by Bella Jacobs
Unleashed
Dark Moon Shifters One
Bella Jacobs
UNLEASHED
Dark Moon Shifters Book One
By Bella Jacobs
Copyright © 2018 by Bella Jacobs
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book. This contemporary romance is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners. This ebook is licensed for your personal use only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with, especially if you enjoy sexy, fast-paced urban fantasy reads. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.
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Contents
About the Book
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Sneak Peek
About the Author
Also by Bella Jacobs
About the Book
One woman on the run. Four dangerously sexy bodyguards. And a war brewing that will change the shifter world forever…
I’m living on borrowed time, fighting for survival against a deadly new virus that has no cure and a cult doing its best to brainwash me. But when a mysterious note shows up on my windowsill one night, its chilling message--Run, Wren--launches me out of the frying pan and into the fire.
Within hours, everything I thought I knew about my life, my family, and my origins is obliterated, and I'm racking up enemies at an alarming rate. Between the cult I've just escaped, a violent shifter faction out for my blood, and an ancient evil who eats "chosen ones" like me for breakfast, my last hope is to join forces with four dangerous-looking men who claim they were sent to guard my life.
Luke, a werewolf with a rap sheet. Creedence, a lynx shifter who never met a mark he couldn’t con. Kite, a bear kin with a mean right hook and heart of gold. And Dust, my childhood best friend and dude voted least likely to be a secret shape-shifting griffin.
But are these men really what they seem?
Or are my alpha guardians hiding a secret agenda of their own?
I’m not sure, but one thing is for certain—choosing the right allies will mean the difference between life and death. For me, and everyone I love.
UNLEASHED is book one in the Dark Moon Shifter’s series. It is a true reverse harem featuring one woman and her four mates.
To all the brave women who inspire
me daily. Thank you for your big, beautiful,
fearless hearts.
Chapter 1
Wren
I don’t believe in ghosts. I don’t believe in ghosts. I don’t—
Believe.
In ghosts.
Palms sweating and a sour taste rising in my throat, I stand tall, forcing a smile to my face for the next girl in the cafeteria serving line.
She has red hair and moon-glow skin just like Scarlett. But she isn’t Scarlett.
She isn’t, she isn’t, she isn’t…
This is just my virus-addled brain playing tricks on me.
I refuse to get my hopes up. I know better. After eight years and a dozen cases of mistaken identity—racing after a woman boarding a train or taking a stranger’s hand at the farmer’s market—I know my sister is never coming back to me.
Scarlett is gone. Forever.
Scarlett is dead, and I don’t believe in ghosts. Only the kooky extremists and the old hippies in our church actually believe in things that go bump in the night and exorcisms and all the rest of the crazy. The rest of the Church of Humanity movement is firmly grounded in reality and helping people come together to make a better world.
Which means not scaring away newbies to the movement by rushing up to hug them like they’re your long-lost best friend.
As the girl slides her tray closer, her blurred features come into sharper focus, revealing a forehead that’s too wide, a nose that’s too sharp, and blue eyes instead of brilliant, glittering green. She isn’t Scarlett, but the sadness dragging at her delicate features reminds me of my sister, and my throat goes tight as I ask her, “Beef stew or veggie?”
“Um…either one is fine, thanks,” she whispers, ducking her head to hide behind a shock of dirty auburn hair. “Whatever.”
“Well, I can’t get enough of the veggie. The tofu has great flavor,” I say gently, “but I’d love for you to choose. I want to make sure you get what you’d like best. Your opinion matters.”
The girl looks up sharply, suspicion blooming in her tired eyes. I smile in response, silently assuring her this isn’t a prank and I’m not being a smartass B-word. I truly care about her opinion and her preferences. I care about her and every teen who comes into the Rainier Beach C of H shelter.
After three years as an assistant coordinator, this is my shelter now. And in my shelter, every soul is precious and valued. Any staff members who thought differently were relocated when I took the reins last August. And I intend to hold on tight to those reins through this relapse and all the pain, dizziness, and exhaustion that goes with it.
I may only be able to work part-time, but the hours that I am here, I’m all in.
When Lance, one of our regulars, sighs heavily behind the new girl and grumbles, “Just pick something already,” I shoot him a gentle, but firm, look and say, “It’s fine, Lance. We’re not in any rush.” I glance back at the girl. “What’s your name, honey?” I just got here an hour ago and haven’t had time to look over the new intake forms.
“Ariel,” she mumbles, glancing nervously between Lance and me.
“Like the mermaid.” I grin. “That was my favorite cartoon when I was little. My sister has pretty red hair like yours, and she would let me brush it while we watched and sang along with all the songs.”
Ariel’s lips curve shyly. “That’s my sister’s favorite princess, too.” She blinks, her smile vanishing as quickly as it appeared. “Or, at least it was. I haven’t seen her in a couple of years. Not since my stepdad kicked me out.”
I want to hurry around the counter, pull her into my arms, and promise her things are going to be
better for her from now on. She’s at a Church of Humanity Shelter, not one of the poorly funded nightmares on the east side of town. No one will hurt her here. No one will judge her. It’s finally safe for her to grieve and grow and begin to heal from all the horrible things she’s no doubt been through as a beautiful young girl living on the streets of post-Meltdown Seattle.
But I’ve learned to keep my heart off my sleeve and my touchy-feely hugging instincts in check.
A lot of the kids in my care have yet to learn the difference between touch that offers comfort and touch that makes demands—sometimes ugly demands. Until they make it clear a hug is welcome, I keep my hands to myself.
Instead I lean in and whisper confidentially, “I bet Ariel is still her favorite. Once you go mermaid, you never go back. I still have mermaid pictures on my wall and I’m a grown woman.” I cast a glance at Lance as I add with mock seriousness. “But keep that just between us, okay? Gotta keep my street cred.”
“What street cred?” Lance snorts. “It’s too late, Miss Frame. We all know you’re a hopeless cheese case by now. The secret’s out. Now give the girl some stew before she passes out.” He nudges Ariel’s arm gently with his elbow. “You’re starving, right?”
Ariel laughs softly and nods. “Yeah. I am.” She grins across the counter at me, hope cautiously creeping into her eyes. “I’ll have the beef stew, please. I’m a meat eater in a big way.”
“A girl after my own heart,” Lance booms, making Ariel laugh again as she scoots her tray down toward the dessert station. “Two servings of beef for me, please, Miss F. I’m starving after all that nature exploration shit today.”
“Language,” I admonish, but my heart isn’t in it. Lance came to us an angry street kid with two misdemeanors for drug possession and a history of taking out his frustration with life on smaller teens. After six months, he’s become a kind young man who enjoys helping the newbies at the shelter fit into our rhythms and who volunteers for campus clean up and laundry duty without being asked.
All it took to unlock his heart was for someone to show him how to turn the key. He just needed someone to care about him first, to show him he was worth it, so he could start learning how to love himself and others. It’s simultaneously so simple and so hard, and I’m so, so proud of him.
“You’re doing great, Lance.” I mound his tray with as much stew as I can fit into the main compartment on his plate. “I appreciate the light you shine around here.”
Lance’s cheeks go pink beneath his golden-brown skin as he rolls his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, Miss F, don’t get sappy on me. Trying to play it cool in front of the new girls.”
“You know the policy on inter-shelter dating, Lance,” I remind him, arching a brow.
“Yeah, yeah.” He flashes a bright-white smile over his shoulder as he slides his tray away. “But a guy can dream. I won’t be here forever, you know.”
The words make my chest ache. It’s true. He won’t be here forever. That’s the hardest part of my job—falling in love with these kids and then seeing them go off to foster families, most often never to return.
I don’t blame them for wanting to leave the past in the past and move on with their lives, but that doesn’t keep me from missing them. From wondering where they are and wishing we could stay one big extended family.
But that’s part of my own set of mental glitches—I hate for people to leave. Too many people have left me already. First the biological mother and father I can’t remember, then my best friend, Dust, and finally my sister, the person who meant the most to me in the world. She was my hero, my protector, my playmate, and my confidante. She was everything I wanted to grow up to be, even though she never made it past the age of nineteen.
I’ve been thinking of her more than ever recently.
For a time, years after the fire, I was able to put her out of my mind for days, sometimes even weeks, and go about my life.
But now…
Now my health is failing the same ways hers failed.
Now there are days when I can’t get out of bed, the agony burning through my bones is so bad.
There are moments—flashes of despair—in which I consider taking a few too many steps at the edge of the train platform. I don’t want to die, but I don’t know how much longer I can live with the pain, the weakness, the uncertainty of whether I will ever go back into remission.
The virus my drug-addict bio-mom caught from a dirty needle and passed on to both of her daughters is a Meltdown disease, one of the many exotic new autoimmune viruses that oozed out of the polar ice caps as they melted to near nothingness in the years before I was born. Researchers and scientists are working as fast as they can to find cures for the Devour virus and the other diseases plaguing humanity, but a cure is still decades away.
I won’t live to see it. Not unless there’s a miracle.
There are days when that’s okay with me, when I’m grateful that there will soon be a day when I won’t have to drag my body out of bed, stuff my mouth full of ten different kinds of meds, and fight to pass as a normal, functional adult anymore.
And then there are days like today, when I look out at a cafeteria filled with once hopeless kids, now laughing and chatting and eating with the gusto of healthy people who need fuel for all the big things they’re going to do with their lives, and I pray for another year.
Two.
Three or more—if somehow my body can be convinced to stop attacking itself.
“We good to close the line, boss?” a voice rumbles softly from beside me, making my cheeks heat.
That’s what he does to me, this man who is another reason I would like to stick around a little longer. Long enough to see what having a steady boyfriend might be like, maybe…
Or at least long enough to see if Kite’s kisses are as lovely as the hugs he gives me every evening as we say goodbye and head for our separate train stops.
“Yeah, let’s close up.” I turn, smiling up at him as he whips off his hairnet with a relieved sigh, setting his long, glossy black hair free to stream around his broad shoulders. “Aw, poor Kite,” I tease. “I’m telling you, you’re pulling off the hairnet. It’s a solid look for you. You should take a selfie.”
His rich brown eyes narrow on mine. “Very funny, Bird Girl,” he says, the nickname making me grin even wider. “Are we saving the peach cobbler, or can I pack up what’s left for the staff?”
I glance over at the warming pan to see only a few inches of untouched cobbler. “Go ahead and wrap it up for the staff. You’re going to make Carrie Ann’s day. She lives for an excuse to have dessert for breakfast.”
“Amen!” Carrie Ann, my right-hand woman, cruises by with an arm full of dirty salad bar dishes bound for the kitchen. Her blond bob is still safely secured under her hairnet and her face is makeup free, but she looks adorable, a real-life pixie with a mischievous grin that always lifts my spirits. She flashes it now as she says, “Make mine a big one, Kite. My legs are jelly from that hike around the bay. I need sugar to restore me. Lots of it.”
I keep my grin in place, refusing to feel envious of my friend or the others who were able to make the hike around the new beach line today, exploring the places where the rising ocean has intruded and where Seattle’s manmade barriers to the overflow are holding strong.
Yes, I would have loved to spend hours out in nature with Kite, absorbing his teachings on native flora and fauna, interspersed with the always fascinating stories passed down from his grandfather—former chief of the Samish Indian Nation—but I learned a long time ago not to waste energy feeling sorry for myself.
Besides, Kite will fill me in on our way to the train. He always does. My newest hire is not only a gentle giant with a heart of gold and a knack for winning over even the surliest street kid, he’s also patient, generous, and thoughtful.
And gorgeous, a wayward voice whispers in my head.
I avert my gaze, pretending great interest in the chafing dishes as Carrie swoops in to gr
ab the empty green bean container near my elbow. I’m not ready to let Kite see how much appreciation I have for his sculpted features, silky hair, and big, burly, and completely snuggle-perfect body. I have as many fantasies about curling up in Kite’s arms and going to sleep with my head on his chest as I do about other, racier things. Maybe it’s a side effect of being so tired all the time—nap fantasies are totally a thing for sicklies like me—but I don’t think so.
I think it’s a side effect of him being absolutely adorable.
“You need vegetables,” Kite calls after Carrie as she scoffs and continues about her business. “For a grown woman, your eating habits are shameful.”
“Good thing I’m not done growing yet,” Carrie Ann shoots back as the kitchen door swings closed behind her.
Kite turns to me with a sigh. “Someone needs to teach that girl the basics of good nutrition.”
“I’ve tried,” I say, turning off the warmers beneath the stew. “But she’s set in her ways. Sugar, caffeine, and sliced deli meat are her three basic food groups. Maybe she’ll rethink things when she’s older. She’s only twenty; she has time.” I reach for the edges of the chafing dish, engaging my abs as I prepare to lift the metal container. It’s half empty and can’t weigh more than ten pounds, but I still struggle to work it free, sweat breaking out in the valley of my spine as I slide it to the edge of the counter.