Wolf Fire (Warrior Wolves Book 2)

by Christine DePetrillo

It was good advice. He had to listen to it and let Nika go. She’d have no trouble letting him go now that she knew his whole wolfman routine wasn’t a routine at all. It probably made her sick to her core to know she’d said I love you to someone who had a wolf living inside him. Sure, Nika loved animals, but she wasn’t in love with them.

  And he was an animal.

  “What can I get you?” Sharon asked, tapping the menu he hadn’t noticed she’d given him.

  “Burger. Beer.”

  “The simple stuff.” She smiled again. “Coming right up.”

  While he waited, Jaemus swiveled on his stool and surveyed the other customers in the diner. A couple huddled on the same side of a booth by the window, no doubt heading home to snuggle into the wee hours of the morning.

  Like I used to do with Nika.

  He’d miss that. Nika’s amazing body fit against his perfectly, and he’d enjoyed every moment of pulling her close, inhaling her sweet fragrance, nuzzling her silky hair.

  At a table in the middle of the diner, four women sat with wineglasses at their elbows and books in their hands. Jaemus’s enhanced vision zoomed in on the cover of the book. Waking the Merrow, by Heather Rigney. The women were talking animatedly, arguing over which character they were rooting for, Evie or Nomia. It appeared to be a tie.

  Near the large fireplace that lined one wall of the diner, another table was full of six men, talking in hushed whispers, but Jaemus could easily hear them.

  I can’t believe it caught on fire so fast.

  I’ve never seen Senclair run that fast.

  Gruff chuckles emanated from their darkened corner.

  I thought he wanted the post though.

  He wants the land. He don’t give a shit about her shop.

  He gave a shit about her though.

  Her pussy at least.

  More laughter erupted from the table until one of the men shushed everyone. A few more chuckles rose from the group, then Jaemus heard what he already knew.

  Robert will have his Mr. Sprinkles erected before the summer ends.

  Jaemus was on his feet. At the table in a handful of long strides. Looming over the men seated there.

  Unfortunately, Robert wasn’t among them. Too bad because punching him was where Jaemus had wanted to begin. His henchmen would be a good start though.

  “Which one of you lit the match?” He had to remind himself not to growl at them.

  “Excuse me?” the fat one at the far end of the table asked.

  “Was it you?” Jaemus pointed at him. “I know one of you did because even if Senclair was there with you, he wouldn’t dirty his hands with lighting it himself.”

  “Fuck off,” the man to Jaemus’s right said.

  “I can’t do that. All of you deserve an ass-kicking. I’m just looking for the first volunteer.”

  As soon as the words were uttered, all six men were on their feet and surrounding Jaemus.

  “Take it outside, fellas,” Sharon yelled from the counter. “Or I’m calling the sheriff to deal with you.” She leveled her gaze on Jaemus as she set down his plate of food. “Burger’s ready, honey. Come eat.”

  His logical brain knew Sharon was giving him a chance to let the six bastards leave without him. She was being the voice of reason.

  Come eat.

  Aye. That was absolutely what he should do. Let them leave, return to his meal, figure out his future.

  But he wasn’t feeling logical tonight. Not even a little bit.

  ****

  “So werewolves are real?” Nika took a long slurp of the tea Meredith had poured for her. She sat at Brandy’s kitchen table with Brandy and Reardon sitting across from her. Meredith had taken Dylan and Daisy to her place so the adults could talk.

  One adult human and two adult werewolves apparently.

  Reardon had told her how he’d been born a werewolf, how he’d changed some of his men—Jaemus included—into werewolves back in Ireland in the past to win a difficult battle. How an ancient Celtic goddess hadn’t been happy with his choice and banished the werewolves in his army and himself from Ireland. How Reardon had ended up at the sanctuary. How he’d fallen in love with Brandy, how they fought to be together, and how he turned her at her request.

  How the goddess had given Reardon his brother back.

  Can this be real?

  The tea wasn’t clearing Nika’s head at all. She felt as if she’d been held underwater, deprived of oxygen, and had emerged with severe brain damage.

  Because how can werewolves be real?

  She’d grown up with stories of spirit animals from her father’s Native American friends, but listening to those stories and finding out they had truth to them were totally different situations. Stories she could accept. She’d always loved a good story.

  But werewolves? Real, living, breathing werewolves? It was craziness.

  Right?

  And yet, Jaemus did have an uncanny ability to portray a wolfman in the trading post’s show. He’d excelled at the role like no one before him. His costume had been top-of-the-line.

  Because it wasn’t a costume.

  Oh, God. Nika chugged more tea, but she needed something stronger.

  “Got any whiskey?” she asked Brandy.

  “I’ll get it.” Reardon rose from the table, leaving the two women alone but not before giving his bride-to-be a glance.

  After he left the kitchen, Brandy switched her seat to the one right beside Nika. “Look, I know this is a lot to take in. It sounds like complete bullshit. The only way to truly believe it is to see it. Come with me.” She held out her hand as she stood.

  Nika blinked at her friend’s hand, her own hands firmly wrapped around that tea cup as if it were her only lifeline to normal.

  “Come on, Nika. I’ll show you. Then you’ll get it. You’ll believe. You can go find Jaemus and tell him you still love him.”

  “I don’t need to see you as a wolf to tell Jaemus I still love him.” Because, dammit, she still loved him. She couldn’t talk herself out of loving him. Her first thought at hearing Reardon tell her Jaemus wasn’t wearing a wolfman costume wasn’t to be disgusted or afraid. Her first thought was that even in wolfman form, covered in blood, suffering in pain, Jaemus was still the sexiest thing she’d ever seen.

  She wanted him. She’d always want him. No matter what. She only felt whole with him in her life.

  “He needs to know that, Nika.” Brandy rested her hand on Nika’s shoulder. “I’ve gotten to know Jaemus pretty well while he’s been here in Canville, and while he’s different from Reardon in many ways, they both think being werewolves makes them… unworthy. Of normal lives. Of happily ever afters. Of love. Of us.”

  “Reardon must know now though,” Nika said. “He has you. He turned you.”

  “Because he knew I wanted it. Wanted him.” Brandy picked up Nika’s tea cup though she hadn’t finished. “Go find him. Talk. Work it out.”

  Nika stood. “Where should I look for him?”

  Brandy puckered her lips as she thought. “He probably wanted to feel anything but werewolf at the moment. He’d want to go somewhere to feel more human.”

  “He’s probably starving too,” Reardon added as he handed Nika a glass filled with a quarter of whiskey. “Healing takes up energy.”

  An image of Jaemus sitting at the counter in Rosie’s Diner flashed into her head, making her stumble back a step.

  “What just happened?” Brandy put a steadying hand on Nika’s arm.

  “I had a super clear picture of Jaemus at Rosie’s pop into my head,” she said. “As if I were really seeing him there.”

  “Flidae,” Reardon said. “The goddess. She wants you to find him.”

  Both Brandy and Reardon cocked their heads to the side as if listening to something Nika couldn’t hear.

  Nodding, Brandy said, “Rosie’s. Go.” She reached to the counter and grabbed her keys. “Take my SUV.”

  “But I have to go back to my property. See what�
�s happening.” Not that her heart could take looking at the ruin of everything Tato had worked so hard to build.

  Brandy shook her head. “All that isn’t going anywhere. Finding Jaemus is first.”

  Nika took the keys and allowed Brandy and Reardon to nudge her out the front door and to Brandy’s SUV. The drive to Rosie’s wasn’t nearly long enough for her to figure out exactly what she should say to Jaemus when she saw him.

  So a werewolf? Does your fur itch?

  Ugh. She hated herself right now. She kept replaying Jaemus’s last words to her. Making love to a fucking animal. Something on her face—shock maybe—had caused him to say that. He thought she regretted being with him, loving him.

  He couldn’t be more wrong.

  Jaemus McAlator had brought so much to her life with his simple presence. He was an answer to a prayer sent by a goddess. Literally. True, that goddess had been punishing him for something his brother had done, but Jaemus arriving when he did had worked out for Nika. She’d lost her Wolfman. He’d become her new one. Her trading post was in trouble. He’d saved it with his phenomenal performances each and every day.

  Her heart had been empty since Tato’s passing. Jaemus had filled it back up and then some. She wanted Jaemus in her life. Today. Always.

  Now she just had to find him and tell him. Make him believe her.

  She parked Brandy’s SUV across the street from Rosie’s, but didn’t see any lights on in the small diner. After crossing the street, she cupped her hand over her eyes and peered into the front window. Everything looked cleaned up for the night.

  Backing up from the window, Nika scanned up and down the street which was oddly barren tonight. Canville pretty much closed up after dark, but this kind of quiet was strange. A whistly wind blew, making buildings creak, flower baskets on lampposts sway, and Nika’s wavy hair fly about her face.

  She rubbed her hands up and down her bare arms, wishing she’d brought a sweatshirt or something. As she walked back to the SUV, another vision blasted into her head, bringing her to her knees in the street.

  Jaemus. In the center of a group of men. Shouting. Fighting. Blood.

  As much as Nika didn’t want to watch anymore, she forced herself to look for where they were. A river gurgled somewhere to their left. A chain-link fence separated a parking lot from a wide open, green field. A brick building behind Jaemus and the others.

  The library.

  Nika got to her feet, the vision dissipating as she ran to the SUV and hopped up into the driver’s seat. Two minutes later, she squealed into the library parking lot on two wheels.

  But it was empty too.

  Dammit. If these visions were from the goddess as Brandy and Reardon thought, she liked to toy with people.

  “Would love to know where Jaemus is now, Flidae. These after-the-fact images aren’t helpful.”

  But isn’t the hunt fun?

  Nika spun in a circle, looking for the source of the voice, but finding no one.

  “No, the hunt isn’t fun. I want Jaemus. I need to find him. Please.” She wasn’t above begging. Besides, didn’t goddesses like when humans begged?

  Not particularly.

  “He could be hurt. Show me where he is.” She was so done playing this game. She had things that needed saying. She had a wolfman to claim. The sooner she found Jaemus, the sooner she could tell him how much he meant to her.

  Another picture materialized in her head. This time, Jaemus was on his knees at the edge of the river, a man standing behind him. As the vision rotated, Nika let out a cry.

  A gun was pointed at the back of Jaemus’s head.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Blood dribbled down his chin from a split in his lip. A split that should have healed already, but he’d never had the chance to eat that burger at Rosie’s so he was at zero in the energy department. Fighting all six of Senclair’s men hadn’t done him any favors either. That was how he’d ended up with a gun pointed at the back of his head.

  To say he’d never been in a similar situation would be a lie. Though guns weren’t around in his time back in Ireland, he’d had every manner of other weapon trained on him at some point or another. Spears, swords, axes… they’d all left their mark on him somewhere.

  A gun, however, was a different problem. Reardon had explained the weapon to him, and if the man standing behind him pulled the trigger, his survival was in jeopardy.

  What does it matter anyway?

  He’d lost Nika. What else did he have? His old life didn’t exist anymore, and the one he’d been hoping to have with Nika was nothing but a daydream now.

  Pull the trigger.

  At least he’d had the satisfaction of beating the shit out of the six men. Easily. He’d used the last reserves of energy to knock them all unconscious. He would have gladly killed them, but the rules of the battlefield didn’t apply to Canville, Vermont. That much he knew. He’d be arrested by the sheriff if he killed the men. Still, he gained a measure of retribution knowing he’d avenged the burning of Nika’s trading post to some degree.

  Until Robert Senclair himself showed up in his fancy shoes and fancy car… with his fancy gun.

  “You’ve taken out my best men, Wolfman.” Senclair had advanced on Jaemus with the gun held out. Edged him toward the river. Ordered him to his knees.

  “One of them started the fires at Nika’s.”

  “Of course. They do what I tell them to. Nika should take a lesson from them.”

  “Nika isn’t yours. She’s free to do what she wants.”

  “Perhaps. But that will change once you’re gone.”

  “Robert! Please, don’t! I’ll do whatever you want. Don’t kill him.” Nika’s voice sounded real, but she couldn’t be there.

  Could she?

  Jaemus risked turning his head slightly to see his sprite running toward them. Conflicting emotions welled in his chest. Elation at seeing her again. Desperation at not wanting her anywhere near Senclair or his gun. Total depression at knowing she wasn’t his anymore.

  “You don’t have to kill him, Robert!”

  “I gave you a chance to choose me, Nika.” Robert pushed the nose of the gun more firmly into the back of Jaemus’s skull, forcing Jaemus to look at the river again instead of at Nika.

  His beautiful sprite. How would he live without her? Fortunately, he wouldn’t have to.

  But if he died today, he’d be leaving Nika with Robert Senclair. He didn’t like that notion one bit. He had no doubts that Nika could take care of herself, but Robert had already burned her business down. What other lengths would he go to in order to get what he wanted?

  Gods be damned.

  Jaemus couldn’t leave her in Senclair’s clutches. Even if she didn’t want to be with him, Jaemus wanted her to be happy. He wasn’t the one to make her happy, but Robert Senclair wasn’t worthy of a woman like Nika. He wouldn’t take care of her the way she deserved. He wouldn’t love her.

  Not like I do.

  He had to keep that love to himself now, but he could ensure that Nika got the chance to find the love she needed in her life. He could at least do that for her.

  What are you doing, warrior wolf? Flidae’s voice echoed in his head, but he was beyond caring what Celtic goddesses thought.

  With a low growl, claws exploded from Jaemus’s fingertips. He reached back and grabbed Senclair’s wrist, snapping it as if it were no more than a twig.

  Robert let out a howl of pain and dropped the gun as Jaemus stood and wrapped his wolfman hands around the other man’s neck. He squeezed until Robert’s mouth opened and closed, choking sounds escaping now and then.

  One flick of Jaemus’s wrist and Senclair would be no more. One flick of the wrist and Jaemus could remove the man from Nika’s life forever. One flick of the wrist…

  “Jaemus, don’t.” Nika stood right next to him now, her delicate hand on his gnarled, inhuman one. “The police are on their way. Let them handle this.”

  He couldn’t look at anyth
ing but her hand on his. She’d touched him. Still. Though he was a beast, she’d touched him.

  “Please. I know you’re doing this for me, but don’t. A long jail sentence for Robert will be just as good.” She didn’t let go of his hand.

  And gods be damned, he didn’t want her to. Ever.

  Robert passed out in his grip, but the man was still breathing, and Nika released a breath of her own. Jaemus let Robert drop to the ground at their feet and his eyes widened when Nika stepped over the man. She wrapped her arms around Jaemus’s shoulders and pushed her nose into the curve of his neck. Inhaling deeply, she settled against his chest.

  “Thank God you’re all right.” She squeezed him closer. “I thought he was going to shoot you.” She slid her hands down his arms and grabbed his hands—his wolfman hands.

  He tried to take a step back and shrug out of her hold, but she tightened her grip and shook her head. “Don’t. Let me see them.”

  “You’ve seen them before,” he said. “You just didn’t realize they were really me.”

  Her soft fingertips running over his oversized knuckles and along his rough palm made him close his eyes. Her touch did so many things to him. So many things no one else had ever done to him.

  When her gaze met his, he was surprised at what he found in her pale green eyes.

  Love.

  She wasn’t looking at him with repulsion or anger. She looked at him as she had over the weeks they’d been together.

  How can this be?

  Shouldn’t she be running away? Shouldn’t she be furious with him for letting her believe he was a normal human? Shouldn’t she hate him for his lies?

  “I love you, Jaemus. This,” she held up his clawed hands between them, “doesn’t change anything.”

  He shook his head, but she grabbed his chin to stop him.

  “I mean it. You’ve brought so much joy to my life.” She flattened her palm against his cheek and slowly his claws retracted, his hands returning to normal. “I want you. I still want you.”

  His eyes stung with tears—the first time in his entire life that Jaemus McAlator almost cried. Her words, the love he saw on her face, for him… it warmed him all over.