by Leia Shaw
“Is it Natasha? Nathalee?” When she didn’t respond he guessed again. “No? What about Nata? Natalene?”
She bit down on her tongue until she tasted blood. Her body yearned to answer him. This was no ordinary werewolf. Good news for the northwest pack, bad news for her.
“Natalia?” Her face must have given her away because he grinned. “Natalia then, isn’t it?”
She didn’t bother to confirm it.
“Natalia,” he said, trying it on with satisfaction. “That’s much better.”
“You’re not really a bounty hunter,” she accused.
“Never said I was.” He stood up and walked back to his spot on the log. She could barely see him through the haze of the fire.
“Why didn’t you use silver to subdue me?” If he had, she’d have been free before she even opened her eyes. What most werewolves didn’t know was that Natalia was the only vampire immune to the effects of silver. She’d been locked in cages, hung from ceilings, handcuffed, and stabbed. But she’d always escaped because the deadliest agent in the supernatural world had no effect on her. Actually, that’s wasn’t quite true. Silver hoops did look lovely dangling from her ears.
“You’re no ordinary vampire,” he said. “Or else so many wouldn’t have failed.”
“Maybe I’m just a good fighter.”
“No doubt. But I don’t trust things I haven’t made myself.”
She looked at the bindings around her legs. “You make your own rope?”
He nodded.
“Tedious, isn’t it?”
He shrugged. “Some people knit, I make rope.”
“I guess everybody needs a hobby.”
“I think you can see it’s more than just a hobby, Talia.”
A nickname? This was getting far too personal. Time for damage control. “Talia? We’re on a nickname basis now. Good to know, dog.”
“Careful, Talia,” he warned. “I’m a patient man but I’ll only tolerate so much from a prisoner. Best tread lightly.”
Actually, best tread on out of here. Time for the most important part of an escape plan. The actual escape. Her gaze rested on Cristian’s pile of weapons. Using her gift she extended her senses, searching for the one thing she needed to escape. But there were no swords, no daggers, not even a switch blade. A bow and quiver of arrows rested against a tree. Next to that was a whip. She sighed. Of course she would get caught by the one man in North America who doesn’t use metal weapons.
“A whip?” she asked. Maybe she’d pegged him for Robin Hood too early.
“Also homemade.”
“Are you planning to raid the Temple of Doom, Mr. Jones?”
He chuckled.
“It’s not a very useful weapon you know.”
“You’d be surprised. But, yes, mostly it’s for intimidation.”
She snorted. As if a werewolf could scare her.
“I see you are immune. Which means you are either very old and experienced or very young and stupid.” A soft gaze landed on her, heating her more than the fire only a few feet away. “Which is it, Natalia?” He was using that seductive voice again. “How old are you?”
Ignoring him, she put her feelers out again, searching for her own weapons. On average she had at least a dozen weapons on her at one time. All metal. It was her essence. She had the unique ability to manipulate it. That was what made her deadly. Well, that and combat skills that rivaled the Navy Seals.
“Where are my weapons?” she asked.
“At the bottom of the river.”
“Bastard,” she hissed, letting her emotions get the best of her for a moment.
Cristian grinned.
She used all her power this time as she reached out around her. Usually metal was easy to find. It was everywhere. Clothing, shoes, hair clips, jewelry, wallets, phones, almost everything contained metal of some sort. Surprisingly, the area she was currently bound in was almost void of it. Almost.
Picking up the essence on Cristian’s belt buckle she smiled inside. Normally, she wasn’t one to gloat. She preferred to just get the job done. But she couldn’t deny a certain satisfaction in escaping Cristian’s handmade bonds.
She started with a little tug and his belt buckle began to change shape. The corner of her mouth twisted up into a smug smirk. With a big mental yank the buckle pulled away from his pants and molded into a shiv. It took exactly three seconds to make it to slice through her bonds and free her arms. One rip with her claws and her legs were free too.
Oh yeah, metal was her bitch.
She shed the ropes and jumped up from the ground facing her captor. He grabbed his whip while she put out a hand and her makeshift knife flew into it.
“Wanna see why the bond is so high?” she asked, circling Cristian in a defensive crouch.
“I can see how you’ve managed to evade them for so long. But I wonder, how long would you last without your special…gift?”
She’d seen that trick before. He was trying to bait her for a fair fight. She shrugged. “Too bad we’ll never know.”
She threw the knife but he dodged it easily and it thunked into the tree behind him. With an arrogant smirk he flicked his wrist and the whip lashed menacingly towards her. He was playing. And that was his first mistake.
Natalia always “missed” the first shot. A simple thought and the knife unloaded from the tree and stabbed into Cristian’s back, cutting through muscle and lodging into his spine. She struck him in the stomach with the heel of her boot. When he lurched forward she grabbed his head and twisted. A snapped neck would put a werewolf out for just long enough to get a good head start. The only thing that would kill him would be to sever his head from his body.
If she was smart, she would have sliced through his neck like she’d done to so many werewolves before. No one had ever come so close to truly capturing her. And now that he knew she could manipulate metal, he wouldn’t make the mistake of wearing a belt buckle around her again.
Once he was unconscious, Natalia studied him. His scraggly blonde hair was just long enough to touch the tops of his shoulders. It matched the scruffiness of his unshaven face. He had a wild look about him that made her heart flutter.
Maybe it would be the biggest mistake of her life, but she didn’t kill him. She left him a clear message not to mess with her – one he would heed if he had any common sense. But she doubted very much that he did.
She chuckled and brushed back a piece of hair from his face. “Cristian the werewolf.”
Also by Leia Shaw:
Destiny Divided
http://www.leiashaw.com
