The Unsinkable: The Legacy Series, #13

By Sheritta Bitikofer

April, 1912

After nine long years of training as a freshly turned werewolf, and five more years of searching Europe, Logan Elster has finally come face-to-face with the man from whom he inherited his supernatural gifts. But, he is just as surprised as his mentor, Darren Dubose to find a very altered version of Dustin Keith. After learning of some unfinished business the Irish werewolf had left behind in America, both Logan and Darren know they have to take the werewolf beta back across the ocean with them. The safety of a future pack mate depends on it.

Express tickets are booked for each of them aboard the newest steamer, the queen of the Atlantic, the Titanic. The marvel of the age, the biggest moving vessel crafted by the hands of man, it is everything they expect it to be and more. Even when they hold third class tickets, the accommodations are incredible. But more trouble awaits on the spacious decks and each werewolf is confronted with harsh truths about themselves, their relations to one another, and their future together. It doesn't help that three ladies have set their eyes on the newly formed pack. They believe these complications couldn't get much worse until the night of April 14th, when they'll have to worry about more than just keeping their preternatural identities a secret from the other passengers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Moonstruck Writing
• Release date: Apr 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9781946821454

Sheritta Bitikofer

Sheritta Bitikofer is a paranormal romance author of eclectic tastes with a passion for storytelling. Her goal with each book is to rebel against shallow intimacy and inspire courage through the power of love and soulful passion. Her biggest thrill comes when she presents love in a genuine light, where the protagonists not only feel a physical attraction to one another, but a deep emotional (and dare we say spiritual?) connection that fuels their relationship forward into something that will endure much longer than the last pages of their novel. A devoted wife and fur-mama to two shelter rescue dogs, Sheritta’s life is never dull. When she’s not writing her next novel, she can be found binge-watching her favorite shows on Netflix, doing Zumba with her friends, or painting at a medieval reenactment event.

Book preview

Chapter One

Via San Nazzaro, Verona Italy

April, 1912

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Five years. Five years of moving from town to town, country to country. Five years of living under the roof of strangers for the chance of a hot meal and warm bed. Five years of searching had led them back to Italy. The woman in Belgium had mentioned Dustin Keith with such disdain that Darren hadn’t been sure they were talking about the same man. But it was their only lead for five long, frustrating years.

Logan trailed behind his mentor and alpha, his severe gaze skimming over the gruff and dirty faces they passed in the street. Dusk only deteriorated this city into a squalor that he wasn’t all together unused to by now. They had traveled to the remote parts of Asia and slept near the watery rice fields with families who barely understood a word of English. They had stayed in hotels in Paris, Rome, St. Petersburg, Mumbai, London, Madrid, and Berlin at the expense of rich alphas within the cities. They had been taken in by packs and other loup-garou families in countries like Turkey, Romania, Poland, Ireland, and Scotland, making friends along the way with others just like Logan and Darren. He had seen so much of the world, the good and the bad. He had learned many languages and cultures turning him into a well-rounded man. Fourteen years ago, he would have never guessed this is where he would end up.

Three- or four-story buildings hemmed in the street on either side, their nearly featureless edifices towering above them. Laundry hung on lines between the balconies, tall rectangular windows still emitted some golden electric light through the slats in their shutters. Smells of cooking dinner wafted out of every doorway, closed or open, making Logan’s stomach growl. They hadn’t had a decent meal in hours, but Darren assured him that as soon as they located Dustin, they would return to the hotel and eat.

With the aroma of roasted meats and boiling potatoes came the many sounds and noises that at one time, might have sent Logan running in the other direction. But the nine years previously spent at the chateau near Albi France had helped to hone his keen, preternatural senses. John Croxen, to his chagrin, had been an invaluable mentor, just as Darren promised. He, like Adam Swenson back in the states, did all he could to be the guiding light in his new life as a loup-garou - what everyone else would know as a werewolf.

Just fourteen years into this new life and Logan could do just about everything that any other loup-garou his age could do. The noises and smells weren’t overwhelming, as he could pick and choose what he wanted to recognize. He didn’t fear the sudden onset of some flying rage that could coax forth the golden stare of the wolf within him. Each month, he could sense when it was his time to shift into the unnatural, half-man half-beast creature of a young child’s nightmares. Such control had been almost inconceivable when he first met Darren Dubose in Devia, Alabama just a few weeks after his first untimely shift.

Logan closed his eyes against the memory of that time before. He didn’t want to think about that, or anything else associated with the small town that didn’t exist anymore. All he wanted now was an end to this search. Dustin Keith, his grandfather, had eluded their grasp long enough and after asking around the local loup-garou pack, they were sure they had finally found him.

The brothel was in their sights now, soft laughter and the stench of sex emanating from the place like a blaring beacon amongst the other mundane scenes. Outside the door were a few women, unoccupied, but dressed somewhat appropriately. Those who were innocent of the sinful vices of the world might have assumed they were only loitering or waiting for a friend to join them. Others knew better not to meet their lusty gazes.

Stay out here, Darren told Logan. His strong British accent stood out just as much on the streets of Verona as it had in France or China. Logan’s South Carolinian cadence, too, drew some attention.

He looked to Darren, his face screwed up in disbelief. You’re joking, right?

One glance from his alpha said enough. He was certainly serious.

Dustin doesn’t know you, he said, dropping his voice so low that it would have been barely audible to any human over the rattle of the carriage that drove by. If I go in alone, he’ll be less likely to become defensive.

Logan had heard enough about his grandfather over the years. Darren had told a few stories, but most of his limited knowledge about the man came from John and a German loup-garou named Johannes from the chateau. Like Darren and himself, Dustin had gone to the old loup-garou for his first decade of training. Countless young men had passed across those grounds in their journey to becoming alphas and betas in packs all across Europe. By far, Dustin Keith had been one of the most cynical and rebellious pupils to grace its halls.

Among other things, he and Logan had that in common. It seemed that he took more after this man he had never met than anyone else in the world. After all, it was from Dustin, by all odds, that Logan had become a loup-garou.

Though he disagreed with the orders, Logan resigned himself to lean against the front of a closed shop across the street from the brothel and wait. Darren passed by the girls, paying them little mind as he entered and began his not so subtle search for the beta loup-garou he had parted with half a century ago.

Logan folded his arms against the early spring chill that swept down the street and busied himself with scanning the thinning crowds. The girls, who had seen him walk up with Darren, watched him with curious eyes that he could feel rake over his body. To them, he wouldn’t have appeared above seventeen or eighteen. He cut a robust figure for his youth, with strong arms and a broad chest that was just as deceiving as it could be intimidating. No one knew that he was nearing his thirtieth year. Being a loup-garou, he aged slowly, and for the next fifty or so years, he would remain a youth to everyone he met who didn’t know the truth.

And it was this that made the prostitutes giggle and whisper to their friends about how he deserved their services. They pitied him for being left alone by his older companion. Darren looked every inch the man that he was, hiding almost three hundred years worth of knowledge and wisdom within a head that hadn’t even begun to grey yet.

For the most part, Logan could ignore their censure. It was only when they began to question why he seemed so disinterested in them, that he decided to hell with Darren’s orders.

He slipped his hands into his pockets and rushed forward before he could change his mind. He bypassed the girls, much to their amusement, and dove into the brothel. He let his nose, ears, and other loup-garou senses guide him through the darkened corridors and rooms. Darren’s scent was only slightly difficult to follow through the clouds of perfume and dizzying energies of the place. His eyes were fixed to the path ahead of him, because he knew what he would see if he looked up. Though the hastily made assumptions by the girls outside the brothel had been utterly wrong, Logan wasn’t here for that.

Beneath the moans, laughter, and covert talk amongst patrons, he could hear his alpha.

You’re a hard man to find.

You’re an easy man to avoid.

Logan felt a flush of heat race through his body at the second voice. He had heard from everyone that Dustin Keith was a born and bred Irish man, but he was completely devoid of an accent, Irish or otherwise. Deep with the tinge of sardonic, Dustin sounded like just what he had come to expect.

He hurried forward, turning down another corridor and climbing a set of stairs, careful to slink by a couple snogging against the wall.

Have you been here this whole time? Darren questioned with a note of disdain.

Dustin laughed. Not here in this exact spot, but I’ve been around Italy and Germany.

John didn’t know where to find you.

I made a point of avoiding France altogether.

Logan found the room where the other loups-garous were talking and he felt the familiar tingle in the back of his skull, the one that told him another of his kind was close. He paused just outside the door and assessed the situation inside. There was Darren and Dustin, of course, but he could smell at least four, if not five, other scents with them. All feminine. Yet, there was a lack of that potent stink of sex to give him any indication that they were of an indecent state.

You’ve avoided a lot of things, Dustin, Darren replied, disappointment laced in every word.

Yes, Dustin said cheerfully. I’ve avoided the law, the wars, and unnecessary attention for the most part. You taught me well.

The slosh of liquid in a bottle followed his half-hearted compliment and Logan sneered at the smell of alcohol. Some things never faded with age. His contempt for spirits was one of them. Even if he could never get drunk, and therefore consume as much whiskey or beer as he liked, Logan would never touch the stuff if he could help it. Some hatreds ran too deep.

You’ve also avoided one responsibility that I’d like to believe was a simple oversight of yours.

A tremor of panic clearly rang through Dustin’s reply. You… You know about him?

Logan bristled and the tiny spark of scorn he felt for his grandfather in that moment was stoked into a flame. He knew about Logan, or Logan’s mother and never bothered? He knew and he still ran away? That didn’t fit with his grandmother’s journal that he had read obsessively for the last decade. In it, she recounted how she had met Dustin and all the research she had conducted about loups-garous for her children’s sake. She couldn’t have known that Logan would be the one to inherit the wolf, but still she meticulously recorded everything she could find out.

That is, all but Dustin’s whereabouts. Now, it seemed that might have been on purpose.

It’s quite hard to not know when the poor boy’s literally crawling into Devia without a friend in the world, begging for help.

Dustin let out an oath that Logan had heard Darren utter many times. It was in one of the few languages he hadn’t learned yet. An ancient dialect for loups-garous had been taught to those at the chateau long before Logan arrived, but Darren had been unwilling to teach him for years. Dustin must have been one of the few students to know it.

Listen, I tried. I really did. It wasn’t working out, so I left. It was for the best and I don’t regret a thing.

You can’t simply walk out on something like this! Darren thundered. The brothel fell into a mild hush when the very frame of the building shook under his booming voice. You have a responsibility to him. You have to finish what you started. I thought you would have learned that. I had to pick up the pieces. Me, Adam, and Robert did. We took care of what you chose to neglect.

By now, the ladies who had been in the room began to vacate. As he had guessed, five girls fled the room. Some pulled on their shawls to cover their bare shoulders and chests as they busied themselves elsewhere, while some lingered and hoped that the men would settle their dispute soon.

For so long, Logan wanted to think that Dustin had left his grandmother for a good reason. They had met during the war between the states in Tennessee. The war had spilled into her backyard and the risk of exposure for a loup-garou was high. He imagined Dustin had left with at least some feelings of remorse, but that wasn’t the truth. Logan balled his hands into fists and the wolf fumed at the injustice done to him.

It was for the best, Dustin insisted. Did you come all this way just to scold me about it?

No, I came to make you face what you’ve done.

There was a pause of confusion and Logan thought it best to intervene. Both undoubtedly knew that he was there from the beginning. He stepped inside the room draped in crimson velvet and furnished with old, but luxurious settees and sofas. Only one wingback chair was occupied.

Dressed similarly to Darren and Logan, Dustin would have done a fine job of blending in if it weren’t for his strikingly young and handsome features. He looked to be no more than thirty, a median age between Darren and himself. Having memorized his own reflection after glaring at it for hours on end, Logan could see his likeness in his grandfather. They even slouched the same.

He had hoped they would have shared a common eye color, but Dustin’s were very much green while Logan’s were a storm-cloud grey. Their hair, too, were of differing shades, Logan’s being a darker tint of brown, almost black, compared to his grandfather’s. Only time would tell if they had any more commonalities. However, after hearing all that Dustin had to say, Logan wasn’t so sure he wanted to get to know the man anymore.

He came to stand beside Darren and waited, losing the words he had planned to say at this meeting.

I see I’ve been replaced, Dustin said with a mocking smile. Does he drag you along everywhere too?

Logan stiffened and didn’t trust himself to say anything kind, so he said nothing. Darren had been his teacher and mentor over the years. He had become the father he never truly had, stepping into a role that was forced upon him in Devia. All with little complaining or grumbling. Logan didn’t deserve his generosity, just like Dustin didn’t yet deserve his respect.

Dustin, this is your grandson. Logan, this is your grandfather… For better or worse.

Those green eyes widened, and he slowly rose from his plush chair. Grandson? he breathed. With a shake of his head, he denied the very idea. I… I don’t have any kids. How can I have a grandson?

In that simple phrase, the Irish finally came out, along a tiny leakage of fear that was just as strong as the perfumes suffocating the room.

Darren clasped his hands behind him and took a long breath. Do you remember a lady by the name of Nancy Raymond?

It took only seconds for realization to dawn in his stare. Nancy? Nancy had… We had a… All color drained from his face and it soon occurred to Logan that the two men must have been having completely different conversations that whole time. If Dustin had known about Logan, he wouldn’t have been so shocked now.

Darren must have realized this too and strode forward to help Dustin ease back into his chair. The Irishman refused and the daze was broken. He moved aside and turned to face Logan again, looking him up and down as if he were something new and foreign.

After a moment to see for himself, he looked to Darren and cracked a smile. I’ve never known you to be a prankster, Darren.

This isn’t a joke.

Logan couldn’t keep quiet any longer. My grandmother gave birth to my mother alone. They lived in poverty, because she didn’t have a husband to support her. They had to move to South Carolina where she married a man who thought she was crazy for believing in werewolves. Nancy was so convinced that my mother gave birth to a werewolf that her husband forced her to disown us. Logan hadn’t realized he was stalking forward until he was just a few feet away from the man who had caused a domino effect of tragedy. And then, I shifted for the first time without any clue of what I was, all because you couldn’t keep it in your pants! No, my life is not a joke!

Dustin’s golden eyes flared and Logan’s mirrored them. Darren, sensing the tension mounting between the two, stepped in and slammed his hands against their chests to keep them apart. Dominance radiated from him, encasing them both with a powerful force that quelled every bit of hostility in their wolves.

The gold slowly faded as each eased out of their aggression. Dustin might have been willing to overlook all that had been said, but Logan couldn’t forget the man’s arrogance. He had such hopes for this reunion, and every one of them had been dashed on the rocks. He didn’t want to claim any relation to this loup-garou. Not anymore.

Hotel Accademia, Verona

---

This wasn’t Dustin. The women, the drinking, none of it was like him. The devil-may-care attitude remained a permanent fixture amongst his many notable, but exasperating qualities. But this was a new extreme that Darren hadn’t seen before. There was a time he wouldn’t even pay a woman a second glance. The death of his bride, Cassandra, was still too fresh to allow him to love or think about loving another woman. Then again, what he was doing in that room in the brothel couldn’t be considered love.

Their nearness to his former beta had rekindled the pack bond, feeding a new sensation that Darren hadn’t felt in centuries. Now he had Dustin and Logan. Together, they made a trio that gave him a sense of completeness. He was the alpha, Dustin the beta, and Logan was too callow in his loup-garou skin to have a rank. Yet, they felt more like a pack, despite their initial tensions.

One of which they were still working to unwind in their hotel room.

Just tell me his name, Darren firmly requested, his arms folded. Dustin reclined on the sofa in their suite, looking more like an adolescent who had been caught in some devious act, but didn’t care about the judgement he faced.

Why? he asked. It doesn’t matter. He’s probably fine by now and it won’t make a bit of difference.

Darren still marveled how well Dustin had managed to hide his Irish roots. No slang, no accent, nothing. To any untrained ear, he was as American as Logan. His deep-seated abhorrence for his home country surprised him.

It matters, because Devia… Devia’s not there anymore. He couldn’t keep the pain from this admission, even if the disaster was fourteen years old. If the man you turned had come to us as you told him to, I want the assurance of knowing he escaped or not.

The recalcitrant loup-garou looked up, a hint of fear in his stare. Isn’t there anymore? Escaped? What’re you talking about?

It was difficult to think of, let alone speak aloud. Even with Logan in the next room, it wasn’t easy to bring up the faces of those they had lost and left behind. It was hunters, he said. That’s all I know. Many didn’t make it out alive. Robert Croxen being one of them.

Dustin knew the founder of Devia. He might have left the town to roam and do as he pleased, but he had made friends that were now dead and gone. Darren hoped the Irishman felt some repentance for leaving and tried to not be so satisfied upon seeing the look of heartbreak transform his face.

His name was Ben Myers. I don’t know if he would have gone to Devia. He was so… damn mulish. That’s why we parted ways. He wouldn’t learn, and I got tired of teaching him.

A melding of relief and disappointment surged in Darren. He knew most of the loups-garous in Devia. Some better than others. He would have known if a man by that name came to them with curses on his tongue reserved for Dustin Keith. It was likely Ben Myers had evaded the disaster and moved on, but that should have never happened to begin with. Dustin should have stayed on and trained him, worked harder to reach him.

I taught you better than that, Darren scolded. I taught you that turning a human was a weighty responsibility. You shouldn’t have taken it so lightly, nor should you have left him so soon. Just one year? I have never met a man that could match you for stubbornness.

Dustin began to laugh as he pulled a cigarette case from his inner vest pocket. You haven’t met Ben Myers. I suppose something of me passed on through the bite and it was magnified in that Georgia farm boy.

Smoking too? Darren wrinkled his nose as Dustin lit up the end of the perfectly rolled, white cigarette with his lit match.

Just for the flavor, Dustin mumbled as the tobacco stick dangled from his lips. Cigars are bangers too, but a little out of my price range.

Yet you can afford five whores?

He shot his alpha a devilish look. Prioritize.

Darren’s brows furrowed as he shook his head in dismay. When Dustin had left Devia, he felt as if one of his arms had been severed. A part of him had left for good. Now that he had recovered that piece, he found it mangled and unrecognizable from what he once knew. It was enough to turn his stomach. What the bloody hell happened to you?

Not a damn thing, Dustin replied before blowing a thin stream of smoke toward the ceiling. I’m just taking advantage of the freedom you gave me.

Freedom to start your own pack and live a simple life. Not galivant across Europe, sleeping in whorehouses, wasting your money on beer that won’t do anything to you, and smoking those damn things. He snatched the cigarette from Dustin’s lips when he was in mid-drag and crushed it in his fist. The sting of the glowing embers hurt only for a moment. The scorched patch of his skin would recover quickly, but his trust in Dustin would take much longer to heal.

The eyes of his former beta flitted from the clenched hand to his alpha’s angry glare as if he didn’t understand. You lost the right to lecture me long ago, Darren.

I’ll lecture you until I’m blue in the face if it’ll make you understand the gravity of what you’ve done.

Dustin threw up his hands. I did nothing!

That’s the problem! Darren roared in return. You left a loup-garou without a pack, without any guidance, without any means of protection all because of your bloody pride!

He sat up straighter on the sofa and jabbed a finger toward the window that overlooked the darkened streets of Verona. "Ben wanted to leave! He didn’t want my help, didn’t want to go to Devia, didn’t want to be part of a pack. The gòrach pìos de cac tried to kill himself, because he couldn’t stand to be away from his precious family, but he signed up to fight on the losing side of a feckin’ useless war! I was done trying to convince him to save his own arse and he was done hearing about it from me."

There was the volatile Irishman he knew. Hearing a bit of Dustin’s native tongue, whether in cursing or not, soothed Darren in unexpected ways. It assured him that a piece of his beta was still inside there somewhere.

Without his notice, a subtle strain of dominance had been slowly leaking during their argument. Darren forced himself to take a breath and calm before asking his next question. Did you form a pack bond with Ben?

For a moment, Dustin didn’t know how to respond. His mouth opened and closed, jaw slackening and tightening as he tried to find his answer.

Darren repeated his question more deliberately. Do you and Ben have a pack bond?

I don’t know, Dustin nettled. Maybe. I never did it before, so how should I –

When you left him, did you feel a pull to look back.

Again, he received nothing but a dumbfound expression and Darren began to lose his patience again.

Did you feel the pull? he demanded.

Dustin couldn’t answer. His face drawn, he looked to the carpet between his feet.

It was settled.

Darren turned to see Logan standing in the doorway, watching the whole affair from a safe, but obvious distance. This wasn’t his intention. Darren wanted to take this reunion gradually, to allow them time to get to know one another, but there would be time for that on the next leg of their journey.

We’re leaving in the morning, he told the young loup-garou.

At this, both of his packmates started.

Leaving? asked Dustin. I’m not leaving.

Darren whipped back around and glared with dark eyes that threatened to lighten into the fierce wolfish gold. Yes, you are. We’re going back to America on the next available ship. We’re going to repair the damage you’ve done. You left your pack. What was my one principle that I always wanted you to know?

Logan, uninvited into the conversation replied with, Your pack is your family.

Dustin would