The Werewolf Wears Prada (Entangled Covet) (San Francisco Wolf Pack) (10 page)

Chapter Fourteen

“I need you to go back inside.” Hayden gripped Melina by the shoulders. “Now. Run.”

“Why, I don’t—”

“I’ll explain later,” he said, the urge to shift lurching through his veins. “Just go. Please. Choose a table away from the windows and wait for me. If I don’t come back in ten minutes, take a cab home and lock yourself inside. Don’t answer the door to anyone but me. I’ll meet you there as soon as I can.”

“You’re scaring me.” She trembled in his grasp. The need to protect her, at all costs, clawed its way through him. “Hayden? What’s happening?”

Adrenaline pulsed hot and fast through him. “Go.”

She took off toward the pier, faster than he would’ve expected given the height and spike of her heels. Keeping his attention locked on the parking garage and the wolf hunkering there, Hayden waited until Melina’s scent was gone from the wind before stalking toward the garage.

He searched north and south down Embarcadero, and seeing the coast clear, bounded into the shadows. Another few seconds and he’d be able to shift without being seen.

Striking the ground hard, Hayden focused on the shifting power rushing through him. He gritted his teeth, let the energy gather into a ball in his gut, and then exploded into wolf form as he leaped into the shadows of the garage. The tuxedo fell away to shreds. His muscles elongated and strengthened, expanding to their robust size, and a coat of thick gray fur blanketed his body. He gave one final shake, hardening into wolf form, and then let the aggression flow freely through him.

Being in this form felt right and good, and damn he was ready to kick some ass.

He took off into the garage, using the stench of the wolf to guide him.

Who are you? What are you doing here?
He projected through the cement jungle using the werewolf’s process of mind-speak. The wolf would be able to hear Hayden’s projected thoughts, even if he was no longer a member of their pack. Whether or not he would communicate, or obey, was a different matter entirely.

No response.

Just as Hayden thought.

Fine
. He threw the thought out there.
We can do this the hard way.

As his strides widened, he rounded the ramp and used his heightened sense of sight to scan the second level of the garage. He padded slowly, cautiously, around row upon row of cars.

Might as well show yourself,
Hayden sneered.
You’ve got nowhere to run, and I’ve got nothing but time to hunt you down.

From the corner of his eye, Hayden caught movement. But it was too late. The wolf was pitch black, blending with the shadows. He used the dark to his advantage and attacked, leaping onto Hayden’s back. Before he could bite, Hayden shook violently, slinging his enemy to the floor.

With a hideous snarl, the wolf rose up on his haunches and pulled back his gums in defiance. The rogue had a sharp ridge on his back, and thick paws, though he’d be no match for Hayden muzzle to muzzle.

Identify yourself.
Hayden paced round and round the wolf, eyeing him carefully.

You can call me Rogue.

Wasn’t that fitting…

You don’t belong here, Rogue. Not in that form, anyway. Explain yourself.

Until you take your place as Alpha of the pack, you don’t own the city, and you certainly don’t own me.
Rogue matched Hayden’s path, round and round. His muzzle remained tilted high, challenging.
I haven’t broken any laws. Not a single non-shifter has seen me in this form.

I asked you to explain yourself. Your presence here is unwanted and unwarranted.
Hayden growled, showing his incisors.
Are you following me for your new Alpha or for you own foolish reasons?

If the rogues had assigned a new Alpha, things were only going to get worse for the San Francisco Wolf Pack. Wandering rogues who refused to join a pack were tolerated, as not every wolf could be expected to accept a unified set of laws. But if they joined together to form a new pack, that was a different situation entirely. Resources and territories would be challenged day and night as the two packs fought for ground. Packmates would be injured or worse in the battle. Families could be split by boundary lines.

Disaster.

We don’t have an Alpha yet, but soon,
Rogue answered.
We’re waiting to make sure a mutt like you doesn’t take control over the city’s pack. How can you possibly think you can slide into a position like Alpha wolf, without even a drop of royal blood in your veins?

Hayden stilled, his own fears erupting inside him.

He wasn’t worthy.

Never would be.

The pack wouldn’t follow him. Not without Dean blood in his veins.

You’re brave, Rogue, but you’re also incredibly stupid
. Hayden pushed out the thoughts.
You must have a death wish if you think you can come here and throw a challenge like that in my face.

Even though Rogue stood strong and stoic, the rancid scent of fear burned Hayden’s nostrils. Alpha or not, Hayden had always had a dominant presence. It was undeniable. He was a fighter, a scrapper, through and through.

And Rogue was afraid.

Hayden took the chance and sprang, lunging for his neck. Rogue ducked, and rolled out of the way, popping to his feet as if he’d performed the maneuver a thousand times before.

The wolf must’ve been a former guard for the pack.

He knew how to move.

Hayden growled low in his throat and stalked closer, slowly, channeling all the power he could into his back legs. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. His vision blurred red. Then, when Rogue took a small step back, Hayden advanced, shooting forward, ramming into Rogue full force. The hit jolted Rogue hard. He staggered back. Hayden pushed forward, slamming Rogue into a Volvo in the nearest parking stall. Its alarm went off, bleeping and honking into the garage. The pitch was achingly high, piercing Hayden’s ears.

Rogue howled, his ears falling back as his head thrashed side to side.

Sensitive hearing, Rogue?
Hayden projected, as a laugh bubbled deep in his belly.
That’s one of the benefits of being turned. My hearing’s not as sensitive as yours.

With Rogue distracted and his eardrums most likely ready to burst, Hayden nipped at his neck, smashed his body against his, and drove him to the ground. He pinned him to the concrete, one paw on either side of Rogue’s muscular body.

Howling, Rogue whipped his body beneath Hayden’s.

I’m only going to ask one more time,
Hayden said with his mind.
Why were you spying on me?

No answer.

Desperate to end the fight and get back to Melina, Hayden reared up, and then hammered his muzzle into the side of Rogue’s neck. He didn’t bite—if he severed his artery, he’d kill his enemy, which wasn’t what he wanted. Not exactly.

Why are you here?
Hayden growled, gearing up for the inevitable.

You’re incredibly brave, but you’re also incredibly stupid,
Rogue answered, repeating Hayden’s earlier words.
We were counting on that.

Counting on what?

Rogue’s gums pulled back over his wretched canines in a twisted sort of smile.
You were right earlier. Your hearing isn’t as good as ours. We were counting on that, too.

What should he have been hearing?

Melina.

Moving with lightning-quick reflexes, Rogue swiped his paw across Hayden’s face, raking his nails through the flesh over his eyes. Hayden recoiled as blood squirted from his brow and oozed into his eyes. Rogue slipped from beneath his hold and darted away. Hayden scrubbed his eyes with his paw, but his vision was too blurred. The blood dripped thick, stinging him.

Melina.

He tried to stand and stumbled, smacking into the Volvo when his eyesight doubled. He strained, listening for any hint of Melina’s voice.

Nothing.

Shifting back to human form would heal the wound instantly, but it would also leave him vulnerable if Rogue wanted to return to kick his ass. And if he went to meet up with his disobedient friends to rope them into the fight, Hayden would be screwed.

One wolf, he could handle. A pack full of rogues? Not so much.

By the time he reached the first level and padded through the entrance, he was nearly blind. He sniffed, picking up hints of the city. Not a trace of Rogue, or Melina.

Pulling the shifting energy into his middle, Hayden knelt and bowed his head. He shook violently as his fur flattened and smoothed to skin, and his muscles returned to their normal size. His head ached like a son of a bitch, right across the forehead, but he’d been clawed to the face. He expected nothing less than the migraine from hell.

“Melina!” he called out, striding through the shadows.

He covered his genitals with his hands, and ran behind parked cars until he could cross the street to the pier. People walked down the long walk of the Embarcadero, some couples holding hands, others biking, running. He wasn’t going to be able to go far before someone spotted him and made a scene.

Thank God there weren’t children around at this hour.

A Civic sped by, and then there was a break before the next light flashed green. Hayden took his shot. He sprinted across the street, stepping on broken glass and garbage, and kneeled behind a cement bench. A few people turned, and laughed, pointing. A twenty-something woman standing near a flowerbed took a picture with her phone.

Effing spectacular.

He could draft the headline himself:
Hayden Dean: Nudist, Terrorizes City.

The homeless man sprawled across the bench in front of him craned his neck around and stared. As if Hayden were the strange one.

“If you don’t mind, I’m going to borrow this,” Hayden said, sliding the greasy coat off the bum’s body. “Two minutes, and I’ll bring it right back.”

“Hell you are!” The bum ripped the coat out of Hayden’s hands. “Help! Police!”

“Shhhh!” Hayden dropped the coat and hid, covering his family jewels. “Never mind, just be quiet, okay?”

“Help! I’m being assaulted! Sexually!” His voice boomed, echoing down the street. “Help! The pervert stole my pants!”

His…
pants
?

Turned out Hayden had been wrong. The coat wasn’t a coat at all.

Oh yeah, add to the humiliation.

Sirens whoop-whooped from the street behind him, and those unmistakable red and blue lights reflected off the buildings.

It hadn’t been more than ten minutes since he’d left Melina at the pier. She had to be safe. Had to be. Rogue had been trying to spook him…hadn’t he?

Desperation and fear streaking through him, Hayden took off like a bolt, jumping over the bench and high-tailing it toward the restaurant. Orders were shouted behind him, but he couldn’t hear over the pounding in his head. He pushed around an older man on roller blades and shoved a runner aside. Leapt over a planter box. Weaved between a group of tourists. He nearly rammed into a woman pushing a stroller, but stopped himself short. His hesitation allowed the officer to catch up. Hayden took off, but only made it a few steps before he was dragged to the ground from behind.

Face down on the concrete, the officer put a knee in Hayden’s back and ripped his arms behind him.

More laughter, more phones held up and pointed his direction.

He arched up, searching for Melina, breathing in deeply to pick up even a single hint of her aroma.

There.

Faint. On the sea breeze. Fading.

As the officer lifted Hayden off the ground, his gaze landed on a blacked-out Lincoln parked at the curb, a few car lengths ahead of the police cruiser. Hayden’s eyes might’ve been playing tricks on him and he might’ve been hit in the head one too many times, but he couldn’t mistake the blue peacock feather caught in the rear passenger door. A peacock feather that looked like it’d come from the bottom of Melina’s dress.

He fought against the officer’s hold. Hayden was stronger. He could burst through the officer’s grip…

As he tugged, slipping one of his hands out, the officer said, “Oh no, you don’t,” before clamping a cold rod of steel around his wrists and jerking him backward.

“Melina!” Hayden’s insides soured and boiled with unadulterated hatred. He lurched to be set free, straining against the officer’s hold. He could run with cuffs—the physical aspect wouldn’t be a problem. He could shift and break free, once he was out of sight. But running from the police was a line he couldn’t cross. “It’ll be okay. I’ll find you. I promise.”

She was in danger. Because of him, an innocent woman, the most beautiful woman he’d ever met in his entire life,
his fated mate
, was gone.

He’d never felt more alone.

“Easy there. I’ll let you go and you can go get her,” the officer said over Hayden’s shoulder. “As soon as you get some clothes on, and answer a few questions. First, you’re going to explain to me what you were doing with that guy over there.”

Hayden’s vision blurred. Knives stabbed through his temples. He staggered. And threw up his dinner into the gutter.

That got immortalized on video, too.

He didn’t care. Not for one second.

All that mattered was getting Melina back unharmed.

Lord help them if they touched a single hair on her head.

Chapter Fifteen

Melina awoke from the deepest sleep of her life, tilted her head to the side—damn, it ached something fierce—and felt a yawn coming on. Her mouth wouldn’t open. It felt like something had taped her lips together.

Her system spiked into panic mode. She gasped, breathing heavy through her nose. Tugging against the binding on her hands and ankles, she took frantic inventory. The room was dark and damp, and the musky smell of grime burned her nose. Duct tape covered her mouth. Bound to a chair, she forced the fog from her brain.

Where the hell am I? Why am I so weak?

“It was an anesthetic,” a gruff voice said from somewhere in the corner. “It’s mostly harmless. Just enough to knock you unconscious and get you here. You’ll probably be groggy for a while.”

Tears burned her throat. She screamed, though the sound came out strained and muffled against the tape. No one would hear her.

“You might as well save your energy,” her captor said again. “We own this lot and the ones around it. The only wolves who can hear you are the ones who work for us.”

Wolves?

Where the hell was she? Alaska? She couldn’t have been knocked out
that
long.

Heart racing, Melina peered through the dark, and tried to make out the man’s shape. He was burly, but not overweight. Built like a bear. She worked on her wrists, sliding them against the rope. Her right one slipped, and then caught once more.

“There’s no reason to scream or try to get free, so wipe that from your pretty head right now. We’re not going to hurt you.” Her captor stood from the chair and stalked closer. “You’re insurance for us. As long as Hayden steps down from the running, we’ll let you go. We don’t want you involved any more than you have to be. That’s all we want. No more, no less.” He stood over her, a looming shadow in the dark, and brushed his hand across her cheek. “Though if it were up to me, I’d want a lot more. It’s too bad you weren’t born, like us.”

Born?

Umm…she was
here
, wasn’t she? Of course she was
born
.

Disgusted and confused, Melina leaned away from his grimy touch. She tugged at her wrists harder, sliding and pulling, gaining fragments of space in the rope with each wiggle.

“Aww, I’m not so bad,” he said, chuckling with a sick husk. “I may not have a face like your boyfriend Hayden, but I’m not Quasimodo.”

Boyfriend?
Did they really think she’d hooked up with Hayden? Yeah. Like he would want something long-term…with her, no less.

Not likely.

What was her problem?
She had serious issues here. Hayden wasn’t one of them.

As she yanked her hands apart from one another, jerked them together, and then gave them a solid tug once more, the rope slackened. She slipped her right hand free.

Swallowing down a happy squeal, Melina stared straight forward so Quasimodo wouldn’t know what’d happened.

“I’m going to check on the status,” he said, turning for the door on the far wall. “See if they’ve reached Hayden yet.”

Strength she didn’t know she had reared up in her heart and soared through her. The moment Quasimodo exited into a dimly lit hall and shut the door behind him, Melina broke her wrists free. As quickly as she could, she untied the ropes on her ankles and kicked loose.

She slipped off her Jimmy Choos and clutched them in her hands with the spikes pointing outward.

Oh yeah. Armed with fashion.

Tiptoeing across the room, Melina tried the handle. It turned. They were either the worst kidnappers in the history of ever, or they’d seriously underestimated her.

She cracked the door open and peered down the hall, first one way and then the other.

Better look out for those wolves Quasimodo had mentioned.

The coast was clear. Not a paw print on the dusty floor. She rounded the corner and turned right, down another hall that sounded quiet. Out of the shadows ahead, something shook like a big fluffy dog…and then moved slowly her direction.

Shit.

The gigantic canine stalking her way wasn’t a dog at all.

It was a
wolf.

She froze, and then forced her feet into a quick and sudden retreat.

A growl vibrated the very air she breathed.

“Easy, boy,” she whispered, not wanting to bring Quasimodo back into the picture. “I’m going back, okay? Eeeasssyyy.”

He padded forward, as deep snarls echoed from all around her.

More wolves.

Clutching her heels tightly against her, Melina turned and bolted down the hall in the opposite direction. Something hit her hard from behind, knocking her to the floor. A heavy weight settled over the top of her. She spun, and faced the most gruesome canine she’d ever seen in her life.

Big, gnarly snout. Jagged teeth in need of a clean. Round eyes that looked oddly human.

Shuddering, she pinched her eyes tight, and then shoved the heel of her shoe into the flesh of the wolf’s neck.

She screamed, cowering from the stream of blood. “Take that!”

Death by Jimmy Choo!

Killer fashion sense totally had new meaning…

The wolf howled and reared up, pinning her within the cage of his powerful body. As she tried to shimmy out from underneath it, the wolf’s gums peeled back over its fangs. It was pissed off and going to bite.

She froze. “I’m…sorry?”

Fury churned in the wolf’s eyes, and as she flattened herself to the floor, shrinking away, it hammered its head against her neck and sank its teeth deep.

She screamed for the heavens as fire and lightning erupted inside her. Without thinking, she roped her fingers through the strap on the other shoe, slung it around, and stabbed it through the wolf’s neck on the opposite side. It thrashed and howled as two spike heels knifed their way through its fur.

Time slowed to a painful halt.

As the wolf unsheathed its teeth from of her neck, Melina scooted from beneath its wavering body. She took off running without looking back, even as a thunderous roar of footsteps pounded behind her. She turned the corner, sprinting hard toward an emergency exit. Shouts and screams came from behind her, followed by the most hideous howls she’d ever heard.

How many wolves were there?

Holding her hand to her neck to stop the bleeding, Melina pushed out the doors onto the street, turned right, and took off running. She tripped and fumbled, dizzy from the loss of blood.

Spinning around to gain her bearings, Melina gasped. She was still in San Francisco. Right in its heart. South of the Mission in Bernal Heights, to be exact. She knew the area well. One of her first apartments in the city wasn’t far from here. And if she wasn’t completely disoriented, she’d just stumbled out an old cathedral.

Holy Mary Mother of Cujo
? That couldn’t be right.

The streets were surprisingly empty for the city that never slept. Mustering her strength, Melina ran toward lights of a few shops on the next block.

“Help!” she squeaked, but her words were quiet and hoarse, straining her throat as they were spoken. “Help!”

Quasimodo’s words rang through her ears:
We own this lot and the ones around it. The only wolves who can hear you are the ones who work for us.

She had to make it a block, maybe two, before she could trust anyone to help her. Her luck, she’d run into someone who’d take her right back where she came from.

Passing a liquor store and a pediatrics drug store, Melina ran until her legs gave out. She fell against a railing for the bus stop, fighting for air. Strength leached from her muscles and needles of pain stabbed their way through her body. She was going to pass out. Right there against the glass. She’d look like a druggie, an alcoholic, a bum looking to sleep on the MUNI, or all three rolled into one dysfunctional ball. No one would know how she’d been kidnapped by some crazy circus freaks toting around wolves. No one would know how she’d fought her way free.

Were they following her?

She couldn’t even muster the power to check. Her eyes fluttered closed as she clutched her shoes in her hand. Just in case she had to fight her way through round two.

Sleep sounded good right about now. A few minutes of sleep and she could run again. The world faded away beneath her.

“Melina, thank God,” someone said from beside her. A shadow. A deep, familiar voice. It sounded like Hayden, but it couldn’t be. “You’re going to come with me now.” Two fingers brushed her neck. Shivers coated her body. “Oh shit.” Gut-wrenching silence. “You were bitten. We don’t have long.” Hands beneath her knees. Big, strong hands. “They’re coming, sweetheart. We have to get you out of here. You ready?”

Reality came crashing down as the stranger tried to move her. Quasimodo had found her! He was taking her back to feed her to the wolves.

“I won’t be thrown to the wolves.” With the last ounce of strength pulsing through her body, she flung one of her shoes at the stranger and swung the other shoe for his face. “Back off jerk. I’ve got Choos—
shoes
!”