Hunted Promises (Cider Falls Shifters Book Four)

By R.E. Butler

Hyena-warlock hybrid Trace Powell met his truemate in a beautiful Hunter. The problem? She doesn’t want anything to do with him. He’d never been sure that he’d get a truemate being a hybrid. But now that he knows where she is and that she doesn’t want him? It’s hell on earth.

Shifter Hunter Jewel Hastings thought the hardest thing she’d ever done was walk away from her truemate Trace for her job and her family. But after the Federal Shifter Alliance discovers she helped a hybrid female on the run, she’s lost everything, including her family. Now, she has to go back to Cider Falls with her tail between her legs and ask to join their pack. She’ll have to face Trace and explain why she chose to walk away from him, knowing full well that he was her other half.

Can Trace and Jewel find common ground despite their rocky start? Or will the danger lurking in the shadows of Cider Falls be the end of everything?

• Language: English
• Publisher: R.E. Butler
• Release date: Nov 4, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005095444

R.E. Butler

A Midwesterner by birth, R.E. spent much of her childhood rewriting her favorite books to include herself as the main character. Later, she graduated on to writing her own books after "retiring" from her day job as a secretary to become a stay-at-home mom.When not playing with her kids, wrestling her dogs out the door, or cooking dinner for her family, you'll find her typing furiously and growling obscenities to the characters on the screen.Her best-selling series Wiccan-Were-Bear, The Necklace Chronicles, Hyena Heat, Wilde Creek, Were-Zoo, Arctic Shifters, Norlanian Brides, Saber Chronicles, and Ashland Pride are available now.

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Hunted Promises (Cider Falls Shifters Book Four)

By R. E. Butler

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Excerpt from Deceptive Promises

Other Books by R. E. Butler

About the Author

Copyright

Chapter One

Trace Powell gave his hyena a mental shake as he stood behind the bar of Brewz and wiped glasses. Busywork was not his favorite thing, but he had to keep active to stop his beast from laying waste to everything around him in his fury.

Last night.

Fuck, had it only been one night? Less than twenty-four hours since he’d faced off against five Hunters and discovered his mate was their leader?

It felt like an eternity had passed already, minute by painstaking minute.

Not too long ago, an exiled hybrid female came to Cider Falls for sanctuary and had wound up mated to the town’s twin mechanics. Willow, Gunner, and Archer had tried to have a happily ever after, but Hunters working for the Federal Shifter Alliance—the FSA—had been tracking the female for seven years, since she’d been exiled from her cougar pride by her asshole alpha. Hunters, traditionally, were virtual dogs with bones, mercilessly hunting their prey until they were caught and imprisoned for the crime of simply existing as a hybrid.

Trace was a hybrid himself—half hyena, half warlock. No one wanted him around—hyenas feared the warlock side of him, and warlocks didn’t like shifters. His mom’s hyena clan had allowed him to stay so long as he didn’t use his magic. Then he’d protected a female from harm with his magic and been immediately exiled. That was four years ago.

He’d found Cider Falls and joined up as second-in-command to Alpha Rehlik, a timber wolf shifter male who had a polar bear-red fox hybrid mate named Weylyn.

Cider Falls was an exile-welcome town, filled with purebreds, hybrids, and humans.

It had been a haven when he’d lost everything with his exile. Now, though, after meeting his mate and watching her walk away from him, well, it felt like a damn prison.

Jewel was not only a purebred bear, she was also a Hunter for the FSA.

There was no one way in hell that she’d accept him as her mate. Many purebreds disliked hybrids.

And no one liked warlocks except other warlocks.

Trace? Earth to Trace.

He nearly dropped the mug he was wiping, catching it before it smashed on the floor. Sorry, what?

Jair, a tiger-wolf hybrid, was standing at the counter. Can I get a pitcher?

Sure thing.

Trace put the mug away and grabbed a pitcher from the shelf.

You look like you’ve got a lot on your mind.

He very much didn’t want to discuss his crappy personal life. What would he say anyway? Yep, it’s hard as hell to be me, a hybrid who knows his mate is out there, but she doesn’t want anything to do with me.

Jair’s mate, Genesis, was a purebred lynx and was exiled for refusing to mate with a male her father chose.

Switching the topic, Trace said, How’s Genesis and your baby? Little Maya was the darling of the pack.

Jair beamed, his face the picture of fatherly joy.

It made Trace’s heart ache.

They’re both great, thanks.

Trace set the pitcher in front of Jair. I’m glad to hear it. Can I get you anything else?

Jair tilted his head. I was really sorry to hear about what happened last night.

Keeping his face carefully blank, Trace shrugged. I’m used to life sucker punching me. It is what it is.

Jair opened his mouth, and Trace put his hand up. He didn’t want or need anyone’s sympathy.

Jair nodded, thanked him for the pitcher, and headed back to his table where his fellow landscapers were seated.

Pressing the heels of his hands to his eyes, Trace exhaled slowly. Then he got back to work. What he didn’t want to do was wallow in pity because it was useless. The beautiful Jewel was long gone back to her job and family and probably hadn’t given him another thought. Why would she, anyway? She was a purebred and a Hunter, the echelon of their people.

He was an outsider, and dangerous to boot.

Putting thoughts of the female he would never have out of his mind, he turned his attention back to straightening up the bar and attending to the customers. It was going to be a long night.

Chapter Two

Jewel Hastings tossed and turned, flapping the sheet off and on her legs, first hot and then cold, and then hot again.

Her bear roared in her head, demanding to go back to Cider Falls immediately and find her truemate, but Jewel was one hundred percent not doing that.

It wasn’t that she didn’t think he was her mate because she knew he was. Seeing him on the side of the road, his warlock power arcing like purple lightning over his hands, had been the most incredible thing she’d ever witnessed. He was gorgeous and powerful, a mixture of hyena and one of the most feared supernatural creatures.

Walking away from him had been the most difficult thing she’d ever done in her life, but she’d had no choice.

She was a purebred black bear and a Hunter. Purebreds simply didn’t cavort with hybrids, particularly not warlock ones.

Mating him would mean the end of all she held dear, all she’d worked for since joining the FSA six years earlier, not to mention her family.

With a frustrated groan, she sat up and swung her legs around, then reached for her phone.

It was eleven p.m. She’d gone to bed early because she’d slept like shit the night before after returning late from Cider Falls.

At work that morning, she’d filled out her report and then waited to hear from her supervisor.

The call had come in a half-hour before her workday was done. Her supervisor, Bart, had told her there was going to be a formal investigation into her report and she was on desk duty until the investigation was finished, which could be a few days or a few weeks.

Putting her phone on the nightstand, she got up and used the bathroom, then went into the kitchen to get something cold to drink.

She lived in an apartment given to her by the FSA as part of her employment package. The one-bedroom was spacious, and she had a balcony off the family room that overlooked a stand of pine trees. After grabbing a bottle of kiwi-strawberry flavored water from the fridge, she headed toward the sliding door to get some fresh air.

She paused as she passed her laptop bag.

She shouldn’t.

Nope.

She took another step, but then turned. It wouldn’t hurt to look him up, right?

Well, it was possibly the stupidest thing she could do right now, but what was one more on top of the shit-sundae that was her current situation?

Sitting on the couch, she took her laptop from the bag and pressed the power button. It booted swiftly.

She logged into the Hunter’s main site and pulled her information on Cider Falls. Hovering her fingertip over the button to open the file on Trace Powell, she inhaled deeply and pressed it.

The file opened, with a scanned picture of Trace that was several years old. It had most likely been taken when he was exiled. His alpha would’ve sent the picture and his personal details to the FSA so he could be tracked. Exiled shifters had seventy-two hours to align themselves with another shifter group, or they were added to the most-wanted list and hunted down like prey.

She felt like she was looking right at him through the screen. He didn’t look sad so much as resigned to his fate.

Dark hair, dark eyes, sexy mouth.

The male was the very definition of temptation and the only male who had ever made her bear sit up and take notice.

Scanning the page, she read the brief synopsis of his exile. He’d been told by his alpha to never use his warlock power on penalty of exile. During a hunt, a female hyena had been cornered by natural wolves. Trace had used his power to save her life, and he’d been punished for the good deed by being marked with a magical brand and sent off on his own.

Some alphas were good, like Rehlik the Cider Falls one, who loved his people and fought for them.

Some alphas were assholes, like Trace’s. How could someone punish another for doing something that saved a life?

It boggled the mind.

The file was short on Trace. He’d settled in Cider Falls within twenty-four hours and taken over the second-in-command spot.

She closed the file and shut her laptop.

She was in hell, but it was a hell of her own design. She’d been tracking an exiled hybrid named Willow for six years. She’d gotten a tip that Willow was in Cider Falls, and sure enough, she had been. Then Trace had come out of nowhere and accused Jewel of splitting up mates and generally being a terrible person. She’d still cuffed the female and hauled her away, but she hadn’t gotten far.

Her bear wouldn’t be quiet.

She’d ordered the Hunters with her to return to the bar where they’d found the female. Jewel spoke to Rehlik about her change of heart and altered the FSA file on Willow to show that she’d gone from her former clan to an exile-welcome commune in Florida before joining with the Cider Falls pack. Then Trace had used his warlock powers to remove the memory of finding Willow from the minds of the other Hunters.

Willow was no longer on the FSA’s most-wanted list.

But now Jewel was under investigation, which meant one of two things: Trace’s memory spell failed and the other Hunters told the investigators all she’d done,