Table of Contents
Title
Copyright
Blurb
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Epilogue
Also by R.L. Kenderson
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Forbidden Claim
A Forbidden Series Novel
by
R.L. Kenderson
PUBLISHED BY:
R.L. Kenderson
(Renae Anderson Au & Lara Kennedy)
Forbidden Claim
Copyright © 2018 by Renae Au and Lara Kennedy
All Rights Reserved
ISBN-13: 978-0-9904144-6-9
Editor: Jovana Shirley, Unforeseen Editing, www.unforeseenediting.com
Cover Designer: Viola Estrella, Estrella Cover Art, www.estrellacoverart.com
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the authors, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
She’s running for her life. He’s never gotten over her. Will she let him claim her to save her?
Wolf-shifter Isabelle Rand is escaping a relationship she never intended to stay in. Fleeing her abusive boyfriend who hates to lose anything, she seeks sanctuary with the only people who can help her.
It has been two years since cat-shifter Zane Talon saw Isabelle, and he’s been aching for her since the day she vanished from his life.
Now, to save Isabelle from a dangerous and ruthless shifter who will never stop pursuing her, Zane will take her as his mate.
While Isabelle agrees to the plan, she’ll give the cat-shifter only her body.
But Zane will do everything in his power to claim her heart as well.
For our dads and fellow bibliophiles.
Please don’t ever read our books. We don’t want to have to give you CPR.
ISABELLE RAND KISSED her boyfriend, Bram, on the cheek and exited his vehicle. As she walked to the front of the school, she took a deep breath. When she reached the doors, she turned around and waved at Bram, knowing he wouldn’t leave until he saw her walk into the building.
She made no move to look and see if he drove away as she walked down the hall to her classroom. But, instead of going to the end of the corridor, she took a right into the school’s office.
“He’s gone,” her coworker, Jessica, said.
Isabelle breathed a sigh of relief, but it didn’t last long. She was only a fourth of the way through her plan.
Two more teachers, Danni and Alice, with their arms full, came from the back office area along with their principal, Noah.
Danni and Alice dropped the huge, mismatched luggage at Isabelle’s feet.
“Here are most of your clothes,” Danni told her.
“And here are the rest of your clothes and toiletries,” Alice said.
Jessica came over from where she’d been watching the window and took Isabelle’s hand, placing a set of car keys in it. “Here’s your new car. It’s nothing great, but it’s bought and paid for.”
“Give me the keys,” Noah said. “I’ll pull the car around.”
Isabelle handed them over.
Noah looked at Jessica.
“It’s a black Kia,” she told him.
Isabelle swallowed hard as she tried not to cry. “I don’t know what I’d do without you guys.”
Jessica hugged Isabelle first. “This is what friends do for each other.”
“Help them go on the run like a criminal in the night?” Isabelle joked as the first tear fell.
Alice embraced Isabelle next. When she pulled away, she squeezed Isabelle’s arms. “No, we’re helping you escape an abusive boyfriend who doesn’t deserve to call you his.”
Isabelle smiled as best she could.
Danni enveloped Isabelle last.
“I’m scared,” Isabelle said in her friend’s ear.
Danni drew away and looked into Isabelle’s eyes. “I know. I would be scared, too. But we’ve been planning this for a month. Minneapolis is less than two hours away. You will make it before he even knows you’re gone.”
“Honey, are you sure you don’t want to go to a shelter? Are you sure your friends in Minneapolis can keep you safe?” Alice, twenty years Isabelle’s senior, asked.
There was no way Isabelle could tell these wonderful humans that she was going to the safest place in the world for her. Not only was Damien her friend, but he was also the alpha of the Minnesota Wolf Pack. And her other friends whom she was seeking solace from were the wolf-shifter sentinels. Once she told Damien about Bram, he would do everything to help her. And Bram wouldn’t dare take on the alpha of their pack. Not if he wanted to live to tell about it.
“I’m absolutely sure. I just need to get there.”
“Okay, honey. We trust your decision.”
“We’d better go. I’m sure Noah has pulled the car to the side door by now.”
Isabelle took one of the handles to wheel the bag outside, and Danni took the other.
Once they walked outside, Noah popped open the trunk and then got out of Isabelle’s new car. The bags were loaded into the trunk, and then Noah hugged Isabelle.
When he stepped away, he held out his hand. “Phone.”
“What?”
With his other hand, he reached into his back pocket. “Your phone.”
“Oh. Yeah. I almost forgot.”
The four of them had discussed the unlikelihood of Bram tracking her phone since he wasn’t on her plan, but they didn’t think it was a risk she should take. Plus, she didn’t want to deal with the numerous phone calls he was bound to make once he realized she was gone.
She opened her purse and took out her phone. With a silent good-bye, she handed it over, and Noah gave her a new prepaid phone.
“I programmed all our numbers into it, just in case you need anything. And please let us know when you make it there safely.”
“I will.” She looked around at her friends. “I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you.”
“I do,” Alice said. “You can repay us by getting yourself to safety and staying there.”
Isabelle smiled. “I will. I promise.”
“You’d better.”
Isabelle walked around to the driver’s side of her new car but stopped before getting in. She’d almost forgotten. “Please be careful. Bram is not a good guy, and he’s not what he seems. He’s very strong and very dangerous.”
She wished she could come out and warn them that Bram was a wolf-shifter, stronger than all of them combined, and capable of turning into a wild animal that could rip them to shreds. But she couldn’t. They were her friends, but she couldn’t give away her species.
“Honey, please don’t concern yourself with us. It’s a teacher in-service today, so no students to worry about, and we’ll just tell everyone else you called in sick. We know nothing.”
Noah waved the phone. “As soon as you leave, I’m going to call my office with your phone. It’ll show up on your statement that you called in. Like Alice said, don’t worry about us.”
Isabelle closed her eyes. “You know that’s never going to happen. But I will try to worry less. As long as you promise to be careful.”
“We promise,” Alice said for all of them.
And, with one last good-bye, Isabelle took off for Minneapolis…and for freedom.
ZANE TALON LAY in bed, staring up at the ceiling, and threw his tennis ball in the air. It went up, almost touching the ceiling, and then back down. He caught it and threw it up again. Down it came again.
He’d been throwing the ball and catching it for a half hour now because there was simply nothing else to do. So far, this new ambassador program sucked donkey balls. They were supposed to learn from each other, but in the two weeks since he’d moved in with the wolves, their shifter communities had been practically perfect. It was like they were all planning to run for office someday. There hadn’t even been any minor arrests. It was hard to learn or teach if there were no opportunities.
Hence the ball throwing. Because that was better than staring blankly at the wall.
“If you throw that ball one more time, I’m going to come over there and shove it down your throat,” one of Zane’s new housemates said from his bed in his room directly across the hall from Zane’s.
Ever the nice guy his new roomie was.
“Damn, dude, you could just ask politely. Haven’t you ever heard that you attract more flies with honey than vinegar?”
A deep sigh came from the other room. “I just need to get some sleep.”
“Sorry. I didn’t think I was making much noise.”
The guy was turned away from Zane, and he’d assumed the guy was sleeping the whole time.
“Just because I’m not a shifter doesn’t mean I have the hearing of a human.”
“Why don’t you just shut your door if you’re trying to sleep?” Zane asked.
“I can’t because someone turns the heat up during the day, and then I feel like I’m suffocating in here. I need the circulation. Why don’t you shut yours?”
“Because I’m waiting for Payton to get here. This way, I can listen for her. And I’m not the one trying to take a nap.”
Hunter rolled over and looked at Zane. The vampire’s blue-green eyes looked sad. “I’m sorry. It’s not your fault I’m stuck here.”
“You didn’t volunteer to switch spots with one of the wolves?”
Hunter laughed without humor. “Just the opposite. I adamantly opposed it, but Dante sent me here anyway.”
“Why?”
“None of your business.”
O-kay. Just when he’d thought the guy was going to be nice.
“Did you volunteer to be here?”
Zane shrugged. “Kind of.”
He hadn’t asked, but Vaughn had offered it to him, and Zane hadn’t protested in the least.
“Why?”
Because Zane was pathetically pining away for a female wolf-shifter who didn’t want anything to do with him, and he hoped that, by living with the wolves, he’d get to see her again. Even though, as far as he knew, Isabelle had never set foot in Minneapolis since she ran out on him almost two years ago.
“None of your business.”
Hunter smirked and rolled away from Zane again. “Touché, cat. Touché.”
Zane wanted to laugh, but when it came to Isabelle, he was very serious.
Almost two years ago, she’d entered his life when he least expected it. The wolf-shifters had been exiled from Minneapolis for years, but the pack alpha at the time, Dwyer, had wanted revenge on the Minnesota Pride’s alpha, Vance. Dwyer had tried to kidnap Vance’s children. Damien, Dwyer’s son, had stepped in to rescue Payton and sent his friend Isabelle to let Vance know his daughter was safe.
Except no one had been able to confirm if Isabelle was telling the truth, and Zane had been ordered to guard her until Payton and Damien could be found. It had been just the two of them, and after days of being stuck together, they had become less prisoner and guard and more like friends.
Then, one night, Zane had woken up right before Isabelle slammed her body down over his and used his dick as her personal dildo.
He often thought of that moment fondly.
They’d slept together a few more times, but after Payton was safely home and Damien was in the clear, Isabelle had hightailed it back home to Mankato. He hadn’t heard from her since.
He’d never thought he’d be the type of guy to pine over a girl, but no matter how many other women he dated or had sex with, he’d been unable to forget the sexy little wolf-shifter.
Coming here and living with the wolves gave Zane hope he’d see her again. Maybe, just maybe, if he could see her and realize that he’d built her up in his head and that she was just another chick, he’d be able to purge her from his mind.
He wanted to move on with his life. After seeing some of his fellow sentinels settle down, he knew that it was something he wanted for himself in the future. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but someday.
Zane was drawn from his thoughts by the sound of commotion downstairs, the front door opening and shutting, and the hint of a female voice that didn’t belong to Raven, one of the female wolf-shifter sentinels. Kendall, the other wolf-shifter female sentinel, had been the one to take Zane’s place with the cat-shifters.
Finally. Payton was there.
Payton and her mate, wolf-shifter alpha Damien, had their own bedroom in the big house the wolf-shifter sentinels lived in, but they also had their own house, which was where they usually stayed. They only had a bedroom here in case it got too late or Damien felt like it was safer here.
That sucked for Zane. He didn’t really know any of the wolf-shifters yet, so his only friend was Payton. With her being the cat-shifter alpha’s daughter and Zane a sentinel, he’d known her for years.
He hoped that he wouldn’t feel like an outsider forever, especially since he didn’t know how long this liaison thing would last.
Zane got up and paused at his bedroom door to look at Hunter. At least Zane had Payton, and at least Zane was a shifter even if he was a different animal. The poor vampire was a different species entirely and had to feel very alone here.
Zane made a mental note to shift his sleep schedule, so he could spend more time with Hunter. After all, they did have the whole outsider thing in common. Maybe Zane could break through Hunter’s prickly demeanor and offer to be his friend. It would suck not to be able to go out during the day when everyone else was awake, and Zane felt for the guy.
But later. Right now, he needed to go find Payton.
Except, the closer Zane got to the bottom of the stairs, the more he realized the new female voice was not Payton.
“Is Damien here?” said the exact female voice he’d been waiting to hear for two years.
As unprepared as he was to hear her voice, the smell of her knocked the breath right out of him.
He took a seat at the bottom of the stairs while he collected his emotions.
&
nbsp; Until now, he truly hadn’t thought he’d see her ever again.
Isabelle wrung her hands together as she waited to see Damien.
“Sorry, Damien’s not here yet,” the sentinel, Quentin, told her.
She’d met him before, but she didn’t know him well. He had beautiful, dark skin and short, dark hair on his head and his face.
She’d arrived at the wolf sentinels’ home in a little over two hours. She’d run into some rush hour traffic that delayed her trip a bit, but she’d made it safely.
She’d been white-knuckled the whole drive, and she’d glanced in the rearview mirror and over her shoulder too many times to count. Her fingers were stiff and her neck hurt, but it was worth it.
Now, if only she could talk to Damien. She’d assumed he would be at the sentinels’ house, but she should have gone to his home instead.
“Would you like to sit? I can get you something to drink.”
Isabelle spun at Quentin’s question. “What?”
She needed to remember that just because Damien wasn’t here didn’t mean she was in danger. The sentinels would keep her safe.
“You’re pacing. I thought maybe I could offer you a place to rest until Damien got here.”
“What?” She’d spaced off again. “I’m sorry. Um…no, thank you. I’ve been sitting in the car for a couple of hours. I’m good.”
He raised an eyebrow, and she looked around. He was right. She’d been pacing. She was almost so far from the front door that she was in the kitchen. She turned and walked back to the sentinel.
As she reached the front door, she smelled him.
Zane.
She closed her eyes and leaned back against the door. His scent flooded her with memories of him being inside her.
Back then, she’d thought she was in trouble, but now, she knew she’d had no idea what trouble was. If only she could go back to that time, she’d be safe.
“Are…you okay?”
Isabelle opened her eyes and shook the cobwebs off her brain. “Yeah. I just thought I smelled someone I haven’t seen for a long time, and I wasn’t prepared.”
“Oh, if you mean—”
The sound of a vehicle coming up the driveway had her lunging for the window and ignoring whatever else Quentin had been about to say.
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