Game of the Wolf Page 4

  As he chewed on the bloody meat, the wolf in him rejoiced. Even with nightfall still hours away, the beast strained against its cage of flesh and bone, and Silver’s incisors felt like they were already elongating as he tore into his steak with gusto. Blood splashed his lips, and he licked up every drop.

  The beast was eager to come out and play.

  Patience, my friend. You’ll get your chance soon enough.

  As Silver continued to tear into the bleeding meat, his mind turned back to the moment that had changed his life in so many wonderful ways.

  The night when Ali Silver died—and the werewolf was born.

  Chapter Nine

  Two Years Earlier.

  On that fateful evening, Silver was getting ready to kill for the third time. The target was a random female hitchhiker foolish enough to bum a ride from him. She sported a blue buzz cut, a ton of piercings, and haunted eyes. Most likely a homeless runaway traveling cross-country.

  The perfect victim, in other words. One who wouldn’t be missed. An opportunity that made Silver throw his natural caution to the wind.

  As they hurtled down a winding forest road, the young woman—her name was Jane, he’d never forget it—kept blabbering away about her boyfriends and dreams and a future that involved reaching the West Coast and becoming the next Miley Cyrus.

  Silver hadn’t planned to kill her, not at first. The woods where he picked up Jane were way too close to home. You don’t shit where you eat, a lesson drummed into him since he was a boy. He figured he’d just practice his rap with the fairer sex, an invaluable skill when he set his eyes on an actual target. But Jane’s incessant chatter set him off, and after twenty minutes of having to listen to her drone on, he snapped.

  Silver made a sharp right and pulled to the side of the road.

  Jane stared at him in surprise, either too dumb or too naive to realize what was happening. Until this moment, the gutter rat had taken him for a nice guy. The man eyeing her now with evil intent shared little in common with the smiling fella who’d offered her a ride less than thirty minutes earlier.

  Jane still stared at him as if he was pranking her, waiting for a punch line that never came.

  Silver opened his coat and revealed the hunting knife strapped in a leather shoulder holster across his chest. Serrated steel gleamed in the car’s interior lights.

  The cautious part of his mind was urging him to finish the woman off on the spot. But where was the sport in that? Where was the fun?

  So instead, he said, “Run for your life.”

  And like a shot, Jane was out of the door and tearing through the darkening woods.

  Ali Silver gave her a five-second head start and then dashed after her, his hunting knife at the ready. His heavy breathing filled the night, interspersed with Jane’s screams and desperate pleas for her life. She would do anything for him—hey, I’ll blow you, man—anything he wanted as long as he didn’t hurt her.

  No dice, sweetie, he thought. The only thing I want to do is hurt you.

  Jane’s cries of panic were suddenly drowned out by a bestial roar. A scream of unbridled terror and pain soon followed.

  This gave Silver pause. Was the party getting started without him? Was there perhaps another hunter in these woods—or had the stupid little girl run straight into a bear?

  Ali received his answer a moment later when he pushed through the thick undergrowth and came face to face with a scene of unfolding horror.

  A massive beast—part man, part wolf—stood silhouetted in the moonlight. The soil and leaves seemed to glow red as the creature’s snout buried itself into the writhing mass on the forest floor. It took him a second to recognize that mass as the runaway’s body. Half of Jane’s face was gone. Bone gleamed in the pale light, but her eyes flickered with unmistakable life.

  Silver should have been terrified. Instead he stared at the spectacle in mesmerized awe. The blood-covered wolfman was beautiful in his savage, murderous fury.

  This is how Silver saw himself. A ferocious force of nature unbound by human morality.

  He took a step forward, almost without knowing he did so. And then a branch cracked under his mud-encrusted shoes, and the monster grew still. The glowing eyes found Ali and narrowed with murderous intent.

  Silver held up the knife. And then, to his amazement, he tossed the blade aside. The knife posed no threat to an untamed creature like the one he faced.

  The wolfman turned in his direction, the blood-caked claws dripping scarlet.

  Silver only had time to breathe the words You’re beautiful before the beast was upon him.

  A claw lashed out and slashed Silver’s chest. A sensation of heat, and then his flannel shirt grew wet with blood and his legs gave way.

  Silver collapsed on the forest ground, and the wolf left him there to bleed out. Perhaps Jane had satiated the beast, or maybe the creature believed he was dead already.

  But maybe there was another explanation. Maybe the beast had recognized a kindred spirit.

  Either way, the werewolf vanished into the night.

  For the next few hours, Silver remained awake and in agony. His chest torn open, his guts threatening to spill out. Silver was dead but didn’t know it yet. His sole comfort was that he wasn’t alone in his suffering. Jane kept crying for her mom. Her struggle energized Silver’s dying body, and he drew strength from her misery.

  At some point, the pain must have gotten the better of him, and he passed out.

  He dreamt of wolves who walked on their hind legs like people, dreamt of howling at the moon.

  When he woke, his body hummed with energy and power.

  His hand probed his mortal wounds from the night before, discovering that the skin under his torn shirt was unbroken. He didn’t even have any scars. It was almost as if he’d imagined the devastating injuries.

  No, it hadn’t been his imagination. His shirt was soaked red, the coppery smell wafting up from it unmistakable. And strangely delicious.

  As he stumbled to his feet, there was further confirmation that last night’s experience hadn’t been a product of his imagination. Jane still lay on the ground in a pool of her blood, somehow hanging onto life by a thin thread. Her injuries were catastrophic. How could she be alive? It was almost as if her brain hadn’t received the message from her body to turn off the lights.

  She would be dead soon. Looking down at her, Ali wondered why her wounds hadn’t healed themselves as his own had.

  Perhaps the wolf was picky about who it spared and allowed to join the pack.

  The wolf had chosen Silver.

  He stared at the dying woman and watched with growing pleasure as she held on for ten more long minutes before succumbing to her injuries.

  Silver returned to his vehicle as a man transformed. The strong heartbeat of an untamed beast roared in his chest. Supernatural strength super-charged every cell of his body and amplified his senses.

  The wolf had deemed him worthy.

  Chapter Ten

  Today. Nashland, Oregon.

  Silver pulled into the RV Park and wheeled the camper into his assigned parking space. He never stayed in hotels or motels, his RV providing him the perfect amount of privacy. It was the off-season and the middle of the week, and the RV park was nearly deserted. Just the way he liked it.

  Silver checked the time. It was less than a half an hour before sunset, and the full moon was already visible against the darkening sky.

  Silver basked in its glow, drank in its power. Deep inside him, the stirrings of the wolf grew stronger. His muscles tightened and contracted, and his chest expanded under his shirt.

  Hours still separated him from the full transformation, but the time of the wolf was approaching fast. Sara Thwaite’s scent was intoxicating. She was here. And soon he would finally taste her sweet, hot flesh.

  In his mind’s eye, he saw her alone in the cabin she’d rented for the night, resigned to her fate, a lamb awaiting the slaughter.

  Some folks were
predators, and some were prey. It was a simple fact of life. Sara had at last accepted her place in the order of the world. Her submission was delicious.

  As he drew in her essence, it was almost like he was mainlining her grief, loss, and fear. It gave him a physical high better than any drug.

  He lived for this shit.

  That’s why he and the wolf made such an unbeatable team. They were both made for each other.

  Don’t worry, little Sara. Tonight, your suffering will end. No more pain, no more sorrow. You and Brady will be reunited again.

  Sara probably hoped the end would come as fast as it had for her husband. Unfortunately for her, Silver had other plans.

  What made the partnership between him and his wolf work so well was that they respected each other’s needs. Silver reserved the male victim for the beast.

  Gorge yourself, devour the useless bag of meat, inhale your food, he’d tell it. The wolf preferred his prey dead. Ali liked to tear into them while still alive, one bloody morsel at a time.

  Silver was a monster, but he was also a connoisseur. He liked to take his time, enjoy each indulgent bite, savor the bouquet. Their suffering made the meat taste better, and the longer it went on, the more he relished it.

  Tonight would be the longest night in poor Sara’s short life.

  And he planned on enjoying every second of the experience.

  Twenty minutes later, Silver got out of the RV. On any other night, the cool air would have sent goosebumps up his skin, but the thick hair that had sprouted on his forearms was keeping him warm. He took a deep breath as his bulging chest muscles strained against the tightening shirt.

  He crossed the RV parking lot and headed for the adjoining woods. The trees loomed large, promising the privacy he sought for his transformation. There were only two other RVs in the lot, the light in their windows gleaming in the deepening darkness.

  Silver didn’t run into a living soul as he walked out of the RV park and into the surrounding woods, but if he had, he would have aroused no suspicion. He still looked human. And who would begrudge a man who spent the entire day behind the wheel the chance to stretch his legs and enjoy the natural beauty of the RV park’s forest?

  The dense tree cover engulfed him.

  Silver’s pace picked up, and his muscles surged with energy. His blood boiled in anticipation. Sara’s scent grew overpowering the deeper he went into the woods. It seemed to be everywhere, a maddening perfume.

  Confident that he was far from prying eyes, he stripped and draped his clothes over a natural rock formation.

  Liberated from his uncomfortable clothes, he let out a shout of pure joy, which turned into the growl of the wolf. Bands of black hair rippled up over his expanding chest and thickening arms. His fingers drew inward, replaced with hooked claws. His spine bowed with the pressure of squeezed vertebrae.

  Despite the physical agony that accompanied the change, he took a perverse joy in the transformation.

  Sara, here I am. I hope you’re ready. It’s time to have some fun.

  The growl in his throat built into a ferocious howl.

  The wolf had come out to play.

  Chapter Eleven

  Today. Nashland, Oregon.

  Weylock stood just inside the cabin door, waiting and watching.

  He studied the nocturnal forest landscape outside and listened to the sounds of the night. It was quiet out there. Even the hooting of a nearby owl had died down.

  The forest can feel the wolf approaching, Weylock thought.

  As the full moon washed over his grave features, his muscles tensed. Soon, the lambent light promised.

  The cycles of the moon had helped mankind avoid nighttime attacks by wild animals since the dawn of time. During the darkest part of the month, humans had sought shelter in caves, knowing the predators with their keen senses were on the prowl. But as the nights became brighter, they would venture out and take their chances as they foraged for food.

  Light symbolized security, hope, life. But it was just an illusion. The werewolf used this sense of false security against its prey. The beast didn’t strike in the darkness. It wanted you to see it coming.

  An apex predator didn’t need to hide in the shadows.

  Well, the wolf would be in for a rude surprise. There was something worse in the forest tonight.

  For Jaxon Weylock was more than a mere man nowadays. He’d defeated the demon who’d invaded his soul, but that didn’t mean he exorcised the beast. The unholy entity still dwelled within him, under Weylock’s control mind you, but a constant, inhuman presence, a cancer nipping away at his soul.

  A dance between the man and the beast required a delicate balance, an endless tug and pull between good and evil. Weylock felt like a lion tamer doomed to spent the rest of his days in a cage with a wild creature he’d never be able tame. He could make the demon perform a few tricks here and there, but the beast was liable to turn on him if he ever lowered his guard.

  The demon doesn’t possess the man; the man possesses the demon. A feat achieved once in a generation.

  Hexecutioners were men and women who channeled a demon’s magical power . He now controlled the creature’s power, could wield the despicable creature’s black magic as a force for good.

  That’s why the Glock in his shoulder holster was more for show than anything else. The damn thing wasn’t loaded with silver bullets. It was merely a link to his past.

  Nowadays Weylock didn’t need weapons.

  The demon inside of him was the weapon.

  And he was about to pit its hellish powers against the approaching monster. The wolf was about to get a taste of black magic.

  Weylock turned away from the doorway and closed it shut. This cabin was larger and older than the one where the beast had slaughtered Sara’s husband, the sagging wooden walls weighed down with history. A shadow hung over the place, a sense of despair clinging to the half-rotten walls.

  Weylock had not been surprised to learn that Sara had rented a rundown cabin on the outskirts of town. She had chosen to die on her terms, yet she was still determined not to endanger any innocent bystanders. The isolated cabin had seemed like the perfect place to make her last stand. Now, it would serve as the prefect trap for her would-be killer.

  He couldn’t smell it, but he knew Sara’s scent permeated the air, coated the wooden floor and walls, and infused the furniture even though she was safe in his hotel room miles away. She’d spent enough time here earlier in the day to leave a miasma of fear in every nook and cranny of the rental property.

  Weylock removed the pistol Sara had purchased in Phoenix from his holster. It had taken some persuading on his part for her to hand over the firearm back at the pub, but he’d convinced her in the end. The weapon was the key to his plan.

  The 9mm Luger was slim and compact with a seven-round, single stack magazine. It gleamed with an efficient deadliness in the cabin’s dim lights. For a woman who knew nothing about guns, she’d chosen a good one.

  Weylock placed the weapon on the rocking chair that he’d dragged into the middle of the living area. The firearm held Sara’s energy, representing her hopes and fears, her strength to stand up for herself, and her terror at needing to defend her life in the first place.

  The yin and yang of courage and fear.

  A loud howl cut through the night. The Hexecutioner’s lips curled into a grin at the sound.

  Showtime!

  Chapter Twelve

  Silver couldn’t stand it. Sara’s scent had quickly become overpowering to the wolf’s enhanced senses. He let loose a howl, the primal need to hunt and feed too strong to resist any longer.

  The brilliant moonlight charged and energized every cell in his monstrous body like a giant battery. Yet despite his size, the wolf moved with grace and precision, a study in raw, savage power.

  According to the legends, during the change the man was subsumed by the beast. That wasn’t the case for Ali Silver. He felt most like himself when the wol
f was in charge.

  The sweet perfume of the woman he was hunting, a haze of spilled tears and crushed hopes, intensified even more as the cabin came into view up ahead. The structure thrust from the top of a tiny hill, moonlight playing over its gabled roof.

  The wolf picked up the pace, furred muscles flexing and pumping like pistons, chest exploding with heavy breaths as he tried to get more of her scent into his lungs.

  An instant later, the wolf burst through the cabin’s wooden door, his weight and speed knocking it right off its hinges in a rain of splintering wood.

  Sara’s terror tickled his nostrils. But where was she?

  The wolf prowled deeper into the cabin.

  His steps slowed as the woman he’d been hunting for the last month finally appeared, half-hidden in the shadows.

  The wolf salivated with overpowering hunger. Wanted to take the woman’s head off in one devastating blow and devour her whole.

  No! Not a request, but a command that Silver barked at the beast.

  She belongs to me. She’s mine to do as I please.

  The wolf roared in frustration. Silver didn’t care. This was his night. His.

  Another howl of rage erupted from the wolf, yellow eyes fixed on the terror-stricken woman in the rocking chair.

  Every atom in the creature’s cursed form screamed for flesh and blood.

  But Ali Silver had tamed the beast. He was the alpha.

  With her, I will take my time. Do you understand?

  The wolf bowed his head and conceded control to his master.

  His gaze locked on Sara. Something seemed different about this one. By this point, his victims were either catatonic with fright or running for their lives. To Silver’s surprise, Sara didn’t seem all scared or impressed by the massive monster in her rental cabin.

  Sara kept rocking back and forth in her chair, a knowing smile playing across her face as she appraised him.