Lone Wolf

by Rebecca Royce

  Anger started at the bottom of his feet making its way up the back of his spine. In a moment he’d boil. His father had used the same gesture to dismiss him as a child. When he’d turned twelve, his wolf had helped him control his response to Kendrick. Now, left alone, he might do just what he’d done at eight and go right for the man’s throat.

  In fact, that seemed like a good idea. A great one.

  Gabriel started to call on his shift. He’d be more effective wearing his fur.

  “Now, now, now, simmer down there, boy.” Kendrick stepped away from the wall. “Remember I have something that you want.”

  Like he’d become some kind of witch himself, Kendrick snapped his fingers and Carrie appeared out of thin air. One second no one stood between Gabriel and his target, the next the one person in the universe he could not hurt stared up at him, her brown eyes wide and alarmed.

  Carrie blinked rapidly. “What the…?”

  She’d always had a husky voice. The intonation had made him hard as hell when they’d been younger. It had brought images of nighttime rolls in warm blankets filled with sultry laughter to pass the quiet hours. Now he couldn’t fathom the idea of sex, but seeing her would have brought him to his knees had Kendrick not been standing behind her.

  “Gabriel.” She paled, which made her practically disappear considering that with her red hair, she had porcelain skin already almost too pale to take any real sunlight. “You shouldn’t be here. I can’t keep you safe if you’re here.”

  He shook his head. Leave it to Carrie to think she had to take care of him. She’d always insisted he needed her help as much as she needed his.

  She rushed forward and launched herself at him, her lips meeting his. They were soft and just as he remembered them. If only he could still be the shifter who had once been able to give her everything. He pushed her back a step, separating his lips from hers. Her eyes flared with hurt.

  “I can’t have you here anymore. This has to stop.” He swallowed. The first words they’d said to each other in forty years and they held no romance, no discussion of the time or the agony they’d lived through. He couldn’t even give her the kiss she deserved beyond all things.

  Her eyes widened and he saw her wolf dance inside them. The change would come quickly if she called it upon herself.

  “There’s something wrong with you.” She reached out and rubbed her fingers against his shirt. “I can smell it.”

  “Well, isn’t this sweet?” Kendrick yanked her back against him. “Good nose, daughter-in-law. There is something wrong with Gabriel. There has been for forty years. Frankly, and I don’t admit this easily, I’m impressed he’s still alive. There aren’t many who could live this long without their wolves. It’s the purity of your Kane blood.”

  “How do you know that?” He couldn’t possibly have that information. No one had been told. His wolf wouldn’t have come and reported to Kendrick…

  “Because I have him.”

  “What?” His mind couldn’t process what his father said. It didn’t make any sense.

  Carrie wrenched herself free from Kendrick. She grabbed his arms and shook him. “Run.” A second later, she shook him again. “Whatever he’s going to say is a lie. You know it. I know it. He’s evil. It’s not possible. He couldn’t have your wolf. Run.”

  His father recaptured Carrie. She cried out when he grabbed her arm, squeezing it hard.

  Gabriel couldn’t take his eyes off Kendrick. Normally he’d believe Carrie. But the only way Kendrick would know Gabe’s wolf had abandoned him was if his father had some sort of communication with Gabriel’s wolf.

  “Prove it.”

  His father took a beat to respond before he grinned. “You always were the most like me.”

  “No.” Once again, Carrie managed to squirm out of Kendrick’s hold. She pushed herself against Gabriel. “Listen to me. Whatever this is, it’s a lie. Or a manipulation. Get out of here. Leave. Go back to Westervelt. Help Tristan. Don’t be here. Don’t believe him.”

  His father shook his head but didn’t go after Carrie this time. “You can go. You might have to explain to your brothers why you stink like made wolf. I’m sure you can come up with a reasonable explanation. You have been lying to them every day for over forty years. Or you can come with me and see your wolf again.”

  “Gabriel.” Her voice was pleading, yet he had no choice but to ignore her warning. If his wolf existed somewhere, he had to get him back. How could he make any decisions while he existed as only half of himself?

  Chapter 7

  Carrie couldn’t believe what had happened. One second she’d been scrubbing dishes, the next she’d been popped into the hall by Kendrick only to find the love of her existence standing in front of her. He’d changed so much in all the ways that mattered. And now his wolf had … left him? She shook her head before she chased him down the hall.

  He couldn’t possibly consider listening to Kendrick. After everything they’d been through, separated, not seeing each other, trying with all his might to keep Kendrick from winning while keeping each other alive.

  Gabriel smelled … wrong.

  It all makes sense now that we know his wolf has gone missing.

  Her wolf paced around inside her. Carrie’s other half had never been comfortable in their current circumstances, but now she acted downright anxious. Her wolf had been her rock through everything. Now did not seem the time for her to get worked up.

  Her beloved, who smelled of pain—rank, gut-churning, soul-destroying agony—strode after his father like a thirsty man who had been told he could soon have a drink of water. He still had the same gait, strong and determined. The back of his hair had grown a little long, which spoke of the difference in him. When they’d been together he’d always had it short and shaved right up against his skull.

  You never told me it was at all possible to lose you. That might have been helpful to know when you explained to me how all of this would work.

  Her wolf remained silent for a second. I shouldn’t even justify that with a response. In the history of our kind, this has never happened before. I can’t be expected to see all possibilities. I’m the wolf here. You’re the human. Let me run free. You do the heavy thinking. These are human problems. Shifters don’t do this to each other.

  Much as Carrie hated to admit it, her wolf had a point. It wasn’t until Kendrick had gone haywire that everything had changed.

  “Gabriel.”

  He turned to look at her, walking backward for two steps while he did.

  “Sweet lady, I have to do this.”

  Her heart stuttered and tears she refused to give passage to threatened to spill from her eyes. She hadn’t heard those blessed words—sweet lady—for too long. The nickname Gabriel had given her so long ago. When they’d both been naive enough to believe the world held nothing but happy endings for them.

  A time Carrie’s thoughts drifted to often.

  “Gabriel.” Carrie sped up and grabbed his arm. “Please, listen to me. We’ll go together. We’ll run away.”

  “And then what? Keep running for the rest of our lives?” He stopped to look at her before he cupped her face in his own. “Don’t forget the spell on us.”

  “Screw spells. I’m so sick of witches and black magic. I’m so sick of the whole damn thing.”

  He laughed and for just a second she saw the man he used to be in his sad gaze. Just as soon as it appeared, it vanished. Had it ever been there or did she imagine it?

  Something is very wrong with him. Her wolf added what Carrie already suspected.

  “I’m so tired of them too.”

  Kendrick stopped walking and stared at them. The usual venom she’d come to associate with her former Alpha’s gaze filled the room. “He’s quite right, Carrie-daughter. If you leave me, you die. If Gabe tries to take you or doesn’t do exactly what I say, you die. Either way you look at this, if you do anything I don’t like, you’re dead.”

  “I was aware of the de
al forty years ago, you sick son of a bitch.” She longed to scratch out his eyes. The years had given her a tolerance for his manhandling and his foul mouth, but the growl that erupted from her told her that her wolf’s patience had come to an end. “I never would have agreed to it if I’d been consulted.”

  “I would have killed you. The curse made all mated men end their women. They all died,” Gabe interjected, his voice shaking in the room. “Struck you dead where you stood. I wouldn’t have been able to help myself. And if I could have managed not to, my only other choice would have been to end my own life, which would have forced you to follow me to death. Either way, you would have died. I couldn’t allow it.”

  “Maybe I could have stopped you.” They’d had this argument forty years earlier. Apparently it hadn’t ever ceased.

  “No. You couldn’t have. Gods know you couldn’t even have waited it out. Tristan tried to kill Ashlee thirty years later until we managed to eliminate Dad’s original witch. That made the curse cease.”

  “Not my original one, son.” Kendrick shook his head. “Just the one my love hired to do her dirty work for her. After all, I couldn’t have you all gunning for Drea to remove the curse.”

  Gabriel shook his head. “Who’s Drea?”

  Her throat felt dry. “His miserable wife.”

  “And how is that possible?” Gabe’s pulse felt too fast under her touch.

  “Your mother was never really his mate.”

  “What?” He didn’t even shout his words. The Gabriel of old would be in a fury.

  Carrie spoke quickly. “It’s a long story.” Right now Kendrick seemed amused. He wouldn’t be in a few moments. The maniacal shifter who happened to be her father-in-law didn’t like any moment that didn’t center on exactly what he wanted whenever he wanted it. “Tristan is mated?”

  “I left a few weeks ago, but nearly all of them are. Maybe even all of them now.” He stroked a hand down her cheek. “Tristan and Cullen mated Victoria’s daughters.”

  He couldn’t have shocked her more if he’d hit her with a live wire. “Ashlee. And Summer? Did she really name them that?” So much time had passed. Victoria had grown daughters and Carrie had never even met them.

  “She did. You should see all the babies running around. My brothers are fathers now. Seeing them like that. Bizarre.”

  Kendrick laughed. “Unfortunately, Victoria never got to see her daughters become moms. I had her slaughtered before that.”

  She took a step back, her attention tunneling on her father-in-law. “You did what?”

  “I couldn’t have Victoria interfering in things anymore. I had to hurt the pack. What better way than by eliminating anyone who got in my way?”

  “She was my best friend.” She could feel her change coming on her. The suddenness and lack of thought to the shift told her she’d lost control of her wolf. Her lupine half wanted blood even if it meant her own death.

  Carrie could still see Victoria as she’d been that day in the woods in the moments before Carrie’s life had changed. Young, alive, full of laughter and self-confidence. Yes, Kendrick had to pay for his actions. Enough had to be enough.

  “Don’t do it.” Gabriel grabbed the back of her neck, pulling her against him. “I won’t lose you. Do you understand?” He stroked her skin and her wolf settled down. The shift stopped. “I need you to trust me.”

  She did, but if his plan included anything less than squishing Kendrick like a bug she’d have something to say about it.

  Chapter 8

  Gabriel followed his father into a back room with Carrie hot on his heels. He knew what she wanted—for him to take her hand before running for the hills. Of course they knew the second they did that she’d drop dead. He’d spent forty years trying to keep his mate alive. Letting her fall to the floor never to rise again hadn’t factored into his plan.

  But he could die and nothing would happen to her. It had taken him years to figure it out, and then one day it had dawned on him. If he no longer had his wolf or any of her soul embedded within him, dying would not affect her in the least. The magic of the Westervelt mating—the exchanging of part of their souls so that each carried the other’s—had been negated.

  For all intents and purposes, Gabriel had no mate. Not anymore.

  Not that he intended to tell her that. Carrie meant more to him than anything. Like humans did, Gabriel loved her completely. He could keep her alive. She wouldn’t need to die because Gabriel wouldn’t be dragging her along with him into the next life. With Kendrick dead, she’d be free to go on with her life without any of the past to hold her back. If thinking about being in a world without her made him clench his teeth, he didn’t need to think about it that much.

  Nothing in Kendrick’s binding spell had prevented Gabe from killing Kendrick, only Carrie.

  But if Kendrick had his soul…

  “Here.” His father pointed to a closed vial that sat next to several other pieces of scientific equipment on a counter. At first glance, Gabriel couldn’t see anything inside of it except air. He walked toward it and stared down.

  “There is nothing in it. Empty.” He clenched his fists. “Is this some kind of sick joke? Is this how you get off these days?”

  “See, I told you. He’s a complete liar these days.” Carrie sounded desperate and it made the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

  “It takes more than me for you to see it.” He turned to his left. “Darling, would you join us, please?”

  A second later, a woman popped into the room, just as Carrie had earlier. “I see you decided to show him his wolf.”

  Gabriel detested the woman on sight. He didn’t need his wolf to tell him the female in front of him had witch blood in her. He’d grown to hate the smell over the years. In the beginning he’d thought witches’ scent somewhat akin to the aroma of mint. These days if he passed by too much gum in a store he wanted to gag from the similarity. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that everywhere a witch went she brought doom, death, and destruction with her.

  “So you’re my father’s whore.”

  Her eyes flared. “Don’t you talk to me like that, you insignificant piece of—”

  His father growled and the room silenced. “Drea, my love, if you will. I promise Gabriel will be dealt with in the appropriate manner.”

  “You’ll deal with me. I’ve come to bring death to you.”

  He called his shift onto him. Gabriel didn’t have a wolf to talk to but it didn’t mean he couldn’t kick serious ass in his wolf form. All he needed to do was finish what he’d once started.

  “Gabriel.” Carrie’s voice barely broke through his rage. He hoped she’d have the sense to get out of the way.

  His father picked up the vial. “Come at me, boy, and I’m going to drop this straight on the ground. Bye-bye wolfie-boy.”

  “Oh for love of the Goddess, Kendrick.” Drea shook her head, her brown hair falling on her shoulders. “You don’t have to be so dramatic. We have a much better way to handle the moron. A way to control him and handle him at the same time.”

  Gabriel had barely a second to consider her words before the vial Kendrick held turned purple. What had appeared empty moments earlier was now filled with a purple smoke.

  Carrie lunged forward just as Drea pulled the lid off the container. His throat closed up and all the air plunged from his lungs. The room spun and he hit the floor, all thought of shifting disappearing in an instant.

  “You’ve killed him.” Carrie sobbed, running to his side. “Why bring him this far if only to end his life?”

  If death was on its way, Gabriel wished it would hurry up. Agonizing pain racked his body and he’d slammed into the ground with no control of his own movements. Gods, he’d ended up such a failure.

  Carrie’s arms came around him, holding him against her while he seized. How long would it take to die from lack of oxygen? He hadn’t had a real breath in what seemed like forever.

  His love called out somethi
ng to his father. He had no idea what she said, but hearing her voice while he died seemed like a gift from a universe that had always been stacked against him.

  The world faded to blackness and as much as he didn’t want to die until he completed his task he welcomed the nothingness when it embraced him.

  * * * *

  Gabriel. Can you hear me?

  He blinked awake. He lay on some kind of table, strapped down across his chest with his arms and legs in restraints.

  The world tilted to the left. He blinked to try to right it and nothing happened except that his head began to pound begging him to go back to sleep.

  No. You can’t do that. I don’t know how much time we have.

  Gabe knew that voice though he hadn’t heard it in forty years. His wolf. Despite the pain he wrenched his eyes open and turned his vision to his mind’s eye to take a look at his fur-covered half who had been gone for so long. Brown and coated with gray specks, his lupine half remained exactly the same as he had been the last time he’d seen him.

  Are we dead? He looked around. When he’d pictured the next life he hadn’t envisioned being strapped to a table. At least Carrie didn’t appear to be around. Perhaps he’d managed to keep her alive.

  No. His wolf huffed. I’m back inside of you. Sort of.

  Kendrick and his damned witch had actually done it. They’d taken his wolf and now they’d given it back. His head whirled at the implication. If this was the case, and it looked like it had to be, why didn’t Kendrick simply take everyone’s wolves? Why bother fighting? Why not take Tristan’s wolf and be done with it?

  He blinked as his wolf’s words crept into his fogged consciousness. Sort of?

  See that purple haze? His wolf gestured upward with his chin.

  Gabriel squinted. He could see a lavender-colored cloud floating around him. He hadn’t noticed it before, which seemed really weird. What had happened to his eyesight? Why did his head feel so thick?

  It’s that very fact that is keeping you from noticing these things. My own senses are all askew. That purple stuff, it’s going to make it hard for us to function. The longer it’s here, the worse it’s going to get.