As she walked, her spell phone rang again. If she kept ignoring it, her mother would just get more and more worked up. She stifled a groan and answered with a bright, fake “Hi! Sorry I haven’t been in touch! So, yeah, I’m about to deliver a package and … ouch!”
She’d gotten too close to the apartment building on the corner, and the gargoyle guardian had spat a pebble at her. The building owners fed him a regular diet of sand, and in return, he discouraged intruders.
“What’s that?” her mother said suspiciously.
“It’s noth– Ouch, ouch, ouch!” Zoey dodged the furious little imp. She made the mistake of picking up a pebble and throwing it back at him. Yeah, like that would hurt a stone guardian. He responded with a machine gun barrage of tiny pea gravel sprayed right at her head.
She ran off shrieking, dodging around a corner, and then realized her mother was still on the phone.
“Fine! I’m fine! Everything is fine!”
“What is happening?” her mother cried out. “Oh Lord, are you being eaten by one of those phoenix things?”
“What? Phoenixes are vegetarians!” she said, hurrying toward her apartment building. “I’m fine. I just sprained my ankle. Really, Mom, I’ll call you back tomorrow. Loveyabye!” Zoey hung up quickly.
“Move to an enchanted city, they said,” she muttered under her breath as she stomped up the stairs. “It’ll be magical, they said.”
She grabbed a bicycle and headed back downstairs. Twenty minutes later, she rolled to a stop in front of an old warehouse building. It was currently the residence of an ever-changing crew of homeless teenagers. Most of them, like her, were magical anomalies who’d been forced to relocate to a portal city. Outside of magic zones, it seemed to happen on average about one every million births.
The warehouse was old, and its busted windows stared out at the street like rows of dark, angry eyes. Weeds choked the parking lot in front. Lorenzo and his two friends, Cin and Heath, were sitting on plastic crates, watching a sullen goth spray-paint enormous dongs on the warehouse wall.
Lorenzo was smoking a cigarette; that was new. Zoey wheeled her bicycle right up next to him and gave him a look, and he quickly dropped it and squashed it under the heel of his sneaker.
“Don’t tell my mom,” he said.
“His mom,” Cin scoffed. She was a skinny little thing with spiky blue hair. She had some kind of magic ability, but she wouldn’t say what it was. Her hobbies were shoplifting, making snarky comments, and … yeah, that was about it.
“Great.” Lorenzo scowled at the ground, embarrassed. He was still basically a good kid, but Zoey was afraid he wouldn’t be for much longer. He’d dropped out of the tech school where he’d been majoring in computer programming, even though he was really good at it. Now he spent his free time hanging out with this group of low-level criminals. Sooner or later, he’d find himself in real trouble, and that would break Andrea’s heart.
“Hey, it’s a beautiful day to go dumpster diving!” Zoey said in her most cheerful voice.
She made time to take the local kids dumpster diving a couple times a week. If they had food and stayed busy, they’d have less time to make mischief. Due to her map magic, she could guide them to the dumpsters behind the high-end grocery stores in the better neighborhoods and avoid security guards, random guard gargoyles, and other nuisances.
Cin shrugged. “I guess,” she said, but she leapt to her feet with an eagerness that belied her bored-with-the-world tone.
She waited while they fetched their battered bicycles, and then they followed her south.
The beat-up warehouses and half-empty buildings gave way to small, shabby ranch houses with cheap protection wards glowing next to their front doors. In some cases, the glow had faded, which meant they hadn’t been recharged.
As they kept peddling south, those houses gave way to larger houses, mostly Mediterranean-style with barrel-tile roofs or adobe houses with massive stucco walls. The yards were trimmed and artfully splattered with flowerbeds. The houses here had entire rows of wards up and down the sides of front doors and underneath the windows, and they glowed with their full magical charge. There were house Gargoyles perched on the rooftops and enchanted stone lions at the ends of driveways.
The heads of the stone lions slowly turned and watched them with their blank eyes as they peddled by.
Finally, a half-hour later, they were in a nice shopping district. They didn’t circle around to the front of the stores. There wasn’t a single thing any of them could afford, and their mere appearance tended to attract the attention of shifter bodyguards.
They glided down back alleyways until they reached their destination—Le Gourmand. Zoey felt badly about letting Lorenzo come because he was supposed to be home. At least he wasn’t out spray-painting a building or boosting cigarettes in an effort to impress Cin.
The dumpster behind Le Gourmand made the trip worthwhile. They found bags of apples, bags of oranges, day-old French bread, and bags of donuts. The owners of Le Gourmand were pretty considerate, and when they threw away expired food, they tried to make sure it was in good enough shape to be used by those who needed it.
“This is great!” Cin crowed, hugging a bag of food to her chest. She glanced at Lorenzo and said in a low voice, “I’m sorry I made fun of you earlier. It must be nice to still have a mom.” She always put on the tough badass act, but a little sweetness seeped through on occasion.
“No big.” Lorenzo shrugged, trying to look casual, but a smile tugged at his lips.
When the kids’ bags were full, Zoey closed her eyes, pictured the route home, and suddenly sensed obstacles. Several of them. She shook her head, trying to refocus, but every route felt blocked.
Too bad her map magic wouldn’t tell her what was in her way. Somehow, though, she had the feeling the obstacles were specific to her.
“Guys,” she said, “we need to split up. There’s something between us and our neighborhood. Can you hang out here for a little while? I’m going to try to find a way back. Just wait a half-hour or so and you should be fine.”
She chose a route that took her through a witch suburb, which was always kind of fun because she got to pass by covens practicing their spells in their front yards.
It was nighttime when she glided to a stop in front of her building. A delivery van was idling at the curb, and a man stood by her door with a huge crystal vase full of peonies.
Dominic. But how did he know peonies were her favorite?
“Zoey Monroe?” the man said as she eyed him warily.
“She skipped out on her rent and left town. You’re lucky you missed her. She was a major twatmuffin.” She quickly sidestepped him, wheeling her bike.
He moved between her and her front door. “He said you’d say that.”
“He said I’d say Zoey skipped out on her rent and was a twatmuffin?” she said skeptically. “That’s awfully specific.”
“He said you’d give me some smartass answer and say you weren’t her. You look like the picture he showed me.”
Dominic had a picture of her? Yikes.
The delivery man shoved the vase of flowers into her arms and stood back, waiting.
“What else?” Zoey said impatiently.
“You got a tip for me?”
“Yeah, avoid Main Street; the traffic is murder right now.”
He gave her a look most people reserve for times when they’ve stepped in something smelly. She ignored him and maneuvered her way awkwardly to her front door, wheeling her bike with the vase tucked under her arm.
The protection wards over the doorway recognized her, and the lock clicked open. Reluctantly, she set the vase down in the lobby. They were beautiful, but she wasn’t taking a gift from someone whose pack was responsible for mountain-high garbage piles clogging up her streets.
Upstairs in her apartment, Zoey plopped down on the couch to try to figure out what to do next. Dominic was sending her flowers. At her apartment. And he had a picture of
her.
All those times she’d yearned for a man who actually made her feel desirable and sexy and worth pursuing? She could never have dreamed up a scenario like this. She didn’t even know what was going on right now. She didn’t know where Dominic lived, what he specifically did for a living, or what he was like as a person. What would it mean to be the mate of a Moretti Capo? Most of the parties she’d catered had been attended by single men. She knew this because married pack members wore a chunky gold wedding ring with two wolves side by side.
She had catered one family event for them in the tourist area. Strictly PG. It had been a birthday party for the six-year-old twin pups of a high-ranking pack member. The wives were beautiful, perfectly made up, and exquisitely dressed.
She had to admit the women all had seemed to be happy. Were they putting on a show? Did the women feel they’d sold their souls by marrying into a crime family? If so, they didn’t make it obvious.
She’d been surprised at how tender the big, fierce daddy wolves had been with their children. She felt a sudden stab of longing as she remembered a big, scarred wolf gently scooping up his little pup after the child had scraped his knees.
I want that. I want that for my children, a man who will adore them and protect them and comfort them
She’d dated so many losers who’d tried to make her feel like she should be grateful for any scrap of attention. On some very deep level, she’d started to doubt she’d ever have a good relationship.
But did she want it with Dominic?
Or, more importantly, did she want it with a Moretti wolf? It was a package deal. She couldn’t have one without the other.
And she couldn’t make such an enormous, life-changing decision based on the fact Dominic’s wolf apparently thought she had a tasty butt.
How far would Dominic go to claim her? He’d insisted she was going to be his mate. Would he kidnap her and haul her back to pack property? She didn’t know what the pack mating rituals consisted of, but she wasn’t taking any chances.
Zoey quickly packed up some clothes and climbed back on her bike. Her legs were starting to ache, and it was late evening now, but she headed downtown, to the business district. The owner of the bike messenger service had a few tiny studio apartments in the building next to the dispatch center and allowed the employees to crash there if they wanted to pick up some early jobs the next day.
Chapter Six
“I don’t suppose you’d care to tell me where you are?” Kalinda said when Zoey called her Sunday morning.
Zoey picked up on the hidden meaning in her boss’s words. Kalinda’s calls were being monitored—by the Moretti Pack.
“Oh, here, there, and everywhere. By the way, what did you mean when you told Dominic there were other girls who would be better suited for him?”
“You heard that?” Zoey could feel Kalinda’s wince all the way through the phone.
“Yes. Because I have ears.”
“Oh, you know. Flashier. Trashier. The type they usually like.”
“Skinnier?”
“Oh, come on.” But Kalinda didn’t say no.
Zoey scowled and let an uncomfortable silence drag out.
“I was trying to help you,” Kalinda said defensively. “Those mafia shifters tend to be the lusty types, so for their events, I hire waitresses who are less likely to be harassed by those guys. Most of them like magazine model types with hair extensions, spell-enhanced tans, and fake bazoongas. That is not you. Is that so bad?”
“Whatever,” Zoey said, stung. “So … I guess I can’t work any gigs for you in the near future?”
“Well, if you did, I am under orders to report back to the Moretti Pack immediately. And I would never disobey a pack order.” Kalinda’s voice was brisk and business-like.
“Got it. See you around.” Zoey hung up without saying goodbye because her feelings were hurt.
It was mildly chilly on Sunday morning, and Zoey sensed more obstacles than usual as she zipped through the streets delivering packages.
The bite wound still ached, making the ride really awkward. Between the obstacles and the bite, she was much slower than usual, which meant she was only slightly quicker than an average bike messenger.
When she finished her deliveries around noon, she headed back to her tiny crash pad. When she got to the hallway, she stopped. She smelled coffee. She hadn’t made coffee this morning. In fact, there was no coffee in the little apartment. No food either. She waited a few minutes before finally heading in. What were the odds someone would make coffee for her and then kill her?
Hopefully not good.
Dominic was sitting on the tiny couch-bed as she limped through the door of the apartment. He wore a suit, as usual—a nice charcoal-gray. There was now a coffeemaker filled with coffee sitting on the kitchen counter. A smile curled his sensual mouth as she shut the door behind her. Her heart stuttered in her chest. From fear or anticipation? She wasn’t sure.
His gaze swept the little living room/bedroom. “Hello. Nice place you’ve got here.”
“Well, it smells better than my actual neighborhood,” she said irritably. He looked mildly puzzled at that and held out a cup of coffee.
“Yes, that’s what happens when you don’t pay your dues.”
Seriously? He was going to pretend the neighborhood wasn’t paying?
She gave him a sour look. “Whatever helps you sleep at night.”
Zoey limped over to Dominic, her butt aching with every step, and grudgingly accepted the cup of coffee.
She made sure to sit on the far end of the small couch. Unfortunately, it wasn’t far enough. There was maybe six inches of space between them, and the warmth of his gaze made the apartment feel stifling. She could practically feel the lust waves rolling off him. Or was it her?
She took a sip of coffee. He made a mean cup of java, she had to admit. Smooth and delicious. Just like him.
“If this whole mobster thing doesn’t work out for you, you’d make a kickass barista.”
He stifled a chuckle.
“What?”
His voice was deep and gravelly as he studied her with an amused look. “Most people don’t give me grief because they’re too afraid of me.”
She took another sip. “Put me in the ‘really annoyed’ category instead, thanks.”
“I like how you banter. You’re funny. I think I’ll keep you.”
She wasn’t going to dignify that with an answer. “What brings you around here? Slumming?”
“Nope.” He shifted on the couch, angling his body toward hers, and the furniture groaned under his weight. “I came to help you out. I could be a real asshole and let you keep limping around, or I could tell you how to heal that bite.”
She stared at him, her eyes narrowing. “And then kidnap me?”
“Nope. I’m just going to court the living hell out of you until you smarten up and realize what you’re missing.”
“I don’t think your lifespan is actually going to be that long. But anyway, back to healing my butt …”
He stood, and the couch shifted again. “When a werewolf bites his female, the only thing that heals the pain is his saliva. He has to shift back to human form and … use his tongue. If you’d stuck around after I bit you, I would have healed you.”
“Seriously? You thought I’d stick around after that?” she spluttered indignantly.
Dominic smiled. “You’ll learn. You miss out on all kinds of good things by running away from me.”
Zoey looked up him. He towered over her, his muscular arms folded across his broad chest, and he wasn’t budging.
Was she seriously considering this?
“Turn your back. And don’t try anything funny,” she warned him, which for some reason made him chuckle. Ha ha, she was a laugh riot today.
She stood and quickly stripped down to her bra and underwear, telling herself it was just because she needed to be able to walk again without limping. That was the only reason she was alone in an a
partment, in her skivvies, with the sexiest man she’d ever seen—the man who’d claimed her as his bride.
Definitely.
Totally.
So why were her nipples pebbling with desire? Why were her panties damp?
Zoey closed her eyes and tried to remind herself why she wouldn’t give in to him. She pictured mountains of garbage and scampering rats. Steering her bike around dead bodies on the sidewalk in the business district—or rather, pieces of dead bodies. A Moretti signature.
She felt the soft caress of his tongue dragging down her right butt cheek and forgot to think. All she could do was feel. It felt like velvet gliding across her aching flesh, and the pain faded instantly.
“Better?” Dominic’s husky voice stroked her like a lover’s caress.
She turned around.
He was still kneeling, and he was dangerously close. He grabbed her hips, holding her in place as he tenderly kissed her stomach—her soft stomach with the fold that lapped over the top of her panties. She sucked in a breath.
“Don’t,” he said sternly.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t try to make yourself less than you are. I want all of you. Every delicious inch.”
She tried to step backward, but he held her still while he kissed her panties—just the outside.
“I won’t settle for anything less, Zoey,” he growled.
God, that is the sexiest thing anyone has ever said to me.
“You are not the boss off me.” Zoey’s legs trembled.
“Ha! That’s a good one. I like you, princess. I haven’t laughed this much in ages.” He grabbed her panties with his teeth and tugged them down. “You can tell me to stop anytime you want to.” He pressed his face into her damp curls. She kept them neatly trimmed, a close-clipped golden-brown triangle.
“I-I can?”
“Yes.” He breathed in deeply as if inhaling fragrant roses. The hot wave of desire that washed over her nearly made her collapse. “Here. Your knees seem a little weak.”
Mated to the Capo (Mafia Wolf Shifters) (Encantado Shifters Book 1) Page 5
