The 2015 R.L. Mathewson Chronicles Collection Read online

  “No,” Chris said, shaking his head as he threw another log onto the fire, “I plan on making your life a living hell for the rest of the night.”

  “And how exactly do you plan on doing that?” Kale asked, sounding bored as he closed his eyes and leaned back against the tree, clearly intent on catching up on some sleep before the fun began.

  “Oh, fuck…,” his father said, closing his eyes in resignation as his shoulders sagged in defeat, because he knew exactly how far Chris was willing to go to piss the shifter off and he didn’t care if he had to fuck over everyone else around him in order to do it.

  “Nothing much,” Chris said, shrugging as he sat back against his tree and stared at the bastard that was forcing him to do the unthinkable.

  “You’re all talk, asshole,” Kale said, not even bothering to open his eyes, telling Chris everything that he needed to know.

  The asshole had absolutely no idea how far he’d pushed him tonight.

  Too goddamn far.

  “Really? You think so?” Chris asked with a small mocking smile that had his father cursing under his breath as he resigned himself to whatever bullshit Chris was about to dish out on the shifter.

  “I know it.”

  Chris nodded as he pretended to consider the shifter’s words. “You could be right.”

  “I am,” Kale said firmly.

  “But then again, you could be wrong,” Chris pointed out thoughtfully as watched the shifter, who appeared seconds away from dozing off.

  “And you could shut up,” Kale added, sounding pissed, which was understandable considering the fact that the shifter was probably exhausted from his last job and could use some rest.

  Then again, Chris really could have used a night off with his family.

  “I could….but, I’m not going to,” Chris said, shifting against the tree to get more comfortable.

  “And it would be a damn shame if I had to beat the shit out of you,” Kale said offhandedly, looking oddly peaceful as he started to doze off.

  “You could, but then you’d miss out on Jessica’s favorite new song,” he said with satisfaction when the asshole’s eyes shot open in panic.

  “You wouldn’t!” Kale snarled, his eyes shifting silver as his fangs dropped in warning, but they both knew that he was untouchable thanks to his mate, which is why he had no problem going through with the most fucked up thing that he’d ever done.

  “It’s a small world after all, it’s a small world after all, it’s a small…small…world,” he began to sing with a smile, ignoring the fact that his father was now glaring at him through red eyes and the shifter was clearly struggling not to jump over the fire and rip his throat out, but he simply ignored them and continued singing the most fucked up song known to man no matter how badly he wanted to stop, because the asshole had this one coming and he was damn well going to deliver.

  Part III

  “A little to the right,” Chris said with an exaggerated sigh of pleasure, earning a curse from him as he grabbed the hand reaching for his son’s throat and yanked it back, twisted it and used the hold to pull the seriously pissed off Shifter off his son, who even Ephraim had to admit had this one coming.

  “Just let me kill him!” Kale said, coming as close to begging as Ephraim had ever heard, letting him know just how far his son had managed to push the shifter with his typical bullshit.

  Not that Chris really seemed to care that Kale was currently growling and snarling as he did his best to get free and tear Chris’ throat out. Chris simply yawned as he leaned back against the tree, closed his eyes and released a slow, and somehow really annoying sigh, renewing Kale’s rage and forcing Ephraim to drag the asshole to the opposite side of the fire and pin him to the ground.

  “You have other sons! You won’t miss this one!” Kale pointed out with a snarl as he bared his fangs in Chris’ direction and allowed his eyes to shift silver, but that’s as far as Kale would allow himself to shift and they both knew it.

  Otherwise, they would be a hell of lot more worried than Chris getting his ass kicked. They’d most likely have to make a run for it, because if there was one thing that Ephraim could honestly say about the asshole snarling beneath him, it was that he never wanted to see Kale shift. He didn’t even want to think about what kind of damage a shifter like him could do once he was set free.

  “Do you know what your problem is?” Chris murmured sleepily as Ephraim grunted in pain as Kale renewed his efforts to go for the little bastard that he was starting to want to throttle now.

  “Chris!” Ephraim snapped in warning, but of course Chris ignored him as he often did when he was entertaining himself.

  “You’re getting weaker,” Chris pointed out, making Ephraim close his eyes and shake his head in resignation, because his son was just asking for an ass whooping tonight and God help him if he wasn’t tempted to release his hold on the shifter and let him do it.

  “Shut up,” he snarled at his son, but there was no stopping Chris once he got started on something and he’d known that his son was dying to bring this up since Christofer had managed to toss the shifter around like a rag doll.

  It was something that he was curious about as well, but he’d been more than willing to leave it alone. Chris, the stubborn bastard that he was going to have to throttle, apparently wasn’t.

  “I have a theory,” Chris announced, because even fucking with the shifter’s head always entertained him, especially on night’s like this when they were stuck out in the middle of nowhere on the off chance that they had to put a Pack in its place. “For why you seem to be getting weaker,” Chris clarified just in case Kale wasn’t pissed off enough.

  “I’m not weak,” Kale snarled, renewing his efforts to get free, but even Ephraim had to admit that the a shifter as old and as powerful as this one should have been able to easily throw him off and beat the shit out of Chris already.

  “You really are,” Chris said with a careless shift that had Ephraim rolling his eyes and saying the fuck with it. He released Kale and sat back, deciding that if Chris got his ass kicked tonight that he more than had it coming.

  “I could tear you apart in seconds,” Kale growled, flashing his fangs in warning, but Chris being Chris, simply ignored the clear threat and continued.

  “You could,” Chris agreed with a slight pause before adding, “if you were in full control, but you’re not.”

  “What are you talking about?” Kale demanded through a snarl, but he wasn’t going for Chris’ throat quite just yet, letting Ephraim know that Chris had hit a sore spot for the shifter, something that they’d all realized and wondered about.

  All but Chris.

  He seemed to have it all figured out.

  “You’re weaker and slower than a fucking beta, which is really fucking pathetic, but no worries,” Chris said when Kale moved to take a threatening step towards him, “I know how to fix this.”

  “There’s nothing to fix,” Kale bit out, but Ephraim didn’t miss the nervous way that the shifter swallowed, letting him know that they weren’t the only ones who had realized that Kale was getting weaker, something that could get him killed if word got out.

  “There really is,” Chris said, not bothering to open his eyes as he sighed heavily with a pleased smile on his face.

  “Oh, and what’s that?” Kale demanded, his voice more beast than man, probably meant to scare Chris, but his son simply yawned as he said, “Because you need to shift.”

  Part IV

  “And what exactly are we doing?” she couldn’t help but ask when Caine pulled off to the side of the road and parked beside a thick copse of trees.

  “Compromising,” was all he said before he turned off the engine, pocketed the keys and jumped out of the truck, leaving her sitting there wondering how driving to the opposite side of town during a full moon was a compromise when they should be waiting with the others to make sure that the Pack didn’t get too close to town.

  Torn between embarrassment an
d curiosity, she decided to sit there for a few more minutes and see where he was going with this. When he reached into the back of the truck and grabbed his gear, she decided that she could forget about the public humiliation just for a little while so that she could assuage her curiosity. Without waiting for an invitation, mostly because it didn’t appear as though Caine was going to extend her one anytime soon, she jumped out of the truck, closed her door, grabbed her gear and scrambled to catch up with him.

  “How exactly is this compromising?” she asked a minute later when she finally managed to catch up with him as he navigated his way through the woods as the pitch black night finally set in.

  “Because we still get to guard the town,” he said, always a man of few words, which she normally appreciated, but tonight, tonight she needed to discuss a few things with him, one of them being the simple fact that they were on the wrong side of town.

  “They’re not headed this way,” she pointed out as she quickened her pace to join him.

  “Probably not,” he agreed with a simple shrug as he continued walking through the woods, towards God only knows where while she was trying to make sense out of her mate’s decision to go fifty miles in the opposite direction of where they were needed when they could have simply moved ten to fifteen miles downwind from Ephraim’s camp and safely taken up that position without anyone finding out.

  “What exactly are we doing?”

  “Would you rather go to that hotel that I promised Ephraim that I would take you to?” he asked, not bothering to look at her, which she appreciated since her damn cheeks were currently on fire with embarrassment.

  There were a lot of the things over the past year that she’d managed to get over and accept with this new way of life, but knowing that the people that she considered her family could smell every single hormonal change in her body was not one of them. It was one thing to make love with Caine in the mansion knowing that the others could hear, because they’d all learned to pretend that they couldn’t. It had taken some time, but she could easily block out the sounds of Madison moaning Ephraim’s name the same way that she could block out the sounds of those damn video games that Izzy liked to play while she was waiting for her programs to run. The one thing that she hadn’t had to deal with, at least not until now, was everyone knowing when she was in heat.

  In heat, she thought, suppressing a shudder of revulsion that everyone knew that her hormones were kicking in before she did. It was always fun to hear the asshole of the group announce to one and all that she was days or possible even hours away from begging Caine to bend her over and fuck her to put her out of her misery. Special memories, she thought, trying to pretend that Kale’s little announcement hadn’t been one of the most humiliating moments of her life and instead focused on her mate, who seemed intent on a midnight hike through the woods.

  “It would probably make more sense to go to the hotel,” she said, trying not to sound grumpy and failing miserably if the small chuckle that the bastard released was any indication.

  As she stepped around a rather large and nasty looking briar patch that promised all sorts of interesting cuts in places that she would rather not have stinging, she wondered if she could blame the hormones for that ass whooping that she was seriously considering handing her mate for mocking her.

  God, what she wouldn’t give for a chocolate bar right about now…

  Then again, in order for her to have a delicious chocolate bar and keep it down it would require her to do something that she had absolutely no interest in doing and that of course was getting pregnant since female Pytes could only eat when they were pregnant. Since it had never been her lifelong dream to push a nine-pound baby out her vagina, she was going to have to accept the fact that she was never going to enjoy another delicious morsel of chocolate again.

  She released a heartfelt sigh as she accepted the inevitable. Caine shot her a curious look over his shoulder, cocking a brow in question, but she simply shook her head and gestured for him to turn around and continue going wherever the hell that he was headed since he would never understand the pain that came with finally accepting that the last time she’d had a bag of Reese’s Pieces really had been the last time.

  It was actually kind of depressing to think about it, but what was the alternative? Have a baby that she didn’t want just so that she could eat regular food for nine months? No. She couldn’t do that to a child. It wasn’t an option before she’d become sterile and it sure as hell wasn’t an option now that all her girly parts had regrown and repaired themselves, deciding that it was time for her to start popping out babies.

  It wasn’t happening.

  Not ever.

  She’d leave that to the other women in the family. They wanted children, loved them more than anything and most importantly, their children meant everything to them. Their children were never forgotten or came in second to the job. Ephraim, Chris, Madison and all the rest of them simply did their jobs to make sure that their children were safe. The job wasn’t the only thing that they cared for and that’s why they made great parents.

  She didn’t have that in her.

  She’d come from a long line of Sentinels whose sole purpose on this earth was to one another and their job. As a human child, she’d just been a blip on their radar. Here one day, gone the next. She’d always just been a responsibility, one that could be passed onto whatever Sentinel was left on duty at the compound and she’d swore that she would never do that to another child.

  Besides, she loved what she did, especially now that she was at full strength. Nothing was going to change that, not even the fact that she now had the option for more, because she didn’t want more and neither did Caine, she reminded herself as she watched her mate make his way through the woods.

  “If you want to go to the hotel, I’ll take you there, but I just thought you’d like a chance to stop the Pack from sneaking into town,” he said with a careless shrug as he shoved a boulder out of his way and continued walking, obviously expecting her to follow, which of course she did since he’d piqued her curiosity.

  “Kale’s source said that they were coming in from the south end,” she pointed out, quickening her pace to catch up with him.

  As soon as she reached his side, he took her hand into his and gave it a gentle squeeze. It was something of a habit of his now, like he was reminding himself that she was really here and was finally going to be okay. She returned the squeeze to remind him that she was fine. It was simple and ridiculous, but if he needed the reassurance that the cancer was no longer destroying her then she would let him have it.

  “Kale forgot something very important,” he said, gesturing to a small clearing by a beautiful moonlit lake.

  “And what’s that?” she asked, dropping her bag on the ground as she took in their campsite for the night.

  “That the Pack will smell him before they hit town and go around,” he said with that cocky grin of his that she loved so much.

  “And you think they’ll go around and cut through here,” she guessed, cocking her head in question as she watched her mate yank off his shirt and kick off his shoes.

  “Yes,” he said, undoing his fly.

  “There’s just one problem with this little plan of yours,” she absently pointed out even as she licked her lips hungrily when he shoved his boxers to the ground, freeing the erection and making the silver piercing twinkle in the moonlight, making her mouth water.

  “And what’s that?” he asked, tossing his clothes aside as he stood there, naked and obviously ready to do a lot more than just keep watch.

  “They’ll scent us,” she reminded him, swallowing hard when she watched him wrap a very large tan hand around his erect cock and slowly stroke it as he watched her.

  His smile became wicked as he said, “I’m counting on it.”

  Part V

  “You want them to scent us?” Danni repeated back slowly even as her beautiful eyes shifted red and focused on his hand, which was current
ly stroking the hard-on he’d been fighting all day since he’d scented her hormones begin to shift this morning.

  It had taken everything he’d had to keep his hands off her this morning when all he wanted to do was to bend her over and fuck her every time he caught so much as a hint of her scent. Christ, he’d thought she’d smelled good before, but now that everything was in working order and her body had finally regulated itself to Christofer’s blood, she smelled fucking amazing.

  She was driving him out of his fucking mind and she had no idea. None whatsoever. All day she’d acted like nothing was wrong, like every smile that she gave him, every time she touched him or sat on his lap wasn’t fucking torture. He wanted her so badly that he’d spent most of the day trying to avoid her, taking cold showers and struggling against the urge to pull his cock out and stroke it until some of the pressure went away.