Dark Vengeance (Dark Wolf Series Book 4)

by Dena Christy

  His new friend grinned at him, and in the firelight he appeared almost predatory, despite his rather jovial tone. For the first time since the stranger had made his presence known, Dany felt a sense of unease.

  “Are you the devil?” he blurted out and wished he hadn’t. If he was the devil, maybe he didn’t want Dany to know he was. And now his logic and thought process was sounding as convoluted as the man sitting in the arm chair.

  “Nope, not the devil. If I was, I would have had you call me Lucy. Who I am is not important at this juncture. It’s more of what we have in common that I’m interested in.”

  “What could be possibly have in common? You’re not a werewolf, I can sense that.”

  “I’m not, although I have great respect for your kind. You could say there is a family connection to your species. Anyway, that’s not what I was referring too. It’s come to my attention that you are having trouble with the Order of Odin, and I’d like to help you out with that. I have issues with the Order myself, and I’d like to see you fulfill your quest for revenge. I think it would be very amusing.”

  “You’ll help me get my revenge?” Dany asked, unsure whether he should believe this stranger he’d known for five minutes. “I don’t even know you, and I’m supposed to believe that you will help me?”

  “Well, I won’t be helping you per se. I won’t solve your problems for you, but when the time is right, I’ll be there to carry the ball, so to speak. I think we’ll make a good team. You have drive Dany, and I admire that. You’ve caused an untold amount of shit for the Order, and I don’t even think you were half trying. I think this is your time to shine, I truly do.” The man stood and made his way back to the corner where he’d come from.

  “Wait,” Dany said and Smith paused and looked at him. “Can’t you get me to my team, to the staff I had at the warehouse? I’ll need support if I take on the Order.”

  “As to your staff, well, I’m afraid to tell you they’ve been slaughtered. The Order botched that raid I’m afraid.”

  “They’re all dead?” Dany asked in disbelief. It would take much longer to rebuild than he’d expected. It had taken years to put that team in place. It’s not like positions like those in the warehouse could be filled with a simple want ad.

  “Well, all except one, so I’m afraid you’re on your own. Living by your wits, at least for the foreseeable future. But don’t worry, when the time is right, you will get what you deserve.”

  “And what will it cost me,” Dany asked. He’d been in the world too long to expect a free ride.

  “You must give me something you will gladly hand over when the time comes. In the meantime, I’ll see what I can do about getting you a maid,” Smith said as he walked into the corner.

  The fire went out as quickly as it had started, and Dany walked to the corner, but could find nothing but cobwebs. He rubbed his hand across his eyes. The drama of the past few weeks was getting to him. Now he was hallucinating. He sighed and shook his head as he turned and walked to the center of the room. He needed sleep, and after that he needed to come up with a plan. If he was taking on the Order, he needed to be prepared. It wouldn’t do for him to let his emotions get the best of him. He’d let that happen before, when he’d kidnapped Kate Townsend. Cooler heads would prevail this time, and he would ultimately triumph.

  Taking one last glimpse around the room, he made his way to the bedroom. Too bad the stranger had been a figment of his imagination. He really could have used a maid.

  * * *

  “So what are your plans for the day?” Lee asked as Simone walked into the kitchen. She looked at him for a moment, not sure what she should tell him.

  “I don’t really have plans, except perhaps figure out a way to contact your father. Maybe you could help me with that since you know him better than I do.” She poured coffee into a mug and sat down at the table. Things were strange between them. She refrained from putting out sexual signals towards him, and he avoided her as much as he could. It made her a little sad. The year apart from him had been hard on her, and she’d missed him. She glanced up at him, hoping they could reconnect when she saw his mouth had tightened. “What is it?”

  “What is what? I didn’t say anything,” he said, casually picking up his coffee mug and taking a sip.

  “You squashed your lips together. You always do that when you don’t approve of something. So what is it that’s bothering you? That I want to contact your father?”

  Lee set his coffee mug on the table with a sharp thud and looked at her for a long moment.

  “Yes, that’s what’s bothering me, okay? I didn’t want you to have anything to do with my father when this whole thing was proposed, and I still don’t.”

  “You agreed to go along with this. Are you saying you want to back out?” Simone pushed back from the table and stood. Lee got up out of his chair, and they stood in the middle of the kitchen, glaring at each other.

  “I’m not backing out, because I think you need someone in this who’s looking out for you. Cadric won’t, and you don’t appear to see the dangers in all this. My father is not a kind man under the best of circumstances. He sent someone to kill you because you were dating me, and that was when he had the world at his feet. What do you think he will do now that his life is crumbling around him and the Order is circling him? Do you think he will have a nice chat with you, apologize for what he did and kindly offer his jugular for you?”

  “You don’t need to patronize me,” Simone said as she took a deep breath. Her body grew hot, and her heart beat picked up speed. She didn’t want to fight with him. The point of interacting with him was to get him to relax his guard around her, not antagonize him. Otherwise he'd never let her out of his sight. “I know your father is a dangerous man, but I’m not the same woman he sent David to kill.”

  “I know you’re not the same,” Lee said as he sighed and resumed his seat. “And I can’t tell you how much I wish that wasn’t true.”

  “Then help me get revenge.” Simone took her seat at the table and folded her hands on the top.

  “Revenge won’t change who you’ve become,” Lee said as he reached out to put his hand on hers. Simone jerked away. She didn’t know how to tell him she hated what she’d become, and the only way she could continue living this so called life was to have a focus. And her focus was Dany. Specifically killing him.

  “You don’t know the half of what I’ve been through. How could you know? You’ve been like this your entire life,” she said as she looked him up and down. He drew himself up straight, and the muscle worked in his jaw.

  “Been like what, exactly? Why don’t you say what it is,” he said as his eyes narrowed. “Say it.”

  “Werewolf. Happy now?” she said as she stood and took her coffee over to the sink and dumped it out. “You’ve been a werewolf your entire life, so how could you know what it’s like to become one against your will. This is not what I wanted.”

  “I know, but you need to make the best of it and move on,” Lee said.

  Simone’s hand tightened on the mug she still held. She didn’t want to get over it and didn’t want to make the best of it. Her life before was exactly how she wanted it, and now it was ruined.

  Her hand shook as her body tensed and heat poured through her. He had no clue what he was talking about. He’d been this way his whole life, and who was he to judge how she reacted to such a drastic change.

  With a growl, as a red haze clouded her vision, she turned in one swift motion and hurled her coffee mug against the wall. It exploded into pieces as Lee quickly stood, his chair scraping against the floor. She looked at the remains of the mug, and the heat and tensions eased out of her like air leaving a deflating balloon.

  “I’m sorry,” she said as she went over to where the pieces lay scatter on the floor. She squatted down, took a deep breath and let it out slowly. She reached for the first piece, her hand shaking so much she didn't think she could pick it up. She closed her eyes and focused on br
eathing in and out until she no longer felt like she was made of jelly. Lee's large hand descended on her wrist, encircling it gently and pulling her to her feet.

  “I’ll take care of it.” He let her go, went to the closet and pulled out a broom and dust pan. “I don’t want you to hurt yourself.”

  “You can’t protect me from everything,” she said as she took the broom from him and swept the ceramic pieces into a pile. He squatted down and put the dust pan next to the pile, and she swept the pieces into it. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me.”

  “The full moon,” Lee said as he stood.

  The full moon? A sour feeling twisted in Simone’s stomach at his mention of the full moon. She hadn’t considered it, and with everything that had happened in the past few days, it’d slipped her mind that it was coming.

  “I’d forgotten that it was tonight.” She walked toward the closet. Her body felt separate from her mind, her movements stiff as she put the broom back where it’d come from.

  “I wouldn’t know what that’s like,” Lee said as he chuckled and joined her, putting the dust pan back in its place. “It must be because I’ve been a werewolf much longer. I’m always aware of the moon’s cycle.”

  She nodded as she turned away. Her footsteps sounded distant to her ears as she went back to the table and sagged into the chair. Her mind raced, thinking of what she would do about tonight. She heard him behind her, and his hand came down to rest on her shoulder.

  “Simone,” he said, his voice a quiet rumble to her ears. “Don’t feel bad about the mug. It can be replaced.”

  She tipped her head back to look at him and forced a smile to stretch across her mouth. “It’s not the mug,” she said. “I’m sorry about my outburst.”

  “It’s okay.” He smiled down at her and put his hand up to her cheek. She held herself still, resisting the urge to jerk away from him. “The moon does funny things to us all. Things will be better tomorrow.”

  She nodded and turned her face away from him. Tomorrow would be better, but she still had to get through tonight. Her stomach turned into a giant knot, and for a moment she thought she would be sick.

  “Are you sure you're all right?”

  “I’m fine,” she said as she pulled away from him and stood. “Aren’t you supposed to be working today?”

  He looked down at his watch, and his mouth tightened. “Yes, and I’m late. I’ll be home just after dusk.”

  Dusk? She’d been hoping that he wouldn’t be home until tomorrow. Then she could go through the night by herself and in her own way. She looked at Lee. He would not approve of what she planned to do.

  “Won’t you be going for a run tonight?” she asked, hoping he would remember a prior engagement for his run, and leave her to her own devices.

  “Of course I’ll be running tonight. But I thought we’d run together. There’s a place not far from here that’s quiet and secluded.” He looked at his watch again. “I got to go. We’ll decide what we’re doing when I come home tonight.”

  He turned and left, and the second the door closed behind him she dove for her purse. She hadn’t taken the time to check it when she got it back from the Order, and as she riffled through it, the sick feeling in her stomach grew stronger. She rummaged through the bag, and couldn’t find what she was looking for. She turned it over and shook the contents out over the table. She pawed through everything and didn’t see what she was looking for. Somehow the sedatives she carried in her purse at all times were missing.

  “No no no,” she said as she shoved the items on the table around again, hoping the pill bottle was there, and she couldn’t see it. It wasn’t.

  Her breathing increased, and her movements grew increasingly agitated by the second. She wouldn’t get through tonight without her pills. She looked around frantically, trying to think what she should do. Her stomach twisted hard, and she bolted for the bathroom. Her knees hit the floor in front of the toilet as sweat broke out across her forehead. She lost what little was in her stomach and sagged in front of the toilet when it was over.

  After a few minutes she got shakily to her feet. She went over to the sink, and ran the water, scooping it into her hands and drinking it. She glanced up, and as she looked in the mirror on the medicine cabinet a thought occurred to her. Lee was a doctor. Perhaps he would have something in the house that would help her get through tonight. She flipped open the medicine cabinet and searched through the cabinet. It appeared Lee was disgustingly healthy as the cabinet was full of toiletry items but no drugs.

  She shut the door and glimpsed at herself in the mirror. Her eyes had gone from her usual blue to a glowing amber. Squinting her eyes closed tight, she turned away. She needed to calm down. She wouldn’t be able to control this if she wasn’t calm.

  She walked in to Lee’s bedroom and felt like an intruder. As she scanned the room, she tried to think where he would keep a medical bag. He had to have one. She went to the closet, shoving down her shame at invading his privacy. She had to do this. It was the only way she would make it through tonight.

  She quickly went through the contents of his closet, and could find no evidence of a medical bag.

  “Fuck,” she said, and her voice echoed in the room, startling her. She took a deep breath and tried to settle herself. There had to be something in the house, there just had to be.

  She went over to his dresser, pulling out drawers and rifling through the contents. Her searched turned up nothing. What kind of doctor didn’t have a medical bag in his house?

  She slammed the drawers shut and went through the house, her search growing frantic as she came closer to the realization that Lee appeared to have nothing in the house that would help her through the coming night.

  She returned to the living room and sank down on the couch. Her hands shook as she drove them through her hair. She knew no one in town who she could ask for drugs. And the man who’d given them to her in Ottawa, David’s friend who had worked at the warehouse alongside them, was long dead.

  She hugged her arms around her middle, the ache in her stomach growing stronger with each passing minute. She couldn’t go through the change tonight. She fell to the side, her legs pulled in and she curled into a ball. Her breathing came in quick pants. She couldn’t change tonight, and she would do whatever it took to stop it from happening.

  Chapter 6

  Lee rubbed the back of his neck as he walked into the lunchroom at work. His brows knotted together as he thought about Simone’s aggression this morning. It wasn’t unusual for werewolves to be on edge the day of the full moon, but she was a little over the top. It wasn’t only her throwing the mug this morning. He remembered what Cadric told him happened when she was being interrogated.

  He grabbed a sandwich, bottle of water and an apple. He paid the cashier and noticed Nick and Rowan sitting at a table. They beckoned him over once he got his change. He walked over to them and put his tray down and sat in a chair across from them.

  “How’s it going Lee?” Rowan asked as he stuck out his hand. Lee shook it and then grabbed his sandwich and took a bite.

  “Good. How’s Kate doing?” he asked after he’d swallowed his food.

  “She’s good. She doesn’t appear to have any issues from her injury. I still can’t thank you enough. If you hadn’t kept her alive on the scene,” Rowan said. He then turned to his brother. “And you treating her when she was brought in, I would have lost her. You guys saved her life, and if there’s anything either of you need, just ask.”

  “She’s family,” Nick said. “You don’t need to thank me for saving her. It’s my job.”

  “Still, I’m grateful,” Rowan said. He looked over at Lee. “There is something I wanted to ask you. Kate wants to get to know her sister, but we don’t know where she is. Nick says she’s not being housed here anymore, do you know how Kate can get in touch with her?”

  “She’s living with me actually,” Lee said, surprised Nick didn’t know that. Cadric must not have thou
ght he needed to know, which sounded about right, since medical staff weren’t typically kept abreast of the Order’s business.

  “Oh really,” Nick said as he grinned at him. “When did that happen?”

  “When she negotiated her release, Cadric put her in my custody. It’s not what you think,” he said to Rowan, who’d raised his hand for a fist bump. “My father is still out there, and Simone made a deal with Cadric to help catch him. She’s bait to lure him out of hiding.”

  “And she’s with you because you talked Cadric into letting her be with you,” Nick said as comprehension crossed his face. “She still wants her revenge doesn’t she?”

  “Yeah, and I have to make sure she’s safe. I brought her to my father’s attention, and I need to make sure she doesn’t get hurt. She’s been hurt enough already.”

  “And I’m sure Cadric sees her as a means to an end,” Rowan said. Lee looked over at him, and while he liked and respected his boss, he understood why Rowan could see that the Order was everything to Cadric. He would use whoever he needed to make sure that he eliminated the Order’s enemies. And Dany Cavanaugh was the Order’s number one enemy at the moment.

  “I don’t think that Cadric wants her hurt, but if it happened while catching my father, he would see it as collateral damage. So she’s with me, and I will make sure she stays safe.” Lee finished his sandwich, and as he remembered Simone’s behavior from this morning, he thought of a question he wanted to ask Rowan. If anyone had insight to the behavior of a turned werewolf, Rowan would. Kate hadn’t yet gone through her first transition when she found him. “Does Kate get hyper aggressive before the full moon?”

  “No, I wouldn’t say so. Things get tense around the house on days like today, but I’m sure we're like any other werewolf couple. She was more aggressive before she went through the transition, but she’s pretty settled now,” Rowan said.