The Wolf & The Psychic: BBW Alien Paranormal Romance (Werewolves & Mates Book 2)

by Serena Simpson

  “They are fierce,” Key agreed.

  Taris came in. “The diagnostics don’t show anything new. I set up new ones with the protocol that Ven and Key came up with. They are running now, but we won’t have an answer in time to help us with this.”

  “Once we get eyes on the house, we’ll come up with a plan. Ven do you have pics of our two fake detectives?” Cade placed his elbows on his knees bringing his hands together to interlock his fingers.

  “I do, I’m running a facial recognition program. There have been no hits so far.”

  “Then all we can do is wait.”

  “Or we can pick out our storm the castle outfits,” Ava wagged her eyebrows making them all laugh.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Ava watched as Taris pulled up the feed they had on the west side house.

  “How do you know they will have him here?”

  “They’ve been prepping this house over the last several weeks. They pulled you from here. That is something we will have to watch for. Whatever trap they used to pull you will presumably still be active. Most likely they will change where they place it. That’s what I would do. Locke check your arsenal. Look for something that will alert us to the devices where abouts. Tristan see what you have.” Cade gave orders as he watched Taris work.

  “What about everyone else?” Ava asked him.

  “I’ve got a theory. We learned about Shadows not long after meeting Mira. One threatened her life. We didn’t know he was a Shadow at the time. Mira unlocked an ability in Tristan, allowing him to sense the Shadow traps. Tristan unlocked an ability in us. We can’t sense them, but we are better able to deal with them. Then you came along and unlocked an ability in Locke. He was able to follow you, it wasn’t easy, and I don’t recommend death as a means of transportation, but he did it. Now he has unlocked different abilities in us. It seems each time one of us takes a mate we gain more power to face the Shadows. I believe that is one of the reasons they are coming after the females. They know that with each new mate our ability to fight them grows.”

  “Are their abilities growing faster than ours? It’s not like we can do mail-order brides,” Ava looked around the room. “Can we?”

  Mira shook her head laughing at Ava. “We can’t do mail-order brides for them. Imagine Locke with one.”

  Ava growled.

  “Exactly. We’ll have to wait for when the time is right, and their mates show up. I have no doubt that there is someone out there for each of you. Until then we will rely on tried-and-true methods as well as our knowledge and whatever ability we have at our disposal right now.”

  Ava sighed. “I was looking for the magical ending. I mean I am mated to Prince Charming.”

  “Girl you and I need to talk.” They both laughed.

  The house on the west side filled the screen of Taris’ pad, with a flick of his fingers it went to the television screen. The houses surrounding it were empty and now boarded up. There wasn’t any traffic on the street as if after finding the children in that house no one wanted to take a chance of passing it.

  “The house looks ancient like it aged a hundred years in a few weeks.” Ava ran a finger over the screen.

  “I hate to say this but Ava’s right. I’m surprised there’s not a condemned sign on the house.” Mira bit her bottom lip agitated at the sight of the house.

  “Can we see what’s happening inside?” Locke asked.

  “On it.” Taris’ fingers were flying over the keyboard. The camera began to move looking for a way into the house. He brought up a secondary feed putting it in the corner so they could still see the front of the house.

  “Get eyes on the back of the house too,” Key told him.

  He nodded, fingers still flying across the keyboard. His camera found a way in, through a crack in the glass. It was in the living room. The few pieces of furniture that had been there were gone or thrown across the room.

  “Look at the cracks in the wall, those were not there the last time we were,” Locke pointed them out.

  “This is going to sound crazy,” Ava almost smiled. When you were about to say something crazy, you need to make that statement, so everyone knew you weren’t. “Could the Shadows be sucking the energy from the house?”

  “Houses don’t have energy.”

  “That’s not necessarily true, Kayden,” Mira told him. “If I pick up this object, I can feel an emotional response from it. It feels love, not the emotion itself but love radiates from it. Whoever owns this loves it.”

  Ven walked over to take it from her. It was a dragon that stood about eighteen inches high.

  “Mom gave this to me to put in the living room. It watches over us; it also reminds me that my mom and dad love me.” He stroked the wings of the dragon before setting it down.

  “Not just emotional energy but psychic energy. Whoever your mom is placed a spell or maybe a prayer over this. It’s low I can make out sound and cadence but not the actual words. Which I believe was done intently,” Ava also stroked the dragon a feeling of peace coming over her.

  “The answer sounds like yes. The Shadows are draining the house of whatever lives inside of those walls.”

  “Hell,” Ava whispered. “According to the internet, that house was the scene of eight horrific murders ten years ago. The father went mad; he killed his wife, four children, his mother, and the wife’s parents. No one knows how he was able to get the jump on all of them. When they were dead, he dismembered them.”

  “That sounds like a meal the Shadows would love,” Taris murmured as he directed his camera upstairs. The bottom floor was empty.

  They watched as he searched each room. They were now at the last one, the room they found the children in.

  Ava could feel the bile rolling in her stomach fighting with the acid for dominance. This had to be the evilest room in the house. Maybe it was the basement she’d never been down there.

  She gasped. Detective Oliver was pinned to the wall a circle drawn around him. Above him written in his blood was ‘Save him if you can’.

  “I don’t think we have days to decide what to do,” Mira moved into Tristan’s arms.

  “Is he still alive?” Ava pushed her head forward trying to get a better look.

  A soft groan left detective Oliver’s lips before his head thrashed. He fell silent again. A Shadow appeared in the room black and wispy like smoke. It solidified taking the shape and look of a man. Turning he stared at them like he knew they were watching. Black eyes looked at them as he grinned. His body transformed back into a Shadow a long arm reached out spearing into detective Oliver’s body. He screamed his torso arching away from the wall. The camera went dead.

  “Fix it!” Cade and Locke thundered at the same time.

  “We’re leaving now.”

  “No,” Ava placed her hand in the center of Locke’s chest knowing he would never hurt her. “That’s what he wants. He’s not going to kill the detective he needs him to draw us out. If we go now, we won’t be any good to the detective or to ourselves. We need a plan.”

  “If the plan involves you getting killed or sacrificing yourself so that the detective can live the answer is no.”

  “My prince, I have too much to live for to do that, but the Shadows don’t know that.” She went to her tiptoes to give him a kiss. “There’s still a hammock with our name on it. They have to believe that I am defenseless, that they still have a shot at me. That means you have to allow me to fight when we get there. We have to separate in a way that makes it look like you don’t know I’m not close to you.”

  Locke sighed she was right, but that didn’t mean he liked it.

  “We wait till it gets dark. I hate leaving him there, but I don’t want to be seen going into that house,” Cade told them before breaking them up in groups to strategize.

  *~*~*~*

  The cover of darkness was the perfect time to start questioning your choices. That’s what Ava was doing. She wasn’t thinking about her childhood, twice down memo
ry lane was too much for her. She was thinking about how she declared her love for Locke. Then she took a detour and remembered in vivid detail the love they made when she became his mate. Now she was wondering what possessed her to offer herself up as bate for a detective she didn’t know. One of the others, she stopped and sighed, no one else could do it beside her. His life for hers was all they would take.

  She had no plans to die, but, and it was a shaky but, but if she could get one good blow in maybe she could slow them down. There was no grand illusion of how she would stop them single-handedly and was given the key to the city. All right, maybe there was a dream of two going around in her head of being the hero, but that was just a fantasy.

  They parked three blocks away from the house on the backside on a side street. Quietly they dipped down the street and made their way through alleys. When there were no alley’s or side streets, they climbed the houses going over the rooftops. Locke and Tristan elongated their bodies enough to carry Ava and Mira and make it comfortable for them.

  “You can’t pick all this up,” Ava hissed gesturing to her body.

  Locke snorted, actually snorted. “When you weigh something, let me know.”

  She climbed on his back sure they were both going to tumble. Without missing a beat, he started climbing the side of the house. She looked over to see Mira on Tristan’s back as he climbed. If she could buy stock in the Kur’iks she would. Her mom used to say there’s someone out there for everyone. She got it now, not every man or male wanted the same thing even if it was the model pushed by the company. America was the company, and it stressed one thing even more now with new people in charge.

  When they got to the street that ran behind the house, they were targeting, Locke let her down. She suggested that she go in the front door it would create a diversion, but Locke rejected the idea. If she was there, then so was everyone else, they didn’t think the Shadows would fall for her having come alone.

  Tristan and Mira went first looking for the void they almost fell into the last time. They gave the all clear signal Key and Kayden went next, they were looking for the trap Ava activated last time. After that Ven and Taris went. Taris was using one of his cameras to look for the trap.

  “Looks like it’s our turn,” Cade led them to the steps and up the back porch.

  She hadn’t disappeared when she reached the porch, she was putting that in the plus column. As they walked in, she began to put some distance naturally between her and Locke.

  It was the whisper of her name that did the trick. The Shadows had their own plan to put distance between Locke and herself. Who was she if not obedient? Giving one last look at Locke she moved toward the voice calling her. All she had to do was keep them busy until the detective was rescued then she could get out of there. The voice was luring her into the living room. Was it still empty as it was earlier in the day? She wished they had stopped to have Taris; cameras or mini-drones have a look around before they went inside.

  Right in front of the living room entrance was another trap. She sidestepped it entering the room.

  “I’ve been waiting for you.” There was a Shadow sitting in a chair that wasn’t in the room earlier.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Locke walked up the stairs knowing he had lost Ava. It took all his years of following orders to keep his feet moving forward not backward. She walked towards the living room that room sent a cold chill down his back. He didn’t know what was happening, but he didn’t believe it was empty. If he reached out to her over their mate bond, the Shadows would pick it up. He knew this with every enzyme in his body.

  There was no way he would lose Ava. She was the very air he breathed. The thought of going back to the half-life he was living or to the life filled with death he used to live was out of the question. Thoughts of how he was treated, abused by females who thought they were superior to him. There was how they used the color of his eyes against him. Ava loved the color of his eyes. To him they were just green, but not to her. She whispered in his ear once that they were forest green. When he told her, that all his brother’s eyes must be the same color she laughed.

  ‘My prince, no one has eyes the same color as yours.’ That had been her response.

  He stopped at the top of the stairs a smile on his face.

  “Get your head in this place, I’ll not take home space dust.” Cade clapped Locke on the back bringing him out of his thoughts.

  “I’ll keep my body tight, my head down, and my mind in place,” He automatically repeated the ritual words letting Cade know he was tight. With a nod from Cade, they followed the others down the hall.

  Kayden and key took point flinging the door open moving inside the room each going to a different side. The rest moved in when they gave the all clear. Everything was just like Locke saw earlier. The detective was still being pinned to the wall. Was he still alive?

  Tristan inched a bit closer. “I see the faintest sign of his chest rising and falling. He’s alive for now.”

  “We need to get closer Locke do you have any ideas?” Cade asked while looking for Shadow traps.

  He knew Cade asked because everything they had gone through so far seemed to be centered around Ava. Since he was her anchor as well as her mate maybe he might be able to tap into her abilities. What Cade didn’t understand was the anchors had their own abilities. One of them was to keep everything stable but he could reverse the ability. Taking his time, time he knew he didn’t have. He reached inside to compartmentalize his brain. He closed off what he used to anchor Ava. The rest he began to turn inside out and direct inside the room.

  “What’s happening?”

  He heard Mira’s question, but he needed to concentrate. His mind wanted to fight with him that he was destabilizing. It was the only way, he pushed back through the mental backlash drawing in deep breaths to allow the pain to wash over him. Later he would cradle his head as heavy equipment tried to rearrange his brain. Now he needed to expose what he was just beginning to get a glimpse of in the room.

  The air vibrated becoming translucent as forms popped in and out.

  “Shadows,” Ven’s voice was deeper, rougher, “three of them.”

  Locke fell to his knee the backlash being too much for his body to handle. He cradled his head refusing to allow the Shadows to return to invisibility. There was a battle going on now that his team could see them. They were fighting for the life of the detective. Until this battle was over, he couldn’t fight for the life of his mate.

  “You could give up.” A seductive voice reached out to him. It caressed his mind with cold dead hands.

  “Now that wasn’t a nice thought. There’s nothing cold about my hands. I’m sure your mate will agree when I’m making her scream. If you gave up, you could come to her rescue. What is the life of a detective compared to the life of a mate? All you have to do is let go.”

  Fingers walked down Locke’s arm until they were on his hands. Electric current traveled through those fingers burning and shocking Locke’s body.

  He kept his eyes closed even as he felt the pain of lines appearing on his body like he had been gashed with claws. His blood heated before slowly moving painfully in his veins. He shored up his resolve as he began to prepare his own surprise. His mental hands moved drawing power to him before he thrust it outward toward the Shadow that was trying to break it.

  A satisfying howl of pain reached his ears. He began readying for his next attack.

  “You can’t win,” a ball of fire accompanied the words. He raised a shield watching as the fire fizzled out. “How long do you think you’ll be able to keep your shields up? I can do this forever.”

  Long enough, but the Shadow didn’t need to know that. He checked back in with his team. They were still battling the Shadows in the room. There was no way to tell who was winning. When the second fireball came, he used the time between raising his shield and deflecting it to throw a fireball of his own. It took the Shadow by surprise, his team seemed to be doi
ng better.

  Everything changed he was no longer in the house.

  “Where am I?”

  “That was a lucky shot you got in, but I am impressed. I removed us from the battle to give us a chance to talk.”

  “The battle?”

  “Let’s say it’s on hold.”

  Locke looked around. They were outside, but he was sure it wasn’t outside as he knew it.

  “Are we on a mental plane?”

  “Impressive. This one was designed by me to mimic the outdoors. I miss it at times when I am confined here for my own growth. If you can’t take Mohammed to the mountain,” he shrugged.

  “You’re human.”

  “Are you sure?”

  He wasn’t sure. Humanity felt a certain way it had a distinct taste that lingered on the tongue and a smell that infiltrated the nose. He could sense these things, experience these things now that he was alone with the Shadow. That wasn’t all. The taste, the scent, the feel wasn’t sharp enough. It felt like some part of his humanity had been ripped away.

  “I’m sure, but there is more. Being human is too plebeian for you.”

  “Your skills are rather impressive. The question I find myself wondering is, are they impressive because of who you are or what you are.”

  Locke stayed still he had been here before. The person in front of him would try to take him down a few pegs, tell him he wasn’t what he thought he was. Usually, it was a born Kur’ik who would bring up the way he was made. Then they would remind him he was good for nothing but dying on the battlefield. If it was a male born, he would remind him that the females of their race found him abhorrent. He was no stranger to someone taking him apart piece by piece until nothing, but the pattern of his enzymes remained.

  “I believe it must be the influence of your mate. I didn’t feel anything from you before she came on the scene.”

  He could tell the Shadow that as an anchor his abilities lie dormant until his charge presents him or herself. He could, but he won’t.