by J. L. Madore
Heavily weighted odds get the adrenaline pumping.
Pounding these degenerate assholes is what I need to let off some steam and center myself. Nothing cleanses the soul like a good wholesome slaughter. I think Gandhi said that—I snort and piledrive a loser in the face—maybe not.
“Calli! Oh, no. Calli, can you hear me?”
The panic in the kid’s voice shifts my world. The kid has shifted and is trying to stop the hemorrhaging. My mate suffers because of these drow scum. They tried to take her from me before we’ve even begun.
Mind: fractures. Temper: rages. Control: snaps.
As a dozen rush me, a switch flips. I push my claws through the nailbeds of my fingers and Freddie Krueger the fuckers like you read about.
I duck as an ice bolt of frozen magic zings past my ear. Four more move in and flank me from all sides. One grabs my arm while two try to take me to the ground. Screw that.
I ram my claws into the fleshy belly of one and swipe left, hard and fast. As his insides become outsides, I slit the throat of the second, and then nail my hat trick with an uppercut of claws through the guy’s chin and up into his skull. That move, I stole straight from Wolverine.
Yep. Life imitating art.
As bodies continue to drop, I get into a mass-murdering groove. Violence flows through me with an ease that might chill a lesser male to the bone.
Me—nah—I’m in the zone, baby.
Grabbing the wrist of my last attacker, I spin the guy and twist him into a chokehold. One satisfying crack later and the drow falls to the heap with the others, his head hanging limp.
Hawk’s in hand-to-hand magical combat with the last man standing, and I raise a brow. Magical offensive abilities are beyond rare in the wildling world. What else don’t we know about our FCO king of the world?
I file that away for later and check the state of deadness of the fallen. We don’t want anyone rallying to get back up. Nope. All dead in a final death sorta way. Nice.
The sound of Harley motors revving at the side of the road highlights the hasty retreat of at least a few of the leather-clad losers. It’s too far to get there before they take off, but the important thing is that the good guys won.
Yay, team!
Kotah
I press my hands against the gaping tear in Calli’s side and try to staunch the bleeding at the base of her neck as well. “One of you, give me something to stop the blood flow!”
Hawk shreds his shirt, yanking it off his shoulders with the brute strength of a mate possessed. He checks that Brant is taking inventory of the dead drow and drops to his knees in the blood-soaked ground beside me. “She’ll be fine,” he says, pressing the expensive tatters against the damage. “Look. See, her wounds are already starting to heal.”
I stare at the carnage, willing him to be right. What does he see that I don’t? Hawk always sounds so cocksure and dictatorial it rakes over my nerves like broken glass. This time, I pray he knows as much as he thinks he does.
Calli must be all right. I only just found her and haven’t started to get to know her yet. I run my hands over the damage her body sustained. Legend states that phoenix healing powers are incredible. It’s not happening fast enough.
Closing my eyes, I use our fledgling connection to grasp the mating bond between us. Yes. I feel it. The avian is right. Calli’s injuries are knitting back together.
I try to rid my mind of the horrific images of Calli being beaten by the drow, but the brutality burns in my memory. The three of us raced from the edge of the blast zone as fast as paws and wings could carry us.
Calli was on fire when we arrived—literally on fire.
Thankfully, a hundred feet or more from the road, behind an abandoned shack surrounded by trees, no one could see what was happening. And if they did, they wouldn’t believe it.
Even knowing Calli is a phoenix, I hardly believe it.
By the Powers, she was magnificent… and then the horde of dark elves attacked from out of nowhere.
“Calli,” Brant says, joining us. The bear is huffing, his mighty chest heaving and covered with blood. He’s taken a few hits, but, like Hawk and I, is solely focused on our fallen mate. “Kid, tell me she’s alive.”
“She is,” I say, a small shiver of relief passing through me. “But she’s been through an ordeal.”
I tilt my head toward the trucker lying twenty feet away. He’s scorched extra crispy and it doesn’t take a Rhode Scholar genius to figure out what brought Calli back here and triggered her shift. The heat of her fury burned a twenty-foot radius of grass and scrub.
Brant growls. “If the filthy piece of shit wasn’t dead, I’d rip him to ribbons myself.”
I glance at the mangled corpses flung around the clearing and my respect for the bear ratchets up a few notches. For an easy-going rancher turned FCO enforcer, he is well on his way to proving himself a lethal guardian.
I wouldn’t want to go up against him.
A throaty moan lets off as Calli tries to squirm from my hold. “Calli, you’re safe. It’s Nakotah—we’ve got you.”
“My wolf,” she whispers, her eyes still closed. She relaxes and brushes my arm with soft fingers.
The gentle smile that graces her lips sends a pulse of heat over my skin and a wave of possession to the animal pacing within me. “Yes, Chigua, your wolf.”
Yours to claim. Yours to command. Yours to love.
“I hurt Jaxx,” she says, her voice choked. “Tell him I’m sorry. I never meant to—”
I pick the blood-matted hair from her cheek and frown. “You can tell him yourself. You’re healing. That’s all that matters. Rest now.”
“I’ve got cleanup,” Hawk says, his voice strained as he pulls out his phone. “You two take Calli back to the house. Once she’s cleaned up and well, we’ll regroup.”
Calli rouses and forces her eyes open. “No. I won’t go back to lick my wounds while those animals ship off their guns and get away with killing Riley.”
I glance up at the others to see if they know what she’s talking about. Brant blinks as blank-faced as I am.
Hawk, however, doesn’t miss a beat. He scowls, his icy, steel-gray eyes growing dark. “You are the priority, Spitfire. Your roommate is already dead. It does her no good for you to sacrifice—”
“No,” Calli says, struggling to sit. She winces when she moves and grabs her side. “If the Sovereign Sons are mixed up in your magic shifter world, Riley didn’t have a chance. How many other innocent girls will they kill? You don’t know these men like I do. They have to be stopped.”
“You almost died twice this week trying to avenge her,” Hawk snapped. “There’s only so much a nary is worth.”
Calli clasps my wrist and I understand immediately. I pull her to her feet and hold her steady. She burned off her clothes again. I try to not brush anything too intimate, but she’s slick with blood and it’s awkward to hold her up.
“Riley may be a worthless human to you, but she was my everything. She had my back from the day she came upon me on the street and I’m not about to repay that by letting those ice-ball wielding freaks in leather get away with it.”
“Drow,” Brant says. “A race of dark elves known for both their malicious intent and their ruthless disregard for life. I never thought I’d say this, but Hawk is right, beautiful. You going after them is too dangerous. Our job is to protect you, and that means you go back to the feline safehouse.”
Hawk offers the bear a quick nod. “That’s settled. I’ll have my team—”
“Whoa, wait. Nothing is settled.” Calli straightens and fights to stand on her own. I release her, remaining at the ready in case she swoons. “I may have lost my say in the turn my life took, but I never signed over my right to make my own decisions. From what I’ve heard, you work for me. Not the other way around.”
Hawk’s gaze is scathing, his jaw clenched tight. “How do we protect you if you refuse to stay out of harm’s way? If we work for your safety, let us
do our fucking job.”
She points and a shower of sparks spit off her fingertip. “Your job isn’t to pit yourself against me at every turn. Maybe it hasn’t sunk in yet, but I don’t back down. If we’re doing this phoenix thing, it’s a partnership not a dictatorship.”
The two of them standoff, glaring. Touching her, my gift picks up how difficult it is for Calli to bite back her anger.
Hawk’s chest expands on a deep sigh. “Very well, Spitfire. Tell me what you know, and we’ll assess the situation.”
Calli looks skeptical but relents. “Every six months the Sovereign Sons sell a shipment of girls and guns to some rich asshole who calls himself the Black Knight.”
Hawk stiffens, his gaze dark and volatile. “And what do you know about this Black Knight?”
“Nothing, really. Riley overheard Sonny’s guys talking in the bar where she worked. She went to the cops and they did nothing. They wanted more than drunken chatter in a bar. They said that if she came to them with something they could use, they would look into in. She got friendly with the patched members to find out more. Sonny must’ve figured that out because they brutalized her, killed her, and dumped her in an alley like garbage.”
“And that’s horrible for both of you,” Hawk says, his frown harsh. “I run a policing agency that takes care of things like this. If drow are affecting human lives negatively, that falls within FCO jurisdiction. There’s no need for you to put yourself into the crosshairs. I’ll put together a task force and take them down.”
“When? Next week? Next month? No. They know I’m alive. They know I’m coming for them. Tomorrow they’ll be in the wind and the girls they have will be lost. Riley died trying to stop that from happening. I’m going after the Sons. You can come with me or not, but there’s no scenario where I go back to a safehouse and wait.”
Hawk stiffens as if an invisible rod rammed up his posterior. “No matter how determined you are, you won’t be engaging in a battle with the drow. You are ill-equipped to defend yourself and too valuable to place in harm’s way.”
I agree with Hawk, but don’t speak out. The last thing Calli needs is for everyone to gang up on her. She needs an ally. “What if you oversee from nearby?” I suggest. “Allow Hawk’s team or us to handle the confrontation with the drow and you remain at a safe distance.”
She wets her lips and swallows as if she’s still in pain. “No. I need to go. Riley was my friend. I want to be the one to end Sonny’s reign.”
“Calli,” Brant starts, but Hawk breaks in.
“Tell me, sweet cheeks, do you plan to confront a horde of hostile drow naked? When you resurrected, your skin didn’t cool enough for clothes for three days. Will you swagger in alongside my men with your perky breasts swaying and your core exposed for all to see? I don’t fucking think so.”
I draw in a tight breath as Hawk’s eye flash gold and his animal surfaces. Even if we, as men, can pull off civility in this mating madness, our animals are possessive and protective beyond reason. The ferruginous hawk is the largest and most lethal of his species. Hawk is an aggressive and high-profile alpha male. Understandably, Calli’s suggestion pushes his limits.
The magical tension in the air is palpable. Hawk is fighting to keep his form. I can’t blame him. If my wolf had his way, I’d lay Calli on a cushioned pallet of silk and wrap myself around her forever.
“It’s likely moot anyway,” Brant says, holding up his large hands. “That was the first time you connected with your phoenix and shifted.”
Hawk snorts. “It was a partial shift at best. A true phoenix is fifteen feet tall and has a flaming wingspan of almost thirty feet.”
“Where the fuck is your remote, so I can mute you,” Brant snaps. “For a first shift, she held her form longer than anyone I’ve ever seen. For fuck’s sake she transitioned three days ago.”
“What does that have to do with me going after Sonny?”
Brant smiles at Calli. “Aren’t you exhausted? I slept for two days after my first shift. Most wildlings do.”
“No,” Calli says, shaking off Brant’s concern. “I’m fine and I’m going after Sonny. End. Of.”
Calli and Hawk remain locked in a glare of wills. Brant looks as if he’s run out of ideas. I open my mouth and hesitate… but no, I’m the omega in this group. Maybe it’s my purpose to calm the waters.
“A compromise,” I suggest. “Together we follow Calli’s direction and assess the danger. If there is a way to allow her closure, we escort her in and get out of there as quickly as possible. If there is imminent preternatural trouble, Calli will trust those better equipped to handle the drow and remain well out of harm’s way.”
The deadlock of the power struggle fizzles out as Calli releases her fists. “Fine. I’ll accept that.”
The others might not be close enough to smell the lie, but I do. Our phoenix isn’t content to sit on the sidelines.
“You’re too stubborn for your own good,” Hawk snaps. “You know nothing of the dangers of our world, you’re untrained, and if you die, what happens to us?”
A icy shiver runs the length of my spine at the thought.
Calli juts her chin. “I get that you don’t think much of me, but if I’m supposed to be a fae savior, I won’t start out by hiding while others fight my battles. You don’t know me yet, but no one fights my battles except me.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Calli
For the second time in two days, I wake in a strange place, naked, and wrapped in the fire blanket. This time, though, I’m in a moving vehicle and remember most of what happened. It isn’t a clear memory of something I did, more like a distant record of events, detached from me. A movie playback of scenes I watched a week or two ago. It was me, but not me.
It’s enough to make it clear that whatever threshold I crossed when I resurrected as a phoenix, there is no going back. My new normal is bizarre and dangerous and—not all bad—filled with sexy, great-smelling men.
They need to realize I run my own life, though.
“Hey, you’re awake,” the young wolf says, smiling down at me as I drool on his collared shirt. The two of us are in the middle bench seat of Hawk’s SUV, with the bear snoring in the shotgun seat and Hawk driving. “How are you feeling?”
I push up and swipe a hand across my cheek to dry my face. “Like my life got hijacked and now everyone thinks they have a say in who I am and what I do.” He flinches and I regret the snark. “Sorry. I’m cranky.”
Kotah shrugs but it’s obvious I hit a nerve.
“How long until we get to the address I gave you?”
Hawk meets my gaze in the reflection of the rear-view mirror and fragments of our standoff last night drift into my mind. “An hour, maybe an hour and ten. I’ll pull over beforehand so we can wake up and stretch. Then, I’ll fly ahead and see what we’re dealing with. My recon team arrived there half an hour ago and are assessing the scene. They are trained and capable to handle this.”
“But they’ll wait until we arrive, right?”
Hawk shoots me is too raw for my comfort. He doesn’t like me. And more than that, he doesn’t like that I refuse to let him set the rules of my life.
Tough titty.
A soothing touch on my arm accompanies a wave of soothing energy. “Your shoulders healed nicely.”
I turn my attention back to Kotah and follow his gaze to the rounds of my shoulders. He’s right. The damage done by Mischief’s bite and the wooden spike are both healed with no trace that I was ever hurt. “How is that possible?”
“Phoenix have unprecedented healing abilities,” Kotah says, his gaze is reverent. I catch him staring and his gaze jerks away as his cheeks flush. “You are very special.”
My wolf has a kind soul and a gentle air. His hair wafts in the breeze from the open window and it’s like he’s posing for an erotic male model magazine. But better—live and in person—I can smell, touch, and maybe even taste him. Shifting back to where I woke against his shoulder,
I inhale deeply and pull his earthy forest scent deep into my lungs.
My cells expand and burst awake inside me. “Thank you for supporting me back there. I… uh, appreciate you trying to find a compromising solution.”
He dips his chin. “I’m sorry about your friend. It sounds like she was brave and driven, like you. I’m sure the two of you together were quite a force to be reckoned with.”
I stare out the deeply tinted window and sigh. “Riley was stubborn and fun and crazy and impossible to predict. She lived every moment like it was a precious gift.”
“It takes a great deal of courage to live like that.”
He’s right. Riley was fearless. If I was more like her, sitting here next to Kotah, I wouldn’t hold back.
Riley never held back.
I’m so incredibly drawn to him. I yearn to brush a hand down the side of his face. His copper skin looks warm and inviting like it was kissed by a sun god. His features are strong and regal yet, of the four of them, he seems the most self-deprecating. He’s a delightful mystery.
Despite him looking like a college junior, he hasn’t once acted or spoken like a kid. He seems to have a wise old soul. Several times, I’ve noticed the others pose a question and turn to him as if expecting him to hold the answers.
“What were you saying to me, last night?” I ask, straightening in my seat. I stop refusing my need for a connection of skin-to-skin and drop my hand toward his. The second our fingers twine, a zing of pure need rushes through me and takes root in my heart.
Jaxx was right. Simply touching brings the rightness of our connection into reality. Poor Jaxx. It sickens me that I hurt him, that I refused this connection with him, that I betrayed his trust and left him bleeding all alone.
I swallow and push that into the ‘fix later’ pile. Right here and right now, I need to focus on something positive. “You were speaking to me while I dozed off a few hours ago, but I didn’t understand the words.”
Kotah ducks his head and pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “I recited what I remember of the legend of the phoenix. It’s a story the children of my nation hear around the fire at equinox celebrations. You are a living symbol of inspiration. The arrival of the phoenix signals the possibility of uniting StoneHaven with those living here with the humans—a reconnection with our ancestry and inherent powers.”