Tempting Whispers: The Kategan Alphas 6 (21 page)

“Why didn’t you just kill your wife
then?”

Brunes’ smile was cold; his eyes dead
and vacant. “Killing impatiently leads to mistakes. I’m not an impatient man.”

While Brayden contemplated his escape he
asked, “How did you get her to the yacht?”

Brunes smiled wider. “You were wrong
about that one, too. I didn’t drug her. She came willingly and compliantly, if
a bit sad. I had Sarina taken away. I told her I’d kill her if she didn’t take
a little trip with me. Of course, she knew what I meant, but hey, at least I
kept my end of the bargain. I never killed Sarina.”

“So you beat her until she was
unconscious, then tossed her off the side. Did you pay Daniel to help cover it
up?”

Brunes shrugged. “I’ve done many things
to see to protection.”

“And you killed Daniel, because...?”

“He was getting soft.” Brunes sighed,
then put his finger over the trigger. “You know, you should have left it alone.
The case has been closed for a long time. I’m afraid you brought this upon
yourself. Just like my bodyguard did by fucking my wife.”

Brunes might have the advantage with the
gun, but Brayden had something he didn’t—speed. Brayden dove across the room in
a blur of motion. A shot fired. Brayden ducked, then lunged into Brunes. They
both slammed into the heavy wooden desk, shoving it across the carpet and into
the wall. Wood splintered and cracked. Brayden grabbed hold of Brunes’ arm then
slammed it into the corner of the desk. Brunes screamed as the gun fell to the
floor. An uppercut slammed Brayden’s teeth together. He tasted blood, but he
had anger and determination on his side. He slammed his head forward and caught
Brunes’ nose. Bones crunch and blood flowed and some of the anger bunched up
inside of him released at the sight.

Brayden stepped back, then hammered two
jabs across Brunes. But he didn’t fall. In fact, he laughed a hoarse, wheezing
sound as he collapsed back against the desk.

“If only you knew...” he said.

Brayden wrapped his fingers around
Brunes’ throat and squeezed applying pressure. Brunes fought him, latched onto
his wrist to tug him away, but his strength felt like that of a baby’s next to
his own.

Still, Brunes laughed, his eyes wet with
pain-filled tears. “I have your woman.”

Brayden’s grip tightened. Flesh, tendons
and muscles gave way under his grip. It felt so good he didn’t want to stop.
Wanted to keep squeezing until it crushed, collapsed under his fingertips.

“You’re lying.”

The corner of Brunes’ mouth tilted up
then his eyes darted behind Brayden. That was all the warning he had before
powerful electric jolts shot through his body. His grip fell from Brunes’
throat, his knees went out, then he fell to the floor in convulsions so hard
his teeth clanked together and his muscles clenched to the point of pain.

“You can stop that now. Thank you,” said
Brunes.

The electrical shocks stopped, but still
his body twitched like he was hardwired to an electric shock machine. The
convulsions stopped, but still his muscles jumped and spasmed. Arms grabbed
his, lifted him, then shoved him into a chair. He couldn’t quite keep his head
up. It rolled backwards so that he was staring at the ceiling. No matter how
hard he tried to make his neck work, he couldn’t lift his head.

Brunes came into view, towered over him.
Then his head slammed left, right, left, then right again as Brunes laid into
him with hard fists. The pain didn’t matter. It was a minor flair to the shocks
making his limbs twitch. A feminine cry sent his eyes wide. God, he knew that
sound. Fuck, no, he couldn’t have her.

“Bring her over here,” Brunes ordered in
a hard voice.

A rush of footsteps ran across the room,
then there she was standing over him. She’d been crying. Her eyelashes were
wet, eyes red. Anger, the kind he hadn’t felt in a long time exploded inside of
him. They’d taken her from him, then hurt her. She collapsed against him,
sobbing, trailed soft wet kisses across his face before she was yanked away.
Finally, his head worked. It hurt like hell, but he lifted his head to take in
the scene.

Five heavily armed guards filled the
room. Brunes’ face was a bloody mess and that made Brayden smile darkly.
Vanessa’s arms were tied behind her back in a way that brought nasty memories
of her naked in the forest in a very similar situation. One face, though, he
didn’t see in the room.

“Where’s Joseph? I believe he might
object to you treating his mate like this?”

Vanessa lunged forward before the guards
yanked her back by the arm. She winced and he fervently started moving his
fingers, his toes to get his circulation back to normal. If he could buy a few
minutes, he could stand.

“They killed him!” cried Vanessa. “They
shot him in the head.”

Brunes cast a disgusted glance her way. “Shut
her up, will you?”

The guard on her right slapped her hard
across the face. Brayden saw red. In a flash, he struck. With two lethal cracks,
he snapped the guard’s neck holding her, then shoved Vanessa behind him as the
other five guards raised their rifles.

Brunes held up a hand to them. “Relax. I
don’t want this to go fast.”

Just then, the windows at the back of
the room shattered in a loud explosion. Glass flew across the room.
Swat-clothed men stormed into the room shouting commands. One man wore no swat
clothes whatsoever.

“Dmetri?” Brayden asked, dumbfounded.

Dmetri’s eyes shone with determination.
He flicked him a glance, then swept on the guards with a flurry of attacks and cringe
worthy kicks. But Brunes ducked down below the fighting, crawling quickly
toward the gun still lying on the floor. Brayden flew to him. He caught Brunes
by the back of his long hair, then made his face kiss the floor—hard. He did it
again. One for the death of Sarina’s mother, another for Daniel, one for the
guard he’d murdered, and twice as many for taking Vanessa and hurting her. He
wasn’t finished, but arms flew around his chest pulling him away. He growled at
them and launched one brutal kicked to Brunes’ head. The old lykaen’s head
whipped back, then he slumped to the ground.

“Never touch my woman,” Brayden growled.

“Relax, man, relax.” Dmetri’s slightly
accented voice penetrated through the raging fog in his mind.

He watched Brunes try to lift himself
back up, then slump again to the floor.

“We got him. We heard his confession.”

That sent Brayden whirling around. “You
were here this whole time?”

“Nah, the butler called the Justicars
in. Then they called me. Needed another higher up on the case.” Dmetri grinned,
then clapped him on the back. “No way was I going to intrude on his
confession.”

A small hand cupped his. He looked down
at Vanessa’s face and something inside him broke. He pulled her into his arms,
holding her close. She clenched her arms around him as if she needed to be
holding onto him as much as he did her. God, it felt good. Almost beautiful.

“Why didn’t you crash in when you heard
the first gunshot, asshole?”

Dmetri sobered. “They found Joseph
Harrington’s body in a ditch along the highway halfway between here and
Justicar’s headquarters. Figured they’d taken her. Figured she was here. We
didn’t want to act to soon and cause...any unnecessary problems.”

Meaning, he didn’t want to act too soon
and have someone pull the trigger on Vanessa before they’d even stormed in. “Yeah,
I got it. Now I’m going home.”

He didn’t even make it to the front door
before he lifted Vanessa’s face, looked into her deep brown eyes and kissed
her. His heart pounded loudly in his chest.

“I’m so glad you came,” she said
brokenly. She gave him a wobbly smile that pulled at all his heartstrings.

“I love you,” he said.

Her eyes flew wide. She gasped.

Then he kissed her again.

Chapter 16

Two weeks later

“And now, this one.”

The pen flew across the black line as she
signed her signature on the last page of the document. The behemoth stack of
divorce papers had looked so intimidating, but with Brayden by her side, it’d
felt like nothing. In fact, she’d smiled the whole way through and happily
scribbled her signature and dated the lines where necessary. She was now free.

The clerk looked over the last signature
then nodded. He slammed a big stamp over the last page, then stuffed them into
a big manila envelope.

“Congratulations. Once these are made official,
you can consider yourself divorced, Ms. Kategan.”

Vanessa’s smile was so huge her cheeks
hurt her. She turned into Brayden and gave him a big hug. He laughed at her and
she liked that too.

“When will I know?” she turned back to
ask the clerk.

He glanced at a calendar. “It generally
can take up to two weeks for it to go through.”

She lost her smile. Two whole weeks. Two
more weeks that she’d still be considered mated to Joseph.

“Come on.” Brayden tugged her hand and
led her outside.

The sun looked brighter, the air smelled
fresher. Everything was good. Everything except her nagging conscious.

Brayden glanced down at her. “What’s
wrong?”

“Well, I feel guilty.”

“About what?”

She took a deep breath and let it out. “I
feel guilty because I don’t feel bad that he’s dead. Isn’t that horrible? I
mean, here I am making the divorce official, just so I can get my old name
back. But, I don’t feel bad about it. Shouldn’t I?”

She didn’t know what his answer would be,
but she certainly didn’t expect him to lean down and kiss her in full display
of the Justicars heading in and out of their headquarters. It was a warm,
tantalizing kiss that brought her blood to a simmer, causing her heart to race.
He pulled back just as she started to think of all the nearest locations she
could get his clothes off.

“No, you shouldn’t. He deserved what he
got. I just wished I could have done it.”

Her jaw dropped. “What? You would have
killed him?”

His eyes darkened so fast it scared her.
“In a heartbeat. He hurt you for two long years...” his voice trailed off as a
finger skimmed down her cheek. “Come on, let’s go.”

With her heart bursting in her chest,
she couldn’t stop smiling. God, she loved him. Like really, madly, deeply,
insane kind of love. “You never did tell me where we’re going.”

“That’s because I said it’s a surprise.”

Not put off in the least she replied, “It
doesn’t have to be a surprise. They’re totally overrated anyway.”

He chuckled, then helped to lift her in
his SUV at the curb. “Nothing you could do could convince me.”

Her eyebrow arched and he looked at her
and winced. “Don’t even.”

She relaxed into her seat and parted her
legs. “Oh, really? Nothing I could do...could convince you to tell me?”

“Baby,
don't;
it’s a surprise.”

“But, I really want to know,” she said,
breathless. She honestly didn’t even care about the secret, but now she was
getting hot and by the look in his eyes, so was he. She wet her dry lips and
his eyes tracked the movement.

“Baby, stop that. I’m going to start
this car, then we’re leaving. That’s it, okay? No games.”

She smiled devilishly at him. “Aye, aye,
Captain.”

He narrowed his eyes on her then shook
his head, started the car, and peeled away from the curb. Still, she watched
him and still, he cast furtive, watchful glances at her.

She scooted closer to him. He tensed. He
must be out of it, because he hadn’t even made sure she buckled her seatbelt.
Watching the road ahead, as if nothing in the world was happening, she casually
lifted the armrest separating them then scooted closer.

His jaw slid left. His hands curled hard
over the steering wheel.

“Don’t do it,” he warned in that dark,
sexy voice that gave her shivers.

She looked up at him with wide eyes. “Talking
to me like that doesn’t help, you know.”

He exhaled a long, long breath.

What was with her desires going wild every
time she was in close confines with him, specifically in this car? The last
time they’d gotten all hot and bothered, he’d pulled over to the side of the
road and things had just been about to get really, really good when they’d been
struck by a car.

“Don’t even think about it,” he warned.

“Don’t think about what?” she whispered,
her panties already wet between her thighs.

“About that day on the side of the road.
I can see every wicked thought that scatters across your face. You’re like a
book, beautiful.”

She sighed then curled around him. He
hesitated at first, but then he wrapped his arm around her shoulders. She liked
this. Liked being close to him, smelling his wonderful scent, feeling the
strength of his body. Her hand rested on his chest, then trailed down over the
hard planes and bunches of muscle. Desire rushed inside her. She wanted to lick
her way down it, slowly.