by M. L. Briers
“I told you that I’d find you,” he crowed, and she bit down on the mouthful of curse words that she would like to have shared with him, had she not been thinking on her feet.
“So you did,” she offered back with just the right amount of a strained smile to make him look as proud as a peacock.
“Thought you could get away from me,” he said.
“I was … wrong,” she hated to say it and give any man the satisfaction of gloating, but needs must, and she had a vampire on her trail.
“Yes, you were. Now…” He took a moment to consider whether he should try to take her scent at source as he wanted to, and he wanted to. But, out there on the street, she could make a scene, and he didn’t want any more attention. “After you.”
“Me?” She played for innocence.
“You’re coming with me.”
“I am?”
“Hell, yeah,” he growled and watched her think that one over. “Mine.” He added, and she grimaced, just a little, just enough for Kent to growl again in warning.
If she had ideas about taking off again then he wanted there to be no misunderstanding between them – he’d follow her to the ends of the earth if he had to.
“Ok,” Darby said as if begrudgingly resigned to a fate worse than death.
She wanted out of there because neither man was going to give up and running from the man was troubling enough. If she left with the shifter, who seemed to be the lesser of two evils, what could the vampire do about it?
She didn’t think that Brogan would be stupid enough to challenge a shifter out on the street. She’d bought herself some time to think, time to plan, and then she could find a way to dump the shifter, dump the vampire, and be on her merry way.
~
~
~
“Time to come up with the answer, Harper,” Joy whispered as she leaned in towards her friend; while their so-called mates were busy gabbing across the room.
“I must have missed the question,” Harper frowned. She’d been caught out in mid-thought.
“Well, der,” Joy hissed, motioning towards the shifters with a flick of her head.
“You called them with your tempting fate bit…”
“You poop on his boxes…”
“How was I to know they were shifters and would be hell-bent on revenge?” Harper looked wide-eyed and innocent of all wrongdoing, and Joy couldn’t help but snort at her attempt to brush her part in the utter catastrophe off.
“Look, smudge-stick queen, you got us into this…”
“Did not.” Harper folded her arms and raised her chin. She knew she was partly culpable in what appeared to be the end of the world as they knew it, but she didn’t have to admit it. If she were going to admit to anything it would be that she’d helped bring to hunky men into their lives – the fact that they were shifters was a mild inconvenience.
“Fine,” Joy bit out. “You deny it until the cows run away screaming and the claim marks are on your shoulder, or, we can forget blame and figure out our next move.”
“Well, the way I see it, you’re pretty much doomed…”
“Why just me? If I’m going down the fur and fangs route, I’m definitely taking you with me,” Joy snorted.
“Gee, thanks.”
“No planning anything,” Alf growled, eyeing them with suspicion and taking a long moment to get his point across as he glared at his mate.
“Us?” Harper offered him an innocent look that didn’t quite cut it for him.
“You.”
“Just how many pups she wants,” Harper shot back, and Joy almost bit her own tongue off as she snapped a look at the beta and his jaw snapped downwards.
“Funny,” she hissed at her friend from behind her hand, turning her back on the men and offering her friend a death glare.
“Deflect and run rings around them, kind of shock and awe, but the female version,” Harper whispered back.
“Do you have a plan?”
“Not quite yet,” she admitted and watched her friend’s shoulders slump as she sighed out the air from her lungs in a slow whine. “But they’re men, how hard can it be to discourage them?”
“They’re mates – I’d say almost impossible.”
“Then we do the next best thing…”
“Which is?”
“Kill them and get rid of the evidence.”
~
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~
“I’m glad to see you came around to my way of thinking,” Kent said, snatching a long look at his mate as she sat beside him in his pickup truck.
Her scent was playing havoc with his beast’s sense of control, and he wasn’t fairing much better. His length had been hard and aching to escape the confines of his jeans since the first moment that he’d recognized that scent. It was disconcerting.
“Meh,” Darby shrugged.
She was paying attention to where they were going and her surroundings so that she could recognize any markers on her escape that told her she was going the wrong way. She didn’t want to stumble back into the city, and Brogan, once she’d escaped the wolfman.
“Why did you?”
“Did what?” She really hadn’t been listening.
“Come with me?”
Kent wasn’t stupid. The witch didn’t seem the type to just accept him as her mate and follow along so easily. Especially not after the run around that she’d given him at the department store.
“When it’s fate; it’s fate,” she lied. Fate be damned, she was out of there at her earliest opportunity.
“Well, glad you agree,” Kent said, but in truth, he didn’t trust her.
He could scent that something was off, and that was mainly due to the fact that he smelled fried chicken in the air – that was coming from her magic, and he guessed it was there to cover up the scent of her deceit. He was going to have to keep an eye on the witch.
“Watch the road,” she snapped.
One eye on the witch and the other on the road, how hard could it be?
CHAPTER ELEVEN
~
“I heard that,” Alf growled as he turned his attention back towards his mate. He sneered at the fact that she tried to look innocent of all wrongdoing. Pah!
It was the damnedest thing – there was a part of him that was jumping up and down with glee that he’d found what most shifters valued most – a mate, while the other part was horrified that she was a devious and troublemaking witch. He knew which part of him was going to win the day, but still, he could mourn that loss of sanity that was sure to follow him for all of his days.
The woman had already tried her damnedest to drive him to the brink of going nuts with her antics, and that was even before he’d met her. Now he could only wonder what she had in store for phase two.
“What?” Harper tried for innocent.
“What you said,” he growled back, eyeing her as she played the part of someone who wasn’t filled to the brim with mischief.
“What’d I say?”
“Don’t act innocent of all wrongdoing…”
“Don’t accuse me of something without being able to…”
“Kill them and get rid of the evidence,” he offered back, turning towards her and folding those big muscled arms over his impossibly broad chest, and eyeing her with a certain amount of victory.
Harper had to admit that those big muscled arms did make her insides flutter. She’d always been a sucker for muscled forearms, and couldn’t quite figure out why. She guessed it was the same reasoning as men who had leg, boob or bum preferences, and yet she still felt it was a little strange.
“Well,” she said, buying a little time so she could come up with a plausible way to deny things and trying to pull her eyes from his physique, and that wasn’t an easy thing to do when the man dominated the room. “Damn, you spoiled the surprise.” She went on the defensive when her brain absolutely refused to spit out a little white lie to prove him wrong.
“Nothing about you would sur
prise me…”
“I want three boys and three girls. I like equal numbers, and that seems about the right number of offspring to make up a happy home,” she spat out the lie and watched his lips part, his eyes narrow, and his arms drop to his sides. “Surprise!” She offered him jazz hands and watched him snap his head back on his neck as if she’d punched him on the nose.
“Funny…” he growled.
“Don’t assume you know me, wolf, you don’t,” Harper tossed back.
“I know you’re a witch…”
“Okay, you get the firewood, and I’ll get the matches, and we’ll have a toasty witch critter by the end of the day.”
“That’s not what I’m…”
“I mean, your judge and jury, and that makes me toast, right?”
“Don’t put words in my…”
“Burn the witch! Burn the witch!” She called out in the small confines of the kitchen. She could hear Joy chuckling into her hand, and the beta wasn’t much better. Those two really did make a great pair.
“Holy hell — you’re insane!” Alf shot a look of disbelief at his beta and Clark simply shrugged shoulders in return.
“Just think how happy and well-adjusted our children will be when their father tells them that their mother is screwy.”
“Now hold on…” He lifted his hand and jabbed the air with his index finger.
“Isn’t that what you just said?” Harper turned to look at Joy and was slightly put off her game by her friend’s happy tears that were almost brimming over onto her cheeks.
“He definitely did.” Joy chuckled.
“Clark,” Alf growled as he turned to his brother in the hope that he could get some backup with the crazy witch.
“She’s not wrong, it’s what you said, brother,” he said offering a helpless shrug.
“Fine, it’s what I said, but I didn’t mean it like…”
“Do you often say what you don’t mean?” Harper shot back.
“No!” Alf rushed out without thinking about it.
“See! I’m screwy!” Harper tossed up a hand and let it fall back to her side with a feigned look of disbelief for everyone present.
“Look…”
“No!” Harper held up her hand, palm towards him, to silence his protest. “It’s too late — you said it now — we all know how you feel about your mate.” She added as dramatically as she could.
“I’m not going to stand here and defend myself…”
“Because you have no defense,” Harper tossed back.
Alf bit down on his need to gush out curse words like a defective fountain. The woman was not only insane but damn frustrating.
Sure, he could see the light of mischief in her eyes, hear the teasing in her voice, and he knew that he was being set up — but still, he needed to defend himself against false accusations. If she stopped talking for long enough, then he might be able to get a whole sentence out to do it.
“I’m an alpha, I prefer offense,” Alf growled.
“Well, job done. I find you very offensive.” Harper folded her arms and offered him a smug look.
“Brother and I’m probably only ever going to say this once in my life so listen up,” he turned to look at the beta, “you were right — we should never have come here.”
“Wow,” Harper said, and Alf slowly turned his head toward her, a sense of foreboding raising its ugly head within him. “Denying your mate — what kind of a man — Wolf — alpha — shifter — example setter — are you?”
There was a low rumble of a growl that started in Alf’s chest and gradually worked its way to his throat, as his hands fisted tightly at his sides, his shoulders locked up with so much tension that they actually hurt, and his temper bubbled over.
“The kind that kills his mate.”
~
~
~
When the car hit a convenient pothole, Darby had the opportunity that she’d been waiting for and used her magic to pop the front tire. The sound of Kent cursing from beside her gave her a strange sense of satisfaction.
“Hold on, we’re fine, I’m just gonna pull it over,” Kent said, trying to reassure her, but a quick glance towards her said that she didn’t need it. His suspicious nature pushed to the front.
“I’m good — I trust you,” Darby made it sound like an innocent offhand remark when it was anything but.
She’d been planning it for a while and had to wait for a suitable moment. That moment had taken forever to come.
Normally, Kent would have liked the sound of that, his mate trusted him, but unfortunately, he couldn’t say the same about her. He didn’t trust her as far as he could throw her, not that he would throw his mate, well, maybe onto a bed, but as for trusting her — not so much.
They were on the outskirts of town. His town. Pack land was just on the other side and stretched as far as the eye could see, including the mountain. He was on home ground, and she’d be hard pressed to get anything by him here.
“You sit here, and I’ll have it fixed in no time,” Kent said, trying to judge her mood. He wasn’t sure what the vibe was that he was getting from her, but if he were a betting man, then he’d say it was nothing good.
“That sign says there’s a town. Why don’t I just walk on in and you can pick me up on the way through?”
Oh, she was good. If Kent didn’t know better, then her innocent act might have fooled him, but he did know better.
“It’s one road in and one road out.”
“There you go then, you don’t have to worry about me running off,” Darby offered back.
That information hadn’t pleased her; she’d planned to hit the town, pick up a ride and keep going. Now she would just have to adjust her plans accordingly and do what she always did, think on her feet.
“You? Run-off? The thought hadn’t crossed my mind.” Two could play her game, and he was determined not only to play it but to win.
Kent had to admit that it might have been easier for him to think had he not been so damn attracted to her. His little brain was more than trying to muscle in on his brain’s territory, and his beast wasn’t helping matters much either.
He needed to woo her, but they’d spent most of the journey with him asking questions and her either deflecting them or dancing around the answers. He knew a couple of things about her, but the primary thing that he took from the time that they’d shared was that she was cagey, and definitely hiding something.
None of that boded well for his odds of wooing her. He needed a different approach, but that’s where his brain was failing him. How did he woo a woman that blatantly had no interest in being wooed?
“We’re all good then?” Darby said with a bright smile that was aimed at his little brain, and it worked.
“You go right ahead,” he offered back. He had a plan to see exactly what she was all about, and he hated it and liked it at the same time.
There were only two people that he knew who was as cunning and devious as a witch could be, and he was about to enlist them both in his dastardly plan.
CHAPTER TWELVE
~
“What kind of an alpha are you?” Joy demanded as she fixed the man with a hard glare. “Kill your mate?”
“Maybe just chew on her a little and see how that goes,” Clark said, but his wide grin and laughing eyes said differently.
His sibling might have been an alpha, the best damn fighter of the pack, but the man was a pushover when it came to females, and he reckoned that the man’s mate could have him wrapped around her finger in no time at all, should she choose to be less confrontational and more subtle.
“You heard that I’m in fear of my life,” Harper said to Joy. “Ergo, I’m defending myself if that man takes just one step towards me…”
Alf’s top lip twitched in anger as he took that first step and stopped, eyeing her with all the contempt that he thought she deserved. Harper’s lips moved as she thought that through, and she fidgeted in place before she scowled bac
k at him.
“One more step towards me then I’m perfectly entitled to…” she snapped off her words the moment that Alf took another step. “Stop doing that.” She hissed.
“I thought it was one more step — then two — shall we go for three?” Alf growled.
“Ever heard of three strikes and you’re out?” Harper cocked just one eyebrow back at him, but for Alf that looked like a challenge that he couldn’t refuse. He took that step, that one step, that one more step that made her seething inside.
Harper couldn’t back down. How could she?
It was her house. It was her dare. She couldn’t change tact now, could she? Where would that leave her? Looking like a right Muppet.
She’d drawn a boundary line and all but dared him to cross it. He had. What was she supposed to do? People needed boundaries. Men needed boundaries.
Harper never moved from the spot, but she did move fast. She’d drawn her magic to just below the surface, and she used it well. With one flick of her left-hand the back door flew open, with one flick of her right hand and a little loop of her index finger, the alpha was tossed backwards through the air, with a somersault for flare — and he landed on his pride on the ground outside looking back in at her with a dazed expression.
Another flick of her left hand and the door slammed shut in his face. She was glad that she couldn’t see his glare anymore because that gave her a moment to pull herself together and allow a small sense of victory to wash through her.
Then, there he was — she could see him through the window as he slowly drew his body upward — he looked miffed. He looked a lot bigger than he seemed before.
His jet black eyes were glaring in at her, and with a little flick of her right-hand, she dropped the blind. It was better if she didn’t see the man mountain while he was doing his impersonation of a psycho.