She avoided his gaze by lowering her lashes. Nothing in her expression suggested coyness or that she might be ill prepared for the attentions of a male. Cara could easily have pushed him away, and didn’t. She could have used some of her incredible speed to outdistance him, but she stayed.
“I wonder if you believe any part of what I’ve said,” Rafe began, uncertain about trusting himself for the next few minutes after having come this far. “Or if it makes sense.”
Warning signals were flashing madly in his mind. His head was filled with whispers. Do not get closer to her. Back away, you fool.
Spikes of flame hit him when he noticed how Cara’s face whitened more, and the way her lashes kept her eyes hidden. She hadn’t moved, and yet something behind all that pale, beautiful skin did, as if there was something coming alive beneath the surface.
“Cara?” His voice was hushed.
Only silence answered him. When Cara finally opened her eyes, the deep green color he had hoped to see was gone.
The eyes looking back at him were now a dull, flat black.
Chapter 12
Death was calling.
The intensity of that call punched through Cara with the force of a battering ram. The spirit had risen unannounced, and it was necessary to distance herself from Rafe to hear what that spirit had to say.
Brittle thoughts took shape in her mind—hard, unrelenting, violent thoughts. She had to leave Rafe, get away before the spirit overtook her completely. The message was that someone was coming. Something was near. And there was going to be a loss of life.
Night crowded in. Internal wailing sounds echoed in Cara’s mind, and she struggled to contain them. Clamping her teeth together proved useless. Her hands were shaking. Her head hurt and her jaw ached.
She shook her head at Rafe’s expression over the suddenness of her rejection and bit her tongue to keep from showing him again that all the fuss and rumors about this Kirk-Killion freak of nature were true. The need to free the Banshee’s cry was a terrible burden.
Swaying slightly before widening her stance, Cara opened her mouth to try to speak, and no words came out. As her throat began to loosen, the sound that emerged traveled upward through her body from the depths of her soul. But it wasn’t a dark spirit’s cry that came out. It was a haunting wolf’s howl that rolled on and on as if it had no end...because she had avoided the Banshee’s appearance by calling upon her wolf for help.
In seconds, her howl was answered. One response came from the direction of the house. Another came from someplace beyond the wall and was followed by a third and a fourth. Weres had emerged from their hidey-holes, lured by the sound she had made. Not the kind of Weres that would be in human form tonight. These responses were the vocalizations of a few full-blooded Lycans able to shape-shift without the lure of the moon—creatures almost as rare as she was, since very few werewolves on Earth could perform that trick.
It seemed the Landaus had a few secrets of their own, besides the obvious ones. Lycans were rallying to her cry as they would have in the wild, and she hadn’t meant for that to happen. She had just needed to outwit the dark spirit she carried within her, at least temporarily, so that Rafe wouldn’t see it and change his mind.
Recruiting every wolf molecule in her body was what it took to overpower the Banshee, and Cara succeeded. But that spirit coated her insides like an internal mist. The ancient thing that predated the wolf species swirled near the base of her throat, soaking up the last of her wolf’s cry.
The spirit had to announce a death. That was its sole purpose. It had veered from this purpose twice in the entirety of its long existence, and each of those mistakes had cost it dearly. This Banshee could no longer live on its own and was doomed by its past transgressions to exist inside a host tied to the family it had helped instead of hindered centuries ago.
Death was coming, though. No mistake.
It was coming here.
With a roar of protest, Cara tore off her shirt and dropped to her hands and knees, feeling the escalation of Rafe’s tension without being able to do anything about it.
He had seen her as a vampire and was about to find out more of what she could do. More secrets were going to be exposed, and Cara saw no other way to manage the next few minutes than to become a creature that could outrace Rafe and his pack.
“Do not follow,” she warned him over Were channels as her body began its downsize into a new shape. “It’s already too late.”
* * *
Rafe stumbled back as if he’d been struck by an invisible hand. Holy hell... The partial shape-shift he had witnessed earlier had been a convincing disguise, but Cara was now a wolf. A real one, on all fours in a full transformation, with a rippling coat of black fur that shone by lamplight like liquid onyx.
When Cara’s head came up, her eyes again shone with green fire, but nothing else about her was familiar. She growled menacingly. Her whole body shook. When her eyes met his one last time, Rafe understood what she was telling him. Cara was inside that shape. She was in control of this shape-shift and had changed for a reason that made this shift important.
In the distance, resounding howls that would have scared the pants off anyone in the park rolled through the night. The sounds shook Rafe up. Cara’s latest trick seemed like a dream. Like the stories about her mother, Cara could become a rare black wolf.
Christ. What could he say, except...
“Do what you have to, Cara. We’ll deal later.”
She wheeled around so quickly, Rafe barely saw her move. Like a streak of supernatural lightning, she took a run at the wall and hurdled it before his next full breath.
Rafe heard the pounding of each thundering heartbeat in his chest. He replayed all the warnings he’d had with regard to Cara, knowing he had ignored them all, believing that she could handle being here and eventually learn to assimilate with the pack. He saw now that the idea had been a mistake, and that Cara was beyond anything his pack could have tamed.
He just couldn’t get a take on the real Cara, or how this had happened to her, which left him more determined than ever to find out. So he lit out after her for the second time tonight, not sure who he’d find behind the rest of those answering howls, but envying those Lycan bastards for the ability they had to get to Cara faster than he could.
He took aim at the wall and scrambled over it, glad he had put on his boots. Dropping down on the opposite side, he traced movement to the west by the trees where he had promised himself to have that second kiss with Cara.
It turned out to be a werewolf, suited up in jeans, missing a shirt and running on two legs that Rafe saw. He knew this guy and blew out a sigh of relief. At least one Lycan was accounted for. It was Jonas Dale, one of the strongest Lycans in Miami, who was also in law enforcement. Jonas had been trolling the park tonight with the intention of keeping people safe.
Behind Rafe came the soft thud of someone else landing. A quick turn brought him face-to-face with Cameron Mitchell. The fiftysomething detective wasn’t Lycan and therefore not in an altered shape, though his muscles visibly quivered across his wiry frame.
“You heard it?” Rafe asked.
“You’d have to be deaf not to,” Cameron replied. “Where is the she-wolf?”
“Chasing something. I have no idea what.”
“The others who responded?”
“Jonas is the only one I saw.”
The more time spent at a standstill, the greater the possibility of losing Cara, so Rafe spun around and raced off. Since he knew this park well, as most of his pack did, he had a good idea where to start his search. No self-respecting criminal would go near the public streets on the opposite edge of the park. Off to the east were darker patches of ground that provided better camouflage.
The only wolf who didn’t know any of this was the one he needed to find. Rafe had to understand what Cara�
�s latest shape-shift was about and whether he could reach her in time to help.
He ran like the wind with his packmate beside him, scanning the dark, avoiding the lighter places near the boulevards in the far distance. Nothing could throw him off the scent. With Cara’s fragrance embedded in his lungs, he was soon able to pick up her trail.
Cameron swore between breaths. “I saw her from the porch. I did see that correctly? She can make herself into a...”
“Wolf,” Rafe replied over one shoulder as he pulled slightly ahead of Cameron. “We’ve all heard the tales, so this shouldn’t really have been a surprise.”
He failed to mention that it had been a complete surprise to him.
“Yeah. Well, good luck with that attitude,” Cameron said, rocketing into a higher pace that made Rafe dig in. Cameron continued to mutter to himself. Between the obscenities and a few human growls, Rafe heard him say, “This is something I’ve got to see up close.”
As they covered more ground, Cara’s scent grew stronger. Just as Rafe had suspected, she was making for the next notoriously troubled spot in this damn park as if she had a nose for these things. He wondered if there actually was someone out here or if she had again been taken in by a vision of some kind.
The night had gone quiet. Each breath he took seemed labored when he wasn’t the least bit winded. “Have to reach you,” he messaged to Cara. “Please wait.”
Cameron said, “You expect her to listen?”
“No.”
Cameron grunted a nonverbal response as they rounded a line of trees that threw long shadows from the partial moon overhead. The scent became more convoluted here with a breeze from the north. And there was something else—a new scent that again chilled the back of Rafe’s neck. It was an odor that he didn’t recognize, and it tangled with Cara’s fragrance. Cameron had no such problem pegging it.
“Hunter.” Cameron spit out the word with a vehemence that could only have come from firsthand knowledge.
Rafe’s stomach turned over. His mind rebelled. There hadn’t been hunters in this part of Miami for years, and the idiots who had trespassed in the area in the past had been lethal. Not only that, they had been led by Cameron’s mate’s father. Having gone through tough times like that, Cameron had to be furious about the possibility of a replay.
“Cara is wily,” Rafe sent to his packmate. “She will watch for this.”
“And if she is in wolf form, her pelt would be worth a few million bucks on the black market,” Cameron sent back. “That kind of money would make a hunter real hungry.”
“It would also mean that someone else would have to know about her and her whereabouts.”
Rafe’s protective instincts spurred him on with new determination. He couldn’t wrap his mind around the idea that hunters were what Cara had perceived. Surely she would understand that his pack could deal with any black-market lackey that came along hoping to make his fortune? Even then, however, there would have to have been a leak of information about her visit and what Cara was capable of. But how, when her many talents had been a complete mystery to the pack? Until now.
For a hunter, Cara would be the rarest of the rare, the catch of a lifetime if trapped while in wolf form. But she was used to fighting for her life and for freedom, and was no fool. Since she and her family battled vampires and demons on a regular basis, what chance did a human with a weapon have against power and knowledge like hers?
The familiar report of gunfire split the night, adding another surprise to an evening full of them. Guns were a bad sign of the times and something he had to deal with on a daily basis at his job. Here, with Cara out of reach and a Lycan or two taking up the chase, the dreaded idea of silver bullets fueled Rafe’s anger...and the thought that though a pair of fangs might not do damage to the daughter of two legendary Weres, that damn metal could.
He had the scars to show for it, as did a couple of his packmates. Worse still was the glimmer of a memory of the well-aimed silver round that had taken down the only other female he might have dared to love, once upon a time, in his youth.
So it was a damn good thing he wasn’t stupid enough to have immediately fallen for the she-wolf they were chasing, in case she turned out to be the kind of adrenaline junkie whose life would end long before he could solidify a relationship with her...if, in fact, that’s what he wanted. And if, in fact, he had a choice in the matter.
Too late, his mind argued. It’s already too late.
The look Cameron threw him after Rafe finished that thought had sympathy written all over it.
Chapter 13
Sifting through so many odors kept Cara occupied as she sped from shadow to shadow hunting for the one scent she sought.
“Wait,” Rafe had urged from somewhere behind her, but she was onto something he couldn’t be involved with. Vampires were bad enough. This new presence was outrageous.
She locked her thoughts behind an iron wall in her mind that was much more secure than the Landaus’ protective pile of stones. Without the ability to read her, she’d be invisible to most Weres. In full wolf form, she could outrun all of them put together.
The park wasn’t as large as she had been led to believe. Skirting the trees, Cara located the shadows she searched for and the abomination hidden in them. Using her exceptional vision to separate other forms of darkness from the night, Cara saw the demon that was cloaked as a human.
No disguise could mask the stink of a demon, and their cunningness was legendary. This one had been waiting, having lured her here with insightful foreknowledge of what her reaction to its presence would be.
She didn’t give the abomination time to appreciate how well its lure had worked, or to pounce. A single leap took her to the monster with her teeth bared and her claws swiping.
The thing hissed like a vampire as her first blow landed and fought back with maniacal energy derived from an innate connection to the others of its kind. The energy of one of these demons was siphoned from the energy of many, no matter how separated they all were from each other.
Being in human form didn’t slow its reflexes much, though Cara didn’t allow the freak leeway to discard the layers of its temporary disguise. She snapped at the hell spawn’s moving limbs, caught skin in her teeth and tore away a large chunk of its muscle while trying not to breathe in the fetid smells emanating from wounds that should have bled and didn’t.
This creep was old, treacherous and used to fighting. It managed to catch hold of her muzzle with both of its bony hands as she wheeled, temporarily delaying the damage she dished out.
Cara shook it off with a fluid show of wolf flexibility that brought her snapping canines dangerously close to the demon’s face. It got to her again by yanking on the fur covering her left shoulder. Using a viselike grip, the demon lifted her front end off the ground, causing a round of pain Cara didn’t have time to process as she heard the snap of her right paw breaking.
Had it broken every bone in her body, she would have continued to fight.
You don’t belong here and can’t be allowed to stay.
No one who knew about demons could have afforded to let this one go so near to a densely populated pocket of civilization like Miami. If granted free rein, others would follow. They might already be here somewhere.
Cara closed the remaining inch of distance to the creature’s face and snapped again. Demons had two vulnerable spots, whatever form they took. Since one of those spots was their face, Cara dug deeply into this demon’s cheek with her wolf-sharp teeth.
The monster screeched in anger and flailed wildly in an effort to dislodge her. Cara hung on, her strength centered in her jaws, until she was able to free herself from its grip.
As the demon leaned back to begin its own shape-shift, Cara heard another sound that drowned out its screech—a sharp crack followed by a puff of air that sailed past her right ear.
A gunshot.
The demon flew backward as if it had been knocked off its feet. Cara lunged toward it to regain her advantage as the demon’s human semblance further dissolved. What remained in its place was an ugly six-foot-tall mass of jellified flesh with a pair of dark red eyes and matching horns.
There was no mouth with which to bite because half of its face was gone, but she hadn’t done all of that damage. The bullet had torn a hole in the demon’s face a few millimeters from where her teeth had clung. Even then, the demon should have recovered. Their composition wasn’t like a human’s. Usually it took a lot more than one big hole to bring a demon down. Yet the monster dissipated in a puff of black smoke as if it had been composed of air rather than a thick coat of recently adopted flesh and bone.
The surprise of such an easy victory stole Cara’s breath. She backpedaled, already whirling to search for the second intruder. What she found instead was a huge, half-furred-up werewolf skidding to a stop in front of her.
The Were’s growl shook the ground. She had to look up to see this guy, who was the biggest werewolf she had ever seen. Male. Lycan. Fierce. Dangerous and furred up. His chest was broad. His legs were thick. Though he had a werewolf’s enhanced musculature, his face retained many recognizable human characteristics, which meant that he also had been bred from an ancient wolf lineage from a time before wolf blood had taken a hold on human anatomy.
Her new companion stared briefly at the spot where the demon had stood. With an incredible display of pure-blooded Lycan speed, he then caught hold of her. But Cara wasn’t afraid. This was not an enemy. One of the answering howls in the distance had been his, and he had come to her aid.
He wrapped his claws in her fur and dragged her closer to him. Her injured paw pulsed with pain. Her heart boomed as the Lycan’s gaze swept over first her face and then her paws. He pounded his chest to show his good intentions and then lifted her up as though she weighed nothing. After settling her into his arms, he walked briskly toward the sound of more running.
The Black Wolf Page 9