The Dark-Hunters (657 page)

Even though they’d lived in New Orleans for more than a century, she’d never spent much time in the swamp or bayous. She’d forgotten how beautiful they could be.

Smiling at the image, she manifested her camera and started photographing it. There was nothing she loved more than capturing nature in its purest forms.

Completely captivated by the complexity of the light playing against the tree, she stopped paying attention to her surroundings. The world faded away as she moved in a large circle, tilting the camera for better angles.

The murky water sloshed around her feet as she moved. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a bird take flight. She turned to catch that as well, but as she moved, she heard something.…

A low, fierce growl.

Before she could react, a wolf attacked her.

CHAPTER 3

Reacting on pure instinct, Aimee dropped the camera and manifested a long staff. She crouched low, waiting for the attack. But in true wolf fashion, he didn’t attack alone. He waited for three more to join rank. By their scents, she knew none of them were the wolves she’d seen earlier at Sanctuary.

These were feral and mean.

True Slayers …

And she was their prey.

Aimee twirled her weapon, bracing herself for them. If they wanted a fight, she would and could definitely give them one. Sometimes they ate the bear, but today the bear was going to take one juicy bite out of them.

Growling and snapping, they circled around her.

She shook her head at their bravado. “Trust me, guys, you don’t want a taste of bear. This one bites three times as hard as you do.”

It didn’t stop the lead one from charging.

Aimee caught him against his side with her staff and sent him flying. The other two sprang forward. She planted her staff into the ground and lifted her body to kick one back before she twirled and used the staff to smack the other against his hindquarters.

He let out a vicious whelp.

“Cry to your mama, Big Bad Wolf. Little Red Riding Hood is about to serve your hide for dinner.”

“You think you can take us?”

She turned to counter their leader. “Oh, baby, I can send you all straight to hell.” At least that was her thought until four more ran at her.

Odds now …

Not so good.

Snarling and snapping, they moved in, slowly, threateningly. As she backed up, Aimee considered shifting forms to fight, but she wouldn’t be as fast as a bear. They would have much better maneuverability and that would cause her to lose.

Losing to anyone was something she wasn’t about to do.

No, she’d handle this as a woman.

“You know, a better weapon against them would be a gun.…”

She frowned as she heard Fang’s voice in her head. Yet he wasn’t near her.

The leader launched himself.

Aimee crouched and just as he reached her … just as she felt his hot, smelly breath on her skin, a large brown wolf intercepted him and sent him flying in the opposite direction.

Fang.

From the image she’d seen in her vision, she knew that this was him. He tore at the throat of the wolf that had initiated the attack against her. Aimee would have continued fighting, but the others backed away in confusion.

A large white wolf who put himself between her and the others transformed into Vane.

“Are you insane?” he snarled at the wolves. “She’s one of the Peltier bears.”

One by one the wolves turned human. Except for Fang and the one he fought.

“Stefan!” Vane snapped in anger.

Instead of standing down, Stefan went for Vane. Fang caught him in a vicious hold on his throat as the two wolves continued to fight and writhe. Aimee cringed at the savage anger that said the two of them hated each other passionately. Old memories surged as they growled and snapped, tearing at each other’s flesh. The sight of it sickened her.

“Stop it!” She blasted both of them with her powers.

Fang yelped as a blast hit him hard in his tail. Sharp and stinging, it sent him reeling. He hated being injured and for someone to get the better of him.…

It spun him into a level of pissed off like nothing else could. Furious, he snapped to human form even though it was hard to hold it.

“What the hell are you doing?” he asked as he limped toward her, his rear cheek still burning.

Aimee narrowed her glare on him. “I don’t like fights.”

“And I don’t like getting stung on the ass.”

She didn’t back down or back off. “Well, if you’d stopped when Vane told you to—”

“I don’t take orders from a woman I was fighting to protect.”

She held her hand up as if declaring war on him for those words. “Well, macho you. For the record, I didn’t need
your
protection.”

Fang scoffed at her misplaced bravado. “Yeah, right. They were about to take you down.”

“I seriously doubt it.”

Fang closed the distance between them to stare down at her as fury stung every part of him. He wanted her to fully understand the danger she’d stupidly put herself into. “This isn’t Sanctuary, little girl. You’re invading our territory and we have burdened females. What were you thinking? We kill you out here and no one blinks.”

She screwed her face up in disgust. “Oh, get over yourselves. Like I give two snots about your den.” She pulled out his sunglasses and shoved them toward him so hard that it forced him to take a step back. “I just wanted to return your property. So go stuff yourself.”

Fang was stunned as her hand struck him in the center of his chest. Instinctively, he cupped his sunglasses as she vanished, no doubt to return home.

The only problem was, he didn’t know what stung most. Where she’d shoved him on his chest, smacked him on the butt, or the blow she’d just dealt his ego.

“How did that bitch find us?” Stefan ground out between clenched teeth.

Vane gave him a droll stare that said he shared the same opinion of Stefan that Fang had—that Stefan was a first-rank moron. “She must have followed our scent.”

Fang didn’t speak. He was still too stunned at her anger toward him when all he’d been trying to do was make her understand the danger. How could she not know better? Had Stefan not called in for reinforcements and Fang not realized who it was they were grouping to attack, Aimee would have been torn into pieces.

Another few minutes …

His stomach churned over the images in his mind.

Vane snapped his fingers in front of his face. “Dude? You okay?”

Fang shoved at him. “Of course I am.”

Stefan came forward with a grimace on his face. “What did the bear want with you anyway?”

Vane caught Fang before he could approach the wolf to attack and forced him away from Stefan. “She—”

“We don’t owe him an explanation,” Fang snapped, interrupting Vane. “He can kiss my hairy ass.”

Stefan rushed at him.

Vane growled at both of them. “I swear to the gods that I am sick to death of breaking you two up.” He pushed Stefan back. “And you—one more time and I’m not stopping Fang. One more insult, one more cockeyed stare, and I’m standing back and turning him loose to break ass all over you.”

Stefan’s nostrils flared. Instead of pushing the issue, he snapped his fingers for the others to follow him. Turning into wolves, they bounded back toward the den.

Vane faced him with a penetrating stare. “What
is
going on between you and the bearswan?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing? She came out here into the middle of nowhere to hand you back a pair of sunglasses for what purpose?”

To keep anyone else from being able to use his scent to track him. Aimee’s kindness wasn’t lost on him.

But if Vane couldn’t figure that out, he wasn’t about to clue him in. “I don’t know. Since when do women of any species make sense?”

Vane’s features softened. “Good point. All right then, I’m heading back. You coming?”

Fang nodded.

Flashing into a wolf, Vane took off. Fang was just about to join him when he saw something on the ground a few feet away from him.

It was a camera.

What the hell?

He went over to pick it up. The moment he did, he smelled Aimee all over it. He started to chuck it toward the water, but curiosity got the better of him. Turning it on, he scrolled through the digital pictures of the Peltier bears, sometimes in human form, other times as bears. He paused on one of the busboys he’d seen in the bar who was feeding a pet monkey peanuts. She’d really captured the way the neon light highlighted him and the monkey in a most unusual way.

But it was the landscape shots she’d made all over New Orleans that were truly breathtaking. The bearswan had an amazing eye for light and shadow. Even a wolf like him could appreciate it.

Just toss the damn thing and let it go.…

He couldn’t. It was as if he were looking at her private diary and he knew instinctively Aimee wouldn’t want this to be lost. These were more than mere pictures. They were like a part of her soul.

Give it to Vane to return.

It was what he should do. Common sense told him to stay as far away from her as he could.

“Since when have I ever had an ounce of sense?”

It was true. Common sense had waved bye-bye to him a long time ago.

Tightening his grip on the camera, he flashed himself from the bayou back to the bar. He paused as he realized he’d managed to jump into the top floor … weird. It was hard to manifest into a place he hadn’t been to before. The bears must have some kind of filter to direct them to a “landing pad” of sorts.

Which explained why the jackals had come from this direction earlier. Nice move on the bears’ part.

Fang made his way down the stairs to the bar where Dev or one of Dev’s identical brothers was tending it. “Where’s Aimee?”

The bear tensed. “Who the hell are you?”

Definitely not Dev. “Fang Kattalakis. I’m returning her property, not that you have any reason for knowing that.”

The bear raked him with a hostile glare.

Another bear with short black hair, one who was Arcadian if Fang didn’t miss the tangy smell, nudged Aimee’s brother gently. “Relax, Cherif, he’s the one who saved her earlier from the jackals.”

Cherif backed down, but not by much. “You want to run him back to her?”

“Sure.” The Arcadian flashed a friendly grin at Fang. “I’m Colt,” he said good-naturedly. “If you’ll follow me…”

Fang did, but not before he gave Aimee’s brother a go-to-hell glare.

Colt led him through the kitchen and past another Dev look-alike to a door that opened into a house that was decorated in a turn-of-the-century Victorian style. The walls were painted a soft yellow while the furniture was a mix of burgundy and black. The dark wood gave it a very regal appearance.

“Peltier House,” Colt explained as he kept walking. “You weren’t here earlier when Papa Bear toured your brother around. This is where the Were-Hunters who call Sanctuary home live when not working in the club. There are four floors of bedrooms total, but most of the Peltiers are on the second floor.”

Colt headed upstairs. “Carson’s the doc and vet and his office is here.” He touched the first door they passed on the second floor and kept going to the end of the hall.

He stopped at the last door. Tapping lightly, he leaned close to it. “Aimee? You there?”

“Trying to nap, Colt.”

“Sorry, but there’s a visitor here who wants to see you.”

The door opened so fast Colt almost fell in. Aimee looked surprised, then pissed to see Fang standing behind him. “What are you doing here?”

Fang shrugged. “Come to inadvertently insult you some more apparently. Who knew?”

Instead of being amused, which was what he’d been hoping for, she narrowed her gaze on him. “I really don’t like you.”

Fang leaned forward to smirk. “You’re really not supposed to.”

Colt’s eyes widened. “Should I leave you two alone? Or stay and referee?”

“You can leave. I’m just returning this.” Fang held up the camera. “And then leaving myself.”

Without another word, Colt headed back the way they’d come.

Aimee snatched the camera away from Fang’s grasp. “Where did you get this?”

“You must have dropped it.”

She leaned out the door to make sure Colt was gone before she whispered in a low tone. “Did you tell anyone I was there?”

“No. Did you want me to?”

“No.” She looked extremely relieved. “Thank you.” Then, in the blink of an eye, she turned angry again. “Did you look at my pictures?” That was more an accusation than a question.

“Was I not supposed to?”

She screwed her face up. “Oh, you’re such a pig! That’s my privacy you’ve invaded. How dare you!”

Fang felt blindsided by her rapid mood swings. He was definitely going to need a signal light to keep up with her. “Are you always this high-strung?”

“I am not high-strung!”

“If you say so. But really, they need to put a collar on you that changes color with your mood swings.”

She curled her lip as if his words disgusted her on the highest level. “Oh, you are feral.”

“Yeah, duh.”

She rolled her eyes.

Fang started to leave, then swung back around. “By the way, I did not overreact earlier in the bayou. You could have been torn apart.”

Shaking her head, she blustered before she finally spoke again. “Enough already with your macho bull-crap. I am sick to death of men telling me how to run my life. In case you didn’t notice, I have a whole bevy of men downstairs just dying to tell me how I don’t measure up. The last thing I need is another one.”

“Maybe you should listen to them once in a while.”

“And maybe you should mind your own business.”

Fang had never wanted to strangle anyone so badly in his life. Every part of him burned with fury and at the same time, he couldn’t help noticing how beautiful she was with her cheeks glowing from her anger. The red in her cheeks made her eyes a sharp, vivid blue. “Maybe you should learn to say thank-you once in a while.”

She closed the distance between them. “And maybe you—” Her hands touched his chest and the most primal part of him came alive.