Monsters, Book One: The Good, The Bad, The Cursed

by Heather Killough-Walden

  Angel shrugged. “I don’t ride anymore.”

  “Why not?”

  Angel looked away, focusing on the glasses of beer on the table a few feet away from their booth. She stared at the amber bubbles rising from the bottom. It looked like she and Jake weren’t the only ones wanting to get an early start on things that day. “It’s just…” she started. But then she trailed off and smiled, meeting his eyes again. “What’s it to you?” she asked, not in an unfriendly way, but with enough evasiveness she hoped he could tell she didn’t want to talk about it.

  Jake leaned back again, and the overhead lights flashed across his jade-shard eyes. He ignored her question and asked another of his own. “What was it you liked about riding?”

  Angel blinked. She looked down at the table top, absently tracing a star someone had carved into it long ago. Her mind turned back the clock fifteen years.

  Normally she found it hard to think back to those times, but for some reason, a feeling of serenity was stealing over her, and she closed her eyes. There in that darkness, old sensations re-emerged. “I didn’t like riding,” she said softly, though her voice echoed in her ears. “I loved it.”

  She licked her lips as she felt the throttle in her grip, the wind in her hair, the saddle between her squeezing thighs. “I loved the way my bike was a part of me, an extension. It moved where I looked, leaned when I leaned, echoed my emotions with the slightest provocation.” She laughed suddenly, recalling how when she’d been angry or impatient, the bike had been too. She’d broken more than her share of speeding laws that way.

  “But mostly it was the freedom,” she continued. “I was… immortal on that bike. I was above it all, untouchable.” She shook her head. “Uncageable. Nothing could get to me. Not even reality.” Especially reality, her thoughts echoed.

  Then she opened her eyes to find that Jacob Crow was observing her with intense scrutiny, his disturbingly beautiful eyes sparking like green fire. Aside from those eyes however, his expression was unreadable, and if the carved stone of flexed muscle pressed against his shirt was any indication, there seemed to be a new tension riding him.

  Angel cleared her throat; it felt a little dry again. She noticed that the waitress had brought the coffees to their table while she’d been in her memory stupor, and hastily she picked both of them up and switched them. When Jake smiled wryly at her behavior, she grinned and shrugged. “Can you blame me?”

  He laughed.

  She picked hers up and took a few quick sips. “Oh… crap,” she whispered, blushing when she realized she’d said it out loud. But it was so good. It was just shy of scalding hot, it was sweet, and it burned just the right amount as it slid soothingly down her throat. “You were right. This is amazing.”

  Jake grinned in satisfaction. “I’m glad you like it.” He picked up his own, and he must have felt it was safe because he put it to his lips and took a few sips himself.

  As Angel swallowed the warm, therapeutic drink, her brain began to clear. A kind of fog was sliding away, and in that sudden clarity, she realized everything she’d just said about riding, and that she’d said it all to a bona fide biker. She blushed and laughed nervously. “But look who I’m talking to about riding.” A member of a motorcycle club, no less.

  Jacob Crow laughed again. It was an honest and pleasant sound, one that sort of vibrated through her like an internal massage. She forgot about her clumsy divulgence and was feeling good again in a few seconds flat.

  “You know, that’s pretty much the only thing I know about you, Crow.” She took another long sip and put the mug down. “I know you ride and I know you own a bad ass car. You seem to know a hell of a lot more about me.”

  Jake smiled. “Do I?”

  “You already knew I didn’t ride. The Monsters clan is a motorcycle club. You don’t go anywhere without your bikes. But you didn’t even ask; you just brought me out in the GTO.” She smiled a sly smile, and thoroughly enjoyed the fast flash of surprise he was unable to hide from his gaze. “And you know I like this drink. There are hundreds of coffee drinks you could have chosen from, and Irish Coffee is normally what people suggest. But not you.”

  Jake straightened a little and chewed on his cheek, watching her with a far more shrewd look than he had been before.

  Angel looked him dead in the eye. “You had me vetted, didn’t you?”

  There were several tense seconds of silence between them before Jake shook his head and grinned. “Damn, Angel.” He actually laughed, the sound once more delicious and deep. “You really are good. And I messed up.”

  “Yeah, you did,” she chuckled. She didn’t care if he’d had her researched. For some reason, despite the fact it probably meant he knew her biggest secret, that she could heal, she felt okay with him knowing. She trusted him.

  And she had nothing else she seriously wanted to hide. Besides, the fact that he’d looked this shit up meant he cared. And that was like a dose of fae aphrodisiac to her. When she thought about it, warmth began to slide down and coil in her core, heating up between her legs.

  But she did wonder how far back his research had taken him. Did he go back fifteen years? Did he know why she didn’t ride any longer?

  With that thought, her smile slipped a little, and she drank more of her coffee to try to put it back on.

  “Okay, fair is fair.” His deep, sexy voice drew her attention again. “You want to know about me?” he asked, leaning forward now to cross his arms on the table and get closer to her.

  Angel’s smile was back. “Yeah, I do.” I really, really do.

  “What would you like to know?”

  “The name Crow. Is it Sioux or Chippewa?”

  He was visibly impressed, his smile growing. “It’s Chippewa. Good guess.”

  “Well, as you already know, I grew up in Minnesota.” She shot him a reproachful look.

  He laughed, guilty and gorgeous.

  “I’ve run across the surname before. But since both the Sioux and the Chippewa are in that area, I was stuck between the two.”

  They fell silent for a bit. Then she asked, “You’re a mage, aren’t you?”

  That was a big question for her to ask. Wardens liked to keep their magic-using abilities secret, though not as secret as her healing abilities.

  Jake grew silent, contemplating her with keen eyes. She was getting bold with him. Maybe it was the coffee. Then again, he owed her. Tit for tat.

  “Yes,” he admitted after a long pause.

  “But you’re not a warlock or witch. You’re something else. You use a different kind of magic.” She nodded at the pendant around his neck. It was a silver chain with a bear claw that seemed to have been dipped in silver as well. “Like that pendant. I can feel magic coming off it. But I can’t place it. It’s… new to me.” She’d sensed it when they’d first met weeks ago, but still couldn’t tell what the bear claw was meant to do.

  Jake seemed to be a little at a loss at first. He sat up straight again and glanced down at the pendant, thinking quietly. He touched the bear claw. Then he took a deep breath, as if coming to a decision. When he looked back up, his expression was soft.

  He’s remembering something, she thought. She knew that look.

  “My father was chief of our tribal clan,” he told her. “And the highest ranking medicine man. His name was White Wolf.”

  White wolf….

  Angel saw a massive white wolf at the edge of a forest.

  Like the wolf from my dream.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Jake’s eyes searched her face for a moment as if he could see what she was seeing. His expression was unreadable. Obviously the alcohol was having an effect on her.

  But Jake went on. “Most medicine men and women simply use herbs the way herbalists do today. But a few were and are what you and I now know of as real mages.”

  Mage was the general term used for anyone with an inherent ability to use some form of magic, whether it was the ability to see into the future, to hea
l wounds, or cast spells.

  “White Wolf, like his father before him, had this very real magic in his veins. But it was rooted in the spirit of our tribe. He was the clan’s ‘dreamer,’ a tribal visionary who had the ability to enter people’s sleep and study their dreams.” He smiled. “When a member of our clan dreamed of a white wolf, he or she knew that my father had been there to guide them and watch over them.”

  Angel felt a weird sensation go through her. “He’s dead now?”

  Jake nodded. “Yes.”

  “Did… he pass this magic on to you?”

  “No,” Jake said. “He did pass on his magic, but mine is a different kind.”

  “What kind?”

  “Well, you noticed the pendant, for instance.” He pulled it over his head and held it up between them. Instinctively, Angel held out her hand, and he placed it in her palm. It was warm, very warm. Was it just his body heat that had warmed it? It felt comforting in her hand, like it wanted to stay with her.

  Jake continued. “It’s been enchanted, I guess warded if you will, to keep dark spirits away. This is how my father would have seen it,” he laughed. “But I’ve found that what it translates to in practice is that it keeps away some warlocks, weaker demons, angry Anime, Pan shadows, and pretty much all unseelie fae as long as they mean you some kind of harm.”

  “So you have the ability to enchant objects,” she mused, turning the claw over between her fingers. That was a valuable ability. “Can you enchant them to heal?”

  He smiled a knowing smile and shook his head. “No. I’m afraid you’re still as rare as ever, Angel.”

  Angel blushed furiously. She handed the pendant back to him and watched his muscles flex as he draped it back over his head and tucked it under his shirt.

  “My abilities are limited,” he said. “I can affect objects – opening locks, manipulating GPS systems to zero in on marks, enchanting them to hold certain effects, changing the channel on the iPod from across the room,” he grinned, “and that’s about it. But it helps with the job.”

  She nodded. Jake was the tracker for the Monsters clan. He was very, very good. He could find anyone, anywhere. In fact, watching him work had been a little unsettling. She’d wondered if she would have been able to shake him if the need ever arose. He could track a mark through transports, even. It was kind of insane. And now Angel had an inkling how he did it. Magic.

  “You’d better finish your drink before it gets cold,” he told her softly.

  Angel glanced up. Jake’s jade eyes had darkened to emerald. They were starkly vivid in his tanned face, making him appear inhuman. More heat flushed Angel’s chest and neck. She grabbed her mug and began downing the liquid rapidly.

  She finished the whole thing off, and was seriously beginning to enjoy the peace it infused her with – until she looked up to find several women nearby openly staring at Jake. The two women were probably in their twenties and clearly on a lunch break from a day at the office. They were dressed for work, but in that sexy manner she would never have pulled off in a million life times.

  They were eyeing Jake like a cool drink of water in an endless desert. Her gaze hardened. Back off, she thought, an uncomfortable heat flooding her veins. The women glanced over at her and paled a little, turning away at the same time.

  Angel frowned as she realized what she’d done. She was pretty sure she’d never done that before in her entire life. She’d uttered the mental command like a spell! She’d actually forced a measure of her precious magic into it!

  She felt devastated. Not only had she wasted magic, Angel wasn’t the kind to lay claim to someone possessively; who was she to do so? She was an orphan mutt from the wrong side of the tracks who knew probably three designer names and didn’t own a single dress or pair of heels. The women she’d just eyed were dressed in pencil skirts and silk blouses, all the right curves hugged in all the right ways by clothing that cost more than a month’s worth of rent. In San Francisco, that was saying something.

  What the hell is wrong with me? She looked down at the table top, noticed her license was still there, and used it as an excuse to do something with her hands. She grabbed it and slid it back into the pocket of her jacket. When she glanced back up at Crow, she found he was still watching her as steadily as always, but now a slightly amused expression played on his painfully handsome face. It was like he’d read her thoughts or something.

  To fill the silence and divert his attention she asked, “So… why is your motorcycle club called Monsters?”

  She’d always wondered that actually; no one knew the answer. They were the only warden clan that hadn’t taken a celestial name, but the Monsters MC history was shrouded in mystery, made absolutely impenetrable by layer upon layer of cover-up magic. Positively no information on any of them existed at all. None.

  Research on the clan was made even more difficult by the fact that they were always moving, never staying in one city for more than a few months to half a year. At this point, pretty much everyone considered it a lost cause to try to dig anything up on them. Besides, they did their jobs and never caused any problems, so no one had reason to.

  Crow’s expression changed, the amusement fading from his eyes and lips to be replaced with something less identifiable. Angel squirmed in her seat across from him when he rose off the back of the bench seat to lean forward, placing his elbows on the table to casually lace his fingers together. He leveled an intense gaze on her, his eyes sparking emeralds.

  Oh crap! Angel thought, her heart racing. I’m already buzzed or something to ask that question. I’ve completely lost my head. Information on the Monsters clan was clearly not up for discussion, or they wouldn’t have gone to the trouble they had to erase it so well. So why the hell was she digging?

  She wasn’t thinking clearly tonight. She was too relaxed in Jake’s presence, too… open. It wasn’t like her. All of her walls were crumbling. She needed to pull herself together.

  “S-sorry,” she stammered quickly. “I didn’t mean to –”

  “Maybe we’re all monsters,” he said calmly.

  Angel froze, her lips parted, her breath stalled in her lungs.

  There was no intonation, no change in his expression. Absolutely nothing he did gave anything away at all. Was he joking? She seriously couldn’t tell.

  But his gaze slipped from her eyes to her lips, and she watched his pupils dilate… and suddenly, she wasn’t thinking about the name of his clan any longer. She was thinking about the body under that shirt of his, the tattoo on his back, the six pack, and the damn Adonis belt V-shaped section of muscle it was hiding. She was thinking about the way his powerful presence took up most of the seat across from her, along with the attention of every female in the restaurant.

  And she was thinking that she wanted some. Badly.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Jake said.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Angel didn’t answer. Instead, she just nodded.

  Jake was up and out of his seat like a light, tossing a wad of bills onto the table and grabbing her by the wrist to pull her after him. They entered the parking lot, and he took her to his car, opening her door first, half afraid that if he left her side or let go of her, she would slip away from him.

  But she slid into the seat, and he slammed the door behind her. He wanted to use his magic to lock the door too, but she would notice that so he didn’t push his luck. She’d already decided to forgive him for researching her. He was a lucky man.

  Jake opened his door, slid behind the wheel, shut the door, and started the car. He’d never had any trouble starting any engine; it was part of his own particular magic. The GTO came to life with a low, delicious rumble, and he caught Angel smiling from her side of the car.

  He could hear her thoughts more clearly than ever now. The coffee he’d made sure she downed was extra strong. He’d known she was going to switch the drinks out. With the way the waitress had blatantly flirted with him and Angel had secretly reacted, he
’d wanted to, well – crow. But he’d also known she was afraid of something unpleasant ending up in her drink.

  So he’d made sure the bottle in the bartender’s hand had slipped a little over his mug rather than hers, pouring an extra amount into the concoction. It was twice as strong as usual, and he’d made sure she finished it, giving her a push of vampire influence to keep her drinking until it was gone.

  Which was perfect. He wanted her off her game.

  When he’d told her about his magic, he hadn’t mentioned the vampire magic he possessed, obviously. But he already knew she was smart. He’d slipped up once, and she’d caught him, reminding him of her intelligence in a surprising manner. And though that intelligence was part of what he appreciated so much about her, it admittedly made him nervous right now. If she’d caught on to those clues – what else had she noticed? How long could he keep up the charade?

  He didn’t want her coming to any catastrophic conclusions right now. Not yet. Or maybe not ever.

  There was something else he wanted from her a whole hell of a lot more.

  As he pulled out of the lot, he put on some classic rock – something he knew she liked, and he did too – then listened carefully to the thoughts moving through her head.

  She was wondering what the hell she was doing.

  Despite the alcohol, she was confused and a little scared. She was excited, and her body was driving her on relentlessly – but she couldn’t help reminding herself that he was a warden. She already felt like she was in hot water with her own clan, especially Gabriel.

  Jake’s gaze narrowed. He felt it heating up and concentrated hard on keeping the vampire light from his eyes. Gabriel Santiago was really pissing him off. But deep inside, he knew it wasn’t Santiago who was really frustrating him. It was this situation. It was the past – Angel’s past. And it was the thoughts going through her head.

  A part of him wanted to put a stop to them. He could if he wanted to. He just had to use enough force. But how many times would he have to do that? He wasn’t willing to let her go any time soon. Hell, he wasn’t willing to let her go at all, ever. And he couldn’t keep her from putting two and two together forever. She was too bright. And this was too important.