Wolf Games (The Vampire Games Book 4)

by Caroline Peckham

  “Yes, father,” Ulvic muttered, bowing his head. I tried to see through the guise, but if Ulvic was faking his loyalty, I couldn't tell.

  “Now tell me, who were you thinking of sending her to?” Alfric asked, speaking as if I wasn't there.

  “Rockley Jones, perhaps?” Ulvic suggested. “It was his resort they destroyed, after all.”

  Alfric let out a hoarse laugh. “You do know he'll most likely have her torn apart by dogs?”

  Ulvic's eyes dropped to me, absent of light. “Yes, I know. And we'll be seen as heroes for it.”

  My heart turned into a lump of ice. “Ulvic...” I tried, but he ignored me.

  “Hmph.” Alfric turned to leave and I slumped back down onto the floor, panting as the pain receded from my leg.

  “Oh... and as a reminder not to attempt to escape again...” Alfric slammed the heel of his boot down on my calf. My scream rang on in my ears, reaching to the sky, shaking the roof. I was in so much agony that blackness immediately swam before my eyes.

  Alfric's voice found me amongst the screams that kept ripping from my throat, striking fear in my heart. “Blood traitors get no lenience in my home. If I fancy it, I'll have that leg broken a hundred times before Rockley lays his hands on you.”

  Jameson

  I missed her. Man, I really did. Days passed with all my thoughts trained on Cass. Sometimes it helped. Sometimes it made me go crazy. I played out our last night together over and over in my head. If I'd only made a few different decisions. If I'd refused to let her out of my sight, I wouldn't be in this situation.

  Gazing up at the dark roof of my cell, I swore to myself if I ever got her back, I'd never let her go. But with each day that passed, the less likely that seemed. The more she slipped from my grasp. What if I never made it back to her? What if I lived out the rest of my life under Ulvic's command, forced to do his bidding, just a living, breathing weapon? I'd rather have died than live out that fate.

  I never had a moment alone with Ulvic. He hugged Alfric's side like a beaten dog. And Mercy was kept away from us in another part of the house. I reckoned that meant Alfric didn't trust her. If she was healed, I wondered whether Mercy would have attacked the Hunds to help us. She might have turned coats back on Øyafrelse, but she wasn't suicidal. And why would she care for us wolves more than her own survival?

  “Jameson?” Nadine whispered for the third time in a minute. She was in the cell across from mine. I could have looked her in the eye if I'd been bothered to lift my head from the muddy floor.

  My spirits were as damp as a sponge right then. But I couldn't ignore her any longer. I was still bound by Ulvic's command to bond with her.

  “What's up, Dina?”

  “We need to get out of here.”

  “No shit,” I growled.

  “Nadine's right,” Reason hissed from the cell next to hers. “We have to come up with a plan.”

  “Working on it,” I said as confidently as I could, but internally, I was drowning in my own sorrows. I needed to man up. But I'd seriously hit rock bottom. Whenever I'd come close to it before, I'd stood up and started climbing again. But this time felt different. I'd lost most of my pack, my free will, and now Cass, too. What more was the world gonna take from me?

  I sighed, pressing my cheek into the cool earth. I wasn't usually one to throw a pity-party. But goddammit, I was so done with life testing me.

  It was impossible to believe how recently Ulvic had been a friend. More than that; he'd been like a brother. Or maybe a weird uncle. But still, we'd had good times. Great times.

  Had he always thought of me as less than him? Had me and the other wolves only held some prize value to him? Part of his little Werewolf collection? His hobby?

  New York, 1923

  I lived like the wind, moving across lands. I was a nomad, exploring new worlds, discovering new people. That was how I'd spent the last hundred years or so. I was done with the pirate life. After days of 'wolf training', Captain Harving had refused to let me join their Werewolf pack because I wasn't a 'good fit'. Okay, so maybe I'd also bedded Ophelia who'd happened to have been Harving's mate. That might have factored in...

  I'd always imagined becoming Immortal would have been intrinsically linked with finding Varick. But at last, I'd had to accept that he was truly lost. Which meant the sea wasn't my home anymore. We'd ruled it together. It hadn't been the same without him and I'd finally decided to leave that life behind and start afresh. A small bonus was that I would have gone down as a hero amongst my crewmen. They would have told stories of the captain who'd sacrificed himself to a wolf to save them. Which was definitely worth faking my death for.

  I'd searched for Varick. Lord knew I had. But over a hundred years after my transition into a Werewolf, I still had no further knowledge on his whereabouts.

  I know you're out there, brother. I'll find you one day.

  In the meantime, I made my way to America. Specifically, New York. And right at that moment, I had a pretty blonde sucking on my lower lip.

  As per usual, I had eyes for someone else. I spent most social events moving from one girl to the next until I eventually chose one to go to bed with. It was the 20s, and life was good. And since the prohibition of alcohol, life had gotten a whole lot better. If there was one way to make sure everyone in New York was drinking on a regular basis, it was outlawing alcohol.

  At that particular party, held in the basement of a wealthy aristocrat who had a lot more money than he did hair, my eyes were pinned on his crimson-haired wife. She was stood beside her husband, whose name I'd forgotten. He was laughing with a friend, sipping from a tumbler of whiskey. The flecks of blood on his spats told me I shouldn't mess with his wife. But the Werewolf in me dared me to. Especially as she was fluttering her long lashes at me.

  I shifted the blonde from my lap and she fell awkwardly onto the seat beside mine with a hmph of disapproval. Women liked my British accent around here. They also liked my roguish smile and the way their knees weakened when I set my sights on them.

  The redhead floated closer to me, parting from her husband. The first stage was easy, the second wouldn't be.

  “Hi...I haven't seen you at one of my husband's parties before.” She held out a silk-gloved palm. Her voice was throaty and her accent had a heavy New Yorker twang.

  “Christopher. And you must be Gracie.” I took her hand. Rule number one when you're trying to bed someone else's wife? Don't give out your real name.

  “Oh gosh, are you British?” She seemed enthralled, fluttering those long lashes again.

  It didn't take much more than twenty minutes for her to invite me on a 'tour of the house'. I endured the tour, occasionally brushing a lock of hair behind her ear, admiring her, courting her. It wasn't an act. I generally obsessed over a girl once I'd decided I wanted them. It was like an addiction. The temptation, the build up, the game of cat and mouse. And when she eventually gave in to my advances, I'd give her the best night of her life and was long gone before morning. I was left with a high like no other. But it never lasted. And I was never drawn back to the same girl for more. Sometimes I wondered if that was part of being a Werewolf, but deep down, I knew I'd always been that way.

  Varick had told me I had abandonment issues because my mother had gotten rid of me. But when Varick's father had taken me in on his ship, that crew had become my family. Varick had been my brother. I didn't know anything else. And alright, maybe I'd wondered about where I'd come from back when I was a kid. But those days were long gone. Maybe my mother hadn't been able to look after me. Maybe she'd thought she was doing the right thing. And hell, I wouldn't have chosen any other life than the one I'd had aboard that ship.

  So no, Varick, I do not have abandonment issues. Unless you count the fact that you abandoned me. And by the way, where are you, you son of bitch?

  Gracie showed me her bedroom last. Where I ruined sex for her with any other man, taking that high I needed, giving her something she could look back on fondly. In
a way, I was a philanthropist. Giving to the needy. She needed good sex, and I donated it to her. Didn't that just make me a saint?

  It wasn't until Gracie lit a cigarette and I was halfway dressed, that her husband walked in. Two men flanked him in pinstriped suits and leather gloves. One had a club in his hand.

  Oh shit.

  “Grab him!” Gracie's husband roared.

  I made a dive for the window, but that club met the back of my head, knocking me down. A shiver ran down my spine. I was going to change into a wolf. I could feel it. I'd tear these men apart with my teeth.

  My muscles bulged as another whack fell across the back of my neck.

  I hit the floor, pretending to be injured as boots met with my ribs. Gracie was screaming.

  She'd be screaming even more in a minute.

  My neck flexed as my muscles stretched, contorted, changed. My spine cracked and twisted. Changing into a wolf was almost intolerable. The pain scored through my body as every part of me morphed and shifted.

  Teeth grew and sprouted from my jaw and suddenly I was full-wolf, standing in the shredded remains of my clothes. That suit had cost me an arm and a leg. Now it was going to cost each of them one, too.

  “Jesus Christ!” Gracie's husband shouted.

  I knocked him to the floor, my teeth ripping into his forearm. Blood. Bone. Yum.

  One of his men hit me with the club again and I snatched it from his hand with my teeth.

  I lunged at him, snarling in his crying face. I felt the cold metal of a gun against my chest.

  BANG.

  I flew off of him, whimpering loudly. The bullet had torn right through my body, leaving a bloody mess on my chest and back. I staggered toward the door, bumping into the frame and splintering it as I moved.

  I darted down the staircase, crashing through the front door and skidding into the dark street. It was raining. Bloody pouring. I heard someone call out to me from the party and glanced back over my shoulder. The cloud grey eyes of a young man found mine. I padded away, ducking under a carriage and slipping into an alley opposite the house. I couldn't go any further. I needed Larkspur, but the bottle I'd had was back in my shredded suit trousers.

  I crashed into a trash can and fell face-down in a puddle. I released a growl and bubbles blew around my mouth in the murky water. Darkness crept in on me, but before I succumbed to it, I heard footsteps pounding through the alleyway.

  My heart rate spiked. Shit. I was going to die. Born in an alley, died in an alley. That's what people would say. Except they wouldn't, because I had no friends.

  Fingers brushed over my head. “I'm Ulvic. I'm not going to hurt you. I know what you are. I have Larkspur. I need you to change back into your human form, can you do that for me?”

  I didn't have the energy to question this man's intentions. My best option was complying, so I focused as hard as I could, and slowly, my body reformed, leaving me naked, face down in the alleyway. I'd been in more compromising positions. Probably not many, though.

  My new friend Ulvic helped me to my feet, shedding his coat and offering it to me. Luckily for me, it was a huge long thing that was about as fashionable as a fish. I gathered it around me, just managing to cover my dignity whilst keeping one hand clamped to the wound on my chest. Ulvic placed an arm around me and I leant on him, having no choice but to do so as he led me back toward the road.

  A horse whinnied as a carriage pulled up in front of me. A girl with white-blonde hair threw the door open. “Quick Ulvic, the police are coming.”

  Ulvic pushed me ahead of him and the girl hauled me into the carriage. Actually hauled me. She was freakishly strong.

  What on earth?

  I didn't have much time to question that as I hit the floor of the carriage, gazing up at two men in cloaks and the girl who'd lifted me.

  “You're safe now, wolf,” the girl whispered, kneeling over me as the carriage took off. “You're in a lot of pain.” She screwed up her eyes, resting a palm to my forehead. “What's your name?”

  I considered giving her a fake one, but the girl had just helped me...

  “No need to worry,” she urged, her eyes like two bright sapphires. “We're Werewolves too.”

  A tingly feeling spread through my chest and I realised she'd applied Larkspur to my wounds.

  “Jameson,” I said on a shallow breath, giving my real name for the first time in, wow, years. “And you are?”

  “Up,” Lynch's dulcet tones jolted me out of my reverie. The cell door opened and a bag hit me in the stomach, winding me. My bag. Result.

  “Where are we going?” Reason's voice carried to me from the corridor. I scanned through my pack, making sure my iPod was still there. Didn't really care about much else. I half-expected it to have been pilfered by Lynch. But if the guy was into any sort of music, it was probably something creepy like the soundtrack to The Phantom of the Opera.

  “Don't know. Don't care.” Lynch marched away and my pack grouped around me as I followed. I would once have thought that anywhere was better than a dark cell, but considering the last time we'd been taken out, we'd killed half a commune of people, I wasn't so sure that was true.

  Ulvic was waiting for us in the hallway, his trench coat in place and his duffel bag hanging from one shoulder.

  Lynch marched away from us without a word, heading up a creaky wooden staircase with faded carpet.

  “What's happening, Ulvic?” Reason asked, moving toward him. She reached out a hand and he patted it gently. I tried to ignore my rising hackles.

  “My father has some business he needs to attend to. He wishes for us to join him.” Ulvic wouldn't meet my eye, so I stared at him to make him as uncomfortable as possible.

  “And why does he need us there?” Mekiah demanded.

  “I believe he has some...work for you to do,” Ulvic said, straightening his shoulders.

  “Drop the act,” I growled. “Why are you playing along with this bullshit?”

  Ulvic finally met my eye and I was satisfied to see him swallow nervously. “This is the best option for now.”

  “Best option for who?” I snarled, but he didn't answer.

  Alfric stepped through the front door, dressed in a full-length black coat that rivalled Ulvic's in the Bad Fashion Awards. He just made first place due to the matching ringed hat that made him resemble that freaky monster in Jeepers Creepers.

  A droning noise carried from outside: a helicopter, I reckoned.

  “Our ride is here,” Alfric announced, turning on his heel and gesturing for us to follow. I angled my face to the sky as I stepped onto the old porch, spotting the helicopter circling above. It landed several hundred yards away, disappearing between the trees.

  “This way,” Alfric commanded, hobbling off into the woods, leaning on his cane for support.

  Nadine gripped my arm and I rustled up a comforting look for her.

  Ulvic marched after him, shouting back to us, “Wolves follow, and keep your mouths shut until I say so!”

  We were soon bundled into the helicopter where our pilot said a sum total of two words ('buckle up') before taking off. Evidently the Hunds knew where we were going, but us wolves were being kept out of the loop.

  Soon, we were soaring over the sloshing, blue ocean below. Dark clouds hung stagnant in the sky, but the rain held off, so the journey was smooth. Though we'd had to stop once to refuel on a craggy headland where a farmer gave us fuel for cash.

  After a few more hours, the helicopter dropped lower toward our destination. Which was apparently in the middle of the sea. I was pretty unprepared for the sight of the cruise ship on the horizon as we zoomed toward it. As we descended, dark, rusted stains became visible on the hull. The deck was discoloured from years in the sun, and the outdoor swimming pools were empty and badly weathered.

  Our ever-silent pilot lowered the helicopter onto a large, triangular helipad at the bow of the ship, touching down with a light jolt.

  Nadine slipped her hand into mine and a
tremor ran through my body.

  Who the hell would go on a craphole cruise like this? I hope they got their money back.

  I pulled at the collar around my neck; a habit I'd picked up and couldn't quit. It was chafing my skin where it sat against my collar bone, annoying me to no end. From the red skin on my pack's necks, I reckoned it was causing them discomfort too.

  Ulvic and Alfric were in the cockpit, keeping their distance from us as per usual. We were being treated like animals more and more. And not the cuddly pet kind. Like dogs that were kept hungry and pissed off so they'd attack cute little creatures for sport. That kind.

  Ulvic stepped onto the tarmac and opened the door for us. An uncomfortable silence filled the air and my pack shifted around me. Ulvic the betrayer...how had we come to this? He'd been so dear to me once. It was hard to believe he was the same man...

  London, 1967

  The 60s was my kind of era. Music-wise, anyway. I couldn't rave about the fashion. But I still embraced it in my usual style. Wholeheartedly and with a winning grin on my face. Shirt buttons open to my navel? Check. Cheesey medallion with a male sex symbol dangling from it? Double check. Sweeping blonde locks that hung all the way down my back? Yes indeed.

  I bloomed in the 60s. And Ulvic let me. He never ditched the trench coat, but even he wore floral shirts and let his hair grow out for a while. Homophobia was finally on its way out in London. It was a long way to go, but there were clubs and bars Ulvic felt he could be more himself in. And I encouraged the whole pack to frequent them on the pretence that I liked to hang out in them. They definitely would have thought I was into men if they hadn't seen me with a woman on my arm every night we went out. It was sad for the male race, really. I would have made one hell of a gay man.

  Ulvic was quietly grateful. He'd stopped having flings though, since he'd started seeing some fair-haired Hunter he spoke highly of. The rest of my pack thought he'd made a new friend. I knew better. I'd told him on multiple occasions that the pack wouldn't care one bit that he was gay. But he couldn't seem to bring himself to do it.