The Hunters Series

by Shiloh Walker

  Oh, yes. Tiffany Morgan was going to suffer.

  * * *

  “Shadoe Wallace,” she whispered, staring at her reflection.

  “My name is Shadoe Wallace.”

  Tiffany no longer felt like her. Tiffany had lived in fear, in solitude for the past five years. Before that, she had been a wallflower, always on the outskirts, never one of the crowd. But now…

  She was no longer the wallflower.

  Staring at her reflection, nearly two weeks after Ben Cross had opened her eyes to life, Shadoe barely recognized herself.

  She had taken a lover.

  She walked down the streets with her head up and she didn’t feel like running at any small sound, or whenever somebody looked at her sideways.

  Small sounds at night didn’t send her into a panic attack.

  She felt free.

  She felt…she felt like a witch.

  Shadoe Wallace.

  Tiffany Morgan was long gone.

  And she liked who she saw staring at her from the mirror.

  Lifting her hands, she cupped them in front of her face and breathed magic into them, the latest little power Ben had shown her. She could watch her entire life in her hands, from her birth, to now. And she could focus her thoughts on one person, somebody she knew, and be one with that person.

  Leandra.

  A guard at the prison who had befriended her.

  A remembered favorite teacher.

  Ben, that slow, sexy smile and the gold of his gleaming eyes… She sighed as his image shimmered into focus within her mind. Mmmm…Ben…

  He was so amazing, so…magical.

  And he thought she was magic.

  How amazing was that?

  “This is a rare gift. I can focus on a person long enough to link with that person for short periods. You can actually merge with them, be one with them. Follow their thoughts back to birth, know their deepest secrets,” he had whispered as his magic hands—some unseen touch of his—guided her through it. “You have to respect it, though. It’s not something to take for granted. Don’t abuse it.”

  “It’s a responsibility,” she murmured. One she couldn’t abuse.

  “Yes. It is. Not many understand that, and that’s what makes you different, makes you more.”

  As she drifted now, she touched lightly on the minds of those she passed, never really intruding, just testing herself, refining the ability.

  She’d need it desperately one day, she suspected.

  A sudden jolt of terror filled her, a foul evil touch that locked her breath in her lungs, and turned her belly to ice.

  A scent, one that she logically shouldn’t be able to place, flooded her mind. It wasn’t something she was actually smelling, in the here and now, but something else.

  A scream filled her mind. Terrified, pain-filled, hideous.

  Alone in her room, she pressed her hands to her temples and struggled to block it out, and her eyes fell on the mirror.

  It was a good thing the terror had frozen her lungs.

  Otherwise, she would have screamed. Pure bloody murder.

  It wasn’t her reflection she saw, wasn’t her room in the mirror.

  It was Marcus. She could see him, but only because he was standing next to a mirror as he lifted his hand, a hideous, leaded cat-o’-nine-tails held in his grip, and he brought it down on the back of a person.

  Too bloodied, too broken for the sex to be easily determined, the person cowered and screamed and moaned under the lash of the evil whip.

  Hands came up to grip her shoulders, but before she could whirl around, screaming and terrified, a soft, gentle growl of a voice whispered, “Shhh… It’s a merging. A deep one. His fury opens his being up to you.”

  Ben’s warm, protective presence at her back steadied her and she whispered, “How do I stop it?”

  His voice was odd, questioning, when he asked, “Stop the merging? Is that what you really want? Or do you want to stop him?”

  Shadoe couldn’t stop the whimper in her throat any more than she could stop the shudder of fear that racked her. “Stop him? I can’t. Don’t you know what he did to me? What he could have done?”

  His hands rubbed soothing circles on her shoulders and he said, “Yes. I know. But then, you didn’t know what you could do.”

  His words ran through her, sending a frisson of something unrecognizable skittering down her spine. Heat sparked in her gut, unfurling and spreading through her before she even recognized it as anger. Wind blew around her, whipping her hair about her face as she continued to stare through the window of the mirror she was still bound to. Around one blood-streaked wrist, she saw a charm bracelet, silver, thin and delicate. Delicate, like the wrist.

  He was beating a woman, beating her bloody.

  And the way his mouth curved up at one corner, she knew he was enjoying it. Rage flooded her. Heat spilled through her, rolling like a river, building and building, but she didn’t know how to focus it. Sending a pretty ball of visions wouldn’t do shit against him. Her skin started to ache and she whimpered softly. “It hurts—” she choked out. “Why does it hurt?”

  “You just don’t know how to release it,” Ben said slyly. “I do.” He slid his hands from her shoulders to her hands as his power slid inside and mingled with hers, his magic guiding, taking hers. “Watch.”

  He cupped her power. She could think of no other way to describe it. He cupped her power in her hands and forged a solid beam of magicked heat that he then urged her to focus on Marcus. “Now…you know what to do.”

  She opened the bowl of her hands, both psychic and physical.

  As Marcus lifted the whip to strike the helpless, bloodied girl again, Shadoe released it.

  Her eyes could see little, just a ripple like the heat shimmering above pavement. But she could feel it inside as it burst from her, leaping toward Marcus, through the distance that separated them.

  And she watched through the mirror as it struck him, knocking him off his feet, charring the front of his shirt with the heat of the power, sending him careening back into the wall behind him. Her gaze narrowed as it landed on the whip he still clutched. Cocking her head, she studied the whip. She wanted it wrapped around him, the leather biting into his skin, cutting him. A short, startled scream left her lips as the whip snaked up with a life of its own and wrapped around Marcus even as he swore and struggled against it. Big, powerful hands gripped the lashes and tried to keep it from him, but still it constricted, tighter and tighter.

  “Sweet heaven,” she whispered shakily. Behind her, she could feel Ben’s approval as he wrapped his arms around her and hugged her tight.

  Marcus was jerking against his bonds, swearing furiously, wrapped from shoulders to toe in leather. More leather than the whip had been made of, and still it continued to enshroud him, until not one untouched inch from the shoulders down existed.

  “Fucking pathetic, sniveling little bastard—come out and face me,” he snarled, the bones in his face rippling.

  “He’s trying to change,” Ben said quietly. “Do you feel it coming on him?”

  She could, but only distantly. The power was raw, primal. Alien, yet somehow familiar. Something inside her stirred, and frightened, Shadoe shoved it all away from her.

  “I’ll be damned…” Ben whispered.

  The bones in Marcus’ face, elongating, a muzzle forming, froze in mid-shift and they watched as it was absorbed back into his skin, sliding in like water.

  “You stopped his shift. His power, I feel it, you displaced it somehow.” The low, gravelly words were soft, awe-filled. She could feel his pleasure warming her like the sun.

  “Who the fuck are you?” Marcus bellowed, and she watched as fear entered in his eyes.

  Unable to stop herself, she moved forward, toward her mirror and reached out, laying her hand on it, feeling it ripple under her palm.

  “Don’t you know?” she asked coolly.

  The jolt of his eyes struck her to the soles of
her feet, but she refused to show the fear that bubbled inside her along with her rage.

  “Forgotten me already? I never forgot you,” she said flatly.

  Ben couldn’t stop the smirk that curved his lips as he stared at Marcus through the mirror, struggling against the leather bonds, and snarling furiously. Marcus could see them now.

  “Fucking whore, stupid bitch,” he spat, his eyes gleaming maniacally.

  “Touch her again and I’ll tear you apart,” she whispered, ignoring him, not listening to the fear roiling in her gut. Her eyes went to the bloodied mess of the woman and her heart skittered.

  She wasn’t breathing anymore.

  Marcus started to laugh. “Your threat is a little late, Tiffany,” he said in a singsong voice. “The little bitch’s body was too weak. She’s gone, chasing after her tail in the great beyond.”

  Rage ripped through Ben, but he lashed it down, chained it up tight. The Wolf inside him struggled against the bonds Ben slammed down, keeping the animal hidden. Death. They both wanted the man dead.

  “You’re going to pay,” Shadoe whispered raggedly. Her hands slipped from the mirror and she asked in a voice thick with tears, “I want him out of my head.”

  Cupping her face in his hands, Ben focused on the bond that merged Marcus to Shadoe. Through it, he could feel Marcus’ torment of her as he jeered, “I’m going to live inside your head, fuck that mind that you opened to me. I’m gonna make you suffer, Tiffany.”

  “My name is Shadoe,” she rasped as her eyes met Ben’s.

  “Good girl,” Ben murmured as he simply severed the link between them.

  At the severing of the link, the strength seemed to evaporate from Shadoe and she stumbled against him, air burning in and out of her throat. “Good girl,” Ben again whispered against her ear. “That’s my Shadoe.”

  * * *

  The leather was wound so tightly, biting deeply into his flesh that Marcus couldn’t get the leverage he needed to tear it. Shifting would have done it, the larger mass of the wolf simply shredding the leather as it exploded out of his human form.

  But she had done something.

  Blocked the animal inside.

  “You are the animal…” a soft, disgusted voice said. It was a familiar voice, one that Marcus either ignored or abused, depending on his mood.

  “Shut up, you old dog,” he spat at the Wolf. Try as he might, he couldn’t rid himself of that sly, snivelling wolf that had come along with the ability to shift. It was the creature his shifter abilities had come from.

  “Oh, you could rid yourself of me. Find a silver bullet,” the Wolf taunted nastily.

  “You shouldn’t want me so easily dead—if I die, you die,” Marcus growled, struggling to find the path that would lead to the Wolf’s power and let him shift and tear free of the leather binding. How could there be so much? The lashes of the cat had been less than eight feet long. He had so much leather hugging him, he could hardly breathe, and his body was growing slick with sweat.

  The soft chuffing sound of the Wolf’s laughter filled him and the Wolf said, “If only you knew how wrong you are. If only you had learned as much of me as I have learned from you. I cannot die. I simply am. So I can wish for the end of your pathetic life and stay alive and well.”

  Marcus had the impression of something big and wolf-like studying him as he lay struggling, so he snarled, “Stop fucking watching me! Give me the wolf back. She stopped me from changing…or was it you?” Marcus cocked his head and hissed, “It is you…the little bitch couldn’t. You did something.”

  More chuffing, and the Wolf’s laughter echoed in his mind once more. “You are such a stupid thing. How did my power land inside you.”

  Marcus struggled within his leather cocoon as he shouted out in fury, “Give him back.”

  The Wolf laughed dryly. “I did not take him. And truly, neither did she. She just…split the two of you. You’ll have to find a way to get him back yourself.”

  Then there was total silence as the Wolf withdrew, ignoring all of Marcus’ demands and furious cursing.

  The fury inside his gut ate a burning hole in it as he threw back his head and roared.

  Of course, none alive were there to hear him. The Alpha had retreated, pulling back from his clan. The betas hid or chased the bitches.

  Well, just one bitch to chase now. The other lay dead just inches from him. The one who could have freed him, he sulked. Stupid whore. If she had just done what she was supposed to—

  Not that Marcus really knew what she could have done to lessen his rage.

  The last bitch was probably pressed between the two betas, when they should have been watching Tiffany. With a last, furious jerk, he stopped fighting and lay there.

  Stewing, fuming, his anger roiling inside him.

  When Sam finally finished cutting through the leather binding him, she scurried away on her hands and knees, her shoulder-length hair spilling around her shoulders as she trembled with fear.

  She should have stayed with Linus. Stupid, stupid bitch…always running your mouth, she thought furiously, lowering her head and waiting for the beating to start.

  “Get up, you little cunt,” he snarled, striding by her. He had resolved not to kill this one. He needed the remaining wolves as extra eyes.

  And fodder.

  Just in case the Wolf hadn’t lied.

  And until he had Tiffany cowering under him, for good this time, he needed the wolf bitch around. He didn’t fancy going without pussy indefinitely.

  Sam couldn’t stop the surprised gasp that left her, but she sure as hell didn’t stay huddled on the floor. If he changed his mind, she could run faster if she was already on her feet.

  Chapter Six

  Linus didn’t like the way the woman looked at him.

  Her amber eyes, almond-shaped, exotic and cool, narrowed on his face. Behind her, Jude was held motionless, his eyes half-empty, his body sitting limply in the chair.

  If it wasn’t for the occasional rise and fall of his chest, Linus would have thought his former second was dead.

  How in the fuck had he managed to end up under the eyes of a Hunter? He’d gotten himself out of that situation, damn it.

  “Well, now… What have we here?” the tall, lean witch asked, her eyes narrowed, her husky, softly accented voice stroking down his spine like silk dipped in poison. Deadly.

  She was deadly.

  “My man there, he has your stink on his skin,” she mused, lowering the cup she had been drinking black tea from. “I oughta know, I’ve been smelling that foul stench for two weeks now.”

  She cocked her head, thick black braids falling over one shoulder as she studied him. “You know him. I saw that in your eyes when you walked in here. You didn’t run, though. I have to wonder why.”

  Linus sighed, shoving a hand through his hair. “Would it have done any good? You can’t run from a Hunter. They will find you. You have to hope to not be noticed by them, witch.”

  He lowered himself into the seat across from her and waited with a cocked brow. At least death from a Hunter would be quick, and more merciful than anything Marcus could offer.

  Two weeks away from him, and still Linus wondered if the bastard was going to come after him.

  The woman laughed, the husky sound falling from her lips without amusement. “I’m not a Hunter,” she said, shaking her head. The wooden beads on the end of her braids clacked together as she leaned forward.

  His brow pinched and he shook his graying head. “I’ve never seen anybody more clearly a Hunter. And I’ve hidden from a lot.”

  “Whatever,” she said, shrugging. Under the black straps of the camisole she wore with her jeans, her shoulders gleamed a soft mellow gold, rounded, firm with muscle.

  “If you’re not a Hunter, then what are you doing with him? He a date?” Linus asked sarcastically, sliding his gaze to his ex-pack mate. “He needs to liven up some, but since I know him, I know this isn’t his normal behavior. I’d say h
e is drugged. Or bespelled.”

  “Oh, he definitely is not a lively boy,” she chuckled. “Not since he tried to lay his filthy hands on me once we left Cross and his new lady. He thought that a lone witch was weak. Eh, he is a man, of course. I could forgive his stupidity.” She smirked. “I just chose to take offense instead. He’s bespelled, all right. Chasing his tail, caught in the maze of his own mind. So now, he is like a baby, and I must lead him everywhere we go. No wonder it is taking so damned long.”

  “Why do I not think you are just being figurative?” Linus murmured, tugging on his short, iron gray goatee, stroking his mustache.

  “Maybe because you be a bit smarter then he is,” she suggested.

  “Smart… If I was smart, I would have taken off running the minute that bastard stepped foot into my town. I thought I could wait it out, that he’d get bored and leave. But he wants the little witch,” Linus murmured, rubbing his hands over his face, lifting tired eyes to study the menu painted on the wall. One last meal…in a hole in the wall diner.

  Cocking a winged brow, she asked, “What witch?”

  “Her name is Tiffany Morgan. She just got out of jail for killing a man—self-defense, plain and simple, but they put her away for six years in the next town over,” he said. “Some college punk, a werewolf that I ignored for the most part, attacked her in Buxley. I knew him, vaguely. Knew the wolf that bit him. And I remember reading about the mess in the paper. He was an infected wolf, not a born one, and young, stupid. When he tried to rape her, she killed him. She moved here once she got out of jail, on the outskirts of town. Looking for peace, I imagine. She won’t find it there. Not with Marcus around.”

  The witch stilled, cocking her head. “Marcus…”

  “Have you been unlucky enough to make his acquaintance?”

  “No. No, I haven’t—but his name, it stills something inside of me. The Council… I have an urge to share his name with them,” she said, her voice wry. “Just the sound of one man’s name. Why is that?”

  He suspected she was talking more to herself than him. But still…