Chapter 2
tWo
SOMETHING SMELLED LIKE CANDY. Not sweet like the cupcakes Kendal bought us, or warm like the cookies Nanna made, but sharper. Compelling, but strange. Like the gummy worms Kendal brought us once. Synthetic. Too chemically. Something that shouldn't exist in the woods.
My nose twitched, and I was moving before I could think, muscles tight, heart thumping like someone else was puppeteering my body.
The smell was too sweet. Too engineered. Too... tempting.
I should've ignored it.
Should've stayed on my porch like a normal, emotionally stunted wyrfang
But impulse control and I weren't speaking.
I'd been sitting on my porch steps. Trying not to think about how badly I slept alone.
I'd run out of brother's beds to crash. Drym had Kendal, Thurl had Jade, Roul was unstable, Kragen talked in his sleep, and Cavi had nightmares.
I wasn't desperate enough to listen to Kragen repeat French words all night and the last time I tried sleeping with Cavi, he'd raked a claw down my arm as he thrashed.
We healed fast, but the pain was real and that burned like a bitch.
I let my nose lead me away from the compound, past the surrounding fence, across the street and into a small stand of trees. It wasn't enough cover for me to be just outside a suburban neighborhood, but the scent grew stronger with every step I took.
I stopped before I left what little safety the shadows of spindly trees provided and winced against the glare of red and blue lights. Several police cars stood sentry in front of a modest house, and their uniformed counterparts milled in and out of the front door.
An ambulance joined the chaos and they wheeled a woman on a stretcher into the back. An older man called to her from behind police tape.
"Haven! Are you okay?"
Haven. The name pinballed around in my brain.
"Just fine, Mr. Howard! Exciting night. One star. Would not repeat."
The ambulance drove off toward the local hospital.
I continued to follow my nose, stepping as deep into the shadows as I could.
I chased the scent until I crouched near the forest floor.
A small indentation in the mud - a woman's footprint - held a pool of the candy smell, along with the metallic tang of blood.
It hit me like a fist.
Her. She was the source of the scent I sucked into my lungs.
Someone had hurt her. Red flashed at the edge of my vision and I stumbled in surprise. I didn't know the woman. Had seen only a hint of black hair and curves beneath the sterile thin sheet as someone pushed her into the back of the ambulance.
Haven.
The name vibrated in my chest—low, deep, instinctive—and I cut the sound off before it escaped.
I crouched lower, retreating into shadow. The urge to step forward was almost painful. Something buried in my bones wanted her scent closer, wanted to drag her to safety, wanted—just wanted.
I didn't know her.
I barely saw her.
This wasn't normal. Even for a creature who was far from normal.
I staggered back, claws digging into the dirt.
I squeezed my eyes shut and forced the reaction down. Whatever was happening, chasing her scent through a public neighborhood was a marvelous way to get shot. Or captured and back in BioSynth's hands.
I backed away, more reluctant to leave than I would admit. This was fine. Totally fine. People obsessed over strangers all the time…. Right?
The first streaks of dawn found me back on my porch, lurking like a gargoyle on my steps. My brain replayed the scent over and over, and every time, the same clawing urge rose in my throat. Find her. Protect her. Keep her.
I was still there when Kendal arrived to give me my daily hug. Touch therapy, she called it.
Seven feet tall, with claws that could slice dragon scale, horns as sharp as swords, and the fur of a werewolf—with the head to match—my five brothers and I were created in a lab to be the ultimate weapons. We were flawless as a unit, and just as deadly alone.
We'd needed help to break free of our captors—the scientists who created us and the military who paid for us. We hadn't been free long enough to settle into what that meant. I was still jumpy and couldn't sleep alone. Cavi had his nightmares, Kragen his whispered French, and Roul his madness.
It was Roul's mate who helped us escape. His mate, who chose to stay behind to continue working to take down BioSynth from the inside. Whose absence was driving my brother insane.
"Bring it in, big guy." Kendal held her arms wide, her hands flicking toward her.
I lumbered up and pretended to be put out until my arms wrapped around the small woman. I hugged her tightly. My emotions were still in turmoil, confused by the reaction I'd had to Haven's scent. The even stronger reaction to knowing she'd been hurt.
"Urk. Too tight."
I jerked back with a mumbled apology.
Kendal squinted at me like she was trying to see through my fur and into my brain. "What's wrong?"
I grinned and playfully scrubbed at my ruff. "You didn't notice my new hairdo."
Her head tilted and she narrowed her eyes at me. My joke bounced off her like a pebble off dragon hide. She stuck two fingers in her mouth and I winced and covered my ears.
I was never fast enough to guard my hearing against all of her shrill whistle, but I was getting better at recognizing the signs with enough time to cover my ears.
Drym came crashing through the trees, claws out, scanning every inch surrounding Kendal for the threat. He relaxed when he saw she was just annoyed. At me.
"What'd he do?"
I sputtered. "Why did I have to do something? Maybe she did something; ever think of that?"
He looked at me like I'd grown a second set of horns.
"No."
I scoffed and plopped my butt back onto the porch step. "And they say family is loyal."
"He,"—Kendal pointed a finger at me like there was a question whom she referred to—"won't be serious."
Drym's jaw dropped. "Little one," he said softly like he was explaining the obvious, "he's never serious."
I set my chin in my palm, wishing I had some of River's popcorn. The tiny woman who worked with Superhuman Security terrified everyone, but she made a mean bowl of popcorn.
Kendal's eye roll was epic. "Something's wrong with him and he won't tell me what. He tried to deflect with a joke."
Drym looked at me like I would offer him help. I gave him a shrug instead.
He again used the tone of a beast with infinite patience explaining gravity to a child. "He always deflects with humor."
Kendal stomped her foot. Drym backed up a few steps with his palms out and I snorted. This was better than standing outside Thurl's living room windows while the Mates Club watched Seductflix. And they were viciously funny while tearing apart the shows.
She threw her hands up with a screech of frustration and let herself into my house. Drym and I heard her seconds later.
"Something's wrong with Quin, and he won't tell me."
We looked at each other and waited.
"Drym is no help!"
Drym's ears flattened. "Rude."
Kendal marched back out, victory-smirk engaged.
I felt a warning at the base of my skull. Something shifted inside me. A compulsion to find Haven.
My first instinct was to blame indigestion. A terrible metaphorical burrito of fate sitting in my gut and demanding I go be weird about a human woman. But the pull sharpened instead of fading, and my ears pricked toward the direction of Haven’s house like I could hear her breathing from miles away.
And for the first time since smelling her, I realized... this wasn't going away.