Awakening: Book 1

by L. T. Marshall

  He’s in full blown aggression mode, his alpha scent getting so heady that my own wolf starts to snarl in response, and I have to deep breath and count to ten to keep her tamed. He’s riling the pack, and the murmur of restless snarls around me tell me they’re all poised and ready to fight, feeding from their leader’s need to attack. The psychic bond of a pack, so that when their alpha hits a battle, they all rev up and flock to him, ready to die for the good of the pack. It’s becoming unbearable, and invasive, as it shrouds like a dark smog around us and I can hardly breathe with the impending pressure.

  I touch him on the shoulder as a way to break his intent focus on the incoming, as he paces past me for the tenth time and he pauses, spinning his head to me away from the road. It’s like I jolted him with a taser, such is his reaction, because he was caught up in his instincts and senses.

  “Deacon’s a coward and no match for us. Be still. You’re making the pack restless and blood thirsty.” I try and soothe him with a small squeeze. Colton inhales slowly but reaches out and runs his thumb over my bottom lip gently, igniting a crazy number of butterflies in my stomach with the simplest of touches, as he focuses those glowing eyes on mine.

  “He laid his hands on you. Kept my mom prisoner. I don’t care if he refuses to fight, or runs… I’ll take him down regardless.” It’s the vicious, lethal, protective coming out and I can only give Colton a soft look. I can’t argue when he’s fueled by instinct, I can only let him be, and let him handle this how he needs to.

  “Many of these wolves have never known battle. Think of the vulnerable among us. We want them to feel safe here, not traumatized by a war on the doorstep. Be a leader. Put vengeance aside for the good of those. There are children here.” I remind him gently, and it has the same effect as a calming wave washing over him. It’s enough to level down the rage, and he exhales heavily to release some of his tension, knowing I’m right. He nods, releasing me and turning away to watch the road once more, but I can already tell he’s reeled in so much of his testosterone already. My words having an effect.

  The wolf hierarchy is not that complex, and wolves have certain traits you just have to accept. One being that a male is deathly aggressive, possessive, and protective of his mate, even if she isn’t technically his, and they maybe imprinted. The need is the same. Colton’s an alpha which means his protective instincts are enhanced naturally, at about five hundred percent higher than most, to be honest. The whole good of the pack, putting his people above all, is a born alpha trait, and it’s crazily hitched up to about a thousand times more intense once a dominant takes on his role as leader. So, Colton is fueled by that. I can see it in him, making him antsy, interwoven with turmoil, and rage. I’m not just his fated mate, in his head I’m part of his pack too, and Deacon disrespected me. He disrespected the Luna also. Colton’s loyalty to his mom is as strong as his love for her, for me. As Alpha he wants to reset the balance, to deal with the insult and offence dealt this way.

  The headlights pull my eyes from Colton to them as they flash violently, swinging around into the car par as they trundle in and catch us all standing here waiting. The low humming of two big green military trucks that I recognize from the bay. Both have tented backs and seem so much bigger out here in the dark.

  The first truck veers left and skids to a halt, obviously not expecting the welcome party out front and maneuvers an emergency divert, and the second slams on the breaks immediately, sliding on the gravel an extra few feet dramatically, stops dead in the entranceway, blocking it off in a mist of scrambled dust.

  There’s a moment of pause as no one moves, and the sound of the humming trucks is the only noise ringing heavily through the eerie quiet. The distant whoop, whoop, of wolves coming from behind alert the presence of our own sub pack returning behind them, and they seem to be in joyful spirits at trapping these bugs in their web, from all sides. It’s as though everyone holds their breath, and waits for someone else to make the first move, and Colton becomes stealthily still, completely trained on the first truck as he hones in on the driver seat through the side mirror, his low growl vibrates through my stomach.

  It’s Deacon, I can smell him. He surprises me with the low husky hostility of his link between us and I blink, stomach turning itself in knots as I realize what he just said. Trying to ignore the tone of killer in his undercurrent because I know Colton is a seasoned warrior, and I’m about to see it for myself for a second time.

  How do you know what Deacon smells like? I blanch, looking from Colton to the truck and trying to figure out how we would know that unless he knew him. He couldn’t have gotten scent from my projecting memories. I mean, Deacon is a Santo, but if he’s been at the facility for years then I assumed Colton would have been a boy and not really known him. Deacon is older, by maybe ten years, and I don’t recall pulling him from any of his memories, but then again, I haven’t looked.

  That asshole and his pack slunk off into god knows where after his father died, but I know him. He tried to take me down in front of his pack when I was a kid, to exert his dominance, and humiliate me, and I handed him his ass. I hate that mother fucker with a passion. Knowing that it’s his pack that held my mom, and now comes after you both, I swear, I’m going to rip him limb from limb.

  I swallow hard, eyes widening and gulp back a little tremor of ‘oh shit’ now that I realize this is more than Colton being pissed on behalf of me and his mother, and Colton thinking about diffusing things. It’s also about already hating the idiot who followed us here. The rev up again of his rage as it waves through me and I know I need to settle him once more.

  We have young here, we have pregnant women, and elderly wolves. We have families, and this space is faced by a hundred windows. We need to shield them from the horrors and instill that this place is a sanctuary. I have to help calm Colton and push this fight outside our boundaries, away from watching eyes. I don’t want him to rile the extended pack and rip a dozen wolves to shreds out here like this. Even if it is Deacon.

  Someone opens the truck door and slides out, all dressed in dark clothes like Colton is, and I recognize the tall, cocky swagger, right away. That air of asshole he wears so well. Deacon looks around, noting all the wolves scattered in a circle surrounding him and then locks eyes on Colton as he seeks out whom he should interact with, and seems to visibly sag. He obviously remembers Colton well.

  It’s all in his body language and the death of confidence. He hesitates, then walks towards us with his hands raised up as a sign of submission, and Colton stands taller, lifting his head and seems to grow a few inches as he locks him with a penetrating glare. Colton moves in front of me instinctively, side stepping and pushing me back with a hand slid across my abdomen firmly. I can tell it’s a protective movement, instinctual, and can’t be mad about it when it’s purely automatic response to an incoming threat.

  Deacon’s own pack slide out of the two trucks, taking in all around them and stand back in the circle surrounding their own vehicles. I can see the hesitant and questioning looks they throw between one another, as they recognize certain members, and it’s obvious this is news to them that they followed my tracks to a Santo lair. They stay put and look towards Deacon for direction, showing zero signs of hostility now they see us.

  “I’m only doing what I’m told, Colton. I didn’t come here to fight, or even knew you’d broken off and had a Santo sect here. I just need to take my patient, and my prisoner, back. Your father was very clear about that.” Deacon isn’t so smug now, in fact, I can taste his nervousness, and smell his fear in the air as he closes the gap and comes within four feet. Sure the second It dawned on him he was rolling into a Santo space he shit his pants and had a moment of ‘what the fuck is going on?’. I move around Colton a tad, to be able to lock a nasty glare at Deacon’s smug head and catch the eye flicker as he notices me and looks back to my Alpha.

  Colton snorts in response to what he said. His body bristling with a pulsing desire to rip at Deacon and I impulsiv
ely lay a hand flat on his back, to remind him to stay calm. I can feel it oozing my way, his emotions riling mine, and that insane desire to turn and bite the asshole in the face. I have to inhale heavily, breathe deeply, and count to ten to make it pass, willing Colton to draw from me some of this settling energy.

  “Prisoner? Patient? ….. Do you mean my mom and my femme? Pretty sure you can’t be talking about walking on in here uninvited, thinking I’m going to stand back and let you touch either of them.” Colton steps to him and closes the gap completely, humanly straight, and tall, aggression pulsating, and pushes nose to nose with Deacon. He’s standing taller than him by only an inch, but he seems so much more dominant as Deacon hesitates but stays his ground. He is a pack leader after all, and his own are watching him closely, so he needs to curb the weakness to keep face. Colton is growling, so low it’s reverberating through me and my wolf is getting all kinds of excited. I try extra hard to pat her down and tell her off.

  It’s the weirdest thing, but seeing and feeling him this way, makes me crazy hot in an inappropriate way, and I curse my damn hormones and that damned haze moving in on me. My wolf wants to play, with him, in all kinds of dirty ways, she’s just torn between ripping Deacons head off or stripping Colton naked for his show of fierce, and I have to work twice as hard to curb those urges. She’s all swooning and needy in a time when she just needs to shut up and be still.

  “Your father won’t care. I’m just doing what I’m told… like I’m meant to. He won’t like this one bit. Just take it up with him when we leave and deal with him yourself.” Deacon doesn’t really seem to be getting the memo, and it dawns on me that much like I didn’t know, he won’t either, that Colton is his rightful alpha and just by questioning him, he’s breaking all kinds of rules and respect.

  He’s oblivious to the pack split, and to him, this is Colton setting off on his own to start a separate sect while still under his father’s order. It happens when males who are next in line become impatient for dominance, and they are then allowed to set up camp somewhere else with any willing to follow. Big packs like the Santos dominate entire regions because of previous generations splitting and setting up across the land, to make sure challenges and disputes don’t arise when young males get too big for their own boots. There’s always only one head alpha though, and Deacon assumes it’s still Juan.

  “My father is not the alpha anymore! I am! Now back the fuck up and listen to me, because this is how I say this is going to go.” Colton snaps at him, making Deacon flinch with the intense crazy that came through with that response and he does seem to shrivel slightly. Colton was right. Deacon is a coward, and when he doesn’t have a dart gun and a facility keeping wolf gifts at bay, or thick plexiglass prisons, he’s just a weak ass omega who is the lowest of our pack.

  “Juan is my Alpha, I don’t know what makes you think otherwise, and for all I know, you could be lying.” Deacon truly is an idiot of epic proportions and much to my surprise, Colton doesn’t punch him in the face, but laughs instead. A deranged yet somehow boyish noise, and he raises his head and looks at the trucks behind Deacon’s head.

  “Do you hear that, Meds? I must be lying!” Colton’s eyes are on the vehicles and I squint to see where he can see her. I can’t. I can smell the sub pack on the wind, blowing gently this way, but there’s nothing but shadows and darkness beyond the lit area we’re standing in.

  “I guess we witnessed a mirage then, huh?” Meadow appears slinkily on the roof of the first truck, coming out of the shadows and strutting across the thick solid canvas of the covering like a supermodel. Hand on her hip as she glares this way and the sub pack seem to emerge creepily too. Some around the sides of the trucks, pouring in like beetles, and scaring Deacons pack half to death with the sudden appearance. Cesar appears behind Meadow, up top, while Matteo appears on the roof of the other one. Ninja stealth and almost magical appearances. They know how to spread out and look like there’s more of them. They have a force that’s hard to miss.

  “Let me have this one, he’s cute, and I want to play with him!” Jesus slides up behind one of the men who are slightly further out from the rest, and he jumps a mile high, growls Jesus’ way and then back runs to his pack to get away from the taunting smirk and kissing motions. The twins chuckle as they round on them, making more of those sexy wink and kiss motions, cooing the males naughtily. They’re humiliating them while standing casually, languishing like they’re hanging out in a field waiting for a sports tournament to begin. No hint of fear, wariness, or even rage. Just taunting confidence of a pack that know as a unit, they’re fierce.

  “I don’t think you’re his type. He likes the soft submissive femmes, so he can feel all man about it.” Radar pokes fun at the member trying to cower behind his pack, and Colton grins at the hilarity of his very intimidating fellows. It’s obvious he’s used to this kind of response when they encounter an enemy, and he doesn’t seem phased by it at all. It now makes sense who was whooping and making noise upon arriving as though heading to a party. They’re comical in a terrifying psychotic way, and you can tell every one of them has tasted blood on a battlefield. You only get that kind of bold scary from experience.

  The jokes and presence of his subs do seem to have calmed Colton down considerably, and already I can sense the waves of fury ebbing out as he realizes this pack isn’t worth it. Not one of them are trying to enforce any kind of fight, and Deacon, despite his eyes faintly glowing, seems to be trying to diffuse rather than entice. They’re what I thought when I met them, Omega cowards, and it’s not even honorable enough to fight them.

  “You don’t want to battle, that’s fine by me. My people don’t need bloodshed on their own doorstep. We have children here, but you’re not leaving with either of these women without going through me, so maybe you should turn around, tuck your tail back up your ass where it belongs, and go tell my daddy I said to go fuck himself. That I know everything. He’ll know what you mean. Maybe on the drive back to the mountain, you and your crew should evaluate which side of the Santo pack you’re going to run with from here on in, because the future doesn’t look pretty if it’s his.” Snarling in his face, returning to a shot of intimidation, and no hint of any kind of hesitation, or nervousness. Colton is about an inch away from pissing on Deacon and marking his territory, such is his overwhelming hostility as the other wolf crumbles.

  Colton doesn’t sound like Colton. He sounds like a man, not a boy. A confident leader, who is extremely accomplished in handling people like Deacon, and it’s like seeing him in a new light. I’ve never had to come head to head with fierce Colton or seen him in real aggression mode beyond the orphanage, and I wonder what exactly him taking his father down looked like. There’s no lie, my inner wolf likes it, and I’m almost salivating over him in this moment, my insides all kinds of churned up and I have to step back and take a few deep breaths to calm the raging hormones once more. The fates definitely picked the right kind of male to match me too. I couldn’t want him more in this moment. Turned on by his dominance.

  “I... Umm. He’ll kill us if we don’t take …. umm. I don’t know what went down, but I have to see for myself what Juan says about this.” Deacon is at a loss for words and I can feel every ounce of his bravado slipping away. Deacon visibly swallows a look of confusion running over his face, as he realizes, he just questioned his possible leader, and I swear, he almost sits on the ground such is the way his legs seem to momentarily twitch.

  “I’ll kill you if you touch her. So, there’s that.” Colton reiterates with a head nod and shrug, and I shake my head at Deacon, disgusted in the weakness I see before me and smothered in confidence as my own temper riles.

  “Not so tough when you don’t have me disabled and stuck alone in a glass room, are you?” I snarl, moving out fully from behind Colton, half expecting him to hush me and send me back, but he doesn’t. He turns a slight way to me, catches my eyes with his glowing amber ones and then slides aside slightly to encourage me to
come closer. I guess because he knows Deacon is no real threat to me, he relaxes a little, and much like a wild wolf would encourage his mate to participate in a hunt, or teach her, he urges me to him. I mean, he just let his subs berate theirs, so I guess it’s my turn. My wolf ignites at the invitation, eyes burning in my skull, and I know I must be glowing as red as Colton’s are amber with the tension in the air around us.

  “What the fuck.” Deacon almost trips backwards as he scrambles a step away and locks an alarmed gawping set of normal human eyes on mine. Shocked at what he sees.

  “Miss those pretties, huh. I guess probably because you were busy shooting her in the back!” Colton teases cruelly, pulling me with a hand on my upper arm and slides me near, in front so I’m between Deacon and him. Getting me close even though he wants me to stand up to this asshat, but he needs to know he’s also keeping me safe.

  “What the hell is wrong with her eyes?” Deacon can’t conceal his fear, and this time he does trip trying to get away and lands on his ass. Scrambling as he thuds with a soft noise and tries to reel backwards away from me.

  “Nothing… I think their sexy. However, it does mean you had a lucky escape and had my Princessa here not been more concerned about getting the fuck away from you, could have taken down your entire team with minimal effort. Maybe I should let her rebalance the scales if you think you can take her.” Colton slides his hand up my back and comes to beside me properly so his hip touches mine, lazily lassoing his arm around my shoulders so it hangs about me casually, and adopts that teen boy lounge of a guy taking the piss out of someone he deems inferior. Deacon hesitates, I can see the questions forming in his head as he looks from Colton to me, and back, and scrambles to his feet, backing away. It’s obvious he’s rattled, and he keeps gawping at me and then back at his pack as though they’re linking. I see the unease as they too, all start to look to one another and shrink closer to the vehicles, our own sub pack moving in and not giving them an inch.