“Jaxson freaking Laurent,” I hissed, my gaze locked on the devil beast
himself. Six and a half feet of man-hunk under those blue jeans and dark V-
neck. He was leaning against the hood of his truck with his arms crossed and
a sinfully sexy scowl on his face, like he was annoyed that I’d kept him
waiting. His eyes drank me in before flashing gold. My skin flushed, heat
pooled low in my belly, and I silently cursed.
“Remember what I told you about smelling like a rare piece of steak?
Lock your horny thoughts down, Savannah,” Sam chided.
Balling my fists, I tried to channel my embarrassment and irritation and
turn it into calm. I failed.
“Did you know he’d be here?” I seethed through clenched teeth, hoping
my anger would mask the heat under my skin.
She smirked. “Of course. He told me to make sure I took some of the
fight out of you.”
Funny. I was just getting started.
2
Jaxson
Savannah Caine burst through the back door of the warehouse and out
into the deep yellow-orange light and shadows of the parking lot.
She stopped short and fixed me with a venomous glare that sent my blood
pulsing.
Striped thigh-high stockings sheathed her long legs, offering a delicious
stretch of skin that disappeared into the trim of her black racing shorts. She
wore a vivid pink top with Hell on Wheels emblazoned across the front. It
was low cut, and beads of perspiration glistened on her chest.
I could smell it, and I wanted to push her up against the wall to taste it. I
dug my claws into my folded arms to get control.
Fuck. This was why I’d stayed away.
Sam stepped out beside her and flashed me a reproachful look.
As if I needed reminding that she was off limits. Savannah was a LaSalle
—a member of the twisted family that had gotten my sister Stephanie killed.
And as if death and destruction somehow ran in their blood, Savannah had
slain Billy, my sister’s fated mate.
Yes, he’d been a monster, driven to madness and revenge after
Stephanie’s death. Billy had kidnapped, murdered, and conspired with a
blood sorcerer. He had to be stopped, but it hadn’t been her right to put him
down.
That had been my duty. But Savannah didn’t understand a thing about us.
Or care to.
A creeping frost wound around my heart as Savannah strode toward me
with her gym bag in hand and a fire burning in her eyes. Sam mouthed,
Watch out.
The red-haired vixen homed in on me like a heat-seeking missile,
stopping inches from my chest. “What the hell are you doing here, Laurent? I
thought we had to stay away from each other.”
Her eyes were murderous, unsheathed daggers.
I didn’t bother moving a muscle in response, just leaned back against my
truck with my arms crossed. “I have information. Are you going to listen, or
are you going to try to stab me?”
She dropped her bag onto the pavement. “I don’t have a knife, so you
might as well start talking.”
Her body vibrated with repressed fury, and her magical signature was on
full display—the scent of tangerines and the feel of cool water flowing over
my skin. It was like fucking nectar, driving me wild. I could smell her anger
and resentment, and beneath it all, an undeniable undercurrent of desire.
I’d forgotten what it was like to be around her. A continuous assault on
my senses. Contradictions piled upon contradictions. She was a beautiful
nightmare.
My eyes dropped to her mouth. Her lips were full and soft, though the
bottom one was cut and swollen. A stain of blood brightened the surface, and
I could almost taste it. Blood that was special, that the sorcerer had wanted.
My muscles tensed with desire and protectiveness. “You’re hurt. You
ladies must play rough.”
She sucked on her torn lip. “We can take it. Now quit checking me out
and tell me why you’re lurking in the parking lot.”
I uncrossed my arms and tried to focus on the information burning in the
back of my mind instead of the alluring line of her mouth and the fire she
stoked in my chest. “We’ve identified the faceless man, the blood sorcerer
who was hunting you, thanks to your sketches. You drew a tattoo of a
triangle with the number 37 on his neck. It’s an old prison tattoo. His name is
Ulan Kahanov, and he’s a murderer and deviant sorcerer.”
Her breath caught as her pupils dilated. “Do you know where he is?”
“No. But his most recent residence was the maximum-security prison on
Bentham Island, just offshore of Magic Side. He escaped a few months ago
when the prison was breached. We would have identified him earlier, but the
Order archmages were keeping the missing prisoner a secret to save face. The
place is like Alcatraz—it’s supposed to be impregnable.”
“Then how did he break out?”
“It was attacked by a genie. Others escaped too, but Kahanov is—as far
as the Order is willing to admit—the only one who wasn’t caught. We’ve had
one of the Order’s best hunters tracking him for the last few days, but he’s an
elusive bastard.”
“Wait a minute, how long have you known? Why am I only finding out
now?”
“Because you didn’t need to know the details.” My irritation flared, but I
kept my emotions locked down.
She scoffed. “If I matter so little, then why are you bothering to tell me?”
I was still uncertain how much to tell her. Certainly not the truth.
“Things have changed,” I said. “You’re in a lot of danger, Savannah.
Kahanov is on the move, and I think he’s going to make another play for you.
I want you to come back to Dockside. I’ll put you up in a safehouse until we
bring him down.”
She crossed her arms. “Oh, hell, no. Not on your life. I’m not going back
into werewolf witness protection.”
Anger simmered under my skin, and I fought the urge to throw Savannah
over my shoulder and drag her back to the Dens. She had no fucking clue
what kind of danger she was in. Not only because of the threat I’d received
from Kahanov, but also because her blood was special. I’d ferreted out the
traitors in our pack, but there were still rogue wolves running loose in
Wisconsin who might come after her for it.
“I’m trying to protect you, and I can’t do that when you’re holed up in the
Indies. Be reasonable,” I growled, heat creeping over my neck. The LaSalles
had refused us access to the south side of the island, so my surveillance teams
had to stop at the border, which made it damn near impossible to keep a
watch over her.
“I am. If the blood sorcerer is coming for me, then the safest place for me
is the Indies, with the LaSalles. You know it. I know it. That’s final.”
I ground my teeth. It was all I could do to keep my claws in. But I knew
that look in her eyes. She’d rather drive her car off a cliff than change
direction.
“Fine. Then I’m doubling your guard for when you’re outside the Indies.”
I turned and started to open the door of my truck. �
��I’ll let you know when we
bring him down.”
She shoved my door closed and pinned it shut with her hand. “So what,
you’re just leaving me in the dark? Out of the investigation? That’s bullshit.”
My gaze dropped to her neck, her pulse thrumming like a hammer in my
skull. What I wouldn’t give to drag my teeth across her sweaty skin. Give her
a reminder of exactly who she was dealing with.
“To keep you safe,” I snarled, eying her hand on my door. “Do I need to
remind you what happened the last time you were involved?”
Her eyes flashed—maybe a glint from the streetlamps—and she reared
back. “What happened? I stopped a killer and prevented an attack on my
family. Without me, God knows how many other people Billy and his freaks
would have killed.”
Her vitriol and resentment were almost overwhelming, and her words
were acid splashed in my face. She’d killed my brother-in-law, and I wanted
to hate her for that. And maybe I did. But she wasn’t wrong. We wouldn’t
have stopped him without her help.
My voice cut through the air like a knife. “Get your hands off my truck.”
She grabbed the lapel of my shirt instead and jerked. “I want in, Jaxson.
Make it happen. I need to know why he’s hunting me.”
My wolf surged at her defiance, and I had to fight to keep him down. I
glanced up, hoping this wasn’t all on display, but apparently, we were the
postgame show, and our conversation had drawn a bit of a crowd. Sam’s
pupils were dilated, and every werewolf in the parking lot had tensed.
A warning growl escaped my throat.
I was certain that Savannah Caine was the only person in Magic Side who
would dare touch me like that. It was an affront to everything I stood for. And
yet, everyone understood that somehow, rules didn’t apply to her. She was
like a rogue wolf, brave and fierce, but hard to trust and impossible to count
on. I wouldn’t put it past her to march into the Hall of Inquiry and start
demanding things from the archmages.
“Hands off my shirt,” I said, pitching my voice low but firm.
She released it and blushed. Unfortunately, by challenging my authority,
she’d just made it that much harder for me to say yes. But maybe I’d bite.
I shoved my hands in my pockets and bent to her ear. “Lucky for you,
Ms. Caine, our hunter has questions she wants to ask you. Meet us at the
North Channel Harbor tomorrow at three p.m. If the Order will give you
access, you can even join us on our way to Bentham Prison.”
“What’s at Bentham?”
“Murderers, butchers, and psychopaths, as well as a bloodthirsty devil
that we need to talk to. I’m sure they would all welcome a visit from a
beautiful redhead.”
Savannah tensed, and I could sense her rising trepidation.
I nudged her with my alpha presence, letting her know she was dismissed.
“Sleep well, Ms. Caine.”
She spun and stalked back to her car, giving me a delightful view of her
long legs and tight shorts. My breath stopped as my gaze landed on the back
of her pink shirt. Below her nickname, Fury, was the number she had chosen
—37.
She knew that the bastard Kahanov might be scrying, and she’d coopted
his mark. Talk about sending a message. The woman certainly had stones, but
she was toying with powers she didn’t understand.
I slipped into the cab of my truck, heart pounding, as all the things I
hadn’t told her raced through my mind. At the heart of them had been the
message Kahanov had somehow left on my desk—a small note, written in
blood:
You have three days to hand over Savannah Caine. If you don’t, I will
make your pack pay. One way or another, when the bodies are piled high
enough, you will submit.
My veins burned, and I struggled to restrain my claws as my fingers dug
into the steering wheel.
The pack was everything. Everything I was, and everything I stood for.
But I would never submit. I was going to hunt the bastard down, no matter
what it took. Then I would wrap my jaws around his throat and savor the
sweet taste of his blood.
3
Savannah
Three hours later, Casey and I stumbled through the front door after a
heavy night of celebration in which I’d done my best to forget about Jaxson,
the sorcerer, and the sword hanging over my head. I just wanted a night to be
normal. Every muscle in my body ached, and I was dead beat. It was a relief
to finally be home.
Home.
A funny thought. Two weeks ago, I hadn’t known the LaSalles existed,
and now I was living with them. I hadn’t meant to linger, but my Aunt Laurel
had insisted. Also, I was broke, jobless, and apparently still very much the
target of a madman, so it made sense.
I dragged my tired ass up the stairs to my bedroom on the third floor, then
locked the door behind me and flicked on the lights.
My room was obviously inhabited by a madwoman.
First off, the decorations were bizarre—though to be fair, that was on
Aunt Laurel. The deep red Persian carpet didn’t mesh with the palm trees on
the heavy yellow curtains or the ship’s wheel mounted on the wall. What was
the theme? There had to be one.
On the other hand, the more clearly insane feature of the room was my
collection of sketches, which littered every available surface—a couple of my
friends and my godmother, several of the night fair and the fortune teller.
And a lot of Jaxson. He was everywhere.
But the images that drew my attention were those lurking in the shadowy
corner of the room, overflowing from the old writing desk onto the ancient
radiator and dresser.
The faceless man.
Ulan Kahanov. I knew his name now.
I’d drawn him over and over, trying to recreate everything I could recall
of my visions. I’d never seen the blood sorcerer in person, only while
scrying. I remembered the fall of his clothing, the broad set of his shoulders,
and the details of his surroundings. But his face was always a blur, a messy
smudge on the paper. I’d kept on sketching, hoping that somehow my
memory could get around the veil cast by his anti-scrying charm.
It had been a fruitless task.
I wasn’t spending another night with the monster scattered around the
room. With a flurry of motion, I scooped up the papers and shoved them
haphazardly in the desk drawer. “I don’t care what you’re up to, I’m not
letting you dictate my life.”
My gaze landed on the dozens of pictures I’d drawn of Jaxson. They were
some of my best work. While the illustrations of the sorcerer were scribbled
with desperate, frenetic energy, every detail of Jaxson’s face and body had
been replicated with soft, meticulous strokes of the pencil. His strong jaw and
handsome beard, his dark, wavy hair and radiant eyes. The powerful contours
of his body.
What had I been thinking?
There was no way to forget the embarrassment and regret on his face after
he’d kissed me in the woods. It still made my cheeks burn with shame and
fury. I wa
s, after all, just a dirty LaSalle. A sorceress with dark, tainted
magic.
He thought I was so insignificant that he’d cut me out of his investigation.
Treated me like a pawn. Kept me on a need-to-know basis. So why the hell
was I drawing pictures of that jerk and leaving them around the room?
That was the million-dollar question.
“You don’t get to dictate my life, either,” I murmured, snatching the
jumbled sketches off the dresser and bedside table and shoving them in the
drawer with the creepy sorcerer, face down. I slammed the drawer shut with a
satisfying thunk. “Enjoy each other’s company, assholes.”
Feeling slightly relieved at having completely and deftly rid myself of all
my problems, I headed to the shower. I peeled off my sweat-soaked uniform
and undies and dropped them on the mildly fragrant pile of clothes in the
corner of the bathroom. I’d practiced three nights in a row and desperately
needed to do laundry.
A quick shower drained the last of my residual adrenaline, and soon after,
I slipped naked between the sheets and fell asleep on the rickety old bed.
The dreams came quickly, as they always did.
Carnival music echoed softly through the darkness, and a deep dread
settled in my bones. I looked around, finding no source in the pitch-black
void that surrounded me. But when I turned back, I was face to face with the
fortune teller, who sat cloaked in shadow.
She reached out of the darkness and drew a card. The Wheel.
Her lips moved, but the sound of her voice lagged moments behind. “You
cannot outrun your fate, Savannah. They’re coming for you. Beware the
wheel of fortune. It does not stop. Time is ticking. You need to learn who you
truly are so that you can stop the ones who are coming.”
She’d spoken those words to me before, in another dream, before I’d
known who she was. From before I’d discovered my magic and my life had
become a living nightmare.
The darkness of my dream began spiraling around me, sucking me down
like a whirlpool. My pulse raced. I fought against the pull and staggered
back, and suddenly, I was outside the fortune teller’s tent at the Full Moon
Fair.
The ebony night hung overhead, but the moon and stars were blotted out
by the thousands of floating lights that lit the fairgrounds. I was alone, but
Untamed Fate (Magic Side: Wolf Bound Book 2) Page 2