Blackmailed By The Wolf (Shifters, Inc. Book 6)

by Georgette St. Clair

  Blackmailed by the Wolf

  Shifters Inc. book six

  Georgette St. Clair

  Blackmailed by the Wolf

  Copyright 2018 by Georgette St. Clair

  This book is intended for readers 18 and older only, due to adult content. It is a work of fiction. All characters and locations in this book are products of the imagination of the author. No shifters were harmed in the making of this book.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Epilogue

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  About the Author

  Also by Georgette St. Clair

  Chapter One

  Krista

  “Don’t look now, but your SHS is back,” Josie said, nudging Krista as she set down her frothy coffee. Then she kicked her under the table. “I said don’t look!” She took a notepad out of her waitress’ apron and pretended to write on it as she peered over the top at the three big shifters sitting on a bench across the street.

  Krista yelped and scowled at Josie, scooting her chair so her leg was out of reach. “The service here sucks. I’m going to complain to the manager. Anyway, how can I not look when you tell me something like that?”

  Krista and her Great-Aunt Hattie were sitting in the outdoor section of Coffee Mugging, ten blocks from the clinic where Krista worked as a nurse practitioner. Josie had a rock the size of a robin’s egg on her left ring finger courtesy of her fiancé, the coffee shop’s besotted manager. Krista would never really complain about her, but it wouldn’t matter if she did. Josie could shift into panther form and gulp down a table full of customers raw, and her fiancé wouldn’t even dock her pay.

  “What’s an SHS?” Hattie asked, grabbing a handful of fries from Krista’s plate. Her wrinkled cheeks bulged like a hamster’s as she munched on the crispy golden goodness. She’d made a rare visit to the city to visit Krista. They came from the rural area known as the Zoo outside Crystal Bay, Virginia, and like most country shifters, viewed the big city with suspicion. Too many humans, too much noise and traffic, too many rules and laws that weren’t meant for a being with an animal nature.

  Hattie was eighty years old, and these days, her hair was only fire-engine red because she colored it that way. Her face was round and wreathed in wrinkles, and she looked like the kind of grandmotherly old shifter who’d bake you cookies and say “bless your heart”.

  But looks can be deceiving. Anyone who got on Hattie’s bad side found that out quickly enough.

  Hattie made an annual pilgrimage to Crystal Bay right before the Ellis Family Gathering, nagging her great-niece to do the right thing and come home to Flowering Dogwood, the little dot on the map where Krista had grown up.

  Krista slapped at Hattie’s hand as she reached for another fry but missed because she was also trying to check her reflection in the street-facing window of Coffee Muggings. Red hair spilling out of her hair elastic in uneven tendrils—bleh. Makeup doing the midday sweat-fade so her freckles stood out in sharp relief, and she had faint mascara circles under her eyes—of course.

  She quickly tucked the straying strands of hair behind her ears and decided that the smudged eye-makeup could definitely possibly maybe be a smoky-eye look.

  “I said, what’s an SHS?” Hattie repeated, making another grab for Krista’s fries. “Is that some kind of new-fangled city thing? Is it a drug? It’s drugs, isn’t it, Krista?” She clasped one hand to her wrinkled chest while simultaneously sliding half a dozen fries off the plate. “I never should have let you come here! On, you were such a sweet little kit…”

  “It is not drugs! Why does your mind always go to the worst-case scenario?” Krista flicked an annoyed glance at her great-aunt, then let her gaze casually wander across the street.

  The big, handsome wolf shifter sat on a bench with two other hot guys, eating a sandwich. He wore a white t-shirt and jeans and what looked like hiking books. Krista wanted to trade places with that t-shirt, which hugged his biceps and broad back and shoulders. She’d never been jealous of a garment before.

  She’d devoured every detail about him, her mind snapping pictures of his clothes, his dark curly hair, and the tanned skin of his arms, but he hadn’t even noticed Krista yet. Had he? Every time he was within a few blocks of Krista, she became instantly aware of him—he set off an intense tingling in her pink bits and made her heart thud against her ribcage like she’d just run a marathon. But she didn’t seem to have the same effect on him, because when they crossed paths, he barely glanced her way, and when he did, he never acknowledged her with more than a grunt and an abrupt jerk of his head.

  Oh well. His loss. On the bright side, he didn’t seem to notice any of the many women who were strolling by and molesting him with their eyeballs, either.

  Hattie nudged Krista under the table with her foot, wanting an answer to her question. “If it’s not drugs, what is an SHS?” she said with her mouth full of pilfered fries. Krista gave her great-aunt a dirty look and turned her attention to Josie, who was still leaning against Krista’s chair and staring raptly at the big wolf shifter.

  “What do you think the penalty should be for people who say ‘Just a salad for me’ and then steal half your fries?” she asked Josie. She pulled her plate closer to her and put her hand over the fries.

  “Death,” Josie pronounced solemnly.

  “I’m just a weak, malnourished old lady,” Hattie said in a hurt, feeble voice. “I need to keep up my strength.” Then she swiped at the fries again and demanded, “What’s an SHS?”

  “Sexy Hot Stalker.” Josie looked dreamily across at the wolf shifter.

  Krista struggled to keep her fangs from thrusting from her gums. “Hey,” she protested, “keep your eyes to yourself. You’re a practically-married woman.”

  She was being silly, and she knew it; Josie was absolutely devoted to her a fiancé, and in any case, she was a panther shifter—in a fight between a panther and a fox, Josie would end up flossing her fangs with Krista. That didn’t stop Krista’s vixen from objecting to the way her friend was drooling in his general direction, though.

  “Hey, did you just growl at me?” Josie asked. “I thought you didn’t like him!”

  “I didn’t! I mean, I don’t! I don’t dislike him, I just…” Krista shrugged and forced herself to look away. “I’m not interested in him in that way.” She wasn’t interested in any man after her cheating ex-boyfriend, Dr. God’s-gift-to-shifter-chicks Jerome Long, had dumped her for a hotter, or at least more gullible model. She was on a break. Even if her Sexy Hot Stalker had asked her out, she would have said no.

  Yeah, right. And the moon is made of camembert.

  Josie was staring at her skeptically, so she suddenly became very interested in what was left of her Fre
nch fries, staring down at her plate as she shoveled them into her mouth, one after another.

  Two weeks ago, the nameless Sexy Hot Stalker had saved Krista from being mugged as she’d walked to her car at the end of a late shift.

  It was the weirdest thing—when she’d realized she was being followed, instead of turning on her attacker and handing him his ass, she’d found herself overcome by a wave of almost pleasant weakness, as if every fiber of her being were flooded with sweet, slow molasses, making it difficult to move or think.

  Even a small shifter like a fox ought to be able to make a human lowlife wish he’d stayed home arranging his personality disorders in alphabetical order. But when the guy had lunged, she’d found she felt too slow and stupid to do anything other than stand there. There was an unfamiliar fluttering in her chest and her pulse thrummed dreamily in her veins.

  One minute there had been a big, foul-smelling human bearing down on her, jabbing a knife at her midsection; the next minute the human was literally flying through the air. He’d smashed into a streetlamp with an echoing clang, then crumpled into a heap on the ground.

  And Krista had been gaping up at a wolf who was easily six foot two, with tousled brown hair and light amber eyes and a rugged jawline. He wore a battered black leather jacket, jeans and motorcycle boots. On the boinkable-meter scale of one to ten, he scored an infinity.

  Sexy Hot Stalker had insisted on walking her back to her car. His voice had been low and growly. She’d stammered out her thanks and then driven away, hands sweating and heart pounding. It had been the strangest reaction. She’d been in fights before, and she’d faced off against muggers on several occasions because she worked in a cruddy neighborhood, and she wasn’t one to go all weak and girly at the first sign of danger.

  But a few days later she’d had the exact same reaction again. Glancing around, she’d realized that the hot guy was fifty feet behind her, emerging from a bodega. No attacker in sight this time. And she’d realized she was reacting to the wolf, not the near-mugging.

  She’d seen him or felt him nearby half a dozen times since then. And she’d felt the same tingling awareness every single time. If she were to have confided in her great-aunt, Hattie would have insisted that he was her “fated mate”. Hah. Krista was a thoroughly modern shifter, with a degree in the medical field to prove it. She didn’t believe in such superstitions.

  She just wished she could tell that to her lady-bits, which practically sang with joy every time the shifter got near her.

  The fact that the wolf had never given her his name, and never even bothered to walk over to say hi to her when they kept running into each other, pretty much proved that he wasn’t her fated mate—he was just some weird crush. After all, the “fated mates” thing was supposed to work both ways, wasn’t it?

  “I’m a hundred million percent not interested,” she mumbled defensively. “So he’d better not get any ideas.”

  Then she realized Hattie’s bright little eyes were narrowed on the big shifter lounging on the bench across the street. “So, he is bothering you,” she exclaimed, grabbing her cane and leaping to her feet. “These city boys got no manners at all when it comes to courtin’.”

  She barreled out of the coffee shop with amazing speed, leaving the door swinging behind her. Hattie’s “arther-itis” only seemed to bother her when it was convenient; the rest of the time she could run like an antelope.

  “Wait, Aunt Hattie, no—” Krista protested, but it was too late. Hattie, all five feet nothing of her, shot across the street like a bullet from a gun. By the time Krista caught up to her, she was violently bashing the tall, muscular shifter with her cane.

  “How dare you stalk my niece, you creepy pervert!” she yelled.

  The wolf’s friends, a lion shifter and a bear shifter, laughed so hard they were actually crying. Tears ran down their faces, and they gasped for breath as they pointed at the wolf and howled. They didn’t make the slightest move to help him, either.

  The wolf warded off the blows with swift movements of his muscular arms and slowly backed away. He could have shifted and gulped down her aunt in one snap of his jaws, but instead, he just winced and looked annoyed.

  Krista leaped between him and her aunt. “He is not stalking me! He’s sitting here eating his lunch and minding his own business!” she yelled at her aunt. She didn’t want to tell Hattie that he’d saved her from being mugged because her great-aunt would either try to kidnap her and drag her back to Flowering Dogwood “among good country folk” or want to round up a posse to hunt the mugger down and make him into finger food.

  Hattie looked narrow-eyed at the wolf shifter. “Likely story. What are you doing here if you’re not stalking her?”

  “Eating lunch, ma’am. I work security at a warehouse down the street.” His warm, rich voice gave Krista shivers.

  “Eating lunch? Likely story. What’s your name?” Hattie demanded.

  “Blake Wheeler. And these are my friends, Dexter,” he nodded at the bear shifter, “and Mal,” he nodded at the lion shifter.

  “Pleased to meet you, ma’am,” rumbled Dexter, shambling to his feet. The lion smirked and bowed with a little flourish.

  “I’m Krista, and this is my Great-Aunt Hattie.” Krista’s voice squeaked, and she wanted to sink into the sidewalk and die of embarrassment. Her crazy great-aunt. Her squeaky voice. Why, universe, why?

  Blake barely spared her a glance.

  “I’m going to check up on you. I know people,” Hattie said loftily. “And you leave my niece alone and go stalk somebody else. Run along now, boys.”

  The three of them actually grabbed their lunch bags from the bench and left. They didn’t run, but Krista wouldn’t have blamed them.

  She watched Blake leaving with a pang of yearning, then tore her gaze away from his broad back and his perfect round butt cheeks and headed back across the street with her great-aunt.

  Chapter Two

  Blake

  Blake let Mal and Dexter move him down the street, even as his wolf threw back its head and howled in protest. He glanced back at Krista as she walked back to the coffee shop with her great-aunt shooting him dirty looks over her shoulder. Krista was wearing pale blue slacks and a flower-print shirt that accentuated her generous curves. Her glorious, rebellious red hair was spilling out of her hairband in sexy waves. And she smelled like… his.

  Mentally, he smacked himself upside the head. Hard. Damn it, “his” wasn’t a scent… and yet it was the smell he’d come to associate with her.

  Why was his wolf going crazy over the sexy red fox? She was an assignment. Nothing more. And if he didn’t get his wolf under control, she’d be the reason he was waiting in the unemployment line.

  “Oh man, that was classic.” Mal wiped tears of laughter from his cheeks. “Why didn’t I think to get a video of that? A million hits on YouTube, guaranteed.”

  “Uh, because those in the security business like to operate under the radar?” Dexter growled at him. “And Stef would have bounced you out on your furry tail the second she saw the video?”

  “Right, right. Of course.” Mal pulled his half-eaten sandwich from his lunch-box and stuffed it in his mouth. “It would have been worth it though,” he mumbled with his mouth full.

  Mal had been working at Shifters, Inc. for several years, originally in the California office. A restless soul, he’d moved across the country when the new satellite office had opened a few months ago. Blake secretly suspected the owners had finally got sick of the lion shifter’s practical jokes and decided they’d either have to relocate him or kill him and hush it up.

  Dexter and Blake had been army buddies together. Blake was just out, and he needed this job. He needed the work. Needed to keep busy, or his mind started chewing over all the things he’d seen overseas. The people he’d lost. The choices he’d made.

  Together with their boss Stef, the hard-headed vegan horse shifter who could cheerfully kick any of their asses into next week, apex preda
tors or no apex predators, they made up the permanent staff of one of three new Shifters, Inc. splinter offices.

  They paused and sat down on another bench, finishing up their lunch.

  “So, what’s the story on that little vixen? Is she single and ready to mingle?” Mal opened a bag of cheese puffs, tipped his head back, and dumped the little orange balls in.

  “How the hell would I know? I’m not a dating agency.” Blake was surprised by the wave of rage that swelled inside him at the thought of Mal and Krista together. His wolf growled softly inside him, and he could feel his hackles bristling just under the skin at the nape of his neck. With an effort, he shook it off—he was just irritable from being pulled away from Krista so abruptly. That was why he should really stay the hell away from her—because coming close to her and then leaving her was weirdly painful.

  “You’re supposed to be doing surveillance.” Mal’s lips were coated in orange powder now.

  “I am doing surveillance. On her, her family connections, and anything she’s doing that might be helpful to us. Her romantic status is irrelevant.”

  Mal shook his head chidingly. “You’re a bad, bad friend.”

  “I’ve gotta say, letting her spot you like that isn’t like you,” Dexter observed. “If you knew that she was eating lunch right across the street from us, why did you have us sit where we did?” Dex liked to do things by the book, and their surveillance of Krista was way too casual for his liking. If he’d had his way, it would all have been code phrases and synchronized watches.