by Emilia Rose
“I knew it.”
Ryker cleared his throat, and we looked over to see everyone finished with their warm-up and staring at us. “If you two are done flirting, we’d like to start training,” Ryker said with a tense smile on his face.
Raj pointed at me, then to an open corner of the field. We wrestled for about a half-hour, each taking turns throwing and pinning each other to the ground. Though he was stronger than me, I kept up with him easily. Unlike the first night I practiced with the Lycans, I quickly figured out his movement patterns and could even spot when he was about to try a take-down on me.
With the right practice and the right people, I made improvements that I couldn’t ever achieve in Roman’s pack.
Ryker didn’t practice with us, just watched the way Raj and I pushed each other after every take-down, after every flirty comment, after every pin.
At one point, Raj caught me off guard and flipped me onto my stomach, pressing the side of my head into the ground. Dirt rubbed into my cheek, and I inhaled a whiff. I spit it out, escaped his hold, and turned him over onto his back, holding him to the ground for one, two, three seconds.
Raj curled one arm under my leg, another around the back of my head, and tossed me above him. I did a somersault out of his grip and stood back up to face my enemy. Covered in dirt and bruises that hurt oh-so-good, we stalked around each other. My chest heaved up and down, my heart racing in my chest.
Ryker nodded in our direction and shouted, “Practice is over for tonight. Bella, stay back,” he said. “I need to talk to you.”
Raj playfully pushed his shoulder into mine. “Ooh, talking to the big man.” He shook his head. “Someone’s in trouble.”
“You too, Raj,” Ryker said. I gave him a sly smirk and mocked him for mocking me. Once I clipped my mate’s necklace back onto me and he tugged his shirt back over his head, Ryker handed us a manila folder. “I’m putting you both on a solo mission.”
“Solo?” I asked. Only the best of the best went on solo missions.
He nodded his head. “You two work very well together. You have chemistry.”
Raj nudged me again. “You hear that, Killer, we have chemistry.”
I scrunched up my nose. “What does that have to do with anything?”
Ryker paused for a moment, like he was contemplating something, then nodded. “This is a different mission. Unlike the typical stray rogue who wanders onto pack properties, there is a group of rogues that are working together. I want you to find out where their hideout is. There will be no killing on this mission. We need information so we can raid their hideout and stop them once and for all.”
Raj took the file from me, read it for a moment, and looked up. “They’re going to be at the Night Raider’s Café? A bunch of rogues?”
“The café is having a party during the full moon this Friday. All the packs in the area are invited which means there will be many alphas there. Since this particular group is targeting alphas, I expect there to be some rogues in attendance.”
“What do you mean that they’re targeting alphas?” I asked, voice wavering. Though Roman didn’t want me, I still wanted to keep him safe. Luna Raya died in a rogue attack, and I didn’t want Roman to have the same fate. If he was in danger, I would do anything to stop it.
“They’re killing alphas and taking their land and people.”
Raj furrowed his brows. “How many have they killed already?”
Ryker sucked in a breath. “Three.”
I nearly choked on the fucking air. “Three?” I shook my head. “How?”
Ryker sighed, looking much tenser than usual. “I don’t know, but I need you to figure out where they’re hiding out. I don’t care how you do it—flirt with them if you have to—but they can’t die. We need them to lead you to their lair.”
~~~
After showering, Raj and I ran to the café to scope it out before Friday so we could create our best plan of action. So far, our only plan was to flirt with the rogues and hope they’d bring us back to their hideout. But I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to flirt with someone who wasn’t my mate or my friend.
Flirting with Raj was easy because he was naturally good at it. With rogues who were here to find an alpha, to kill an alpha, to take an alpha’s land and his people, it would be difficult to convince them to take me home. I would have to cover my Lycan tattoo and… take off my necklace.
Raj stepped into the buzzing early morning crowd at the café, shook his hips back and forth seductively, and looked back at me. “Such a tight space for a club, but they don’t call it dirty dancing for nothing. A small tight space, filled with sweaty bodies that you have to grind against just to move.” He chuckled. “Seems like my kind of party.”
Wait for it.
“Especially if you’re my date.”
There it was.
I picked my hazelnut coffee up from the counter, yawning. “Why do you insist on flirting with me?”
“I flirt with everyone. It’s my job.”
“Your job is to kill rogues.”
“Killer, you’re still so new. You don’t know that there are subgroups in the Lycans. Some groups are pure warriors and kill; some flirt and get important information.” He smirked and placed an arm around my shoulder. “I happen to do both.”
“What about Ryker? What is he?”
He nudged me. “Why you have a crush on him?”
“No, I just haven’t seen him kill many rogues, and he gets awfully flirty,” I said, cheeks flushing as I remembered earlier before practice.
“He goes out on a lot of solo missions to kill rogues, but he is highly skilled in flirting.” He wiggled his brows at me.
“Well—”
“Long time, no see, stranger,” Vanessa said in that high-pitch, screechy-ass voice. I pressed my lips together and gazed over at her. She walked into the café, swinging her purse in her hand, wearing an oversized t-shirt and a pair of heels. “I almost didn’t recognize you. You look different—pretty.” She curled a finger around my hair and watched it bounce.
Her eyes drifted from me to Raj—who suddenly dropped his flirty-boy attitude—to his arm around my shoulders. I shrugged him off. “Wow, thanks, Vanessa,” I said, sarcasm dripping from every word.
Her hair was ruffled slightly, like she had just rolled out of bed. I inhaled and tensed when I realized how good she smelt.
“Two cappuccinos for Vanessa,” the barista said.
Vanessa grabbed the coffees and smiled at us. “Well, I should get going. Don’t want to keep Roman waiting. I’ll tell him you and your boyfriend said hello.”
My heart dropped.
Roman… that’s what her shirt smelt like. Fucking Roman.
I stared at her from behind. Why the fuck did she have his shirt on and why was she getting him coffee? Was she fucking Roman now? Decided to make her fucking move after I moved out?
I stepped forward, ready to follow her, when Raj grabbed my arm and tugged me back. “Lycans don’t make rash decisions,” he said. I clenched my jaw and watched her drive off in her stupid Mercedes.
My hand tightened into a fist, and my coffee spilt all over my stomach. Though it was hot, it didn’t sting as much as this, as much as betrayal, as much as rejection. My wolf whimpered inside of me. We were hurting.
“Isabella?” Raj asked, brows furrowed together. The logical part of me knew that Vanessa always liked to stir up trouble. This was probably an elaborate scheme to fuck with me even when I was gone. I shouldn’t have believed her, but I did. She was wearing his fucking shirt.
“Izzy!” Derek walked into the café, his brown hair tousled. Derek tugged me into a familiar big bear-hug. Since I left, I hadn’t seen him. We had texted back and forth every day. But hours between texts weren’t the same thing as an instant reaction from him like I was used to. There had been too many rogues lately to see him. “How have you been?” he asked. When I didn’t answer, he pulled away and looked between me and Raj. “What’s wrong?�
�
I should’ve been as happy to see him as he was to see me since I hadn’t seen him in over two weeks. But how could I be happy when Vanessa was wearing Roman’s shirt?
“Derek,” I said quietly, not wanting to seem weak in front of Raj. “I asked you to watch Roman.”
Derek’s eyes widened, and just for a moment his gaze drifted to the ground like he was guilty. I grabbed his hand, squeezing so fucking desperately.
“Derek,” I whispered, tears threatening to fall. “Please don’t tell me he and Vanessa are together.” I shook my head, feeling a stray fucking tear fall. “Please.”
He didn’t say anything, just tensed.
My lips parted in disbelief, and it felt like my whole world came crashing down. Two weeks. I had been gone for two weeks. That’s it. “Oh, Moon Goddess. They are.”
Derek sucked in a breath and put his hands on my shoulders. “Isabella, I’m not sure what’s going on between them. All I know is that they’ve been spending more time than usual together. Something happened at Vanessa’s house and she claimed that she couldn’t live in it, so he offered to let her stay in the packhouse with him.”
Tears filled my eyes until everything was blurry. Derek. Raj. My whole future. Raj squeezed my shoulder, and I pulled away from Derek.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
He pressed his lips together. “I thought it would only be for a day or two.” He shook his head, wiping the tears from my cheeks. “I even offered for her to stay at my house with me so she would stay away from him. But they both refused.”
My heart ached so fucking bad.
“I’m sorry, Isabella,” Derek said. But it didn’t make anything better.
It hurt as bad as his rejection would.
Chapter 37
Isabella
I gazed at the people dancing in the middle of the Night Raider’s Café with a frown on my face. All week, I had been thinking about Roman, about Vanessa being in the house with him, about him giving his shirt to Vanessa to wear. And all week, I wanted to march right onto his property and tell him to reject me.
This feeling was beyond me. I didn’t know what was happening there, and it was eating me alive. Sure, he might just be a nice alpha to Vanessa. But he wasn’t even nice to me before I turned eighteen. Sure, he might’ve been doing his alpha duties. But didn’t Vanessa have her own damn shirts to wear? Why did he let her go out with his shirt?
This pain was too much, and I hadn’t even gone through heat yet. In less than a week, I would go through it. I would scratch and claw through all the walls in my bedroom, begging for someone to take away the pain by mating me.
The pain would disappear if I rejected Roman, but I couldn’t get myself to even think about those words.
Music thumped through the hazy bar, and I sipped on my Tequila Sunrise. Nobody from Roman’s pack was here, at least not yet. Not even that fucking bitch.
Alphas walked through the crowd in the Night Raider’s Café-gone-nightclub. People parted their way for them to walk; others gazed up at them—some with looks of respect or with looks of lust. I clenched my jaw and grasped the mate’s necklace in my pocket. I hadn’t worn it, but I brought it with me so I could thrust it in his stupid face and tell him I was done.
Out of all the alphas that couldn’t be here, he had to stay at home. Probably fucking Vanessa in place of me. It should’ve been me he was loving. Me. Me. Not her.
My wolf growled in the back of my mind, but I hushed her. Whether this was all some fabricated lie or whether it was the truth, I had to think clearly for this mission. It was my first solo with Raj, and I couldn’t fuck it up.
Raj curled an arm around my waist and leaned down. “You ready, Killer?” he asked against my ear. Lights flashed upon his face, bounced off of his eyes, making him look so much more attractive tonight. His soft brown hair, the dark lustful expression in his eyes. I brushed my fingers against my neck—where my necklace should’ve been.
Without it on, I didn’t feel bound to Roman. And I didn’t know how to feel about it.
Raj’s hands glided against my hips as he pulled me onto the dance floor between sweaty bodies. Pressing himself against my backside, he leaned down so his lips grazed against my ear, making me shiver. “You remember the plan?”
“Yes.”
“Well, start acting like it.”
I painted a smirk on my face and turned in his embrace, my fingers crawling up his chest. He didn’t have to tell me twice. His muscles felt so taut underneath his thin button-up. So rigid. So big. I pulled him down closer to me and wrapped my arms around his shoulders, resting my forehead against his.
He smelt like butterscotch. Such a sweet and inviting scent.
After wrapping his arms around my waist, he pressed his fingers against my lower back. I spun us slightly and looked up from his shoulder to see the group of rogues in the corner of the room, watching us.
One, in particular, with glowing hazel eyes stared at me. From the scar on his right cheek to his lips curled into a dangerous smirk, everything about him screamed bad boy. And we all knew who loved bad boys. Isabella did for tonight.
After giving him a flirty smile behind Raj’s back, I gazed at Raj and blushed. He pulled me closer, our bodies pressed hard against each other. Why did he smell so goddamn good?
I moved my hips with his, not wanting to get too close but close enough. My wolf purred inside of me, and for a moment I thought Roman was here. She had never purred like that for anyone else but him.
But when I looked around, I realized that Roman wasn’t here. My eye caught that rogue’s again and this time I kept my eyes on him as Raj and I danced together. I could only imagine that Raj was doing the same thing with another one of the rogues, somewhere in the club.
I whispered something into Raj’s ear and took off toward the bar, placing my glass on the counter. For a brief moment, I gazed back at the group of rogues and noticed that he wasn’t there.
“Looking for something?” the rogue said.
One arm resting on the bar, the other holding his drink, I smiled at him and fingered his collar. His sleeves were rolled up his forearms, and I tried my hardest to keep calm. But my heart was racing, and my wolf was quiet.
“For someone,” I said.
He brushed his thumb against my lips and smirked. “What would your boyfriend say?” he asked, gazing at Raj who had his back turned to us—just like we had decided he would.
I placed a finger against his chin and turned his head, so he was facing me. “Like you really care what he would say. Guys like you just take what they want, don’t they?”
He chuckled and stepped closer, and suddenly my wolf was purring again. Just like she was with Raj, just like she almost did with Ryker earlier today before I had to scold her. I licked my lips.
“Let’s get out of here,” he said in my ear.
I pretended to think about it for a moment. When he brushed his fingers up my abdomen, I was terrified that he would see me as way too muscular for an average wolf, that he would know that something was up. But he didn’t. So, I wrapped my hand around his neck and pulled him closer, so my lips were grazing against his. “Show me the way.”
He took my hand and led me to the exit. I barely had enough time to look back at Raj to make sure he knew I was leaving to find this hideout. A few of the other rogues from the corner of the room watched us leave, and the rogue with me threw his hand up into the air, like I was a fucking victory prize for him.
But something about it was so sexy.
We walked out of the bar, and even before the door of the bar closed, the rogue had me pressed against the side of the building and had his lips on my neck, sucking harshly. My heart was racing, yet—for some reason—I couldn’t even push him off of me. He moved his lips up my neck, nibbling even more roughly on it and leaving a red mark.
Jane’s car pulled into an empty spot in the parking lot thirty feet away, its headlights blazing in our direction. I tugged him
closer to me, so she wouldn’t see me working. I didn’t need any rumors spreading that I turned into a whore after I left the pack.
The rogue moved his lips closer to mine, but I leaned away from him, shielding my face with my hair. This wasn’t time to play. This was work. Work that I had to do. Work that Ryker assigned to me because he believed in me.
My wolf purred as his scruff brushed against the crook of my neck and made it burn.
Jane walked to the front of the building with a few of her friends and two warrior wolves—who I assumed Roman assigned to her for protection. I could smell their pungent scents, but none of them smelled like Vanessa so I could keep myself calm. She paused for the slightest moment, gazing in our direction. And when she did, I turned and pushed the rogue to the side of the building, my hair falling into my face. He grabbed my ass, and for some fucking reason, my wolf didn’t pull away. She didn’t want to.
But I did.
It felt wrong.
Jane walked into the building.
When she disappeared, I took a deep breath, and he pressed his lips to mine, his tongue in my mouth. He wrapped a hand in my hair and forced me to kiss him. I placed my hands against his chest and tried to push him away, but I wasn’t strong enough—even though I had done more than just push someone away in practice.
My neck burned. Blazing. Scorching. Sweltering.
I took a deep breath, gathering enough strength to push him back. I had a fucking mission.
“I thought you wanted to take me home,” I said, keeping my gaze steady. He licked his lips, and I pressed a hand against my neck and hoped that the pain would stop. I stepped away from the rogue, catching sight of Raj lingering at the entrance to the Night Raider’s Café. I swayed my hips back and forth, walking toward the woods. “So where are we going?”
He followed me into the woods, his scent becoming overwhelming, and grabbed my wrist. “We’re not going anywhere.” He stepped closer to me. “You’re too damn sexy to take all the way back home.”
“But—”