She started laughing suddenly. It warmed his heart a little to hear it, but he gave her a confused look.
Casey motioned to the wreck in front of them. “I don’t think my life is so quiet anymore.”
He chuckled and pulled her close. To his surprise and delight, she leaned her head on him. “It’ll quiet down.” He wanted to reassure her that pack lands would be peaceful, that she could find a sanctuary there as well, but the EMT approached them, and he lost the chance to comfort her more.
An EMT, a cop, and a tow truck later, Casey wasn’t sure what to think of the evening. She’d welcomed Kylian’s comfort and was ready for the night to end. The person who had struck them with the van was probably well on his way to talk to Lex about what happened.
Kylian took her hand once everything was cleared. “I’ll call Julia to come pick us up. Why don’t we walk and grab a late dinner while we wait?”
Her stomach grumbled at the thought of food. She’d only snacked a little bit at the bar while she was getting Anthony drunk, and dinner would get them off the street and out of view of any wolf that might be watching them. Kylian put a hand on the small of her back and led her down the road. His questions about her family had caught her off guard and kind of shut her down, and now her mind was whirling with her own questions.
“Do you have any family?”
A strange smile curved over his lips. “I have a large family, but I don’t keep in touch with them much.”
“How come?”
She saw the hesitation play over his face. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have asked.”
“No, don’t be sorry. Let’s just say that we don’t always see eye to eye, so it’s better if we don’t see each other often. Or talk much. The pack is my family. I take care of them, and they take care of me. Which is what family is supposed to do.”
She nodded. She hadn’t really had that growing up. Her parents had been well-off and had a nanny raise her until she went to school. From there they always seemed a bit cold to her, and as soon as she left for college, they went off to fulfill the dreams that she seemed to hinder. She just learned to deal with it. Solitude wasn’t bad; it was one of the reasons she didn’t want to take Anthony up on his constant offer to move in together.
Kylian led her into a low-lit restaurant, and they waited for the host to come up to them. They were led to a table in the quiet dining room, and she found herself relaxing as the lack of chaotic noise set in. But her wolf didn’t like it. It lifted its head and sniffed the air, letting out a low growl.
Casey put a hand to her chest as her heart seemed to speed up. Kylian grabbed her other hand. “Deep breath,” he whispered.
She listened, but breathing was suddenly a struggle. The wolf rose to her feet and started out of the forest. Kylian wrapped his arms around her and Casey took a deep breath, sinking into his warmth. He smelled like fresh rain on evergreens with a hint of dirt. The forest. The wolf retreated, and she looked up at Kylian. “How can you do that?”
“Do what?” He pulled her seat out for her.
She sat down and picked up the menu, avoiding looking at him. “Calm my wolf, make her go back to the forest in my head.” She realized she sounded crazy and hung her head.
“I don’t know how I do it, but you do it to mine too. Maybe because we are meant to be pack? The other people in my pack find comfort in my presence too, maybe that’s what it is.”
She looked at him and met his gaze; arousal rose in her at just the look in his eyes. Heat flushed her face, and she reached for the pre-poured water to take a sip.
Lifting the glass to her lips, she couldn’t help but notice the smirk on Kylian’s face.
“Why are you blushing so much, Casey? What thoughts are going through your mind?” He folded his hands on the table.
She nearly spit out her water. “I’m sorry, what?”
“Do I need to mention that I can smell the arousal on you as well?”
Her cheeks flared again, and he laughed. “Nothing to be embarrassed about, especially after what happened in the bedroom yesterday.”
“Who said I was embarrassed?” She glanced up at him. “Maybe I’m just not used to these kinds of feelings.”
He snorted. “What? Nothing like this with Anthony?”
“Not since he turned into a jerk.” She shook her head. “Don’t want to spend our dinner out talking about him. It’d be like you talking about your ex all night.”
“Yeah, that’s a subject I don’t really want to touch on.” He looked away awkwardly. “Order what you want, dinner’s on me.”
She glanced over the menu. “Thank you, for coming after me.”
“It seems that you didn’t need me to come after you after all. How did you manage to get away from Anthony?”
“I got him really drunk and snuck out while he was on the dance floor.” She laughed. “He never could resist free drinks.” She looked through the different menu choices and felt overwhelmed with the choices until her eyes landed on the steak. Her stomach rumbled at the thought, and she set the menu down. “So, about us just appearing outside the car.”
His brows creased and she waited for him to deny it happened. Tell her that she was crazy and that he’d just managed to pull her out of the car. Maybe he stalled on telling her so he could come up with an explanation. She bit her lip as the anxiety filled her, she shouldn’t have asked or pushed.
“I’m afraid you won’t believe me if I tell you.”
“I’ve just recently come to terms with werewolves. What more could there be?” she joked, but he didn’t smile. “You swore to tell me what happened.”
He took a deep breath. “A couple centuries ago, I slept with a woman…her husband walked in on us, and he cursed me. What he didn’t realize at the time was that I was, am, a Greek god, so it didn’t quite have the effect that he wanted.”
Curse, Greek god, violence, rage…Ares. “You put a shrine of yourself in the wolf community housing?” was the only thing she could think to say while her mind wrapped around what was going on.
He choked on his water. “It’s not a shrine. It’s a reminder that the world hasn’t really forgotten about us.”
“Us?”
“My pantheon.” He shrugged. “I haven’t been able to return to Olympus since the curse, but at least I know that the human world knew we existed, and we’re written down in history.”
She studied him. He didn’t look exactly like the statue or the drawings of Ares, but she’d seen how fiercely he fought, the rage he held, and for some reason, it was fitting that he was the alpha of a werewolf pack. “The rage you have, that’s part of you.”
“It is, it’s what allows me to protect my pack, but as a wolf, it still tries to tear me apart when I don’t…manage it,” he muttered. “As a god, I could go out and cause a war, something bloody and violent and curb that urge, but…I have to be careful about that. We’re not exactly supposed to be known in the modern day.”
“So you hunt and fight, to control those urges. Does it fulfill you?”
He shrugged. “Sometimes it does, other times it doesn’t. What you’ve seen, the small amount of damage, the taped hands, that’s just from sparring with the pups. The thing that really fulfills me are the cage fights. Some of the other supernatural creatures around here hold them. They allow me to really let the rage out, with the only rule being that I can’t shift.”
She paused as the waiter came up and took their order. “Does it help the pups? To spar?”
“It does, it also shows them how to control their rage.” He touched her hand, and her wolf raised her head for a moment. “Is that something you wanted to do?”
She thought about it and then shook her head. “No, I have some self-defense training, but not enough to go up against a god.” She smirked.
“I can teach you more.” He wrapped his fingers around hers. “I don’t want you to be defenseless, in any way. Not against the madness, not against jerks like Anthony, not against alpha’s
like Lex.”
“I would like that.” She squeezed his hand. “So how do we keep Lex away?”
The question drained the blood from his face, and she had a feeling she knew what the answer was. “We find you a mate.”
7
Ares held his breath for a moment. It hadn’t been what he was expecting to say, but it’s what came out. He wanted to tell her that she was his. In every way.
“A mate?” she whispered and looked down.
He looked away as the waiter came back with their food. She slowly started cutting her steak. “A mate,” she said again.
“Yes, if you mate someone in the pack, you can stay there, but…” He took a deep breath. “The only way it’s going to work is if it’s an actual mating, not one to put on a show.”
She pressed her lips together. “Lex mentioned mating Anthony, that it was just a ceremony.”
That sneaking bastard. “Most of it is, but there’s a marking involved.” A painful, violent marking if it was forced. “That happens…during.” He ran his hands over his face. Him, the God of War, scared to mention what happens during a werewolf mating.
“I don’t like the sound of that.” She pushed around her food with her fork, not looking up at him.
“It’s not bad if you’re meant to be mated, which your wolves will know, that’s the hardest part about finding a mate. It’s why I don’t push mating in my pack, especially forced mating.” He shook his head. “Let’s eat up and talk about it when we’re at my house. I don’t like talking about things like this in public.” It was a little bit of a cop out, but discussing werewolf mating over dinner killed his appetite.
She nodded. “Okay.”
“Don’t worry; I’m going to do everything in my power to keep you with our pack.” He reached over and squeezed her hand. He knew he would do everything, even if it meant starting a bloody war.
“It’s amazing, you touch my hand, and it’s like my wolf just relaxes.” She shook her head. “I don’t know if that’s normal because you’re an alpha or not.”
She’d said something similar before, but now he knew what it meant. He smiled. “You’re the first woman that my wolf likes, he stirs and wants to protect you at all costs, even if it means a bloody war with the other pack.”
“What does that mean?” She looked up at him from under her long lashes with a tiny coy smile on her face, one that told him she had a very good idea of what that meant.
“That you might be my mate.” And with those words, his wolf let out a howl in his head that called for Ares to mate with her now. He coaxed the wolf back with silent promises of later.
“Isn’t that an interesting turn of events?” She gave a small laugh that shot through him. “So how—”
“We need to get you two out of here.” Julia’s voice suddenly broke through the quiet conversation as she approached the table. He cursed. He wanted enough time to finish the meal. He looked at Julia.
“Why do you sound so panicked?” he asked and leaned back in his chair, removing his hand from Casey’s. He met the gaze of his second and then she looked to Casey. “How did you get here so fast?” He followed up as he waved his hand to catch the waiter’s attention.
Julia gave a subtle shake of her head as the waiter came over. Ares pulled out a hundred and handed it to the man. “Keep the change.” He stood up and Casey followed. Julia led them outside and to her car. Ares opened the back passenger side door for Casey, and she got in without question, which was good because he had no answers at this moment. They got in, and Julia slammed the gear shift a little harder than she needed.
“What is going on?”
“I was in town checking out a robbery at a traveling exhibit.”
“The Greek artifact one,” Casey whispered. “At the downtown art museum.”
Julia nodded. “I hadn’t mentioned it—”
“Because I would want to go and dwell in the past, yada, yada, yada, get to the point, Julia.” Ares snarled and glanced around them. There wasn’t anything out of the normal, but he could sense the tension in his second’s voice.
She took a deep breath and pulled the car out. “The item that was stolen was a dagger made of adamantine, rumored to be forged by Hephaestus.”
Shit. “Okay, do we know who stole it?”
“No, but one of the reporters mentioned that they caught a white sixteen passenger van on video.”
Like the one that had hit them. “Okay, take us to my house. I’ll figure out what to do from there. You need to go back to the pack lands and watch over the wolves. I don’t want Lex’s pack trying anything while I’m away.”
Julia nodded and took the car onto the highway, heading north.
“What’s adamantine?” Casey asked after a couple minutes of silence.
Ares glanced back at her. “It’s a stone that’s lightweight and unbreakable when forged by the gods.”
“And why is it so important that it was stolen?”
“Because it can kill a god.” He saw the color drain from her face a little bit. “Don’t worry; Lex won’t get a chance to use it on me.”
“Does she know?” Julia asked and jerked the car into the exit lane. “Why on earth would you tell her so soon.”
Ares raked a hand through his hair. “Because I had to use my abilities to get us out of the car when it flipped. I wasn’t going to lie to her.”
“Great, can she keep a secret?”
“What’s it to you? It’s not like I’m going to shout it from the rooftops that he’s a god. For some reason, I don’t think it would be a very smart thing to do with what’s going on,” Casey snapped. “I think there are more important things to focus on than what secrets he shares with me. Don’t you?”
He heard something in her voice that made him turn around and look at her. Her eyes flashed yellow for a second, and he knew that her wolf was close to the surface. He needed her to hold on just a little bit longer; He reached back and put his hand on her knee, and she took a deep breath and closed her eyes. “There you go,” he whispered. “Julia, don’t provoke the new wolf. If she shifts while we’re driving, we’ll get in an accident, and that’s not something I want to experience twice in a day.”
“Sorry.” Julia shook her head. “Just under a bit of stress. I’ll get you guys to the house and get back to the pack. Just whatever you do…”
“Don’t get stabbed by that dagger. Don’t worry.” The fact that Lex had stolen it from the museum was troubling enough. Not knowing exactly what the other alpha had planned only added to the worry inside, which fed his wolf. He needed an outlet before it got too bad.
He glanced at Casey and knew exactly what he wanted to do as his outlet. He wanted her spread out on a bed under him while he fucked her and watched the pleasure sweep over her face. Yes, that would be a nice outlet.
“Whatever you are thinking about, stop. You’re going to stink up my car with your arousal.” Her voice was half joking.
Casey laughed. “Is that what that scent is?”
Ares grumbled. “Yeah, it is.” He met her gaze. “We’re almost to the house, and then you’re mine.”
Ares’ words flooded Casey’s body with heat, and she found her wolf responding with a low come-hither growl. Her lips quirked up in a smirk, and she leaned forward. “I’d like that.”
“Ugh, you two seriously need to get a room.” Julia shook her head. “I don’t want to smell or think about you two having a one-night stand.”
Casey glanced at Ares, wondering if they should mention they were supposedly mates, but Ares gave a subtle shake of his head as if reading her mind. “We’ll try to control ourselves for the rest of the ride,” she promised, but she couldn’t keep the smile off her face.
“Don’t worry about it Julia; she’ll be pack soon.”
A thrill went through her as her wolf howled in her mind. They both wanted that. To be under Ares’ rule as his pack and under his body as his mate. It sounded right. The moisture grew between her leg
s, and she didn’t want to wait until they got to the house. Part of her wanted to demand that Julia stop driving and let them take care of this right now.
Her cheeks grew red at the thought. She’d never been so determined to have sex with someone before. Especially someone she hardly knew…except she’d already grown to know him over the last couple days. He knew some about her as well, and they’d learn more…as long as she became pack and Lex stayed the fuck away.
Julia swung the car into a driveway and threw the gear into park. “There, now get out. I warned you about the weapon; I brought you home. I’ll have one of the pack members bring you a car later. Remember to be—”
“Yes, be careful, I know.” Ares got out of the car and looked back in at Julia. “You’re not going to lose your Alpha. Lex won’t get to take over the pack.”
Casey got out and didn’t miss the look on Julia’s face as she turned away from Ares. She was truly worried about the knife. She shut the door and followed Ares up the driveway as Julia pulled out. “Why is she so worried?”
“She’s been with me a long time. She fought long and hard to be my second-in-command, but she never wants to take over the pack. If I die, she’ll have no choice but to kill Lex, and then she’d be alpha over two packs.” He pulled out a key and unlocked the front door.
Casey followed him in. “What about Anthony?”
“She’d probably kill him before Lex. Being a top werewolf isn’t easy. People constantly challenge your authority; they constantly think that they are stronger than you. That they can do better than you.” He cupped her face and traced his thumb along her bottom lip. “This isn’t an easy life.”
She had gathered that already, seeing as in her first few days she’d torn a bedroom apart, been forced to run with another pack, and had to get her ex-boyfriend drunk so she could sneak out of a bar. “Apparently, it was just too much to ask for a quiet life.”
She saw something pass in his eyes at her words. “What?”
“If you had the choice…” he hesitated slightly and pulled his hand away. “Would you leave the pack?”
The Fall of War (Gods of Olympus Book 4) Page 7