The Dark-Hunters (219 page)

He grimaced at the brightness of the morning light. He really hated mornings.

Forcing himself up, he pulled on his pants and zipped them, but left the button undone as he wandered into the kitchen area. Bride liked to eat two pieces of toast with marmalade in the morning.

While the bread toasted, he sliced her grapefruit for her and sprinkled a spoonful of sugar over it, then poured her a glass of orange juice.

He was putting the marmalade on the toast when she came out of the bathroom and stopped to stare at him.

“What?” he asked, puzzled by the deep scowl on her face.

“Is that your breakfast?”

Vane made a face. “Not hardly. I was going to fry some bacon for me.”

“Then how did you know I liked to eat that?”

Vane paused as he realized that the man Vane wouldn’t know what the wolf Vane knew. Clearing his throat, he shrugged. “I opened the fridge and saw the marmalade and grapefruit. Most people only eat those for breakfast so I figured you wouldn’t mind them.”

She seemed to accept that as she pulled the towel from her hair and draped it over her chair. “Thank you,” she said, placing a kiss on his cheek.

Vane closed his eyes as his body hardened instantly. Without thought, he pulled her into his arms for a much more satisfying kiss. He trailed his lips over to her neck as he opened the front of her robe and pulled her naked body against his.

Bride moaned at the feel of his cool, hard body against hers. She ran her hand over the flexing muscles of his back and felt the scars he had there. His whiskered chin and cheek scraped gently against her skin.

“If you keep this up, I’ll never get my store opened.”

“Keep it closed and stay with me.”

She cradled his head in her hands while his tongue played gently in the hollow of her throat. “I can’t.”

He pulled back. “I know. I was only hoping.” He released her, then tied her robe closed. “Eat your breakfast.”

Bride sat down at her small bistro-style table as he returned to the stove to make his bacon. She nibbled on the toast and watched him. “You have serious guts to fry bacon without a shirt on. Aren’t you afraid it’ll splatter?”

He shrugged. “It doesn’t really hurt.”

She frowned as she traced the various scars with her gaze. “How did you get so many scars, Vane?”

Vane debated how to answer her. She wasn’t ready for the truth—that they were battle scars from four hundred years of being pursued by Arcadians who thought he was a Katagari Slayer. For that matter, they thought any Katagari male was a Slayer. That he had been forced to fight his own pack to keep his brother safe. That some of them were from the she-wolves he’d been with.

Some were from beatings.

“I haven’t had an easy life, Bride,” he said quietly as he turned the bacon over in the pan. He turned around to look at her. “I’ve never had anything I didn’t have to pay for with blood and bone. Until you.”

Bride sat perfectly still as that green gaze held her transfixed. There was something about his open expression that reached out to her. He was laying himself bare to her, she sensed it.

God, it would be so easy to love this man. He asked her for nothing and he was so incredibly giving. This moment felt surreal to her. She’d never known anyone like him.

This is too easy.

That niggling voice in the back of her head reared its ugly head. Nothing was perfect. Nothing was this easy.

There had to be more to him than what she saw.

What if there isn’t?

What if he really was just as he appeared? She couldn’t see any deception. Maybe it was because there wasn’t any.

“Thank you for last night, Vane,” she said.

He inclined his head to her, then went back to his bacon. He removed it from the pan and placed it on a plate, then turned off her stove and brought his plate to the table.

“You want some?” he asked.

Bride took two crispy strips while he got himself a glass of juice. There was something so intimate about sharing breakfast with him. She didn’t know what it was, but in five years of dating Taylor, she’d never experienced a feeling like this. It was wonderful.

She ate quickly, then got up.

“I’ve got it,” Vane said as she reached for her dishes. “You get ready and I’ll clean up.”

“You really are too good to be true,” she said, kissing the top of his head before she darted to her makeshift wardrobe closet.

Vane tried not to watch her dress, but he couldn’t stop himself. He was aroused just by seeing her pull on her underwear and dress.

Cocking his head, he realized she never wore pants. She always wore flowing dresses in dark earth tones or black. She slid her feet into a pair of flats and brushed her hair. Then she coiled it into that familiar messy bun.

Vane was enchanted by her actions. There were so many details involved in her morning routine. Such as the way she put on her makeup and then powdered it down. The precise movements it took to put on mascara and lipstick.

He loved watching the way she artistically dressed herself and styled her hair.

Bride paused as she lined her eyes to look at him in the mirror. “Something wrong?”

He shook his head. “I’m just thinking I’m glad I’m not female. I can’t imagine putting on all that every day.”

She smiled at him and his heart thundered.

As soon as she finished, she scooped her keys up and headed for the door. “Will you lock up?” she asked him.

Vane nodded.

She blew him a kiss, then left him alone in her apartment. Outside, he could hear her calling for the wolf as she made her way to her store.

He cringed at that. “I’m going to have to tell her.”

The longer he put it off, the harder it would be.

“Okay. I’m going to do it.”

After he showered.

And dressed.

And cleaned.

*   *   *

An hour later, while Bride was dusting in her store, she felt the hair on the back of her neck rise.

She turned around expecting to see someone behind her.

No one was there.

She rubbed her neck and glanced about. Still, the feeling was there. It was almost evil.

How weird was that?

Frowning, she went to look out the store windows. There wasn’t anyone out there.

“Bride?”

She screamed and whirled about to find Vane coming from the back room.

He quickened his steps to reach her side. “You okay?”

Bride laughed nervously at her childishness. “I’m sorry. I didn’t hear you come in the back door. You just startled me.”

“You sure that’s all it was?”

“Yes,” she said, taking a deep breath.

Vane was dressed in his black slacks and shirt. He must have left his jacket in her apartment. Stepping back from her, he had an odd look of discomfort about him.

Oh Lord, here it comes …

“You need to get back to your life, huh?” she asked, trying to be brave while inside she struggled not to cry.

“What life?” He looked confused by her question. “What are you talking about?”

“Isn’t this the part where you tell me we had fun and you break up with me?”

He looked even more confused. “Is that what I’m supposed to do?”

“Well, no. I mean, I don’t know. Isn’t that where you were heading?”

He shook his head. “No. I was just going to tell you that I…” Vane’s voice trailed off as he looked past her, to the door.

Bride turned to see two women entering the store.

Vane stepped back while she greeted them. They began to browse, but their eyes kept returning to Vane, who moved to stand near her counter.

Bride busied herself rearranging a necklace display. She could tell Vane wanted to talk to her, but when those two customers left, three more came in.

Vane watched while Bride showed her merchandise to the women. He really wanted to get this over with, yet the last thing he needed was an audience when he told her that he was a werewolf.

More customers came in.

Oh, this was getting bad.

He could use his powers to make the women leave, but he didn’t want to interfere with her business.

“I’m going to wait outside for a bit,” he said to her while she rang up a sale.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll be out in the back.”

He headed into the storeroom, then out the back door that led to the courtyard.

Damn.

“It’s okay,” he breathed. He would have plenty of time to talk to her later. He just wanted to get this over with as soon as possible.

“Vane.”

A cold shiver went down his spine as he heard the low, gravelly voice inside his head.

He stiffened and went to the gate to see a sight that made his entire body go cold. Coming up Iberville was one of the last animals he expected to see.

It was Fury in human form.

Equal in height to Vane, Fury had shoulder-length blond hair and eyes that were one shade darker than turquoise. He wore his hair pulled back in a ponytail and tight blue jeans with a long-sleeved black shirt.

The wolf approached him with a deadly, carefully measured stride. Power and strength bled from every molecule of his body. This was one of the few wolves Vane had never sought to fight.

Not that he didn’t think he couldn’t take Fury. He was sure he could, but Fury wasn’t the kind of wolf who fought fair. He was much more likely to tear your throat out while you were sleeping.

There was an amused glint in the wolf’s eyes as he stopped by Vane’s side and glanced to where Bride stood inside her store.

“You’re being careless,
adelfos.
”

“We’re not brothers, Fury. What the hell are you doing here?”

His smile turned crooked, evil. “I wanted to warn you that your father knows you and Fang are alive. I was one of the ones chosen to kill you two.”

Vane went rigid.

“Relax,” Fury said. “If I wanted you dead, I would have attacked by now.”

“Why haven’t you?”

“I owe you, remember?”

It was true. He had saved Fury’s life back when the wolf had first joined their pack. “You waited a long time to pay up.”

He shrugged. “Yeah, well, some things take time.”

“I don’t understand why you’re breaking from the pack to help me.”

A sinister smile curved his lips. “Because it’ll piss off the old man. I hate him, he hates you, so I guess that makes you my new best friend.”

That was news to Vane. “Why do you hate him?”

“I have my reasons and they’re all mine and not for public consumption.”

“Then why have you stayed in the pack all these centuries?”

“Again, I have my reasons.”

Yeah, Fury was an odd creature. “If they ever find out you’ve told me, they’ll kill you.”

The wolf shrugged nonchalantly. “We all die sometime.” Fury’s brow lifted as Bride came around the corner, then reversed directions as more customers neared her boutique. He sniffed the air. His eyes widened. “You’re mated.”

Vane grabbed him by the throat and shoved him back against the building.

“Easy, Vane,” Fury said. There was no fear in the beast. Only amusement and honesty. “I won’t hurt your mate, but Stefan and the others will.”

Vane didn’t doubt it. Stefan would give up both testicles to have a way to hurt him. “Who hunts?”

“Me, Stefan, Aloysius, and Petra.”

Vane cursed. Every one of them had a personal ax to grind against him, especially Petra, who hated him because he had shunned her when she tried to mate with him, and then he’d come between her and Fang. If they ever learned of Bride, they would kill her without hesitation—just to cut him. And that was if they were kind. The males of his pack would do much worse than that if they found her.

Whenever a mated male broke from the pack, the pack struck back by punishing the female mate.

Vane would kill anyone who did that to Bride. Anyone.

“You gonna move that hand off my throat now or do I have to hurt you first?”

Vane debated, then released him.

“Obliged,” Fury said as he straightened his shirt with a tug.

“Look,” Fury said, his tone deadly serious. “I never had a problem with either you or Fang, you know that. Honestly, you were the only two strati I could ever stand. I figure you guys have had a hard enough time losing Anya. You don’t need this shit just because your father’s afraid you’re going to take over his pack.”

Vane cursed. “I couldn’t care less about the pack.”

“I know. Believe it or not, I hate injustice as much as you do. The last thing I want to see is the only two decent wolves in the pack killed.”

Those were unexpected words. But then, Fury had kept himself away from others in the pack much the way Vane had. The wolf had confided in no one. Trusted no one.

Fury started away from him.

“Fury, wait.”

He looked at him, his brow arched.

“Thanks for letting me know.”

Fury inclined his head.

In that moment, he felt a strange kinship with the wolf. Not to mention the fact that he now owed Fury, and Vane always paid his debts in full. “Where are you off to?”

Fury shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess I’m a lone wolf.” He howled low. “Clichéd as hell, isn’t it?”

The wolf really was crazy.

Vane looked back at Bride through the windows of her store and a thought struck him.

“Can I trust you, Fury?”

“No,” he answered honestly. “I’m a wolf and I’m always going to do what’s best for me. Why?”

Vane hesitated, but in the end, he had no choice except to make a pact with the wolf. “Because I need help for the next couple of weeks. I can’t be in two places at once.”

“Wow,” Fury breathed in disbelief. “I never thought I’d live to see the day Vane Kattalakis ever asked another living soul for help.”

He ignored the sarcasm. “If you help me until Bride is either free or fully mated to me, I’ll make sure you never have to hunt for another pack again.”

Fury didn’t say anything.

“I know what it’s like to be alone, Fury,” Vane said, his voice betraying his own pain at being left to his own defenses. “You help me and I’ll swear brotherhood to you.”

That wasn’t something ever taken lightly. To take a blood oath of loyalty was almost as major a commitment as mating. It was an unbreakable oath. Fury had no one else on this earth. His family were all dead and he had come to them as a scared, callow youth.