by Ovidia Pike
The Hunted Wolf
Crystal Lake Forest Wolf Shifter Series
Book 3
By: Ovidia Pike
Copyright 2019 Ovidia Pike - All rights reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction
Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Cover Image by Charmaine Ross
Contents
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Chapter 1: Jackson
Chapter 2: Alicia
Chapter 3: Jackson
Chapter 4: Gabriel
Chapter 5: Alicia
Chapter 6: Jackson
Chapter 7: Alicia
Chapter 8: Gabriel
Chapter 9: Jackson
Chapter 10: Alicia
Chapter 11: Gabriel
Chapter 12: Jackson
Chapter 13: Alicia
Chapter 14: Jackson
Chapter 15: Alicia
Chapter 16: Jackson
Chapter 17: Alicia
Chapter 18: Jackson
Chapter 19: Gabriel
Chapter 20: Alicia
[Preview] Chapter 1: Camilla
[Preview] Chapter 2: Sam
[Preview] Chapter 3: Gabriel
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Chapter 1: Jackson
I woke up in the morning to a knock on my door, standing and stretching, wincing as the motion pulled on my healing wounds, the stitches that held my skin together. I opened the door to see Gabriel Alarick on the other side. I bowed my head to him in deference.
“Sir,” I said, lifting my head to meet his eye. There was a serious look there, as there usually was, and he looked me over for a moment without speaking, eyes trailing me up and down, sizing me up.
“Jackson,” he said in a cold, hard voice. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m fine,” I said to him.
“When did the doctor release you?”
“Yesterday morning. I’ve spent most of the time in bed, but I’m starting to feel better.”
“Good,” Gabriel said. “Come for a walk with me. We need to talk.”
“Yes, sir,” I said to him, following him out, shutting the door behind me. We walked toward the edge of the village, and he looked at my face as we made our way through the trees.
“Tell me more about your connection to my family,” he said, cutting straight to the chase. “You say you are my protector—why haven’t I come across you before?”
“I keep my position low-key, stay in the shadows. My father...believes that our life is one of subservience. He thinks it’s beneath us.”
“And what do you think?” Gabriel asked, peering at me intently.
“I have always seen it as my sworn duty to protect you and I always will, no matter what my father thinks.”
“I’m not sure I need a protector,” he said. “I can take care of myself.”
“Of course you can,” I said to him quickly. “But every Alpha has enemies. Your father did, as did your grandfather. My family has always been tied to yours as servants and protectors.”
“I don’t want a servant,” he said.
“That’s fine, sir. But I’m going to protect you anyway.”
“I see,” he said stiffly, and I had no way of reading his tone. It was quiet as usual, soft but dangerous somehow. I couldn’t help but to stare at him as we walked along the border of the village together, his hands behind his back. There was something striking about his features and his stature, the straight-backed strength with which he stood. It made him radiate with an unimaginable power, and I wondered just how strong he was, the things he could do with his hands alone.
“Did your father forbid you from serving me?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said to him. “That’s why I’ve stayed in the shadows—but when I saw you with the witches, I knew I had to help.”
“You risked your life for me.”
“Yes, sir,” I said to him. “And I’d do it again to keep you safe.”
“Hmm,” was all he said, lips pursed together as he thought. “I suppose I should thank you for saving my life.”
“You don’t have to thank me,” I said to him. “It is—”
“Your duty. Right,” he said. “I—”
His voice was cut off by a shrill scream in the woods, a sound of terror that made something shiver through my spine. I exchanged a glance with Gabriel, who hesitated for only a moment before he began to turn in the direction of the sound. I put my hand on his chest to stop him.
“Wait,” I said as I quickly stripped out of my clothes and shifted, sniffing the air, finding it thick with the scent of blood and fear. I started to run even as I felt Gabriel shift beside me, but froze in my tracks when I saw what was happening. The screaming had stopped, and in front of us was a massive lion with a thick, shaggy mane, tearing into the flesh of a woman who was no longer recognizable, her face completely gone. The lion turned his eyes to us as soon as we got there and sprung at Gabriel before I had a chance to stop him. He was about to sink his teeth into Gabriel’s shoulder when I lunged at him, caught him by the throat even as he swiped at me with his long, powerful claws. I felt them rip into my shoulder as Gabriel joined me, the big black wolf sinking his teeth into the lion’s neck, tearing it out before I had a chance to respond.
I shifted and caught my breath, holding my hand over my bleeding shoulder as I watched the lion shift in front of us, turning into a naked human, eyes lifeless and dead as the blood pooled underneath him, gushing out of his throat. Gabriel shifted beside me and we stared down at the body, a look of cool confusion on his face.
“Why is a lion shifter in our woods?” I asked him.
“I don’t know,” he said gravely. “They’re not supposed to come over here.”
“Have you had any contact with them at all?”
“No,” Gabriel said. “I haven’t. We don’t—there is no communication between us. They stay in the caves and we stay in the village.”
“That’s strange,” I said to him. He grimaced as he looked down at the body of the woman who had been mauled, her corpse destroyed, unrecognizable. I barely noticed the guards hurrying toward us until they were surrounding the body.
“Where were you?” Gabriel snapped at them. Their backs straightened immediately, a look of fear on their faces at the sound of his anger.
“We were close by. I didn’t...know anything was happening until we heard the screams,” the guard said.
“You’re supposed to be patrolling these woods. We’re not far from the border of the village,” said Gabriel.
“Lions are...sneaky,” the man said in a lame voice. Gabriel gave an exasperated sigh.
“Go switch out guard duty. You two are relieved from your posts.”
“But—”
“Go,” Gabriel snarled, and they skittered away as he looked down at the body again, a look of disgust on his face.
“We need to find out why this happened,” he said. “Jesus, this is the last thing I need right now. I don’t have time—”
“Let me do it. I can help you,” I said. He shook his head.
“I have Harley as a right hand,” he said. “I will send her to the caves.”
“I’ve been there before,” I said to hi
m. “I know where they are. Has she?”
“No, I don’t think so. You’ve gone to the caves?”
“When I was younger, I—there’s a princess. We were friends.”
“Elina or Selene?” he asked.
“Elina,” I said, and he gave me a knowing look.
“She’s...nice,” he said.
“You know her?”
“Not in the way you know her,” Gabriel said. “Do you think that will work to your advantage?”
“It will get me an audience, at least,” I said. “That might be enough.”
He stared at me for a moment, sizing me up again.
“Fine,” he said. “You can go. But I want you back within two days.”
“I can do that, sir,” I said to him.
“Will you serve me in other ways?” he asked. “Do anything I ask of you?”
“Yes,” I said to him, bowing my head. When I lifted it, there was a look of intensity in his eyes that made me shiver under its power.
“When is your next appointment with the doctor?” he asked, looking down at my shredded shoulder. Most of the right side of my chest was covered in blood, and it was dripping down my hand.
“I should probably go see if I can find her right now,” I said to him.
“Yes. And leave after. I want this done. Speak to Elina and ask her what she might know about this attack. None of the royal family would condone such a thing—they are adamant about staying away from the village. She will want to know what’s happening just as much as we do.”
“Okay,” I said to him. “I’ll see Alicia, then leave. It takes about eight hours to get over there.”
“That’s fine. Be careful,” he said.
“I will,” I promised. He frowned down at the bodies again.
“I need to go get Harley. Are you fine to make it to the doctor’s?”
“Yes,” I said to him. “Thank you, sir.”
“Good,” he said, turning his back to me. I grimaced when I looked at my shoulder, the thick, painful gashes in my skin. I shifted so that I could hurry to the doctor’s, knocking on the hut. I felt a prickle of nervousness as I waited for her to open the door, the same feeling I’d gotten every time I’d seen her in the days of my recovery. The door opened and her eyes immediately fixed on my shoulder, widening as she took a moment to register what she was seeing. She looked up at my face with a stern frown.
“What did you do now?” she asked, ushering me quickly into the exam room. I sat on the table and she brought a towel over, pressing it firmly against my shoulder.
“There was a lion shifter in the woods,” I said to her. “He attacked one of our people, attacked Gabriel and I before Gabriel was able to take him down.”
“Why are you always risking your life for that man?” she asked in exasperation, beginning to clean the blood from my skin. I watched her face as she did so, taken in by her features, her wide, almond-shaped eyes and thick dark lashes, the bronze of her skin, her high cheekbones and full, sweet lips. For a moment I couldn’t even answer her, and when I didn’t, she peered up at me with a frown on her face.
“I’m sorry,” I said, tearing my eyes away from her mouth. “It is my duty to serve and protect my Alpha.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she grumbled, pulling the towel away, looking closely at my arm. I noticed the way her eyes moved over my naked body, over my chest and arms, something she had done frequently while patching me up in the last few days of my medical stay. There was a look on her face that made me chuckle, a heat behind those big brown eyes that couldn’t be masked by her polite professionalism.
“We’re going to have to stitch this up,” she said. “Again.”
“I can deal with a few stitches,” I said to her. “I think I’m in good hands.”
“You are,” she said in a soft voice, a slight blush on her cheeks as she turned away from me to gather the supplies she needed for the stitches. She came back and I looked at my arm as she stitched it up, watching her dexterous hands work quickly over my skin. I couldn’t help but to shiver when her knuckles brushed my shoulder, the skin contact feeling like a lightning strike through my body. I looked at her face to see that her lips were slightly parted, and when she met my eye I realized she was leaning in to my face, tilting her own as if for a kiss. I took a deep breath to steady my heartbeat, about to meet her lips before she turned her face away, taking a trembling step away to grab the bandages to patch me up.
“Thank you, doc,” I said when she was finished, unable to take my eyes off of her.
“Come in for your regular appointment tomorrow,” she said.
“I will,” I said to her, pausing for a moment before she turned her back to me.
“Goodnight, Jackson,” she said dismissively. I left her then, regretting having to walk away, but looking forward to going back already.
Chapter 2: Alicia
In my dream I was free to do what I wanted, be a person I could never be in real life. In my dream, I was naked and pressed against Jackson, rubbing my body against him, ready to feel him inside of me. He kissed me over and over, tasting my mouth, but I woke up just as I felt the head of his cock start to enter my pussy from behind. The knock on my door startled me out of my sleep and I bolted up in bed, scrambling to get dressed. I felt flushed all over and embarrassed over my dream, how I’d acted, like I was without any shame at all. I looked in the mirror, quickly brushing through my long black waves before hurrying to the door.
I opened it to see Harley on the other side, holding the body of a young man in her arms, probably no older than eighteen or nineteen. I recognized him as one of the people I had checked for symptoms just days before, but then he’d been healthy and whole. Now, he was pale as a sheet, eyes open and lifeless as he dangled in Harley’s arms. I felt tears well up in my eyes but forced them back, putting on a mask of professionalism as I gestured for Harley to come inside.
“When did it happen?” I asked her.
“He was found this morning. He’s—one of the new guards.”
“But he’s so young,” I said, looking down at him as she placed him on the table. Harley gave him a sad look.
“Do you have time to get to him today? I can put him in the freezer.”
“No, I’m—I don’t have any appointments until the afternoon.”
“Okay, good. Do you need any help?”
“No,” I said to her. “I want to be alone.”
“Okay,” she said. “Let me know if you need anything.”
“Thanks, Harley,” I murmured as she left the hut. I set up the table for an autopsy, laying it back so that he was flat against the metal. I gathered my tools and bent over him, feeling sadness well up within me as I made the first cut. I went through the steps of searching over his body, trying to find some cause of death, knowing that I wouldn’t. It wasn’t until I peeled back the skin of his ribcage that I saw anything of note, and when I did, I gasped aloud, stumbling back out of instinct.
“What the hell?” I asked myself, my hand shaking, not wanting to go near the body. I forced myself to do so anyway, looking more closely at the markings inside the skin. A symbol was burnt over and over again on the inner layer, as if he had been branded from the inside with it. I had no idea what it meant, had never seen it before. In that moment, I felt panicky, and knew I needed some air. I pulled my gloves off and tossed them in the trash, hurrying out of the hut, taking a deep breath of fresh air.
“Doctor,” came a voice behind me that made me jump out of my skin before I recognized it as Gabriel’s. I turned to look at the concerned frown on his face.
“What’s wrong?”
“The—the body,” I said to him. “Of the boy. It’s—”
“Show me,” he commanded, and followed me inside. His eyes squinted when he saw the body.
“I’ve seen that symbol before,” he said, leaning close to it, studying it carefully.
“Where?” I asked him.
“Sophie and I—the old doctor, Tum,
was found with this on the back of her neck. We found it on the walls of that old house.”
“What does it mean?”
“I have no idea. Is it the first time you’ve seen this?”
“Yes. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
He straightened up, an exasperated look in his eyes.
“Anything else you’ve found recently? Any progress?”
“No,” I said. “This is the first hint I’ve gotten, and I have no idea what it means.”
“Find out,” he said. I didn’t argue with him, knew there was no point. He expected it to be done.
“Yes, Mr. Alarick,” I said to him. “I want to see any bodies that come up. Send them straight to me.”
“Will do,” he said. “Let me know what you find.”
“I will,” I promised, watching as he left. I looked back at the boy on the table, feeling nausea stir within me as I approached him again and continued the autopsy, finding nothing else of note. There was no obvious cause of death, just the symbol seared into the flesh. When I was finished and cleaned up, I went back to my room in the hut, taking a quick shower before my appointment with Jackson. For a moment, my mind had left him, but now that I wasn’t doing anything with my hands or my mind, his handsome face swam behind my lids. I had never had a patient so difficult to work with, mostly because the feeling of his eyes on me as I worked made me feel hot and cold at the same time, and always left me shaking.
I froze for a moment when the door opened and I heard him walk in. I put a polite smile on my face, trying to still my heart as I turned to look at him. He gave me that crooked grin when he met my eye, bowing his head slightly in greeting.
“Hey, doc,” he said.
“Hello,” I said crisply. “You can come into the exam room. I’ll be there in a minute.”
“Wonderful,” he said, stripping out of his shirt as he walked past me. I turned my eyes to him almost involuntarily, looking over the muscled planes of his slim body, tall and lean and chiseled. His skin was a tawny color, his hair long and auburn, tumbling down over his shoulders, making him look as wild as he was in wolf form. I soon realized I was staring, saw amusement there behind his pale green gaze.