Harlequin Nocturne March 2014 Bundle: Shadowmaster\Running with Wolves (29 page)

She gave herself a strong mental kick for being so paranoid. Here was this nice guy, who had done nothing but help her and try to make small talk, and she was thinking the worst of him.

“I'm sorry about the apartment,” she said, deciding the best thing to do would be to change the subject. “I'm afraid Mr. Henderson was right and I'll need to get the foundation checked. I don't think it's inhabitable.”

For a moment he didn't say anything, just sat at the table as she placed the steaming mug of coffee in front of him. She dropped into the chair across from him and added milk and honey to her tea.

“I am a contractor. I do remodels for a living and I don't believe the problem is with your foundation.”

She perked up at that news. “Really? That would be great news because, honestly, I can't afford that kind of extensive repair.”

She took a deep drink of the soothing chamomile. At first it hit the spot, but after a second her stomach flipped over on itself, sending a painful cramp slicing through her abdomen. She grabbed her middle and bent over.

Jason stood. “Are you all right?”

She tried to straighten but was in too much pain. She wanted to assure him that she was fine, but another racking wave shot through her. “I'm sorry. I must be coming down with something.”

“You should lie down.” He reached for her, his hand on her arm, pulling her out of the chair.

“Oh, I couldn't. We still need to discuss....” Sudden weakness and a spike in her temperature killed the words on her lips. But she had to say them. They had to talk. How could she sleep with a strange man in her house? And what was she going to do with him? He couldn't stay in the apartment, foundation issues or not.

“I insist.” He slipped his hand around her waist, helping her walk. And once he did, once she stared up into those gorgeous pale bluish-gray eyes of his, she knew she couldn't fight him. But more than that, she knew she didn't need to fear him. Though, for the life of her, she couldn't imagine how she knew.

He led her into the living room and over to her large comfy couch. “Just for a little while,” he said as she fell into the deep cushions. He pushed the hair back from her face and it took all the effort she had not to tip her head into his hand. To seek comfort from him.

“I'll check out the cracks in your apartment to see what needs to be done, then we'll talk.” He looked around the room, noticing the cracks she'd tried to spackle on the wall above the TV.

Before she could respond, she started to drift off. She felt the warm familiar threads of her grandmother's afghan being pulled up over her shoulders, and heard him softly whisper in a deep, commanding voice, “Buddy, stay.

“You'll be safe for now,” he whispered, and she couldn't help thinking what an odd thing for him to say, but before she could determine what he meant she succumbed to the dark.

* * *

Jason left the room with Buddy keeping watch over Shay and walked outside. The afternoon was growing late. With the shortened days of fall, soon it would be dark. He walked back down the road toward town and his truck, which he'd left parked outside the small grocery store.

His wolf scent was much stronger than hers. But with the crystals on his wrist, he had another day's protection from the
Abatu
before the stones stopped working. Then he'd attract the demons himself. If only it hadn't taken him so long to find her.

He had hoped he'd have more time to build her trust before he had to drop the truth on her and explode her world. But time was a luxury they no longer had. From the size of those cracks on her walls and the way the change was affecting her, they would need to get on the road first thing in the morning or risk what would be coming through those walls after them.

He climbed into the truck and drove it back to her house, parking in front. He had all the necessary supplies he needed in the back—rope, knife, flashlight, water, extra food, extra clothes. He just hoped he wouldn't need to use any of them. But she was changing fast and from what he could gather, she had no clue who she was or what was happening to her.

How could Dean have been so careless? He knew the danger a fledgling wolf faced. How could he not have prepared her or at least told Lily what to tell her? He ran a hand over his face and wondered when Lily had died. Maybe they hadn't had time. That was the only explanation that made sense. Maybe they'd died too soon, when Shay was still too young to understand.

Grief tugged at his insides and he wished once more that Dean had chosen to stay at The Colony. Obviously if he had, he'd still be alive today and there wouldn't be as much dissention in the pack.

Malcolm was a good leader. A strong leader. But there had been grumblings about his methods, his integrity and honor. Not something anyone would ever have said about Dean Mallory. Dean had been as honorable as they came, which was why he'd left to marry Lily when she'd become pregnant. It was the right and honorable thing to do. The only thing to do.

As Jason sat there staring at the little house, thinking about Dean's daughter inside, he couldn't help wondering if Lily had known the truth about them. Had he ever told her? Or had he gone to his grave never letting the love of his life know his true nature? That he wasn't like everyone else. That he wasn't human.

Jason shook his head as the magnitude of what Dean could have done hit him. Had he really loved Lily that much? Had he made sure she never had to make the choice to give up her humanity, to give up her ties to her mother, to the outside world only to have to spend the rest of her life with wolves? That's when Jason knew the truth of his thoughts. Yes, he'd loved her that much and more. Only now his daughter would pay the price of his silence. Dean had gambled on the fact that, as a half-breed, Shay would never make the change, that she'd stay human. He'd been wrong.

Now it fell on Jason to have to tell her the truth about herself and her heritage. He would be the one to tell her it was time to give up everything and everyone she knew and move to The Colony with no forewarning of what was to come. Of what her future would bring, her responsibility to the pack and her need to marry Malcolm, the pack's leader.

He only hoped she'd come with him peacefully.

Chapter 3

J
ason breathed in deep the salty ocean air. It had been a long time since he'd been able to enjoy the beach, the crashing of the waves, the sand between his toes. They were so close, he wished he and Shay could have even an hour together to walk along the shore and get to know one another better before he had to tell her about The Colony and about Malcolm.

It was imperative that she understood how important she was to the pack. Her marriage to Malcolm was the only way to bring peace to The Colony, to stop the grumblings and whispers of war. She was Dean's daughter; she was next in line as successor. As Malcolm's wife, they would rule together. Side by side, they could bring peace.

Jason walked back into the house. Shay was still sleeping as her body struggled to adjust to the changes going on within her. He sat in the chair next to her, watching her sleep while contemplating the best way to tell her she'd have to leave everything behind.

The crystals twined into the rope on his wrist began to prick his skin. He rubbed his wrist then noticed the faint scent of sulfur drifting into the room. He stood, his gaze immediately going to the cracks in the wall. Dammit, he'd thought he'd have more time. He hurried into the kitchen and, one by one, began pulling family pictures off the wall and placing them in the canvas tote bag Shay had used for her grocery shopping. She would want these and it would be a long time before she would be able to return to get them. If ever.

With the bag slung over his shoulder, he hurried back into the living room. It was time. It was almost dark and the whispers coming through the cracks were getting louder and almost...comprehensible. He sat on the sofa next to her and gently shook her shoulder. “Shay, you have to wake up. We need to go.”

“Huh? Go?” she muttered, trying to rouse herself from a deep sleep.

“Yes, it isn't safe here.”

“Not safe?” She sat up, rubbing her eyes and staring at him, her face crumpled with confusion. “What do you mean? Where do we need to go?”

“To The Colony.”

“Where?”

Buddy whined at her feet.

He knew what was coming. The dog had enough wolf in him that he could smell the acrid scent filling the room, a cross between sulfur and vinegar, a sign of the demons getting closer, of barriers being breached.

“Where have I heard that name before?”

“The Colony? Hopefully from your dad. He used to live there. In fact, he sort of ran the place.”

“What? When?” She started to stand but, unsteady on her feet, she quickly sat back down again. “I'm confused. Is that where you're from? This colony?”

“Yes, I've come to get you.”

“But what about the candle shop remodel?”

“It can wait,” he lied. “What's important is getting you to safety.”

Her concern grew to fear as she came fully awake. He could smell it in the subtle shift of her scent. Could see it in the tensing of her shoulders and the way she kept moving her hands across her thighs.

“I didn't know I was in danger,” she said, her voice soft enough to almost be a whisper.

“I'm sorry. I know this must seem strange, coming out of the blue like this from someone you've never met—”

“That's putting it mildly.” She got to her feet and walked into the kitchen and toward the coffeepot. She took down a clean mug and poured herself a cup, then popped it in the microwave.

He'd spooked her. “I know how this sounds, and I wish I had more time for you to trust what I have to say, but I made a promise to your dad that... I promised I wouldn't let anything happen to you. I'm not about to break that word. We have to go, and we have to go now. Take only what you absolutely need. You have ten minutes, tops, to get your stuff together.”

She stared at him with incredulity filling her face. “You didn't
know
my father. You're too young. How dare you tell me you promised him? I'm not going anywhere with you. Now I think you should leave.”

He stepped toward her then stopped as fear widened her eyes and she backed up against the cabinets.

“I don't know why your parents didn't tell you about The Colony or about yourself, and I'm sorry for that, but I don't have time to explain it all to you now. Those cracks in your walls aren't caused by fault lines. They are doorways splitting open and leading into a demon dimension. Soon they will be wide enough for the
Gauliacho
to get through. Trust me, you don't want to be here when they do.”

“Demons! Are you listening to yourself?”

“I know it sounds crazy.”

“It doesn't just sound crazy. It is crazy.”

“It's the truth. You heard the whispering. You breathed their air and it made you sick.”

She stared at him wide-eyed and began shaking her head back and forth. “No. It's. Not. Now get out.”

* * *

How could Shay have been so stupid? She knew better than to invite a stranger into her home. But she'd been distracted by his good looks and tempted by his cold hard cash.
Idiot.
Never before had a smooth-talking handsome man fooled her, and the one time one had....

And then she noticed the pictures that were missing off her kitchen wall and her fingers froze at her sides. “What have you done with my photos?”

He held up her tote bag. “I packed them. We're taking them with us. You shouldn't need them to prove who you are, but it wouldn't hurt. Bring your papers, too—birth certificate, driver's license and anything that might have this symbol on it.” He pulled up his sleeve and showed her a tattoo on his forearm of a large swirling circle with five claws sticking out from the sides.

Shay gasped as her knees weakened. Coffee forgotten, she dropped into a chair at the table. The tattoo was exactly like the one her father had worn. Her hand fluttered to her neck, to the amulet hidden beneath her shirt as she recalled her father's words the night he'd given it to her.

You're a big girl now, Shay. Big enough to wear a big girl's necklace. Do you see this symbol?
Her dad had swung the obsidian amulet in front of her.
This is a symbol of a very special place. A place where your daddy came from. If anyone ever comes to you and they have a symbol like this, you must trust them. You must go with them. Never take it off. Promise me, pumpkin?

All these years and she'd kept her word. She'd never taken it off. And now someone who had a symbol just like hers was here.

You must trust them.

But how could she?

“I'm sorry I don't have time to explain everything that is happening to you. Please trust me when I tell you that you are in danger. We both are. What happened in town today was just the beginning. We have to get out of here. We have to get you back to The Colony where you will be safe.”

“Why?” She didn't understand. How could she? “Why this colony? Where is it?”

“The demons can't sense us there. It's protected.”

Shay stood on shaky legs. “And you're saying that once I go there...” She couldn't finish the words.

“You might be able to leave. Like I can, but only for short periods of time. Most choose not to.”

Unbidden tears filled her eyes. She didn't know why. She didn't believe him. She didn't have to listen to him, even if she could still hear her father's voice echoing in her mind. But it wasn't true. It couldn't be true. “This was my grandmother's home. It's my home. Buddy and I love it here. We can't just leave. We won't leave.”

Jason sat back in his chair and took a deep breath. “What has been happening to you, the colors you've been seeing—”

A chill swept over and wrapped around her. How could he know about that?

“Have you started to hear the buzzing yet?”

She stared at him, unable to move. To breathe. Was it possible that he was telling her the truth? How else could he know these things?

“It's part of the change. Your body is transforming, and that transformation is what is attracting the demons. Soon it will draw the
Gauliacho,
too. They'll come through the walls, through the cracks. We can't be here when that happens. Please, Shay, pack what you absolutely must have and do it quickly. We have to go.”

She shook her head. “Maybe you know some things about me that you shouldn't know, but that doesn't mean I am going to give up my home and run away with you. I don't know anything about you. I don't believe what you're saying. I just... I won't go.”

Silence thickened the air between them and she was finding it hard to pull in a breath. He was angry, she could see it in the bunching of his muscles, could hear it in the sharp intake of his ragged breath.

“I don't think you understand,” he started again, his face tense, his eyes dark. Energy pulsed around him, making him look bigger than he was, stronger, more lethal.

How could she have invited him into her home? Why hadn't she seen this side of him? How big he was? How dangerous? And yet, he had the tattoo. And she had the echoes of her father's words playing around the edges of her mind.
You can trust them.

“I...I just can't run off with a perfect stranger,” she said again, though she wasn't sure if she was saying it for his benefit or for hers. No sooner had the words left her mouth than a rumbling shook the kitchen. A long crack split the wall where her family's pictures had once hung, forming a long gaping fracture.

Jason stood so fast his chair crashed to the floor behind him. “You have no choice, Shay. We have to go. They're coming! Hurry!”

Fueled by his fear, and her own, she ran to her room at the back of the house and pulled a duffel down from her closet. What was happening? She didn't know, and yet she started throwing things into the bag without much thought of what she was grabbing until it was overflowing. How could she choose in a matter of seconds which items of her life to take with her and which to leave behind?

She stopped, took a deep breath then picked up the duffel and dumped it upside down, shaking the contents onto the bed. She started again: her two favorite pairs of Levi's, her favorite sweater, socks, underwear, boots, a long-sleeved T-shirt, the book she was reading, her jewelry—not because she owned a lot of nice pieces but because most of what she did own had once belonged to her mother—a spool of yarn, her crochet needles.

“How are we doing?” Jason asked, appearing in the doorway; his eyes, wide with urgency, fell on the half-crocheted scarf in her hand as he shifted back and forth on his heels in his impatience to hurry her.

“Almost done.” She grabbed some shorts and T-shirts and shoved them into the duffel, then ran into the bathroom and seized all her toiletries, sweeping them into a makeup bag, then hurried into the living room. She stood in the middle of the room staring at the brocade sofa, the soft leather wing chair that she loved. The antique sideboard filled with porcelain and crystal, her memories, her family's heirlooms, whether they were valuable or not, how could she leave them all behind?

Tears welled in her eyes and she collapsed onto the sofa. What was she doing? She dropped her head into her hands and tried to catch her breath and still her racing heart. This was crazy. He was crazy and somehow he'd sucked her into his delusion.

But as she sat there, listening to her heart thud in her chest and trying to get ahold of herself, she heard faint whispers filling the air. Like before, in the apartment, they seemed to be coming from the wall. From the crack. Slowly, she rose off the sofa and walked over to the deep fissure in the wall. The same wall that had been a supporting structure for this house for the past sixty years and suddenly it was broken.

And emitting a foul-smelling gas. She placed her hand over her nose and mouth and leaned in closer.
They are doorways leading to a demon dimension.
Jason's words filled her head and quickened her heart. But that was crazy! There was no such thing as a demon dimension. She leaned in closer, listening, and then she heard it again, the whispering that had filled the room with a strange rhythm that was almost a chant. The one word she could grasp clearly.

Abomination.

Chills scurried madly down her arms and across the back of her neck. But it wasn't just the chills; a strange vibration pulsed deep inside her ears, and the room began to spin. Darkness bloomed on the edge of her vision and her legs turned rubbery. Weakened, she turned and, on her way out of the room, grabbed her grandmother's afghan and her laptop case. She slung it over her shoulder with the duffel and hurried out the door and onto the porch. She quickly closed and locked the door then turned around and stifled a scream.

Jason stood on the porch's top step, the tote bag and a bag of Buddy's dog food under his arm. Buddy stood crouched a foot behind him, his hair bristling as he stared out into the yard. A lone wolf stood not ten feet in front of them, his head bowed, his teeth bared. Buddy whined, pushing himself next to Jason's powerful legs.

“What does it want?” Shay asked nervously.

“He's drawn to the smell of the demons.”

“Why?”

“Because it's in his blood. He knows the smell, he fears it, but he doesn't understand why. He doesn't remember.”

She didn't understand. How could she understand? It was nonsense. “Will it hurt us?”

“I don't know. He's confused and afraid.” Jason stepped off the porch, walking slowly toward his truck. The wolf's eyes tracked him as he proceeded across the yard. Its upper lip lifted, showing a row of sharp teeth as it caught Jason's scent, then it snarled a warning that sent the hair on her neck standing on end.

Jason slowed, taking a tentative step forward. Then another, his eyes never leaving the wolf's. He was almost to his driver's door when another wolf stepped out from behind a large redwood tree.