But he had committed to ending the war against Dante Alighieri with his brothers. So long as he survived the final battle, he would join her in California.
He would say goodbye to the life he knew and dive in, headlong and blindly, into the unknown.
Of course, Los Angeles was a massive city. It had more than its fair share of crime. He was an experienced bodyguard and could easily join a private security firm in California, if not start one himself. He had options.
Another zing of excitement shot through him. He hadn’t had a spare moment to ask Gretchen Halsey for her daughter’s hand in marriage. He would like to get her blessing and resolved that he would before they left town tomorrow.
All he wanted to think about right now was restoring the severed bond between himself and Elizabeth, and he was already looking forward to how precisely he might accomplish that.
He eased her back down onto the pull-out bed, helping her to settle down on the pillows, and angled over her.
There was no better feeling in the world than pinning her beautiful body under his. He loved the feel of her soft warmth, the way her long legs spread apart to accommodate him over her.
He breathed in deeply, smelling the unique scent of her hair, her warm skin, as he kissed and nibbled her neck.
“If I never told you,” he growled out as he delivered soft, suckling kisses across her collarbone, teasing her tee shirt down her chest, “I really do love you, Elizabeth.”
She took hold of his face, cupping his strong jawline, and searched his eyes.
“You do?” she asked.
“Definitely,” he promised, though he didn’t dare ask her if she felt the same.
He didn’t have to. She smiled and breathed, “I love you, too.”
Part of him felt the strong urge to push her declaration to its farthest conclusion and force her to agree to be turned, but he held himself back. There was no rush. Not anymore. Not if she returned to California with her mother where she would be far out of harm’s way.
When she let out a little laugh, Dean having inched his way down her body and brought his lips to her exposed stomach where he’d pushed her tee shirt up out of her shorts, he breathed, “What?” as he looked up at her.
“I can’t wait to see you in L.A.,” she laughed. “You’re going to be a fish out of water.”
“I’m not sure any werewolves have ever ventured west of Utah.”
“You’ll be the first,” she said as her voice melted into a moaning sigh at the feel of Dean unfastening the fly of her shorts.
As he explored her body further, pulling her jeans down and gently caressing the apex between her legs where her panties rested, he put Dante and the looming war out of his mind. All he wanted was this moment with Elizabeth. All he needed was to know that she loved him…
…and she did.
***
Rick spilled across the dark front lawn of the little stone house. His muscles burned yet felt stiff with a buildup of lactic acid, he had sprinting so hard and fast straight up through Yellowstone. He was breathing so heavily that all he could hear was his pounding pulse in his ears. If Dante and Eddie had shifted and raced after him, he’d lost all sense of knowing if they were now darting through the clearing that led to Nikita and Sasha’s house.
His shoulder was sticky with blood that had matted down his wolf fur. He howled as loudly as he could, in part to relieve the searing pain that coursed through his shoulder blade, but also to beckon Nikita and whoever else was inside to rush out to him.
Rick was fighting to stay conscious, but he didn’t have a shred of energy to crawl closer to the door. He howled again and was vaguely aware when the front door of the little stone house burst open.
Just as Nikita ran to him and dropped to her knees beside the fallen wolf in her yard, Rick blinked out of consciousness. As he did, he mustered a shred of strength to will his body to shift back into its human formed and then breathed, “Dante will strike in two nights.”
In the next moment, Rick Abernathy’s world went dark.
Chapter Sixteen
ELIZABETH
The following morning, Elizabeth slipped out of bed where Dean was still fast asleep. It was still dark out as she gathered her clothes quietly and tiptoed into the bathroom where she would have some light to dress.
She had barely slept last night. She had tossed and turned for the most part, at times enjoying the feel of Dean’s strong arm around her, the feel of his sculpted chest under her cheek, but otherwise she had spent the long, dark hours wrestling with thoughts of Dante Alighieri.
Dean had called her perspective on the matter compassionate, and that might have been accurate, but what it really felt like was sensible. He had admitted it, himself. Neither he nor any of his brothers had made a shred of a single diplomatic attempt to avoid the so-called looming war by talking to the man and trying to reach a reasonable compromise. It was clear to Elizabeth what Dante wanted, and he may have been trying to take it by way of force and diabolical, egregious tactics, but maybe he didn’t want to have to do it that way. Dean wouldn’t know one way or the other since he hadn’t bothered to try to reason with him.
There seemed to be an injustice in the works, one that had been debilitating Dante for perhaps his entire life. Why not talk to him, as a last-ditch effort, to see if they couldn’t find some common ground. Wasn’t peace worth it?
It was that very possibility that had kept Elizabeth awake all night. Every time she had nearly dozed off, guilt had roused her awake all over again.
Maybe the guilt she felt didn’t belong to her. Maybe she had taken it on, on behalf of her father and his father and all the Halsey fathers that had come before him, dating all the way back to the Alighieri name belonging to her own ancestors. But someone had to feel enough guilt to do something about the shameful prejudices that had been plaguing Dante his entire life.
Maybe if Dante learned she was a descendant of his own father that would warm him to hearing her out and help open his mind to a peaceful alternative.
Of course, it wasn’t lost on Elizabeth that Dean and his brothers probably wouldn’t like whatever degree of compromise she might be able to strike with the man, but that didn’t stop her from suiting up in a pair of long jeans, sweater, and hiking boots and sneaking out of Conor’s cabin where she and Dean had been staying for days.
She climbed into her Mercedes and felt momentarily strange about the state-of-the-art car. She’d gotten so used to driving around with Dean in his pickup truck and it took her a moment to get her bearings. She reasoned that she would drive into town, catch Angel’s Food as soon as it opened for a cup of coffee, and see if she could reach Dante on her cell phone.
And that’s precisely what she did as soon as she sat down in one of the red, vinyl booths in the heart of town.
“Good morning!” she exclaimed into her phone as soon as she heard Dante’s smooth voice boom through the line. She was surprised he answered since it was fairly early and also because she figured he had probably opted to regard her as an adversary. She had, after all, attempted to usurp his effort to buy the old Devil’s Advocate building. “This is Elizabeth Halsey.”
“What can I do for you, Elizabeth?” he asked with an edge of caution in his deep voice.
“I’m interested in speaking with you,” she told him straightforwardly. “Would you be available to meet me?”
“Hit a snag, did you, in terms of buying my building?” he asked with a cordial air of confrontation.
“That’s not the reason I’m calling,” she allowed. “I’m at Angel’s Food. Is there any chance you would like to join me for breakfast?”
“I seem to have lost my appetite,” he said, and her stomach dropped momentarily. “But if you like, you can meet me on my new land.”
Eager, she asked for the precise location, making note on a napkin of the route as he explained it, and promised she would head right out.
She felt nervous and excited. This would all b
e over soon. As she placed cash on the table to cover her coffee, she slid out of the booth and hoped for the best. It might have been smarter if she had dolled herself up. Dante seemed to be a man of means, one who appreciated wealth and class in the women he interacted with. But Elizabeth was a far cry from the woman she’d been when she’d first arrived in Devil’s Fist.
As she drove south on Bison Road, following the directions that Dante had advised, she realized how far she’d come in the few weeks she’d been in Devil’s Fist. It felt like she had found herself, as though the person she’d been her entire life had only been some kind of invention she’d devised based on who she thought she needed to be to fit in with her family. Her mother was a regal, calculating woman who had taught her that a woman’s looks were her highest value. That assumption had gotten Gretchen far in life, and Elizabeth’s father had confounded the notion, but her time in the Fist had shown her that she could lower the mask and drop the act and come fully into being herself.
The old Elizabeth would have never thought to attempt reconciliation on behalf of an entire town. It was somewhat ironic when she thought about it. Dean had brought out in her someone she was proud to have become, and yet no one seemed to have a bigger problem with her suddenly compassionate nature than the very man who had inspired her to be precisely that.
The sun was rising over the plains in the far east as she turned onto a grassy road that cut straight through a wide field. It looked as though many vehicles had driven this route over the years, but it wasn’t categorically a real road. Her GPS navigation system certainly had no idea where she was going. The voice coming through the speakers kept warning her to make a U-turn, so she shut the system off and kept her eyes peeled for the dirt expanse that Dante had mentioned she could park her car.
When she did, she stepped out into the crisp, morning air and felt empowered. Dean would thank her, she was convinced. Maybe the sheriff would, too, and everyone who had been tyrannized by the so-called dark lord.
She followed the trail, glancing at the napkin where she had written down the directions as she started through the woods, and soon she came to another clearing. On the other side of it stood Dante. He was dressed in a tailored suit as always, but had foregone his suit jacket and tie. He looked both classy and wildly out of place as she neared him.
“Hi,” she greeted him with a smile. “Thanks for meeting me.”
“I honestly didn’t think I’d ever hear from you, though I must say, I admired your strategy.”
“I wasn’t aware I was using a strategy,” she told him, trying to keep her tone light and friendly.
“You spent enough time with me to learn my plans for the burned down building in town, only to steal the idea right out from under my nose,” he reminded her. “You might have a future in real estate, after all.”
“Maybe,” she allowed. “But buying that building isn’t a priority for me anymore.”
“Oh?”
“Dante,” she began as she looked up into his dark eyes and did her best to appeal to his sense of reason, “I know what you’ve been up against your whole life.”
Questioning her and growing guarded, he asked, “Is that right?”
“Yes,” she told him indefinitely. “Do you know who I am? Whose daughter I am?”
“Should I?” he countered.
When she looked at him, she could see his vulnerability. She could see years of struggle and oppression behind his dark eyes, and she felt for him.
“Dean doesn’t know I’m here,” she mentioned. “But I felt compelled to talk to you. I know why it meant so much to you to buy this land. This is the land where you’ve been hunted for years and years… by my father and by my family,” she finally admitted. “But you knew that, didn’t you, since my last name is Halsey.”
He said nothing, only stared at her with guarded interest.
“I’m sure you also know that the Halseys once shared your last name,” she stated and then hunted his shifting expression to gauge his reaction. Though he didn’t have much of one—he seemed committed to veiling his thoughts and feelings—she went on in her effort to coax him out and bridge the horrible rift that her family had caused centuries ago. “I’m here to see if we can reach a peaceful compromise.”
There. She had said it. Now it was his turn to respond.
“A peaceful compromise?” he questioned. “And what, in your opinion, would that entail?”
“My impression of the situation is that all you’ve ever wanted was to be able to live in Devil’s Fist, to be respected, and to not have to look over your shoulder all the time. You’ve been attacked so many times that it caused you to believe that the only way to get what you want is to use force and violence. And the Quinns have retaliated against that. What if you and the Quinn brothers could form a truce? They would have to agree not to plot against you and you would have to agree to leave the residents alone. Does that sound like an answer you could live with?”
Where she expected to be met with cooperation, Elizabeth was met with laughter.
And she didn’t like it.
“You’ve done your fair share of damage around here,” she reminded him.
“You think that after centuries of being hunted, of being rejected by my own family, by both the Quinns and Halseys, that I’m going to simply forget about all of that and go quietly into the night?”
“I don’t expect you to go quietly into the night or to go anywhere for that matter,” she promised.
“You do realize that I’m the rightful heir to the Quinn clan throne,” he informed her. “That as Sasha Quinn’s eldest son, I should’ve inherited the crown before my half-brother, Xavier, or did no one tell you that?”
“Even so,” she said, though she hadn’t heard that particular detail, “I’m hoping there’s a way to look forward to the future and not dwell on the past.”
Again, he laughed. “The only scenario where I would agree to a compromise would be if I was handed the throne that’s been due to me for hundreds of years. If my mother, Sasha, can accept me back into the fold, if the Quinn brothers can respect and obey me, then I’ll agree to your truce.”
“Why does anyone have to be on top?” she questioned.
“Ask Troy Quinn,” he countered.
“What if the packs could unite?” she suggested. “What if instead of following the rule of a single werewolf king, there could be a true democracy?”
“Do you understand that you’re attempted to advocate on behalf of a pack that would never agree to what you’re suggesting? Troy Quinn is never going to step down. He’s never going to agree to unite the packs. There’s no room for democracy so long as he’s in charge.”
“So, that’s it? You’re just going to keep turning innocent residents into werewolves? You’re going to take the town by force? You’re going to wipe out the Quinns and rule over Devil’s Fist?”
“That’s the plan.”
“Aren’t you concerned you’ll lose?” she challenged.
“I would rather die trying than continue to live as I have,” he declared.
“But you would continue to live as you have even if you did win,” she argued. “How will you trust your own pack? They won’t be loyal. They’ll always be looking for a way to overthrow you in order to break free from their own tyranny, can’t you see that?”
“I’m sure you mean well, but my dear, you’re way out of your depth,” he warned.
“There’s nothing evil in you, Dante. You were born from Sasha Quinn and a mortal man who was my father’s ancestor. Neither were evil or bad. You don’t have to keep choosing evil.”
“The time for talking has past,” he said as he raised his spread hand in front of her face.
In an instant, Elizabeth felt a warm wash of energy blast through her. Her mind went suddenly blank and yet she felt so deeply content that she didn’t mind. All arguments disappeared from her mind and she felt an overwhelming urge to please Dante and serve him.
“Now
,” he breathed, letting out a sigh as he figured out exactly what he was going to do with her. “I have a job for you.”
***
At around the time Elizabeth Halsey was zombie-walking back to her Mercedes, the spell Dante having placed on her taken full root in her heart, on the north side of the Fist Sheriff Rick Abernathy woke in a dark room to the searing pain in his shoulder.
Hazy with sleep, he couldn’t immediately place where he was, but when he smelled incense in the air and realized crystals were set around his head, it all came rushing back to him.
The walk through the old Halsey land. The plan he had devised with Eddie Friendly. The double-cross that he should’ve seen coming. He glanced down at his shoulder and felt a phantom arrow. The real one had been extracted, he remembered, though the recollection was feverish and foggy.
Eddie had betrayed him. He was somewhere out there now with Dante Alighieri and the war that would strike tomorrow night was still in motion. Nothing had been accomplished. Nothing. And yet, Rick knew that if he informed Troy Quinn of the attack, the werewolf king would be so angered that Rick had disobeyed him that Rick feared Troy would go back on his word to free him from Dante’s dark hold.
Oh, God, what had he told Nikita?
He wracked his brain, fearing the worst. Terrified that he had already spilled to her every shred of information that Eddie had told him, he felt his stomach twist with knots. But he hadn’t told her anything. He was certain. All he’d said was that Dante’s army would strike tomorrow night.
He tried lifting up, but the pain in his shoulder was unbearable so he rolled onto his side, determined to get out of the little stone house before Nikita or Sasha could question him.
As he sat up, he realized he was wearing nothing more than his boxer shorts. Where were his clothes?
He groaned his way to his feet and neared the thick curtains that were covering the window and blocking the light. As he drew them aside, looking out across the backyard, he realized that day had broken, but it still looked early. If he hurried, he might be able to leave before the she-wolves woke up.
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