by Leah Blake
Something deadly flashed behind those crystal clear eyes of the beast when Mik tore his attention away from Nico. He wanted to recoil, but kept his dignity about him.
“Who are you?” Mik asked.
“Raul Carney. I’m pretty sure I don’t need to give you more information. You have everything you need on me.”
Raul Carney. The oldest living wolf shifter. One of the deadliest, cruelest, coldest wolves who held no regard for human life.
Then, why was he being…understanding? Polite, even?
“Hunters have what they need to justify their actions, be it a whole truth, half-truth, or untruth.” Raul motioned with a hand to the man at the foot of the bed, whose aqua eyes didn’t hold the same politeness as Raul’s. No, this beast picked him apart like a disgusting meal, hoping to get to something good. “This is Vuk, my second-in-command.” His hand swept toward the third beast. This one appeared cautious but tired. “Storme, who you may or may not have met. He is a guard, as is Nico.”
“I know Nico,” Mik said, his cheeks flushing at his quick response. He kept his gaze away from the wolf and held weakly to Raul. “He…”
Raul arched a brow. “He’s your mate. That is the only reason I opened my doors to a hunter with ill intent toward my people. You, Mikhail, are not unknown to me. Nor is your leader.”
“If I was not Nico’s mate, you would’ve left me to die.”
He needed something to keep his reserve in place. Since that first night he and Nico crossed paths, he had begun to doubt the information he had on shifters. To the point he was beginning to think they might actually be more humane than some of the hunters he knew.
“Answer this question for me, Mikhail, and perhaps you will find the answer you seek. Had the roles been reversed the night Nico saved you the first time, would you have left him at the mercy of the lamabra? Would you have put him down if the lamabra did not? Or would you have jeopardized your life to save an enemy facing the same dangers as you?”
Mik lowered his eyes to the plain black flannel pants that covered his legs. Frustration boiled in the pit of his gut. Frustration over the ease that Raul shamed him in a matter of a few words. Since he witnessed his two brothers’ murders, he held a very potent hatred for anything and everything that was not human.
Sitting on this bed in the heart of Beast, surrounded by sorcerers, vampires, and shifters—one that was the top dog—he couldn’t muster that hatred.
“As I suspected. And that is the difference between your people and mine,” Raul said. “Your presence in this sanctuary will not be taken to as kindly and as openly as it has been with myself. Those who know you and know your record will beg to have you cast from the premises. However, I will not cast you out unless you give me reason to do so. You will not have any contact with any members from any hunter cells while you reside on Creek property. You will not be allowed to leave this room without being accompanied by Nico or another guard. That is for your own safety more than the safety of my men. Should I, or any man present here, catch you wandering the manor unsupervised, I will kick you off the property immediately.”
Mik caught a slight shift in Nico’s posture from the corner of his eyes. Raul’s warnings were etched with his bone-chilling threat, leaving a discomforting air all around him.
“You will not place a single resident of the Creek in danger. You will not threaten a single resident. At the time you are released, you will not return to Jude and divulge the happenings here to him. I brought you into this sanctuary to protect you on behalf of Nico. Do not betray me, do not betray my men, and do not betray your mate.”
Mate. He still wasn’t sure about that term.
“You can just as easily erase my memories,” Mik said, turning his eyes up to Victor. Why the hell did the guy have to look so…innocent? His composure sucked Mik in with the promise of friendship. Vampires weren’t supposed to be so easy to dismiss as friendly. Especially this vampire.
“You must have me confused with Mallouch. I do not meddle with another’s free will. Your thoughts are your own unless they are a threat to you,” Victor said in that sweet, airy voice.
Mik’s gaze narrowed on the vampire. He didn’t understand. Victor Cavanough was supposed to be a potent threat. He could destroy an entire demon army with a simple look.
Staring at him now, Mik had a difficult time envisioning this angelic creature causing mass combustion with a look.
Now Raul, on the other hand…
Mik glanced at Vuk, who still tore him to mental shreds, Storme, Cael, and returned to Raul. He couldn’t spare Nico a glance. Not when the wolf warmed his blood and made him want to toss the very threads of who he was to the wind.
Maybe he had hit his head harder than anyone thought.
“I’m a prisoner. I get it, but I’m going to have to get in touch with Jude at some point. Let him know I’m okay. He’ll have his men tracking me down if there’s no body in the forest,” Mik said.
Raul shook his head. “There will be no contact at this time. I can’t allow it. Your clothing and your gear was discarded in the woods before coming here.”
Mik swallowed. All of his weapons, gone. His phone with a GPS tracker, gone. If Jude pinged him, his men would find a bodiless pile of cotton and Kevlar.
He was completely, truly helpless in this place. He held no chance against a vampire like Victor without one of his guns specially designed for wooden bullets. He could best a wolf or two with his hands and feet, but not an entire pack.
Maybe he should get kicked out of Beast. He could return to Jude, fill him in on the layout of the sanctuary. They could plan an attack, bring down these monsters…
But, they weren’t monsters, were they?
I’m fucked.
“Are you hungry?” Raul asked.
Mik blinked, a furrow forming over his brows. “Hungry?”
His stomach growled at the mention of food and he groaned. Storme snickered.
“You’ve been healing for three days with only IV fluids to keep you hydrated. Until your head injury improved, I couldn’t chance waking you,” Cael explained. He waved a hand. A clink from the kitchenette drew Mik’s attention to a large plate with steam rising from hot food. “You’ll need nutrition. Plenty of protein.”
As the first scents of the delicious meal hit his nostrils, making his mouth water, he nodded. “Okay. You got me. I’ll eat.”
“We’ll leave you be, then,” Raul said.
Mik watched Storme and Vuk lead Cael out of the room. Raul followed Victor to the door. Right before Raul paused in the doorway, his hand lowered to Victor’s back, bringing the vampire to pause. Mik lifted his gaze from the strange, intimate gesture, one that made his head spin with an onslaught of questions.
As the door closed, he finally braced himself to turn his attention to Nico. The wolf had shaved, but his jaw still held a sexy day-old shadow. His hair hung to his nape, thick waves with streaks of honeyed brown. He wore simple clothes, dark jeans and a dark T-shirt. A gold medallion rested on his chest, dangling by a leather cord from his neck.
The moment their gazes met, every trouble, every problem that taunted him in the last fifteen minutes evaporated. Nico’s expression was cautiously speculative, his eyes searching Mik for something he wasn’t privy to.
He held his hand out to Mik. “Let’s feed you.”
Mik glanced at Nico’s outstretched hand. Long, strong, calloused fingers capable of a killing blow or a tender touch. Clean, trimmed nails, not claws.
Turning his attention back to Nico’s face, he frowned. “You saved me again, didn’t you?”
The corner of Nico’s mouth twitched. “You’re my mate, Mikhail. Regardless of your perceptions of me right now, I will not let harm befall you. I will do everything in my power to protect you.”
Don’t do it, Mik. Don’t take his hand.
Deep inside Mik’s head, he understood the significance of this moment. The hunter within him protested while the man inside his heart
already made the decision. As he lifted his hand to Nico’s, the wolf’s words from a few days ago resonated in his head.
“I’m about to burst your perfect world bubble, little one.”
The moment his fingers touched Nico’s palm, a familiar heat swelled through his entire body, infiltrating every nerve, muscle, cell he possessed. His heart skipped and the air in his lungs grew heavy. His cock—damn it—hardened, tenting the pitiful pants as he kicked his legs over the side of the bed.
Nico pulled him to his feet. Mik stumbled, his legs weak. Nico wrapped an arm around his waist and tugged him close, trapping him against the hard wall of his chest and the supportive embrace of his arm.
“I’ve gotchya,” Nico murmured.
Dear god, help me. My bubble is about to explode.
Chapter Seven
“Are you going to tell me what happened in the woods?” Mikhail asked, leaning over the plate of food and taking a deep breath. He poked at the steak with his knife. “Are you sure he didn’t, I don’t know, put a spell on the food?”
“The only magic used was that to get the food here. Your meal is preservative and spell-free.” Nico took a seat in the chair to Mikhail’s right, sipping his glass of water. “Cael used a spell to transfer the food from the kitchen to here. Nothing too complicated.”
“Unlike my healing.” Mikhail cut a small piece of meat and tried it. He gave a nod, cut a bigger piece, and popped it into his mouth. Nico stifled a smile when his mate’s stomach grumbled its thanks. “What happened with the lamabra?”
“You saved a woman’s life.”
Mikhail shot him a perturbed look. “No. I didn’t. I may not remember the details immediately surrounding my fall, but I know there was no way that woman should still be alive.” He stabbed a few vegetables onto his fork. “You said so yourself. I shouldn’t be alive right now, either. So, did you save me?”
Nico gave a small nod and took another sip of water.
Mikhail’s copper gaze stared at him for a long moment before dropping to the plate of food. Nico so badly wanted to run his fingers through the messy spikes of Mikhail’s bed-mussed hair, those that refused to be tamed after Mikhail’s numerous attempts to smooth them down. He looked like a sexy delight he could scoop off the chair and carry right back to bed. Even with the days-old scruff along his jaw and the few pounds he’d lost during his healing, Nico ached to do more than kiss the man.
“My friends. You said they were killed.”
Nico sensed the unspoken question hidden in Mikhail’s words. Tension rippled along his mate’s shoulders before he relaxed and took another bite of food.
“I have no clue how you survived. I barely reached you in time.”
“But you did.”
“I did.”
“And?”
Nico shrugged. Mikhail lowered his fork as he chewed his food, giving Nico his full attention.
“I slammed into you with every bit of power I could put behind my run. I was too concerned about getting you out of the lamabra’s path that I didn’t even think to break your fall.” Nico swirled the water in his glass. “Roughly forty miles an hour of powerful wolf barreling into you and taking you to the ground. You sustained the injuries you did because I failed to protect you from the impact. I’m sorry, Mikhail.”
Mikhail had stopped chewing at some point during his confession, his eyes clouding. Nico sighed. He wasn’t about to hide the truth from his mate. He needed to make Mikhail see that the hunters’ thoughts and ideas that propelled them to stalk out and kill paranormals was wrong.
“Did you kill the lamabra?”
“Yes.”
Something softened in Mikhail’s expression. He dabbed a napkin against his mouth and washed his food down with water. Nico continued to watch him, trying to learn every nuance of his mate. Every expression, emotion, shadow and light that touched his eyes.
“You don’t think that Jude will realize someone intervened? He’ll know that someone else killed the lamabra, even if my body is missing.”
“Do you want to return to your people?” Nico asked. He regretted the brash edge to his voice. He didn’t want to talk about Mikhail’s hunter family. He didn’t want to face the fact that his own mate may very well abandon him.
Nico had wondered over the last few days if it was possible that humans who were mated to paranormals did not experience the pull, the attraction, the burning need to be together. If, because they were human, the mating status didn’t impact them as strongly. He wondered if the ever-throbbing ache in his groin was his alone to suffer. The thoughts that plagued him about Mikhail, protecting the hunter, defying what he, himself, believed because his mate was supposed to be an enemy. They shared a kiss, a kiss he had initiated. That was all.
He wanted a fair chance to make this work.
Mikhail dropped his head into his hands and rubbed at his face. Silence continued to stretch. Nico couldn’t decipher the air that thickened between them. He tried to transpose into Mikhail’s mind, but couldn’t bring on the transfer. The only thing that kept him from shifting nervously in his seat was the tease of Mikhail’s arousal brushing his nostrils. He hadn’t missed the man’s wicked hard-on when he walked into his room, not that he read into it as a promising reaction. Mikhail held too strong a belief in his cause to toss it away so easily.
“Are you okay?” Nico finally asked, unable to take the silence any longer.
“No. I’m not okay.” Mikhail groaned into his hands and shook his head. “Far from okay.”
“Do you need a pain pill? Cael has medications in his office.”
Mikhail lifted his head from his hands and pinned Nico with a mixture of frustration and confusion. “I’m not in pain, Nico. I’m a mess. Do you see where I am? Who I’m around? Do you realize that this is the very place my boss has wanted to breach since as long as I can remember? Everyone is saying we’re mates. Humans don’t mate. Animals mate.”
Nico arched a brow at Mikhail’s anguish-riddled philosophy. Last he checked, humans mated. Fucking, courting, relationships. All forms of mating.
“You, Nico, have blown every fucking expectation I’ve had of shifters away. You have ruined the only things I’ve known since my brothers were killed. Then, I wake up to find a sorcerer healing me and a vampire who can kill a population with a glance concerned for my well-being. Nico, this isn’t supposed to be. You should’ve maimed me and left me in the forest with my friends.”
“Is that what you would’ve wanted?”
“No!” Mikhail tugged his fingers through his hair. The distress Nico sensed increased, pressing him to comfort the man. He refrained, barely. “It’s what we expect from your kind.”
Nico motioned to Mikhail’s water. “Think you’d do better with a beer?”
“I’d do better with a shot of whiskey.”
“I can make that happen.”
“Are there dietary restrictions after my head injury? Shouldn’t I stick with water?”
“Between Cael and Victor, you’re healed up pretty nice.”
“Victor?” Mikhail shook his head. “What are you talking about? How did he help?”
Mikhail’s eyes widened. Nico received a surge of panic from his mate and instantly realized why.
“He didn’t give you blood. I promise you. He doesn’t share his blood with anyone but Raul.” Nico began to wonder if the hunter’s eyes were going to pop out of his head. “They’re mates. Raul and Victor. The only reason Raul allowed him near you was because he’s also a healer. Contrary to what you might have been brainwashed to believe, Mikhail, Victor’s heart is bigger than a saint’s. That vampire will sacrifice himself before bringing permanent harm to another living creature. That is, unless you bring harm to those he cares about. And Raul? What have you heard of him?”
“He’s a beast.”
Nico chuckled. True, if someone pisses him off.
“He can be, but he, too, has a heart bigger than you can imagine. Many of the residents at the C
reek came here because they were in danger. Raul opens his doors to any paranormal creature, provides them food, shelter, and protection. He is hard around the edges, but he is more genuine than the vast majority of your human counterparts. In fact, Raul and Victor want to build trust with the hunters. They want the hunters to understand we are not the enemies you believe us to be. We are trying to live peacefully beside you, but you have made that virtually impossible. We do not hunt humans. We protect them, as you learned with the woman you reached in the forest.”
“Can I have that shot now?” Mikhail asked, his voice strained. Nico nodded, pressing up to his feet. He shuffled through the small stash of liquor bottles he kept in his cabinet, found a bottle of decent whiskey, and poured two shots. With both glasses in one hand, the bottle in the other, he returned to Mikhail and held out the drinks. His mate took both glasses and threw back the shots. Nico laughed. “What?”
“Well, I had poured one for each of us, but it seems you need my shot more than I.”
A deep blush touched Mikhail’s cheeks and a demure grin crossed his mouth. “Sorry. That was selfish.” He lowered the glasses to the table and pushed one to Nico. “I’m a fucking mess.”
“I warned you about your perfect little world.” Nico poured another shot, for himself. “It’s not.”
“I should hate you, you know that, right? I should be coming up with an escape plan right now that includes taking out as many of you beasts as possible. I should, but…I can’t. I don’t understand. I don’t see how so many of the hunters think the way I do and I’m only now learning that, well, all the bullshit we’ve been fed is exactly that. Bullshit.”
Nico watched him carefully, gauging the storm in his mate’s eyes and the twisting expressions battling for a place on his handsome face. Mikhail chewed his lower lip, his gaze lifting to Nico’s whiskey before lowering back to his steak. He opted for another small piece of meat.
“Unless this is all a mind game. That sorcerer could be controlling my thoughts.” Mikhail spoke more to himself than to Nico, and Nico kept quiet as he listened to his mate try to make sense of the situation. “Maybe he put a spell on me? Or maybe that vampire did give me blood and can now control me.”