The Trail Back
Pine Falls 3
The Trail Back
Brayden Walsh is a wolf shifter, and has spent the last fifty years trying to bring his brothers, Josh and Shane, back to humanity after they all suffered a horrific childhood trauma. When their mate, Abbie Munroe, is brought to Pine Falls having been freed from the evil vampire, Selwyn Graves, he realizes his brothers must finally decide to fight for their own lives.
Abbie Munroe was taken from her home and held captive at the hands of brutal vampires for over a month due to her wolf-hybrid genetics. Rescue from imprisonment brings her the joy of discovering her mates and the pain of never being able to claim them.
As the mates fight to find a way to love each other, evil threatens the whole pride as Selwyn Graves comes to claim his precious hybrids. Can the pride use all of the supernatural powers at their disposal to forever free their mates from evil?
Genre:
Ménage a Trois/Quatre, Paranormal, Vampires/Werewolves
Length:
59,957 words
Pine Falls 3
Ashley Malkin
MENAGE AMOUR
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
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IMPRINT: Ménage Amour
THE TRAIL BACK
Copyright © 2015 by Ashley Malkin
E-book ISBN: 978-1-63259-680-2
First E-book Publication: September 2015
Cover design by Harris Channing
All art and logo copyright © 2015 by Siren Publishing, Inc.
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PUBLISHER
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
Letter to Readers
Dear Readers,
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The Trail Back
by Ashley Malkin from BookStrand.com or its official distributors, thank you. Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book.
Regarding E-book Piracy
This book is copyrighted intellectual property. No other individual or group has resale rights, auction rights, membership rights, sharing rights, or any kind of rights to sell or to give away a copy of this book.
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I would like to thank my husband and my children for all your love and support. I would not have had the courage to write without you.
A special thank you to Maggie Walsh for your love and unwavering support. You have helped me through all stages of the writing process and are a wonderful friend to me.
Thank you also to my friend, Heidi Rundle, for your love and encouragement. Your love of books is a joy to share in.
Pine Falls 3
ASHLEY MALKIN
Copyright © 2015
Prologue
Abbie fought hard to open her eyes. The pervading despair that had eventually settled over her after her weeks of captivity and abuse had robbed her of the will to continue fighting. Imagining she’d escape her captivity alive had been futile, and she’d long since come to accept her death as inevitable.
“I need your help,” the female vampire said.
She’d carried Abbie for a long time now and had moved so fast through the night air that Abbie was sure her bones were frozen. She’d ceased shivering, too weak for even that autonomic response.
Abbie heard voices but was so tired that they sounded like bees buzzing in her mind. The woman who had taken her from the cage had insisted that she shift. She’d said she could take Abbie to safety if she shifted.
The stranger had carried no scent, none at all, just like the evil ones who’d held her prisoner and abused her. She hadn’t known if she should trust her but felt as though she had nothing further to lose. She’d decided that if she were to die then she’d die with what little dignity she had left. She’d die as her wolf, not as a naked and beaten woman.
Abbie took a breath, trying to detect any familiar scents that she could associate with her home. She’d eventually grown accustomed to the foul stench of her unwashed body and the cabin she’d been caged in. She reeked of blood, excrement, sweat, and dried vampire seed. It made it hard to discern anything else over its pungency. Her next breath brought with it an aroma that had her wolf fighting against the lethargy and attempting to howl.
The smell of something wonderful pulled at Abbie’s senses, dragging her from her stupor. It was a smell she’d never encountered before, but was instinctually recognizable to her. She was in the presence of her mate.
Despite what she’d been through in the last few weeks, this particular smell called to her wolf. Her wolf wanted to fight again. Fight for what was hers.
Hers?
She somehow found the strength to open her eyes. People surrounded her. Inhaling as deeply as she could she detected cat, bear, and wolf.
My wolf.
She savored the smell and breathed deeply, only to be rocked by the combination of three individual aromas that somehow blended together to make a whole. Her wolf howled weakly, begging for the strength to live, to make these wolves her own.
Mine. They’re mine.
She wished she could call to them, let them know that she wanted them to be hers, but she couldn’t even muster a yip.
I’m so tired. I hurt so much.
It grew silent as she was moved into the warm embrace of one of her wolves. He smelled like home, and she began to believe she was finally free from the continued pain of her imprisonment. Pain lanced through her as the agonized howls of her mates suddenly split the silence. Their pain became hers by nature of their burgeoning bond as mates. It just wasn’t possible for her to endure any further pain.
Warm lips brushed over her head and the faintest whisper of pleasure broke through the fresh onslaught of torment. She drifted into the abyss of oblivion with a softly spoken promise ringing in her ears. “It’s all right now, little one. We’ll keep you safe.”
“Where the fuck were you?” Selwyn bellowed the question at his new business associate, Jeremy Donaldson.
The vampire is five hundred years old
,
plenty old enough to have accumulated some common sense. Or so I would have fucking thought.
Selwyn Graves had spent two thousand years on this planet, and just when things had finally become perfect, some sanctimonious bitch was threatening to ruin it all. Selwyn threw the flat-screen television through the cabin wall and watched it shatter on the ground outside.
The small deserted resort he’d purchased in the wilds of Canada was the perfect location to build his new empire, and this vampire, whoever she was, was not going to ruin it for him. If she thought he’d let her walk away with one of his prized wolf hybrids, then she was in for a shock. She would not be allowed to take what was his.
“I was here,” Jeremy said sourly. “I was on the phone arranging our next delivery time with our contact in Alberta. I didn’t hear a thing. I don’t know how she got past me.”
Selwyn was old enough to detect the smell of deception from a vampire, and this one stunk of it. “On the phone or sampling the goods again, Jeremy?” Selwyn kept his tone light, but if the vampire continued lying to him, he’d have his head.
“I was here, but I was fucking that little cat. Okay? I know I’ve screwed up.”
“Very funny. Pun unintended, I assume?” Selwyn said, softly and calmly. He knew how to convey menace with his words and the stench of fear rising from Jeremy showed he’d succeeded. “And are you leaving now to track this vampire and retrieve my wolf for me?”
“Yes, sir.”
The vampire vanished. Selwyn surveyed the rest of the small resort. He still had four strong vampires here, but he’d have to remain at the camp and supervise the operation more closely. Left to their own devices his men had all fallen victim to the lure of the hybrid blood.
Selwyn’s cock stirred in his suit pants. “It is an almost irresistible high. But one we will all have to abstain from for now. Do you all hear me? We can’t let another source be taken from us.”
The four other vampires guarding his facility, though not present in the cabin, would all have been listening to his conversation with Jeremy. They knew he wouldn’t hesitate in killing them if they failed him again.
“I may still kill Jeremy when he returns with my wolf. Don’t forget that.”
That was exactly what he had planned. Jeremy, however, didn’t need to know that. At present, he, above all the men, possessed the highest motivation to retrieve the wolf. He thought it would save him. It would be a waste not to take of advantage of all that enthusiasm. Then he’d kill him, slowly, as an example to the others.
