Yet, those around him smelled…happy.
And Drew didn’t know if he’d ever been so content in his whole life.
His mate was fine. She turned to Saja and said something, which made the other woman laugh. Ryker shook his head, always alert, scanning the crowd. Drew doubted there would be threats on such a night, but he wasn’t going to tell the Enforcer not to do what Ryker had been born to do.
Xio and Marcus. Brick and Summer. Jace and Michelle. Colt and Tasha. Sela and Rio. Stephen and Kate. Lara and Ogden. Drayce and Kinsey. Jackson and Aimee. Darci and Ross. Alanna and Bastian. Isabelle and Wyatt. Patch and Kennedy. Ravage and Adrie. Mike and Damien. Angeni and Jaxon. Nika and Kimi. Max, Kole, and Jasper. And the ever-present, even when he wasn’t there, Z, and his mate Ripley.
There were so many more.
His friend—the werebear Gee, who’d he never know completely but could always count on. Even his daughter, Amelia, put on a rare appearance, though she stayed at the fringe of the gathering. Silent. Watchful. All of them had come out to celebrate.
He was all set. They were going to go and…movement caught his attention. He looked skyward. There, attached to his strange bird shifter mate by her talons, was Stewart. And he had, in his arms, a large red bag. As they crossed over the Christmas tree, he opened the bag and dropped the toys out. Packages of wrapped gifts spilled out around the tree.
Drew’s eyes sought out B’s. He saw laughter in them. And he wondered if she remembered what he’d done. Her drugged out comment about Stewart being Santa Paws. Looked like she’d been pretty right on.
A gasp sounded before a cheer from the pack. Of course, Stewart had dropped presents during Solstice. They were wolves. This was their holiday. And what an event it had turned out to be.
“Okay, we’ll all thank Stewart and his mate later for the toys. I don’t know, maybe we’re having a new tradition. All right, everyone. Let’s do this. Time to run. As a pack. You’re my family. Now and forever. Let’s have a great time.”
He called on his wolf. Time to shift. Time to own the night. And enjoy the season.
You’re invited to take a run with the Black Hills Wolves….
A year of change since Drew Tao defeated his father and took over the Black Hills… A year of chaos as wolves return home, new packs are merged into the Hills, and human mates join their pack… A year of hope since the pack pulled back from the brink… Together, they will celebrate a new year, a new chance, and all the changes yet to come…. Join the Wolves on their Winter Solstice Run.
Winter Solstice Run
A Black Hills Wolves Mini Series
Look for it Fall 2015
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When Hell Freezes by Rebecca Royce
Chapter One
Everything was exactly the same. Beer and pork still wafted through the air of Gee’s bar. The woods leading up to Los Lobos held clean, fresh scents he remembered from childhood. Hell, even the birds chirped and sang eerily familiar tunes.
And yet everything had changed. At least for him.
“Drew Tao.” Colt Hannigan projected the words, keeping his voice clear and his words precise. The statement he intended to make needed to be heard and understood by all within earshot.
“Yes, Cousin?” Older than Colt remembered him, Drew raised an eyebrow, looking up from where he sat at the other end of the bar. Surrounded by four dominant males, including Ryker—who had been pack enforcer in Magnum Tao’s day and appeared to still hold the role with his new ‘Alpha’—Drew leaned against the bar as if he hadn’t a care in the world.
Colt clenched his jaw. Drew appeared so calm, so at ease, when he and every other Wolf shifter in the room had to be able to smell Colt’s intent, and that only made Colt want to hit him harder. The fact that his cousin pretended to be unalarmed by his presence pissed him off further. How dare he act as if he couldn’t be beaten?
Colt meant to kill Drew, and every living soul for miles needed to be aware.
“Drew, I swore I would never follow another Tao. Your father, my uncle, was evil. But no one should have been surprised by his sickness. The Taos have long been the bane of the Black Hills Wolves.”
Whatever Drew would have said faded out when his mate, Betty, jumped to her feet and snarled, “How dare you speak to Drew that way? He is the Alpha of this pack. You might not be a part of us anymore, but as long as you stand on pack land, you will respect him, or one of us will take off your head.”
In other circumstances, Colt would have been impressed. Betty had been broken ten years earlier, a shell of the former Wolf she had been after Drew had abandoned them all to the not-so-tender mercies of Magnum Tao.
“I might remind you, Cousin”—Drew walked to Betty and placed a hand on her arm—“that you are related to the Taos. Your mother called my father brother. For a while, she too used my last name.”
Colt snarled. “The day she mated my father was the day fate smiled.” Even if he still had too much Tao blood in his veins for his own liking.
The son of a bitch had the gall to grin at him. What did Drew find amusing about this? He was about to be challenged, called out, and killed. Colt would do what he hadn’t been strong enough to do when Magnum had been in charge—take over the pack and finally lead them out of the Tao darkness.
“Drew Tao,” Colt had to speak the words correctly so Ryker and the others couldn’t interfere.
His cousin shook his head, looking over the bar to Gee who had stayed quiet the whole time. Colt had never been able to get a real read on the Were-bear, who played his cards close to his chest.
“Don’t kill him. I think he has guts. I want him around. At least for now.”
“What?” Colt shook his head. This wasn’t how things were done. He’d come to make a challenge. Drew needed to listen. “Drew Tao, I….”
Gee stepped out from behind the bar. If the Bear thought to throw him out again as he’d done ten years earlier, he could go ahead and try. If he landed on the street, Colt would shout his challenge from there. One way or the other, he would fight Drew for control of the pack. Hell would freeze over before he’d follow his cousin’s lead.
Drew walked toward him, but when he would have faced him, he headed for the exit instead. Was he cowardly? Is that why he left?
Colt had thought his cousin would be many things, but afraid hadn’t been one of them. Anger warred with frustration, and he growled, feeling his teeth elongate in his mouth. Colt had been waiting for this fight since the day Drew had taken off for who knew where and left them all to suffer at the hands of Magnum.
“Drew—
A whack to his head brought him up short. What the hell? Several seconds passed before he realized Gee stood behind him, holding a baseball bat. Stars passed in front of his eyes while Gee moved in front of him.
“Pup. Pass out. I don’t want to hit you again.”
“I’m not a pup anymore.” Why was it so hard to talk? The whole world went black.
***
Eleven years earlier….
“Where is he?” Colt needed to pound out his anger. Magnum Tao had gone too far. Alpha or no Alpha, he didn’t get to haul the unmated, young females in front of him like a sexual cattle call to determine who he and his disgusting followers would eventually mate.
If they waited to claim them at all….
“Colt,” Tasha Moore’s voice called behind him, and he turned to see her rushing up behind him.
He smiled at her approach, some of his temper cooling with her presence. She was fourteen years old and sweet. A lot of the young
juveniles developed tempers as their dominant tendencies warred with the human rules the pack self-imposed on themselves so they could exist in the world without discovery. But not Tasha. At least not yet. He suspected she would end up a true non-dominant Wolf, the kind that made all the strong shifters want to take care of her; the reason wolves like him had been given such protective instincts.
“Tasha?” He stared at her pale face and the dark circles under her eyes. “What’s the matter?”
“Don’t.” She placed a hand on his arm, and he smiled. In addition to being calming, she had the true and rare quality of being one of the kindest shifters he knew.
“Don’t do what, sweetheart?” He was only five years older than she, but in their world, that meant a monumental difference.
She narrowed her gaze. “Don’t go there and make Magnum mad. Since Drew left, there’s no stopping or controlling him. Look what happened to Brick. No one has seen him since. Please. We need you. If you die or he throws you out, what will happen? All of the dominant males can’t disappear. What will happen to us?”
The frantic tone of her voice made his skin crawl, and the acrid smell of her fear burned his nose. “Honey, I’m not going to die. I’ll tell Magnum to leave you all alone, and then if he won’t, I’ll do what every capable male here should be doing. I’ll stop him one way or another, but not from an Alpha challenge. No one wants that.”
He would find a way. His uncle couldn’t continue to be allowed to torment the young females as if they were toys to use and discard. The fact that he wanted to in the first place meant their Alpha had transitioned from menacing to disturbed. Magnum had once possessed a mate. He’d been a father and a competent, if not kind, leader. Now? The abhorrent man had dragged all of them into his pit of misery.
Worse, he was Colt’s uncle, and Colt wouldn’t allow him to continue to disparage their family the way he’d been doing. Colt Hannigan would never be that cowardly.
“No.” Tasha shook her head. “He’s the strongest. I don’t know how to make you understand this. I don’t think I can. But I have the ability to feel all of you differently than most Wolves. Because I’m not dominant, I can tell when I’m around you what your strengths are I can also feel who can take care of me, who is strongest, who is able to fight. I know. He can beat you in a fight, Colt. He’ll rip you apart.”
He patted her on the shoulder. “I think you’re confused because you don’t really understand your instincts yet. They’re only starting to come through. Beta Wolves can’t tell who the strongest dominant in the room is. That’s not possible.”
She put her hands on her hips, an unusual show of temper from such a passive juvenile. He grinned at how irritated she appeared. “Or maybe the Beta Wolves simply don’t tell you everything. Maybe there are some things we generally keep to ourselves.”
“Tasha, you can’t even tell if you’re a Beta yet. You have years before you’ll be fully in control of your Wolf side.”
She sighed, shaking her head. “Did you ever not know you were dominant?”
Tasha made a good point, but he didn’t want to stand around and debate semantics. Not when Magnum could be bothering more of the young females while they argued.
“I appreciate your concern. I really do. But I got this.”
She huffed. “No, you don’t.”
With her final proclamation, she took off running in the opposite direction. He watched her long brown ringlets sway as she disappeared into the distance. Someday, she’d grow up to be quite a beauty.
He shook his head. Sentimentality couldn’t have a place in his heart today, and Tasha made him too calm. Colt needed his anger to face his uncle. The man was old, but not so ancient he couldn’t still put up a good fight.
Colt picked up his pace as he got closer to the barn Magnum and his cronies had turned into their personal lair. Once upon a time, the place had actually been a functioning building, filled with horses, hay, and other tools they’d used to help keep their town self-sufficient.
Red with white shutters and a giant door that had to be yanked open before he could go inside, the barn no longer housed anything but greed and corruption. Anything that happened within its walls spread out into the pack, mimicking an infection Colt wanted to kill.
He pulled open the door and stepped inside without knocking. The sounds of the rowdy party that never seemed to cease were not present. Instead, he immediately scented his uncle and the pack enforcer, Ryker, inside.
Magnum looked up from his reading when Colt entered, but Ryker didn’t turn around. The enforcer stared out the window, and Colt wondered, not for the first time in his life, what the scariest member of the Black Hills Wolf pack thought about during his perpetual silence.
“Do you think you can come in here without knocking because you’re my sister’s boy? Because I’ll kick your ass from here to the other side of tomorrow for barging through my door as if you own the place.”
Magnum’s scorn struck like a million bee stings assaulting Colt’s body all at once. He gritted his teeth against the pain. No matter what happened, he couldn’t back down from what had to be done. Too many people depended on him and, as Tasha had pointed out, with so many dominant males being shoved out every day, there would soon be no one left who could make things right.
Not even Ryker, who still hadn’t looked at him, could stand against Magnum. The enforcer’s blood oath prevented his interference
Well, Colt had no such problem. Alpha or no Alpha, uncle or no uncle, he couldn’t allow Magnum’s evil to fester any longer. He’d stop it.
“Uncle, my Alpha.” He wished he didn’t have to use the Alpha phrase, but Magnum still held the title. If Magnum could be reasoned with, then none of this had to progress any further. He deliberately didn’t answer Magnum’s remarks. He had to speak with the Alpha whether the Alpha wanted to be spoken to or not.
“What?” Magnum turned his head to Ryker. “Can you believe the balls on this kid? Aren’t you supposed to be protecting me from this kind of nonsense?”
Ryker turned around, one eyebrow raised. “I will protect you from all threats that are unacceptable. Right now, the inconvenience of your nephew is not really a concern.”
Colt fumed, hands fisted. Ryker didn’t think he could be a threat? Damn, Tasha hadn’t thought he could be either. Fuck Ryker. He could handle himself.
“Careful, pup.” Ryker’s voice traveled across the barn, and the sound fueled Colt’s anger even more. He wasn’t a pup anymore. Nor a juvenile. Hadn’t been for over a year. Why would they treat him the way they did? It was so unfair.
“Magnum, Uncle, Alpha.” He cleared his throat, starting again, “I want you to stop harassing the older juvenile females. They’re not ready for you. We need to protect them, not parade them around in an unacceptable manner.”
There. He’d said it. His uncle would have to listen. Certainly, the man could be reasoned with. Maybe he simply didn’t understand how creepy what he had been doing had become.
“You want me to stop?” Magnum snarled, stalking forward until he grabbed the front of Colt’s shirt and jerked him up against his chest. “You come in here, you sorry excuse for a Wolf, the son of my bitch sister or I would have had you put down at birth, and you make a demand of me in a way that only a man, only a trusted advisor, would dare? Even Ryker knows better than to use that tone with me, boy. How old are you? Seventeen?”
His heart rate had kicked up, and he knew his uncle would be able to smell his fear. Still, he didn’t care. If Magnum pushed him, he would make a challenge; he wouldn’t be the wimp his cousin had proven himself to be.
“I’m nineteen.” Certain his uncle knew exactly how old he was. The man wanted to throw him off, wanted to make him uncomfortable, unsure of himself. His mother had told him before she died—was killed—that Magnum was an expert at mind games.
“Ooh.” Magnum laughed, a long cold sound. “All of nineteen and such a man, coming in here t
o tell me what I can’t do with my juvenile females. They’re all mine. All of you. You live and die in my care. If I’m not happy, you don’t eat. And guess what? It’s time for me to take a new mate. I want my complete options. So, I’ll parade around whomever I want to, and there isn’t a damn thing you can do.”
He shoved Colt backwards, and he fell back a step until he righted himself. Heat infused his cheeks. He could not, would not make this so easy on his uncle.
“Colt.” Ryker called out his name. “Go home. Someone will talk to you later.”
“No.” He snarled even as he tried to keep his temper in check. Anger, he needed. Rage would get in the way. “Magnum, if you won’t leave the juveniles alone, then I will stop you. Physically, if I have to.”
Magnum turned to Ryker. “Is that not a threat? Still not a threat?”
Ryker shook his head but didn’t utter a word.
“How dare the two of you dismiss me? I’m strong. And I will not be discounted. You will leave the girls alone. I’m going to make you.”
Magnum growled, and Ryker rolled his eyes before turning around.
“He issued me a challenge,” Magnum roared. “And now, I will tear him to small pieces and feast on high carnage tonight.”
Behind him something banged, but Colt didn’t have time to turn around and see what it was. Not when he had to concentrate. His heart had never slammed against his rib cage so fast; his breathing seemed shallow. He needed to shift before Magnum did.
Magnum moved fast, changing quicker than Colt had ever seen him do before. One second he was a man, the next the huge Wolf that had led the pack into disaster time and again. So much for shifting first.
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