Masters of the Hunt: Fated and Forbidden

by Sarra Cannon

  Clad in baggy sweatpants and a bleach-splattered hoodie emblazoned with RODANTHE KITES on the back, the woman managed to have a regal bearing…in spite of all the muttering. He, of all people, would certainly understand what constituted regality. Had seen enough of it, and she had what it took. Sure, her dark brown ponytail had bits of plaster stuck to it, and some of the words she muttered under her breath could scandalize Satan himself, but Heath suspected she knew when to rein it in. When to behave—to act properly.

  “Fuck it,” she whispered, giving the curtain top a final swat. She wrapped her fingers around the step stool’s handle and climbed down.

  He noted she wore no rings before he let his head fall back to the pillow and closed his eyes. When she’d exited, leaving the room permeated with her scent of soap and warm-blooded woman, he sat up, groaning, and rubbed his eyes.

  “Where the hell am I this time?” And where the hell was his gear? His weapons? He craned his neck and peered over the sides of the bed.

  Nothing on the floor. Maybe Thom had stashed them in his own room, but he wouldn’t have left Heath completely weaponless. Heath dragged his hand beneath the pillow and met the cold hilt of his favorite knife. “Hey there, precious,” he said, withdrawing it.

  He warmed the hilt between his palms as he scanned the room. Single queen bed. It was all right. He’d slept on worse. Hell, he’d slept on the ground beside his bike enough times not to complain about the qualities of a mattress. And where was his bike, anyway? Usually he was strong enough to ride away on his own seat, but that last job had been unusually difficult. He and his crew had been tracking an unstable demifae down the East Coast. Half fairy, half troll, and wholly cracked out. It’d taken Heath a lot more juice than usual to siphon off the violent man’s energy, but they’d managed to suppress him. Magic and brute force usually did the trick. Unfortunately, the troll had gotten too many good blows into Heath before his crew arrived for backup. He wondered how long he’d been sleeping off the fight.

  Yawning, he reached for the remote control, thinking perhaps he’d scan the channels. Local commercials would give him some sense of where he was and maybe the channel guide would have the date on it. But, too soon, a wave of dizziness overtook him.

  “Need some energy,” he said into the pillow. Just a little transfusion to get him up and running. Back to his crew. Naturally there weren’t any suitable donors around.

  Just his bleeding luck.

  — —

  The next time Heath pushed his eyelids up, the bang-bang feeling in his head had gone away. More or less. He sat up slowly, groaning at the aches in his ribs, and peeled off his leather vest and sweaty T-shirt. He tossed them on the floor in front of the bed along with his socks, and lie back again, breathing heavily. Too much work.

  “Some fucking warrior I am today.” It was unreasonable to think he’d win every skirmish, but rarely in his hundred and seventy years had he used up so much of his power in a fight.

  He was Daione Sídhe, and had a parcel of power rare amongst fairykind. Very few things could stand against his strength or his natural magic, but apparently an idjut half-troll whose idea of a nutritious breakfast was half a crack rock could. Fairies and illicit drugs went together like electric appliances and full bathtubs. Generally an awful combo and, eventually, someone got a nasty shock. Whether it was the drug user or the person confronting him who received the shock was the unpredictable part.

  The last time Heath had been so wiped out had been the evening a succubus had tried to drain him in his sleep. He’d dispatched her just in time, but not before she’d taken a great deal of his energy. She’d had every male member of his crew laid out for a week, and Heath for three days. But, that was only three days at a succubus’s hands, so shouldn’t he be getting up soon? How long had he been out?

  The motel room door clicked open, and Heath jammed his eyelids down. He knew who his visitor was without having to see her.

  Most human women seemed to have scents that blurred together; there was nothing particularly unique about them. The little mumbling hellcat was a rare flower. Maybe it was exposure to the salt air, or something she put in her hair, but she stood out to him. Without a doubt, he would always be able to pick her out in a crowd, even with his eyes shut. And, oh, he wanted to open them. Wanted a better look at the face that went with all that muttering. To see if her front was as spectacular as her backside.

  “Oh. One of the guys must have been in,” she mused quietly.

  He heard the sound of leather rubbing against leather, followed by a plop. She must have moved his clothes to some higher surface. He stole a peek, guessing her back would be turned.

  Aye. Nice view, indeed. She wore some of those stretchy black pants women supposedly exercised in, and a long-sleeved, turquoise, crew-neck shirt with HEARTH MOTEL, SALVO/RODANTHE - 252-555-0100 printed on the back.

  Hearth. Heath suppressed a chuckle. Thom would have seen it as some kind of sign. Fae were always on the lookout for signs and harbingers. At times, signs were how the gods announced themselves. Signs could also be warnings or, rarely, omens of rewards. He hoped he was getting the latter, though, because damned if he weren’t overdue for a reward. The past few years had been one long kick to his nuts. Between keeping his harridan of a mother from terrorizing the entire sodding fairy realm and his job—hunting rogue fae and demifae—he had his hands full. To add to his numerous troubles recently, though, there’d been an uptick of people trying to escape the realm. More accurately, escape his mother. Heath was supposed to be herding them back to the realm, but how could he? The only thing they’d ever done wrong was to be born Sídhe and in his parents’ domain. Like hell if he were going hunt them like dogs to assuage his mother’s bloated ego. He’d escorted quite a few into hiding his own damn self, and he’d continue to do so if he saw fit, duty be damned.

  The woman in the clingy pants climbed atop the step stool once more, and set about pressing special clips into the top where the curtain had been sagging. For five minutes, he watched her stretch and reach, transferring the curtain pins she held clamped between her lips to the top of the fabric. Finally, she managed to successfully tack the things back up in the manner in which they were designed to hang.

  Once or twice, he caught a brief glimpse of her profile, and a stunning one it was. Dark eyes, full pink lips, and a nose that had the cutest little upturn he’d ever seen, outside an elf. It was perfect. No, she was perfect. All of her.

  And that worried him.

  The fact she was hitting his radar screen so hard could mean a number of things—that she had magic of some sort, that she was cursed, or, most likely, that he was long overdue for a good shag. He’d almost prefer her to be cursed. Curses, he could deal with. Sex, he didn’t have the strength for. He wasn’t the kind of asshole who’d just lie there, although he was fairly sure the view of her atop him would be quite nice. High, pert breasts. More than a handful. They’d probably have rich brown nipples and would taste like paradise.

  He reached beneath the comforter and loosened the button of his snug leather trousers. His tailor had thought he was joking when Heath had asked that he make extra room for his cock.

  “Yes, Prince Heath,” he’d said, and nodded. The pants had come back even tighter.

  If Heath had been as vicious as everyone thought, he would have sent the asshole to the pillory, coated his shiny bald pate with peanut butter and birdseed, and let the fucking pigeons have their way with him.

  He groaned softly and tugged at his crotch. He’d have better luck buying ready-to-wear clothes, but what was the point of having staff at his disposal if he didn’t give them shit to do?

  She moved carefully down the steps of her little ladder, her backside behind those thin pants a hypnotizing oracle. He just knew that if he could touch it, he’d know his future. That very near future likely involved grabbing her by the hips and rutting like the untamed beast he pretended not to be.

  He let out a breath.

/>   Not that he had the energy for it. Probably a good thing. He couldn’t go scaring her off before finding out what was so alluring about her besides her looks.

  He let his eyelids fall as she padded past the bed, and let recuperative sleep take him under yet again.

  — —

  The next morning, when his door clicked open, he had to hide his grin before she crossed the foot of his bed.

  She sighed, and there was that sound of leather against leather again. She’d picked his stifling pants up off the floor.

  The plop indicated she’d added them to all the rest of his discarded clothing.

  He opened his eyes to see her leaning over the trash can beside the dresser, peering into it in search of refuse to clear, apparently, and he pushed himself up to his elbows by the time she turned around.

  She yipped, and clutched her chest. “God!”

  “Not exactly, love.” He grinned, aware of how he must have looked. Bedraggled would be putting it mildly. Hell, he was bedraggled on most days. It wasn’t so much part of his look, but part of his personality. So many fairies were hung up on looks—on outward appearances—but who really had the endurance to keep up with that shit? He’d run out of fucks to give a century ago.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I wouldn’t have come in if I thought I’d wake you. I thought Thom or one of the guys had been coming in to tend you. Figured there’d be some trash by now.”

  He gave his head a slow shake, never taking his eyes from her. In profile, she’d been beautiful, but straight on…well, she was outstanding. The embodiment of every wet dream he’d had since he was a mere boy of seventy, and not a lick of makeup on her. Natural beauty. Almost ethereal with her pristine, glowing skin and elegant features. Nothing about her was forgettable. Everything, from the little beauty mark on her chin to the lumps in her ponytail, was worth noticing. Even the long scab on her forearm she rubbed idly.

  He narrowed his eyes, squinting at it across the room.

  From a burn, perhaps? The shape was so odd…

  “Sorry, I’ll let you get back to sleep.”

  At that volume, her voice had a husky quality that reminded him of old jazz singers from way back when, slightly accented with a bit of Southern exposure.

  He let his head fall to the pillow. “Ah. I remember now. Salvo is in North Carolina. Hard keeping up with the names of all these tiny coastal towns.”

  “It’s not really a town. Anyway, sorry to bother you. Thom said you probably wouldn’t be up, and I had some maintenance to do in here. Figured you wouldn’t know.”

  “’S’all right. I was getting up, anyway,” he lied. If it hadn’t been for her, he’d stay there for another day on his back, letting his eyes blear at the television screen. He’d be back up to snuff in another day. “Do me a favor, will you? Tell me, is my bag in here?”

  She nodded and pointed toward the corner abutting the window where the floor lamp was set. “Over there.”

  “Good. Could you do me another favor?”

  “I wish I could say you guys were running out of favors, but I don’t really have a choice.”

  He raised an eyebrow at her curious statement, but figured he was merely processing information a few beats slower than normal and had missed a joke somewhere. He pushed himself up so his back was flush with the headboard. “Could you come here, please?”

  She studied him, warily, it seemed, and after a few seconds, closed the distance between the dresser and the nightstand. She stood to the right of the bed, though far enough from him that he couldn’t reach her without using more energy than he was willing to exert. She had good reason to be suspicious.

  He locked his gaze on hers, and her eyes widened briefly before she recovered. Even after meeting all the others in his crew, people always did that. Were surprised at what they saw up close. His eyes were too blue, and often people didn’t like what they saw in them.

  Anger. Vengeance.

  Lust.

  “I need some help getting up,” he said softly. Didn’t want to scare her. He needed her closer. Needed to touch her. Sample her scent, and maybe even taste her. His body demanded it, and he was in no mood to deny it simple pleasures.

  She furrowed her forehead, and assessed him head to toe, or at least what she could see of him with the blanket atop his body. “You look rather heavy. Took two big guys to get you in here.”

  “I’m awake now. I can help a little.” He started to turn his body to the right, angling as if he were going to stand, but he didn’t want that blanket to fall away just yet. Already, she’d unpinned his superior control just by being in the room with him. Fairies were sexual beings—hypersexual, some would accuse—but arousal was usually something he could switch off if it was unwanted. At the moment, he couldn’t. Something was definitely wrong.

  Or right.

  She rolled up her sleeves and took a bracing breath. “Okay. We’ll give it a try.” She took the hand he extended to her, and braced her feet as if to prepare to pull, but he had no intention of getting up.

  Naturally, she wasn’t prepared for his quick, oppositional yank. He pulled her onto the bed, and pressed her body against his, still clutching her hand as he pressed his face into the crook of her neck.

  “Mr. Horan!”

  “Yes?” She smelled like the sea nearby, and faintly floral, but underneath that was a hint of that cloying essence all the Sídhe had. Hers was muted—muffled. She wasn’t full Sídhe, that was for sure, but she was enough Sídhe that he should have known what she was from a block away. Something was concealing it. Magic, or maybe…he sniffed her again.

  A curse? Curses always came with a sort of magical fingerprint from the caster. Some he saw again and again. The goddess Gefjon was a prolific curser, so a curse from her would have been easy to recognize. This wasn’t Gefjon’s work, though. Familiar, but not Gefjon.

  “Please let go of me,” she said.

  “Are you sure you want me to?” He let his energy lap against hers, tasting it. He determined it was exactly what he wanted, and perfectly calibrated for his needs.

  Of course.

  She half-pushed at him, and kneaded his chest when she wasn’t pushing. Obviously uncertain of the predicament.

  He lifted her arm and turned it over to study that gruesome scar. Naturally, it’d seem familiar. It was shaped like his sword. He’d recognize that silhouette anywhere, because that weapon had been especially crafted for him. He’d been wielding it for nearly all his life.

  A sign, and he knew signs. Depended on them. “How’d you get that?” He laid gentle kisses across it.

  She sucked in a little air, and tried—seemingly halfheartedly—to pull her arm back. “Um. Had a blackout during the last big storm. Candle tipped over from an unstable shelf as I walked past.”

  Poor dear. He could fix that, though. Jumpstart her healing. He just needed a boost of his own, first.

  “Listen, I’m running a little low on energy. Can I borrow some of yours? I promise to give it back.” He snaked his hand beneath her shirt hem and pressed it flat against her quivering belly. He yearned to push it lower, down into her waistband to feel more of her warmth, if she’d let him, but fought the compulsion. Instead, he slid his hand higher, between the mounds of her firm breasts and let it rest over her heart.

  She didn’t mind, but he’d guessed she wouldn’t. She was likely the kind of woman who’d smack him hard and expel him from her motel for him touching her without explicit permission, but he’d had to be sure. The signs were there, but he’d needed to touch her to know. He’d found his fated mate. The fact she was somehow cursed was just par for the course for his life. He’d expect no less.

  Her heart beneath his hand beat as fast as a hummingbird flapped its wings, and he worried, briefly, that he was doing her some harm. Then her hand squeezed his free one, and when she spoke her voice was strong and clear.

  “Unhand me, fairy-boy.”

  “Fairy-boy, eh? Someone’s been running his or her
mouth, I take it. Well, you don’t want me to do that.” He inhaled her scent and allowed himself a tiny taste of her salty skin with a flick of his tongue.

  She giggled at the tickle of her neck, and tried to pull back, but he held her firm by clamping her between his legs.

  “What I want doesn’t matter.” Her whole body quivered from his touch. From his lips. Just more confirmation, the way he saw it. “Good girls don’t fall into bed with naked men and let them do weird stuff to them,” she said.

  Was that a note of regret he heard in her voice? Well, it was a good thing he didn’t want a good girl. He wanted a girl who’d speak up. Hell, one who’d talk plenty of shit like all the rest of his crew. She would fit right in if she were a little nasty.

  “Define weird.” He skimmed fingertips down her spine and smiled at her ensuing shudder. So responsive. He’d have a lot of fun testing her limits.

  “I don’t want to give you any ideas,” she said.

  “Certainly, I would come up with some of my own eventually.”

  “What exactly do you need from me? I don’t have sex with strangers.”

  “We don’t have to have sex, but I think you’d really be missing out.”

  “Presumptuous bastard.”

  “I’ve been called worse.” He dragged his thumb across her waistband and grinned at her gasp.

  “I won’t do anything you refuse, but I need some help bouncing back. Just a little charge, and my body will do the rest. Get what it needs from the earth, water, and air. And food, when I feel like eating again. And we don’t have to be strangers. My name is Heath.” He spread the fingers of his right hand wide, so they splayed beneath her generous breasts.