Joker: Wolves of Angels Rest, #2

By Elsa Jade

The mating moon is rising…

Born and raised in a clandestine paramilitary cult dedicated to destroying all shapeshifting monsters, Leela Jones has to prove her worth by testing her deadly new revolvers on the terrible white wolfman. Too bad he caught her. Even worse, she's not sure if she wants to get away.

Vicious werewolf hunters killed Bastian Villalobos' father and left him to run wild, dreaming of a someday revenge. But when that someday comes, it's in the soft, quiet shape of a lonely woman suffering the same pain as him. She knows him in a way no one else does, and together they could broker a ceasefire between their people.

Except not everyone wants peace...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Red Circle Ink
• Release date: Mar 24, 2016
• ISBN: 9781941547106

Book preview

Wolves of Angels Rest: Book 2

JOKER

Elsa Jade

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The mating moon is rising…

The local bad boy discovers an AWOL female wannabe werewolf hunter has infiltrated the town and threatens to force shift her to make her see the light (moonlight, that is) about wolves.

Born and raised in a clandestine paramilitary cult dedicated to destroying all shapeshifting monsters, Leela Jones has to prove her worth by testing her deadly new revolvers on the terrible white wolfman. Too bad he caught her. Even worse, she’s not sure if she wants to get away.

Vicious werewolf hunters killed Bastian Villalobos’ father and left him to run wild, dreaming of a someday revenge. But when that someday comes, it’s in the soft, quiet shape of a lonely woman suffering the same pain as him. She knows him in a way no one else does, and together they could broker a ceasefire between their people. Except not everyone wants peace.

Copyright © 2015 by Elsa Jade

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as factual. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be scanned, reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the author.

Chapter 1

The werewolves were too fast, too strong. And there were too many of them, attacking in synchrony, with the white wolf coming right for her throat. Leela Jones shuddered as her guns’ hammers clicked on empty chambers with terminal finality. She’d fired every bullet from the two prototype weapons, and still she’d failed to bring down even one of the terrible monsters.

She’d failed, and she deserved to die. So said the teachings of the Jonestown Militia. How ironic that the werewolves the militia hunted would probably agree with the righteousness of her demise.

Though she’d never argue aloud with militiamen or werewolves—well, the way things were going, she’d never be speaking to anyone again ever—she couldn’t silence her first and last defiant shout as the white werewolf leapt at her.

Her heart leapt too, as if to meet him in mid-air. In the moonlight, his pale fur glittered like the first, pure snowfall of winter. The ferocity of his charge was matched only by the grace of his flight. He was…

Beautiful.

Leela flung both empty revolvers at his snarling face.

Then he was on her.

His hot, hairy weight slammed her to the ground. The blow knocked her face mask askew, covering her eyes, and the moonlit night went utterly dark. At least she wouldn’t have to see her death coming.

Watch it, Bas, called a brusque voice. That hunter bastard will have more weapons on him.

Him? Oh, they meant her. It wouldn’t take them long to realize—

Rough hands grabbed her hips, right where she would have holstered a third gun if she’d thought she’d have time to use it.

Just as well she hadn’t bothered. At least she could prove these devils wrong about something: she didn’t have any more guns, and she wasn’t a man.

What the fuck? The growl from above would have made her laugh if she wasn’t hyperventilating on the choking fabric of the mask.

And if she wasn’t about to die, of course.

Pure, crisp night air flooded her lungs as the mask ripped away.

The white wolf stared down at her.

And he was very much a man. A very naked man.

Her urge to shout or laugh deflated into a tiny, shocked gasp. She’d never seen such…everything.

He crouched over her, one hand clenched around the black mask he’d yanked off her, the other flattened between her breasts, pinning her to the earth. Though his smooth skin was not the white of the wolf, he was pale enough that he seemed to almost glow under the moon. Except for the writhing of primitive black tattoos across his shoulders and chest, tracing down over his ribs and muscled abdomen. Down farther toward his—

He took a deep inhalation—scenting her—and she jerked her gaze back to his face. When he huffed out, his hot breath feathered her hair.

He smelled of juniper, sage, dust…and a wildness that triggered a strange sensation deeper in her core.

He leaned back on his haunches and blinked once, his glittering blue eyes shielded for a split second. Huh. Didn’t see that coming.

And you never will, Leela hissed.

He clenched his fist in the shirt between her breasts and pulled her roughly to her feet. Oh, I bet I can get you to tell me all your secrets, little hunter.

She clamped her lips shut. She was almost glad when he pulled the mask over her face again—backward, so she couldn’t see anything—so she could imagine the thin fabric gagged her, reminding her not to speak. He couldn’t kill her and make her talk.

Not in that order, anyway.

He marched her blind for what felt like ten miles though realistically it couldn’t be that far. Mesa Diablo wasn’t that big. With her huffing breath, the mask was stifling, and her head whirled. When she stumbled, only the unyielding grip of his hand on her elbow kept her upright.

The sound of her footsteps changed from the blunted thump of her soles on dirt to the hollow echo of indoors.

Steps, her captor warned. Don’t make me drop you.

She reached out to feel her way, but he caught both her wrists behind her back with one hand, his other hand at her nape as he forced her down the stairs. Another few miles—yards?—of staggering, and then he shoved her forward.

She whirled as soon as she caught her balance, yanking off the mask. But the clang of a closing door set her back on her heels.

A weak, bare bulb cast indifferent light on the even more bare room. A cell. She rushed to the door, and through the heavy wood she felt more than heard the vibrations of a bolt sliding shut.

Trapped.

She tried the door anyway—definitely locked—then made a thorough exploration of the space. Judging from the faint chill and scent of damp earth, she guessed it was a repurposed root cellar. A few holes in the back wall had probably once held shelves and should only take, oh, a century to dig out with her bare fingernails.

Very trapped.

She braced her back against the concrete wall and slowly slid to the ground. She sank her forehead down onto her arms crossed over her knees.

He was definitely going to kill her.

Not the white werewolf who’d unmasked her—well, no doubt he would try eventually, but she planned to escape his wicked, clawed clutches before he got around to it—no, it was her grandfather who would kill her.

He always said female soldiers were an abomination. Women were weak and needy, distracting men from the virtuous work of killing. Women existed only to make male children who would grow up strong and single-minded to slay the vile, shapeshifting demons that haunted the darkness.

For years, Leela had kept silent when Reynold Jones—she knew better than to call him anything besides Colonel, sir, in public, or in private, for that matter—went off on his rants. Even as a child, she’d understood his vehemence: he’d lost his beloved daughter—Leela’s mother—in a werewolf attack. The same attack had killed his valued captain, Leela’s father. It hadn’t been until she’d grown up that Leela considered his words and realized it wasn’t as if they’d been using penises as weapons, so that hadn’t been the deciding factor in who lived or died.

By then, silence had become an instinct.

It was easier, and safer, to stay out of sight and out of mind in a quasi-military organization of men who would be locked up for criminal insanity if their self-imposed mission ever became public knowledge. Most people had no idea monsters stalked among them, wouldn’t want to know, so it was up to men like her grandfather and his secret soldiers to save the world. At least she could help support their cause by developing better weapons against the shifters, who were stronger, faster, and more cunning than any human.

The colonel had been doubtful of her contribution until she showed him the stopping power of the hollow points with her custom alloy jacketing. After that, when one of the men made a derisive comment about made in China, the colonel had backhanded him so hard a tooth jolted from his mouth.

"She’s half Japanese," her grandfather said.

Since the war wasn’t going well for them—their enemy was tough and secretive—they reluctantly took her rounds. When they came back from a