Bonnie Vanak - Demon Wolf

Confused, she backed off, watching warily as he stood. Their gazes met and she felt an odd connection, as if this powerful man of magick understood.

He regarded her quietly, sadness in his gray eyes. “I won’t hurt you. I will not return evil for evil, for whatever was done to your people is making you react.”

A giggle sounded nearby. Keira tilted her head, fear curling in her stomach. The demons were returning for her. Pure evil had infiltrated the region and it would never die. But this man who’d refused to hurt back, he was good. She sensed it.

She lowered her head, pawed at the ground and hit him with her muzzle, urging him to leave. The man’s mouth narrowed.

“I won’t leave you here alone.”

Keira growled and head-butted him again. The man seemed torn, and glanced toward the west. She knew if the demons found him here, they’d enslave him, as well. He must not remember her, or he’d return. She sensed it.

So she bit him. He yelled and looked down at the wound, blood trickling with her saliva, saliva that carried the memory spell the demons infused into her. By the time he looked up, she was gone, fleeing into the forest toward her captors, vanishing from the man’s sight and memory.

Giving him time to escape to safety.

While she charged forward straight into hell.

Chapter 1

If he discovered her true identity, the powerful Mage would kill her.

From across the bar, Keira Solomon studied her quarry. The glass of white wine gripped in her trembling hand rattled against the polished wood counter. She ignored the flirting drunk to her right and riveted her gaze to Lt. Commander Dale Curtis.

The navy SEAL commander of Team 21 sat by himself, his expression as lonely as she felt. Keira’s heart went out to him, knowing she was the reason for his turmoil.

Careful, she warned herself. If you let him get under your skin, you’re a dead woman. She concentrated on the man instead of her feelings, gauging how to approach him.

Though he looked no more than thirty-eight, the Mage was hundreds of years old. The commander had taut, angular cheekbones, a chin carved from granite, tempered by a full, wide mouth. His thick black hair, silvered at the temples, did not touch his starched collar. He looked like a powerful man of strong character, unaccustomed to compromise. But his most striking feature was his piercing gray eyes, shaded by thick, dark brows. Those eyes could become hard and unyielding, coaxing a confession out of the most tight-lipped prisoner, or turn seductive with promise, charming a woman into his bed.

She’d discovered all this about the man from listening to gossip in public haunts like this bar.

A severe khaki uniform hid a body firm with muscle that was now layered with deep scars. Keira knew the depth and width of each mark, knew how he’d endured, tight-lipped, as each one lashed his skin. And she knew the depth of his screams when the agony she inflicted became too much to bear when the Centurion demons forced her to hurt him.

No other man had survived such torture. Past victims had died from the force of her claws. Centurion demons had enslaved her to torture others. Now she had a rare chance to break free, because the man she’d tortured was strong enough to vanquish the demons for eternity.

“Hey, sweetie.” Obviously determined to get her attention, the big, barrel-chested drunk put a paw on her arm. “Lemme buy you another drink.”

Giving him a look of utter disdain, she pushed her glass aside. “No, thanks. I don’t accept favors from gorillas.”

The man narrowed his eyes as his companions chortled with laughter. “Ain’t no ape.”

“Okay, then. Chimp shifter.” She gave him a singularly sweet smile. “I can’t quite tell, but you all smell the same.”

“Bitch.” The shifter scowled. “I should drag you out to the parking lot, show you the meaning of respect. Flat on your back, your legs spread.”

Demon blood surged. Keira held up a hand. Like flicking a switchblade, her claws emerged, each a razor-sharp talon. Ape Boy’s eyes widened as she gouged the bar’s surface. “Care to try?”

The men pushed away from the bar and fled. She sighed.

“I hate having to do that,” she muttered to no one.

One day, she wouldn’t have to worry about the demon blood inside her. The key to her freedom lingered temptingly close, but it wouldn’t be easy to fool him. Curtis’s piercing gray eyes could see straight inside her, and discover who she really was.

And if that happened, no point fearing the demons capturing and enslaving her once more.

Because Curtis would have at her first.

* * *

Ladies’ night at the paranormal Dive Bar.

Once a month, Tom dropped the magick shield blinding humans to the bar’s presence. He announced two-for-one drinks and the human women streamed inside as if he’d offered marriage proposals to millionaires.

The custom was for regulars, who liked human women warming their beds once in a while. Tom’s bar was a short distance from Little Creek, home to SEAL Team 21’s elite Phoenix Force in Virginia. When in town, the secret force of paranormal SEALs crowded the seats.

Dale ignored the chatter around him. He sipped his beer, waited for his burger.

Scar tissue pulled and stretched uncomfortably, reminding him of a body no woman wanted to see naked. While in the hospital, his sometime girlfriend had visited. Melissa had taken one look at the blood and bandages and left.

No Mage female wanted him. No human, either, even if she didn’t sense he was a powerful Primary Elemental Mage who could fry her to ashes with a single flick of his finger.

Dale knew he was better off alone.

“You okay, Commander?”

Tom always called him by his title. Dale nodded. It had been the ultimate bitch of a day, back at work only ten days after two long months of mandatory medical leave. Paperwork piled to his nose, submerged in long meetings, most of his team deployed to dispatch a last-minute threat overseas. Only Ensign Grant “Sully” Sullivan remained at base. Chief Petty Officer Sam “Shay” Shaymore was in North Carolina, training in close-quarters combat with SEAL norms—human navy SEALs. He’d taken his new wife with him.

Dale relaxed into a smile as he thought of the much younger Shay. Last month the SEAL had married his girlfriend. Dale had proudly escorted the fatherless Kelly down the aisle. A wedding he’d never forget, as he was glad to see the two Mages declare their love in a lifelong bond. Those two had rescued him from the dark, dank basement where he had only memories of pain and blood.

And the scent of a woman...he could never forget.

Across the bar, Sully flirted with a pretty, slightly tipsy blonde. The woman rested her hand on the SEAL’s arm, giving him a suggestive look. Someone was getting something-something tonight.

Dale hoped Sully remembered to glove before love. A half-human bastard faced a lot of hardship in the real world.

Children. Setting down his beer, he closed his eyes. One regret he’d had in his eleven-year marriage. Kathy hadn’t wanted any. The Mage had used one excuse after another and finally, she just left, but not before admitting she’d been sleeping in another man’s bed.

You’re a good man, Dale. But you’re never around, not when I really need you.

Deep inside, he still craved a home life, a wife and a family. But what woman would want him now, his body looking like a road map to hell?

Someday, maybe, he’d find someone else. But first, he’d find the demon wolf responsible for scarring his body and when he did, that shape-shifter would pay. Such evil must be eradicated before innocents got hurt. Dale would do so gladly, sending the SOB straight to hell.

Tom slid a steaming burger, with fries piled high, before him. “Here you go, Commander. My treat.”