Marked (Howl #5)

by Jody Morse

  Marked

  by

  Jody Morse

  Jayme Morse

  Marked

  © 2013 by Jody Morse and Jayme Morse

  Marked is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents in this book are products of the author’s imaginations or have been used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons or locations is coincidental and not intended by the authors.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, please purchase your own copy.

  Thank you for respecting the hard work of these authors.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from Jody Morse and Jayme Morse.

  Connect with the authors at:

  http://www.jaymemorse.com/

  http://www.jodymorse.com/

  Chapter 1

  The ball began its descent in Times Square, and the crowd beneath it roared on the television as they welcomed in the New Year. Samara McKinley sat on the couch in the living room of the house that most of her pack lived in. Timing it perfectly, Samara turned to her mate and now fiancé, Luke Davenport, and pressed her lips against his.

  The icy hot feeling she felt whenever their skin touched crept up her spine, spreading through her body and creeping down to her toes as they shared their first kiss of the New Year. Samara knew that it would be the first of many kisses that year, including the one that would seal their fate as husband and wife.

  “Gross, Sam,” Kyle Robinson complained from behind them. Kyle was one of the members of Samara’s pack, as well as her cousin, and it grossed him out whenever she and Luke kissed in front of him.

  When Samara pulled away from Luke, she turned to Kyle and smiled. “Sorry. Where’s Silas? I thought he was coming over tonight.”

  Silas was the guy who Kyle had fallen in love with over the past few weeks. Kyle was convinced that Silas was meant to be his mate. The two had shared quite a few of their own kisses recently.

  “He’ll be over after he gets out of work,” Kyle replied with a grin. “New Year’s Eve is a huge night for pizza delivery.”

  “Tell him to bring a pizza over once he’s done!” Colby Jackson called. He was sitting on a barstool at the kitchen island, chowing down on hot dogs. “Tell him to bring pepperoni! No, actually, let’s go with sausage. Ah, what the hell! It’s New Year’s! Let’s make it a meat lover’s pie.”

  “Okay, will do,” Kyle replied, pulling his cell phone out of his pocket to text Silas. Once he hit ‘send’ and the sound of an incoming text message chimed, Kyle laughed before he began to type back his response.

  It made Samara happy to see her cousin so happy. Kyle deserved this more than anyone. He had gone through so much in his life over the past two years; his father had been killed in a werewolf fight, his mom had gotten remarried rather quickly, and, like the rest of them, he’d made the difficult transition from human to werewolf himself.

  “Hey, Kyle, while you’re at it, ask Silas when me and him are going shopping!” Emma Taylor, Samara’s best friend and another member of the Ima pack, said.

  “Okay, I will,” Kyle replied, giddily.

  Samara smiled. Kyle had been so afraid that the Ima pack wouldn’t be accepting of the fact that he was gay, but nobody seemed to care. Emma and Silas were already becoming BFFs since they both loved to shop at the same stores, and Silas was going to help Samara plan her wedding, which would take place sometime after her birthday in March.

  At that moment, there was a loud knock at the front door. Luke rose to his feet and opened it.

  Samara’s brother, Seth, stepped inside, his dark chocolate brown hair a disheveled mess, probably because he had just ran over to the house in his wolf form.

  “Hey, what’s up, everyone? Happy New Year!” Seth said. Samara couldn’t help but notice that her brother’s voice sounded deeper than it had the last time she’d spoken to him, which had only been a few hours earlier.

  “Happy New Year, Seth,” Emma said. Narrowing her eyes at him, she added, “You look different.”

  Seth glanced down, inspecting the dark jeans and navy blue polo shirt he had on. “I don’t know why. I’m wearing the same thing I wear all the time.”

  Emma shook her head, running a hand over her blonde, wavy hair. “No, it’s not the clothes you’re wearing. It’s . . . you.”

  As Seth tried to make sense of what Emma was saying, Colby turned to her. “Maybe it’s just your eyesight. Do I look different, too?”

  Samara wasn’t positive, but she thought she picked up on a note of jealousy in Colby’s voice.

  Emma rolled her eyes at him. “No, you don’t look different.”

  Colby laughed loudly and raised his eyebrow pointedly. “Oh, yeah?”

  Emma glanced around the room nervously. “Yes, you look like the same old Colby Jack to me.”

  “Oh, come on, Emma. I know you’re lying. I can hear your thoughts, remember?” Colby teased.

  “Colby,” Emma started to say, but before she could stop him, he announced, with a proud grin, “You think I’m too sexy for my shirt.”

  Emma’s face reddened. “I really hate it when you repeat my private thoughts for everyone to hear. It’s so unnecessary.”

  “Then, why don’t you block him out of your mind? I gotta be honest. I wouldn’t want Colby Jack listening to me, either,” Steve snickered. “It’s just wrong.”

  Emma rolled her eyes. “I sometimes forget, okay? I’m not used to someone listening to everything I think all the time.” She turned to Colby, with her hands on her hips. “I’m serious, though. It’s really rude when you do that.”

  Colby’s face fell. “I’m sorry, Emma,” he said apologetically. He started to say something else, but before he got the chance, the “Please Don’t Stop the Music” by Rihanna ringtone that Samara knew belonged to Emma’s cell phone sounded. Emma turned to the rest of the pack and said, “Sorry, guys. Phone call.”

  As Emma headed off in the direction of her bedroom, Samara turned to Seth. “Actually, I have to agree with Emma. You do look different. You’re more muscular . . . or something.” Her brother’s face looked the same, but he somehow looked stronger than usual.

  Seth furrowed his brow. “I don’t know why. It’s not like I’ve been lifting weights or using steroids or anything like that.”

  “I don’t know what it is. Anyway, have you talked to Declan more about combining packs?” Samara asked, noticing Luke tense up at the mention of Declan Kingsbury’s name.

  She knew that even though Luke had tried to put his feelings towards Declan aside, he still really didn’t want Declan to be a part of the new pack that they were going to form. The only reason Luke had said he would try to be okay about Declan being a part of it was because Declan had saved Samara’s life by informing her of Jason Masterson’s plot to kill her on Christmas Eve. If it weren’t for that, Luke probably would have protested the idea, but felt like he owed Declan for his good deed.

  Samara wasn’t sure how to feel about Luke’s negative feelings towards Declan. It’s not like Declan had ever personally done anything to Luke. If anything, Declan had actually saved Luke once when they were in the woods with Jason, even though it was probably more to save Samara than it was to save Luke.

  On the other hand, maybe Luke’s reasons for not wanting Declan around were warranted. When he’d told Samara about Jason’s plan to kill her, Declan had admitted something els
e to her, too—that he loved her.

  “No, I haven’t talked to Declan,” Seth answered, snapping Samara out of her thoughts and back to the present. “That’s actually part of what I came over here to tell you. Declan’s sort of . . . missing.”

  “What do you mean he’s sort of missing?” Samara questioned, meeting her brother’s eyes, which were the same shade of amber as her own.

  “I mean, no one knows where he is,” Seth replied quietly. “I went over to his house today to pick up a few things I forgot there when I moved back home. He wasn’t there, but his dad was. He said he hasn’t seen or heard from Declan since Christmas Day.”

  “That’s weird,” Samara murmured. Christmas Eve had been the last time she’d seen or talked to Declan; the last time they’d spoken, Declan had said he was going to think about whether or not he wanted to join the new pack the Ima would be forming with Seth. In the midst of her and Luke’s post-engagement excitement, Samara hadn’t really had that much time to think about Declan. For once. Normally, she couldn’t stop thinking about him.

  Samara turned to Seth. “Well, haven’t you tried to contact him? You are his Alpha, after all.”

  Her brother nodded. “I have tried to contact him . . . more than once. He won’t answer me.”

  A feeling of worry washed over Samara. What if the reason Declan wasn’t responding to Seth wasn’t because he didn’t want to but because he couldn’t?

  What if Declan had gone off on his own somewhere . . . and he’d been killed by another werewolf?

  The worry must have registered on her face because Seth told her, reassuringly, “Wherever he is, he’s okay, Sam. I can feel him in my mind. It’s like the messages are going through, but he’s ignoring me. I don’t know how to explain it exactly, but . . . I know for certain that he’s alive.”

  Samara felt her own lips tilt into a slight smile—and not just because she knew exactly what he meant about being able to feel Declan in his mind. She was happy about what it meant; wherever Declan was, at least he was okay and whatever this had to do with was probably the result of his own inner demons.

  “Sam?”

  Samara turned around and found that Emma was standing behind her with her hands on her hips. “What?”

  “I need to talk to you.” Emma had a stern look on her face. “In private.”

  Samara shot her brother and Luke glances over her shoulder before following Emma back to her bedroom. Once they were inside, she closed the door behind them and turned to Emma. “What’s going on, Em?”

  “Is there anything you need to tell me?” Emma asked, raising her chin high in the air, pointedly. A look that Samara couldn’t quite identify passed through her eyes; anger? She couldn’t think of a reason why Emma would be mad at her.

  “Umm, no, I don’t think so,” Samara replied, but as soon as the words flew out of her mouth, she instantly wished she could put them back in. There was, in fact, something that Samara had been keeping from her best friend—something that, in the midst of everything else, she had completely forgotten about until now.

  “Do you want to explain to me why my stepfather was bitten by a white wolf when he was in the hospital, and why no one’s heard from him in the past week?” Emma asked with raised eyebrows.

  Samara lowered her eyes to the floor, feeling guilty that she hadn’t mentioned this to Emma before now. “I . . . I wanted to tell you earlier,” she started to say, but Emma interrupted her angrily. “Sam, how could you?”

  “I know this looks really bad, but . . . it was to help him,” Samara replied quietly. “You said he probably wasn’t going to make it, so I figured this would help. It was a way for him to live when it seemed like his time was running out.”

  Emma scoffed. “You thought turning him into a monster was going to help things?”

  Samara cringed at her best friend’s words. “You mean into one of us? Yes, I did think it would help.” She studied Emma’s eyes, which had a cold look in them. “What’s gotten into you? I thought you were okay with being a wolf.”

  Sitting down on the bed and running her hands over the comforter, Emma sighed. “It’s not that I’m not okay with it. It’s that I have no other choice but to try to be. I can’t do anything to change this, now that this is what I am. But I would never wish for it to happen to anyone else, and if I could go back . . .” She looked away from Samara and down at her hands. “If I could go back, I would have stayed away from the school parking lot the night Troy bit me. If there was a way for me to undo this . . . I would.”

  Samara nodded. “I know. It still makes me angry that Troy did this to you. I didn’t have a choice. I was going to be a werewolf even if Colby didn’t bite me, but . . . it was unfair of Troy to make this decision for you. All over my grandfather’s talisman.”

  Emma nodded. Playing with the beans in one of the bean bag pillows on her bed, she asked, “Do you ever think it’s weird that Colby’s not your mate?”

  Samara was surprised at the question. “Why would he be?”

  Emma shrugged. “He’s the one who bit you. Doesn’t it seem like that’s the way things should be?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t really try to understand why our mates are chosen for us,” Samara replied. She still was a little unsure about why Luke was her chosen mate. When she thought about it, the two of them didn’t really have all that much in common. Unlike Declan, who had been her best friend for years and could have been her mate if she had chosen to become a Vyka, she hadn’t known Luke all that well before she’d made the change into a werewolf.

  “It’s not that I think we’re monsters, Sam,” Emma explained, changing the subject. “It’s just that I know my mom is going to think my stepdad is a monster now. It seems bad enough that she had to lose me because of this. Now, she’s going to lose my stepdad, too.”

  “She was going to lose your stepdad either way, though,” Samara pointed out. “If he didn’t become a werewolf, he was probably going to die, Em.”

  “I know, but . . . it would have been different. She would have lost him because there was no other choice than to lose him. Now, she’s going to have to live with knowing that he’s out there somewhere and that he’s not the same person he was before. She’ll have to live with knowing he’s a monster now—a monster in her eyes, I mean. I just wish you would have talked to me about this first.”

  Samara sighed. “Look, I’m sorry. I know I probably should have asked you, but I was too afraid to get your hopes up if it didn’t work. Colby wasn’t sure if changing him would definitely save him.”

  Emma met her eyes. “Colby knew about this?”

  “Yeah, most of us were all there at the hospital that day. I was the one who bit him, but I needed everyone else’s help to distract the hospital staff. Actually, though, the whole thing was Colby’s idea.” Samara paused before adding, “But please don’t be mad at him. He was only trying to help save your stepdad.”

  “I’m not mad at Colby. It was actually really thoughtful of him.” Emma sighed. “My stepdad was in the hospital weeks ago, though. Why didn’t you tell me about what you did before now?”

  “I meant to tell you. I just . . . I forgot,” Samara admitted. When Emma only stared back at her questioningly, she explained, “Well, I think I forgot because I wanted to forget. I pushed it to the back of my mind because I wasn’t sure how to tell you after the damage was already done. I didn’t want you to be mad at me for not talking to you before I did it, and I hate keeping secrets from you. And I expected you to say something about it before now. It was all over the news the day it happened, but you never knew?”

  Emma shook her head. “No, I never knew. My mom said the hospital informed her, but she didn’t mention it to me because we were fighting over something stupid. I don’t even remember what. It annoys me that she didn’t think it was important enough to mention it until now. The only reason she even called me was to see if my stepdad has contacted me since she hasn’t heard from him. He hasn’t gotten in
touch with me, of course.” She paused. “When I saw my mom’s number on my caller ID, I was sort of hoping she was calling to apologize. I thought maybe making up with me was her secret New Year’s resolution. I bought her a Christmas present, and I was hoping to give it to her. I figured she would want to see me for the holidays, at least.”

  Samara gave her a sympathetic look. “I’m sorry, Emma. I wish your mom would come to her senses.”

  “Me, too. Oh well. You can’t change everyone, I guess. Her mind’s already made up. I just hope she’s less harsh on my stepdad than she was on me.”

  Samara nodded in agreement. “Yeah, let’s hope so.” She didn’t even want to think about how difficult it would be for Emma’s stepdad to go through the transition into a werewolf if he were completely alone.

  Chapter 2

  Samara watched from inside Luke’s Honda Civic as the snowflakes fell from the white sky, glittering as they made their way to the ground.

  “You’re not going to say anything to my mom, right?” Luke questioned, breaking their silence, as he parked on the side of the dirt road that led to his mom’s house. “It’s going to be shocking enough for her to find out we’re engaged, since, you know, I never told them I was proposing to you.”

  Samara rolled her eyes. “I’m not going to say anything, but, seriously, Luke. I don’t know how long you think we’ll be able to keep up with this lie. Eventually, your mom is going to figure out I’m a werewolf. We probably have about five years before she notices that I don’t get any older.”

  “I know we can’t keep it from her forever, Sam.” Luke sighed loudly. “I’m just not ready to tell her the truth yet. It’s important to my mom for me to be with a human. I don’t want to crush her . . . or piss her off. Have you ever seen a raging werewolf woman? It’s not pretty.”

  Samara smiled. “I know . . . I get why it’s so important to her. I’m not even going to lie, I understand why your mom feels the way she does. She’s been through a lot.”