Last Wolf Hunting

by Rhyannon Byrd

“Fine, have it your way.” She sighed, her eyes bright within the paleness of her face, damp with tears. “Do you think you can move?”

  His lips pulled back over his teeth in a grimace, and his brow was covered with beads of sweat that trailed down the sides of his face. “Not yet. Just give me a second for my stomach to settle.”

  “Okay,” she whispered, pulling her wrist from his hold to wipe his forehead for him, careful to keep the stinging trails of sweat out of his eyes. Staring at the dark stain of blood seeping through the fabric of his shirt, she gave a weary shake of her head. “God, Jeremy, how many enemies do you have? You’ve been back in Shadow Peak for little more than a day and already they’re trying to kill you.”

  “They?”

  “Who do you think it was?”

  “Hell if I know,” he rumbled, unable to pick up anything other than Jillian’s mouthwatering scent and the coppery smell of his blood. “But I’ve already had my share of threats since yesterday, including one from your mother.”

  She gasped, suddenly looking as if she wanted to hit him, her concern giving way beneath a wave of indignation. “My mother did not shoot you, you idiot!”

  “Don’t go getting all prickly,” he wheezed, trying not to laugh. “It’s the honest to god’s truth that she hates me enough to shoot me.”

  “She doesn’t hate you,” she argued, pushing the words through her clenched teeth.

  He didn’t even bother responding to that one.

  “And even if she did,” she huffed, “she’s powerful enough just to fry your circuits. She wouldn’t need to resort to a bullet.”

  “Jillian, a bullet isn’t going to kill me.” His breath hissed through his teeth, the pain in his shoulder burning like fire. “Not unless I bleed out, but that isn’t going to happen from one shot. This was a warning.”

  “So then we can add Drake to the list?”

  “Stefan and Eric.”

  “What is it with you and Eric?” she practically growled. “He does not want you dead!”

  “But he does want me gone,” Jeremy grunted, putting the emphasis on the last word. “And come to think of it, maybe he does want me dead. I know I wouldn’t mind seeing him dead and buried.”

  She gave him a priceless look of confusion. “For god’s sake, why?”

  His own look said the answer to that question should be obvious. “For touching what belongs to me.”

  “You can be so thickheaded sometimes,” she muttered. “I already told you that there’s nothing serious going on between Eric and me. We. Are. Friends. Nothing more.”

  “Well, if that’s true, Mommy’s gonna be crushed to hear it.”

  * * *

  Jillian sighed at his stubbornness. “You still don’t believe me, do you?”

  “Irritating, isn’t it?” he asked, arching one brow. “Not having the trust of those you care about.”

  “Who says I care about you?” she grumbled out the side of her mouth.

  He managed a low rumble of laughter, though the sound was strained. “I do,” he said lightly. “Which is why you’re going to help me home and take care of me, because this thing is starting to hurt like hell.”

  Sending a furtive glance in the direction the shots had come from, she said, “Do you think it’s safe now?”

  “Yeah, it’s getting late enough in the morning that the pack’s going to be moving around. Whoever it was got what they wanted. They’re long gone by now.”

  “Can you walk if I help you?” she asked, putting her arm around his shoulders as he struggled to sit up, his shirt saturated with a fresh surge of blood.

  “Just get me to your place. It’s closer,” Jeremy told her…and for once, she didn’t argue.

  Chapter 11

  The walk to her house was painfully slow, but thankfully uneventful. Jillian sat him down in one of her kitchen chairs, cleaned and dressed his wound while he sipped on some “medicinal” Scotch to dull the pain, then helped him to her bed. If his shoulder hadn’t been burning so badly, he’d have taken the time to tease her about helping him out of his clothes, but by the time he was stripped down to his black cotton boxers, Jeremy was done for. The second his head hit the pillow, exhaustion swept over him, but he struggled to stay awake long enough to call his partner.

  Mason picked up on the second ring, and Jeremy quickly filled him in on the shooting, as well as the fact that he had information that he didn’t want to share over the phone. His partner was furious that he’d been shot, but he assured Mason that it wasn’t serious. He was going to be back in working order within hours, a day at the most, since the bullet had gone clean through. Their Lycan genes allowed the Runners to heal at a far greater rate than humans, which was a convenient genetic bonus, considering the physical demands of their jobs.

  While he finished up with Mason, Jillian closed the blinds behind her sheer bedroom curtains, casting the room in deep, dusky violet shadows. Jeremy set his phone on the bedside table, and his gaze moved back to where she stood by the window, her arms crossed over her middle. With the pale streaks of light sneaking around the edges of the blinds at her back, it was hard to read her expression, but he knew she was upset, maybe even a little bit afraid.

  “You okay?” he rasped.

  “It’s all related, isn’t it?” she asked unsteadily, her voice a whispery thread of sound as she moved slowly toward the bed. “The rogues, the dayshifting, the teenagers, Drake’s wife, you being shot. All of it, everything, it’s all tied together. Someone’s trying to destroy us, aren’t they?”

  He reached out with his good arm and grabbed hold of her hand, her fingers cool within the feverish heat of his grip. “If it is Drake, and I don’t see how it can’t be, we’re going to find the proof we need to nail his ass and put a stop to all of this once and for all. The Runners won’t quit until that happens.”

  “I know. I’m just worried about you,” she whispered, staring at their joined hands while she made that telling confession, before daring a shy glance up at his face.

  “I like the sound of that,” Jeremy teased in a deep, suggestive rumble, waggling his brows at her, glad when he saw her lips twitch with a small smile. “And I promise nothing’s going to happen to me. I’m not going to give the bastard the satisfaction of taking me down.”

  She nodded, and took a step back, pulling her hand from his. “You should rest now,” she told him. “I’ll check back in on you in a little while.”

  “Don’t be too long,” he murmured, closing his eyes, reopening them a moment later when she walked back into the room, carrying a tall glass of iced water. Jillian set it on the bedside table, and turned to leave as silently as she’d entered. But when she reached the door, she stopped, one hand on the frame, and looked back at him, her velvety brown eyes full of questions.

  Jeremy watched as she wet her bottom lip with a quick swipe of her small, pink tongue, and softly said, “Why is it still…”

  Her voice trailed off, but he picked up the question for her, knowing instinctively what she’d wanted to say. “You mean, why do our bodies still scream that we belong together, even though we’ve both been with other people?”

  A strange look darkened her eyes, but she only said, “Yeah.”

  “I don’t know for sure, but I assume it’s because we never completed the bond. We never had sex…and I never took your blood. You know as well as I do that when a true lifemate takes a lover who isn’t his or hers, it can sever the connection. But our connection was never made, Jillian—we’ve just put it on hold for all these years.”

  She nodded, but didn’t say anything as her gaze slipped away from his, and he wondered if she was thinking about the forest. About the way she’d begged him to take her when she’d been wild with need, too hungry to fight what her body so desperately craved.

  “But I wish I’d made love to you that afternoon when you kissed me,” he confessed in a sudden rush, driven by a sharp sense of urgency to get the guttural words out before she turned and l
eft. “I could have made you give in to me, Jillian, but I went easy on you. But if I had, if I’d pushed for what I wanted, we’d have made it. I’d have had that bond to fight with, to make you believe in me when everyone else was working to keep us apart.”

  She blinked, the movement rapid, as if trying to hold back tears. “Maybe believing in you was never the problem,” she whispered brokenly, and before he could respond, she pulled the door shut behind her.

  * * *

  Before Jeremy had so much as opened his eyes, he knew that Jillian was close. He drew in a deep breath, and savored the sweetness of her; that lush, provocative scent that called to every part of him and made him burn.

  Cracking his eyes open, he found her lying beside him in the bed, her head cushioned on her folded hands, her eyes open, but hazy with the remnants of slumber, as if she, too, had only just awakened. “What time is it?” he asked, his voice scratchy from sleep.

  “Late afternoon. I hope I didn’t bother you. I came in to check on how you were doing, and you looked so peaceful, I couldn’t resist lying down for a nap.”

  “It hardly bothers me to wake up next to a beautiful woman,” he told her with a lopsided smile, reaching out to thread his fingers through the soft, silken tresses of her hair, enjoying the way it caught the shimmering sunlight that edged its way around the blinds. “You know, I’ve always wondered what you would look like if I were able to wake up next to you, when my eyes were still sleepy.”

  “Pretty scary, huh?” she joked, obviously trying to lighten the moment.

  “No,” he confessed with a grin. “To be honest, you’re more beautiful than ever like this, with your hair falling around your face, eyes soft, mouth softer. I’ve always thought you were the most beautiful thing in the world.” He drew in a deep, Jillian-scented breath, and lifted his thumb to the corner of her mouth, watching as he stroked the seductive swell of her lower lip. The curve of her mouth was too petal-soft to resist, moist and pink and delicious. “I never forgot you, Jillian.” His words were hushed…solemn. “God knows I wanted to, but I couldn’t.”

  Her eyes blinked slowly closed, cheeks turning a soft shade of rose. “Jeremy…”

  “No, let me get it said,” he rasped, cutting her off. “I know you’re scared, but—”

  The ringing of his cell phone on the bedside table interrupted his words, and she sat up, quickly handing him the phone.

  “Burns,” he growled, ready to howl with frustration as Jillian slipped off the bed and padded softly from the room.

  Mason’s low laugh rumbled over the line. “I see your sunny disposition hasn’t suffered any.”

  “Piss off,” he grunted, dropping his head back on the pillow, half wishing he could strangle his best friend for interrupting what had been leading up to be…a moment. He didn’t know what “kind” of moment, dammit, but he’d sensed that something powerful was about to happen.

  “I know you’re not feeling too hot,” Mason rumbled, “but I wanted to let you know that we’ve got a new development. I don’t want to get in to details on the phone, either, but it’s one that’s related to the case Cian and Brody are on.”

  “Shit,” he groaned, scrubbing his hand down his face, knowing that another human victim had been found. There’d been two other murders in the past few weeks, both blond, blue-eyed human females whose hearts had been eaten out of their chests, and at both crime scenes, no traceable Lycan scent had been found, only a sharp acidic odor that was produced when a wolf dayshifted. Anthony Simmons had known about the killings and had even staged a similar murder of a woman whose hair had resembled Torrance’s, trying to mess with Mason’s mind. Before Simmons’s death, he’d told Mason that the deaths would continue, and that the Runners wouldn’t be able to stop the Lycan responsible.

  And now they had a third victim. “I have a really bad feeling about this.”

  “Me, too.” Mason sighed. “I’ll give you a call back when I have all the info, okay?”

  “I’ll be waiting,” he said, then disconnected the call. Jeremy thought about his options for a moment, and then, making sure to move as carefully as possible, he rolled to his side, relieved when his shoulder didn’t flare up with a fresh surge of pain. Instead, there was a low, annoying ache, but it was definitely manageable. Reaching for his jeans at the foot of the bed, he pulled them on, and had just stood up to finish buttoning his fly when Jillian came back into the room.

  Her eyes went wide when she saw him. “What are doing? You need to be in bed.”

  “Something’s come up and I can’t discuss it on the phone,” he told her, realizing he didn’t have a shirt to wear. “I need to head down to the Alley for a bit to see Mase, and since I’m not leaving you alone after what happened this morning, I guess you’re coming with me.”

  She crossed her arms over her breasts and glared at him. “Jeremy, you’re not going anywhere. You need to give your body time to heal.”

  “I can heal later,” he countered, “when we don’t have this shit breathing down our necks.” He pushed his fingers back through his hair, hopefully dealing with any bed-head he might have. “You don’t happen to have an extra large T-shirt I could borrow, do you?”

  She moved stiffly to her dresser, rummaging through the bottom drawer while growling, “You’ve been shot, dammit. You may be an almighty Runner, but you’re not invincible!”

  He waited until she’d turned around to face him, tossing a wash-softened Pearl Jam concert shirt at his chest, before saying, “The only way I’m staying in that bed is if you’re in it with me. Under me, Jillian. Your sweet little body laid out, wide-open, with me buried deep inside of you. Got it?”

  “God, you’re impossible,” she huffed, but he could see that the image he’d created fascinated her. Bright flags of color burned in her cheeks, and her eyes had that hazy glow of hunger again.

  “Not really,” he shot back, the sound muffled as he carefully pulled on the shirt. “I just know my own limitations. Trust me, dragging my ass to the Alley is going to be a hell of a lot easier on me than lying here the rest of the day, driving myself crazy thinking about you.”

  “Impossible…and oversexed,” she muttered, grabbing her brush off the top of her dresser and ripping it through her hair so viciously, he actually winced for her poor scalp.

  “Can’t be oversexed when I’m not getting any,” he drawled, the corner of his mouth kicking up in a crooked grin when she stopped and cut him a sharp look from beneath her lashes.

  “Oh, and by the way,” he remarked casually, sitting down on the bed so that he could slip on his boots, “we’ll need to take your car. The truck is out of commission. Can’t get anyone out to fix it until tomorrow.”

  “What’s wrong with it?” she asked, her eyes narrowing in suspicion.

  He sent her an innocent look as he tied up his right boot, determined to ignore the pain in his shoulder. “Nothing’s wrong with the truck itself, but the tires aren’t doing so hot.”

  “What happened to them?” she demanded.

  “Someone slashed them up a bit last night.” He reached for his other boot, careful to hide his smile, since for some reason he was taking perverse enjoyment at seeing her so bent out of shape on his behalf. Maybe it meant she did care. God, he hoped so.

  “A bit?”

  He lifted his good shoulder. “That’s one way of putting it.”

  Jillian closed her eyes, shaking her head. “You’ve had rocks thrown at your parents’ house—”

  “That was probably just Drake’s little thugs,” he interrupted.

  “Had your tires slashed,” she went on, clearly on a roll.

  “Thugs again.”

  “And been shot at,” she growled through her clenched teeth, opening her eyes to glare at him.

  “That I’m still trying to figure out,” he murmured, enjoying the fire blazing in her eyes. “But I’m placing my money on Drake again, or Cooper Sheffield. So that’s three for three for the psychotic headjob. Guess he
’s in the lead, then.”

  She stood completely still for a beat of ten seconds, breathing slowly in…then out. “Fine, I’ll drive you to the bloody Alley,” she finally said, her menacing tone making him want to smile as she prowled forward, poking him in the chest with her finger, “And in exchange, how about you just try not to get yourself killed?”

  “Will do,” Jeremy agreed, unable to hold in his grin any longer…but she was already walking out of the room.

  * * *

  Despite its unusual name, Bloodrunner Alley was a picturesque, gently sloping glade located on Silvercrest pack land, several miles down the mountain from Shadow Peak, with the ceremonial clearing sitting equidistance between the two. The only structures it boasted were the fully modernized cabins where the Runners lived, the rugged homes surrounded by the wild, natural beauty of the forest, perfectly suited to their environment.

  As they made their way down the private roads that connected Shadow Peak to the Alley, Jeremy finally told Jillian about the latest human victim, and the ones who’d come before. At first he’d tried to convince himself that he hadn’t told her about the gruesome, ritualistic murders because he didn’t trust her enough to tell her everything about the Runners’ investigation—but he knew that’d only been a lie to cover the real reason.

  The truth was that he’d kept this last bit of information to himself for the simple fact that he’d known it would upset her. Stupid, but there it was.

  And it did upset her. At first, she got pissed that he’d kept the killings to himself, considering they were supposed to be working together, but then she’d admitted that she’d known there was a last piece of the puzzle he hadn’t shared with her yet. She could have pressed him about it, but she’d been waiting for him to tell her himself, which he’d just done. Then, the reality of what they were dealing with sank in, and she went quiet, a strange, unsettling stillness settling over her body that made him want to take her into his arms and crush her in his embrace.

  Unfortunately, when they pulled in to the Alley, Mason and his wife, Torrance, came outside to see who was there and he never got the chance. Mason gave him a hard time for getting out of bed after he’d been shot, and Torrance fussed over him, which only irritated his partner even more. But once inside, the four of them settled into the kitchen, and Jeremy went over what he and Jillian had learned at the hall of records, as well as from Pippa. While he talked, the other three worked together to make some cold-cut sandwiches, which they paired with chips and beer for an impromptu dinner.