by Claudy Conn
She had gone wolfen.
He ducked into an alley and shifted into wolf.
Yes, he had been something of a player, but the moment he saw Zoie, those days had come to a screeching stop. He had been telling the blonde just that when Zoie walked into the Wolfe’s Den.
He knew what it looked like. His hands had been on the woman’s hips, but he was pushing her away, not bringing her in.
Zoie would have to believe him. She would just have to believe him. She was his future mate, and he meant to make her understand that fact once and for always.
Oh hell, he could still see the look in her beautiful blue eyes. Shock, hurt…so much hurt. He had done that simply by not getting rid of the blonde faster.
He put his nose to the ground, but got nothing. Where had she taken off from?
He made his way down an alley and found her scent, put his nose skyward and got a direction.
His speed, both as a vamp or a wolf, was exceptional, and he had developed that skill over the years. It didn’t take him long to find her, but what he saw made him bellow out a howl.
He saw his brave little silver wolf tear off a demon’s head, but before he could reach her, two remaining demons were on her. He saw the claws extend and slash across his beautiful silver wolf’s back.
He howled ferociously and went on the attack, making short work of one demon, chasing down and tearing apart the other.
He turned, his belly full with fear before he transformed into human.
Zoie, still wolfen, lay on the ground, semi-conscious and dying.
There was nothing he could do and what he could do was unthinkable and might not even work. How could he lose her? She was his intended mate. He had been searching for her all his life. How could he allow her to be taken from him?
He held her in his arms and rocked her as she descended into unconsciousness. Her body transformed into human and he groaned. “Baby, stay in your wolf form…you will be better able to fight off the toxin.” But he knew that was a lie. The demon’s poison would kill her whether she was in wolf or human form.
She began to shake. Her body was writhing as her agony took over. He had nothing to cover her with, so he held her to himself as he cried out in pain, “Why…why let me find her and then take her away!”
He pressed her limp form against himself and his voice was anguished. “Baby, baby, the poison is killing you. Please forgive me. I can’t lose you. This is not what I wanted. I swear, I never wanted to do this to you, but I can’t let you die. I have to try…I just have to.”
The next thing he did was bear his fangs and bite into his own wrist, putting his free flowing blood to her lips. His open wound would close quickly, but not before he got enough of his blood into her system.
As he bled into her throat, he told her, “Drink, drink deep, sweetheart, for me, for you…just…” He didn’t finish the sentence as he stood up, with her naked, shaking body cradled in his arms. He went vampire and at super vamp speed, headed for her family home.
He crashed through the kitchen door where her mother, father, and Ralphie were standing, involved in some kind of heated debate.
They stopped and her mother ran forward, taking a coat off the hook and draping it over her daughter as Ralphie took off his shirt and held it out towards Owen.
Owen laid her on the kitchen floor, took the shirt and shrugged into it. He was larger than Ralphie and couldn’t get it buttoned. All at once, he saw Zoie open her eyes for just a moment and heard her whisper, “Owen…” before she passed out.
Her body was soaked in her own blood under the jacket that covered her and she was shaking uncontrollably. Her mother rushed and covered her with a blanket. Ralphie was out of the room for a second, returning with sweat pants for Owen.
“What? How?” Belva cried as she stroked her daughter’s face.
“Red Demons! She slaughtered two of them, but there were four. I didn’t get there in time and one of the two demons left standing clawed her…they are all dead now,” Owen said, and he heard the rawness in his voice. He could see the poison was already taking its toll. He knew it and couldn’t do anything other than what he had already done.
There was no telling when she would die, but die—she would.
Owen heard and saw her family fall apart as they gathered around her on the floor. He pulled on the clothes Ralphie had thrown to him, and went down beside Zoie. He had to hold her.
He didn’t care what her family thought. He had to hold her, and he took her into his arms and kissed her forehead. “Please, baby, stay with me.”
He knew what Raymond Bracken’s reaction would be when he told them what he had done, but he had to tell them. “Sir…I couldn’t let her die. I know you don’t want to hear this. I know you have something against hybrids, but the only way I could save her…and there is no guarantee that her heart will accept my blood, but it is what I did. I gave her my blood.”
Raymond grabbed Owen by his shirt and pulled the hybrid away from his daughter. Owen allowed it. He stood staunchly, giving no resistance. He could see the pain Zoie’s father was going through.
“You did what? You…”
“Sir, forgive me, but do you hate hybrids so much that you would rather she die? With my blood, she has a chance.”
Zoie’s mother had collapsed in a heap and Ray turned away from Owen to hold and comfort his wife.
Ralphie listened to all this before he nodded his approval to Owen and put his forehead to his sister’s. “You did good, hybrid. You did good.”
Zoie’s older brother, Brock, rushed into the kitchen from outside just at that moment. He had heard Zoie’s howl, and had arrived on the bloody scene to see four decapitated demons.
Owen was once again down on his knees beside Zoie and watched as Ralphie brushed some of her hair away from her face.
“Zoie…this is me, Ralphie,” he told her limp form. “Listen, sis, new blood is flowing inside of you…hybrid blood. Accept it. Nothing is going to change who you are. You are Zoie Bracken, shifter supreme. Aren’t you always telling me…you are shifter supreme? Come on, Zoie…please…” His voice broke up, and when he realized that she was no longer breathing, Ralphie cried like a baby.
Zoie’s mother wailed into her husband’s shoulder as her oldest son tried to comfort her.
Ralphie and Owen each took one of Zoie’s hands and Owen murmured, “Now, Zoie…feel it flow into you now…come on…come on, Zoie.”
Nothing.
“She is dead,” Ralphie shouted.
“Yes, but if my blood takes…she will wake up.”
“Still dead,” Ralphie said.
“Not quite,” Owen answered. “Now, shut up and let me help her.”
Zoie remained in place, not a muscle fluttering as Owen scooped her to himself. “Please, Zoie, come back to me,” he whispered. Then for all the world to hear, he shouted, “ZOIE!”
But she remained still and unmoving. He rocked with her in his arms and blotted out the pain he heard all around him. “Zoie…please. I need you. Come back to me.”
And her eyelids flashed and opened. Zoie’s blue eyes were bright with life.
Chapter Eight
ZOIE FELT LIFE spin through her body. A surge of power swept through her veins. Everything smelled stronger and she stared at her family, crying and laughing all at once. What was going on? What happened?
Her mother was on the floor beside her, collapsing on Zoie’s stomach as she cried and laughed and cried some more.
Really? WTF?
“What…happened?” she managed to ask, but even as the words formed, she recalled the demon slashing through her fur. She remembered the pain as the poison hit every nerve in her body.
Still on her back, she stared at the ceiling while images raced through her brain. Red Demons in Human Glamour took front and center. She was in the woods…running, going to Carrie. What happened after that was a blur. Yes, oh yes, she had killed two of them when they attacked.
Again, the memory of the claws digging into her body made her cringe now.
A Big Bad Wolf—Owen, had come to her rescue, again. He was always coming to her rescue. He must have carried her home when she passed out. She must have passed out because she couldn’t recall the trip home.
Faces swirled above her. Her mother, father, brothers, but someone had her in his arms. Who?
Owen’s face. Oh yeah, she remembered now. His cheating, no good, son of a bitch face was near her own as he put his forehead to hers and said, “Baby…ah baby.”
She started to move and snapped, “Off…off me, you…you...”
She was cut short when he started to laugh and his laughter shook his body. He seemed so relieved, so…what the hell was going on?
Her family began talking. All of them, all at once. She couldn’t understand anything they were saying, then they began hooting and howling.
Again, what the fuck? She glared at Owen. “You…get out of here. You are a cheating…”
He cut her off, “No, baby, wait. I know this is going to sound lame, but this time, it is true. It wasn’t what you thought. I was pushing her off…ask Aric. He was there the entire ten minutes she was all over me.”
“So it was what I thought. She was all over you, and what—the Big Bad Wolf couldn’t push a little blonde off himself?” Zoie sat up and realized she was wearing only a jacket and saw the green blanket had slipped and pulled it up to cover her nakedness.
She held the blanket to herself even as Owen reached to keep it from slipping again. With her free hand, she smacked his away.
Her mother clapped with glee and threw herself into her husband’s arms. “She is alive and she is Zoie.” She turned her head and bent to touch Owen’s shoulder. “Thank you.”
Zoie’s eyes narrowed. “What is going on? I remember taking down two of the scaly bastards…” she gasped and said, “Dad…they must have found a way to open the portal.”
Brock nodded. “Yeah, little sis, they did, but as of now, Lael has it closed up again.”
“It was a test,” Owen said. “The next time they open it, and they will, they’ll open it wider, and then wider still, to allow more of their forces through.”
“You know this, how?” Zoie’s father asked.
Owen shrugged. “Common sense makes me draw that conclusion, but knowing their goal is to conquer this realm, confirms it.”
Zoie’s brow was furrowed as she sank into deep thought. “Wait…one of them clawed me…I got sick and passed out. I thought their poison was fatal to us?”
“It is, baby. I don’t know how to tell you this but straight out. You died, Zoie,” Owen said, and slid his hand down her arm and rested it there. “But before you died from the demon poison, I gave you my blood.”
Stunned, too stunned to even remove his hand, Zoie sucked in a load of air. No one spoke or broke the attending silence as they waited for her to react to this news.
“So, you gave me your blood, hybrid blood,” she finally said. “And it brought me back to life as…a hybrid?”
“Yes…don’t hate me, Zoie. I didn’t know if it would work. Hybrids don’t usually meet with success when they try and turn a human. I wasn’t sure if you already being wolf would allow your blood to mingle with mine successfully, but I couldn’t let you go. I just couldn’t. I had to try.”
“I was dead and now I am alive, but I am a hybrid,” Zoie said. Everyone went very still as Zoie thought this out.
She came to grips with the information and frowned before asking, “So, now what? I have to drink blood? Eweee, yuck, ugh.” Her tongue moved into gagging motion.
Her brothers laughed nervously. Her parents stood apart, seriously contemplating this.
Owen put his hand to her back and softly rubbed. She made no attempt to remove herself from his touch as she mentally clicked off her analysis of this new development to herself.
“I’ll get you through it, baby. I promise. You see, I wasn’t turned. I was born a hybrid and have never had a craving for human blood. I have never had human blood in my system. The blood I gave you—my blood, wasn’t tainted and I believe your body accepted it for that reason. The fact that you are my destined and fated mate might also be a factor. You have nothing to worry about. You will never crave human blood.”
“How does that work, exactly? Being born a hybrid?” Ralphie asked, and everyone pulled up chairs.
Zoie watched Owen Slade and said, “You don’t have to tell us anything.”
“Yes, yes, I do.”
She pushed out of his arms and he helped her to her feet, seeing her seated before he pulled up a chair beside her and put his elbows on his knees.
Everyone waited and finally he sat back and said, “I have never told anyone about my past,” he looked at Zoie, “but you are my mate…”
She cut him off, “Who says?”
He grinned. “I do, and you know it in your heart.” He waved a hand towards the people all eyeing them with keen interest. “This is your family, your pack, and therefore, we, you and I, start now—no secrets.”
* * * * *
He started slowly, saying each word quietly. “I never knew my parents. I was raised by a mortal witch who had befriended them. In our world, my mother had been a wolf shifter, her mate a vampire, but not a turned vampire. He was born a vampire and quite a respected oddity in their realm. My father was chosen—elected as ruler. His opponent didn’t take the loss well. Apparently, his opponent enlisted a supernatural to open a portal to my parents’ private dwelling, and he managed with the supernatural’s help to physically shove them through that portal. They landed here, in the Human Realm, many, many years ago.” He waited a moment and continued, “A witch, Deliah, witnessed their arrival and befriended them. I was conceived and born here and as far back as I can remember, she was the only mother I knew.”
“Why? What happened to your parents here?” Zoie asked, reaching out for his hand.
“When Deliah finally got the portal opened, they had no way of knowing that it would only accept the original transfers—my parents. I was three months old when they stepped inside the portal for home, with me wrapped in a blanket in my mother’s arms. It sucked them through and spit me out.”
A gasp went around the room. Owen waited a moment, cleared his throat, and continued, “Deliah caught me and raised me while both of us waited for them to find a way back. They never did. End of story. But she—Deliah, was the best mother anyone could ever hope to have, so don’t think I was neglected in any conceivable way.”
Everyone sat back. No one spoke as they digested all of this.
Except Zoie, he thought, bless her for she turned the subject off him and said, “So vamps in your world don’t drink human blood?”
He grinned. “As I understood it, no.”
“What about human type beings—do they exist in your world?”
“Yes, but Deliah told me my parents said they were called temps.”
“Temps?”
“They are mortal, we—shifters, vampires and supernaturals from my realm are immortal.”
“Huh.” Zoie frowned. “Wait…so now…I have your blood…and what am I, mortal or immortal?”
“Not sure, Zoie. This is new to me and some things we have to learn as we go along,” he answered softly. He wanted to take her in his arms and show her how he felt, but how could he with her entire family looking over his shoulder?
“Okay,” Zoie said. “You saved my life. You do that a lot, but this time you gave me a whole new one to live. Fine, but I have some whole other meat I mean to chew and spit out, right now.” She eyed him. “Let’s get back to the blonde who was all over you and me not really seeing you push her off!”
“Zoie, she was someone I knew before you. She saw me in the Wolfe’s Den talking to Aric. I didn’t even notice her until she was throwing her arms around me. One minute not there, the next she was, and her flirtation—I swear was one-sided.” He crossed his chest. “I swear,” he repeat
ed. “Please, Zoie, I know what you think—that I was a player drifting from town to town and woman to woman. While I was a traveler, I really wasn’t that kind of man. Sure, I have been with women. I am red-blooded and I was until recently,” he eyed her meaningfully, “a free agent, but I would never treat a woman I have known cruelly. I didn’t want to embarrass her, but I very clearly told her I belonged to someone…you! And I told her that I don’t cheat or want to cheat.”
Zoie seemed to consider this and said, “Yeah, well, next time, buddy, some old flame comes on to you, be cruel. Shove her off your body and walk away or you won’t have me to ‘not cheat on’.”
Brock and Ralphie gave each other high fives. Ralphie laughed and said, “See, Dad, you have nothing to worry about. Sis is in control.”
Owen grimaced and looked at her father, and then her brothers. “Your daughter—sister, is as you can see, feisty and well. I hope you will forgive me, but I need some time alone with her.” So saying, he had Zoie wrapped in the blanket and once again in his arms and with hybrid speed, was outta there!
Chapter Nine
IT DIDN’T TAKE him more than five minutes before he stopped at a large cedar home.
Zoie’s eyes swept over the place with interest. How was it she had never noticed this place before? She loved the large panorama windows, although they needed serious cleaning, and the wraparound front porch needed major sweeping.
A further scan told her that the landscaping had also been sadly neglected for a long time and what had once been a front lawn in the middle of pine woods was now overgrown weeds.
And even so, Zoie stared at the house and fell in love with it. “Where…whose place is this?”
“It belonged to a human family who had a job take them out of state. Timing is everything,” he answered on a grin.
She slapped Owen in the chest and pushed off him. “Why did you bring me here?”
“Zoie, I bought this place the day after I looked at you in Aric’s place. I marked you, I know, without your permission. I couldn’t help myself and I believed you wanted me as well. I want you. I know you are my mate. I think you know it as well. I want to marry you and raise little hybrids, as many as you want. All I want in this world is to be with you.”