by Hannah Pole
‘Yup.’
He leant forward, brushing a stray strand of that silky black hair behind her ear. He didn’t even realise he was doing it, until the heat of her brushed his hand as she pressed her cheek lightly into his palm.
Instinctively he leant further forward, until she was only inches from him.
Lord almighty, he wanted to kiss those lips.
‘Leyth?’ she whispered, her breath hot against his lips as she spoke.
‘Yeah.’ Christ, all he needed to do was lean forward, just a fraction more, and he would be on her, he would be tasting that beautiful mouth of hers.
‘You gonna take me inside?’ she asked softly, snapping him back to reality.
Crap, that was close. What the hell was it about this female that made him almost lose control so easily?
‘Sure,’ he grunted, clearing his throat and snapping his hand away from her, a little more violently than was really necessary. Her green eyes locked on to his as he retreated, both emotionally and physically.
She looked startled, and maybe a little hurt.
‘OK.’ She cleared her throat, her hands twisting in her lap. He leant forward once more, keeping his mind on the ball and not allowing himself to think of anything other than getting her inside to see Doc. Shifting a little, he hauled her gently into his arms, ignoring her warm scent as it filled his nose and keeping his eyes away from her. He shot through the parking lot and in through the side door into the clinic. Once inside, he didn’t give her time to look around or for anyone to notice he was home, he just carried her straight into one of the medical rooms lining this half of the mansion and closed the door.
Leyth pulled his phone out and sent a quick text to Doc, telling him to get his arse here ASAP. This awkward silence was killing him.
‘Can they use their um, “abilities” when the Circle has taken them over?’ Tamriel asked, touching the metal gurney he’d placed her on. He was pretty sure she was trying desperately to fill the silence with conversation.
‘Yes. Well, no. The problem is, the magi who control the tomb can’t use their abilities properly. Have you ever watched a werewolf horror movie? You know where they make wolves out to be like a human-wolf monster?’
‘Yeah, like a hairy person with a wolf head and massive claws?’
‘Yup. That’s what a tuhrned wolf looks like. Half shifted, it’s creepy.’
‘Sounds it.’ He watched her as her eyes scanned the room, she was literally the strongest female he’d ever come across. Calm and controlled even in a situation as crazy as this one.
As Leyth waited for Doc, he racked his brain for anything else to tell her; he was pretty sure that he’d told her everything she would need to know, but Lord only knew he couldn’t recall a word he’d said. The entire time he was talking, all he could do was look at those ruby-red lips of hers as they moved.
Her eyes sparkled every time he talked about the kingdom; something about the magic of it all seemed to intrigue her.
She seemed to get excited discussing the likes of fay and elves; it just made him want to wrap her in his arms and crush those big lips against his own. What on earth was wrong with him?
Doc, of course, was at the ready as soon as he came in.
‘Tamriel? John’s whelp?’ he drawled.
‘Hi, nice to meet you.’ She grinned, sticking her hand out, though her wide eyes took him in with what could only be described as awe. As Doc bent to kiss her hand, a pang of anger roared through Leyth. What was this? Jealousy?
Doc flashed him a grin as he checked her pulse and took her temperature.
‘She just needs her wound checking,’ Leyth muttered.
He caught his reflection in the glass and groaned. He really was a state.
His grey eyes looked colder than ever under the bright lights of the clinic. Once they’d been a deep, gun-metal grey, the colour of his father’s, but when he went rogue, he isolated himself. And, as a result, he’d lost the colours he was born with. Even under Julian’s roof, with the brotherly bond he had here, it wasn’t coming back. Once rogue, always rogue.
‘Leyth!’ Doc snapped at him. ‘Turn the hell around!’
‘Wha—?’ Crashing back to reality, Leyth realised he was staring into the glass stand next to the bed like a gormless idiot, and both Doc and Tamriel were staring at him.
‘Turn around so I can dress her,’ Doc growled.
‘Sorry,’ Leyth muttered, spinning around so quickly he nearly lost his balance.
‘OK, you can turn around now.’
‘Sorry, Joe.’ The male’s head snapped up at the sound of his name; he was in fact ‘John Doe’, the lost kid abandoned at Dover docks many years ago. He’d shortened the name to Joe after a while, but had never been called anything other than ‘Doc’ since he’d started training to be a surgeon.
The Council agreed to let Julian, their alpha, take him on, look after him and feed him. But, in return, he had to work for the Council, had to train to help the ‘kingdom’, like the rest of them. Doc had been beaten and bruised, though those like him generally had exceptional healing abilities; whoever had left him there obviously wanted him to suffer. They’d bound him with silver, scarring his skin and keeping him from healing and, as a result, he was now a broken man. His left leg was torn to shreds; the nerves and tendons had healed, but not fast enough, making him rely on a crutch most of the time.
He could fight with the best of them though, he trained and sparred daily with the rest of them and, as a result, he was the same size as everyone else and just as deadly. But he’d devoted his life to medicine, searching constantly for ways to help the race heal even faster. To stop salt and the ever-present threat of silver affecting them the way it did.
Looking at the guy’s chocolate-brown skin, scarred by the enemy and worn by time, Leyth had nothing but respect for the male. He may be a beta, but he was a male of honour without a doubt.
‘I think it’s best you wait outside.’ Doc started dabbing at Tamriel’s forehead with a wet cloth, trying to ease the sweat that had broken out across her forehead as he prepared to remove the bandage. As Doc slid the damp material down to her neck, Leyth bared his teeth; the wolf in him snarling to the edge. Before he realised what he was doing, a thundering growl rumbled its way from his chest, reverberating across the room.
‘What the—?’ Doc shoved his chiselled face directly in Leyth’s line of vision, hiding Tamriel from view.
‘Cut it out.’
‘Sorry.’ Leyth cleared his throat. ‘I’m responsible for her life,’ he muttered by way of excuse.
‘Sure.’ Doc grinned, ushering him out of the room.
Leyth took one last look at Tamriel, now wrapped in a loose hospital gown. Still trying to hide the fear rippling out of her in waves, she looked so fragile on the gurney as Doc gently unwrapped her bandage.
It was possibly the most painful thing he’d ever encountered; it absolutely broke his heart to see her like that, scared and in pain – and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.
Doc would take care of her, he told himself. She’d be OK. Of course she would. So why in the hell was it so difficult to leave her in a room with Doc? What was this impulsive anger that roared through him when another male was near her? Ridiculous.
He would wait it out, he decided, as close to her as he could be.
Such an idiot, letting himself begin to care for her. She didn’t even really know who he was and she deserved so much more than he could ever offer. He was a deserter. His father was a deserter. No, he needed to stay the hell away from her and allow her the best chance at life she could get.
When all this crap was over, he would drop her back into her world and she would be fine, wouldn’t she?
She could lead a normal life, or as much of a normal life as she physically could. It was better than living under the Council’s rule; Lord only knew what they would do to her. The bastards treated everyone like dirt; they all had to provide a service and if
they didn’t comply, they were relieved of duty, by the way of death.
And those of them like Tamriel?
They were treated even worse; hell, they were made into servants or killed straight off. This would be no life for her, even if Julian did accept her into his pack; she would have to go and live with Sarah and her group of half-breeds on the reserve, separated from everyone else and living in fear of the Council’s men showing up and picking them off, one by one, to be sold, put to work for another pack as slaves or killed.
At least Julian treated them with respect, tried to make them live as equals and refused to let them work as servants.
The problem with that was that most of them had been brought up as serving staff; it was the only life they knew, they didn’t want to fight and live as the rest of them on the reserve did, they actually preferred to keep the grounds tidy, to look after the various houses built on the land and the mansion, they liked to cook and clean. But Julian wouldn’t allow it.
So they, and the rest of the wolves, tended to live separately.
Julian ran the grounds, of course. This was his land and it was hundreds of acres; more or less all of it was woodland, and wild wolves, rabbits, deer and a variety of other creatures roamed freely.
It was a ‘nature park’; after all, that’s where most of the pack’s money came from. Hunting, or at least the normal version of hunting, was forbidden, of course, but given the number of trained fighters on the land, you were a brave man indeed to hunt in these woods.
The mansion, which was smack bang in the middle of the land and was surrounded by a group of houses built into the landscape, all blended smoothly into the trees. They were almost invisible to satellite pictures and curious eyes, only if you knew they were there, could you find them.
Julian lived in the mansion, as did his sister Alison. The rest of them had houses surrounding the main manor; the twins lived together and Dax lived by himself. Leyth lived in one of the mansion’s spare rooms at the moment; he had no personal belongings to speak of and definitely no furniture, just the clothes on his back and that was pretty much it. So living in a guest bedroom suited him for now.
‘You can come back in now, Leyth,’ Doc barked out of the door. She’s healing well.’ He leant in and hissed, ‘You need to go speak to Julian soon though, some shit’s gone down with Alison. She never turned up at her parents’ house.’
Leyth cursed and nodded. ‘I’ll be there as soon as I can. Let me get Tam home first though, OK?’
Doc waved goodbye to Tamriel, promising to tell her more stories of her father when he had a chance. Tamriel was still sat on the gurney, looking embarrassed, scared and hopeful all at once, if that was even possible.
‘So,’ she said after a moment. Then he realised he hadn’t said anything and had just been staring at her. This really was bad. What the hell had come over him?
‘So.’ He echoed her words. ‘You look hungry, do you want to eat?’
‘Yeah, I am hungry, actually, can we eat here?’ She looked around nervously.
‘How do you feel about pizza?’ he asked, moving forward, ready to call through for food to be brought straight to the clinic. The last thing he wanted was for his pack brothers to scare her; hell, Doc had been enough. Her hand fell next to his leg as he moved forward, brushing him as it fell.
Heat sparked instantly where she’d brushed him, sending ripples of tension flying to an area he’d really rather forget. He cursed inwardly, Maker only knew he’d never been like this around a female before.
It just made it more obvious that he needed to get out of her life, remove himself from her and leave her to her world before he did something he’d regret.
‘Pepperoni?’ God, his voice sounded strangled. He caught her hand as she stood, her palm soft against his own rough skin.
‘OK.’ She smiled at him, glancing down at their hands, still entwined.
He gently squeezed and as her fingers left his, he briefly mourned the loss. This female was really getting under his skin.
Shoving that thought back where it belonged, he moved to the phone to ring through for pizza, casually covering his traitorous crotch as he went, telling his body to give it a rest and calm the hell down.
Whilst they ate the pizza, she and Leyth talked for hours. Tam took it all on board, trying to make sense of it. She found out just how many rules the Council had put in place to keep the supernatural community hidden from humans. As far as she could see, there were various ‘departments’ that supernatural races were put into; magis and the fay ran the Council. They seemed to be ‘judge, jury and executioner’. Wolves and vampires fought the Circle’s minions, along with shifters – who apparently could turn into any animal. Elves kept humans from finding out about the ‘Kingdom’. There were so many different types of supernatural race, some of which she’d not only never heard of, but frankly found it difficult to believe in. She honestly couldn’t keep up, but she got the picture.
She had to admit, she was still pretty dumbstruck from the whole wolf thing. And, Christ, her father.
As much as she wanted to deny it, that photograph was proof that he really was still alive, and the kind doctor who had checked her wounds had told her many stories about their time together on pack-land. She had listened intently to every detail, the small parts of every story he told her, trying desperately to find a hole in it, to find something that was wrong or didn’t fit. But every word was watertight and, what’s more, the way he spoke of her father was bang on. He described mannerisms, little sayings and personality traits that were exactly what her father used to do. She found herself thinking, ‘Yeah, he used to say that to me.’ Or, ‘Ah, that’s such a Dad thing to do.’
She was beginning to believe it was true.
‘Did you enjoy your pizza?’ Leyth flashed her a grin that made her pulse jump, her stomach doing an awkward jig in response to those gorgeous dimples. Goddamn that smile, the way his eyes lit up; it sparked a response so deep in her that it terrified her a little.
‘So, how are you feeling?’
Scared of how you make me feel. ‘Yeah, good. Still processing it all, I guess,’ she said hastily.
‘So tell me about this “change” I’m going to go through?’
‘Might go through,’ he corrected her. ‘Your father is a wolf and, as far as we know, your mother is human.’
‘Yeah, she is. Or at least, I think she is?’
Confusion flooded her. Tam closed her eyes, letting Leyth’s dark, masculine scent wash over her. It soothed her to the bone. Yet she hated those feelings, she hated the fact that the warmth of him was something she just wanted to wrap around herself, curl into and stay like that for an eternity.
As Tam glanced over at Leyth, she found him staring at her. Their eyes met and her pulse skipped a beat. His shaggy black hair framed his chiselled face, his broad muscular chest punched out from beneath his heavy bomber jacket.
It took every ounce of strength she had not to lean her head on his chest and just let him hold her.
‘So…’ She cleared her throat. ‘This “change”?’
‘Well, your father was hoping you wouldn’t go through the change, that your human half was strong enough to keep you from it.’
‘But why?’
‘The Council doesn’t look too fondly on—’
‘On what, Leyth?’
‘Well, half-breeds.’
‘Is that what I am? Just a half-breed?’
‘No, not just a half-breed. I mean, hell, Tam, you’re born and bred from one of the strongest males our race has ever seen!’
Tam held a hand up, cutting him off. The reporter in her wanted to talk about her father, wanted to find out why he’d left. The daughter in her was too hurt. The daughter in her was still very much lost and alone.
She would find out why. She would get to the bottom of this; she had no doubt. And if her father truly was alive, he would have a lot of explaining to do.
Tam tried her best t
o think of something to say, something to take her mind away from her father and onto—
‘Tamriel…’ Leyth caught her hand. Damn this man and his strange intuition; any words she may have had got caught in her throat as she looked up at his icy-grey stare, his eyes almost sparkling in the dim light.
‘Yes?’ She couldn’t help herself, she leant closer into him, only slightly, her leg brushing his as he lifted a hand, stroking her cheek. The heat of his skin pulsed through her, making her heart do little flips in her chest and her stomach twist.
He leant forward too, his hand falling from her face into her lap.
She twisted her fingers into his before she’d really worked out what she was doing, losing herself in the depths of those gorgeous eyes. She pressed herself forward, her body moving of its own will, leaving logic far behind.
‘Leyth…’ Tam moaned, as his lips brushed hers. They were so soft, so gentle. For a moment the two of them stayed frozen to the spot, their lips so close Tam could feel the warmth of Leyth against her, so infuriatingly close. She sucked in a breath, wanting to move forward just that fraction more, needing to feel him against her. Leyth groaned, lifting his head and wrapping an arm around her as he pressed a kiss lightly against her forehead.
‘We shouldn’t,’ he growled, the sound reverberating through his muscled chest and into her own. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Why?’ God, she sounded desperate, so pathetic.
‘Because I can’t.’ He snapped his gaze away from her. ‘You’re better off living a normal life, this—’ He motioned to the clinic. ‘My pack, the Council, it’s not a world you should live in.’
Crap. She’d only known this man for a matter of hours and she was already nearly kissing him? Good lord, she had no idea what had come over her, but she knew she needed to make it stop.
What was she thinking?
‘You’re right,’ she snapped, pulling herself out of his grip and standing up. ‘I’m only a half-breed after all.’
‘The purity of your wolf heritage has nothing to do with it,’ he hissed.
‘Well it obviously does. It’s the same in this world as it is everywhere; if you’re a little different, no one wants to know you.’ Her words were clipped, anger edging its way to the surface. She knew she was being maybe a little irrational, actually, she was more angry with herself, with the way this man made her feel, the way she could so easily lose herself in him. She was furious with this confusing spin of emotions.