Decision (Shifters Forever More Book 2)
Page 1
Decision
SHIFTERS FOREVER WORLDS
Elle Thorne
Thank you for reading!
* * *
To receive exclusive updates from Elle Thorne and to be the first to get your hands on the next release,
please sign up for her mailing list.
Elle Thorne Newsletter
Put this in your browser:
http://www.ellethorne.com/contact
* * *
Copyright © 2017 by Elle Thorne
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Contents
Decision
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Excerpt: Possession
Chapter 1
Afterword
The Shifters Forever Worlds
Thank You!!!
About Elle
Elle’s Newsletter
Decision
A mission at the top secret Razorpeak Mountain Complex has completely flipped Ciara’s life upside down. Daughter of an intuitive and a bear shifter descendant, Ciara is an intuitive herself. And she has a problem she can’t explain and definitely can’t solve.
Ciara hadn’t counted on her cousin Griz, driven by concern, stopping at nothing to help out his little cousin.
Krisztián’s been asked to assist Griz’s cousin with a problem. What problem? Griz doesn’t even know. So, with a GPS set for her home, Krisztián heads out.
New paranormal types abound as Krisztián and Ciara maneuver through the obstacles that could bring them together or tear them apart.
Chapter One
Ciara was in the belly of a mountain in Montana, at the Razorpeak Complex, a bunker maintained by a variety of supernatural races and entities. More than 1,500 feet below ground, the complex was composed of ten three-story buildings. Wards and enchantments, put in place by witchDes, safeguarded the area. Also protecting it were granite, concrete, and steel structures. Razorpeak housed suites, as well as a medical facility, a store, cafeteria, and a fitness center contained within.
She’d been a guest at Razorpeak for the last few days. Guest being the operative word. Mostly because she wasn’t a guest. She was on a job. Or more accurately, she was deep in a mission. One she’d accepted for a lucrative amount of money. She’d occasionally been contracted by various supernatural organizations to assist with matters which required the specific skillset an intuitive brought to the table. Particularly when the entity wanting the assistance of an intuitive type needed said assistance to be off-the-record—something that couldn’t happen if they’d used an intuitive appended to one of the official Shifter Council branches. That was her specialty. She was very much off-the-record and off-the-radar.
In this instance, she’d been hired by a group who’d asked for her assistance, but only after she’d signed a nondisclosure agreement. She’d put her signature on the NDA without mentioning that she’d never been guilty of sharing information. She understood their need for privacy. She enjoyed a high degree of privacy herself, living in an isolated cabin, far from anyone—human or supernatural.
She’d been brought in to monitor the questioning of a bear shifter. This was nothing new for her. The set-up, however, was new. The agents in charge of the interrogation had insisted on putting her in a soundless vacuum after she’d imprinted on the subject they were questioning. She wasn’t there to hear his answers. They’d assured her that the subject was in a soundproof room as well. He couldn’t hear her. And he couldn’t see her through the two-way glass, either, they’d promised her.
Ciara wasn’t completely ignorant of shifter politics and matters. She recognized the man they were questioning from some files she’d seen long ago, on another mission. She couldn’t remember the specifics of it. And she had no idea what he was being questioned for now.
An agent sat next to her in the soundless and soundproofed room, taking notes anytime she conveyed the auras she picked up.
Her objective? To monitor the aura’s signals that the one being questioned gave off. To tell them the aura, whether he was fearful or deceptive or angry. And all of this while she couldn’t hear a word he said.
They’d been at it for two hours already today.
At this very moment, the shifter being questioned became angry. His aura showed his displeasure in vivid oranges and reds.
He rose from his chair abruptly and pinned his angry glare directly on Ciara.
She flinched and fell back in her chair. This was impossible—she was behind a two-way glass. “How does he know I’m here?” she whispered.
The agent next to her gave her a glance of disdain. “He doesn’t. No one knows.”
The shifter on the other side of the two-way glass stalked toward her.
Ciara scrambled backward, knocking her chair back. “The hell he doesn’t.”
“He can’t,” the agent argued.
A low thrum began to envelop her senses. It was replaced with loud, piercing, inhuman shrieks the nearer the shifter came to the glass, until he was up against it and could get no closer.
His eyes lanced through her, straight to the soul, as though he could see her.
She grabbed her head, squeezing with all her might, anything to make the high-pitched shrieking sounds stop.
She kept her eyes locked on the shifter in the other room, certain he was doing this to her, but not sure how. She wasn’t even sure what he was doing.
The alarming sounds grew louder and louder.
Her vision began to fail her; everything went dim and faded to a pinpoint of light.
Silence encased her then the pinpoint vanished, leaving her in complete darkness as Ciara lost consciousness.
* * *
“Is she awake yet?” a faraway voice asked.
Ciara opened her eyes slowly, immediately recognizing she was the she the voice referred to.
Two faces were close to hers, studying her. Judging from their scrubs, they were medical personnel.
She remembered where she was. At Razorpeak. The memory of the angry shifter came slamming into her. He’d done this when—
Something was wrong.
She couldn’t process what it was yet, as there were two sets of eyes staring at her. Disconcerting and distracting, to say the least.
From behind them, another voice spoke. “You fainted.”
That voice came from the Agent in Charge, Victor Saizon, bear shifter. The one who’d brought her into this mission.
Ciara sat up straighter in the semi-reclined ho
spital-type bed. “I don’t faint. I’m not prone to that. It was that—” She second-guessed herself and decided she didn’t want to reveal the shifter had caused her to hear something the agent next to her clearly hadn’t. The shrill shrieking. “You’re right. I don’t feel well. I can’t carry on with this mission anymore. I’ll release you from paying me. Just give me the paperwork. I’ll sign the release.”
“Mission’s over, anyway,” tall, in a dark suit, clean-shaven, and shorthaired Agent Saizon said. “I’ll make sure the funds are wired to your account.”
“What do you mean, the mission’s over? I quit mid-interview.”
He shook his head. “The mission’s over. You didn’t quit. The interview ended, as did your assignment.”
“I don’t understand, it was—”
“You know I can’t discuss this matter with you in detail.”
Ciara nodded.
Now, she could go home and figure out what was wrong.
Because something was definitely off.
Chapter Two
Krisztián studied Salvatore Draecen, the man who’d brought him to Bear Canyon Valley to find the escaped dragon shifter who’d turned out to be Salvatore’s daughter, Allegra. A baby he’d never known he’d fathered, who’d been left on Salvatore’s doorstep as a dragonling child, to be protected from those who hunted dragons.
The dragonkind, a group of nine dragons—to their knowledge the last nine dragons on Earth—had followed Allegra, Salvatore’s daughter, from Old Europe to America. A place Krisztián had visited before, but not often. Not since its name had changed from New World to the United States of America.
Salvatore, who’d always kept their kind hidden in a monastery, with rare excursions into the outside world, had decided to accept an irresistible offer—an alliance the dragonkind with the shifters of Bear Canyon Valley.
Salvatore’s jaw was clenched. He seemed more uptight than when they’d first arrived at the valley.
“What’s on your mind?” Krisztián asked the man who’d been like an older brother or an uncle to him for decades now, since Salvatore brought him into the Draecenguard to serve as a protector for the dragons.
“I find myself occasionally questioning the wisdom behind this alliance I’ve made with the Bear Canyon Valley group.”
“You’re not thinking of going back on your word, are you?” Krisztián was certain this would not go over well with the Bear Canyon Valley group. Salvatore had agreed to work with them on a couple of matters in exchange for assistance with searching for Allegra. And they’d assisted. And she’d been found.
Salvatore chewed his lip. “My objective has always been, and will always be, to protect dragonkind. I cannot enter lightly into commitments that may jeopardize that goal.”
“I’d urge you to reconsider your assessment. So far, the Bear Canyon Valley group has held up their part of the agreement.” Not to mention, Krisztián liked it here. He liked these shifters, people, witches, and assortment of individuals.
It would not be easy to get Krisztián to agree to leave them and renege on their agreement. And from the murmurs among the other bear and dragon shifters that had come with Salvatore, he was not alone in his thoughts. He was not the only one who wanted to stay in America.
Chapter Three
Ciara tried walking, but her legs had turned to jelly. She dropped onto her sofa with a groan, though that hurt, too. She was in agony. Full-blown agony that felt like she’d pulled every single muscle in her body. Her teeth were in pain. Even her nails were sore. If she were to name the pain, she’d have said it felt like her fingernails were being yanked out from their very nail beds.
On the side table next to the sofa, her phone buzzed incessantly. To her tender, overly sensitive ears, it sounded like a million bees right inside her head.
She reached for her cell and, no sooner had she grasped it, than one of her fingernails bumped against the glass, sending her careening into a spiral of pain. She flinched and bit back a cry, the agony excruciating. Tears sprang to her eyes.
The screen had shown Griz’s name as the one calling her, but she could hardly talk to him now. She’d tried when he’d called before, but, like her body, her vocal cords were a mess, and the sounds came out growly and gravelly.
She couldn’t even use her own intuitive skills to determine what was wrong with her. Her skills had vanished.
Two days ago, she’d returned from Razorpeak. Since regaining consciousness after the incident with that bear shifter, she’d felt something was wrong. She couldn’t pin it at first. But later, she realized she had none of her intuitive skills. She no longer saw auras. She couldn’t call on her ability to imprint. These skills and more, all of them, she had been able to access before the bear shifter had rushed the glass partition between them. Now, her gifts were gone.
That bear shifter.
She couldn’t remember his name. She wished that long ago, when she’d seen a file with his picture and name on it during another mission, she’d taken the time to read it. To learn more about him. Maybe that would give her insight into what was going on with her now.
She tried to assess the situation objectively. She’d awakened feeling odd. That was one thing. Not a big deal, in and of itself, feeling odd. Then, her skills were gone. She’d tried to access them and failed.
No skills. Nothing. Zip. Nada.
Chapter Four
“Why does she need a babysitter?” Krisztián looked at his old friend Larsen—the man who now called himself Griz. He hadn’t been able to wrap his head around calling him Griz. Not at all.
From his spot at the picnic table, Griz laughed. “Ciara’s not a child. She doesn’t need a babysitter, per se.”
He, Larsen—aka Griz—and Allegra were enjoying a leisurely late spring afternoon in the mountains in Bear Canyon Valley, a place that had become Krisztián’s new home. Long gone was the monastery in the Pontic Mountains off the coast of modern-day Turkey. Gone were the old buildings and ancient temples he had come across during his life.
He’d come to think of life in terms of, not B.C .and A.D., but in terms of BBCV and ABCV. Before Bear Canyon Valley and After Bear Canyon Valley. He had to admit, he much preferred life after. He’d become a part of the menagerie of shifters and other paranormal types inhabiting the valley.
Allegra focused on the mountains surrounding them, studying the scenery. Krisztián had known her long enough to know that look in her eyes. She had something on her mind. He also knew she wouldn’t divulge it until she was ready.
He turned back to his old friend Larsen—Griz, he corrected himself. He was now Griz. And he needed to get accustomed to calling him that. “Griz.” He stumbled over the name, which brought a slight smile to Griz’s scarred face. “What does she need, if not a babysitter? You’re asking me to, what? Guard her? Keep her in line? Keep her from harming herself? I don’t understand.”
Griz’s shoulders slumped. “Something is going on with Ciara, but she’s not told me what. I called her to see if she could come by. I thought her skillset would be useful in dealing with the issues at hand.”
Issues at hand. Krisztián had been briefed on those issues at hand. Though, really, the briefing had been exactly that. Brief.
In exchange for the protection of the Bear Canyon Valley group of shifters, elementals, and witches, Salvatore Draecen, Allegra’s father and leader of the dragon shifters, had promised to help them with two matters. First, in resolving a longstanding issue with Crossroads—a well-hidden facility that did research on shifters, and second, creating an antigen which would render shifters immune from the toxins delivered in a dragonstrike. Dragonstrike, a lethal wound delivered by the spur on the tip of a dragon’s tail.
Krisztián Kardos wasn’t a dragon shifter. No, he was a bear shifter descended from a Hungarian semi-nomadic group not too far from the Pontic Mountains. His great-great-grandfather had been in the Royal Army during the Crusades and a legendary general in the Army under the Árpádi
an kings. His grandfather had been part of the Siege of Buda, a struggle between the Holy League and the Ottoman Empire.
All of that history had been long ago, and almost as long ago, his family had been eradicated by a group of roving shifters. He’d narrowly escaped death, then, one day, he’d run into a man who’d offered him a new family, a vocation, and a new way of life. Salvatore Draecen. Krisztián had taken the position as one of the Draecenguard in Salvatore’s tightknit group of shifters and sorceresses. He’d been one of the last ones brought in, along with Ilona and Larsen, ahem, Griz, to protect the last dragon Salvatore had been able to find. Allegra Draecen.
Allegra had been one of eight dragon shifters Salvatore had found and assembled—more like adopted—even giving them his own surname. Each dragon shifter had a Draecenguard trio composed of two bear shifters and one sorceress, all three working in conjunction to keep their assigned dragon shifter safe. Salvatore had seen to the education of all the Draecenguard and the dragon shifters. They’d been taught many languages and given them the equivalent of a college degree in learning. Something Krisztián never really understood, because what would they need an education for, after all? He was happy about learning several languages. English had come in quite handy since they’d come to the United States.