Lady in Black (Drekinn Book 6)

by Jana Leigh

  Lady in Black

  Drekinn

  Book Six

  by Jana Leigh

  Published by JK Publishing, Inc.

  © Copyright October 2015 JK Publishing, Inc.

  All cover art and logo © Copyright October 2015 by JK Publishing, Inc.

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN #978-1-310-17264-9

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales are entirely coincidental.

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  Dedication

  “A sign of wisdom and maturity is when you come to terms with the realization that your decisions cause your rewards and consequences. You are responsible for your life, and your ultimate success depends on the choices you make.”

  Denis Waitley

  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Epilogue

  Books by Jana Leigh

  About the Author

  Prologue

  Damn it, she thought and looked around the bar again. He was supposed to be here, he said he would be and they would work together. The fucking idiot was going to be the death of her and she knew it. They were part of the Drekinn now and they couldn’t make stupid mistakes.

  “Blackie,” Giovanni Castrella bellowed from the door and she grimaced. Stupid asshole, he knew that name drove her up the wall, of course he wouldn’t use her real name, it would be too fucking easy for him. Weird ass woo woo shit was going on and she was sick of it, she was supposed to be a Seer, but she had more power than that, and she couldn’t explain it. She was strong, she could appear and disappear at will, and that was only the beginning, it was also a secret. The prophesy was wrong; at least the one the Denver Pack had assumed was correct. Now they had to find out the truth, and who the hell knew what that was.

  Gio was one of her mates; she knew this and so did he. However, they couldn’t mate until they found their third, it was imperative, how they knew this they couldn’t explain, all the clues were there, they just couldn’t figure them out damn it.

  “Babe,” Gio laughed and came right up to her and hugged her, seriously hugged her. She frowned and pulled back.

  “What the hell are you doing?” she snapped.

  “Come on, baby, you know what I am doing, saying hi,” Gio said and leaned down to give her a kiss and she punched him in the stomach.

  *****

  “All right, let’s give this a go,” Storm repeated, then looked to the sky.

  “Gods, I hope this works,” Rayne said, glancing toward his twin, then he too looked to the sky.

  “We don’t know what is going to happen,” Storm growled. “I just want it to work.”

  “Well, like I said before, as long as we aren’t found,” Rayne said and looked down at the road that led to the old Denver Pack training facility. It sat in the mountains, and no one had been there in years.

  Rayne and Storm had been leaders since they arrived back to Milliken. With the others they had waited, hoping for the day when they would be asked to band together once again. The time was growing closer; they felt it. It couldn’t come soon enough to the brothers who watched the clouds forming, each silently praying this was the beginning and not the end.

  *****

  “I am freaking cold,” Trina whined.

  “Do you have to keep bitching about it? You have said it a thousand times since we got here,” Sabrina said and grabbed the map Pilar had given them before they left, shoving it in her bag.

  They had made it to Denver, and then Milliken last night. They hoped to find more clues to where the shifters were hiding.

  “Denver Pack Training Compound, here we come,” Sabrina said as they walked out of their room.

  As soon as the door opened, Trina burrowed deeper into her coat. “I am going to freeze—” she was cut off before she could finish.

  “Don’t even finish that statement,” Sabrina looked at her as they headed to the parking lot.

  “How and why did they live here?” Trina whispered.

  “Fur, princess, fur,” Sabrina replied, looking around to make sure no one was listening before continuing, “plus the lush forest to run in. The privacy to be who they were without worry of being found because they had loyal humans in the area to keep their secrets. At least until it all turned to shit.”

  Both women where quiet, thinking of the many shifters who had at one time passed through or lived in this area. When they reached their cruiser, they opened the doors and then jumped when they heard a man calling to them from behind. They had stayed at a small hotel off the beaten path in Milliken. There had been no other hover cruisers in the lot when they checked in, and there were no hover cruisers when they woke, which is why they were startled.

  “Hey,” the man called and both women turned and sucked in their breath, holy shit he was gorgeous, like movie star gorgeous. Then both women frowned, even though he was gorgeous, neither of them recognized him as their mate, damn it. Sabrina’s frown
deepened, he wasn’t her mate, but something else, she could feel it. She knew him.

  “Yeah?” Sabrina asked and moved into the open door to the cruiser so she could get in and lock the door quickly if needed. She may know him, but there was no way in hell she trusted him.

  “Where are you headed?” he asked out of breath and Trina frowned.

  “Why?”

  “I need a ride into the mountains, sorry, didn’t mean to frighten you, and I promise I am not a serial killer. My hover cruiser broke down and I just need a ride, the lady at the desk said she heard you mention driving into the foothills first thing, thought I could catch a ride,” he said with a grin.

  Both women shifted on their feet, Sabrina glared at the man while Trina looked at him intently. Sabrina was trying to place him, she had seen him before, and she needed to figure out why the hell she knew him, it seemed important.

  “You know,” Trina said. “If you were a serial killer you would probably tell us you weren’t just to lull us into a false sense of reality and then when we were in the mountains you could just snap our necks.”

  The man grinned bigger and shook his head. “Yeah, could probably be true, but seriously I am not. In fact, here, I will give you my phone, my wallet, and you can sit behind me and watch my every move. I swear I just need a ride, I won’t even talk if you don’t want me to.”

  Sabrina looked over the hood of the hover cruiser to her friend, they were shifters, killing him was always an option. He didn’t smell like a shifter and there was nothing about him to say he was anything paranormal. Trina shrugged and Sabrina turned back and said, “What’s your name?”

  “Maksim, but you can call me Mak,” the man said with a grin. “I swear I only need a ride.”

  Chapter One

  Ari groaned in the bed and Vivi, Brenda, and Shelly jumped up and walked to the bed checking on him. His eyes were closed and Vivi turned to her friends and snapped.

  “Really, how long can a coma last in a shifter? I mean he is a shifter, damn it, he has been out of it for too long.”

  Shelly rolled her eyes. “Bitch, he is in a COMA. That means in shifter terms some serious shit went down and his body is regenerating and repairing itself.”

  Vivi glared at her best friend and then shook her head. “Doesn’t matter, we need to know what the fuck was going on, why he was in there, for how long, and who else was in there with him.”

  “I know one,” Brenda said softly and looked at her friends.

  “We need to find out how long,” Vivi said firmly.

  “We haven’t heard from him for months, we already thought something had happened, you know it and I know it. They were supposed to come here when Calli and Kade opened the gates, they should have been here, all of them,” Brenda whispered. “You know how difficult this has been for us, sneaking around and using spells to hide from everyone.”

  Vivi sighed and nodded. “I do know, and I also know that it was going to be over soon, we only need to figure out where the hell the books went and we will be good, then they can solve the problem and we will beat the Ulfer.”

  “What if someone dies?” Brenda whispered, voicing all of their fears.

  “Not happening,” Vivi said firmly. “We just wait. Everything is going to be fine.”

  *****

  Gio grinned at the woman who was destined to be his mate, he had been waiting a long time, and although he wasn’t sure when their third would appear, he was certain it was going to be soon. Something inside him told him that, and he never ignored his gut reaction.

  She was pissed, gloriously irritated with him and he loved it, because it was one of the few times he got a reaction out of her even if it was combative, it was a reaction nonetheless. Gio was getting frustrated and needed to get them on the same page, they were mates, and come what may they would be with each other forever.

  “You gotta stop doing that,” Hope snapped and Gio grinned. She had punched him in the stomach, but it hadn’t been hard enough to hurt him, she could do some serious damage if she wanted, Gio knew this since he had seen her in action. He also knew the name Blackie pissed her off, but if he used her real name, he wouldn’t get a reaction. Gio would love to be able to figure out why she couldn’t remember everything, the only thing he had come up with was there was a memory spell blocking her. Unless they found the witch who put it on her, they would never know the truth.

  “Come on, what else am I supposed to call you?” Gio grinned. “Besides, I kinda like the name Blackie, it is sexy.”

  “No it isn’t,” she snapped. “Call me…Hope, my fucking name!”

  Gio turned his head and thought for a second. “But it doesn’t match you, like at all.”

  She glared at him. “Apparently someone thought so you ass.”

  He frowned now and said, “Hey, I wasn’t saying anything bad, I was just saying how your personality is sexy and dangerous. Hope is soft and caring.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Shut up.”

  Gio pursed his lips and then nodded. “Okay, Hope it is. Now, Hope, we have some things to take care of, Calli and Kade are wanting us to do a few things to help since two of the people are gone. We need to start looking at where the Chosen could have hidden their books, so if Sabrina and Trina don’t find anything, we have a new place to go.”

  Hope nodded and looked at Gio. “Do you seriously think they are going to find anything in Colorado, you and I have both been over the area, there was nothing there. Just old buildings, which the Ulfer had already looted and destroyed.”

  Gio shrugged. “Maybe they will, maybe they won’t, but either way, we need to figure out where the hell the books are and if the Ulfer have them, we need to get them back.”

  She nodded. “Okay, where do we start?”

  “I have an idea, we need to go and talk to Kade and Calli about it first, I have a feeling they will give us the okay, but until we talk to them, I don’t want to do anything.”

  Hope looked at him and nodded. “Let’s go.”

  *****

  “So,” Sabrina said to the man who was sitting in the front seat of the hover cruiser. They had agreed to have him sit in the front so Trina could keep an eye on him, and she was. Any little movement she tensed and watched to see if he was going to pull out a knife and stab one of them. She didn’t trust him, even though everything in her said she could. It didn’t make sense, this feeling she was having, and it irritated her.

  “Yeah,” Mak said and looked at her.

  “Where are you going? The mountains are a big fucking place,” Sabrina asked.

  “There is a small town in the mountains where I have been living while working construction. They are building a bunch of houses there and I was hired on a crew. I was supposed to be on vacation for a few weeks and return tomorrow. My hover cruiser broke down, and with the way the boss is, he would have just replaced me and not even cared. I need the job so I need to get back,” Mak said smoothly.

  Sabrina nodded and asked, “What is the name of the town?”

  “Drake,” Mak said, turned, then smiled out the window when both women reacted to his announcement. They were right where they were supposed to be, but he needed to make sure they were getting the information they needed in order to help.

  Sabrina frowned, yeah, what were the chances of that. They pick up a random hitchhiker who is going to the same place in the mountains they were. NOT. Thankfully, Trina was the one who took over.

  “We are going there too,” Trina snapped. “How did you know that?”

  “I didn’t,” Mak said smoothly, although he lied. “That is where I have been going all along, when we get there you can check with my boss, I have been working there for months helping them out.”

  “Such bullshit,” Sabrina snapped. “I wanna know the real reason you tagged us and I wanna know now or you can get your ass outta my vehicle.”

  Mak grinned at Sabrina and shook his head. “So mistrusting, seriously, I am no threat to you. If anything, y
ou are safer with me than by yourself. The people of Drake do not like strangers. I have been working there a long time, they will talk to you if you are with me.”

  “So you admit you knew where we were going?” Sabrina snapped.

  “Let’s just say, I had a feeling I knew. Listen, I know you are shifters, and I know you could kill me in a second if you wanted to. However, you won’t.”

  “Oh really?” Sabrina snorted. “You don’t know us very well.”

  “Maybe, but I do know that you want answers, and right now I am the only one who can help you get them,” Mak said smoothly and Sabrina looked in her rearview mirror and stared at Trina who shrugged again. They needed answers, and seriously had no choice but to trust him…for now.

  “I will kill you if you are fucking with me,” Sabrina said honestly.

  The women were silent as they thought about what Mak said, they were just entering the canyon that would take them to Drake, it was only a scant twelve miles from where they currently were, but the drive was on a curvaceous road, which was difficult to maneuver when you weren’t familiar with the hairpin turns.

  “How many people are there?” Trina asked.

  Mak said, “About two hundred right now. Most of them working and living there. They are rebuilding the city after a huge flood in the 21st Century and then again, in the 22nd, both floods wiped out the town, and changed the canyon. Now there is more area, which was cleared by the rushing water, to build a bigger town. Also there are a lot of hiking and camping places there now. The tourists have flocked to the area and love it.”

  Again the women remained quiet, it had been secluded, which was why, according to their research, the Denver Pack had picked the place. In the late 20th Century, it had been practically deserted, only for a few people who would go up to commune with nature. Then Quin and Jaden had bought some land there, and slowly they had taken over the area, although humans remained, they also were aware of them, and who and what they were, and they didn’t care. Which was refreshing but important because it meant they had people protecting their secret there.