“Logan’s watching Kiera.”
What those three words did to his insides. Beast squeezed the bottle so hard, it shattered in his hands, and a long slice across his palm starting pouring blood. “Shit,” he muttered, wrapping it in a hand towel. Now he was good and pissed, so he wrenched his voice up to yelling. “What do you mean he’s watching her? Not hunting her. Not stalking her. Don’t fucking tell me he’s after a kill. She ain’t a shifter, and fuck him for following her, and fuck Kane for caring.”
“Fuck Kane for caring? You just threw a tantrum because someone else is looking at her.”
“Because I don’t like Logan stalking a woman. He’s a mercenary—”
“Ex-mercenary—”
“What, you think he dropped the instinct to hunt? To kill sick shifters?”
“You said she wasn’t a shifter.”
Now Dustin was messing with him. Twisting words and making him speak in circles, and he wasn’t doing this shit. Three steps to Dustin, and Beast moved to wrap his hand around his throat to get him to stop talking.
At the last moment, Dustin held up a folder that Beast accidentally grabbed instead. The shitty handwriting on the front read Kiera Pierce.
Dustin ducked out of pawing range and jammed a finger at the folder. “I know you don’t want her here, but there are too many secrets in this crew. Like why the fuck weren’t we told Kiera is still in the territory? You I get, but they are leaving me and Emma out of their little secret stalk, too. I snuck in Kane’s house today while you two were at work and found this.”
“What is it?” Beast asked, his voice more animal than man right now. He hated when he got this riled up, hated the gravel to his tone.
“That’s everything Kane dug up on Kiera. You know as well as I do the dragon knows everything about everyone, and he’s got tons of dirt on this one. She’s a total nutcase, Beast.” Dustin snarled up his lip. “And you know what Kane does with total nutcases.”
Beast heaved a sigh. “Yeah. He makes them Blackwings.” He looked suspiciously at Dustin and held up the black folder. “Why did you give this to me?”
“Because like it or not, I really do consider you a friend. I owe you for going to battle with me against the packs. You showed up first, and that counts for something big with me. You freaked the fuck out yesterday when you found out Kiera was a lioness. I don’t know why, but I saw the panic in your eyes, and I don’t want you to leave the Blackwings. Not because of Kiera, not because of anything.” Dustin made his way to the door, but turned just before he left and made an elaborate sign with his hands. He’d been learning American Sign Language for his hearing-impaired mate. “Emma says I should be more open with my feelings. Do you know what I just said to you?”
“I don’t care.”
“I said I love you, too, because I know deep down you—”
“Get out before I kill you.”
“Yep, see you later,” Dustin rushed out with a nod, then disappeared out the front door.
Beast really, really didn’t like the idea of Logan tailing Kiera. Or that she was still in the territory. Or that Kane was keeping secrets from Beast. He’d been Kane’s confidant in the crew—the one Kane came to for advice. He’d been the one Kane had tasked with finding out what Dustin was really up to when he was thinking of betraying their crew to the Valdoro pack. Honestly, right now Beast felt a little demoted. Maybe Kane was going to make Logan his Third.
Beast looked down at the folder. He had respect for dark pasts and really shouldn’t read this. Kiera wasn’t offering it, so it was like he was stealing her secrets, and something about that curdled his stomach. The folder made a slapping sound as it hit the table. Without a look back at it, Beast peeled off his shirt and strode for the bathroom where he was going to shower and refuse to jerk off for the freaking second time today while thinking about that sexy ex-lioness. Maybe she was in heat or something. Maybe that’s why his animal was going mad for her. Or maybe he was just so damn deprived after running a pride for ten years and taking care of the females in heat. They required sex multiple times a day, and going from that to nothing had shocked his system. He wasn’t like this with the other females in the crew at all, but Kiera had him rutting so freaking hard. Probably because of those pretty lioness eyes. And her curves. And her little nose, rosy cheeks, and her hair all piled up, making him want to yank out the hair band and run his fingers through her long locks, flip her over on a bed, and fuck her from behind while gripping that pretty purple hair and…crap. Now he was hard again.
For that little fantasy, he deserved a cold shower, and that was just what he got. He ignored the hell out of his raging boner because he had to get this under control. He felt like a freaking addict right now.
Dustin had said there was dirt on Kiera in that folder, so maybe that was the solution. Maybe if he read all the terrible things about her, he would be so turned off it would cure whatever was happening to his body.
Mind made up and moral compass smashed to smithereens, he wrapped a towel around his hips and strode into the kitchen, flipped open the folder, and yanked out the contents. A medical bracelet fell onto the table. It was splattered with dark brown spots, and when Beast lifted it to his nose and sniffed, he wanted to retch. It was old blood.
Kiera Rain Pierce, age 15, lioness, not to be left unattended. There was a logo on the underside of the bracelet. Apex.
Beast sat slowly in the chair and read the first page. It was a letter written in a kid’s scribbled handwriting. All the Bs were backward. Across the top it read Kiera age 9.
When I grow up I want to be a police woman or maybe a firefighter so I can help people. Henry said girls can’t be firefighters but I’m a lion shifter. I’m strong. I could get in and out of houses really fast and carry people to safety. My mom is a firefighter and she is the strongest person in the world.
Underneath, there was a picture done in crayon of two lionesses, a big one and a small one sitting next to each other. There was a house and flowers in the background with a rainbow across the top of them.
Jesus. A huge part of him didn’t even want to know what happened to her. He had enough of his own shit to deal with.
The next page was an official looking document with the Apex logo across the top.
Kiera is showing signs of success. We almost lost her last week, but she recovered and this morning wasn’t able to Change. We thought she was lying to us again, but when she was prodded with electricity, she was truly unable to defend herself. We aren’t there yet, but we’re getting closer with her. I think this one will live.
Beast’s hands shook as he barely resisted the urge to crumple the paper and burn it to ashes. He hated Apex with the fire of a million suns. Kane was just now pulling out of what they’d done to him, and Beast constantly saw the cracks in the dragon’s façade. Kiera would never get the chance to recover. She never got her animal back like Kane did.
There was a Ziploc bag with pictures. Beast pulled them out carefully. They were all out of order. That bothered him, so he spread them out and put them right. There was one of Kiera probably around the age she drew the picture of her and her mom. Sandy-blond hair, bangs in her big blue eyes, hair all curled and in pigtails, two missing front teeth. Cute kid. It was a school picture, and she was sitting up straight. She looked happy. Normal. Her shirt read Teachers Rule. Beast smiled. He couldn’t help himself. She was probably the class brownnoser. He could imagine her sitting at the front of the class and raising her hand as fast as she could every time the teacher asked a question.
There were pictures of her on a soccer team, one of her in a cheerleading uniform being thrown up in the air. Next was a selfie. She was standing in front of a mirror in a black dress, dead eyes locked on the camera, cheeks and nose red as though she’d been crying. She was maybe fourteen.
Beast rushed through the rest of the pictures, all apparently from Apex. He couldn’t look at those for too long. Kiera was like a corpse. Sometimes her eyes were blue
, and sometimes one was gold. The ones where she was emaciated, her head was shaved, showing three deep surgical scars on the side. In those, her eyes were dead and frozen in that lioness color.
Kane had once shown him a similar picture of himself when Beast had asked about Apex.
There was a tattered newsprint obituary for her mom. Firefighting accident. Burning building her mom hadn’t been able to escape. She died saving a little boy. Apparently Kiera had some hero in her bloodlines.
Next was a list of names Kane had put together.
Holly Dunes – lion, killed in transition
Brandon Fastmen – wolf, killed in transition
Meghan Stewart – grizzly bear, killed in transition
Dawn Evener – grizzly bear, no trace of animal, married, two human children
Kannon Dayton – wolf, deceased, took life
Kiera Pierce – lion, no trace of animal, never married, never registered to a pride, no children
Caleb Porter – panther, killed in transition
Ben Porter – panther, last seen in Bilk Creek Mountains. On the move. In hiding. Married. Mated? Animal? One child. Human? Shifter? No established contact.
Where the fuck are you, Ben?
LSKDJFLSKJFDLKF
Kane had found Ben only recently. And now he’d found Kiera.
No animal, never married, never registered to a pride, no children, and hell, he was having a really hard time hating her now. She’d lost so much. Perhaps she’d even lost as much as Beast. He never thought he would find someone as irreparably damaged as him, and yet here was this woman who was now sick, without her animal, and completely rogue. Of course she’d never registered with a pride. Prides weren’t like crews. They didn’t accept humans, and that’s how they would’ve seen Kiera. She had no shot of joining up with other lions. She either had to join a crew, which she clearly didn’t do, or join the human world that had stripped her animal from her.
He didn’t know Kiera, but something deep inside of him told him that after her mom died, she had never fit in again. Back when he was alpha, back when he was okay, back when he was king, he would’ve taken her into his pride, even as a human.
Beast frowned. But then she would be dead.
He couldn’t read this shit anymore, so he shoved everything back in the folder and slapped it closed.
The thought of Logan watching her hotel room drew a deep rumble up his throat. He wanted to gut that bear for hunting her, and he didn’t really give a single fuck that Kane had ordered Logan to do it. Kiera was a lioness, or she had been once. This wasn’t Logan’s business.
Beast made his way into his room and dressed as fast as he could. Since his chest was still wet from the shower, it made dark spots all over his black sweater, but so what? No one looked at him like he was fuckable. More like a monster instead. He snarled when he caught his reflection in the bathroom mirror. Stupid face all torn to hell, a constant reminder of what had happened. No wonder Kiera had smelled scared of him.
She was a beauty. He was a beast.
He needed to chase Logan away. No, wait. He was supposed to chase Kiera away. From the mountains, from Kane’s territory…from his territory. But that didn’t feel right anymore. Stupid protective instincts had confused him for a minute, but he was getting his head back on straight little by little. He just had to ignore the pictures he saw. If she stayed here, near him, he would ruin her life even more. And a huge part of him wanted Kiera to be all right now. To be a success story. To get her act together, find her strength, and heal from whatever was making her smell sick.
Beast grabbed his coat and winter hat and shoved the door open. He didn’t even bother turning off the lights in his trailer before he bolted down the porch steps and through the gate to his truck.
“You’re welcome,” Dustin called from his front porch swing where he was cuddling with Emma under a thick blanket.
Asshole. Beast flipped him off as he drove by. And furthermore, they were a disgusting couple, always cuddling everywhere. Kissing and slow blinking at each other like they were in a damn romantic movie. I’ll love you for eternity and all that horse-crap. Love wasn’t real, but Dustin and Emma liked to pretend. So did Logan and Winter, so did Kane and Rowan. It was puke-inducing.
When Beast gassed it over the bridge, his lion reared up inside of him at the prospect of fighting Logan. It had been two whole days since they’d bled each other.
And for some reason Beast couldn’t understand, Kiera felt like the perfect reason to sharpen his claws on some bear hide.
Chapter Four
Kiera pushed the curtain aside and glared at the beat-up white truck in the next parking lot over. At least she still had impeccable vision from the cat. She was being hunted by Logan Furrow of the Blackwings, but why?
Oh, she knew what he was—a mercenary. But she wasn’t a shifter, and killing her would bring down hell on Kane’s Mountains. No way would she go quietly. Not now. Not with a life to protect.
For two days, he’d followed her. Sometimes his mate, Winter, came with him, sometimes not. He talked on his phone sometimes. He had to be better at hunting than this, but she’d grown suspicious he must not care about being caught.
Was he here to push her out of the mountains? To make sure she really left like Beast had ordered her to? Or was his reasoning more sinister?
Not one to pussyfoot around, she slid the bowie knife from her bag into the back of her jeans and pulled her sweater over it. Then, with a three-count breath for bravery, she marched across the motel parking lot and into the adjacent lot of Frankie’s Burgers & Tots.
Mouth full of burger, Logan rolled down his window. Around the bite, he said, “About damn time.”
“You’ve been following me for two days. Why?”
He gulped. “Good instincts still. And because Kane told me to. He’s alpha, so I do what he says.”
“Bullshit, you’re as dominant as he is. Even I can feel how fucked up you are. You could say no if you wanted.”
“Nope, he really is alpha. Doesn’t matter how broken my animal is. I still don’t want to end up in the belly of the dragon. Tater tot?” He handed her a carton half full of the fried potatoes.
She was always hungry, sooo… “Thanks,” she muttered, yanking them from his hand and taking three steps back to eat them.
“It’s cold, and you don’t have a jacket,” he said, dark eyebrows arched high as he took another bite of burger.
“What do you care?”
“About you? My care-level is at maybe three percent. Nah, it’s what you got hidden in your belly that has me concerned.”
Kiera nearly choked on the tot she was devouring. She coughed a few times and bullied it down her throat. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“And neither do any of the other Blackwings, as far as I can tell. Clearly they’ve never been around a pregnant lady because they just keep talking about how sick you smell. You don’t smell sick, though. You smell fertilized.”
“Gross. That’s a seriously gross way to put it.” Kiera looked around to make sure they were truly alone. “I don’t really want it known.”
“Hey,” Logan said, throwing up his hands. “When you announce your bundle of joy is up to you. I haven’t said anything.”
Kiera narrowed her eyes. “Why not? They’re your crew.”
He canted his head and frowned. “I don’t know exactly. Instinct? If I told them, would you run?”
“Maybe.”
Logan nodded slowly. “Well, I have orders to keep you in the territory, so that would just make my job harder. Your secret is safe with me.”
The chilly breeze kicked up, so Kiera wrapped her arms around herself to keep warm. Shifting her weight from side-to-side, she admitted, “You’re the first person I’ve talked to about this, and you’re a total stranger.”
Logan shrugged. “It’s the easiest way to talk about stuff.” She opened her mouth to say more, but he put his hand up and rushed out, “Not that I wa
nt to hear about it. I don’t. I just want you to stay in the mountains so Kane doesn’t burn my ass.”
“Right. Well, you can stop following me, at least until the end of the week. I told the guy at the front desk I’m staying through Friday.”
“John?” he asked. “Nice guy. I still have to tail you, though. You know, you could make this a lot easier by talking to Kane. He doesn’t want to lose track of you again, but he’s trying to give you your space—”
“By having me followed.”
Logan gave her an empty smile and continued. “If it was up to him, he would storm the motel and drag you back to his mountains, but he has a mate with a sensitive soul, and Rowan doesn’t want you feeling pressured. She wants you to have a chance to come when you’re ready.”
That bit of information drew Kiera up straighter. Kane had found a good mate then. One who could take the edge off him. Kiera touched her belly gently. That was good news.
“Why hasn’t Beast registered to the crew yet?” She’d tried but failed for nonchalance if Logan’s suspicious little slits for eyes were anything to go by.
“If you’re after the Beast, best go looking for love elsewhere. Even the dark dragon is wary of him, and for good reason.”
“Because he’s dangerous?”
“Yeah. To any male in the territory.”
Kiera rubbed her chilled arms and kicked a loose rock on the asphalt. “But not females?”
“Nope. The females are safe. He’s got a dominance problem, though. Mountains aren’t exactly a safe haven if you have a dick, if you know what I mean.”
Actually, she didn’t know what he meant. He’d murdered his pride, all females. That’s probably where he got that hideous scar down his face. Fuckin’ deserved it.
“You’ve eaten all the tater tots,” Logan pointed out.
Kiera looked down at the empty carton and swallowed the last bite. “Yeah, I’m still hungry so I’m going to go get some dinner.” She walked toward Frankie’s, but called over her shoulder, “Please stop following me.”