“I’ll…die…”
She realized that his head was in her lap. Iona didn’t remember sliding her knees under him. Why had she even come to check on him? The shooter could still be out there. The shooter could come for her.
She should run. Leave. Hunt.
Not lean over him and brush the hair from his forehead, but, sure enough, she saw her own trembling fingers sliding thought that thick, dark hair.
What is wrong with me?
“If I die…” It certainly looked like the wolf was close to death. Jamie growled, then managed, “So…do you…”
She gazed down at him. She knew what others said about her. She was evil. Wicked. Without a soul.
And maybe some of those stories were true. But in this one instance…
Iona brushed her lips over his. A soft kiss. Gentle. Their first kiss.
It seemed strange to have it here, with blood around them.
It seemed strange to have the kiss after she’d already taken his blood.
But maybe it was fitting.
The kiss was light, but she enjoyed the taste of his lips almost as much as she’d enjoyed his blood.
Perhaps the werewolf could prove to be addictive to her.
And, maybe, she’d show him just how addictive she could be.
Her mouth lifted from his, a few inches. “What makes you think…” Iona asked him quietly, “that I would let you die by any hand other than my own?”
Then she lifted her hand. Brought it to her mouth. Sliced the flesh with her teeth, then offered her wrist to him.
When he drank, she understood that Jamie wasn’t like the others. For some reason, he’d touched a part of her that she’d buried deep inside. The human part. The part that wouldn’t let a man die before her eyes.
Not a man who’d saved her. Who’d tried to protect her.
I won’t let them hurt you.
Funny. No one had ever tried to protect her. Not even her father. No, he’d been the one to tie her to the stake on her twenty-fifth birthday. The day he’d realized she wasn’t aging as she should.
He’d tied her to the stake and carried the torch that had started the blaze around her. She’d screamed and begged him to stop. He hadn’t.
Too bad for him, she’d been strong enough to break free of the bonds that held her. Burned, savaged, she’d escaped.
Later, she’d gone back for him.
Jamie’s hand lifted and locked around her wrist as he took her blood. As far as she knew, only one other werewolf had ever tasted her blood.
That was the werewolf who’d locked her in that horrible house. Made her a prisoner in her own body.
The same werewolf that had been there tonight because, right before the first bullet had slammed into Jamie, she’d caught Latham’s scent.
Her gaze lifted to the woods once more. The scent was gone now, but it didn’t matter. Latham knew she was free—and she, well, she knew that he’d soon be one very dead wolf.
***
The fool had freed her. Latham raced through the woods, his packmates close to his sides. They were bleeding, and he knew that Jamie would track the scent of the blood.
Jamie thought he was such a fine tracker.
They burst from the woods. Two black SUVs were waiting for him. Latham rushed into the first SUV, the gun a heavy weight in his gloved hand. The silver bullets should have taken out his rival, but Latham had missed Jamie’s heart because he’d been distracted.
By her.
The witch was waiting for him in the SUV. Unlike the other werewolves, Latham hadn’t transformed into his wolf form.
“Is he dead?” The witch asked. Brian Hennessey didn’t look much like a witch. Tall, thin, with small, black glasses perched on his nose, the guy appeared to be a harmless human.
Brian was far from harmless.
The other werewolves were shifting. The others who’d survived anyway—two packmates wouldn’t be escaping with him.
Should have gone in stronger.
“No, Jamie is still alive,” Latham bit out. “Because he wasn’t alone.”
Latham knew that once Jamie was out of the picture, the remains of his pack would be easy pickings. Jamie was the strength of that pack. Without him, they’d crumble to nothing.
He wanted them to crumble. Those fools deserved to crumble.
“More wolves?” Brian shook his head and waved for the driver to get them out of there. “I would have thought you’d be able to take them—”
Latham grabbed his arm and let his claws rip into Brian’s flesh. “Most witches can see into the future.”
No fear flickered in Brian’s gaze. “Most witches didn’t nearly burn out their power by locking up a born vampire queen for you.”
His claws dug deeper. “She’s not locked up.”
“Yeah, she is. I put that bitch in her cell, I—”
“Not anymore,” Latham snarled at him as the rage flared hotter within him. “He got her out.” In-fucking-possible. Or it should have been.
Brian paled. “Iona…is free?” Ah, now the fear was there.
The witch was right to be afraid. Iona knew Brian had been the one to cast the spell that bound her.
She’d be gunning for him, too.
But Iona would have to get in line. Latham was ready to rip the witch’s head right off. “You said I was the only one who’d be able to get her out.” Only he hadn’t wanted her out. She just would have fought him then. Tried to take his head. So he’d kept her locked up, and every few months, he’d gone in and drained blood from her.
Iona’s blood was pure power. It gave him the strength of a werewolf—of five werewolves in fully shifted form—but let him keep the body of a man at all times. Why shift? Thanks to her blood, he always had more than enough strength to break his enemies.
“I-I told you…as a werewolf alpha, you’d be able to bind her body.” The scent of Brian’s sweat and fear filled the interior of the vehicle. “And if a werewolf alpha locked her body, then only a werewolf alpha could—could free her.”
Snarling, Latham put his claws at Brian’s throat. “You didn’t tell me that any werewolf alpha would do the trick! I thought I was the only one! Just me!”
More sweat. More fear. But Brian shook his head. “I never said you were the only one who could free her.”
That information would have been important before then. Yet even as the rage pulsed in his blood, Latham smiled at the witch.
Brian’s fear deepened. Ah, the witch knew him well.