by Kayla Wolf
No. Stop that.
He would take her into his arms, and he would tell her who he was and why he had come, and she would know that she was his soulmate and he was hers, and together they would fly back to his ancestral home in the Rocky Mountains. His father would love her, his sister would love her, his people would come from their caves and lairs to celebrate their new queen, to welcome her to their home. She would be radiant on the day of their wedding, and he would be content, and never feel anything else for anyone else.
And he would send a gift to Lisa. Something as beautiful as her. Perhaps that would make up for some of it.
Stop thinking about her!
His feet grew sore, and his breath grew labored. He was walking fast, pushing himself harder than necessary, staring more and more wildly into the faces of the women he encountered. More and more, the reactions were of fear or concern. One particularly sweet woman asked him if he was okay, and he turned back to her – could this be her? Could this be the soulmate? But when he looked into her concerned eyes, all he could think of was Lisa. Not the one, then. When he found the one, he would never think of Lisa again – so none of these women could be the one, because the more he looked at them, the harder he searched, the more his mind turned back to her, again and again, and again.
At some point – it could have been hours, could have been days – he found himself stopping, almost without his input. His feet slowed almost of their own accord, and he realized he was near Central Park, and it was starting to rain – clouds had been gathering across the sky all day, but he hadn't noticed, so set was he on his quest. His pointless quest. He'd searched the faces of at least a few thousand women, and none of them had been the one. How many more were out there? What were the odds that he would find her? He hopped over the wall into the park, hardly thinking about what he was doing, wandered disconsolately down the winding paths. A beautiful place. Lisa had always talked about running through here. For a person who lived in New York, she certainly did love trees, and nature, and the wilderness. God, he wanted to show her his home. It would take her breath away, he was sure of it.
He stopped walking, finally. He'd wandered off the path and into a copse of trees. The hard rain and the thick mist that had started to cloud his vision seemed to have driven most people out of the park – he could safely transform here. And do what? Go home? Go to another city and start searching again? How many cities were there in this country? How many countries were there in this world? Did he want to spend the rest of his life searching? Or did he want to spend the rest of his life ...
He'd never transformed so quickly – the sudden growth of his body bent and cracked the trunk of a tree. He hurled himself into the sky, heedless of the rain, the thick mist, and the distant, ominous rumble of thunder. Maybe it wasn't too late. Maybe she'd stayed at the house. Maybe there was a chance she was still there, and he could talk to her, tell her – tell her something. Make her understand. They could figure something out together, surely. He'd deal with that problem when he reached it. For now, the most important thing was to find her.
He landed hard in the yard, the soft dirt turned to mud by the rain and squelching unpleasantly beneath his talons. But before he could turn back – even before he'd fully folded his wings to his back – he knew something was wrong. There was a smell in the air, under the smell of the rain – a familiar smell, something that stirred his blood.
The smell of wet dog.
The shifters stepped out from around the house. Three huge wolves, the size of a horse – the one leading was the largest, covered in shaggy, russet fur. The two behind her were smaller, leaner and more agile – a dull, nondescript brown and almost indistinguishable from one another. Their eyes gleamed silver, and the red wolf was snarling, lip curled and a low rumbling growl emanating from her throat.
And behind them, still human, stood Jax.
“Alexander, old mate! Fancy seeing you here.” The man strode through the wolf pack as though they weren't there – each stepped slightly aside to let him through, their gleaming silver eyes still fixed on Alexander. “What a coincidence.”
How did you find me?
“You don't think. That's your problem, mate. You dragons, holed up in your caves, letting the world go by... you don't know anything about the people you think are so small and so pointless. It's surprising you can still shift.” Jax's lip raised in a snarl like his deputy's. “We tracked your gadgets, dipshit. Phones, laptops – they've got GPS these days. Do you even know what that is?”
Alexander shut his golden eyes. He'd been on a date with a computer programmer, a loud, funny young woman who'd spoken a mile a minute and deeply, deeply confused him. It seemed there were satellites in the sky (how was that possible?) that allowed computers to recognize where other computers were?
“See? You don't even understand how we found you. It's almost sad. We got your girlfriend's old phone repaired, found her passwords, found the replacement device she was using... ah, the technical stuff's wasted on you. Shame. Anyway, time to kill you.”
I am leaving. There's no need for bloodshed.
“I disagree, mate. I'm very interested in spilling a bit more of your blood.”
It will not be my blood, Jax.
Jax shifted faster than Alexander thought possible, turning into a huge, jet-black wolf, taller again than his companions by a solid foot. His teeth were bared in a snarl. He snapped at Alexander's talons, the blow glancing off his scales, and Alexander roared, whipping his tail around to knock the wolf off its feet.
Jax went flying, a snarl ripping out of his throat, but recovered his balance quickly. Meanwhile, Alexander hissed as he felt two wolves leap onto his back beneath his wings, two pairs of jaws fastening around his wing joints – one of the few unarmored places on his body. He roared, twisting his sinuous neck to try to tear them off with his jaws – saw Shrike, the red wolf, leaping to intercept him. She struck him hard and bowled him over, and then Jax was on him, his claws and teeth tearing at the sensitive wing sails.
These wolves knew what they were doing, he began to realize with mounting alarm. With his wing sails torn he'd struggle to get any altitude if he made a bid for the sky – a scream ripped itself out of his throat as Jax tore a hole through his right wing, breaking the delicate bone that held the sail outstretched. There was blood mingling with the mud and rain, now, and Alexander lashed out as quickly as he could with his talons. Jax dodged out of the way, but one of the twins was too slow to do the same – the wolf yelped as its flesh tore beneath the sharp blade of his claws.
Alexander slithered to his feet, holding his tattered wings to his side, grimly aware now that this battle would be won on the ground – or not at all. The wolf he'd injured was struggling to get to its feet now – he drove his foreleg down hard onto its body, felt ribs crunch under his blow and heard the wolf's brother scream in protest. The other wolf flew towards his talon, made reckless by emotion, hurled itself into his armored foreleg and clamped down with its powerful jaws – he roared as he felt those teeth shatter his scales and tear a wound in the flesh beneath them.
He lashed his tail again, hoping to knock Shrike off her feet, but Jax was coming in from the other direction, eyes glowing furiously silver. The huge wolf leapt onto his back and clamped its jaws onto the ridge of his neck. They knew his vulnerable points, Alexander thought with alarm, trying to twist his neck far enough to bite at the wolf. Jax snarled, biting again and again at the skin on the back of his neck, and with no other option, Alexander rolled over, trying to crush Jax under his body.
That was a mistake. The other two remaining wolves leapt onto his now-exposed belly, going for the places where his limbs joined his body, where the scales weren't as impenetrable – he felt their teeth rip and tear at multiple sensitive spots and roared with pain. They were wearing him down, he realized with mounting panic. Each wound they tore in his body with their jaws wasn't of particular note by itself, but he could feel himself bleeding in a dozen pla
ces now, and the loss of blood was already having an impact on his reflexes. As he thrashed with his body, attempting to strike or crush any of the wolves who were tearing at him, he saw Jax make a leap for his head – and roared in pain as the wolf, with a crushing blow of his claws, tore at one of his great golden eyes. The vision blurred with blood instantly and he shut it, furious about his altered depth perception. The pain drove him back to his feet, and he lashed out at Jax, managing to fasten his jaws around the scruff of the wolf's neck and bite down hard. But Shrike and the remaining brother weren't far away. They leapt, sinking their jaws into his throat, finding purchase under the scales or simply shattering them with the force of their bites.
It was the communication. He remembered his father talking about it, just once – his father didn't like talking about the old wars, but once on a late night of storytelling, he'd talked a little about their ancient enemy. Wolves could speak to one another the same way dragons could – but their telepathy was more immediate, more like being present in one another's minds than politely extending thoughts to one another like dragons did. In his wolf form, Jax didn't need to call for Shrike – she was in his head and knew his every moment, so she would be anywhere he needed her to be. He wasn't fighting four wolves, he was fighting one wolf with four bodies.
And he was going to lose if he didn't start fighting like he meant it. It had been so long since he'd had to fight – really fight, fight to win, fight for his life. He'd grown slow and complacent. He'd made mistake after mistake after mistake... and not just with the shifters. Well, it wasn't too late.
Alexander dropped low in the mud, letting his forelegs slip forward as though he was collapsing from the blood loss. The bigger wolves hesitated, wary of the gambit, but he almost felt the surge of vicious triumph from the smaller one – the one whose brother lay dead in the mud. It sprang, paws outstretched and jaws wide – and he heard simultaneous barks of warning from Shrike and Jax as he lashed out, lightning-fast, his sinuous neck whipping through the air to bring his powerful jaws down in a savage, crushing grip on the wolf's exposed throat.
Two down. Who's next?
The taunt worked. Not on Shrike, who either knew better or was too shocked by the loss of the twins – but on Jax. The wolf thundered forward, heavy paws churning up the mud.
And Alexander rose to meet him with every inch of power that remained in his sinuous body.
Chapter 24 – Lisa
Go get him, she says. Fight for the happiness you want, she says. If she told you to jump off a bridge would you do it, Lisa?
Lisa hadn't felt this out of control in her life. But she hadn't been able to shake off what Jacqui had said to her – and God, had she tried. She'd buried herself in her emails, she'd tried to get caught up on work, she'd even changed into the workout gear she kept in her office and gone for a blisteringly fast run. None of it seemed to help. All she could think about was Alexander – and what Jacqui had said about how he'd behaved on their date. But how could she trust a guy who was taking her into his arms one minute, running scared the next? It was a cardinal rule she imposed on all her clients – abandonment is abandonment, no matter what their excuse is. If they can't be with you like you want them to, then they're not right for you. If a client of hers had been treated by a date like Alexander had treated Lisa, she'd be strongly advising them to reconsider the entire relationship, mitigating circumstances be damned.
That being said, the mitigating circumstances she was facing were definitely unique. It wasn't as if magical dragon prophecies entered into the equation particularly often. (That she knew of, anyway. Who knew what her clients were and weren't telling her?)
Running usually helped clear her head, but not this time. She got back to her office, sweating hard. She'd pushed it a lot harder than she usually did, striving for that beautiful, crystalline point in the run where the world would just drop away, but she'd never reached it. No matter what she did, she couldn't outrun Alexander. Where was he, she wondered? Wandering the streets of New York, searching for his soulmate alone? Or had he gone to some new city to start again? Would he find another young woman to take him in? Would he break her heart, too?
But as clouds gathered in the overcast sky, she couldn't shake a lingering sense of unease. Clearing out her unattended inbox, she kept running across strange security notices from her service provider – automated messages saying that her location may have been accessed by a third party. It wasn't unusual in this day and age, and Lisa had never really minded the idea of advertisers knowing where she was, but since the fight at her apartment, things had felt a little different. What if it had something to do with the wolf shifters? Could they be tech-savvy enough to have hacked her phone? Surely not. They looked like a bunch of cyberpunk rejects, sure, but...
She checked the date on the alert emails. They were all in the last week – between the time she'd taken all her gear to the house and today. She searched her entire email history for other messages. Surely it was a coincidence – this kind of thing probably happened all the time, people like Jacqui wanting to advertise more effectively, get some kind of edge in business. But though there were other security alerts, these ones, it seemed, were unique. And if they'd found her location, they'd have found the location of the house.
What if it was the shifters? What if Alexander had gone back to the house – and found them waiting for him?
Then that was the choice he'd made, she thought, trying to steel her heart. He was the one who'd decided to go it alone, he could deal with the consequences. But how could he have foreseen the consequences? He hardly knew what a phone was, let alone that it was possible to track location on one. He'd be caught completely unawares.
Before she knew what she was doing, she had grabbed her bag and locked up her office. Then she was on the street, walking fast, hardly sure of where she was going until she saw the car rental office appear ahead of her. Her license was still current, though she hadn't driven in all the years she'd lived in New York – far too stressful. Besides, cars were expensive. But she had her credit card – and she had to warn him. Get to the house, check if he'd come back – if he hadn't, she'd just leave a note warning him, then head home.
This is the last time, Lisa. This is the last time you go back to him, okay?
The woman at the desk smiled brightly when she saw Lisa, a look of pleasant surprise on her face, and Lisa's mouth dropped open – she had been one of her first clients, years ago. They'd fallen out of touch since then, but Lisa never forgot a face. And she was good with names, too.
“Anna? Seriously?”
“Lisa! Oh my God, I can't believe it's you!”
“This is crazy. How are you? How's...” She searched her memory for the name – “Michael?”
“Oh, not too bad,” Anna said nonchalantly, before very theatrically raising her left hand to her cheek. On her slender finger gleamed a beautiful engagement ring. Lisa suppressed a shriek, a grin spreading across her face like wildfire.
“Anna! No way! That's amazing!”
“You were right about all of it, of course,” she said. “He just needed time. I kept getting frustrated with how long it took him to get back to me about stuff, but it wasn't that he was afraid to commit, he just takes a lot of time to think things through.”
“That's amazing. I'm so happy for you.”
“Sorry, sorry, talking your ear off! What do you need?”
“I need a car, actually. Now. I haven't got a booking or anything, it's just...” She hesitated, but Anna was basically a friend. “It's a bit of a personal emergency. I know you usually need to book ahead —”
“I'll make it happen,” Anna said immediately, and Lisa sagged a little with relief. The young woman tapped away at her keyboard, frowning at the screen in between telling Lisa about the wedding planning process – her fiancé’s slow, cautious, dependable way of going about things was actually a huge blessing when it came to such a stressful process, it seemed. Then she struck a button w
ith a triumphant expression, handed Lisa her license and credit card back, and dropped a pair of keys in her hand with a wink.
“Gold one.” She jerked her head towards the door to the garage. “The emergency. Is it a love emergency?”
“Yeah,” Lisa said before she could stop herself.
“For a client?”
She hesitated. But Anna had done her a big favor. She could afford to let herself seem like a human being to a former client, just this once. “For me.”
“Go get 'em,” Anna said, grinning widely.
“Thank you so much. Seriously.”
“Are you kidding? It was the least I could do. And hey! I'll send you a save-the-date!”
Lisa was halfway out of the city in the little gold car she'd hired before she realized she had absolutely no idea where the house they'd stayed was. They'd always approached it by air. Frowning, she pulled over, grabbed her phone out, and spent a frustrating twenty minutes on Google Maps trying to compare her hazy memories from Alexander's back with the satellite imagery available to her. Eventually, she located a street that might have been the right one (there was a creek in the trees behind it that she suspected was the one she'd used to go for walks along) and keyed its location into the GPS. It was the best she could do.
The more she drove, the more her intuition that something was wrong grew. Maybe it was the gathering storm, the rain beginning to hit her windshield in fat, heavy droplets, but there was a sinking feeling in her stomach that got worse and worse as the dark gathered. By the time the GPS told her to turn down a familiar-looking street, her heart was pounding sickly in her chest. Sure enough, it was the right street – she let out a sigh of relief as she recognized the run-down little house they'd shared, but that relief was immediately banished by the sight of a battered black van pulled up on the road outside.
