Wolf's Hunger (Mafia Monsters #5) - Atlas Rose Page 0,77

it?”

“She was here.” The Wolf sounded breathless. “Then those bastards came.”

I jerked my gaze to the screen. “Did they hurt her?”

“No, but Phantom, there was something strange about her, the way she was acting. The…power she had. She just stood up, told me to hide, then walked out of the damn club and climbed into their car like it was nothing.”

The words were a fist to my chest. “They didn’t force her?”

“No, they barely pulled up outside before she climbed in. She…she’s darker, Phantom, more Unseelie than she was before.”

Chaos. That’s what she'd called it in the cavern. That feral hunger rode her harder than I’d ever seen before. “It’s the Unseelie.” I answered, but even as I said the words, a chill swept through me. “Goddamn it. How was she when you saw her?”

The male didn’t answer right away, making me focus on the silence. I lifted my gaze to the darkened houses through the windshield, and let the Alpha in me roam. I tested the boundaries of our bond, pushing deeper through the connection of Alpha and his second until I felt that charge of lust echo back. The kind of animal lust that only comes from one thing. “You…consummated the bond?”

He didn’t answer at first. Jealously tore through me, making me strangle the wheel and fight the savagery in my tone.

“Not completely,” he answered. “But it was enough. Enough to know she bonded with me…and I with her.”

My lips curled back from my teeth, and my fangs shone white in the rear-view mirror. I closed my eyes for a second. That was a good thing. That was the right thing. I opened my eyes and leaned forward, shoving the four-wheel drive into gear. “Then it’s done. She belongs to all of us.”

My beast shifted under my skin and scented the air. Need to mark her, he growled. Need to bite, need to rut…need to smother her with our scent. No other pack will come for her then…not when they know who she belongs to. I found myself turning the wheel.

“You’re angry,” Church murmured.

“Not angry, fucking agitated,” I answered, scanning the traffic before I pulled out. “I don’t like her away from us. Don’t like the way they have her locked up and controlled.”

No, I didn’t like it at all.

“I don’t like it either,” Church echoed through the phone. “Something doesn’t feel right.”

I reached down, and my finger hovered over the screen before I ended the call. I scanned every car that drove past, always searching now for the enemy in unmarked sedans.

I turned the corner of the low-cost housing development and caught the flare of headlights of an agent’s vehicle as I passed. His head turned, watching me, before I signaled and turned off onto a side street. I kept driving, watching the rear-view mirror, and stopped the Jeep three blocks away from where they were keeping her in the safe house.

If I could just get to her…just talk to her.

I climbed out of the Jeep and closed the door, locking it before I set off on foot. Mortals. I could smell them a mile away, the only problem was, they were like goddamn vermin right now…crowding around her.

I scanned the darkened houses, found one without the faint flicker of a TV through the blinds, and slipped along the side of it until I jumped the fence into the backyard.. The low, warning snarl of a big dog trembled through the air until I jerked my gaze toward the sound.

A whine followed before the Rottweiler cowered, sinking to the ground and rolling onto his back. I knelt beside the animal and scratched his belly, then his head. “Good boy. I’m not here to harm your family. They’re safe from me.”

He lifted his head and licked my hand as though to say thank you before I rose and kept on moving, leaving his home behind. I’d spilled enough blood that night…I didn’t want to spill any more.

House after house, I worked my way closer to her, reaching through our connection, desperate to touch her. Church’s warning rang inside my head as I leaped over a six-foot fence and hit the ground with a thud. I froze, scanning the darkness.

Need her, the beast inside urged. Need to lick, need to taste…need to breathe her scent.

“I know,” I whispered, and kept on moving, my strides longer, my breaths coming harder.

I stepped up to the fence and peered over the brickwork to the back of the safe house. The lights were