Crossed Fates by Lexi C. Foss

Makayla

Four hoursin the car with Alaric was a really bad idea. The glimmering lights of New York City were still bright in the rearview mirror, and already I couldn’t breathe.

His scent overwhelmed me, cloaking my shoulders in a thick blanket of his masculine warmth.

My wolf practically rolled around inside me, belly up, begging him to take me right here in the bucket seat of his sporty little car.

I grabbed the stick shift between us and curled my fingers around it as I inhaled deeply through my mouth.

Didn’t help.

That just made me salivate.

Damn wolf pheromones.

I’d met some potent alpha types in my day, but Alaric certainly took the attraction to a new level. It probably had something to do with the whole “fated mate” theory.

First of all, no.

Second of all, I couldn’t be a fated mate to him because I wasn’t from this world.

Third of all, no.

I’d consider bedding him—especially after seeing what he had to offer. Because damn, yes, please. But mating? Yeah, no, that was a hard pass and never going to happen.

One comment regarding my chosen path would put that whole notion to rest. He’d realize I was incapable of such a connection and move on. Best to just set the record straight now by rejecting the whole concept of us being created for each other.

My purpose was to help those who couldn’t help themselves. Anyone who wanted more from me would be strongly disappointed in the outcome.

Packs had their enforcers.

Humans had me.

Hell, this realm had me now. Because they weren’t strong enough to care for themselves. Hence my reason for being here.

And no man—hot alpha or not—would ever change that.

I glanced at my mirrors again and noticed Alaric watching me. “Yes?” I prompted, not particularly enjoying the sensation of being studied so intently. We hadn’t said much to each other since entering the car. He’d just handed me the keys, then I’d followed the signs to exit the garage beneath his condo complex and started the journey north.

“Well, I’m trying to figure out how you know where we’re going,” he said slowly. “Either you’re a mind reader or you’re psychic. Which is it?”

I rolled my eyes. “Neither. You mentioned Silver Lake earlier, remember?” It was around the time I offered to drive him. Or maybe right after that. I couldn’t recollect the exact sequence but definitely recalled that he’d mentioned Silver Lake. It wasn’t the sort of detail I’d soon forget, considering I was from the same pack, but in my world, not his.

“And you just happen to know where that is?”

My lips twitched. “As a matter of fact, I do.” But I really didn’t want to explain how I actually knew that, so I added, “I’m a wolf, Alaric. I know all the packs in this region.” A half-truth—I knew all the packs in my world. I’d also learned the names of a few in this reality during my first mission in this universe. That’d been an eye-opening experience.

Marc had hand-selected me to help him on the assignment because of my background in human trafficking. Only, I hadn’t realized we’d be headed to a new world when he’d recruited me for the case.

I’d been shocked upon our arrival, not only to learn about a brand-new reality but also to meet so many inadequate supernaturals. Such as the vampires in this world and the fact that they could be slayed by a simple stake to the chest. How pathetic could one get?

But then the real adventure had begun as we’d searched through the underworld of crime, desperate to locate Sapphire. We had finally found her in a seedy situation surrounded by vampires and wolves.

Which had been my introduction to the shifters in this reality.

To say I’d been unimpressed would be an understatement.

My jaw ticked as I considered the events of that mission and the reason I’d returned to this realm just a few weeks ago. Sapphire had sent me on another assignment, saying some women needed my help. She had a penchant for fortune-telling, something I’d learned after rescuing her, and I tended to take her premonitions seriously.

However, now I wondered if there’d be an ulterior motive to her plans. It would be just like her to meddle in my affairs. And she would have foreseen the news articles about the Bloodsucker Serial Killer, just like she would have predicted the link to the wolf beside me.

Oh, you crazy bitch, I thought as the puzzle pieces came together in my mind. She’d told me the ruby ring was a payment in its own way. I’d thought she meant because it allowed me to travel realms at random.

Now I understood.

Not happening, Saph. Not ever happening.

If she were here, she’d just be grinning in that loony way of hers before losing herself to another premonition.

“Something entertaining?” Alaric asked, his gaze still locked on me in the way a hunter eyed his prey.

“Just thinking about a friend of mine,” I replied. “She’s the reason I’m familiar with packs in this territory.” Because it’d been a wolf who had kidnapped her. Fortunately, it hadn’t been one from Silver Lake. That would have been awkward.

“And have you been to Silver Lake before?” he pressed.

I considered how to answer that. Technically, yes, but not in this world, so… “No.”

“Yet you know where we’re going.”

“I have a reasonably good sense of direction,” I returned. “Are you going to backseat-drive the whole way, Alaric? Because that’s going to get old very fast.” He wasn’t actually trying to correct me at all, but I wanted to change the subject away from how I knew our destination.

Because he was right.

It’d been a slip on my part.

While Silver Lake might be a notable pack name in the region, the directions on how to find it might not be as well known. Or maybe they were and he was just testing me. Either way, I should have asked for directions in the beginning just to avoid all this nonsense. But I’d been so consumed by his scent that I hadn’t considered much beyond trying to drive without climbing into his lap and demanding he take me into oblivion.

“Secrets only intrigue me more,” Alaric finally said after a beat. “However, I’ll let you keep your lies for now. Just know that I don’t take kindly to duplicity, so if you try to hurt me or my pack, mate or not, I will kill you.”

The serious quality of his words told me he meant them.

“Wouldn’t that hurt you almost as much as it would hurt me?” I wondered out loud. The true mates in my world, at least the ones who had fully bonded, often didn’t survive when their other half died. Perhaps it didn’t work that way for Bitten wolves?

“It would, yes,” he replied, his gaze finally leaving my face. “But protecting myself and my pack is worth the pain of losing a mate.”

I considered that, my brow furrowing. His statement reminded me of Nathan. He would sacrifice everything for his pack, too. Because he was the Silver Lake Alpha.

Alaric had alpha written all over him, but not in the same way as Nathan.

The former struck me as a lone wolf, while the latter was very much a leader. Nathan would never live in the city, because Silver Lake was his heart. But Alaric’s condo confirmed he didn’t reside up north. His space was too well lived-in for it to be a temporary home, suggesting he didn’t stay with his pack often. Which meant he couldn’t be a true alpha.

However, as we drove, I felt his aggression mounting. Like his wolf wanted out.

His focus had completely left me and gone to the windows, his vigilance making me uneasy. “Are you expecting something?” I asked. “Or someone?”

He didn’t reply, his behavior seeming to be more animalistic than humanlike as he rolled down the window to sniff the air. His palm went to his chest, his fingers massaging the muscle there in a rhythmic caress that nearly distracted me from the road ahead because I pictured him doing that to my breast.

Goddamn it.

My thighs clenched, his pheromones hitting me hard in the nostrils and drowning me in lust.

Definitely. A. Bad. Idea,I chanted to myself, my lips parting as I forced myself to breathe through my mouth.

“You’re tempting my wolf.” The low growl in his voice only heated my blood further.

“Trust me, it’s not intentional,” I managed to reply, my throat dry from his intoxicating aroma. God, no one had ever tempted me like this before. He had to be an alpha. Or at least close to one. Because damn, I actually wanted to get on my knees for him, and that wasn’t like me at all.

I was an enforcer by nature. I’d even trained to become one until Nathan had introduced me to his black ops agency. Then my entire world had changed in a matter of years.

I bowed to no one.

Yet a dark part of me wanted to bow for him.

What the hell?

I tried to shake the sensation by rolling down my window to inhale fresh air.

“I can feel it.” Alaric’s words came out in a rumble of sound that vibrated through the car. “The turmoil. The pain. The danger.”

“From your pack?”

“Yes.”

Shit. Nathan could do that, too. Well, to an extent. He could speak telepathically to packmates within a certain distance of him. He could also control his wolves, but that wasn’t an ability he regularly used.

“Is it your alpha?” I wondered. “Is he calling to you?”

“Something like that,” he muttered. “More like my wolf is reacting to a disturbance.” He cut me a sideways glance. “Bitten wolves aren’t telepathic. We adhere to a hierarchy with an alpha at the top, and we’re bonded in a way, but nothing on the mental hive-mind level.”

I tried to ignore his knowing stare, but I felt it engraving a hot path along my cheek and my neck. “What?” I demanded after a beat, not liking the way he kept staring at me. The intensity in the car was overwhelming enough without his incessant looks.

“Your questions tell me you don’t know much about Bitten wolves. And yet, you know where Silver Lake is located. That’s very interesting, Makayla. Very interesting indeed.”

“It just means I haven’t studied your kind. I wouldn’t read too much into it.”

“Oh, but I am,” he drawled. “Did you know we can be killed from things like, say, a knife wound?”

“Most wolves can die from that,” I pointed out. “Especially when strategically placed. But yes, I’m aware your kind is more susceptible than others.”

“And yet you didn’t know about our alpha structure.” The taunt in his tone had my grip tightening on the steering wheel. Was he trying to piss me off?

“I didn’t say that, did I?” I countered. “I just asked if you could sense your alpha.”

“Hmm,” he hummed, his body less tense than before. It seemed talking to me had calmed him down. Or perhaps having both windows open helped.

I decided to keep the fresh air flowing as I drove, but the tension licked the air again as I turned off the highway toward Silver Lake.

And it mounted even more with each passing mile.

My stomach churned beneath the weight of Alaric’s growing aggression. “What is it?” I finally asked, my tone breathless. We were maybe thirty minutes out now, and I was ready to pull over and just wish him luck. He could still shift while injured. Then he could run home. Wouldn’t be too hard with all the woods around here.

“He’s dying,” Alaric whispered, the words killing my idea to pull over and instead having me press harder on the gas. “Fuck, I can feel it. He’s… his wolf… he’s seeking.” The word came out on a pant, his head falling back against the headrest.

Damn, had he been driving, he would have crashed or stomped on the brakes by now. Knife wound or not, he couldn’t seem to move.

“Faster.” His voice broke on the word. “Please. Go. Faster.”

I didn’t hesitate, just did exactly what he asked, putting all my skill and supernatural ability into navigating his sporty little car at highly illegal speeds. Fortunately, it was too late for anyone to be out and too early for cops to be lying in wait.

The path came easily to me, years of driving similar roads in another version of this world paving a trail that wasn’t difficult for me to follow.

Until we entered the primary grounds, littered with trees and dotted with homes throughout a sprawling woodsy landscape.

“I need to know what house,” I said quietly, although I suspected that I already knew.

So when he gave me the same location of Nathan’s main residence, those suspicions were confirmed.

Alaric really was an alpha. Perhaps not the alpha of Silver Lake, but the brother of one.

Which meant he’d be the alpha’s successor unless he had a strong beta nearby.

Thatwas what had Alaric’s wolf all up in arms—he could sense his pack’s need for him. Their leader was dying, and the animal souls were calling for their heir, begging him to come home, to make everything whole for them.

I stabbed an alpha,I realized. An alpha who thinks I’m his mate.

The ring on my finger suddenly felt like ten pounds, the reminder of my ability to escape a welcome beacon in my thoughts.

Only, my wolf snarled in response. She wanted to stay.

We need to go,I argued.

But as we pulled into the alpha’s driveway, I knew I couldn’t leave.

“The silver package has been delivered. They should be dead by morning.”

The sun was kissing the horizon now, the early morning air heavy with mourning.

“Tyler’s been poisoned.”

Dead by morning.

Two different conversations, both with related outcomes.

This isn’t a coincidence. It’s all related. If I run now, I’ll never understand why. And those girls… someone has to save those girls.

Alaric sat frozen in the passenger seat, his nostrils flaring. I almost reached for him to offer comfort, to say something, anything, to calm him down. But the vibrations growing in his chest kept me at bay.

“I need to go inside.” Darkness underlined his tone, his wolf riding just beneath the surface.

“Do you want me to come in with you?” I didn’t mean to offer that. I didn’t mean to even speak.

But his midnight gaze met mine, the pupils blown wide to engulf his irises. It left me wondering what he looked like in animal form. Ebony eyes and brown fur to match his hair. I could almost see it. He’d be big, too.

“He’s dying,” Alaric whispered. “I can feel it.”

I swallowed. That wasn’t exactly an answer to my question. But I suspected he was beyond reason at the moment. Grief altered behavior, made some more aggressive and others weaker. Alaric would likely fall in the former. “I’ll come in with you,” I decided out loud. It just felt right. I’d examine why later.

He nodded as though I’d answered some unspoken question. Then he unbuckled his seat belt and exited the car without another word.