by Jessica Snow
He was staring at her with a smug expression. For a moment, Crystal was afraid he was going to tell her to get the hell off his property and find others to be her tools, but she felt relief when he finally smiled. "Now, you may command me."
Even with the humiliation she had been put through, Crystal was happy enough at the prospect of being able to bring Liam ultimate pain to return his smile.
Ten damn years, Thelma thought with disgust as she shouldered several large black trash bags and stepped out in the early dawn in her barmaid outfit.
Ten years she had given her boss, Harvey, working at Gold Moon, a ritzy club in the middle of downtown. For the past decade, she had been one of his hardest workers, but for some reason, he had chosen to treat her like crap.
Maybe it was because Thelma was overweight, middle-aged and liked to speak her mind. And Harvey did not like women who spoke their mind. No, Harvey liked the ditzy types, that did whatever he said, no questions asked.
And because they did whatever he said, they got certain perks. Like getting to leave early when the club was still in shambles, leaving poor Thelma to do all the work. Like she had that night, staying way past her shift into the wee hours of the morning.
"Let Thelma do it," the younger bar waitresses would say to each other when they thought she wasn’t listening. "She’s an old maid anyway."
The little heifers did not realize that they would one day be old and fat, except they would be old, fat, and dumb, which thankfully, Thelma was not.
"I should quit and leave him with those airheads," Thelma grumbled as she made her way to a dumpster, trying not to breathe in the fumes of the smelly alley. "That’ll show him."
When she reached the trash bin, she set her bags down and then she opened the lid. One by one, she began tossing the bags into the dumpster while trying to hold her breath. On her last one, she paused, the hairs on her arms rising. Whenever she got this feeling, it meant one thing. Someone was watching.
Slowly, she turned and her heart almost jumped out of her chest.
There, before her, was a golden wolf, staring at her.
Immediately, she began trembling. What the hell was a wolf doing out far from the wilderness and in the middle of the city? Thelma had no time to ponder the curious circumstances. She did not want to end up the wolf’s next meal.
"Please don’t hurt me," Thelma whimpered at the thing.
The wolf did not reply and just stared at her with its penetrating, eyes. Thelma had no idea if it understood her or not.
Oh, my God, she thought, what am I going to do?
She cursed herself for not bringing her usual beating stick that she kept with her when she came out to throw away garbage to keep stray dogs and cats away.
She glanced down at the last trash bag. Suddenly, she had an idea. "I have some food for you," she told the wolf.
Nervously, she wiped her sweaty palms on her apron and carefully bent over to open the bag. Keeping her eye on the wolf, she began digging for any type of morsel. Her hand shifted through a bunch of grimy, moist muck before it landed on something soft and squishy. Thelma pulled it out of the bag and stared. It was a half-eaten lime, probably leftover from someone’s margarita.
Suddenly, the wolf took a step forward. That was all the frightened Thelma could take. With a strangled cry, she threw the half-eaten lime at the beast and took off for the safety of the club.
In all her fifty-two years, she could not remember moving so fast as she dashed inside the club and slammed the door, her chest heaving, her breath coming out in pained wheezes.
"That’s it," she gasped as her heart pounded in her ears and she began searching for the club phone to call for backup. Harvey did not pay her enough for this shit. "I quit."
The wolf eyed the trash bag the big woman had left, the smell of decay wafting to his nose. McKenzie’s scent had led him to this back alley that was sandwiched between two buildings.
Making sure the woman was not going to return and that no one else lurked about, the wolf quickly transformed into a naked, golden-haired man. Liam stretched out his arms and yawned. He was near exhausted. He had searched the city exhaustively, evading human contact, until he had picked up a strong aroma of McKenzie’s scent coming from in between two buildings in a seedy part of town.
He walked forward, intent on investigating the alley when he paused. This was not good. McKenzie’s scent was emanating from the open dumpster. A sense of trepidation filled him.
Reluctantly, he stepped toward the trash can, dreading what lay within. Just before he peered inside, another distinct scent wafted to his nose. Liam crinkled his brow in confusion. He smelled a cat very close by.
He looked around but did not see anything. After a while, he gave up looking for the elusive feline. He needed to hurry up and get back to Kat and assuage her fears. The sky had already turned a light blue color.
Taking a deep breath, he peered over the side of the dumpster. Instantly, his heart dropped at the sight before him. A blonde girl lay naked inside, her lower torso half-covered by the trash bags the waitress had thrown in, her eyes staring and unseeing. Small puncture wounds riddled her neck. Instinctively, Liam recognized her wounds. Vampire bites.
The girl looked young, in her teens, a delicate flower that had just begun to blossom. It was a terrible shame that her life had been taking from her before she had a chance to live it. She would never know what it was like to grow up, find a mate, have children and grow old.
Tears stung Liam’s golden eyes. It was all so terrible.
And the worse thing of all? She looked just like Kat.
Chapter 26
Katerina came awake with a gasp. She had been having a dream about her family. In the dream, Kat and her sister were sitting at the Headley kitchen table, having dinner with both their parents and talking about good times. Everyone had seemed blissful, particularly Kat’s mother, Reba, when suddenly, the house began morphing around them into a dark and strange forest.
Glowing eyes watched the family from the sidelines, predators of unknown origin. Kat barely had time to register what was happening, when without warning, Big Mike stood up and went into a complete rage, transforming into a bear. When McKenzie saw this, she started screaming and took off into the forest into the sea of watching eyes. A second later, Big Mike followed his youngest daughter, hot on her heels.
Kat screamed at her mother to do something, but her mother just sat there calmly with a tranquil look on her face as if everything that had just happened was perfectly normal.
The eyes watching them began moving in, surrounding the two women and revealing themselves in the process. To Kat’s surprise, they were wolves. And the most surprising thing of all; was that a familiar golden wolf led the pack.
Slowly, they crept nearer to the two women until they were completely surrounded. Kat yelled at her mother to help, but her mother still just sat there smiling.
That’s when the golden wolf had jumped straight for Kat’s throat and she had woken up.
Suddenly, Kat was brought out of her reverie by the creak of the bed. She looked down and gasped at the surprising sight of Liam sniffing in between her legs. She looked around, wondering if she was still in a dream.
To her surprise, she was in a room, most likely Liam’s, in a large bed, with a crack of sunlight peeking through the curtains. Somehow during the wee hours of the morning, she must have gotten up off the couch and sleepwalked into Liam’s room and into his bed. For a moment, she wondered if the Lilly boy had picked her up and carried her into the room, but she quickly discarded the notion as she realized Liam was the most likely culprit.
She reached down and touched Liam’s shoulder. She felt warm flesh. He was real. This was not a dream.
Liam looked up at her touch, his golden eyes inquisitive.
"Liam, did you find McKenzie—"
"Shhh." Liam brought his fingers to his lips and returned to her crotch and continued sniffing.
What in the hel
l is he doing? Kat thought with confusion.
Was this some sort of odd mating ritual? Then it hit Kat. Liam had told her earlier that the smell of a female’s nether regions was what turned male wolves on. Maybe that’s what he was doing. But that did not explain why he was doing it now, at the oddest of times, when he should have been telling Kat about how his search for McKenzie went.
But the question of Liam’s odd behavior would have to wait.
Suddenly, Liam tore the rags off her body with an animalistic snarl and continued to sniff her nether regions like a starving dog before burying his face into her mound.
Immediately, all thoughts of McKenzie fled at the pleasure that swept up Kat’s spine. Liam’s firm lips clamped down on her clit, sending shockwaves of pleasure through her thighs. Kat groaned. It felt so...damn...good.
He sucked on her clit and lapped at it, almost too roughly, then let her go for a few seconds to recover and start to crave it again. He repeated this several times, driving Kat absolutely wild and making her nipples stiffen with need. She grasped them and squeezed as he covered her mound with his mouth again, sucking and slurping while looking up into Kat’s eyes with those golden orbs.
Kat stared back, hardly able to take his penetrating gaze, her thighs quaking around his neck. Liam bore down harder, staring up at her, quickening the rough caresses of his lips and tongue and this time, not letting up. Kat fought desperately, but it became too much pleasure to take. Kat opened her mouth and screamed.
"Ah my head feels like it's wrapped in a vice," Carly groaned, suddenly sitting up in the small bed that she had laid recovering in for the past few hours and clutching at the bandages wrapped around her head
Zack snapped around, his eyes widening with relief. "Carly! You’re finally awake."
"No shit. Sherlock," Carly groaned. She looked around. "What the hell happened to me? And why are you sitting here watching over me in a room I’ve never been in before?" The girl paused, eyeing Zack’s muscular biceps up and down appreciatively. "Not that I’m complaining or anything."
Zack looked away and blushed. "Your cousin and uncle came to blows last night, and I’m told you got in between them to break it up and got a blow of your own from your uncle."
"Geez, no wonder why I can’t remember anything," Carly complained. "He must have nearly ripped my head off."
Zack nodded. "Yeah, Liam says you’re lucky to be alive. You hit your head pretty darn hard."
"Good things we wolves regenerate." Carly continued to rub her sore skull, then paused to stare at Zack. "Well, I guess there is one good thing out of all this mess."
Zack turned to look at her. "What’s that?"
Carly grinned at him and gave a playful wink. "Having a hunk like you watch over me."
Zack’s cheeks turned redder than blood and he let out an uncomfortable cough. It was no secret to Zack that Liam’s cousin had a crush on him. Although Carly was pretty cute, he did not find her as attractive as McKenzie.
Quick to change the subject, Zack said, "But that’s not the half of Liam’s worries." When Carly quirked an eyebrow questioningly, he quickly filled her in on all that had happened while she had been knocked unconscious, including his sister making off with Kat’s sister and threatening to feed her to the vampires.
Carly shook her head. "Geez, Zack, I always knew your sister was batshit crazy but—” Suddenly, Carly snapped her head around. "My god, what is that noise? Sounds like a cat in heat is getting strangled."
As if to punctuate her words, the floor beneath them shook as they heard loud bangs and screeches from the next room over.
Zack made a face. "Looks like Liam is having some fun with his new mate." Then Zack frowned. If Liam was in the next room over, banging Kat’s brains out, did that mean he had found McKenzie?
Liam’s breath was hot on her neck as he thrust deep inside of her. He growled into her ear while his hands cupped her large breasts, squeezing and kneading, while his hard stomach rubbed firmly against the softness of her flesh.
Her back arched with ecstasy, Kat clawed at Liam’s back, feeling his skin come away underneath her fingernails as she let out pleasured cries.
The bed rocked and undulated like ocean waves from the force of Liam’s thrusts, sounding like booming thunder when it banged against the bedroom wall and shook the floor.
Kat should have been telling Liam to stop, should have been demanding him to tell her about his search for McKenzie, but she couldn’t. He just felt. So. Damn. Good. She was enraptured with passion, totally and utterly his.
His lips burning her neck, Liam swiveled his slender hips, driving deeply inside her, hitting all the right spots. Kat cried out and latched onto his buns as he moved his chiseled body like a seesaw.
A match had been lit in the pits of her stomach, and with each deep thrust, it caught fire.
Faster and faster Liam went, working that magnificent body like a god from Olympus, sending flames of pleasure licking up into Kat’s swollen breasts while she held on for dear life to his ass crack.
Suddenly, Liam pulled back from nibbling on her neck to stare into her eyes while he pounded. Those beautiful golden eyes. The penetrating gaze that said Kat was his property. He wanted her to cum. He was daring her to. It was more than Kat could take. With a raw scream that tore from her lips like a screeching banshee, Kat’s nerves exploded with pleasure as Liam’s valiant efforts sent her over the precipice again.
Several hard thrusts later, Liam threw back his head and howled as a warm deluge of liquid filled Kat up.
So much for birth control, Kat thought dimly as her limbs were wracked by powerful explosions of pleasure. She had known she was forgetting something, but Liam had managed to distract her thoroughly.
Then it was all over. Liam let out a contented sigh and collapsed next to his mate, his muscular body covered in a sheen of sweat. It was only after Kat had recovered from her mind-blowing orgasm when she was hit by a frantic thought.
McKenzie!
Kat turned to her lover. "Did you find anything?"
Reluctantly, Liam returned her gaze, his eyes suddenly sad.
Panic punched Kat in the gut. "What? Why are you looking at me like that?"
Liam sighed. "You’re not going to like what I have to say."
Kat’s heart began to pound. Oh no. It’s bad news. That’s why he wanted to distract me!
"McKenzie’s dead."
Kat felt her heart skip several beats. It couldn’t be true. It just couldn’t be.
Suddenly, Kat snatched the bed sheet and pulled it up to cover her breasts, her body shaking like a leaf in the wind. "Is this your sick idea of a joke?" Kat demanded incredulously. "You come back and screw me and then tell me my sister is dead?"
Liam’s eyes were pleading. "Please Kat, I needed you after seeing that, and it was only my way of relaxing you before the bad news."
Kat gaped at her mate. "Seriously? What kind of horseshit response is that?"
Gently placing a hand on Kat’s shoulders, Liam soothed, "It is a wolf thing, Kat—"
Kat jerked away from his touch. "Don’t touch me!" she yelled. She was getting fed up with being shocked with these strange customs that the wolves engaged in. What other crazy things did they do besides sniffing booty holes to decide their mates and screwing someone’s brains out to ’relax’ them before giving them horrible news?
Liam recoiled from her rage, a pained look in his eyes.
Kat ignored his hurt and shook her head with disbelief. "And I don’t believe you. McKenzie can’t be dead. You have it all wrong."
"I followed her trail to a dumpster in the heart of the city. She was lying inside. From the looks of it, she had been drained of every drop of blood she had by a vampire." Liam shook his head with sadness. "I’m sorry Kat, but it looked like Crystal carried out her threat to hand her over to an unscrupulous fanger."
Tears streamed down Kat’s face. "No," she moaned. "It can’t be. It hasn’t even been twenty-four hours yet.
"
"I’m sorry, Kat. It had to be her. She looked just like you."
A tide of guilt threatened to overcome Kat as she struggled with the news. What would Kat tell her father? That she got mixed up with wolves and because of mating with one that happened to be promised to another, McKenzie had paid the ultimate price? It was all too much to bear.
"Where is her body?"
Liam glanced away. "There was no way I could take it with me without drawing attention."
Kat wiped away the tears staining her cheeks and glared. "Are you serious? You expect me to believe my sister is dead with no proof?"
"Kat I—"
"Take me to her now."
Or so help me God.
"Kat—"
"NOW!" Kat bellowed.
Liam stared at her long and hard before letting out a defeated sigh. "Okay."
"They’re gone," said Zack as he peeked out from the curtain and watched as Liam and Kat drove out of the gated townhome community in Liam’s white Porsche. He was relieved. Now with Liam out of his hair, he could resume his search for McKenzie. The golden-haired shifter had obviously come back empty handed if Kat’s sour face had been any indication.
Both Carly and Zack had heard a heated exchange going on between the two one room over, but even with their enhanced hearing, they had been unable to hear exactly what was being said. One thing was for certain, though; McKenzie was still missing.
Carly smirked, her gaze dropping to his backside. "You don’t say."
Zack held back a sigh of exasperation. "I’m going to need you to stop with the comments and dirty looks, Carly. I have a girlfriend."
Carly, tilted her now bandage-free head to the side and fixed her brown eyes on his face. "You’re a total buzzkill, you know that?"
"I can’t help it." He scratched at his hair, his gazing dropping to the floor. "I’m going to need your help."
"Help with what?"
"Finding McKenzie."
