by Mikayla Lane
True Traitor
By Mikayla Lane
Editor Beth Braden
[email protected]
Cover art by: humblenations.com
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, organizations, affiliations and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
First Wave Series in Reading Order
Hunting Cari
Finding Jess
Chasing Dare
Grai’s Game
Taming Jax
Grounding Gracus
True Traitor
Second Wave Series in Reading Order
Viper
Drago
Mikal Coming in October 2015
Find me on Facebook at:
facebook.com/author.mikaylalane
In Loving Memory of the very best friend ever. I will be forever grateful that you wandered to my front door, all skin and bones and angry at a world that threw you away. It took 2 years for you to be petted without scratching, but we both knew you were worth the patience. You taught all of us that feral only means that you love more fiercely and are more loyal when people earn your trust and love.
My little Gibly, I can’t thank you enough for picking me to be your pet parent and a day won’t go by without my heart breaking over your loss. My life, my heart and my soul will never shine as brightly now that your light is no longer with me. I hope I can do justice to your memory and your spirit by continuing with the Sibiox species you inspired and their leader, named after you. Maybe one day, I’ll be able to write your name again without crying.
Many thanks to my Beta Reviewers and friends:
Beth Naylor
Tammie Den Boen
To my Readers:
There is one name in this book that is historically accurate but quite an interesting one to figure out how to pronounce. It took a little searching, but I found a site where you can actually hear it pronounced correctly. I’m including it here so that you guys don’t have to try and figure out how to say it as you read it.
The name is Thjodhild. The mother of the legendary explorer, Leif Erikson. Here’s the site, click on the speaker symbol next to the name. http://www.babynology.com/meaning-thjodhild-f49.html
Thanks so much for all of the awesome reviews, suggestions and comments. Your words mean a lot to me and I read everything.
As always, feel free to email me.
[email protected]
facebook.com/author.mikaylalane
Mikayla Lane
522 Word Document Pages
105,971 Words
Chapter One
Countdown Clock to Human Discovery
24:00 Hours
This is a WFWZ radio news update. There are reports of some wicked weather and a potential landslide in the White River National Forest near Burnt Tree Ridge. Local authorities are asking citizens to avoid the area until they can get out there and check on things. Good thing it happened early in the season, so it’s mostly deserted out there. Travelers along I-70 should be cautious since we can’t be certain how far the slide has reached. Stay safe, guys, we got some crazy weather going on. Now, back to the music.
True Demetrios had been enjoying the best sleep she’d had in a long time when her beast, Roar, decided to become an absolute pest, repeatedly yelling at her to wake up. She thought she was doing a great job of blocking him out and falling back to sleep when the bed began to shake violently.
True sat bolt upright, her hands clutching the sheet to her naked chest as her eyes adjusted to the dim light in what was obviously not the room she’d fallen asleep in. As she scanned the strange room, her eyes clashed with a pair of the prettiest blue eyes she’d ever seen.
Which are apparently attached to the hottest guy as well, True thought, as she wondered where the hell she was and who the guy was sitting next to the bed. He was a pretty big guy.
Almost as big as Grai, she thought, but not as bulky.
This guy was a little leaner, like a cowboy. His blond hair was cut short in the back and close on the sides, but the top and bangs were an unruly mass of waves that gave him the look of a male model.
Full lips, a rock hard jaw, and that sultry, practiced pout he was giving her completed the male model look in her mind, and after sizing him up her instincts decided she didn’t like or trust him.
She stared at the hot guy as she reached out to Grai through the Shengari’ and was met with a cold silence in her mind. Her ability to contact anyone was gone from her.
“You’re safe here, firefly,” hot guy said, startling True.
True grabbed the silken sheets around her naked body and wondered where the hell her clothes were and who undressed her, before she looked around the room for them. Hot guy stood and came towards the bed, causing True to slide over to the other side and hop off. She faced him across the large bed and glared daggers at him.
“Who are you? Where the hell am I?” she demanded, holding the sheet with one hand while she flicked her palm with the other, creating a small fireball that she whipped across her fingers and palm.
Hot guy sighed heavily, as if already worn out by her.
True snorted.
This idiot has no idea. I’m just getting started. Her thoughts were thrown off track completely by his words.
“I’m Leif Erikson. And I’m a void, so don’t play these games with me,” he said as he waved his hand and snuffed out the fire in True’s palm.
She gasped and used her energy to recreate another fireball, and with another wave of his hand, it too was gone. True was getting ready to make another one when he held up his hands.
“Stop! We can waste our time playing void and not void, or we can talk and I can explain things to you,” Leif said.
True grunted in anger and stomped her foot.
“What is a void, and how can you do that? And where the hell is Grai?” she demanded in frustration, wondering what was going on.
Leif chuckled at her pouting face.
She is exquisite, he thought before he pulled his mind to the task at hand.
“A void is a hybrid who can void the abilities of other hybrids. Hence, why I’m called . . . a void,” he teased.
True wasn’t amused at all.
“How the hell is that possible? Only primes can do something like that, not a hybrid. Are you people stupid or something? Did you not get the memo about our hierarchy here? Because we’re no longer at the top of the food chain, buddy,” she said as her eyes darted around the room looking for weapons — and clothes.
Leif laughed at her, wondering when she’d give up her false bravado.
Before or after she realizes there are no weapons around? And no escape?
True screamed in her mouth and stomped around her side of the bed in a fit of temper when she realized there was no way out.
“Where the hell are my clothes, and where is Grai?” she demanded again, trying to keep a tight grip on the slippery silk sheets around her.
Leif chuckled and sat back in the chair.
“Your clothes were destroyed. Not only were they filthy and impossible to clean, but they also looked hideous on you. You will find more appropriate clothing in the dresser behind you,” he said.
The words no sooner left his mouth than True whirled to the dresser and shuffled through the items in it. The top two drawers were filled with a wide selection of silk and lace bra and panty sets in her size, and although they were exactly like the things she already owned, she’d never admit it. Instead, True picked up a particularly sexy red lace bra and turned to him, dangling
it off of one finger.
“Really?” True asked in her most sarcastic tone and felt a rush at seeing him blush.
Not such a hardened alpha male after all, she thought.
That information might come in handy later on, and she filed it away in her mind, knowing she’d need it at some point.
Leif cleared his throat.
“I merely went by what you were wearing when you got here,” he said, making sure she knew he’d seen what she was wearing under her uniform.
True went from embarrassed to furious in seconds, and before he could “void” her, she threw a fireball and singed his eyebrows. She was getting ready to hurl another one at him when he stood and waved his hand, voiding her ability.
“Damn it, firefly! You could have done some damage if I hadn’t caught that in time!” he huffed while he slapped at his own forehead to put out his eyebrows.
True looked at the sexy guy with his one still-smoking eyebrow.
“Tell me where the hell Grai is and get me my damn clothes! And my weapons!” she sneered.
She stared at the man as he stood there with his mouth slightly open. One blond eyebrow was blackened and singed with small patches of hair missing, and she snorted her disdain at him. Hot guy or not, he was an idiot. True shook her head and turned back to the dresser, determined to find some appropriate clothes and get out of there.
She’d just found a pair of low-rise jeans and a black Henley when she heard Leif speak again. That husky voice coaxed her to listen even if she didn’t want to hear his words.
“You have just now found clothes, so that takes care of your first request. The second will be a little trickier than the clothes because Grai is currently a guest of my father and grandfather,” Leif said, ready to void the next flames his little firefly lobbed his way.
She whirled around so fast Leif was caught off guard by the cage of fire she encased him in. He almost grinned at her spirit, but really didn’t want to encourage her to keep this up. Instead, he waved a hand and the flames disappeared again.
True backed towards the dresser, unsure what was going on.
“You have to be a prime. How can you not know that? Or do you? Oh. Damn,” True said as the realization dawned on her that Leif could be working with the dark prime. If that was the case, she had to get out of here and get to Grai and the others.
Hell, she thought, if these assholes are working with the Dark Prime, then I want Grai and all the Tezarians, Dranovians — hell, everyone — here.
Leif could feel the panic building in True and he had to know why.
“What is this prime you keep going on about?” he asked, folding his arms across his chest as he leaned back in the chair, pretending a nonchalance he didn’t feel around the feisty little firefly.
True stared at him for a moment, trying to judge if he was mocking her or not. What surprised her was that he really didn’t seem to know what she was talking about. True’s mind whirled with the implications of that, and she narrowed her eyes slightly as she made up her mind.
“I will say no more until I’m allowed to speak to my commander,” she said as she pulled on the jeans under the sheet, watching Leif’s every move to see how he would react to what she said.
Leif sighed and rubbed a hand down his face as bits of burned eyebrow and blackened soot floated down to his lap, the smell of singed hair irritating his heightened sense of smell.
I’m going to be really thrilled to see the damage later, he thought as he felt a few bald spots and sighed.
He watched True wiggle into a bra and shirt while expertly keeping herself hidden under the sheet, and somehow he knew that once she was dressed she was going to be a bigger handful than when she wasn’t.
She didn’t disappoint him by getting off several fireballs before he voided her. While she stood on the other side of the bed, chest heaving and hair tumbling around her in riotous waves, he stood and put out the small fire on the thigh of his pants.
Next time I’ll keep her naked and pissed instead of clothed and pissed. At least the view’s better, he thought.
True tried not to grin as Leif put out the fire on his pants.
He’s given himself away, she thought, realizing that he couldn’t keep her abilities voided. It only works for short periods, unlike Lara and even Tricia, who can jack your shit for days.
She tested the theory by lobbing a few more fireballs at him before he waved his hand again, this time extinguishing the balls before they got halfway to him.
Leif sighed again.
“True, this is childish . . .” he began before she sent a fast volley at him that left him ducking a few before he could void them.
“Damn it, woman!” he yelled as he turned around and realized that the chair was on fire. He was just putting it out when he felt a roaring heat and knew that she’d set his ass on fire.
He hopped onto the bed and extinguished his ass on the blanket as he reached out and pulled True into his arms, effectively trapping her deadly flame-throwing hands. He took a deep breath, easily keeping the fighting woman from flinging fire as she fought against him.
Several minutes later, True was still fighting and Leif was at his wits end with her.
“Damn it! Stop! You’re flinging fire like a monkey with his shit and you’re wearing yourself out!” he roared, realizing too late that he never should have said that as she fought even harder to get away from him.
Within seconds, she’d gotten a hand free and the entire bed burst into flames around them. Leif quickly rolled them to the floor just as smoke began to fill the room, and the fire from the chair and bed began spreading to the dresser.
He looked at the woman smirking above him, and he voided her again before grabbing her stray hand and glaring at her.
“You set the room on fire! Who the hell does that?” he yelled, shaking his head as he pulled her to her feet.
Leif had just gotten confident that he had her under control when the ground again shook violently beneath them. This time they were both thrown to the floor, and he watched in horror and amazement as True seized the advantage and launched several volleys of flames at him before sprinting towards the door.
True threw it open and raced out without looking and ran smack into a solid wall before she was thrown to the floor by the impact. She sat on her butt, shaking her head as she looked up into an identical pair of Leif’s blue eyes on a much larger, older man than Leif.
True tried to backwards crawl away from the man in the doorway when she was grabbed from behind and thrown over Leif’s shoulder. She raised her hands to throw some more fireballs at his already charred and partially exposed ass, when the larger man grabbed her hands and quickly taped them together with heavy-duty tape.
The older man didn’t spare her a glance as he finished with her hands and moved out of True’s line of sight. Her suspicion that the guy was related to Leif was confirmed by his next words.
“Son . . . are you sure you don’t need some help with her? You’re . . . uh . . . looking a little . . .,” Leif Erikson Sr., legendary Viking explorer, let his voice trail off, unable to think of the right words.
Leif snorted.
“Oh hell, just say it! My eyebrows are probably half gone and my ass is still smoldering! But, I can handle my own damn mate!” he said, furious that this was not going anything like he ever thought it would.
True heard his last words and she went wild, bucking, kicking and driving her elbows into his back.
“Mate? Never, you bastard! Tell me where Grai is! Take. Me. To. Grai!” she screamed, punctuating each word with another double elbow to Leif’s back until they both ended up on the ground while Leif tried to block and avoid the multiple blows of her wildly kicking legs and dangerously sharp elbows.
Several minutes later, True heard a heavy sigh before Leif Sr. dragged her away by her taped hands. She smiled smugly when she saw all the blonde hair stuck to the tape on her hands, then Leif’s hair, which was sticking up in all direct
ions with small bald spots noticeable in various places on the top.
It goes well with his new, partially burnt and missing eyebrows, True thought as she tried to get her feet under her as she was dragged several feet away from Leif.
The moment the big guy let go of her hands she launched herself back at Leif in time to catch him off guard as he tried to stand, effectively putting them both back on the floor. She kicked and hit him while he covered his head and tried to block her wild blows.
The older guy barked out orders around her, but True was intent on taking it out on Leif, blaming him for the fact that she was here and hating him for it. She barely noticed the sharp jab in her ass until her body began to go limp, and she realized that they had drugged her.
True looked at Leif, her vision becoming blurry.
“My mate wouldn’t be such a pussy that he had to drug me to keep me,” she said, her words slurring before she slumped in his arms.
Leif took several gulps of air while he tried to calm down, slowly sliding out from under True’s quick, dangerous limbs before he accepted his father’s hand up.
Leif looked down at the beautiful wild woman lying on the floor and shook his head, hoping his father wouldn’t comment. He should have known better.
“She’s a wild one, son. You better get this under control pretty damn fast because I don’t know what the hell just burst through the barriers and into the old chamber, but we’ve got more problems going on right now than your crazy mate. Lock her up until we have things under control outside, or get her mated and then locked up. I don’t care which, but we don’t have time for you to play with her now,” Leif Erikson Sr., said to his son. He stormed down the hall rubbing the back of his neck.
Leif Erikson Jr., legendary nothing, known only as “Son of Legend” and “Grandson of Another Legend,” looked down the hallway and flipped off his father with one hand while rubbing his burned bare ass cheek with the other.
Leif didn’t even turn around at the familiar chuckle behind him.
“Don’t start, Tara. I’m not in the mood,” he said as he kneeled down beside True and lifted her into his arms.