Lawman
Regina Carlysle
Book 5 in the High Plains Shifters series.
In the deep of night she longs for him. Mate, lycan, lover. Her lawman. As Katalin Petrova struggles to control her wild and untamed “gift”, she yearns for the only man who can make her whole. His every touch burns, searing her with unimaginable pleasure. Only her strong, protective lover can tame the wild yearnings of her body and help her claim the power of her ancestors.
While Gabriel Dunham, lycan lieutenant of the Wolf Creek Pack, watches over his intended mate, his patience to claim her nears an end as savage need burns his body. Consumed by unbridled lust, he claims her, takes her, hoping it will be enough to protect Katalin from unseen forces determined to rip her from his arms.
Ellora’s Cave Publishing
www.ellorascave.com
Lawman
ISBN 9781419934056
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Lawman Copyright © 2011 Regina Carlysle
Edited by Helen Woodall
Cover art by Syneca
Electronic book publication May 2011
The terms Romantica® and Quickies® are registered trademarks of Ellora’s Cave Publishing.
With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the publisher, Ellora’s Cave Publishing, Inc.® 1056 Home Avenue, Akron OH 44310-3502.
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This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.
Lawman
Regina Carlysle
Trademarks Acknowledgement
The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:
Stetson: John B. Stetson Company Corporation
Chapter One
Though it was midafternoon, weariness settled over Sheriff Gabriel Dunham like a shroud and he had only a serious lack of sleep to blame. Nights spent in his truck while watching over Katalin, his intended mate, had taken their toll on him. Every night, he stared toward her small, secluded house where a warm bed and a beautiful woman waited for him. But he was no fool. He didn’t dare go inside. Taking her now, making her his wasn’t an option at the moment.
She was too fragile, much too delicate and Gabe simply wasn’t strong enough to hold back from his determined need to stake his claim on her.
Kat needed more from him now than hot, frantic sex.
After all she’d been through, Katalin needed safety and he wasn’t quite sure that he could deliver considering the raw, savage need that clawed through his belly. It was like a prairie fire gone wild, alarming in its intensity.
Protecting others was in his nature and he’d face death rather than hurt her.
A lawman who’d lived more than two hundred years on this earth, he’d worked the docks in the great ports of St. Louis during American expansion to the West and then later, he’d followed covered wagons filled with hopeful adventurers. In those days, he’d been a lycan in search of a pack, a place and a people to call his own. He’d settled in rough, rowdy towns throughout the savage West selling his skills with a gun, sometimes in the name of law and order and sometimes not. Many had been the time Gabriel Dunham had accepted the job as “protector”, a bodyguard to the rich and powerful. That he was a giant of a man who stood well over six foot seven and appeared as intimidating as hell had kept him employed throughout the West during the many years of his life.
Gabe leaned back in the chair at his scarred desk and propped his booted feet atop it, crossing them at the ankle. His eyes burned like hellfire and he needed sleep in the worst way. Burning the candle at both ends wore at him.
As always, in quiet moments, he thought of Katalin Petrova.
Through the past centuries, he’d hoped and prayed for a mate, the woman destined to belong to him alone and he’d pretty much given up on ever finding her. But now, through an act of fate, she was here, a beautiful female who was too damn delicate to touch.
Breakable.
She’d just taken a job at the library at Cloverfield High School. The school year was brand new and suddenly the local streets were quiet since every teen lycan in town was currently parked at the school instead of dragging Main Street or partying out by the lake as kids were known to do. He knew that after her ordeal over the summer she was making baby steps toward re-entering society. Dr. Santos, a lycan psychiatrist from Dallas, had suggested this job would be a good thing for her so Katalin had bravely forged ahead with things.
Was she thinking of him as he thought of her, a quiet obsession born of desperation burning just below the surface of her skin? Scrubbing his palms over his face, Gabe finally closed his eyes and let her image swim to the surface of his mind. Damn but his mate was a pretty woman. The ache of his need wasn’t a sudden thing but a perpetual burning in his gut, a need to claim her, fuck her, and make her his.
For life.
Sighing deeply, the sound of the air conditioner a low hum in the room, he let himself drift off as memories of his first moments with her sifted through his brain and sleep took him away.
“I’ve got you now, Katalin. You’re safe.” Sitting at the side of her bed as shadows surrounded them, Gabe reached out his hand to brush back a pale reddish curl from her forehead. Someone had once told him this particular color was strawberry blonde but it sure looked like a Texas sunset to him. Katalin Petrova’s exotically tilted blue eyes looked back vacantly but he sensed the current of emotion that raced through her veins. Letting his mind meld with hers, he absorbed her desolation into his pores. A vast emptiness, fear, rage, guilt.
Guilt?
What the fuck? Why?
That he felt her emotions, even buried as deeply as they were, was no surprise to him. This was the way of mated couples. Instant recognition had swept him from the first moment he’d clapped eyes on her. “You don’t have to worry about anything now. Not even talking, honey. I know you can’t right now but that’s all right. Do you hear me? You are going to be fine and nothing is gonna pry my ass from your side. Do you believe me?”
Katalin blinked.
Gabe sensed her desire to speak as her lips opened slightly. She was probably wondering why her intended mate was babbling like a loon. He wasn’t a big-talkin’ man yet you’d never know it by the way he rambled on. But if coming off like a damn fool would put her at ease, he’d do it. Unable to stop himself, he gently drew his fingers over the soft flesh of her cheeks and across the bridge of her small nose, instantly noting how big and rough his hand looked against her pale skin. Her lips were full and slightly parted. When he drew the tip of one finger over that particular bit of softness, a tremble raced through her body.
Gabe went still. Leaning in, close enough to feel the brush of her breath against his face, he pressed his lips to hers. “Don’t be afraid of me, Kat,” he whispered against them. “I would give my life to protect you.”
Looking into her eyes, hoping to see something other than that vacant expression, he
blew out a gusty breath. She was in shock from her ordeal the poor, sweet little thing. The need to comfort her swept him. She wouldn’t be sad or bereft or lost if he could help it. Standing, he shucked out of his boots and drew the worn, cotton tee shirt over his head until he wore only his jeans. The woman needed cuddling in the worst way. She was so lost. Confusion, hers, wrapped around him so he lay down next to her and drew her still body against his.
A low breath soughed from her lips as if in relief.
Gabriel, the big, badass lycan lawman, buried his face in her soft curls, wrapped one brawny arm around her waist to tug her more tightly against him. The guest bedroom she’d been given by Joe and Quinn McKinnon, the pack’s alpha and his lupa, was huge. The white linen offered a stark contrast to the vibrancy of Kat’s hair as it spread across the pillows like a fiery flag. His own dark, wheat-colored hair mixed with hers as if their merging was meant to be. “Let me start at the beginning,” he murmured, astonished by the raspy, heaviness of his voice. “You and your sister, Sara, were kidnapped by rogue lycans. They intended to force consummation on you two but we prevented it.” Among their kind a forced consummation was tantamount to rape and punishable by death.
Her breath caught and her worry swirled through his mind in an empathic connection that was impossible to ignore. Energy sizzled between them and popped with sound in the otherwise quiet room. His cock instantly hardened but he couldn’t do a damn thing about that now. Lust flashed heavily through his veins. Ignoring it, Gabe nuzzled her hair, quick to answer her unspoken question. “No, Sara isn’t hurt. She’s fine and sleeping in the bedroom next door. Cactus is watching over her. He’s a good man. He found his mate today in your sister Sara as I found my mate in you, darlin’. Fate. It’s meant to be. You are mine, my pretty Kat.”
A restless movement surprised him. She’d gone into shock, some deep emotional paralysis since the moment he’d carried her from that ratty trailer in the wilds of Mexico and driven her to the pack’s ranch in West Texas. She would remain here at the Wolf Creek Ranch near the lycan town of Cloverfield until she was well. In time she would realize she belonged here with him as his mate.
Best not to push her now.
“Shh. Shh, now darlin’, don’t get yourself all worked up. Nothing but comfort is happening tonight. You’re weak as a kitten but I’m going to take care of you, protect you. Forever if you’ll let me. Sleep now, sweet Kat.”
A picture frame on the wall rattled along with a vase that sat upon the bedside table. Gabe frowned. What the hell? Energy popped again, briefly filling the silence and he knew somehow, that power had come from her, wielding itself like some freaky force of nature. Curiosity swelled and he wondered about this woman who was destined to be his mate. His arms tightened around her as he felt the strange, sizzling force recede to bury itself deep inside her mind. Her thoughts went calm, her emotions tucked away as if hiding from him, she finally slept leaving him to wonder what the hell was going on with her.
The phone on his desk rang, jarring him from sleep. Sitting up, planting his booted feet on the floor, he reached for it.
“Sheriff’s office.”
“Gabe. Hey, how are you?”
Gabe smiled at the sound of Sara Petrova Mackey’s voice. He’d liked Katalin’s sister from the moment he’d met her but even more so now that she was the consummated mate of Cactus, one of his closest friends. “Better than I deserve. Everything okay?”
Sara sighed over the phone. “Well, yeah but I have a problem. I’m all tied up with something and I’m supposed to pick Kat up at the school in a few minutes. Until she gets a car I’m her taxi, Gabe. Can you help me out here? I’d call Cactus but he’s out at the ranch and the phone connection is crappy.”
Gabe’s heart rate kicked up a notch at the prospect of seeing Katalin but then he frowned. “Dr. Santos has pretty much tried to keep me away from her these days. I don’t like it. For what it’s worth, I think I can help her. Sure don’t like not knowing what’s going on. Hell, there’s nothing I’d like more than to cart her around anywhere she wants to go but every time we get within two feet of each other everyday objects become projectiles.”
“Yes, that tiny little thing is a dangerous woman,” Sara said, humor in her voice. Then she paused. “She needs you, Gabriel. I was just talking with Cactus about this last night. I can tell she is distraught without you. I can’t help thinking that once the two of you become joined through consummation, you can keep her calm enough that she can get the telekinesis under control. You could soothe her. I just know it.”
Soothe her?
Hell, every time he was within feet of the woman her emotions swamped him. Grief, fear, lust, desire, just everything. He’d sell his soul to find one tiny kernel of truth in his future sister-in-law’s words. Gabe’s response was low and measured. “I’ll pick her up at the school, Sara, don’t you worry. Eventually we’ll get this all figured out.”
Gabe got up and dug through the pocket of his jeans suddenly wide awake. Watching over Kat every night, wanting to protect her was taking its toll on him but the prospect of seeing her, if only for a moment, perked him up better than ten cups of coffee might do. He revved up his big truck and drove to the edge of town where the high school was located. Braking to a stop across the street, he watched young lycans laughing and pushing at each other as they raced to their cars. All that energy just waiting to burst at any moment but to the casual observer they might be human kids. Not so. It was a constant battle watching over them. Especially the young male lycans. They had raging testosterone like human boys but when you added the fact they could shift at will, it was purely a recipe for disaster. The females, of course, wouldn’t see their first shift until after they’d consummated with their mates.
Horns blared as they blasted from the parking lot, hell-for-leather, and Gabe shook his head wondering how they managed to survive these wild teen years.
Anticipation caught him up as he looked toward the wide double doors of the school. A group of adults, all lycan educators, walked from the building and unable to stop himself he craned his neck, trying to catch a glimpse of Kat.
“Hey, Sheriff!”
“Hey, Molly. You doing okay today?”
The girl adjusted the straps of her backpack and headed toward her mother’s car as it pulled up. “Yep. Doing great. Bye!”
Smiling, he watched her drive off then returned his attention back to the group of teachers. Sunlight caught the strands of Katalin’s hair making them shine like a sunset. His body responded helplessly, his cock twitching behind the fly of his jeans. Horny ass. He couldn’t help it, damn it all. He wanted her like he needed his next breath. She laughed at something someone said and he felt his gut tighten. One day, she’d be that easy with him. He prayed to the gods for that day.
“Kat! Over here. Let’s grab some coffee and then I’ll give you a lift home.”
Frowning, Gabe watched Dee Santos step from her car and onto the sidewalk to wave Katalin down. Frustration sank its claws in his belly and his disappointment bordered on despair. Yeah, Dr. Santos was helping and she was a damn nice woman but he was getting downright tired of her presence in Kat’s life. He was man enough to admit he was jealous of the time they spent together considering his moments with her were so few.
When Kat rushed over and she and Dee Santos drove away, his heart sank. Wearily he climbed back into his truck and headed off to make his rounds.
* * * * *
As Katalin Petrova lay in her bed, shadows moving in a menacing fashion across the pale bedroom walls, she wondered what it was about the heavy dark of night that made every horror even more intense than in the daylight hours. Though she should be at peace in this new place, a shiver shook her as memories of her childhood rolled through her mind like a scary old movie in which her father, Anton Petrov, played the starring role.
Past terror suddenly seemed so real that it shook her to her bones.
Kat pressed her head deeper into the soft
cotton of her pillow, tugged the sheet to her throat and closed her eyes as a gentle breeze from the open window sifted across her hot face, momentarily cooling her. But the memories wouldn’t leave her alone.
What had happened that night months ago was her burden to bear, her guilt, her fault and nothing would ever change this raw truth. In one instant of carelessness, her world had come crashing down. Anton had witnessed her blossoming power and the result was a night of violence and death.
Kat tightened her eyes as tears of helpless rage seeped from beneath the fringe of her lashes, a hot, liquid reminder of loss and pain. She saw her mother dead, a beautiful, caring lycan female, bleeding on the floor of their rustic cabin. She saw the look of abject horror on her sister Sara’s face and then later, the way the sisters had been forced from their home at the point of a rifle as her father planned to sell them both to outlaw wolves who would use their powers for their own greedy purposes. What those lycans would do with Sara and her would have been, among their kind, tantamount to rape.
Would the memories ever dim? Would she ever manage to close her eyes without seeing it all again?
She doubted it.
Red visions curled through her mind. Forgotten was the current serenity of her little cabin in the Texas woods. Safety and security seemed far way, too far to grasp. The memories threatened to undo her.
“Anton! Dear gods! No. Please,” her mother had shouted mere seconds before her father had pulled the trigger and then trained the gun on Sara and her.
Her mother’s words echoed through her mind bringing with them pain and grief.
Tears fell heavier now and Kat gasped, struggling against the powerful urge to cry out her anguish. But her mouth only opened in that soundless way that happens when caught in the scariest of nightmares. Her hands trembled so badly she clutched them together against a chest that tightened, threatening to squeeze the breath from her lungs.
Lawman Page 1