Alpha's Bane

Chapter One-2

Present

Sheridan

Those who don’t learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.

The quote from my ‘daily wisdom quote’ calendar rolls through my head as I stride across the pitted parking lot. My heels crunch on broken glass and I grit my teeth. I’m here under duress. If I ruin my favorite pair of Jimmy Choos on this fool’s errand, I am going to be really pissed.

You can do it, sweetheart. This was just one line from my father’s pep talk. The pack’s counting on you, was another. I hear the unspoken addition: I’m counting on you. If there’s anything thirty years of life have taught me, it was that I’ll do anything to make my dad proud. Including walking back into a scene from my high school days.

Apparently, I didn’t learn anything from the past, because here I am, repeating it. Come to think of it, my dad gave me that damn ‘daily wisdom quote’ calendar.

A rundown warehouse looms across the gravel lot, rising from the cracked concrete. A line of motorcycles lean in front of a broken chain link fence. A few beat up pickup trucks break up the endless row of leather and chrome. I pass one mud-spattered Chevy, a rusty replacement door adding a splash of color to the battered blue. A faded bumper sticker features a howling wolf. Another: a dog with its leg c****d, a telltale arc of liquid splashing on a Ford symbol.

Charming.

As I approach, the door slams open and a shifter staggers out, his matted mane of hair and sweat stained shirt reeking of beer, piss and pot. At 6 p.m. on a Wednesday.

Lovely.

“Excuse me.” I’d touch his arm to get his attention, but I don’t know where he’s been. “Is this the shifter fight club?”

The shifter dude gapes at me, and I stiffen. I’m dressed in an Anne Klein suit and skirt. The olive tone makes the caramel and chestnut highlights in my hair pop and my green eyes look amazing. Paired with the sheerest of sheer stockings and my lucky Jimmy Choos—I’m business up front, yowza in the back. And sexy as f**k underneath.

Not that this trifling shifter wolf will ever know it. His gaze roams from my shiny shoes to my elegant skirt to my rather generous hips, detouring around the tailored cut at my waist and stalling right at my girls.

“Hey,” I snap. “My eyes are up here.”

The shifter looks higher. “Is it a full moon?” he leers. “‘Cause I got the urge to mate right now.”

A bad pick up line. Awesome.

“No,” I bark, no longer willing to waste politeness on this moron. “I’m looking for—”

Behind the shifter, the door swings open, and rock music blasts into the sunny day. A drunken howl fills the air. “Drink, drink, drink, drink!”

Just like that, I’m back in high school.

A keg in the woods, bare-chested shifter boys doing handstands. My heart flutters as I walk up to one. The beautiful troubled one with the ice blue eyes. He turns as I approach, a smile lighting his rugged face. It takes my breath away...

“Lady? Lady…” Beer-soaked breath on my face makes me step back. “I wouldn’t go in there if I was you,” the wolf informs me solemnly. Great advice. Too bad I can’t take it.

“This is Fight Club?” I ask, and when he nods, I hit the door with my palm, sucking in a breath and holding it as I enter the murky underworld.

It takes a second for my eyes to adjust to the gloom. Dust motes hang suspended in the smoky air. To the right, a shifter stands behind a makeshift bar, slinging drinks to his rowdy patrons. A group of leather-clad jackals slam shots. A few sway. One stands on a metal stool, singing a drinking song that sounds vaguely Irish. I can’t tell because he’s slurring and cussing every other word.

The place is cavernous, with a concrete floor and light sifting in from windows near the ceilings. Whoever converted this warehouse didn’t do a bad job. The bar and the backsplash are made of recycled wood. There are a few tall tables, metal topped with more polished wood. Not bad looking, actually. Give this place a good cleaning—maybe a powerwash—and it would look trendy, a hipster brunch spot. Of course, you’d have to change the bathroom signs. Right now they read: Bitches and Studs.

Enchanting.

I roll my eyes and step aside as a prowl of jaguars brush by, heading to the bar. They have their dark hair slicked back and collars up like wannabe 50s greasers. A few look back at me with casual interest and I fight not to roll my eyes again.

I do not fit in here. For one thing, I’m the only one in a suit. For another, I’m a she-wolf. There aren’t many females in this place. A few bitches maybe. Well, I can be a b***h, too. I set my teeth into half smile, half snarl, and stride into the shadows. More shifters stand in clusters, muttering together. One points to a notebook, and his companion pulls out a wallet. Out of the corner of my eye, I see bills change hands. I nearly stop and stare at this blatant proof of gambling.

A large cage sits on an elevated stage. Inside, a scrawny shifter with a shock of orange hair pushes a mop around lazily. My nose pricks with a sharp smell. Blood.

The closer I get to the fighting ring, the stronger the scents hit me. Blood, sweat, piss in a dizzying miasma. If testosterone had a smell, this would be it. I wrinkle my nose and pick my way around the piles of trash, and walk smack into a solid wall of muscle.

“Oh excuse me—”

“Watch it, princess,” a rumble like an avalanche comes from a hulking beast of a man. I look up and freeze, mouth falling open. Feral eyes peer from a fight-ravaged face. Arms, neck, cheeks—whatever part of him that isn’t tattooed is covered in scars. The scars alone make me stare. With shifter healing, they’re not common, but not impossible. How much damage had this guy taken that he didn’t heal right away, but scarred?

One beefy hand hovers at my elbow, as if he’s ready to grab and steady me—or throw me out. “This is no place for a lady.”

“I—uh-I—” This is ridiculous. I’m Sheridan Green of the Wolf Ridge Greens, leaders of the Phoenix pack. Both my uncle and cousin are pack alphas. I’ve navigated werewolf politics since before I could walk.

I stare up into the scarred face and try to remember my mission and manners. “I beg your pardon.”

“You looking for somebody?” he growls.

I straighten my suit jacket, searching for composure. “I...yes. Is Garrett Green here?”

The big guy c***s an eyebrow. “The alpha don’t come here.”

I lick my lips, trying to think of who to ask for. “I was told this was a pack operation.”

“You were told wrong,” the big guy tells me. He’s a shifter, but I can’t scent what type of animal, though I feel it, big and brooding under his intimidating skin. Definitely an apex predator. “This here’s independent from the pack.”

My brain scrambles. If Garrett’s pack isn’t running this operation, who is? “I thought this place was under the Tucson pack’s protection.”

The big guy shrugs. “We’re fighters. We protect our own.”

“That’s”—I shake my head, not wanting to say ‘crazy’—“I’m from the Phoenix pack. I was sent here to find out what’s going on—”

“Hey, Grizz. Who’s your friend?”

I turn towards the silky voice, and get my second shock of the night. Grizz—the big guy at my back, steps between me and the speaker, but not before I get a whiff of cologne. The seductive scent covers an uglier smell—a stone-cold scent like a tomb, with an undertone of old blood.

My lips curl back and I snarl, “Vampire.”

The leech is tall, too tall, with a fine-boned face so beautiful it’s inhuman. His beauty is predatory, lethal, like a poisonous flower. Men and women will find themselves attracted to him, but before they know why, they’ll be dead.

He smiles, showing a pair of pointy teeth. My hackles go up and my wolf surges to the fore.

“Back off, Nero,” the big shifter barks, his brawny shoulder inserted between me and the vamp. “She’s a guest.”

“My dear Grizzly.” The vampire spreads his elegant hands. He’s wearing a thousand-dollar suit and snakeskin cowboy boots. “Aren’t we all?”

“Come on.” Grizz herds me toward the back, away from the smiling vampire. “Office’s this way. The boss will want to speak with you.”

I let the scarred shifter—grizzly bear, of course—guide me around the fight cage toward the corner of the warehouse, where a dark, room-sized cube hugs the walls. Behind us, Nero watches, his teeth shining in the gloom. I suppress a shudder.

“So the rumors are true,” I mutter. “This place has gone to the leeches.”

Grizz gives me a sharp look and pushes me gently toward the office door. “Someone to see you, boss,” he calls and raps the side of the cube.

The door opens and I get my third shock. Spiked hair, lip ring, dark tattoos running up and down muscular arms. And those ice blue eyes piercing me through. I sway as if stabbed, and he automatically puts his hands out to steady me.

Trey Robson.

“Sheridan.” It’s just like the first time he spoke my name. Trey stares as if he’s not sure I’m really here. I’m tall, but he towers over me. And I’m lost, drowning in the past, the heat and memory in his pale blue gaze.