Authors: Lora Leigh
He turned, leaning back against the bar, and watched with narrowed eyes. Growls, human and canine filled the room. Surprised cries of male pain followed, as Faith became an animalistic fighting machine. And Hawke was no slouch. With a mix of Asian fighting techniques, dirty grassroots redneck kicks, and snarling teeth, the two Breeds fought the determined lusts of the South America bullies.
It wasn’t a pretty fight. Jacob tipped the bottle to his mouth, his fingers clenched, his body filled with the need to kill as one bastard fought to hold Faith down to a table. A knee to the groin, and the flat of her palm to his nose convinced him otherwise. In surprise, Jacob watched as the two hundred plus pounds of male crumpled to the floor. He lifted his brows in amazement as the man then stayed there. One down, five to go. She’d better hurry, the stink of their lust was making him crazy to jump in and destroy them.
“Bastard. That was a new jacket,” Faith cursed as Jacob heard the rend of cloth.
A shattered male scream followed. Angling his head to see better, he grimaced at the white knuckled grip she had on one man’s crotch. She twisted. The bastard paled and went to his knees as she released him, crumpling over as he began to vomit disgustingly.
Faith was like a wild woman. She ignored the two men Hawke was fighting off, and faced the two who came at her from each side. Pride filled him as a slender leg kicked out at one. Chest shot. Jacob had a feeling, seeing the power behind that kick, that the ole boy just might not survive that one. He went down hard. Hawke’s two followed similar fates. The last one, the largest and the instigator of the attack, began to back away from the two slowly, a dawning horror on his face revealing knowledge he shouldn’t have had.
“Demons,” he muttered before turning and running.
“Well, hell,” Jacob drawled as he stood to his feet and moved purposely for the door. “Let’s get the hell out of here before the local soldiers get in on the fun.” Not to mention before his cock managed to bust his straining zipper. Watching that ass twitch and bunch was going to kill him.
Chapter Four
Jacob pushed Faith out the door of the bar, leaving Danson and Hawke to follow. Inside, it sounded as though the whole place was erupting into a fight. Nothing surprising, Faith knew. Too much alcohol, too much testosterone. The combination was sure to cause trouble.
“Took you long enough to show up,” Faith bit out as he rushed her to the dirty black SUV parked behind the bar.
His arm was wrapped around her waist, holding her close to his larger body as he pulled her to the parking lot. Now wasn’t the time for her damned lust to spark and turn on full force, yet she felt it heating, moistening her, preparing her for him.
“Danson, take Faith’s buddy with you. I’ll call in the morning. Hide deep. I don’t have time to bust your asses out of the local lockup,” Jacob called back, his voice dark, violent as the hand riding low on her back pushed her faster to the vehicle
“Hey wait, that’s my partner,” Faith protested as Hawke followed Danson quickly to a matching vehicle. “Damned traitor.”
“Get in.” He opened the door and pushed her into the dusty seat quickly before moving to the driver’s side and jumping in. “We don’t have time to argue over it.”
Faith snarled. Bossy.
Jacob started the vehicle up and accelerated quickly from the parking lot. They were on the main road, heading out of town when sirens flashing on a disreputable sedan rushed past them.
Breathing out a hard sigh, she glanced over at her reluctant rescuer. Damn him, he was as handsome as he always had been. His shoulders were broad, clothed in a dark T-shirt that conformed to every line of the lean muscles beneath it. His muscular chest tapered to powerful hips and thighs.
His hair was thick and such a dark brown it was nearly black. It framed the hard contours of his features, fell to his shoulders and raked back from his face with careless fingers. In profile, his features were savage, relentless. With high cheekbones, a straight, arrogant nose, and lips that were just shy of full. He had sinfully kissable lips. They made her mouth water.
“What the hell are you doing here?” he finally bit out, dragging her away from her admiration of his male form as he checked the rearview mirror to be certain that the local police weren’t turning back. “Were you looking to get raped, Faith?”
He flashed her a brooding look. He looked sulky and sexy all at once. A prime male, irritated and put out, and just a little aroused. Or a lot aroused if the bulge she had glimpsed in those jeans earlier meant anything.
“Looking for you.” She leaned back in the seat, crossing her arms over her breasts as he maneuvered through the narrow back streets of the small town. “What the hell are you doing here? You know I’ve been looking for you for over two months now? Every time I was certain I had found you, you were gone again. And no, Jacob, I wasn’t looking to get gang raped, as you should well know.”
He shot her a hooded look. Faith decided she didn’t care much for that look. The way his eyes glittered from beneath his lowered lashes affected her too much. For a moment, she remembered the Labs, the lust, white hot and violent as the pleasure tore through her body.
She took a deep breath. The mark at her neck, the wound that never healed, throbbed at the remembrance. There was a corresponding pulse in her vagina, and the smooth slide of slick readiness. She didn’t need this. She had fought to forget him for six years. To forget the memory of his touch, the hunger and lust that rose like an inferno as his cock pushed deep inside her anal entrance. The memory of the sheer dominance of the act, the incredible sensuality of it, left her shaking in reaction.
“Are you fucking Hawke?” His voice was a rough rumble as he asked the question.
Shock and surprise flared in her at the abrupt question. She felt more than a little insulted at the rough accusation she heard in his voice.
“What business is that of yours?” she bit out. “You have no rights over me, Jacob. Even Wolfe doesn’t ask me anything that personal.”
“Wolfe hasn’t fucked you, so it’s no business of his,” he bit out. “All I want is an answer.”
“Why? And it’s not like you’ve actually fucked me either, Jacob,” she reminded him as she wondered if the act they had shared so long ago had actually constituted sex.
“So I know if I need to kill him or not.”
Faith blinked, not entirely certain that she had heard him right. Not certain if the throb of violence and arousal in his voice was real or a figment of her imagination. Not that she imagined things often, but surely she couldn’t have heard him right.
“Kill him?” she asked for clarification. “For what exactly?”
She watched his hands tighten on the steering wheel, then glanced up to see the muscles at his jaw bunching in anger.
“For fucking you.” That was definitely a cold edge of violence in his voice, she decided.
Faith shook her head in amazement.
“You gonna break my vibrators too?” she asked him with false innocence.
Silence filled the vehicle. Arousal, hot and pulsing, wrapped around her. Hers and his. She could feel the heat radiating from him now.
“Do you have a vibrator?” His voice lowered, thickened. Faith narrowed her eyes, watching him carefully.
“Several,” she assured him mockingly. “Tucked away nice and safe at home. So let’s conclude our business so I can return to them, or I might be forced to fuck Hawke. You know how it is, Jacob, a woman needs her fix.”
His lips thinned. Faith turned away from him. She didn’t want to look at his lips, didn’t want to remember the feel of them. But the flesh between her thighs remembered. Clearly. It pulsed and throbbed and the slide of her moisture already had her panties damp. Damn, she wished she hadn’t lost her backpack the week before in that frigging hell hole Hawke had dragged her into the last time. Some stupid broad was likely enjoying her little BOB right now. Life just wasn’t fair.
“You didn’t answer me,” he reminded her.
“I resent the question.” Faith shrugged, fighting for nonchalance. “Rephrase it.”
His growl was dark and deep. A primitive, savage sound. He was Alpha, and the demand for an answer had just been voiced.
“No, I’m not fucking Hawke,” she bit out, resentful that he would make a command. “But it’s still none of your business, Jacob.”
He shot her a hooded look, his pale eyes glittering with naked lust. Faith felt her body responding with a surge of moisture that pulsed from her cunt, and a hard ache in her nipples. He had never looked at her like that before. Like he was hungry, starved for her, and didn’t care if she saw.
Then just as quickly the look was gone. His gaze became shuttered, considering.
“Everything okay with Wolfe and Hope then?” he finally asked her broodingly, turning his eyes back to the road.
“They fuck and they fight, then they fuck some more, from what I hear.” She shrugged her shoulders negligently. “I haven’t seen either of them since the day he killed Bainesmith. Thanks for sticking around to help clean up the mess, by the way.”
He slanted her another of those hot looks that went straight to her loins. The ache between her thighs was a warning, a prelude to the hot lusts that occasionally tortured her body. Rather than deal with the sickening displays of male lust she had encountered so far though, she used the cold comfort of her vibrators. She was going to buy stock in Duracell soon.
Silence filled the vehicle as he navigated the narrow alleys and rough roadways until he turned on a rough path that led into the jungle surrounding the town.
“Where are we going?” she finally asked him impatiently. “I need to get back home as soon as I give you the papers Wolfe sent. I do have a life, as I keep reminding our renowned leader.”
“We’re going to a house I’ve borrowed. I’ll read Wolfe’s papers then.” His voice was dark, deep and sexy. Surrounded by the jungle, the sultry heat and the wild sounds of the night, Faith felt an uncomfortable mix of lust and primitive needs. Needs she knew she no longer had the strength to fight.
Within minutes, they pulled into a small clearing, surrounded by a high stone fence. Flipping open the dash he pulled out a remote, flipped a switch and the heavy iron gates swung open.
“Nice little place,” she mocked him as he drove into the circle stone driveway and pulled up to a two-story hacienda complete with a wraparound balcony.
“Come on.” He opened the door, sliding smoothly from the seat and walking around the vehicle.
Faith followed suit, tucking her hands in the light leather jacket, feeling the press of heat on her skin soaking into her body. Her womb fluttered, her flesh felt sensitized, her breasts swelling beneath the light cotton of her shirt. The reaction was similar to the drugs they had pumped her full of at the Labs. The drugs that raged through her body and lost Jacob to her forever.
She entered the house, staring around at the wide foyer, the curving staircase and large open rooms. The interior was cooler than the air outside, but not much. She shed her jacket as they entered, holding it in front of her uncomfortably as she followed Jacob through the long hallway, then into a spacious, well-lit kitchen.
“Beer?” He pulled two from the modern refrigerator and set it on the counter for her.
Faith picked up the cold can, popped the lid and drank from it gratefully. The beer at the bar had been tepid and bitter. This went down smooth and cool, but did little to stem the heat she felt between her legs.
Holding the beer carefully with one hand, she reached into the inner pocket of her jacket and pulled out the sealed envelope Wolfe had given her months before. It was wrinkled, dusty, but still in fairly good shape. She tossed it on the table and looked at him expectantly as he watched her from the other side of the sink.
“In a hurry?” He arched a brow, his expression mocking.
“I do have a life to return to,” she reminded him blandly.
“Not to mention your vibrators,” he growled, clearly put out with the thought of her toys.
“Yeah, don’t mention my BOBs. I already miss them.”
“Bobs?” he asked, frowning, his brows lowering warningly.
“Battery Operated Boyfriends.” She smiled tightly. “BOBs.”
He grunted. Moving away from the sink, he stalked to the kitchen table as he cast her a brooding look. He pulled out a chair and waved towards it before moving to the other end to take a seat himself. Faith took the offered chair then took another long drink from the beer. The liquid was cool, but more than that, its potency seemed to ease the tight knot of nerves in her chest.
Jacob had always made her nervous. Since she was young, she had looked up to him, idolized him, and then coveted his touch. She had gotten more than she had bargained for in that.
As he tore the envelope open and began reading the letter, Faith finished her beer then laid her head on the table. She was tired. The last two months had left her with little time to sleep as she searched for Jacob. Not that she had slept much before that. And damned if that fight hadn’t worn her out. Her body ached all over. Unfortunately all the aches weren’t due from the fight.
* * * * *
Jacob looked over at Faith as he read the last page of the letter. He sighed tiredly. He had wondered why Wolfe hadn’t just used the damned cell phone to contact him. Now he knew why. Faith. Delicate and as fragile looking as ever.
She had filled out in the past years, her breasts and hips were fuller, her legs more defined and sexy as hell. But she wasn’t the girl he had known six years before. The girl he had known would have balked at six goons attempting to rape her. She would not have waded into a fight so eagerly. She was a negotiator, and a damned good one, not a killer.
As Pack Liaison, Faith had coordinated the known Packs, working between the Pack leaders and aiding in bringing peace among them rather than open warfare in some cases, as many of the Packs were eager for bloodshed rather than peace. She was also a courier between Council informants and Wolfe. But Faith wasn’t a fighter. Until now.