Huntsmen (The Better to Kiss You With Book 2)

by Michelle Osgood

  “Okay. You two have to leave. Now.” Kiara grabbed Deanna’s arm in one hand and Jamie’s in the other, steering them with inhuman strength to the back of the room.

  “You’re not coming?” Jamie held tight to Deanna’s hand, as her partner frowned in confusion.

  “I’ll follow.” The lights spun from the stage and illuminated the crowd around them. Hands were waved high, and people were cheering as the song reached its climax.

  Three people away, one of those raised hands led to a forearm with an unmistakable tattoo: an axe’s thick black lines stark against the woman’s pale skin.

  “Go. Now.” Kiara shoved Jamie and Deanna through the crowd.

  “Why aren’t you—”

  “I don’t understand—”

  Kiara cut them off and spoke directly to Jamie. “It’s Taryn. Onstage. Ryn.”

  Jamie closed her eyes in a split second of understanding, then tightened her grip on Deanna and tugged her toward the stairs. She’d never met Kiara’s first girlfriend, but she’d definitely heard about her. “Come on, Dee, I’ll explain when we’re outside.”

  Kiara shoved the shock of seeing Ryn to the back of her mind and ruthlessly slammed the door on any speculation about what and why and how. That didn’t matter. Nothing mattered now except getting through the mass of people to the stage, getting Ryn, and getting the two of them out of the bar.

  She dropped her glass carelessly, and it rolled against the foot of the girl beside her, who squawked. Kiara was already moving past her. Kiara was small—tiny, the boy at the bar had described her—and she used that, sliding through the press of bodies with barely a ripple.

  She’d lost the axe wearer in the crowd, but her skin crawled with the knowledge that they were here. Hyperawareness coalesced behind her eyes, like the not-quite-painful pressure of an itch she couldn’t scratch.

  The last line of the song pumping through the sound system faded out, low and suggestive. On stage, Taryn-as-Terence gave a mocking bow; the jut of her chin told the crowd that she knew it was all a performance, that she had given them exactly what they’d asked for and had risked nothing to do it. The self-assuredness was breathtaking.

  Kiara pushed her way to the front of the stage. Ryn rose from her bow. Her dark eyes swept over the upturned, adoring faces before snapping to a stop on Kiara’s.

  “Huntsmen.” Kiara spoke the word conversationally, not bothering to raise her voice over the cacophony of the cheers and the music.

  Ryn’s nostrils flared, and her eyes widened a fraction before they skipped past Kiara and out to the crowd.

  “We have to go.”

  Ryn jerked her chin down in a barely perceptible nod. Her eyes flicked to the right, and Kiara understood.

  Terence blew a smirking kiss to the crowd and sauntered offstage. Kiara wriggled urgently through his swooning fans.

  “You can’t come back here.”

  Confronted by an upheld palm, Kiara halted at the stairs that led backstage.

  “This area is for performers only.” The Latina woman’s face was set in bored lines; her yellow shirt identified her as one of the club’s staff. Clearly it was not the first time she’d turned someone away that night.

  “Look, I’m meeting—”

  “Hun, I don’t care if you’re meeting Evan Rachel Wood herself. Performers only.” The woman enunciated the last part without managing to pull her attention from the room behind Kiara.

  The prickling behind Kiara’s eyes mounted and was echoed in the flesh of her gums.

  “Maria, hey.” Ryn pushed back the black curtain. “Come on, let her through.”

  “Tar—” Reluctance was heavy in the woman’s voice. “You know I’m not supposed to.”

  “I won’t tell if you won’t, ‘kay? This is my girlfriend. We won’t cause any trouble. Promise.” Ryn held out her hand past Maria.

  Kiara placed her hand in Ryn’s and plastered a smile across her face. “I’ll be good.” She added a flutter of her eyelashes and coaxed a blush to her cheeks. Ryn’s skin was hot under her palm. Touching Ryn had always felt like touching the sun.

  “You’d better be,” Maria warned as she stepped aside and let Kiara through.

  “Thank you.” Ryn winked at Maria, and Kiara heard the woman’s heartbeat accelerate in response. With a valiant effort, Kiara swallowed her huff of annoyance.

  The area backstage was dimly lit. Ryn kept Kiara’s hand in hers as she led the way, deftly avoiding the few other performers who loitered about, waiting for their turns onstage.

  “We have to go,” Kiara repeated. She spoke more loudly now that they were away from everyone else.

  “I heard you the first time.”

  “Then what are we doing?” Kiara’s fingers curled perfectly around Ryn’s. She wanted to yank her hand free. She wanted to kiss the spot where they fit so well together.

  “I have to get my bag.”

  Ten years. Surely ten years was long enough for feelings to fade, for the memory of what they had been to dull. She shouldn’t feel the bright hurt, the greedy hunger, as though it had been yesterday.

  In the back of her head a siren screamed, a warning that she didn’t have time for this. Kiara’s grip on Ryn’s hand tightened involuntarily.

  “Leave it.”

  “I’m not leaving it. There’s five thousand dollars’ worth of equipment in there.”

  “Ryn, you heard me. The Huntsmen are here.”

  “Maybe.” They reached a set of lockers, and Ryn wriggled her fingers free of Kiara’s. “Aren’t you the one who told me they’re a myth? Do you really think they’d show up in Vancouver? At a drag king show?” But even as she spoke she opened the locker door and pulled free a large duffel bag.

  “Werewolves are supposed to be myths, too.”

  “And yet,” Ryn conceded. She slung the bag over her shoulder. “My bike is out front.”

  Kiara shook her head. “We’re not going back out there.” She had no idea how many Huntsmen were in the crowd. “There’s a back exit, a fire door, right?”

  “I’m not leaving without my bike.” Ryn stared Kiara down.

  There was no use arguing. There never was.

  “Fine. We’ll go around and grab it on our way out. But we have to go.” The siren wailed louder. Kiara grabbed Ryn’s arm and pushed her toward the back. Ryn snapped her teeth at Kiara and twisted free, but led the way.

  As they pushed through the heavy metal door to the alley, Kiara spared a moment to curse under her breath. Cold, insistent rain was coming down, and her coat was inside with the chipper coat-check girl who’d tried to slip Jamie her number as they’d come in.

  Now it was Ryn’s turn to tug Kiara out from the slight protection of the building. “Is it just you?” she asked as they made their way around the side of the building. Kiara squinted against the rain as Ryn moved through it unconcerned.

  “No. Jamie’s here and her partner. They’ll meet us out front.”

  As they rounded the corner, Jamie spotted them and hurried over with Deanna in tow. Jamie’s lips were pressed together in a worried line. With her wet hair plastered on her head, Deanna looked miserable.

  “We have to go,” Jamie hissed. “There’s one…” She jerked her head at the club door, and the woman with the forearm tattoo stepped through. Outside now, in the glow of the streetlights, Kiara could see her more clearly. The woman’s hair was long and straight, an unnatural shade of dark red—like dried blood, Kiara thought. Her face was dominated by a pair of strong eyebrows, dyed to match her hair, and her eyes glittered fiercely underneath.

  “Come on.” Kiara moved down the street with Deanna and Jamie close on her heels. “Taryn.”

  “I need my bike; hang on.” Ryn stood beside an ancient-looking bike chained to a bike rack. The seat was covered with a plastic bag, though in this downp
our Kiara doubted it had done any good.

  “We don’t have time!”

  “Excuse me.” The woman at the door moved forward and slid her arms through a jacket.

  Ryn swore viciously and abandoned the bike. “Let’s go, let’s go.”

  They ducked down another alley, and Kiara urged Jamie and Deanna ahead of her so that she could keep an eye out behind them.

  It’s not really the Huntsmen, Kiara told herself, they’re not real. Ryn was right; as far as Kiara and her pack were concerned, the Huntsmen were a legend. A group of humans dedicated to hunting dangerous werewolves? It seemed unlikely that an organization like that could operate without the General North American Assembly of Werewolves being aware of it, and Kiara was certain that GNAAW wouldn’t allow humans to interfere within their jurisdiction.

  Well, she’d been certain until now.

  The woman’s footsteps rang on the cobblestones behind them, and the three werewolves automatically picked up their pace. Jamie hurried Deanna along with them.

  Ryn fell into step beside Kiara. “We’ll take a right out to the street. There’ll be people there.”

  Kiara gave a short nod. Jamie was already beginning to veer in that direction. This late on a Friday Gastown was always a hub of nightlife activity, and not even the pouring rain could dampen that. Once they got to the street, they could lose themselves in the roaming packs of drunken, rowdy clubgoers. If this woman was a Huntsman—a Huntress?—she’d be human, and there’d be no way for her to track the werewolves’ scent the way another wolf could.

  They turned to head down the alley toward the street. The rain wasn’t heavy, but it was steady enough that Deanna had her arms wrapped closely around her, and it occurred to Kiara that, like her, Deanna and Jamie had left their coats inside. It didn’t matter, though. They could come back tomorrow for them, if they had to. If the Huntsmen were really—

  Stop, she ordered herself. There was no sense in questioning what both she and Jamie had seen. Better safe than sorry.

  Someone stepped into the alley in front of them.

  Chapter Three |

  Kiara’s lips curled back from her teeth in an echo of the growl that rumbled heavily in her throat. Jamie had moved in front of Deanna, who, smart enough to know she’d be no help in a physical altercation, had slid toward the wall. Ryn lowered her bag from her shoulder and kicked it to the side.

  The man at the end of the alley, who had the collar on his long coat flipped up against the rain, moved toward them. He was tall with wide shoulders, and his smooth footsteps pointed to training that was probably not received as a civilian. He held his gloved hand up in a demonstration of harmlessness.

  “Just give me a minute, girls. I only want to talk.”

  Ryn snorted. “Not likely,” she said under her breath. Kiara agreed.

  “There’s no need to be defensive.”

  The man continued toward them. He had a suspicious bulge in his jacket coat and smelled of anticipatory excitement. Kiara glanced over to see Deanna’s pale face and wide, scared eyes.

  “Agree to disagree.” Kiara balanced on the balls of her feet. Her body hummed with tension, and the itch was back in her gums and the tips of her fingers.

  Footsteps came from behind them, and Jamie turned. “Two more,” she informed them. Jamie lowered into a crouch, and Kiara didn’t need to look to know that Jamie’s eyes probably weren’t their soft brown anymore.

  “Let us go, and we won’t hurt you.” Kiara spoke to the man in front of her. “Turn around, walk away, and this ends.”

  He shook his head and smiled. “See, that’s the problem with lycans. Always threatening violence.”

  “You started it,” Ryn pointed out. She rolled her shoulders and flashed him a grin that was all teeth. “I’m happy to finish it, though.”

  “Heads up.” Jamie’s voice was a low warning. “One of them has a gun.”

  Kiara wasn’t going to wait around to see if they were going to use it. She glanced back. The woman from the club and another man advanced. He was smaller than the first, but sturdy and compact with mass that was more muscle than fat. The gun in his hand gleamed in the orange light that filtered into the alley.

  “I’ve got this asshole.” Ryn stepped forward, eagerness rolling off her in waves.

  “Take the woman. I’ll take the gun.” No sooner were the words out of Kiara’s mouth than the alley exploded with movement. Jamie raced toward the woman, who was reaching into her jacket, and Kiara went for the raised gun.

  The man was fast, but not werewolf fast, and the silencer on the barrel lengthened the gun so that Kiara had no trouble sweeping it out of her way. He threw a punch with his other hand. Kiara ducked and rammed her fist into his stomach, which forced the breath out of him in a sudden whoosh. He dropped to the ground. His gun clattered from his fingers. Kiara kicked it away. She could see the tattoo on his neck peeking out over his collar: a black axe that matched the one the woman wore.

  Kiara saw Jamie snarling with fury and held at bay at the end of a cattle prod. Ryn had her man on his knees with his arm twisted behind his back and her fingers at his throat. Ryn’s knuckles were bloody, and blood ran from his nose.

  “You’re dangerous.” The woman spoke calmly, apparently at ease in the face of three furious werewolves. The prod in front of her crackled.

  “We were dancing,” Jamie spat.

  “Drop the weapon, and we’ll walk away.” Kiara shoved a handful of wet hair from her face. The rain came down harder. She moved closer. “We don’t want this.”

  The man on his knees laughed.

  She ignored him. “We don’t want to hurt you.”

  “But you will. You have. And it feels good, doesn’t it?” The woman spoke just to Kiara now and she had a gleam in her eyes. “The blood rush, the high, the hunt. You can’t help it.”

  At least on one point, the woman wasn’t wrong. Power surged through Kiara’s body; her blood thrummed with it. The excited beat of her heart, of Jamie’s, of Ryn’s, pounded in her ears. Adrenaline sharpened her focus and opened all her senses so that the night was suddenly alive around her. An eager press of wildness ached for release.

  “Just because something feels good doesn’t mean you have to do it.” Kiara took a deep breath. The rain-heavy air was a soothing counterpoint to her heated flesh. She eased the anger, the outrage, and felt the answering tingle along her body as the near-shift melted away. More in control, she held out her hand to the Huntress. “Give it up.”

  At a sudden movement to her right, Kiara whirled to see the man she’d taken down lunge for the gun. Unprepared, Kiara didn’t move fast enough, and then he was on his knees with the barrel pointed, not at her nor Ryn nor Jamie, but steadily at Deanna.

  Deanna made a choked-off noise and pressed farther back against the brick wall.

  Kiara’s control vanished.

  She surged forward in a blur of motion. Her hands wrapped around his outstretched arm, and, with a vicious shriek of rage, she hurled him against the brick wall. He hit with a sickening crunch; the gun fell from senseless fingers. Before he’d crumpled to the ground, Kiara whirled to face the other two Huntsmen. Her honey-brown eyes were now ice-gray; when she opened her mouth to speak all that came out was an inhuman snarl.

  The woman smirked. “You see? The lycanthropy controls you. You pretend to be normal. You pretend to be people. But you’re not.”

  Kiara lunged for her. Jamie intercepted, her hands digging into Kiara’s arms with bruising force as she held her cousin back. The woman laughed and backed away.

  Ryn released the man she held and shoved him toward the street. “Run.”

  He scrambled to his feet.

  “Kiara, Kiara, calm down.” Jamie refused to let go as the two Huntsmen vanished around the corner. Kiara could make her let go. Claws pushed through the tips of her fingers, her
toes.

  Ryn shouldered Jamie, who instantly moved to Deanna’s side.

  Unlike Jamie, Ryn kept her hands off of Kiara, but her mere presence barely a foot away blocked any movement Kiara might make. “Control yourself, Kiara,” Ryn snapped, with none of Jamie’s understanding. “Control yourself.”

  The too-familiar words jabbed through Kiara’s rage. She took a sharp breath and then another. Stepping back from Ryn, she spun around, faced the far wall, and closed her eyes.

  Focus, focus, focus. The rain was sharply cold on her shoulders, her bare arms. The pavement was flat and solid under her feet. She smelled sweat, blood, fear. And urine—a constant in downtown alleys. The exercise grounded her, and the urge to shift receded.

  Chapter Four |

  Kiara turned back to the group. The stormy gray of her eyes gave way to their usual shade of honey gold. Deanna crouched beside the fallen man. Her brow furrowed as she checked his pulse.

  “Leave him,” Kiara said.

  Deanna stared up at her with her eyes wide. Kiara stepped past Jamie and gave Deanna’s arm an impatient tug, pulling her to her feet.

  “We should call someone though, right? He needs help. He needs an ambulance,” Deanna said.

  “He pointed a gun at you.” Ryn put herself between Deanna and the man’s fallen body to block her view.

  Kiara kept her senses flung open and did her best to filter through the influx of sensory information to hear if anyone was approaching the alley. “We have to move. There might be more of them.”

  “Dee, it’s okay,” Jamie coaxed, wrapping her arm around Deanna’s shoulders and hurrying her forward. Deanna’s right hand was still balled in a fist. The metal of her keys poked out between her knuckles the way she’d been taught in a half-remembered self-defense class.

  “He’s human, though. He’s a person,” Deanna insisted as they hurried from the alley. “He won’t heal.”

  “He’ll be fine. They’ll come back for him.” Ryn’s tone indicated that she wasn’t thrilled with the thought. “We should be long gone before they do. So where are we going?” She arched an eyebrow as Kiara darted into the street to flag down a cab.