Читать книгу Dark Wolf Returning - Rhyannon Byrd - Страница 9

Prologue

Love sucked. And it hurt. Like a bitch.

Carla Reyes believed this with every fiber of her being, because she’d learned it the hard way. By experience. She bore the internal scars to prove it.

But she wasn’t alone. As far as tales of pain and betrayal and heartbreak went, she knew her specific story wasn’t all that different from what had happened to thousands—make that millions—of other women around the world. At the emotional level, of course. Obviously, the fact that her mother was a werewolf, which made Carla a half-breed, added a certain edge to the situation. As did the fact that the object of her need was a male so completely and utterly alpha wolf, he’d once made other deadly Lycans literally scurry out of his path.

Now, from what she’d heard, he intimidated everyone he came across, no matter their species. Everyone but her, that is. She’d taught herself to feel nothing where Elijah Daniel Drake was concerned. And it had worked for a long time. Until her shields had been blasted to hell and back almost two weeks ago, when she’d been taken prisoner by a rival werewolf pack and overheard their battle plans before making her escape.

Now the time had come for him to make things right. Both for her...and for Eli’s birth pack, the Maryland-based Silvercrest Lycans. Failure wasn’t an option, because failure could mean the death of not only the pack, but also her friends and their loved ones. And her fellow Bloodrunners meant too much to her to sacrifice because of misplaced pride.

As Carla drove into the star-filled night, she was so tired she could almost taste the sweetness of sleep, but refused to give in. For two weeks, she’d had to struggle through injury and fatigue to find him. Tonight, he felt closer—within her reach—and she knew this was it. She was currently making her way across Louisiana, and within a mere matter of days, her search would finally be over.

Then she was going to do what she should have done the moment he’d abandoned her. She was going to end the pain once and for all. Break the connection, like a bone fracturing beneath the force of a brutal, crushing blow.

She was going to make him cut her loose...and be free.

After that, things would be...easier. She would get on with her life, and find a way to forget that she’d ever even known Eli Drake.

Were there risks with her plan? Of course. Weren’t there always when it was something that mattered?

Her life as a Bloodrunner—a hunter of rogue wolves who had taken a liking for human flesh—was nothing but one continual risk after another. And now, thanks to Silvercrest enemies who were planning to attack the pack, which was already weakened after catastrophes it had suffered at the hands of Eli’s own father, an inevitable war was on its way. A bloody battle on a scale she knew might very well wipe out every person she’d ever loved and cared about. Her band of brothers, in the truest sense of the word.

They needed Eli and his fellow mercenaries on their side. Needed the mercs’ strength and expertise to help train the members of the pack who were willing to fight. But once he’d served his purpose, she was making this happen. Ripping him from her heart and her thoughts for the final time. For forever...

Even if it killed her.