Alphas for the Holidays

by Mandy M. Roth

  The loud roar, turned to a mewl.

  —but effective nonetheless.

  She might be easier to break than he first thought. Wait until she saw what he planned to do to her. Now, he no longer skinned his pretties. That process had been messy and, though fun at first, quickly lost its appeal. The treasure he found, the golden athame, was ancient, cursed and blessed. It held great power, which was why he guarded it. It also took life and gave riches. Or in his case—a quick and rather simple way of keeping his rare beauties.

  He’d decided to turn them. Now they were perfect for him, large as life, jeweled eyes, and…treasures of wealth. Again he ran his hand down his last pretty. What had her name been? Oh yes, Trish. He patted the golden head and turned down the hallway.

  For now, he needed to check on his other pretties. He rubbed his hands. He had a new one to play with.

  Chapter 2

  Russia

  Reen wiped the blood out of her eye and limped up the icy stone steps. Didn’t they have people to keep the snow and ice off the steps? If so, they sucked at their job.

  She swiped at the blood on her head again, wiping her palm on her pants. She really hated this job sometimes. Her black boots rarely felt this heavy. The doors at the top of the steps opened into the grand foyer. The mansion seemed like any other in Europe, except it was still a functioning castle. Not merely a museum for retirees and backpackers to tour through, this castle had a purpose. It wasn’t just any castle, this one was special—a defense like castles of old.

  It was headquarters for the Hunters.

  The Hunters tracked supernaturals that had become problematic. In this day and age of decadence, where the supernaturals were both worshipped and ignored by mortals, they often became bored. No longer was the world their playground. Now sciences wanted them for research, men and women alike wanted them for the simple fact of novelty and other supernaturals felt merely displaced. Displaced. She snorted. Supernaturals with identity crises led rise to the new super shrinks—a new breed of psychiatrists. Whether or not she agreed with therapy for the confused supers, was irrelevant.

  Cyzarine knew some people needed such help. Her? She’d rather eat her leather boots. Vamps, weres, the fae, all were trying to figure out how they fit into the new order of the world quickly outstripping itself of humanity.

  Powers shifting and vying for attention left vacuums for greed, corruption and crime.

  That’s where the Hunters came into play. The supernaturals still needed balances, checks and in most cases, retribution.

  She was a Hunter. Though more specifically, she didn’t just hunt the criminals, as many Hunters did, she eliminated the problems.

  She was an assassin.

  She was no different than many of her kind before her—a firebird could destroy. She merely cashed in on her genetic legend.

  Petrov, the guard, nodded to her as she passed him, her trench coat hiding the weapons she used.

  She shoved through the waiting area, completely ignoring Valerie at the outer desk in front of Erik’s office.

  The doors were shut, but she also ignored the unspoken rule to wait until invited into the inner sanctum of her boss. Opening it, she saw someone stood in the shadows in the corner, smelled the spice of his cologne, gave him a quick glance, and then ignored him as well. She had only one man in her sights.

  “Erik.”

  “Reen.” He peered at her from behind his desk with a raised brow. “I’m busy.”

  “You call me in off a job, have your boys pick me up and expect me to wait prettily?” She shook her head and walked to the desk, tossing down the amulet she was supposed to have retrieved, which of course, she had. “Target is taken care of.”

  Erik was a vampire, ancient, as the office rumors went. She knew for a fact the whispers weren’t just rumors. Though she’d never actually come out and asked the man how old he was. Some things were better left alone.

  He stared at it for a moment, then turned completely from the window behind his desk and picked up the dull necklace. The stone glimmered faintly as if whispering secrets, and the gold beckoned to be polished.

  Cyzarine merely waited. Erik brushed the stone and then the chain with his thumb. He was dressed as he always was. Black. Black shirt, black pants, black shoes. She often gave him a hard time. Every chance she got, she gifted him some bright tie, scarf or pair of gloves. He’d yet to wear any of them. Not that she cared either way, right now she was pissed.

  “I should shove that up your ass,” she said, again wiping the blood from her eye. She pressed her fingers to the wound in her scalp still trickling blood over her forehead and down her ear. And she’d lost her favorite hat in the fight.

  His gaze narrowed on her. “I should lock you in the infirmary.”

  She blew out a breath and strode to the windows, looking out on the cold winter landscape. She hated the winter. Hated the snow, and here in Grubsretep there was plenty. Snow and darkness, especially with the holidays right around the corner. Festive she was not. Holidays were for family and she had none. Spring and more daylight couldn’t come quickly enough.

  “I’ll be fine.”

  Someone cleared their throat and she was reminded of the other person in the room. Without glancing at him, she turned from the window and strode towards the door, saying over her shoulder, “I get one day off, then you can give me my next assignment.”

  “Actually, I can’t do that.”

  She stopped halfway to the door.

  “Reen, sit down.”

  Her eyes narrowed on his and for the first time, since storming in, she took a deep breath and tried to read the situation.

  Erik was calm, but then he generally always was. He was however, frowning, the lines around his mouth and across his forehead deeper than normal.

  Something warned her she might not like what was coming.

  “I want to introduce you to someone.” He motioned to the other occupant of the room.

  Reen waited as the man stepped from the shadows. He was tall, taller than she, but then many were as she was average in height. Where her hair was black, his was blond, almost white. Her eyes had a golden hue to them that many had often commented on. Including Erik.

  This man, with his pale hair, had dark, almost black eyes. She had no idea if the color was dark brown or dark blue, they were just extremely dark. His body was long, not lean, but not overly muscular, reminding her of a runner. He had muscles, she could see them through the tight pale blue shirt he wore.

  His face was altogether different. One might expect with his coloring and build that he’d have a refined face, one of beauty, of the classical statues she’d seen in Greece and Rome on her journeys there. But his jaw was too square, his brow too deep, making his eyes appear even darker. His nose was ridged, giving him a birdlike appearance almost. Bird, she almost snorted. He sure as hell wasn’t a sparrow.

  He merely raised a brow. Or she assumed he did, as his brows were as pale as his hair.

  He offered a hand. “Saker.”

  Saker. It meant falcon. Falcon. A cold, hard twist rolled inside her. She took a deep breath and merely studied at the long-fingered hand, the sinews of the wrist, noted the scars on the back, across the knuckles.

  Without taking it, she looked back up to his face and said, “Reen.”

  The man arched a brow and lowered his hand. “We worked a case together a few months back.”

  “Did we?” She didn’t remember him, or didn’t think she did.

  He smiled slowly. “Yeah, we did.”

  She tilted her head. “Did we get the bad guy?”

  “Yes, we did.” His gaze stayed locked on hers.

  A tingle of awareness swirled down her spine. She frowned.

  Erik cleared his throat. “Now that the introductions are out of the way.”

  She glanced at Erik and shook her pounding head. “Luv, what have you cooked up now?”

  He glared at her. Erik rarely glared at anyone. Reen won
dered what she’d done to aggravate him. Then again, she normally did very little.

  Without another word, Reen sat in the chair. Her head hurt, her arm throbbed where one of the target’s guards had caught her with a knife toss.

  She rolled her shoulder, leaned her head back and closed her eyes. Still applying pressure to the wound on the side of her scalp—thanks to the target and his sword—she merely said, “Get on with it, Erik. You obviously worry I won’t like it or you’d have already spit it out, then.”

  She could sense it, hostility in the air. And it wasn’t hers.

  Still she didn’t open her eyes. Instead, she shoved the pain away and thought of light. Light a pale pink, tinged in blue. Light soothed her, the colors of twilight calmed her more than anything.

  With her eyes closed she could smell Saker even more, outdoors and…something dark. Saker. Now that she thought about it, maybe she did remember him. He was with the undercover team. Or was he? She had heard about him. Saker and Company did freelance work. Mercenary. He was some sort of bird shifter—falcons.

  She had no use for falcons. Anger swirled through her, but she pushed it aside. Falcons—in her opinion—were very unreliable and rather useless.

  Erik cleared his throat again. “We’ve got a problem,” he said finally.

  “Usually do,” she muttered.

  He sighed. She knew the sound of Erik’s sighs. The way so much emotion could be in one little sound. Anger, frustration, resignation. His was currently a mixture of all three.

  “Luv, just spit it out.”

  “Would you stop calling him that?” the other man asked.

  She slowly opened her eyes to see Saker staring at her from across the small sitting area. He did not sit. He was leaning against the chair, his arms crossed. His voice was even, deeper than she would have thought.

  “Why?” she asked.

  He opened his mouth, then snapped it shut, and turned to Erik. If she hadn’t been watching, she would have missed it. But Saker’s eyes turned from black to a dark green glow.

  She glanced to Erik. As always he was calm, or appeared so.

  “Look, we might have worked together before. But you obviously didn’t leave an impression on me. I don’t know who you are, but I do know that Erik and I go way back. I can call him luv, Erik or dickhead if I so choose, none of which you have any say in. And I really need to get going if that’s all.”

  What the hell was going on?

  “Sit down,” Saker said, not even sparing her a glance.

  She walked to him and poked him in the chest until he met her gaze, her own power, so recently used, still close to the surface. She felt the heat tingle along her fingers. “I don’t know who you think you are, Saker, but—”

  Those glowing green eyes swung back to her and stilled.

  Something in them made her pause…

  “Reen,” Erik said on a sigh, “please sit down. We’ve got a serious problem and we all have to work together. You’re not the only one pulled off an assignment. Higher ups than me have asked that you two work together.”

  It was her turn to cock a brow. “What do you mean, higher than you? You mean she asked for the two of us,” she motioned between her and Saker, “to work together on some problem?”

  Erik took a deep breath, nodded and raked a hand through his hair. “Yes. In a manner of speaking.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Erik, cut through. What’s the bloody problem?”

  “The higher up’s daughter. She’s missing. And Navalovich’s pulled in all the best. That’s you two.”

  “I said, no, Erik,” Saker said.

  She glanced to the man and shook her head. Very few told Erik no. Whatever history he and Erik had, she didn’t care.

  Erik’s words sunk in. “Oleana is missing?”

  Oleana was Navalovich’s daughter. Alexandra Navalovich, founder of the Hunters and very quiet about her role as their supporter with the governments. The reason for her secrecy, she had a family and didn’t want them harmed.

  “Who?” she asked.

  “We think she might be the latest target of a person only known as the Treasure Collector. It’s possible and we’re investigating every possibility.”

  Treasure Collector?

  “I said no, Erik,” Saker repeated.

  Her mind was already sifting through what she knew of the Treasure Collector, which wasn’t much.

  “Isn’t he also known simply as the Collector? Missing rare shifters or something?” She thought she remembered reading something about him in one of the files.

  “Saker,” Erik warned.

  “No.”

  She turned on Saker. “Fine. You said no. There’s the fucking door.”

  Leana. Her mind crashed through with memories of her friend. They’d met at the training academy as young girls and had always been close. The cat shifter, a white tiger. Rare even as supernaturals went, Leana had a lot of power. Her mother was also one, but Reen had no idea about Leana’s father.

  “How do we know it’s the Collector?” Maybe they were wrong.

  Erik sighed. “He’s a blot on the books. People want him. They want the man found. He’s elusive as smoke or has been in the past. But there are too many women shifters, rare descendants, who have vanished from similar circumstances. No bodies are found, but missing is missing. And someone is taking them.”

  “And you don’t believe in coincidences.”

  He only arched a brow.

  “When?” she asked, pacing.

  “Three days ago.”

  “And Navalovich is just now getting to this?” Anger swirled in her, her fingers tingling even more.

  “Now, Reen. Leana is as old as you. She’s a grown woman, with her own life. It was just when she didn’t show up for a meeting with her mother that Navalovich started searching. And then she realized and pieced things together.”

  Reen shook her head. “Three days? Do you have any idea what could have happened in three days?”

  “Which is why I jerked you off the job you were currently on.”

  “You could have said that to begin with.”

  She paced away, forgetting about the wound on her head, and walked the length of his office.

  “We have discovered that the Treasure Collector is a collector of the worst kind.”

  “Of anything specific?” Saker shifted his weight.

  Erik sighed. “Women. Girls. He likes female shifters. The rarer the better. We think he took or had her taken because…well, Oleana is one of seven registered Siberian tiger shifters. Before her, there’s a missing file on both a cheetah and a jaguar from early summer. The cheetah just went missing this fall.”

  A collector.

  “When did you learn this?” she asked. She glanced over her shoulder and noticed that Saker was glaring into the fireplace, watching the flames dance.

  Pissed at the rude man, either because he rubbed her wrong, or just because he was of the useless Falcon order, she let her power flow over her and into the fire. It leapt out at him and licked his hand.

  He slowly turned and cocked a brow at her.

  Arrogant.

  One corner of his mouth lifted on a grin.

  “We’ve traced him to a club in Grubsretep.”

  “Which club?”

  He didn’t answer her.

  “Which club?” she asked again, pulling her attention from Saker to Erik.

  Erik rubbed his forehead. “Bindings.” He shrugged. “We think. From previous reports on him, he seems to hop from club to club. We’re not certain who he is. He might be a worker in these places, a patron, or an owner. So we’re now investigating.”

  “And how many other shifting women disappearances have been labeled as his?”

  “Not certain again. Could be as few as half a dozen, or worst, more than three dozen.”

  She could only stare at him. “Three dozen?”

  Again, he shrugged. “This is in the last twenty years. Frankly there’s be
en little known of him, so he’s never been a priority until now. People go missing. Some get killed, some vanish because they want to, Reen. But going with what intel is learning now of a man collecting rare breeds of shifters as a…hobby—for lack of a better word—it looks like he can be accredited several disappearances and possibly several deaths as well, probably his earlier works.”

  She could only stare at him. “A serial? Is he human? Supernatural? Shifter? Vamp? Do we even know?”

  He sighed and fell into his chair behind his desk. “Now that we have a place to start, and with this latest development, we’re setting up a team. Undercover all the way.”

  She noticed he didn’t answer her questions. Then his words registered. Undercover team. “Good, when?”

  He glanced towards Saker then locked his gaze back on her. “As soon as we get everything in place.”

  Blood ran down her forehead again and she wiped it away with a curse.

  Erik frowned. “How much blood have you lost?”

  She glanced at her shoulder, noted her pants were stiff with it where she’d constantly wiped her hand, her collar where it had dripped from her head. “I don’t know, does it matter?”

  Saker cursed.

  “What’s the plan?” She ignored the man.

  Erik cleared his throat. “From the orders I received, we’re to go in—”

  “We?” she asked.

  He nodded to the file on his desk. “Yes, we. You and I posing as a couple and he,” he said, motioning to Saker, “as your bodyguard.”

  “Like hell,” Saker all but snarled.

  Chapter 3

  Saker tried to calm the emotions raging through him. But he knew he was doing a piss poor job of it. Damn it.

  He studied again at her. Reen.

  Cyzarine.

  Once upon a time… He’d been known as a prince, and she’d been his.