Table of Contents
Copyright
Chapter One – Bliss
Chapter Two – Hugo
Chapter Three – Bliss
Chapter Four – Hugo
Chapter Five – Bliss
Chapter Six – Hugo
Chapter Seven – Bliss
Chapter Eight – Hugo
Chapter Nine – Bliss
Chapter Ten – Hugo
Chapter Eleven – Bliss
Chapter Twelve – Hugo
Chapter Thirteen – Bliss
Chapter Fourteen – Hugo
Chapter Fifteen – Bliss
Chapter Sixteen – Hugo
Chapter Seventeen – Bliss
Chapter Eighteen – Hugo
Chapter Nineteen – Bliss
Other Books By Harmony Raines
To Catch
A Wolf
Wolf Valley Raiders
(Book Two)
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Note from the author: My books are written, produced and edited in the UK where spellings and word usage can vary from U.S. English. The use of quotes in dialogue and other punctuation can also differ.
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All rights reserved. This book, or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written consent of the author or publisher.
This is a work of fiction and is intended for mature audiences only. All characters within are eighteen years of age or older. Names, places, businesses, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, actual events or places is purely coincidental.
© 2015 Harmony Raines
Silver Moon Erotica
Kindle Edition
Chapter One – Bliss
“We’re cattle rustlers now?” asked Bliss as she watched her brothers loading up their truck, ready to go out into the night and steal someone else’s property. Not for the first time, she was questioning what exactly their motives were for being in Wolf Valley. Yes, she knew they were here to avenge their father’s memory, but what did that have to do with cattle?
“Why not? If you don’t want to come with us, you can stay here,” Cole said, jumping down from the truck and kissing her quickly on the cheek. “We don’t need a girl along. You’ll only get in the way.”
“That kind of psychology only worked on me when I was a teenager,” she said, wiping her face. In truth, she was happy to catch a glance of the old Cole. Her elder brother had become a different person since they had all sworn a blood oath to return to Wolf Valley and take back what belonged to them.
“Now you’re all grown up and would rather stay here playing house. Is that it?” Riley asked, coming out of the house they were living in. That is, if you could call it a house. They had moved back here a couple of months ago, after their dad died. But the place hadn’t been lived in for years and was damp and crumbling around them.
Damn it, she missed her father, but she blamed everything that had happened recently on him.
If he hadn’t made them swear to come back here and take back what he thought was rightfully his, then they would all be somewhere else, happy, instead of about to risk their wolf hides once more in a night-time raid. But their dad had always taught them to fight, because everyone was against them, and so that was what they were doing.
Feeling jaded by the whole thing, she found the strength to say, “I’ll stay here if Sol does. If not, you know I’m coming with you.” Sol was her younger brother. Starved of oxygen at birth, his brain didn’t function the same way as other people’s and he behaved like a child. It became an even bigger problem when he turned wolf; then he had a habit of being completely unpredictable. Bliss had managed to keep him out of most of the raids, because there had been another two wolves running with them. The extra pairs of hands meant there had always been someone free to stay home with Sol.
Things had run smoothly, despite the odd insinuation from one of the wolves, Lance, that Bliss should sleep with him as a perk of the job. However, everything had come to a head two weeks ago. They had stolen a car from a local woman. Lance’s job was to scare her off, but he had a lot more than scaring on his mind. To compound matters, a couple of days afterwards, he had gone after the same woman and there had been a fight between Lance and the woman’s mate. It all got nasty, and Bliss had been furious. Especially when Lance had come back here bragging that he could have what he wanted, that they were above the law.
Bliss had made sure he knew that in this pack, she was the law. She could not risk Sol thinking that kind of behaviour was acceptable. At least her brothers had backed her when she insisted Lance and his friend Jed left. They might steal from people, but she would not accept inappropriate behaviour towards women. None at all.
Except from her brothers, who were always inappropriate, about most things. From whose job it was to do the laundry, to who cooked. Male chauvinist pigs. She kicked a stone across the dirt track and shoved her hands in her pockets. She had grown weary of this life; maybe the oath she made was loosening its grip on her. Bliss had begun to come to her senses and realise exactly what they were becoming. And she loved her family to much to watch them descend to the same depths their father had.
Behind her, Sol appeared, looking excited, Bliss knew she had to keep a close eye on him. With less people, they all had to go on each raid, and that meant Sol came too. Something Sol was ecstatic about, he watched how Cole and Riley behaved and tried to be like them. However, he didn’t have the same common sense, and that made situations become dangerous. Fast.
Keeping her brother safe had always been a problem, but the blood oath had made his behaviour worse, more unpredictable, and she wished they were all free of it. Yet just the thought of pulling free made her head feel as if it was about to implode.
What worried her more was that Cole and Riley didn’t see Sol’s behaviour as a big problem. Probably because they were too busy fighting amongst themselves, trying to be the biggest, baddest wolf around. Did they really think that was how they were going to become the alpha of Wolf Valley? She might be a girl, but she knew better than that. She also knew, deep down, that her dad had never been alpha material, and so the revenge they were participating in seemed hollow. Maybe it was her female instincts kicking in, but she understood they had to break free.
However, she knew, none of her brothers shared the same view. They’d looked up to their father far too much. If she ever voiced her thoughts, they would no doubt disown her. And that would be unbearable. Bliss just needed to find a way of convincing them to break free too. For their own sakes.
“Look,” Cole said, coming back towards her. “You know we have to do this. Apart from what we owe Dad, Sol’s drugs don’t come cheap. Once we have taken over Wolf Valley, we won’t have to steal.”
“Don’t you ever think that this whole becoming the alpha of Wolf Valley is nonsense? I think maybe Dad was a little crazy by the end of it.” She attempted to voice her concern, but Cole soon knocked her back.
“Don’t say that.” His face coloured in anger. “He looked after us all of our lives. Alone after Mom died. We owe him this.”
“Revenge for something that happened to him over twenty years ago? Stealing from people who might not even have been born then?” Cole’s anger was contagious; the blood thumped through her veins and she squared up to him, no longer afraid of Cole. Damn, they were a mixed up family.
“Call it a way to
thank him for what he did for us,” Riley intervened. “Anyway, if Dad had become the alpha, like he was promised, then this would have been what was due him. So we are taking the cut he never had.”
“You need to remember, Bliss, that we made a promise to the man who raised us. He was our alpha, you know. We were like his pack. I sure as hell am not going to back out of this. I plan to honour his memory. His life would have been so much easier if he had been alpha. He would have had help raising us, instead of dying young because he worked himself too hard. For us.”
They had been over and over this before. They couldn’t see that their dad didn’t work himself into an early grave: he drank himself into one. However, she knew it was no use arguing with him, he hadn’t been there, watching it first-hand.
She also knew she would have to go with them because Sol was already in the back of the truck, and unless she wrestled him out of it, he wouldn’t be budging. Sol loved going everywhere with Cole and Riley. They had been apart for a couple of years leading up to the death of their dad. Her elder brothers having left home, travelling around the world to find themselves and to understand what it was to be a wolf. While she had spent her whole life looking after her dad and assuming the role of mother to Sol.
Now they were all together again, Sol wanted to be one of the boys. He was getting harder and harder to keep out of harm’s way. She had thought it had been difficult back in the city, caring for Sol and her dad, who drank far too much. But here in the wide-open spaces of Wolf Valley, Sol had further to run, and her brother’s low mental age meant he didn’t see the hidden dangers. It was like one big playground to him.
“Look, Bliss,” Riley said, walking back to the truck with some rope. “You are one of us. No matter how much you try to deny it, your blood runs the same as ours. This is what we were born to be. Outlaws. The people of Wolf Valley made sure of that when they ran our father out of town.”
This time she didn’t argue. He was probably right; she had never fit in where they grew up, none of the Merric kids did. She knew it was partly to do with them all being able to turn into wolves once they hit puberty. As if that wasn’t enough to screw any kid up. If the people of Wolf Valley were to blame for all this, why should she make more trouble for herself by arguing with her brothers?
“Here she comes,” Riley called as she went to the truck and climbed in the back with Sol.
Sol eyed her nervously. And with good reason: she intended to keep him on a tight leash. He was becoming a danger to himself as much as everyone else. Bliss planned to make sure he kept out of the way tonight, preferably in the truck. If the cattle they were going after trampled him, they couldn’t exactly take him to a hospital. No, the deal would be, she would help if Riley and Cole told Sol to stay put. Give him the job of lookout, anything, as long as he didn’t end up under the hooves of the cattle.
Cole started the truck, and she grabbed hold of the sides to stop herself bouncing around when they drove down the rough track leading away from their house. Once out on the open road, things smoothed out and she lay back and stared at the sky above. The stars began to twinkle in the moonless sky; she almost forgot the reason for the journey. One by one, they appeared, so bright, so far away, and she wished she could fly up there and be out of this mess of a life she was living.
But family came first; her dad had drummed it into her. Into all of them. It was the reason she had worked two jobs to pay the bills and then gone home to look after the two men in her life who couldn’t look after themselves. Sol and her father.
“Moon?” asked Sol, looking up at the sky too.
“Not tonight, Sol. This way it’s so dark no one will see us.” She slid across the truck bed to be next to him. Behind them, the trailer they were going to load the cattle into rattled along the road. She sighed, sensing trouble. They might not be seen in the dark, but they most certainly could be heard. “Are you warm enough, Sol?”
“Yes, Bliss,” he answered, giving her that sweet smile that made her heart tighten and her resolve to protect him strengthen. He couldn’t help the way he was.
“Did you eat your sandwich before we came out?”
“Yes. Peanut butter.”
“It’s your favourite, I thought it would tempt you.” She didn’t let on she had hidden his meds in it. Getting Sol to take the drugs that helped keep his temper even was getting increasingly difficult. Damn, her whole life was getting increasingly difficult.
“Then I had cupcakes,” he said, his expression naughty; he was testing her. Sol was supposed to ask before he ate sugary treats, because they tended to make him hyperactive, especially since he could eat ten cupcakes in around two minutes and not puke.
“Exactly how many cupcakes?”
“One.”
“One cupcake?” she asked hopefully, but she could see by his face that it was a lot more.
“One box,” he said, smiling happily at the thought.
She groaned inwardly. “You ate one box of cupcakes?”
“Riley said I could have one,” Sol said defensively.
“I think Riley meant one cupcake, not one box.” She had better stay with him when they got to the field where the cattle were. If not, he would end up running all the way to top of the mountain on a sugar-fuelled adventure. She did not want to spend the night scouring the mountain, looking for him. Sol’s idea of hide and seek was to get as far away from Bliss as possible and get into as much trouble, or mud, as possible.
“In my tummy,” he said and giggled, rubbing his hand round and round.
“I bet they are, Sol. We’ve talked about this. You shouldn’t eat lots of cakes.”
“They were yummy.”
“I bet they were.” She smiled.
“Yummy in my tummy,” he laughed and she had to join in. Yep, just like a child.
The truck took a sharp turn, the trailer faithfully following behind. Then they came to a halt, the doors of the truck opening, and Riley and Cole got out.
“Right, let’s get on with this. Quicker we round up a couple of these cattle, the quicker Bliss can be back beside the fire with her slippers and knitting.”
“Funny. Very funny.” Bliss jumped down from the truck, breathing in the clear air. It was a beautiful night and her wolf just wanted to run. Run and run, and never look back. As much as she hated the life they were leading, she didn’t hate the open air. The city had been claustrophobic at best, her wolf constantly scratching to get free. Here she could be free. If only they were not tied up with this stupid oath to avenge their father.
But an alpha has to be obeyed, and their promise held them even after his death. But how much longer they were going to let this play out, she didn’t know. Sooner or later they had to make a move on Wolf Valley. The only problem was none of them exactly knew how they were supposed to become the new alpha, or which one of them the role would fall to.
Cole and Riley both maintained it would be one of them. With Riley being the eldest, he was sure he must be his father’s rightful heir, and yet Cole announced he would never let that happen without a fight. Which was usually where their argument ended. They had fought both as grown men, and grown wolves, neither a pretty sight when you were expected to clear up the mess.
Riley, as usual, had a plan. “Bliss. You circle round the back of the herd, drive them this way.”
“Now I’m a sheepdog?” she asked, not hiding her annoyance.
“You have a softer, more feminine touch,” Cole said, his voice serious.
Then her two older brothers laughed and Sol joined in, wanting to be one of the men, to fit in with the brothers he adored.
Outnumbered, she moved away from them, only turning to say to Cole, “Tell Sol you need him to keep watch. I do not want him out there with the cattle. It’s too dangerous.”
“She’s right, Sol. I need you to stay here.” Cole pointed to the edge of the trailer.
“I want to chase cows.” Sol’s voice held a petulant tone, and she knew it was going
to take a lot of persuasion from her brothers to make him stay out of the way.
“But we need you to stand here. Hold the edge of the trailer and make sure the cattle don’t get past you. It’s a very important job, Sol. Do you understand?” Cole patted Sol on the shoulder, making sure he had his brother’s attention. “Very important.”
“OK,” Sol agreed, although he did not sound enthusiastic.
“Good man.” Cole slapped him on the arm, making Sol laugh even louder, and thump Cole back. “Hey, calm down, buddy.” Cole rubbed his shoulder.
“He ate too much sugar. I doubt whether he will be calm the whole night,” Bliss said, glaring at Cole. “You make sure he stays here, Cole.”
“I don’t know if he would be better to go with you. I think he needs to run all of that energy off,” Cole said.
“No. It’s too dangerous. He stays here. Tell him, Cole. Riley, you too,” Bliss insisted.
“Anything to stop you going on about it,” Riley said crossly. “Sol. You stay here, or there will be no more cakes or cookies when we get home.”
“Sol can have more?” Sol asked hopefully.
“No!” Bliss said firmly.
But Riley overruled her. “Yes, you can have one more cupcake if you stay here and don’t move.”
“Don’t move,” Sol repeated.
“Yes,” Riley said, and then turned to Bliss. “Sooner you get those cattle over here, the sooner we can go.” Then to Cole, he said, “You ready, bro?”
“Let’s do this.” Cole changed into his wolf and ran off into the night.
Bliss turned wolf, pleased she could shut her brothers out while she went across the field towards the cattle. At first, they ignored her, and then one of them caught her scent and turned to face her, head down. Running at it, she snarled. It had the desired effect, and the herd began to move away from her, towards the gate.
In her peripheral vision, she could see Cole and Riley making the herd aware of them, so they didn’t stampede off to her left or right. It was all going smoothly.
To Catch A Wolf: BBW Paranormal Shape Shifter Romance (Wolf Valley Raiders Book 2) Page 1
