The alpha of the Fortitude wolves, my father, Anthony Marini, had never been a bundle of sunshine and rainbows.
I’d always been a little frightened of him as a child. When I got into trouble, he was quick to anger, and my mother made sure I was never alone with him. She took the brunt of his foul temper for my sake, keeping me away from him and his criminal life as much as she was able to.
Now, I was in the middle of it and had learned the hard way it wasn’t as it seemed.
I glared at the back of Harley’s head as he led me into the compound. He looked like he had a fair whack with the ugly stick, and I wondered, besides working in the garage, how much whacking he did of his own.
It had been a long couple of weeks, and I’d forgotten when I’d last slept. My eyes burned every time I blinked, my entire body felt like it was one large bruise, and I was running on fumes, but I still followed him without complaint. Thinking about Chaser, I knew he would fare better than I would. Vampires seemed indestructible, especially when they had spells binding them into servitude.
Harley led me down a dark hallway, then into a common room. Glancing around, I was greeted with more wolves. What felt like a hundred carbon copies of Harley glanced up and stared at me, their eyes raking over my body and sizing me up. Women glared my way as the men leered, making my skin crawl.
I painted my face with a mask of nonchalance. No fear or emotion. Cold eyes. Hard mouth.
The hazy air in the room reeked of cigarette smoke. Music was playing in the background, some old rock ‘n’ roll record, while the clack of balls flying across the pool table caught my attention.
A hand grabbed my arm, and Harley wrenched me towards him. “Don’t stare, sweetheart. Predators take it as a challenge.”
“Let me go,” I snarled.
The room fell silent with all eyes on us. This was my debut moment in front of the people I needed to win over.
“You don’t get to touch me,” I said, wrenching away. “I’m a Marini wolf.”
“You’re nothing, little girl.”
I curled my lip and took a step closer, challenging him. “What was that you said about predators?”
Harley snarled and pulled me forwards, dragging me through the common room and into another hallway. When we were out of sight, he pushed me against the wall and curled his big, greasy hand around my neck.
“You’ve got a big mouth on you, Betty,” he murmured. “Around here, big mouths get people into trouble. You don’t want to get off on the wrong foot. You might be Marini’s daughter, but that won’t save you.”
I shoved down the wave of fear welling up inside me and smiled the sweetest smile I could manage. “The moon isn’t full, so I guess we’ll see about that…won’t we?”
He snarled and tightened his grip. “Bitch.”
“You need to learn how to respect women.”
“Harley.”
He froze, his grip loosening.
“Let her go,” the voice commanded. “That’s not the way to treat my daughter.”
Harley’s lip curled and his eyes burned with unmasked loathing. Leaning close, he delivered a threat directly into my ear. “Daddy won’t always be around to save you, Betty.”
Letting me go, he strode off down the hallway towards the common room, leaving me against the wall. I was hyperaware my father was standing a handful of steps away.
I didn’t want to look him in the eye, but I had to. There was no avoiding it.
I turned my head slowly, my heart pounding in my chest. How one man could cause such fear was chilling. I knew what he was capable of. I knew who he was. I knew what he’d done to my mother. Now I had to cozy up to him so I could stab him in the back. It would hurt—oh, would it hurt—but the look on his face when he realised I’d taken everything from him would be worth the salt in the wound.
He’d aged considerably in the last fifteen years, but it was his eyes I noticed first. His Italian heritage shone through in their chestnut colouring, but they couldn’t be any colder. His short, scrappy beard was strewn with grey, and his severe, short back and sides haircut gave his hard angular face a menacing look. Broad shoulders, a hard chest, and a towering stature completed the picture. A picture was worth a thousand words and all of them said ‘don’t trust me.’
Anthony Marini was a big man. Bigger than Chaser. Bigger than that vampire Bailey. But not as big as Harley.
“You’ve got your mother’s looks,” he said, picking up a strand of my hair and rubbing it between his forefinger and thumb. The baritone of his voice was gravelly, as though he’d smoked a thousand cigarettes a day until his throat had turned raw.
“You’re acting like you never saw me before,” I snapped, pulling away.
“You’ve changed.”
“It’s been fifteen years. I grew up,” I said, implying I would fight with deadly force if I had to. “A whole lot.”
He nodded towards the door behind him. It was a silent command—the alpha asserting his dominance. If I was supposed to feel anything supernatural, I wasn’t sure, but I needed answers…so I obeyed.
Dad—I wasn’t even sure I should call him that—held out his hand, gesturing for me to step into the room like he was some kind of reformed gentleman. I wasn’t on the road with Chaser anymore. If he was the one standing there, I would give him lip, but he wasn’t.
Where was he?
The room beyond was large, part of a suite made up of a private sitting room with posh leather couches, a sleek bar fridge, and a massive, flat-screen television. A private bathroom and bedroom completed the presidential suite, all fitted out with the latest mod-cons. Marini was alpha, so he took what he was owed.
My gaze flickered around the room and settled on the automatic rifle mounted on the wall, and the handgun and long-barrelled revolver on the glass-top coffee table. The grip on the revolver was inlaid with mother-of-pearl.
Dad closed the door behind him and crossed the room. Sitting in the armchair, he leaned forwards and rested his elbows on his knees, waiting for me to take a seat.
I lingered behind the couch, my eyes on the guns in front of him. Did the air have a tang of copper to it, or was it my imagination? I could smell tobacco, spice, gunpowder, and something else…the same stench I’d caught a whiff of outside. Did werewolves all smell like wet dog?
Taking in the room, I was aware of him watching me as I saw the patched hole in the wall behind my head. I promptly stepped to the side.
Dad raised his eyebrows and resigned himself to the fact that I wasn’t sitting anytime soon.
“Did he hurt you?” he asked, his voice familiar yet oddly strange to my ears.
“Who?”
“Chaser. Did he take care of you?”
“Yes.” I narrowed my eyes, not liking what he was implying.
“Did he touch you?”
“No.”
Dad watched me closely, taking stock of my answer. Chaser had fed from me only hours before, but Dad couldn’t know that. He would cut Chaser open top to tail if he knew, and I’d be right back on the pack’s list of items to sell—if I wasn’t on it already. The vampires seemed to want me for a blood surface, after all.
“He was shot,” I went on. “He desiccated and—”
“Butcher will patch him up,” Marini interrupted.
“He did his job. He should be rewarded.”
He grunted, his lip curling. “Will you sit down?”
Tensing, I rounded the back of the couch and perched on the edge. My thighs burned, and my back thanked me for it, but it was a bed I longed for the most. A bed, sleep, and knowing Chaser was going to be all right. Maybe I should’ve been thinking about my own fate, but I was running on fumes.
“You will be given a room in the compound,” Marini stated. “You’re free to come and go as you please, but you are not to leave under any circumstances.”
“That’s the direct opposite meaning of ‘free to come and go as I please,’” I pointed out.
“If you need something, ask. Don’t bother Chaser with your inane requests. I know he saved your life, but that does not make him your errand boy. We have new recruits who specialise in those things. Ask them for your tampons.”
I snorted and rolled my eyes.
“So, when does the bidding start?” I drawled.
He stared at me and didn’t bother replying. His fingers stroked his beard while his eyes retained their icy lustre.
“The vampires attacking you is a slight on me,” he began, lowering his chin. The light bounced off his face in a demonic way, making my spine tingle. “It makes me look weak. You know I’m not weak, Betty. They’ve declared war on Fortitude by putting a hit out on you.”
I snorted. He really thought I’d buy that? Fortitude was going to war over me? The more likely scenario was that he wanted to sell me to the Hollow Men for their blood ritual.
“Betty died,” I said, lowering my voice to match his tone. “Fifteen years ago.”
“Ah, you call yourself Sloane now.” He smiled. He actually smiled at me like I was a cute little child playing grown-up games. “So, tell me, Sloane, how much of our world did you know about before Chaser retrieved you?”
I tensed, my lips thinning. “None of it.”
“And what do you know now?”
Werewolves, vampires, witches… A wolf who could turn at will, who was not enslaved by the curse binding her kind to the moon.
“I know you’re a werewolf,” I said. “An alpha. All those people out there…they’re wolves, too. Chaser is a vampire, and there’s a bunch more that are after me. Then there are other wolves, from other packs, who would like to see me dead, too.” I narrowed my eyes and wrapped my arms around my stomach. “I wouldn’t know why. I’m ordinary. I’ve never…”
Marini smirked. “Turned on a full moon?”
“No.”
He laughed and shook his head. “How fortunate for you.”
“Why?” I asked. “Why me?”
“Because I’m the alpha of the Fortitude Wolves, the dominant werewolf pack in the entire state…and you’re my only daughter.”
It was a lie, but I said nothing.
I swallowed my anger. “Then why aren’t I like you?”
“Your mother was human, Sloane,” he told me. “You take after her.”
One statement was a lie, and the other I wasn’t sure about. Was my mum human? The thought hadn’t crossed my mind, and I regretted not slowing down and asking Chaser about her. He hadn’t met her, but maybe he knew anyway.
“So, I just have to stay here?” I demanded. “Just because I’m your daughter? A daughter who you haven’t seen in fifteen years, by the way.”
“Yes,” Marini drawled. “Where you stay and how you are treated depends on your attitude.”
“You could’ve had something good,” I murmured. “It could’ve been great, you know, but you screwed it all up.” I reached out and picked up the revolver, knowing full well it wasn’t loaded. I stroked the mother-of-pearl, watching the colours shimmer. “I’m half her, but I’m also half you.”
“Is that what you want?” The undertone of his smile changed, and the leather creaked as he leaned back in the armchair. “To be acknowledged?”
Setting down the revolver, I rose to my feet, trying not to vomit on the way up. “It wouldn’t even matter. I’m human. It’s not like I can be alpha, is it?”
He nodded, the ice in his eyes beginning to thaw. His gaze never left mine as he took a mobile phone out of his pocket and brought it to life.
“You must be tired.” He pressed the screen. Lifting the phone to his ear, he added, “Rick. My daughter is here. Get in here and show her to her room. Get her whatever she wants,” he looked at me, “within reason.”
He put the phone away, and I wrinkled my nose as the door opened.
A man strode into the room, dressed in beat-up jeans, boots, and a faded Harley Davidson T-shirt. He had a shaved head, stubbled jaw, and soft eyes to match his baby face. A new recruit. I made a mental note to ask him for tampons.
“Rick, this is my daughter Sloane.”
I stepped around the couch, glad to get away from the dangerous tug of war that’d begun with my father.
The newbie wolf nodded, eager to serve his master like the desperate dog that he was. “Room’s this way.”
I took two steps before I stopped.
“Dad?” I turned, leaving Rick out in the hallway.
My father lifted his head and waited for my pearl of wisdom.
“If you ever try to hurt me again, the last thing you’ll see is my face as I put a bullet in your head.”
“Of course.” He smirked, lips curving lopsidedly. “You are half me.”