Filthy Vandal

by Liza Street

  Filthy Vandal

  A Junkyard Shifters Prequel

  Liza Street

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Also by Liza Street

  About Liza

  Filthy Vandal, A Junkyard Shifters Prequel

  by Liza Street

  Cover designed by Keira Blackwood.

  Copyright 2020 Liza Street. All rights reserved.

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

  Prologue

  The ceiling of Grant’s porch needed another coat of paint. He didn’t like buying paint if he could help it. He’d have to barter with one of the Junkyard shifters to find him some in the dump. Just as easy and a helluva lot cheaper to get an old can than to drive twenty miles into town to buy a new one.

  It was warm for February. A fly buzzed past, drawing his attention to the boundary between his modest property and the Junkyard nearby. An empty camp trailer sat at the edge, an eyesore dragged there by one of the shifters inside the territory and then abandoned. Whoever had moved it must’ve gone to some effort getting it all the way across the Junkyard—the dump was on the far side of the ninety-acre territory. Now the door faced Grant’s cabin. The plastic siding had yellowed with age and Grant itched to give it a good coat of paint, too. Or better, burn it down.

  Grant reached down for his beer and the hammock swung gently. Despite the ugly as hell camp trailer nearby, this was the fuckin’ life—resting easy, day in, day out. Painting in the garage when it got cold, and on warm days, hauling canvases outside and painting in the sunlight.

  His phone buzzed on the porch floor beneath him, and he cursed.

  This life was easy until one of the west coast alphas called him for help with a Junkyard run. Idiots. Any moron could throw a shifter into the Junkyard. You take a bad guy, you push him across the magical boundary, and bam. He’s stuck forever, and the world is a safer place.

  The name on his phone read Hutchins. He was the alpha of the Halfmoon Clan in northern Nevada. Grant picked up his phone and answered, “Yeah. Lewiston here.”

  “Shipment coming in,” a gruff voice said.

  Inwardly, Grant winced. Shipment? He knew they were bad guys, but they were still guys, not “shipments.”

  “You there?” Hutchins asked.

  “Yeah. How many?”

  “Two. But I gotta warn you—one isn’t interested in going quietly.”

  “They never are.” Grant sighed.

  He and Hutchins worked out logistics and the call ended with Grant staring at the old trailer that sat just on the other side of a line of what looked like gravel. It wasn’t merely gravel, though; it anchored a powerful spell.

  The rest of the day passed in a blur of paint and canvas. Grant used the art to keep himself from thinking too hard about the job ahead. When twilight rolled around, he put away his canvases and paints, rinsed out his brushes, and stretched, trying to shake off the intense focus painting had brought on. He opened another beer and set it beside his hammock—the drink would be waiting for him when he was through with the transfer.

  A vehicle’s engine rumbled. Far away, still, but Grant would need to hustle to take himself all the way around the Junkyard to the road that led to the dump. The run took him through forest and his inner mountain lion reveled in the scents and sounds of nature. Snow clung to the shadows of trees and boulders, but new grasses punched up in the sunny patches on the ground.

  Soon, he reached the “real” dump—the area of the Junkyard that was filled with old cars, scrap metal, and random furniture castaways. Humans didn’t bring their castoffs here anymore, and it hadn’t ever been used for regular household garbage, which was a plus. Otherwise, the place’s smell would’ve been intolerable to any shifter.

  A van rolled up and parked in the dirt lot next to the boundary. Grant ambled over while the driver climbed out. Young guy, scrappy, looked like he couldn’t weigh more than a buck thirty. His thick, bushy eyebrows probably weighed more than the rest of him. Grant frowned. This was a guy some asshole had sent to transport vicious shifters who weren’t fit for society?

  “Are you Grant?” the kid asked.

  “Yep.”

  “Cool. I’ve heard a lot about you. You throw ’em in and watch the boundary?”

  “Pretty much, yeah.”

  The kid nodded and his giant eyebrows went up and down in time with his nodding. “What’s it like living without a pack?”

  “My pride wasn’t much to miss,” Grant said.

  “Pride…whoa, so you’re a lion shifter? Wicked.”

  “Mountain lion. Yep.” Big cats lived in prides, bears lived in clans, and wolves lived in packs.

  Grant stood, waiting. The kid stared at him. Grant stared back, focusing on the eyebrows. It might be fun to paint them, do a whole Frida Kahlo thing. Itty bitty man, big-ass eyebrows slashing across the top of his face.

  “Oh, right,” the kid said. “The guys.”

  Grant nodded. “Yep.”

  The kid opened the rear door of the van. Within the dim interior were two men, each of them almost twice the size of the kid, which made them about Grant’s size.

  The kid pulled a piece of yellow legal paper from his back pocket, unfolded it, and read, “Carter Varrone, your alpha has sent you here due to your excessive fighting and your inability to peacefully live within your clan or any others. Alex Mathers, your alpha has sent you here for wild and wicked behavior, which includes attacking and—shit, is this for real?”

  One of the men in the van growled, low and ominous.

  The kid finished in a quiet voice. “—attacking and killing seventeen human women and three shifter women.”

  The other man inside, Carter Varrone, Grant guessed, gave a whistle and said, “Well, that’s fucked up. You’re gonna put me in there with that guy?”

  “Yeah, you first, Carter,” Grant said. Better to do the easier one first, get the kid more comfortable with the motions of the transfer.

  “Fine by me,” Carter said, scooting toward the open rear door. He had dark hair, blue eyes, and a devil-may-care attitude. “Lots of assholes to fight in there, right?”

  Grant couldn’t be sure without naming them all and counting, but he thought there were eleven or twelve guys in the Junkyard. “You’re a brawler?” he asked Carter.

  Carter bared his teeth. “Fuck yeah. Soothes my bear.”

  Grant nodded. “It’s the perfect spot for you, then. They fight for dominance every damn night, just about.”

  Carter jumped out of the van, grinning. He was just as muscular as Grant, probably from all the brawling. He turned around to show Grant the zip ties holding his hands behind his back. “You gonna take these off?”

  The kid started forward, but Grant held him back.

  “He wouldn’t hurt us, would he?” the kid asked.

  “No promises,” Carter said, tilting his head.

  Grant sighed. “We’re not idiots, Carter. We’re not gonna let you go. You’ll figure out the zip ties when you’re in the yard.”

  “Whatever.” Carter hesitated on the edge of the boundary, the toes of his boots touching the gravel. “Once I go in, I’m in forever, right?”

  “Yeah. You need a push?” Grant asked.

  “Nah.” Shrugging, Carter too
k two steps over the boundary. He was in.

  Well, that wasn’t so hard, Grant thought.

  The kid looked ready to piss himself with relief.

  Carter turned around to face Grant, the kid, and Mathers in the van. Lifting a foot to take the step back again, he said, “I don’t feel anything. I think this boundary is bullshit—”

  Then he slammed into an invisible barrier.

  He shook his head, whipping his dark brown bangs from his eyes. “Fuck, that hurt.”

  The kid cracked a smile, but Grant looked at Carter.

  “You okay, man?” Grant asked.

  “Yeah. See you. Or not.” Carter loped toward a jagged piece of sheet metal, probably so he could use it to get the zip ties off his wrists.

  One down, one to go. Grant was pretty sure Mathers would be a more difficult transfer. He hadn’t even come to the edge of the van to face his fate.

  “You afraid, Mathers?” Grant asked.

  “Hardly. Fuckers chained me to the van.”

  Either Mathers’s alpha was paranoid, or Mathers was a real bad guy. Grant guessed it was the latter, given the things the kid had read off of that paper.

  When the kid didn’t move to unchain Mathers, Grant sighed. “Hand me the key.”

  “Thanks, man,” the kid said, pulling a key from his pocket and handing it to Grant. “I didn’t want to do it.”

  “You still need to help me get him into the yard,” Grant said. “I’m going to unchain him, then together, we push him over the barrier. He probably won’t go gently.”

  “Fuck right, I won’t,” Mathers growled.

  The kid widened his eyes at Grant. He looked like he was about to shit his shorts.

  Grant shook his head. “It’ll be fine. I’ve sent big-ass, angry dudes over the boundary before.”

  He hopped into the van and took a closer look at Mathers. Brown hair, brown eyes, a cleft chin. Muscles like Grant’s. He’d be a fair match if they had to fight. Grant didn’t want to fight, he just wanted to go back home to his beer and his painting.

  “I’m gonna unchain you now,” Grant said, “and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t send a foot to my face.”

  Mathers closed his eyes and echoed Carter’s words. “No promises.”

  Chills raced up Grant’s arms, and he didn’t scare easily. This was one bad motherfucker. All the better to get him into the Junkyard and let the other bad guys deal with him.

  He unlocked Mathers’s chains. Luckily, Grant had experience and he was ready to not only block the kick Mathers sent at his head, but come around behind Mathers and grab his neck in a hold that gave him control over the other shifter. He yanked Mathers out of the van with him, grateful that Mathers’s wrists were still in the zip ties.

  “Fucking motherfucker,” Mathers said. “I’ll eat your fucking liver.”

  “You won’t be able to get at my fucking liver,” Grant said, shoving him toward the boundary but keeping his arm around Mathers’s neck. “Kid, get over here, grab his shoulder.”

  The kid hesitantly took a step forward. “I’m not a kid.”

  Exasperated, Grant said, “Yeah, okay, will you grab his shoulder?”

  Mathers kept up a string of curses and threats, all of which Grant ignored but the kid seemed to take to heart. The kid’s grip on Mathers’s shoulder looked tenuous at best. Grant grumbled to himself and kept marching Mathers forward. A few more steps.

  “Okay, kid, we’re gonna hang onto him until I say. He needs to be over the edge completely. Keep your feet braced. Got it?”

  “I’m not a kid,” the kid said, mouth twisted in a frown.

  “Right.”

  The gravel boundary was one yard away. A foot. Six inches. Mathers fought and twisted the entire way. The gravel border sprayed with the force of his kicking. That wouldn’t harm the spell, though. Nothing would, save the intervention of a powerful witch.

  Ignoring the dust Mathers kicked up, Grant kept pushing. The kid pushed, too, although with substantially less force. Mathers went lopsided over the gravel border.

  As soon as Mathers’s feet were over the boundary, the kid let go.

  “Wait—” Grant started to shout.

  With a roar, Mathers spun around and grabbed Grant’s arm.

  Fuck.

  He didn’t feel anything as he went over the line, but he heard the kid shout, “Oh no.”

  Grant looked down. Both of his feet were in the wet earth on the wrong side of the fucking boundary. He leaned back, just to be sure, and his shoulders hit something solid and invisible.

  “Mister, I’m so fucking sorry,” the kid said.

  Grant would’ve reassured him in some way, but Grant’s world had just been changed forever. He thought of his hammock, the porch ceiling that needed painting, the canvases and easels in his garage.

  As Mathers grinned and sent a fist flying toward Grant’s face, he thought of the fucking beer he had waiting next to the hammock. Grant dodged Mathers’s blow, but from the corner of his eye, he saw several shadows emerging from among the scrap metal and junk cars.

  Noah Ephraimson, Jase Englander, Damien Buenevista, and several others. All guys Grant had sent over the boundary and into the Junkyard. Even Carter Varrone emerged from behind an old camp trailer.

  None of them looked friendly.

  Grant was so fucked.

  1

  Shouts of victory and groans of dismay echoed from the ring. Grant shook his head. They were fighting again—one of the few pastimes available to the guys in the Junkyard. Yeah, someone had fixed up an old car stereo and they could get a handful of radio stations. And books came in along with the food every couple of weeks, although as far as Grant could tell, Stetson Krom was the only guy who read them.

  Grant frowned at the view from his trailer. The view was of his beautiful cabin, the place he’d lived until four months ago when Alex Mathers had dragged Grant into the Junkyard after his sorry ass.

  Yep. Grant was now living in the very place he’d hated looking at from his front porch. And from this place, he could see the hammock swing lazily in the breeze. The beer he’d left on the porch was long gone, guzzled up by a wandering black bear.

  Once he’d gotten free of the other shifters, he’d had to find his own place. Lucky for him, he knew of the trailer, so he’d run toward it and roared at anyone who had chased him. Anyone who underestimated a mountain lion shifter learned fast: the claws were sharp, the jaws powerful.

  The trailer was cramped, but clean. It also wasn’t as ugly as it used to be—he’d found old cans of paint and even some not-too-crusty brushes in the dump, and he’d painted abstract animals on all four sides of the trailer. His favorite was the mountain lion, of course, but the bear wasn’t half bad.

  Another set of cheers rose up into the morning sky. “Carter! Carter!”

  So the dumbass grizzly was fighting again. Shocker. Nobody seemed to have adjusted so well to life in the Junkyard as Carter Varrone. Dude was in his element. Fights every day, mischief to be wrought at every turn.

  Grant was a little jealous, and a little lonely, to be honest.

  Four months in the Junkyard, and Grant still hadn’t made friends. No big surprise, as he’d shoved most of the guys in here. Carter wasn’t bad, and they chatted occasionally, but Carter was just as likely to swing at him as say hello. The guy’s inner grizzly was pissed about something. If Grant had any beer, he’d invite Carter over to talk about it, but beer was scarce here. You wanted to get drunk, you drank moonshine made in the back of the 1956 Ford pickup that Noah had claimed.

  Grant didn’t entirely trust the moonshine wouldn’t make him bleed from his eyes, so he kept his distance.

  Still, he was bored. He itched to paint, but the old brushes and half-filled cans of house paint weren’t calling to him at the moment. He carefully got up from the lawn chair; if he moved too fast, the broken metal on the back would come loose again and the whole thing would fall apart. It helped to lean it against something, so
he’d perched it against the front of the trailer. It faced the cabin, which was both a comfort and a torture.

  The walk to the ring, in the dump part of the Junkyard, took about five minutes. A chorus of shouting and groans continued during his walk.

  “Ooh, ref’s here,” Jase Englander said. An easygoing guy with dark skin, Jase still liked to stir up trouble. Grant couldn’t remember why Jase was in the Junkyard to begin with, but it was Grant’s policy not to ask.

  Mathers stood up, his brown eyes dark with malice. “You wanna fight again, Lewiston?” he asked, pointing a thick index finger at Grant.

  “Nope, just here to watch—what the fuck?”

  He’d just taken his first look at the ring, where Carter was matched up against four guys—Damien Buenevista, Derrick Alleman, and a couple other guys Grant didn’t know well.

  “Keeping things interesting,” Mathers said with a laugh.

  Four on one might be “interesting” in normal circumstances. But the four were in their animal forms and Carter faced them as a man.

  Or rather, he lay on the ground as a man while Buenevista, in his wolf form, grabbed Carter’s arm in his jaws and shook his head back and forth like he’d take off the limb.

  Shifters could heal from all kinds of shit, but they couldn’t grow their arms or legs back.

  “This is over,” Grant said, starting for the ring.

  “The fuck it is.” Mathers took a step toward him.

  “He’s the ref, he makes the rules,” Jase said.

  “Get out of there,” Grant said to the four attacking Carter. He marched forward like he was actually in charge. He wasn’t in charge, not really, but he won enough of the nightly battles for dominance that he had some weight to throw around. He could get things for the guys, that was his main pull in the Junkyard. Most of them cared about acquiring the occasional beer or joint. Jase was saving up for a guitar, so he made art and furniture out of recycled materials and depended on a connection to the outside world to sell them. And because Grant didn’t actually belong in the Junkyard, he was able to call in favors with the nearby alphas.