Past My Defenses (Taming the Pack series) (Entangled Ignite)

by Wendy Sparrow

  He wouldn’t have felt so screwed if he thought she felt something—something more than a hormonal connection. He’d felt a hormonal connection to a dozen women over the years. Well, not this strong, but he had felt it, and he’d never trusted it then.

  He groaned when the clock changed to four a.m.

  One hour. After two nights of next to no sleep, he was going to get one hour of sleep tonight. Great. He didn’t even have Lucifer around tonight purposefully breaking things just to annoy him. The house had never sounded so quiet. He even missed her snoring.

  Leashed. Screwed. Whipped.

  And he should hate it a lot more than he did. In fact, he didn’t hate it…if she felt the same way. But she was probably sleeping in her bed just fine, oblivious to the amount of turmoil she’d thrown him into after only… He looked at his clock again. Fifty-seven hours and twenty-eight minutes—a good portion of which she’d spent as a wolf. Did he count those hours? Technically, she was even naked all that time if you didn’t count the fur.

  You had to count the fur.

  He took another shower when he finally gave up on sleep. That nightmare had left him in a cold sweat. It was another cold shower. Eventually, maybe, he’d be able to be in this shower stall without thinking of her.

  His phone rang as he was buttoning his shirt, and he almost threw it when he recognized the number. It’d been stupid to think it was her. Even if she would eventually call him, it wouldn’t be at six in the morning.

  Not after knowing each other fifty-nine hours.

  “Hello.” He ought to answer a little more politely, but after one hour of miserable sleep, he was so far beyond polite.

  “You were right,” Sammy said.

  He nearly dropped the phone. He had no idea what he was right about, but her voice didn’t sound cheerful. It sounded flat and matter-of-fact.

  “It wasn’t the wolves.”

  “What wasn’t the wolves?” he asked.

  “Travis found our missing person—all cut to pieces like a surgery gone wrong. Definitely human. It looks like we got a killer around.”

  His heart stopped and then began pounding. He couldn’t swallow. That nightmare. That horrible nightmare.

  “I have to go. I won’t be in today, so don’t expect me.” And he hung up and dialed Vanessa’s house again. It rang and rang and rang. He’d call in to work in order to take a personal day when he got to Vanessa’s.

  He was in his Jeep within seconds and driving toward the address he’d found online. The closer he got, the louder the sirens became.

  In between his frantic calls, Sammy managed to get through and suggest, yes, he should come in because the body had been left near his place, and they’d want him to help canvass the houses nearby. Near his place? It wasn’t as close to his place as it was to Vanessa’s. It was almost in her backyard. She should be hearing the sirens and freaking out. Where the hell was she?

  Chapter Seven

  The noise was making her head pound. Dragging herself around in a near-zombie state, she gathered the two squawking phones and shoved them in the freezer before returning to the floor. Vaguely, her aching back suggested the bed, but her head was screaming “get horizontal, you freak!” So in concession, she dropped halfway on the tile and halfway on the carpet and went back to sleep—even with the distant alarm sounds.

  In her dream, she heard pounding, possibly still her head aching, and then wood splintering, and something smacked her feet sideways. Then the shaking started. Someone grabbed her shoulders and started shaking her.

  “Vanessa! Vanessa! I can hear you snoring so I know you’re alive. Vanessa! How many of these pills did you take? Vanessa!” Shake. Shake. Shake.

  No one, but no one, shook her awake. A girl had to have rules. This was one of hers. She squinted her eyes open enough to slap him good and hard.

  Dane’s face, even through her slitted eyes, reflected shock and something that looked like stark terror, but then he frowned at her. At least the shaking stopped. “Vanessa, how many of these pills did you take? Do I need to get you to a hospital?”

  She squinted and pushed herself onto her elbows. All around her were dozens of pills that had spilled when she’d opened the bottle. It looked like an allergy pill overdose.

  Okay, so maybe the shaking had been warranted.

  Maybe she shouldn’t have slapped him.

  “Just a few,” she said, sitting up. “My allergies were so bad that I spilled because I couldn’t see, and then I crashed here.”

  “You slept here all night?” Why did he sound relieved and a little amused?

  Oh, hell, her head was pounding both from sleeping on the floor and the sinus headache. And her back felt like she’d slept on a tile floor. Ugh. Pollen was such a bastard, because, really, everything went back to being pollen’s fault. Besides, pollen was basically plant sperm, so it was both gross and vile.

  Dane eased up behind her and put his arms around her. “Vanessa, are you going to be okay? Do you need anything else? Wait, why didn’t you answer the phone?”

  “Yes. No. In the freezer.”

  He was silent, but finally asked, “Which question did you answer with ‘in the freezer’?”

  “The phones wouldn’t stop ringing so I put them in the freezer.”

  Damn her allergies, she had about two seconds notice before Jordan opened the door from her basement, thankfully wearing sweatpants, and said, “Well, that explains why you’re not answering your cell phone.”

  And this was about to go to crap.

  Dane froze…he went as still as a Lycan. Hell of a thing for a human. Then, his voice sharp and cold as ice, he asked, “He lives with you?”

  She pulled away from Dane, and they both stood, eyeing each other warily.

  “No, he just…came in through my basement entrance.” Please don’t ask for more of an explanation.

  Jordan was grinning at Dane smugly, so really, that was a fairy tale of a possibility.

  She cleared her throat. “Dane, this is Jordan. Jordan, this is Dane.”

  “We’ve met,” both men said at once.

  Oh. My. Hell. Please, let them have met some other time, some other place. Dane couldn’t recognize Jordan as the wolf he’d seen. He couldn’t.

  “I think I like you less on two feet. But you look less intelligent, so there’s that,” Dane said, his eyes narrowed, his chest puffed.

  Jordan crossed his arms and lifted his chin. “Either way, I’m looking down on you, little man.”

  Jordan was maybe two inches taller than Dane. But two inches was all it took when you were dealing with two Alphas facing off.

  Dane turned back to her. “He leaves or I do.”

  Oh, no, he didn’t issue a demand this soon after arriving. “Why the hell are either of you here?” She clutched her head and looked around for her purse. If she didn’t wrap this thing in ibuprofen, her brain might explode. That’s when she saw her door. “You broke through my door?” The doorframe was splintered around where the lock was, and the door looked like it had tangled with a boulder. “Why would you break through my door?” Instead of waiting for their answers, she stalked over, crouched, and rooted through her purse. A moment later, she’d swallowed four ibuprofen dry.

  She turned back to see both men staring at the doorframe—Dane looking sheepish and Jordan seeming impressed.

  “Okay, here’s how it’s going to go. I’m going to go take a shower because I just spent like twelve hours sleeping on a floor. When I get out, you’ll both be gone, but you will return, Dane, at some point to replace or fix or do something with my door.” She stomped off toward her room.

  Men! Freaking Alphas!

  Jordan—coming here and pissing off Dane.

  Dane—breaking her door, shaking her awake, and then issuing ultimatums.

  Apparently, one Alpha plus one Alpha equaled two eight-year-old boys and playground fights.

  “They found Cheri,” Jordan said.

  She stopped and look
ed over her shoulder.

  “That’s why I broke down the door when you wouldn’t answer your phone,” Dane said. He pointed toward her kitchen window. “That sound you hear is sirens.”

  “They found her?” she asked Jordan.

  “Travis found her—so we found her,” he said, casting a look toward Dane.

  She rolled her eyes. “Not who found her, I meant…the poachers…was it them?”

  “Her organs were all gone.”

  Her shoulders dropped in defeat. No. This couldn’t be happening. But not only was it happening, it sounded like it was happening practically in her backyard.

  “Okay, you both can stay, but don’t kill each other.”

  “Of course not,” Jordan said.

  “Yes, because it’s not like you’ve tried before,” Dane said sarcastically.

  Well, that was the best she could hope for. She went to go take a shower.

  …

  If there was a more awkward set of circumstances possible, he couldn’t imagine it. They sat on separate pieces of furniture, staring straight ahead.

  With any luck, Vanessa’s shower would be very, very short.

  The sirens were getting to him. “What did she mean when she asked if it was poachers? Like animal poachers?”

  “None of your business, skinny,” the ass said.

  “If it involves Vanessa, furry, it’s my business.” He was making it his business. If this was Jordan Hill, he was also the dead woman’s ex. And he’d been shopping for a new alpha female before his old one was even cold. Like hell was he going to stay out of this.

  Jordan slid him a look that was probably meant to intimidate him. “You may be her mate, but I’m her Alpha.”

  Of course the stupid fool had meant to insult him, but being acknowledged as her mate actually made him smile. “It must burn that she chose me over you.”

  Jordan snorted. “Please. The only reason you’re alive is because she got between us.”

  Dane cleared his throat. “No. The only reason you’re alive is because she got between us. I had my gun trained on your head.”

  “You would’ve missed.”

  “I trained at the police academy, and I nearly lived at the gun range. I wouldn’t have missed.” He wouldn’t have. Probably. The black wolf had been doing some effective evasive maneuvering.

  Jordan shook his head. “You would’ve missed.”

  “No, I wouldn’t have.”

  “Prove it.”

  “You want me to shoot you in the head? Because believe me, it’d be my pleasure, but I’m pretty sure Vanessa asked us not to do that.”

  That actually made Jordan laugh. And if he didn’t despise him so much, Dane might have laughed too. As it was, he was only mostly joking.

  “No. Target practice. I want to see if you’re all talk.”

  “Target practice? With what? Trees?”

  Jordan shook his head. “No, something that will sound satisfying if you actually manage to hit it.”

  It sounded stupid—like a pissing match. He was still going to do it—quickly, before Vanessa got out of the shower.

  …

  She’d left them alone long enough. Even if it’d been tempting to stand underneath the hot spray and let it relax her aching muscles, she made it quick. Any longer and there’d be bloodshed.

  She’d planned on dressing first when she heard them out talking on the porch—since the shower had cleared out her sinuses—instead of shouting inside. Hearing accord when you expected discord was terrifying.

  “You should go put it out there. You’ve got the gun…unless you want me to hold the gun for you.” Jordan was using his charming, arrogant, selling-snake-oil voice that he only used in contracting jobs with someone attempting to screw him over.

  Nice. She couldn’t find the belt for her robe. It was probably still in the dryer or something.

  “Give you my gun?” Dane asked. “Yeah, right. What kind of idiot do you take me for?”

  Where was that belt?

  “The kind that walks on two legs and has no right to an alpha Lycan female. Oh, wait, was that a rhetorical question?”

  “Is that what you are? Lycans?” Dane sounded genuinely curious.

  “I can put it out there. Just remember if you shoot me in the back, she’ll be obligated to kill you.”

  “She wouldn’t.” He didn’t sound as confident as he should have been.

  She grabbed the lapels of her robe, holding it together, and used the sliding glass door to slip out onto the porch.

  “What are you two doing?” Despite the fact that they’d both seen her naked, she still blushed when they turned to look at her.

  Jordan muttered a quiet “Aw, hell” under his breath.

  Her gaze took in Dane’s shotgun in one hand and her favorite mug in his other hand. “What are you doing with a gun and my favorite mug?”

  Dane blinked and whirled back to face Jordan. “Oh, it had to be that mug, did it? She’d never miss it? Isn’t that what you said?”

  Jordan smirked.

  Dane set the mug on the porch railing with a thunk and lifted the shotgun. A moment later, Jordan had shifted to a wolf and dropped back into position to lunge. Dane shouldered the gun and snarled, “I have a lot less reluctance to killing you when you’re like this.”

  Jordan snarled back.

  Being faced down by a giant, growling wolf would have intimidated 99 percent of men, but not Dane, and that should have made her proud, but it sure as hell didn’t.

  She snatched up the mug on her way to stand between them.

  Dane tipped his shotgun up.

  “So, you’re saying it’s easier to kill him because he’s less human?” she asked.

  Behind her, Jordan snickered. She kicked back with a bare foot that connected with his muzzle. Damn them both.

  “No, I’m saying it’s easier because he already tried to kill me when he looked like that.” Dane continued to glare at the wolf.

  Oh, well, when he put it like that…that was better. She still grabbed the shotgun with her hand, letting her robe fall open. They’d both seen it anyway, and she was facing Dane. Dane’s eyes widened slightly, and he smiled for the first time that day.

  “Jordan, get out of here, I’ll talk to you later,” she tossed over her shoulder, making Dane’s grin widen.

  The black wolf growled behind her. Only another Lycan would have recognized that he was annoyed about her tone and lack of respect in dismissing him.

  She set the mug down, clutched her robe closed, and swung to face him. “No, you gave me your word that no harm would come to Dane, and now you’re trying to provoke him. You know that’s my favorite mug, and you know that there’s an active murder investigation less than a mile from here where a dozen Lycans are watching, and they’d know where the shot came from. Did you really think I’d let them kill him to protect me? And if they did, after you gave your word that no harm would come to him, what then? Or were you hoping this would all happen while I was taking a shower, and I wouldn’t ask any questions at all? Or I’d come out and decide I didn’t want him because he’d killed a piece of ceramic? Where the hell is your honor?” Her voice had dropped from a shout to a hiss, and Jordan threw one last pissed look at Dane before loping off in the direction the sirens were coming from.

  “Would you like me to carry your mug in?” Dane asked behind her.

  “No, I’ve got it.” She turned to face him, grabbed the mug, and walked by him back into her bedroom, set the gun inside, and slid the door closed behind her.

  When she came out five minutes later, dressed, she could feel that Dane had relaxed significantly despite the light splotches of pink on one side of his face where she’d slapped him. He was talking on the phone with Travis and looking in her medicine cabinet. Most men might’ve been uncomfortable getting caught going through cupboards. He turned and smiled tightly at her.

  “No, my girlfriend lives nearby and I’m with her now…I’d planned to make sure
she hadn’t seen anything suspicious and make sure she’s safe.” He smiled. “Yes, Vanessa Tucker.” He frowned. “Yes, Jordan knows. He was here to check on her too.” His frown deepened. “Yes, he knows she’s my girlfriend.”

  She winced. They’d been outed.

  Travis was adaptable: if Jordan knew, then their Alpha was in control—maybe this was even planned by him. That’s what she would have thought—eventually—in Travis’s place. She heard the deputy respond, “Nah, you stay with Vanessa. I’m sure that’s what Jordan would want, and I’ll clear it with your office.” He hung up without saying good-bye.

  Dane took the phone from his ear and stared at it. “Travis is a Lycan, isn’t he? Jordan meant that when he said one of you found the body. Travis was the one who warned me about wolves in the area, too—and their leader being a huge ass. He was talking about Jordan.”

  “He called Jordan an ass?” That was…hard to believe.

  “Basically. Who else?” He hadn’t looked at her when he asked—it would have made it harder to be evasive if he had.

  “I can’t tell you.” She strode by him and filled her favorite mug with water. “Since you’re there, can you get one of those herbal tea packets down for me?”

  “The purple, green, or orange ones?”

  “Green.”

  “Okay, so why can’t you tell me?” She should’ve known he wouldn’t drop it. In that way, they were a lot alike.

  “Because I promised my Alpha I wouldn’t or your life was forfeit.”

  “Just like that?” He sounded all peeved about it.

  “Yes. I’m not allowed to give you information on our…members…or our business, and you’re to be silent about what you do know, but I didn’t ask you to do that, because I knew you would be.” She put the mug in the microwave to heat the water.

  “Or my life is forfeit?”

  “Those were the rules Jordan agreed to honor. Neither he nor anyone else would harm you.”

  The silence from behind her was so icy it sent a shiver down her spine. When she turned, he tossed her the tea packet and crossed his arms and looked out the window. His jaw was tight with irritation.

  “And you’re okay with that? You’re all okay with that? If someone doesn’t follow the rules, they’re murdered?”