Beastly Desires (2 page)

Morrison, Colorado…

Irritating.
That goddamn buzzing was like a beacon just asking him to kill; kill
a lot.
It might’ve been his sensitive hearing or the fact that he was trying to quietly,
happily,
curl up and sleep. That was all he wanted—
sleep.
Why were others against the basic principle of rest? Why was it illegal for him to go on a mass-murdering spree when said others displayed their complete disregard for said rest? And why wouldn’t his goddamn phone stop all its goddamn buzzing, pushing him just that much closer to crushing it in his goddamn hands?

Kaisal Verochka finally stopped his unsuccessful attempt to sleep and rolled over toward his nightstand. With a small growl, he swiped the screen on the device and quietly said, “If this is not an emergency, please prepare yourself for the onslaught of my fury.”

There was a snort. “I cannot even
begin
to describe how frightened I truly am. I think my balls just tucked themselves away,” Kaisal’s brother Naresh stated just as softly. “Would you like me to put the phone receiver just beneath my thigh so you can hear their screams of terror for yourself?”

He sighed, then sighed again. Once he felt that was sufficient enough as a response, Kaisal hung up, snapped his phone in half—uncaring that it cost damn near the same price of rent in a townhome—and tossed it. That done, he rolled over, taking his sheets with him as he pulled them over his head and closed his eyes. The lulling sensation of his own natural heat soon took over and he could feel himself falling. At least until his fucking
landline
just about
screamed.

“Son of a cock!” Kaisal snatched the phone off its base. “What?! What?! What do you want?!”

Silence followed right before, “Why are you such an angry person? What made you this way? Who
hurt
you?”

“Naresh,” he snarled. “I can swear to you that I am going to shove my hand through your chest, take your ribcage and play my own rendition of ‘Silent Night’ while using it as a xylophone if you don’t get to the black bottom line of this call. Are you understanding me? I am threatening to use parts of your vertebrae as an instrument.”

“Well, if you’re going to be a dick about it…”

Kaisal pulled back the phone, sucked in a deep breath and roared. His nightstand rattled as well as his bedframe and the rest of the furniture in his bedroom. The small screen on the landline cracked but it fazed him
none.
The second he was finished, he put it back to his ear. “You were saying?”

“So,” Naresh casually stated. “I think I need to go to the ER now.”

“Why do you hate me?” Kaisal questioned. “Is this about me super gluing a trail of cans to your tail? Because we can work that out in therapy. I’ll allow you to hit me with a foam bat and everything if you just. Let. Me. Sleep.”

His brother grunted. “My plan of vengeance is larger than me interrupting your naptime, oh sibling of mine. You know that system we just put in a week ago for the Monahan pack house?”

Tugging at the hair at his nape, Kaisal waited for the rush of endorphins that followed. “There’s no way to possibly forget that we entered the gates of hell and were introduced to what Satan clearly had a hand in creating.”

“Are we talking about the pups again? Because really, you were warned that they had their fangs already.”

“I was attacked!” he cried. “I have scars! Wounds! Trauma!”

“One pup nipped you,” Naresh softly answered. “On the finger…
playfully
.”

“I required stitches.”

“You required an iodine pad and a
Dora
Band-Aid.”

“I feel like you’re trying to call me dramatic, and I don’t really appreciate it,” Kaisal replied as he got to his feet and stretched. Sleep was a distant memory now, and it was no surprise that work was the interruption. As a software designer for a security operations company that he, his brother, and their frightening cousin ran, he was used to late nights and long days. It was something he’d adapted to as a SEAL, and it was now something he had to adapt to as the leader of his pride and proprietor of a business that catered to the most irrational, emotional, animalistic species to ever walk the earth—
shifters.

Pulling up the jeans he’d kicked off just four hours ago when he’d stumbled in from finishing up a meeting with advertising, Kaisal strolled to his kitchen, stopped at his coffee maker, and hit one simple button.

Just the way he liked his life—
simple.
As he waited for the elixir of the gods to brew, he dug around in a nearly empty fridge until his hand hit the cream he kept stocked.

“Have they called to tell you that pup had rabies and that I should get checked?” he asked as his coffee finished percolating. He pulled the pot off, poured half the container of cream in, and without further hesitation, gulped down the one thing that would keep him sane.

“No, they called to say that the left wing is malfunctioning and a slew of their canine progeny decided to escape and find something to hunt.”

Kaisal paused. “Did they?”

“Dublhainn says they found them poking at a dead squirrel in the backyard,” Naresh answered, mentioning the pack alpha.

“Lovely.” He swallowed the rest of his coffee. “I’m assuming your harassment is because you need to me figure out what went on malfunc and fix it?”

“If I could bake, I’d make you cookies—and probably tie you down so I could eat them in front of your face…off the crotch of one of your ex-girlfriends.”

“I truly admire your jaunty ‘
I really want to die by my brother’s hands’
outlook on life,” Kaisal commented.

“Just make your way on over to the set of ‘
Why the fuck do we have so many children in one house’
and let me know how it goes. Dublhainn knows it’s late but he’s willing to pay for the extra time to keep their spawn from running amuck.”

“Err…by myself?” The thought of taking on the hordes alone did something that not even the Roman-Catholic church, his mother, nor the first time he’d seen his father’s bare white ass after shifting could do—it put the fear of God in him.

“The last time I went I lost several locks of hair.
Several.
Do you not grasp that my lustrous tresses are a representation of my sexual prowess, and that every pair of panties within a twenty mile radius drops when I run my hands through them?”

“Do me a favor, Naresh,” Kaisal retorted as he headed for his bedroom, picking up strewn-about clothing. “Check between your legs and make sure there’s still a dick there.”

His sibling growled. “There is, trust me. I used it the other night to aim right at the tires on your precious Yukon when I relieved myself of the many shots Baz and I did.”

“That’s funny. I’ve used mine for more important things. Like last week when I
relieved
myself in your shampoo.”

The roar that came from the other end satisfied every vindictive fiber of his being. “Rinse and repeat, little brother. Rinse and repeat…”

“You mother—”

Naresh didn’t get the opportunity to complete that insult because Kaisal hung up and replaced the landline on its stand. Whistling as the coffee warmed him from the inside out, he snatched up a pair of keys, his jacket, and one of the many phones he kept handy when he needed a new one after the previous one ended up broken. He was a creature of habit, not to be judged. The brisk air of a Colorado winter hit him full force the moment he stepped outside, and he welcomed it. His large booted feet crunched through inches of snow as he trekked toward his truck, climbed in, and pulled out of the cul-de-sac where his home resided along with several other pride members as Mozart’s
Requiem
softly played through his sound system.

Christmas and New Year’s were long forgotten but the laziness of his feline family was not
.
Lights and decorations still twinkled on every lawn and roof, illuminating the usual darkness of their pride compound as he made the long drive out onto the main roads. They’d purposely sequestered themselves away from the humans, preferring to remain out of sight and mind lest they start hearing reports of tiger sightings in the area.

Kaisal had no interest in attempting to explain that to his father, or as
he
liked to call him—Lucifer’s kept promise. Taras Verochka was a hardened man, only made softer by his mate. His father’s softness ended there, never really slipping beyond the bounds of his adoration for Kaisal’s mother, Asha. He wasn’t cruel, just…gracefully cold. That seemed to be the best way to describe the man who’d raised him, groomed him to take over what he’d built.

Taras would be the first to call if he believed the management of what was once his understated but strong empire was beginning to slip through his eldest son’s fingers. He’d never made Kaisal feel inadequate, even with his constant criticism—he’d just always seemed determined to give their pride a legacy that his hadn’t had. Kaisal didn’t understand why neither Naresh nor his cousin Basanti had been chosen, being that Kaisal’s name hadn’t always been clean. There were things he’d done after retiring from the military and coming home—things that occasionally made him cringe; things he never wanted to return to. His days as a hunter for hire were long gone, forgotten by his father, supposedly by his pride, and he wouldn’t go back. His jobs had supplied what he needed when he needed it—had satisfied the untapped bloodlust that manifested the day he signed his life over to becoming a soldier.

The Navy had changed him, had done something not even his natural predatory instincts did—it made him enjoy the kill. The structured regimen of taking lives appealed to his baser urges and when it was over, he couldn’t separate from the need. He’d taken contracts under the table from certain government types and found himself falling into the demands of his beast more often than not, becoming someone no one around him recognized. But if he could’ve stopped himself from taking that first deposit, from accepting that second bundle, from finding that third target...Kaisal would have.

Being chosen to lead the Verochka pride was something he’d never understand, never truly grasp, but it was obvious his father had known what would happen the moment he became the dominant male. The need to constantly keep moving,
killing,
stopped and he found himself caring more about his people, his family.

Taras didn’t know everything but he obviously knew something
.
The old man
always
knew something. As a cub, there wasn’t much that he, Naresh, or Basanti had been able to get away with. That had never changed, and to say he was grateful was an understatement. His father’s thinly veiled approval meant much more than Kaisal would ever admit.

His mind now on how he could stop the Monahan pups from re-enacting
Escape from Oz
once again, Kaisal took a detour and made his way to a gas station in Lakewood just off the road that was closed due to the heavy fall of snow they were supposed to receive in just a few hours. Climbing out of what his brother referred to as a misguided tank, he reached for his wallet, looking to pull out his card when it hit him in the solar plexus harder than his brother had when he’d told him he was getting fat. And by
it
he meant the most incredible scent that had
ever
struck his heightened olfactory glands. Sweet. It smelled amazingly sweet.

His eyes scanned several pumps around him and finally landed on an SUV just feet away and with bated breath he waited as the front driver’s side door swung open, staring when a pair of dusty steel-toe boots appeared, followed by long powerful legs, full hips and a waist that he could span with both hands. A heavy chest pushed against a plain white T-shirt underneath a leather bomber. When those boots touched the ground Kaisal jerked his gaze upwards and felt his tiger stir.

Definitive feline features came into view. Full lips with a small, muzzle-like nose, sharp cheekbones and a dimpled chin all under skin that was a rich, raw umber beneath the lighting. Honey-toned hair was tied into a ragged knot, and he briefly wondered if it was as soft as it appeared but what caught his attention, what gave him pause and set a growl into motion that rumbled up from his gut, was her eyes. Large, luminous, and tilted up just at the corners with distinctly small pupils, and her irises—like the rest of her—were golden, ringed in green.
Lioness.