for anyone who likes their romance sweet and emotional.”

  -MM Good Book Reviews

  The Forgotten Man, Dreamspinner Press

  “The Forgotten Man was one of the best books I've read recently. The author got her history *spot on* and every single character leaped off the page. Also, the prose is lovely.” Honorable Mention, Best Gay Historical, 2012 Rainbow Awards

  –Judge's comments

  Kaden’s Colors, Dreamspinner Press

  “Kaden’s Colors will make one think. It’s more than a nice, entertaining, breezy read.”

  -Hearts on Fire Reviews

  Offside, Dreamspinner Press

  “...a good balance between romance and drama, keeping the story firmly grounded in romance but still having enough of the sport theme to keep the interest and provide a fully realised setting.”

  -Well Read Reviews

  Pop Life, Silver Publishing

  “A captivating, enthralling story focusing on the scenes behind the stage, the chaos and emotions that go into being famous and successful. A complex and layered plotline, a large cast of characters and various romances, yet author Ryan Loveless manages to keep everything balanced with excellent results.”

  -Joyfully Reviewed

  Standalone Short Stories

  The Gift, Dreamspinner Press

  “I love a good m/m story. One with laughs, tears, and a whole lot of hot and sweaty sex. This book delivered in spades.”

  -Long and Short Reviews

  Off the Page, Dreamspinner Press

  “When you are in the mood though for a light-hearted read... it’s a perfect choice.”

  -Brief Encounters M/M Romance Short Story Reviews

  Short Stories in Anthologies

  Administrative Leave (Men of Steel Anthology), Dreamspinner Press

  Jean-Paul (Uniform Appeal Anthology), Dreamspinner Press

  Twenty Years Later (Welcome Home to the Conquering Hero)

  (Don't Read in the Dark Anthology, Vol IV), Goodreads M/M Group

  Wolf Hunter

  Ryan Loveless

  TVB Publishing

  2013

  Wolf Hunter

  Copyright © 2013 by Ryan Loveless

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review or scholarly journal.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is coincidental.

  First Printing: 2013

  TVB Publishing

  New York, NY

  Contact information: mslovelesswrites@gmail.com

  Website: http://ryanloveless.dreamwidth.com

  Cover design © 2013 by Nelson Yan nyan089@gmail.com

  Royalty-free image via Shutterstock.com

  TVB Publishing logo by Jito Lee http://www.jitolee.com

  Acknowledgements

  I wouldn’t have finished Wolf Hunter without the regular support and encouragement of everyone mentioned here. My early readers Melanie and Sheri helped me see the good and keep going, not to mention avoid third grade math errors. Additional gratitude goes to Sheri for editing this book and letting me call her and read sentences aloud. Author CJane Elliott’s early critique helped me improve the main character.

  My cover designer Nelson Yan. He’s talented. You should all check him out.

  BJH because.

  Angela for talking me through this in the middle of many nights and expressly forbidding me from ending this the way I’d originally intended.

  Everyone I roped into helping me with the blurb, AKA the hardest part of writing a book. Brian, Melanie, author Carolyn Gray, and Kara. Thank you for not killing me when I kept tweaking. Kara again for keeping me on track that one time.

  Finally, I want to thank all the readers of this and my past books. If ever a book can be said to be self-indulgent, it’s probably this one. But I think self-indulgency can be a good thing. If you please no one else, you’ll at least please yourself. Hopefully, it will please some of you as well.

  CHAPTER ONE

  TOWN NAME: LA MER-SUR-PLAINES. Size: 3.00 sq. mi. Pop. vocation(s): Farming, 18%; Factory/Blue Collar: 32%; Finance/White Collar: 8%; Coal Mining, 13%; Small Business (owner/employee): 20%; Other: 6%; Unemployed: 3%. Terrain: 100% flatland, of which: 20% in-town residential, 40% farmland, 30% woodland, 1% lake/bodies of water, 8% prairie land. Population: 3500, of which werewolf population: approx. 5%. Male population: 44%, female population: 56%. Crimes reported 2000-2010: Murder (4), Sexual Assault by unknown (5), Non-sexual assault by unknown (157), Domestic Battery/Assault by known (51), Theft/Non-Assault (544), Missing Persons Reported (57, of which 39 recovered). Median income: Males, $35,252; females, $24,781. (Margin of error for survey: +/- 3%).

  AT AN HOUR past dawn, Jaylen parked his ancient junker on a residential side street a half-block from the road he’d driven in on. He stretched his legs as he levered himself up and out, holding the door in one hand and his phone in the other. Turning to face the car, he rested his elbows on the Beetle’s dented roof and pretended to stare at his phone’s screen. Anyone looking would think he was checking messages. In truth, he was willing the nameless drug that ran through his blood to hold off on making him scream with pain for a few more hours. It had a 24-hour time limit from injection to “hand me a gun so I can euthanize myself,” and he was pushing it close.

  He made his way into the town square on foot, following along sleepy dew-kissed sidewalks toward a coffee shop he’d seen, shuttered, on his drive into La Mer-sur-Plaines at dark o’clock the night before. It was open now, the pink and orange neon curlicue sign shining cheerily in the glass storefront. It was a small enough town that the teenaged girl behind the counter greeted him and asked for his order before the door had closed behind him. She started prepping his coffee (black, large, as hot as she could make it), as he moved toward her. He walked slowly, trying to shake his joints free of his fourteen hour road trip and the drug’s promised revenge on his already embattled body. He glanced sidelong at the Curlicue Coffee Shop’s only other patron, a man in his fifties with a round gut pushing the buttons on his pale blue checkered shirt. The guy tightened his grip on his “Come to Curlicue’s” mug and didn’t look up from his La Mer Morning Herald.

  “Here you go.” The girl’s pink hand shook when she put Jaylen’s lidded paper cup on the counter between them. Jaylen stared at it, thinking of the ceramic mug in the other guy’s hand, and smiled. Smart girl, giving him a hint that he shouldn’t stay. Maybe she’d seen the blood on his knuckles or didn’t like the way he tried to walk like he didn’t have a limp. Hell, situation reversed, and Jaylen would kick himself out, too. Beat up brown leather jacket, RIP Tupac T-shirt, torn blue jeans (from snagging them on a nail as he fell down a mineshaft, not from paying $500; the nail had saved his life) that had seen their best days five years before his fall, ass-kicking black combat boots, and a face that kept a glare as its default expression.... He was a suspicious-looking m-f’er. Of course, take that all away, put him in
a suit, and he’d still be a six foot plus black man walking into an almost empty establishment at ass o’clock. Still might scare her because of that. He put his money down; she didn’t meet his eyes, and he didn’t give a shit if his grin looked threatening to her.

  The Alpha was here, or nearby—Jaylen was surer than he’d been in months of dead ends and fruitless leads—and once Denton was gone or dead, he’d make himself scarce.

  “Thanks, kitten,” he said. He kept his voice a low growl because even though he expected her fear, it didn’t mean he enjoyed it. When she didn’t respond, he headed for a table near the door—the better to see out the picture window.

  “Excuse me?” The other man lumbered up from his chair. He stood, the same height as Jaylen but twice as wide. “What’d you say, stranger?”

  Jaylen’s veins tingled, the drug in him keen on the sensitivity that allowed him to know wolves from humans, itching for a fight. That was what this nameless drug did; why he tolerated the pain, why he injected it like clockwork, all so he’d know who to kill. He’d ignored the signals since he’d stepped into the little shop, wanting coffee first, but it wouldn’t wait any longer. The drug acted on him, dried his tongue, told him, “Monster.” He waited for its move, kept his eyes downcast. “Nothing to you.”

  “That so?”

  Jaylen glanced up, saw the yellow behind its pupils. “That’s so.” He pulled his knife and lunged. The monster sputtered, grabbed at him with a newly furred hand, and collapsed. Jaylen slit its throat, wiped his knife clean on the semi-wolf’s shirt, and put it away. He looked up to see the barista backed against the wall, her mouth open and working like she couldn’t summon any sound out.

  “Sorry about your floor.”

  “He’s, he’s—” From her distance, she gestured at the snout and fur the wolf had summoned up before Jaylen laid him low.

  “A werewolf,” Jaylen said. He moved his coffee to another table. “I’m going to suggest you shut down for a few hours so I can clean this up. You need to call your boss and get permission?”

  She shook her head, lips pinched.

  “You sure?”

  “That was my boss.”

  Jaylen glanced down at the corpse. Its blood colored the front of its shirt so dark the criss-crossed pattern was indiscernible. “Huh.” He stepped closer to the girl. Now that the other one was dead, he could sense her secret too.

  “What are you doing?” Her voice shook and she started to run, but she wasn’t fast enough, not in her human form.

  “Your boss, huh? Or your father?”

  She raised her chin. “What’s it to you?”

  He caught her and pushed his knife into her gut. He eased her down next to the counter. “You’re all the same to me,” he said as her eyes went dark. He slit her throat and she died. He picked up his coffee and swept the coins she hadn’t put away back into his palm—partly to get rid of anything with his fingerprints on it, but mostly because killing monsters paid shit. Covering his hand with his sleeve, he flipped the lit logo sign off at its cord, locked the door, and pulled the shades.

  He managed to drag the male behind the counter before his stomach cramped. Gritting his teeth against the groan that wanted to come out as his body submitted to the drug’s demands for attention, he pushed his forearm against his gut until the pain passed. Then he dragged himself into the back for a mop and pail and got to work.

  WESTLEY STARED AT his calendar as he leaned on the chest-high counter separating the kitchen from the main living space in the cabin. (The calendar featured “16 months of playful kittens!” given to him without a trace of irony by a very traditional aunt. He had accepted it, and her sincere “You’ll find yourself, son,” with the practiced disinterest of someone told too many times that he was “wrong.”) Ignoring the gray kitten in a bowler hat featured above the dates, he peered again at the little circular moon symbol. Ten days out until the full, and yet his body was acting like it was only a few days away. He tried to ignore it, but it was hard to ignore anything when his super-charged hearing could pick up rabbits chomping on his garden vegetables a hundred yards away through walls constructed of felled trees.

  He sipped his tea. Well, Auntie, he had found himself. After countless experiments, he’d finally developed a way to stop himself from shifting. The last six months had been amazing. A cup of tea at breakfast and another after dinner, and he could have a normal life. Hell, he was ready to do an infomercial about it. “Now you, too, can be your best self. Let me show you how!” Because of the weirdness, for lack of something else to call it, amping him up, he’d made it full-moon-strong this morning, and his stomach rumbled in uncomfortable protest.

  Better dead than a killer. He needed to find a more powerful herb that worked the same way but didn’t make his insides feel like puking themselves up—one he could grow in his garden and which he could obtain by the next full moon. During the full moon he needed to triple his dosage to stop the shift, and since he was at triple force now on a regular day, if things kept up as they were, he’d be at triple triple over the upcoming full moon, and he didn’t want to think what that might do to him.

  He’d exhausted all the resources he had. Time for a library trip—

  “Do you have any more of that tea?” Tom’s voice came from the couch, grumbling and woozy like a post-hibernation bear emerging out of a cave.

  —as soon as he got Tom’s hungover ass out of his house.

  Tom meant the intoxicated-dumb-ass tea, not the brew Westley was drinking. Westley left the calendar alone and glanced at him. Ever since Westley had shown him his hangover cure, Tom had sworn by it.

  “I can make some,” Westley said, heading for the refrigerator where he had his freshly cut herbs stored. Tom was doing his best to make Westley’s already over-sized couch look like part of a child’s play set. His huge socked feet hung off the edge, and Tom had wedged his shoulders against the arm in an attempt to pillow his head on it, but had instead succeeded in manipulating his neck into an unnatural ninety-degree angle. One arm was flung up the back of the couch, hand hovering stuck in the air, while the other arm bent at the elbow to make a V over his chest and ended where his fingers curled into the collar of Westley’s borrowed T-shirt.

  “Don’t start.” Tom opened his raised hand, as if warding Westley’s lecture off.

  “I’m making you tea.”

  “It’s your own fault you got drunk,” Tom said, ignoring him as he did a high-pitched, nasal-focused impersonation of Westley that sounded nothing like him. “You know what happens when you mix beer and liquor.”

  “Making tea,” Westley sang.

  Groaning, Tom rolled himself over. “Screw you. It’s my goddamn birthday. I’ll drink if I want—”

  “Not saying anything,” Westley said, though he paused in putting the herbs into the mesh strainer and looked pointedly at his swinging screen door, visible because Westley had opened the front door to let in the bracing cool air. Tom had knocked it off the latch with his “entrance” the night before. Plus, Tom had slept in Westley’s shirt because he’d “lost” his own somewhere between O’Riley’s Pub and the tailgate party at the rock quarry. He’d lost a shoe as well. It was a miracle he’d arrived at Westley’s (intact) door with pants. At least he hadn’t driven himself. Westley had seen Cody’s departing taillights speed away after he’d dumped Tom in the front yard, leaving him to drag his stupid self up to the porch. Cody had stopped long enough to yell for Westley to “wake the hell up” before he got his coward ass clear of Westley yelling at him that his house wasn’t a drop off point for drunken idiots.

  “Screw you,” Tom repeated. He lurched to his feet. “I’m a... I’m an alph... oh shit.” Clapping his hand over his mouth, he stumbled toward the bathroom, crashing into the couch as he went. When the retching started, Westley covered his ears and prayed he’d made it to the toilet.

  “Tom? You okay?” Tom never pulled this alpha wolf shit unless he was wasted, which would have worried Westl
ey—made him think Tom’s “we’re all equal when I’m sober” spiel was an act—except Tom tended to be miserable when he was drunk, so it was probably more expectation weighing on him than his actual belief system coming through.

  A weak groan offered a reply. Westley grabbed a towel and a bucket and headed for the sorry sound. The vomit splash started at the edge of the bathroom and made a V up to the toilet. Westley pulled Tom out of it and wiped his mouth. Leaving Tom kneeling over the bowl, he cleaned up the floor and then ran water over a clean washrag.

  “You’re an idiot,” Westley said, crouching beside him. Tom looked up, bleary eyed, and made a face that hadn’t changed since he’d gotten owwies as a wolf pup and gone running to his mother. Westley couldn’t resist it either. He tried for keeping his expression stern as he tenderly laid the damp rag over Tom’s forehead. “You alphas are all the same.”

  “Generalize much?” Tom grabbed Westley’s wrist when Westley started to pull away and leave the washrag to Tom’s own hand.

  “Everyone thinks alphas are these big dominant overachieving heroes, but the second somebody shows the slightest inclination to take care of you, you all roll over and show your bellies for a scratch.”

  Tom pushed the washrag out of his eyes to reveal a mischievous glint. “You want to scratch my belly, West?”

  Westley pushed the rag back down. “Omegas don’t get away with this crap. I don’t have anyone holding my hair back when I act like a dumb ass. I’m expected to take care of myself and you while pretending I’m totally helpless and holding up the illusion that you’re my big strong hero.”

  Tom patted Westley’s hand, which Westley was still holding pressed to his forehead. “You’re too focused on image. You never do any dumb ass stuff.” Wincing, he reached up and flushed the toilet. He leaned on the seat as his dinner swirled away.

  “Did we have sex last night?”