Malik’s Reclamation
Hellfire dogs mc book two
Crystal Miller
Copyright © 2017 by crystal miller
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
Prologue
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
Epilogue
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Crystal Miller
Prologue
Iraq 2003
Laying on my bunk, thinking about how much I don’t want to be in this shit hole right now, makes me wonder what life would be like back home. I joined the Army at 17. It wasn’t just because I wanted to serve my country or some bullshit like that. It basically was being homeless or join. So, I did. I packed my bags and left everything I knew about New Orleans behind. I spent a year in basic and military occupational school or MOS, before being stationed at Ft. Hood. When orders came in to be deployed, I packed my bags for those too. Not a day goes by that I don’t think about momma or my sisters. Last I heard my momma wasn’t doing too well.
As I come out of my daydream of home, I notice some of the men laughing and playing cards. I can’t help but wonder what goes through their minds when they sleep at night, if they sleep at all. Across from me a soldier, no older than me, is sleeping. How, is beyond me. With all the artillery going off it’s a wonder anyone can sleep. The tent isn’t that big. Big enough to house maybe eight of us, but it feels crowded tonight. Almost claustrophobic. I shove that feeling aside knowing it’s because we have a few more men in here than expected.
“Sgt. Bourque?” I would probably reword this: I glanced up startled to see a young woman who looked no older than fifteen standing over me.
“How did you get in here?” I ask, trying to figure out how this girl got passed the gate guard. I instinctively grab place my hand on my rifle. I’m not going to shot her unless she gives me a reason to shot. I swing my legs over the bed and stand.
“The man at the gate let me in.” I studied her closely, but still kept my guard. Her English is good for a girl her age, but you can definitely hear the accent in her voice. She looked nervous. My senses aren’t picking up anything though.
“Miss, you need to tell me what’s wrong.” I say drawing my weapon closer to my body.
“You’re in danger, all of you.” She starts to cry as she covers her face with her hands. “They plan to attack tonight.”
“Who plans to attack tonight?” I ask as the whole tent becomes quiet and the tension in the room starts to rise.
“My father.” Those are the only words that she manages to get out in between the sobs. I know she has done her family a great dishonor by coming to us. But now, we not only must protect our soldiers, we must protect her.
“Gonzalez, take her to Command, she is not to leave under any circumstances. Rogers, Torres, on me. The rest of you, suit up. Look alive.” I order. Gonzalez takes the young girl and starts talking to her in Arabic to calm her. We have learned when it comes to informants, they will talk in their native tongue but it is uncommon for a woman to come and speak to a man. Something made her come to me. Something made her find a man instead of a woman. There are plenty of women here, why didn’t she choose them?
“What are you thinking, sir?” Torres asks.
“I have no idea,” I say as I continue to watch Gonzalez. Just then that feeling that I know all too well hits me. Something is off. It doesn’t feel right, it doesn’t smell right. It smells like sulfur. But that can’t be. Can it?
Then I hear it. It’s faint. But I hear it. Tick. Tick. Tick. I slowly walked closer to the entrance get a better vantage point. Tick. Tick. Tick. The ticking gets faster, then a high pitch whistle. Panic starts to rise in my chest, sweat dripping down my forehead as I the noise becomes louder.
“GET DOWN!” I yell as I dive to take cover pulling on of the beds over top of me for protection. Heat and debris from the blast engulf the tent as the tent becomes a life size torch.
The sounds of screaming burn in my ears as the explosion engulfs the tent.
1
Malik
I wake up drenched in my own sweat. This isn’t the first time I have dreamt of the explosion and it probably won’t be the last. I look over to the clock sitting on my night stand, three in the morning. I lie in bed staring at the ceiling with my arm across my forehead. Same time every night. To subject anyone to these ‘night terrors,’ as my therapist call them, would be selfish of me. That is part of the reason why I have not found my mate, up until four years ago. How can I tell the woman that I have grown to love and care about that when I do stay over at her place, I don’t sleep? How do I tell her that the nightmares are so vivid it feels as if I’m still there?
I can’t. She wouldn’t understand. She doesn’t need that burden, especially with her running the packs. Sad part is, I’m not even supposed to be with Sierra. To keep the bloodline pure in her family, she has to mate with someone inside her circle. She’s pretty much royalty when it comes to the Lycans in Louisiana. Fuck man, I never wanted this, I didn’t think I needed it. But the calling happened and there is nothing neither one of us can do about it now.
The Lycans were created into the charters 75 years ago. This was a way to not only keep who we were under wraps, but also a way for the people of Louisiana to sleep soundly at night. The Lycan packs came to this state in the late 1500s but it wasn’t until Sierra’s reign that the Hellfire Dogs were created. We all thought it would be a good way to blend in rather than hide in the woods for the rest of our lives. My father was the first President of the New Orleans chapter. After his death, it was passed to me.
I know I probably won’t go back to sleep with the nightmares and Sierra running through my head. I throw the covers off of me and swing my feet over the bed, I let my eyes change to see better. One of the benefits to being Lycan. I can’t shake the feeling that something’s not right. That something is about to go down. I glance at the reflection of myself in the mirror. I can definitely tell that the lack of sleep is starting to catch up with me. That doesn’t matter, though. There’s plenty of work that needs done around the clubhouse, might as well get an early start.
As I start to get dressed, I notice my phone is blinking, like I have missed some calls or some shit. I swipe it open and sure enough I did. Trigger and Eve have been having a rough time since the miscarriage. More so Eve. Her emotions have been all out of whack, so to speak. And with her being a new lycan, it doesn’t help matter much. I told Trigger to take as much time as he needed with her but I think she is going to need something to combat the stubbornness she has inside her. The problem is, Trigger doesn’t want to leave her to change on her own yet. I think that’s exactly what she needs.
I finished scrolling through my messages, and noticed Trigger isn’t the only one who has messaged me. Sierra. The Alpha of us all. The one my heart craves for. The one I can never have. I scroll past Sierr
a’s messages and click on Triggers to open them up.
Trigger: Man, I don’t know what to do anymore. She’s out of control. I can’t keep her calm.
I ponder this for a moment. Eve is one of the few that was turned. Most humans don’t survive when they are bitten but she wasn’t bitten, she was scratched. Somehow her ex mutated his DNA to be able to turn a human with just a scratch. Dangerous. If Sierra finds out that Eve isn’t turning the way she expects, Eve’s life could be the end.
Me: Bring her to the camp at 6am. I know what she needs.
It’s true. I know exactly what she needs. She doesn’t need to have her brains banged out every night. No. She needs to connect with nature, she needs to connect with her habitat. If she doesn’t, it’ll drive her mad. And I don’t want to be there to clean up the mess when she breaks.
I click out of Trigger’s messages and I go up to Sierra’s. This woman here is going to be the death of me, I swear. I open her messages and my heart ends up in my throat.
Sierra: My love, I need to see you. I cannot go another day without you here beside me.
Sierra is what you would call old fashion. Yeah, she looks like she is 19 with a smoking ass body, and eyes that light up the world. But at over a century old, teaching her to talk like a 21st century person is just out of the question. Plus, to me, it’s fucking sexy.
Me: I can’t come today, baby. I promise soon. I have to take care of a few things.
Almost immediately she texts back.
Sierra: You cannot deny my call, I’m Alpha remember.
Me: My love, you didn’t call. I have things here I have to do. Eve needs me. She’s not doing well and Trigger doesn’t know what to do. I promise as soon as I’m done with her, I’ll be there to you.
Sierra: Do you need help?
Me: It wouldn’t be a bad idea. Bridget is coming too. Just promise me no alpha bs. I don’t feel like cleaning up the mess.
Sierra: I make no promises. Bridget is not an alpha like she thinks she is. I will defend my position.
Me: Then you will stay, yeah?
Sierra: No
Me: No alpha bs.
Sierra: No promises.
Me: Woman, you’re killin me.
Sierra: And here I thought you loved me.
That ends that conversation real fuckin’ quick. She knows exactly how I feel about her. I do love her and I would die for that woman. So would everyone else in our pack. She may come off as a bitch at times, but that bitch; no pun intended; has kept us safe and at peace for over a century. She knows how to run our pack and she runs it well.
I didn’t even realize I’m still standing in my boxers. I open my drawers and pull out a pair of jeans and a black t-shirt. After I get everything on, I grab my cut from the back of the chair sitting in the corner of the room. It’s too damn early in the morning for this bullshit.
I make my way down the hallway to the common room. No one is up except for Nico. He’s been working night and day to find out how the DNA that was mutated to create Eve and the serum that was sent to Bridget. I know he’s over working himself but I can’t tell him what to do. He’s fuckin thirty-four years old. He can do what he wants. I walk into the tech room and lean against the door frame with my arms crossed. I stand there for a few moments before I say anything, not wanting to interrupt his groove.
“Found anything yet?” I finally say. I must have scared him because he jumps at least six inches out of his chair and turns to look at me.
“Fuck, man. How about a knock or something, fuck?” Nico growls as I chuckle. “Actually, do you remember Max saying he was a descendent of someone who vowed to seek out revenge for creating rogue lycans?” I nod remembering that before Eve took his head off. “Well, he was telling the truth about that. Apparently, Max was descended from a guy named Sedric Landry who Boris Thibodeaux had executed back in the 1600s. Now, not much was documented back then as far as lycans because we were still living in secret and the Louisiana Purchase had not happened. But it is rumored that Sedric, had quite a few heirs with some rogues.”
“You mean he changed them?” I interrupt Nico.
“Not necessarily. You see, here let me pull up a map.” Nico turns back to his computer and pulls up a map of the US from back in the 1600s. “You see the original thirteen colonies right here. But everything to the west had not been explored yet. Washington was actually one of the first to start exploring the Ohio Valley but that wasn’t until the late 1700s. Now, this doesn’t mean Indians weren’t here. Remember, we have the Chitimachas and a few other tribes too. But to know exactly who he slept with is near impossible.”
“Well, I mean you’re talking the 1600s here, the blood line had to have ended in what the 18-1900s.”
“Again, not necessarily true. Look at Sierra. She’s over a hundred years old. I mean fuck man, even for a human that’s fucking old and she looks damn good for that age.” Nico says as he shakes his head with a wide ass grin on his face. I know what he’s thinking. And right now, I would love to rip him from limb to limb for having those thoughts. But no one knows about the relationship Sierra and I have. No one knows we’re in love.
“So, what does this mean for us? Is the pack safe?” I ask suppressing the anger I’ve got
the time building inside me.
“Not sure. Look, man. What we know now is that Max is dead. Alec, on the other hand, is half Lycan. We won’t know for what? Another couple years, at most? So, we’ll have to keep a close eye on him. Now Eve, she was turned by him.” Nico continues as he leans back in his chair with his hand to his mouth. “According to Lycan law,” he says as he gets up and retrieves an old book from the bookcase. “She is now a descendant of him, even though he did not bite her. The scratch itself transferred enough DNA to her to change her.”
“Yes, but now that he is dead, she is no longer under that family’s control, right?”
“Yes and no. Technically, she is considered a rogue. However, Alec could change all of that. Blood is blood, brother.”
Those words were enough to make me realize that this is her reality now. No, I don’t think she would kill her own son. What I do think will happen is that if worse comes to worse she’ll resent him because of what he becomes all because of the father.
“Malik,” Nico says as I turn to leave, “You need to know, I placed a tracker in Eve, the night we went to Morgan City. Not that I think she will do anything stupid. I just got a feeling, man.” And his feelings are never wrong. I walk out of the tech room with more than just worry for the MC, I worry for Trigger’s woman, and now for the temper of my woman. Man, she is going to be pissed.
2
Sierra
As I stand in front of my full-length mirror, studying myself I realize something. Leather looks fucking amazing on me. It’s not the language I was brought up to use but no one’s in the room why should I care. My room. I turn to look at it. It’s too big without Malik here to share it with me. It’s painted in red and gold with a California King bed that sits in the middle against the wall. The vanity sits on the opposite. I’m lost in my own thoughts, wanting Malik here sweeping me off my feet and straight into my bed, that I don’t even hear the door open.
“Were you told to enter?” I ask in a stern voice as I turn around.
The man, Lucias, stands before me hands folded at his diaphragm as he gives me a small bow. Where would I be without with this man. He has been with me for the past hundred years, ordered to keep me safe by my father. A slave once, but granted freedom when he saved me from a group of savage men who wanted nothing more than to rape and kill me. “Excuse me, your grace. You have a visitor.”
“I am expecting no one. Tell them now is not a good time. I have business to attend to.” I say as I turn to grab my weapons.
“I’m afraid, this person insists, madam. Miss Laveau is in the parlor talking to the man now. But he is very persistent on you.” His golden brown eyes meet mine. I’d know that if he were lying to me but this is not the
case.
“Very well,” I say I grab my jacket and slip it on gracefully. “Take me to him.”
Lucias takes another bow before he opens the door for me. I nod my head as I exit the room and patiently wait as he shuts the door behind him. He leads me down the hall that is decorated with the portraits of my ancestors. Once at the staircase, he waits for me to take the first step down. The stairs are made of the oldest cypress and twist around into the foyer where it meets with mahogany flooring. With the heels I have on, anyone can hear me coming from a mile away.
As we approach the foyer, I stand there waiting for Lucias to open the door. He gives me a gentle nod with a hint of a smile. We enter the room just as everyone turns. The man standing by the fireplace is arguing with Marie. He knows he is not supposed to be here, I just need to figure out why after all these years he is here.
“May I introduce, Miss Sierra Thibodeaux.” Lucias says with a bow as he backs away behind me. Marie stalks over to me. Whatever this man has said has upset her greatly and that doesn’t sit well with me.
“How may I be of service to you, Mr.?” I ask, not knowing what his name is.
“Smith, for now you can call me Mr. Smith.” One of these guys, huh? Well, two can play this game.
“Well, Mr. Smith. I’m in the middle of something that does require my attention. So, I would appreciate it if you would not waste my time and cut to the chase.” I cross my arms hastily.
Malik's Reclamation (Hellfire Dogs MC) Page 1