by Cece Rose
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Twisted Fate
Chapter Five
Rejecting Fate
About the Author
Other Titles by the Author
Author’s Note
Twisted Fate
Fated Part Two
By Cece Rose
Twisted Fate Copyright © 2017 Cece Rose.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient.
Cover Design by Arizona Type Designs.
Editing by Michelle’s Edits.
Table of Contents
Twisted Fate
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Rejecting Fate
About the Author
Other Titles by the Author
Author’s Note
For the one with the icy eyes, but a warm smile.
Warning
This e-book contains strong violence, sexual scenes, and adult language.
This e-book is intended for adult readers only.
If you’re easily offended or have delicate sensibilities, put down your e-reader and back away slowly. You may also wish to consider avoiding the internet, I hear that’s pretty damn obscene too.
Author’s Note
I write in UK English. So, colour rather than color, realise rather than realize, travelled rather than traveled, and learnt rather than learned. I’m not illiterate, just British!
*Waves at the Americans from across the pond*
P.S. I GOT POP-TARTS! Thank you to Tamara, Amy, Sarah, Amber, and Heather. <3
Prologue
I’m shocked awake by icy water being poured over my head. Pieces of ice slip down the back of my torn shirt. I shiver as I feel the ice slide across my skin. The movement strikes pain into my body, and I’m instantly reminded of where I am. The ache in my arm from the cut that was made earlier is almost unbearable. The throbbing pain ripples through my arm as I move. I bite down on my lip to hold in a gasp of pain. I slowly look around the space in front of me, not seeing my assailant. I notice I’m sitting back up in the chair, and the camera appears to be switched off, the previously green light now red.
“Welcome back to the land of the living, Lena,” a familiar voice calls from behind me. I try to turn my head in his direction, but he grabs me by my hair and faces my head forward again. “Now, now, pretty girl, let’s not get any ideas,” he murmurs into my ear softly.
I try to recoil from his touch, disgusted by the monster I once trusted. “Go to hell,” I mutter.
“I don’t have any holiday plans there anytime soon, but I know someone who has booked a one-way trip,” he goads.
“The fates may not like me, but I’m definitely not going to hell,” I retort.
“Not you, him,” he replies, as he walks around the chair and gestures to the switched-off camera. I stare at the camera. Him. The onslaught of emotion that hits me takes me by surprise. I swallow the feelings back down. This isn’t the time.
“And I’m supposed to care?” I respond. I try moving, to shift some of the muscle cramp from where I’ve been in this odd position for too long. The movement only serves to remind me even more of the tenderness that is encompassing my entire body right now.
“Oh, I know you do.” A sinister looking smile takes over his face, and I can almost taste the vomit that wants out, on my tongue. I find it hard to think that I ever saw anything but evil in his eyes. “And guess what the best part is?” he adds, the sickening glee in his voice filling me with dread. I stay silent. “Aw, come on, Lena, make a guess.”
“Go fuck yourself.” I try to put all the steel I can into my voice.
He laughs, completely unfazed. “Fine, fine, you’re no fun anymore.” He leans right down, shoving his face right in mine, so I have no choice but to look him directly in the eyes as he softly whispers. “He’s going to die tonight, and it’s going to be all your fault.”
6 weeks earlier….
Chapter One
They’re outside my damn mother’s house, again. Three of them this time, none of whom I recognise. Two in a grey car parked down the street, and another sitting on a wall across the road from the house, not even bothering to hide his guard on the place. There’s no way I’m getting in there without being seen.
I sigh and turn around, heading back through a neighbour’s garden to avoid detection. I cross through the small, woodland area around the back of the houses. As I reach the edge of the trees, I spot Erik leaning up against his car, his new car, anyway, an older Mercedes this time. This is the fourth car he’s switched to in the past two weeks. Paranoid bastard.
“So?” he calls out cheerfully.
“Fine, you were right. They’re still fucking there, three this time,” I grumble. I jump straight into the car, not wanting to stand around listening to his, ‘I told you so’ speech. The same one he’d been repeating since helping me escape. He seemed to enjoy reminding me regularly that I’d be doomed without him, captured ten times over. I’d like to disagree, but when I think of the close calls we’ve had, I just can’t. There’s no way I’d have kept out of Cyrus’ grasp without him, so we were stuck together, for now. Me, because I needed him to keep me safe from Cyrus, and him…well, I haven’t quite worked that out yet. I haven’t worked out anything about him.
I hear the driver’s side door open, and turn just as Erik slides into the leather seat. He slams the door shut, and, without a word, starts the car and drives us off.
After a few tense minutes of quiet, I decide to broach a topic that’s been bugging me.
“When are you going to tell me more about this shifter stuff?”
“What do you want to know?”
“How do you shift? And when you do, do you like fully turn into a wolf, or is it some half-and-half wolf-man-beast stuff going on?”
“Neither,” he answers blankly.
“Neither? What kind of shifter doesn’t shift?” I question.
“I never said I didn’t shift. I just don’t shift into a wolf, or a wolf-man-beast for that matter,” he answers, bringing the car onto the M5 motorway.
“Wait, so what do you shift into?”
“Guess.”
I look across at him and trail my eyes over the tattoos on his neck and arms first. They always catch my attention when looking at him. As do his blue eyes that are so icy, you can never tell the emotion behind them, but the intelligence in them is clear.
His black hair stands out against his fair skin, and his sharp, angular features are striking, but none of these things help me make a guess of what the hell he is.
“Nope, not a clue. What are you?”
“A liger.”
“And in English, that is?”
“My father is a lion and my mother was a tiger
,” he answers.
“Why didn’t you just say that instead of mushing the names together?”
“Actual lions and tigers can mix, you know. And, they’re seriously called ligers, Google it.”
I pull a face. Whoever came up with that name is clearly shipper.
“If the actual animal forms can’t mix, you just get born as one or the other,” he adds.
“So, you're a cat?” I pause for a moment then add, “Note to self, pick up catnip and ball of string. Kitties love string,” I tease.
“You're so not funny.”
“Maybe you're more like the grumpy cat meme then, because I'm fucking hilarious,” I retort. He glances across at me, shaking his head at my comments. “So, do you turn into a liger-man-beast, or a normal liger?”
“A normal liger, I wouldn't like to think what a liger-man-beast would look like. I can partial shift though, so maybe that’s close.”
“Partial shift?”
He lifts a hand off the wheel and holds it out in my direction. The skin on his hand ripples, and a crunching sound reaches my ears. My eyes widen as I watch his fingers slowly form into long, thick claws. The effect of it against his still human-like hands is terrifying. I look away swallowing.
“It's okay to look back now,” he says softly. I wait a moment and then slowly turn around, finding his hand has once again returned to normal. “See, I'm just human again,” he adds.
“But you're not really ever human, are you?”
“Neither are you,” he replies.
“But, I was,” I whisper. A melancholy feeling overtakes me for a moment.
“That wasn't what fate had planned for you, I guess. You've got to make the best of the hand that fate has dealt you.”
“Well, fate handed me a psychopathic, werewolf mate. I think I'll pass on the hand that fate has dealt me,” I snap.
“I didn't say you have to accept what it deals you; just that you have to make the best of it. Even if the best of it is running as far as you can in the opposite direction,” he replies, as he pulls into another lane to overtake.
“All this running is hard work. I just want to see my family, and go home.” I look back out the window, watching the scenery fly by in a blur of colours.
“I know, I'm sorry. I wish you could.”
“Where are we headed anyway?”
“Don't freak out, but we're actually headed back towards London. We need to—”
“‘Don't freak out’? Are you freaking kidding me?” I turn back in his direction. “You want to go closer in the direction of Cyrus? Are you insane? No chance! Stop the freaking car!”
“I'm not stopping the car on the motorway, Selena,” he says calmly.
“Yes, you damn well are! Look, there's a service station in one mile,” I say, gesturing to the road sign as we speed past it. “You can let me out there, I'd rather chance it on my own than walk back into the wolves’ den!”
“If you go off on your own, you're basically handing yourself over, and you know it.”
I grit my teeth and contemplate it for a minute. “Why are we going to London?”
“I'm taking you somewhere, we're going to see someone. I promise you'll be safe. I won't let him get you.”
“Why are you helping me?” I ask, posing the question that has been burning through my mind almost constantly.
“I have my reasons,” he answers.
“And those are?”
“They don't concern you.”
“But—”
“But nothing. All you need to know is that you're safe with me.”
I roll my eyes. “Yeah sure. Trust the sketchy shifter just because he says to,” I mutter.
“You can leave at any time.”
“Yeah, and end up back in the wolves’ den,” I say with a sigh, turning back to look out the window.
He pulls off at the next exit for the service station. He parks in a space right on the far end of the carpark, and he gets straight out without a word. I slowly follow after him, but he doesn't head toward the building, instead heading to a line of trees that lead into a thick forest area.
We walk through the trees in relative silence, the leaves and twigs crunching under our feet the only noise. Eventually he comes to a halt in a small clearing and turns toward me.
“Okay, clothes off,” he says casually, as he pulls his own shirt off. I stare at the dark tattoos that all but completely cover his fair skin for a moment, and then what he said hits me.
“Wait, what?” I blurt, staring wide-eyed at him.
He smiles sinfully and kicks off his shoes, before slowly unzipping his jeans, pushing them down his legs, and stepping out of them. Don’t stare, don’t stare. You’ve got this, eyes on his face. On. His. Face. My resolve cracks, I peek down. God freaking damn it! He’s reaching as if to pull down his boxers. I quickly whip around covering my eyes with both hands
“What the freaking hell are you doing?!” I snap, keeping my eyes shut tightly, my hands still over them.
“Well, it would be a waste of clothing to shift fully dressed now, wouldn’t it?”
“Shift?”
“You've got to try at some point,” he answers. “It's been over two weeks now since you were turned, your inner animal is going to get restless.”
“I'm not taking my clothes off in front of you,” I mutter.
I feel the heat radiating off his body as he slides up close behind me. “Why not, Selena, something to hide?”
“No.”
“Are you sure, you seem a little nervous?” he whispers into my ear.
I turn around sharply and stare up at him. I take a step back and slowly pull off my top, throwing it to land on the ground next to his discarded clothing. His eyebrows raise, and he casts his gaze over me, before meeting my eyes and smiling. He really thinks I won't do it.
Never one not to answer a challenge, I slowly kick off my shoes, one and then the other. I slip my socks off too, placing them inside the shoes. Taking a deep breath, I pull my leggings off, and throw them onto the clothing pile collecting on the ground.
Standing in just my underwear, out in the open, in front of a naked guy, was definitely not how I imagined my day going. I try to keep my eyes on his shoulders and up, however, he doesn't seem to be giving me the same courtesy. He watches and waits silently, as if daring me to continue.
I take another breath and reach a hand behind my back to unhook my bra. I let out the breath as I let it fall to the ground. Almost there, no backing out now.
I hook my fingers into the lacy fabric of my panties and slowly slide them down, till they hit the ground too.
I shiver, but I'm not really feeling cold. I stare at Erik, waiting.
After what feels like forever of us just staring at each other, he coughs and turns his head. “So, shifting is pretty easy for most shifters,” he says. I cross my arms over my body and awkwardly shift side-to-side.
“So, how do I actually do it?”
“You just reach inside and pull it forward. It helps to visualise it. I picture it in my head as I pull on my inner animal. It's meant to be easier to fully shift, than to partially shift. Hence why we're…errr…standing in the woods…naked.” He coughs again. “I'll go first. It helps to see it done. It’s pretty instinctual, so there’s not much more I can really say to instruct you.”
I nod my head in agreement and step back to give him space. He closes his eyes, and, within seconds he's bent, hunched over. The cracking sound of bones breaking hits my ears again. I force myself to keep watching as his body contorts and seems to expand in size. Fur erupts from his skin, and, within less than two minutes, I'm standing face-to-face with the biggest, damn animal I've ever seen. Ligers are fucking huge.
The animal that stands before me looks nothing like Erik, apart from his icy, blue eyes, that is. They are the same and keep the human intelligence that is normally behind them.
He stalks towards me, and I stumble back a few steps. He pauses and tilts his he
ad to one side, as if assessing me. He shows his sharp, pointy teeth, in what I can only describe as a terrifying version of a grin.
He starts forward again, slower this time. I hold my ground, and he nudges my side with his head. Does he...does he want me to pet him? Like an actual freaking cat? I tentatively reach for his head and stroke once across his soft, furry head. He brushes his head up against my hand, as if asking for me to continue, which I do.
“You know, I think I prefer you as a giant kitty-cat,” I tease. He growls softly. “Hey! Don't go getting growly now, kitty.” I look at him thoughtfully. “I always wanted a kitten.” He growls a little louder this time and steps away. He looks at me, tilting his head again, waiting.
Oh shit, it's my turn.
I look down at Erik, willing him to let me out of this. He growls again and steps closer to me. I stumble back away from him.
“Okay, okay! I get it, I’ll try,” I say, holding my hands out in front of me, a poor attempt at keeping him away. ‘Reach inside and pull it forward’, how hard can it be? I close my eyes and try to focus, not really sure what I’m looking for. I try and picture a wolf, which is a little difficult considering I haven’t ever seen one in person. I’m going to accidentally shift into a husky or something, damn it. Is that even possible? I hear Erik growl again. My eyes open, and I glare at him. “Shut it, kitty-cat! I’m damn well trying,” I mutter. He sits back and appears to relax a little, content I am now attempting this.
I shut my eyes again, trying to find anything inside my mind like he said. This isn’t working…wait. I feel something, but it’s not in my head, the feeling is in my chest. I try to focus harder on it, but I feel pushed back. A faster heartbeat, not like my own slams against my chest. I try desperately to visualise an animal, but I feel like every time I get close, it slips away from me. I groan. This isn’t working.
I slump down onto the ground and open my eyes to look at Erik. “I don’t think I can do this,” I say softly. He crawls up closer and nudges me with his furry head. I stroke his soft fur for a moment, trying to let the frustration go. Letting the disappointment flow over me, I rest my head against him and sigh. I guess this isn’t going to be as easy as he’d hoped.