Through the Woods: A Little Red Riding Hood Novel, #2

By Cassandra Johnson

Elle Marshal has loved werewolves since she was a little girl listening to her grandmother's stories, but living in the reality that werewolves exist was far beyond Elle's wildest dreams.In the exciting sequel to LRR Hood, Elle and the Chaliceman wolves realize that the danger didn't end with Jamal. He was merely a small pawn in a much bigger plan.Power and green threaten their very existence in a ruthless battle for the title of Alpha

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cassandra Johnson
• Release date: Jan 4, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393811060

Cassandra Johnson

Growing up in the deep south I was taught some precious life lessons; you should always answer with Ma'am or Sir, tea that isn't sweet and iced is blasphemy, and that you catch a lot more flies with sugar than you do with vinegar. I was born in Fort Smith, Arkansas but I was raised in the small town of Marion, Arkansas a short fifteen-minute drive from Memphis, the birthplace of rock and roll. While it may not seem like an accomplishment to some, I am proud to say that I was a published author before the age of thirty and I have many more books left in my head to share with the world. My first novel, LRR Hood is a twist on the classic Little Red Riding Hood fable, and I currently have two more books lined up for a trilogy series of the main character, Elle Marshal's dramatic encounter with werewolves, one of my favorite mythical creatures. My writing continued to evolve from the time I was a teenager, getting involved in text-based roleplay games where my friends and I would create storyboards where we each contributed to the story through the eyes of the character's we chose to write for. I also love fan-fiction and was an avid reader and still am to this day. I decided to throw my hat in the ring and write some of my own fanfictions until eventually, I wanted to work with characters that were my own. From those days I continued to write short stories that never reached the public until I was introduced to Kindle Direct Publishing because while I wanted to be a writer and I wanted to publish my work, I never truly believed that anyone would publish my writing and I now have a work in progress list as long as my arm, and it continues to grow every day, LRR Hood won't be the last you hear from me.

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

I think the local wild life has enjoyed Elle’s hospitality. Gaerik surmised looking over the kitchen, there were animal droppings, he could smell piss strongly, a raccoon by the smell of it. 

I can’t believe no one’s called the cops what with the door being open. Marik said, he disliked the smell of this place. It reeked not only of wild animals but of the people who’d tramped through Elle’s home, pilfering anything that they could get their hands on. 

Making his way into the bedroom he went straight to her closet, there were dresser drawers thrown open and some laying on the floor turned upside down, he couldn’t remember if it had been exactly like this when he was here last or not. That day seemed so long ago. Grabbing a duffle bag from the closet he started turning drawer’s upside down inside of it and emptying their contents.

What about her phone and laptop? Gaerik asked from the door way of the bedroom, his light gray eyes assessing his goddess’ bedroom. So, this was where she slept, among other things? 

They’re still here? Marik looking up, his eyes widening with amazement.

Yeah, her phone was under an empty flour canister and the laptop is sitting right there on the floor next to the bed. He nodded in that direction, at least he thought it was her laptop, it looked like some small light was blinking from beneath a discarded blouse.

Grab them both. Marik said emptying another drawer, one filled with socks and panties.

Gaerik’s heavy boots thudded along the hardwood floor of the bedroom as he tossed the blouse aside and yanking the charger cord out of the wall, wrapping them around his hand. Anything else of any value she might want from here? He looked at his brother as he tucked the computer under his arm. 

I don’t think so. Clothes, things she works with, he paused to nod at the laptop. She already has her photographs at home. Hopefully when she wakes up she can keep her mind busy with this stuff. Marik had his doubts though, what if when she woke up she ran as far away from them as she possibly could? Changed her name, moved to Paris or something. Writers went to Europe for inspiration, didn’t they? Elle was a smart woman, she could find a way to leave all of this behind her and he felt that if she did, somehow, she would take a part of him with her. He could feel the bond growing stronger and stronger each time he looked upon her sleeping face, laying bundled beneath the covers in his bed. He didn’t want to lose her, even if she chose to sleep and never open her eyes to see the world again, Marik wanted to keep her.

Playing ‘guardian’ to her isn’t going to keep me away from her. Gaerik said breaking through his brother’s thoughts.

What? He snapped.

I know what you’re doing. You’re falling in love with her. 

That’s ridiculous. Marik said, zipping up the duffle bag and slinging the strap over his shoulder quickly.

Is it? Gaerik said stepping in front of the door way to stop his brother from blowing past him. You’ve slept in the same bed with her every night since we brought her back, you barely leave her side. You’re falling for her.

Well, so what if I am? You want her so fucking bad? Maybe you should have walked up to her like a normal person and introduced yourself. You do it easily enough in bars and everywhere else you pick up women, including my god damn office, Gaerik. Just because I don’t want to kill you anymore does not mean the boards been wiped clean. You’re my brother and I know the games that you play. You will toy with her and then toss her aside when you’ve satisfied your thirst. Marik spoke, his icy blues glowing electric as he looked his twin in the eyes.

You don’t know that Marik. I found her because of what she was writing. She drew me to her just like she drew you in when you came looking for me. Gaerik snarled before turning from the door way. She’ll make the decision, but you can’t keep me away from her, I’ll make damn sure of that.

Marik fumed from behind him as they left the house, tossing the bag into the back of the Range Rover. 

The drive back was as silent as a tomb, Marik thinking of all the ways that Elle would be hurt if she ended up choosing his brother while Gaerik considered the ways that his brother would try to keep him away from her. He’d seen her first, which to him meant he at least deserved the chance to get to know her. Marik of course was right, he’d gone about Elle the completely wrong way and he could only assume that she’d forgiven him at least a little bit, at least from their small conversation the night they had officially met when she was bleeding out on the floor of that cabin. Watching her almost die had brought him to the realization that he might never have that chance, and he’d be damned if Marik was going to climb on his high horse and stop him, Alpha or not he couldn’t forbid him from seeing Elle and if he tried to make that choice he’d find a way to break the Alpha’s command. He usually did and his brother could well attest to that.

Gaerik was the first out of the truck when it stopped, having rode the entire way with Elle’s laptop in his lap and her cell phone in his pocket he walked inside of the house taking them into his father’s study. He needed to get away from his brother for a little while, some space to breath that didn’t feel like Marik was sitting there judging him for his past sins. Walking right out of the French doors he inhaled deeply before turning to the stump by the side of the house used for splitting firewood, they would need it and it would allow him to take out the aggression that was simmering to its boiling point. Grabbing a log from the stacks he picked up the axe and swung, splitting the piece in half easily before picking up the fallen half and splitting it again before he began to take the quarters and toss them up by the door. 

Gallen could hear the twins had returned and neither seemed to be in a sociable mood. They had been like this since bringing Elle back to the house to heal. Snapping at each other, two dogs trying to go after the same bone and each time one got a little close the other would issue a warning growl. He was hardly the man to talk to them, this would only end when Elle woke up and made a choice, one or the other or neither one at all. They were continuing in such a way as if they knew how Elle felt for them. She didn’t know Gaerik and she had only just begun to know Marik during the ordeal that they had all gone through together. Sighing as he stepped out of the living room watching one depart through the French doors of the study out onto the side deck of the house and the other down the hall towards the kitchen with a bag in his hands. Perhaps this would be easier if their mother was still living but Gallen doubted it. He was all thumbs in these matters. He’d loved one woman all his life and when she passed away he saw no other women, no one ever compared to his true mate but it left him pause to wonder if perhaps a female’s touch would have helped the twins growing up.

Making his way down the hall into the kitchen the basement door was open, following his sons path Gallen paused inside of the finished basement and found Marik loading the washing machine, stuffing too much clothes in at once. Yes, in need of a woman’s touch.

If you overload it son those won’t get clean. Gallen offered from behind him.

Marik flinched somewhat at the voice before he half turned, looking at his father for a second before he began to remove a few items from the load, tossing them into a basket before he turned, pressing the heels of his hands down into the washing machine for a moment. 

He’s testing you... Gallen said after a few seconds of silence.

He can’t have her. He was stalking her for Christ sake. If all this hadn’t happened...what would he have done?

You still think the worst of him? Gallen asked folding his arms over his chest.

It’s not that. Gaerik isn’t a killer but he is a womanizer. She deserves better than that, I’m not saying I am the man for it but...I don’t want to give him the chance to use her. Marik released a sigh as he poured detergent into the washing machine and set it on gentle.

I think you should at least allow your brother to rise to the occasion, he was chasing after her just as hard as you were. I’m not saying that you should bow out of the dance son, but...trust your brother to make the right decision and trust Elle enough to make her own choices.

Marik knew that his father was right, he always was and there wasn’t an ounce of advice that he’d given him in all his life that hadn’t helped him, even when he didn’t want to embrace it. Punching the button on the washing machine now was one of those times when he didn’t want to acknowledge that his father was right even as his words rang true.

***

The axe whistled through the air as Gaerik swung free from his shoulder once more, another piece of pulverized wood splintered free from its twin and landed in the snow. Bending down Gaerik picked it up, the wind carrying the scent of a mutt coming closer.

Straightening up he watched as three of them walked through the tree line and came to a stop there, assessing him. They didn’t look very old and as he took in their appearance he knew that two of them were bite ins; Gaerik had never seen two of them, one of them he knew from the pack, but the other two were dark beneath the eyes, a trimmer in their limbs as if the moon itself was calling to them and they weren’t fully prepared for the beast that was raging inside of them howling for release. Gaerik knew that feeling, he’d been told to control it all his life.

We’ve come to deliver a message. the taller of the three said, he was a pack member, he was born a wolf and therefore he felt he had seniority over the two other boys.

Yeah, and what would that be? Gaerik asked, swinging the axe, the blade embedded into the stump.

Show him, Bryson. The spokesmen said, nodding towards the largest of the three. Two brunettes and one blonde; the single blonde was Bryson and as Gaerik watched, he removed his shirt, none out of the trio were wearing any jackets, their hot-blooded nature kept them safe from the cold. Canting his head to the side slowly Gaerik wasn’t at all impressed as Bryson shifted.

That’s real nice training your dogs to shift on command but I’ve seen all that before. Gaerik smirked, reaching up and ripping his shirt open and roaring as his canines elongated. Bryson charged at him quickly, crossing the distance. Gaerik grabbed him by the muzzle, snapping his jaw in two before dropping his body into the snow.

Would you like to try that one more time? 

Gallen’s head turned, listening up the stairs for a moment.

‘It would seem we have some visitors." He spoke, straightening his shirt collar before he turned motioning his son along behind him as he moved up the stairs from the basement and into the kitchen to exit the back door. By the sound of it, Gaerik had already taken care of one of them, he could smell blood—blood that he knew was not his sons.

Rounding the house Gaerik was on his feet, there was also a dead mutt at his feet, it’s jaw cracked in two.

What is all this? Gallen asked moved across the hard-packed snow to stand beside his son as Marik came out of the French doors to flank.

The Council wants you, dead or alive. 

That isn’t necessarily a message that needed to be delivered in person. I’m already very aware of what the council wants. Gallen said. I can only assume you...two were supposed to come to deliver more than a simple message.

You’re smart for an old man. The spokesman said with a shrug.

The Council is sorely mistaken if they think that we’ll bend to the knee for them. Marik spoke, from between his father and twin, sizing up the two remaining wolves standing a mere ten feet away from them.

It’s already been put to a vote. The other wolf said before the spokesman could open his mouth.

A vote. Gaerik laughed suddenly, flicking blood from his hands. Well, isn’t that diplomatic of them. He snarled.

Are you boys sure you want to go ahead with this suicide mission? Gallen said then, looking to the teenagers, the couldn’t have been older than nineteen. They were just pups, and the Council had sent them here to carry out a mission that they had to know they weren’t going to survive.

The two boys seemed to look at one another, then their fallen comrade who was lying on the ground. They had been led to believe that this would be an easy win for them, a chance to go out and stretch their muscles, show the Council what they could do, but now it was just the two of them against three werewolves. Bryson tasted the moon for the first time only last month, Barron as well. Corey was the only one, the spokesman, who was born a wolf. They could fight and maybe they would win, but if they turned and fled with their tails between their legs, Richard would surely have them killed for coming back empty handed.

Corey pressed his knuckles into the palm of his hand, the crackling filling the silence of the woods as the clan’s charged towards each other.

***

Unknown to the rest of the council, Richard had been biting young man whom he found had more brute strength than they had brains. One, sometimes three a month. Not all of them survived the bite, some didn’t make it through the first shift, but those that did he found he could use. They turned on the first full moon and Richard was there to greet them into this new and glorious life. Richard had just unintentionally proven the point that he had been trying to prove all along, they’re bloodlines were weakening under the establishment of a council.

The uprising of a new order, an order to go back to their old ways had come about almost by accident. Himself and Jamal had spent an afternoon heatedly debating with the council upon the fact that their numbers were dwindling. With each year families either moved away or it was found that through inbreeding their own children did not possess the specific genetic make-up that made them what they were. More wolves were marrying outside of the pack, to humans and while it wasn’t unheard of it was becoming more and more common and the gene pool itself was shrinking every year. Like some Indian tribes, Richard was suggesting that it was made law that you could not marry outside of the ‘tribe’ as it were. Jamal thought this was a cruel and ridiculous idea though he couldn’t dispute the evidence before him. Richard had verbally flayed the boy, afterwards feeling he needed to apologize. He was after all still an outsider to them, an accident and he had not grown up in this life. Together they went to a bar and drank themselves stupid but it was in that drunken rambling that the truth had come out. Jamal was not an outsider to the packs, he was one of those genetic mishaps. A human born from werewolves whom the gene had not been passed on to. 

It was several weeks before Richard was given the entire story, but once he knew he saw an opportunity. Jamal had come into their ranks and gotten close to the wolves themselves and was cunning enough to orchestrate his being turned, he also had a healthy hatred for the Chaliceman family. Now, he had to consider if he were Jamal he would have felt the same way. Richard had found a weak link in the chain that was the Chaliceman family. Lucian had founded the council after Jamal’s pack had brought war straight to their doorstep and now, the New York pack itself would have a hand in finishing the Chaliceman bloodline.

Richard didn’t foresee the girl or the fact that she would somehow come to play such a large part in the changing of all their lives though it didn’t matter. If she stood with the Chaliceman family she would be a problem, one that needed to be taken care of and soon enough would be just like the rest of them.

He’d send an army and smoke them out.

CHAPTER TWO

The dim haze of the tree line was just before her as she ran through the knee-deep snow drifts that blocked her progress. Elle had to make it too the house but the beast, no doubt was only inches away from nipping at her heels and taking her back to his den of tortures, Elle was sure of it, she would have bet her life on it but under the wheezing of her lungs begging for mercy she no longer heard its growls, the thunder of its paws meeting with the snow packed earth. 

Struggling to take a full breath she took a chance and glanced behind her but only her own clumsy path was visible. Could it be that she had lost him or was he lurking in the darkness that surrounded her, just waiting for her to think that she was safe if even just for a moment. Hot water was running from her nose, Elle slowly brought the sleeve of her shirt