The Hunters: Byron and Kit Read online

  THE HUNTERS: BYRON AND KIT

  An Ellora’s Cave Publication, May 2004

  Ellora’s Cave Publishing, Inc.

  PO Box 787

  Hudson, OH 44236-0787

  ISBN MS Reader (LIT) ISBN # 1-84360-934-7

  Other available formats (no ISBNs are assigned):

  Adobe (PDF), Rocketbook (RB), Mobipocket (PRC) & HTML

  THE HUNTERS: BYRON AND KIT © 2004 SHILOH WALKER

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part without permission.

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. They are productions of the authors’ imagination and used fictitiously.

  Edited by Pamela Campbell.

  Cover art by Darrell King.

  The Hunters:

  Byron and Kit

  Shiloh Walker

  Dedication

  To my editor Pam, the Wondrous One.

  To my kids Cam and Jess—my world revolves around you two. I love you both.

  And to my husband Jerry. My real life fantasy… I love you.

  Prologue

  Byron stared down at the pain-racked body of Kristof Beauchamp and wasn’t sure if he could fight off his rage much longer. The man responsible was in this house and Byron would see to it that he paid. But his duty, through friendship, was here, by his dying friend’s side.

  “Katrine…will you take care of her? So young, she is, and now alone…”

  Byron held tight to Kristof’s hand and broke a promise. The Inherent was so battered in body, so injured—the vampire doubted the shifter would even notice. As Byron slid inside and separated the pain from the man, Kris was able to breathe and think without the pain caused by the silver and poison.

  “I’ll take care of the girl as though she were my own,” Byron promised, smoothing back Kris’s sweat-tangled hair. The air stank of the poison that was eating through Kris’s body and Byron shoved his fury under control again. Wolfsbane…the poison served only one purpose, and it was exactly what it sounded like. It had been put inside a hollow silver bullet that had exploded on impact with Kris’s body and even now was eating away at him like acid.

  “She will not be a girl always. What then?” Kris asked, his accent thick with his weariness.

  “I’ll see to it that Kit has everything her heart desires,” Byron promised. “She will want for nothing.”

  Kris laughed, and when he did blood leaked from his mouth. “My Bella is telling me…da, you had best remember that. Kit will want what she wants. Da.” His combined French and Russian upbringing made his accent, at times, difficult to understand. Bella? The lady had died in childbirth three years earlier. “Ah, my Bella. I see you now. But Katrine. To leave her, my bebè, my heart breaks.”

  “Go to Bella,” Byron whispered roughly, feeling tears sting his eyes. He could hear the baby crying. The hearing of an Inherent child was sharp, and she had heard her father. One of his people should have taken her away. They’d be lucky if heads didn’t roll for letting the baby be upset this way.

  “I will take care of Kit, I promise. I will do everything in my power to see her happy.”

  Chapter One

  Twenty-four years later…

  Kit tapped her pen on the table and stared at the disheveled woman in front of her. “I warned you, Melissa. Byron doesn’t like women placing themselves naked in his bed unless he invites them. He chooses his women and his feeding companions. If he sent you away, then it is your fault. I am not intervening for you,” Kit said wearily.

  How many times before had she done this? Of course, Byron didn’t exactly help much. He had been known to walk into a room and just take one of the women by the hand and lead her away without even speaking a word. The sexual pull a vampire exuded was always intensified after he’d touched one particular woman, and for a little while Melissa had been his favorite. Byron’s call seemed to be rather strong for a vampire who was just over a century old, but then, Kit had only known a few. She was very drawn to Byron, so maybe she wasn’t the best of judges.

  Melissa sat staring at Kit with heartbroken eyes.

  Kit hated her. Not for any particular reason. Melissa was nice, pretty, she had a sweet heart, she was sharp, and she had been through a rough time, otherwise she wouldn’t be here.

  A Hunter’s home tended to be a fortress on the outside, but the inside where the Hunter brought people when he wasn’t sure what else to do with them, held a veritable enclave of wounded souls.

  Enclave—that was what they were—an enclave. Made up of the warriors who surrounded the outside and protected the vampire during the day while he slept, and those who acted as food and sex partners while he was awake.

  Byron had brought Melissa here three years ago. For a year, she hadn’t been able to even look at another person without fear in her eyes. She had moved past that. In the second year, she had learned that she could take care of herself, and in the third, Byron had taken her into his bed.

  That was why Kit hated her.

  And Byron, being the bastard he was, had even made sure Kit saw it. She had walked into his office thinking he had business to discuss, and instead she had been audience to a blowjob. Granted, somebody had given her the wrong fucking time. He had wanted to talk to her in a couple of hours, but for crying out loud.

  Well, it really wasn’t his fault.

  She could still remember it, how Melissa had sucked on Byron’s cock, and how much Kit wanted to be the one doing it. Byron had opened his eyes—he had known she was there—and glared at her. “Do you mind, Kit?”

  “Not at all, Byron. I like to watch,” she had drawled. Well, she hadn’t ever really watched anything like that before, but she hadn’t really been able to leave either. Her eyes were drawn to the length of his cock as Melissa slid her lips up and down, pulling back to stare at Kit with wide eyes before resuming what looked to be a very pleasant task.

  His fangs flashed and she suspected part of him wanted to tell her to get the fuck out. But another part was aroused. He had gripped Melissa head’s tightly and started to rock his hips faster, forcing his cock farther and harder into her mouth until he came. Kit’s sharp sense of smell caught it in the air and she stared at him, so hot she burned.

  He’d made his human pass out. “That’s the bad thing about humans, Byron. They just can’t handle as much,” Kit said, tsking a little, clucking false sympathy.

  That was when things had started to change, at least on his end.

  Things had been changing on her end for a long time. Byron was her soul mate. She knew it. She had told him so when she was nineteen, which had been a mistake. Apparently. He had taken her for a love-struck kid and he had laughed, patted her on the head, and sent her off to college. Six years ago. And she still felt the same.

  After her little peep show, Byron had gone out of his way to antagonize her, and she couldn’t figure out if he was angry at her or trying to tease her. He was so…skilled with women, but he was acting so crudely toward her. He was her boss, signed her paychecks, but he was also her Master. She had gone into service to a Hunter, and sworn to abide by the Council law. That meant something, damn it. She not only was a Hunter in her own right, she was his first Lieutenant, his guard, his servant, the highest honor a Master vampire could afford a member of his enclave.

  Kit guarded him while he slept; she ran the household and his people while he was away.

  She owed fealty to him until she decided that she was going to leave, or he decided to send her away. It was still her decision—although one hundred years ago, it wouldn’t have been. A hundred years ago, she would have been Byron’s until he was tire
d of her, or until she died. The Council had changed things. She would have to appeal to them and they would allow her to leave, providing she did things appropriately. All she had to do was state her case, basically her unhappiness with the situation, and they would let her leave. The Council didn’t like any of their people being unhappy.

  Kit just couldn’t seem to make herself do it. Yet.

  But, for now, he was her Master. Although she was not subservient, if he gave her an order, she must follow. She was not a slave. She actually had a position of power in his enclave. All obeyed her as they obeyed him. Nobody could question her orders, for her orders came from Byron. She acted as his second, and if she expected others to follow his orders, then so must she.

  So when he sent for her, she went, even though she knew what she was walking into. It had been Byron and Benjamin Cross, his other lieutenant—a very mysterious, unusually powerful were—who were fucking Melissa. Benjamin was buried to his balls in her pussy, and Byron—oh, hell—he was bent over her and thrusting deep inside her ass.

  The blonde was screaming with delirious pleasure and Kit hated her. She stood staring at them, unable to speak, but unable to leave until Byron gave her permission. And what she wanted was to rip the bitch away and take her place.

  She had strolled over to a chair and flopped into it, sliding her hand inside her panties and starting to rub her clit, meeting Byron’s eyes over the bodies of the others. Bastard, she had mouthed at him, as she stroked and massaged.

  If she closed her eyes—her mental powers were strong enough—she was almost able to imagine it was her they were fucking. But just almost. After all, Kit was still a virgin. She had never even had sex, much less the pleasure of a threesome.

  Chapter Two

  Byron heard Melissa crying in Kit’s office, and he fought the urge to break the door down and drag the little bitch out. She had been flaunting herself in Kit’s face for weeks. Had she thought he hadn’t seen it? The bitch went around whispering that ‘the little bitch dog was in love with the Master’ but that he only wanted her.

  He had wanted her, for a little while.

  But he craved Kit.

  Kit thought he was blind as well. He knew how she thought she felt. She was still a child though, and she hadn’t really experienced life outside his territory. How could she know if she was in love with him? Even when he had sent her off to college, she had done it in her own way. She had completed in less than thirty months the courses it normally takes four years to do. She had stalked back up to the house one late summer night, on a full moon, wearing that beautiful wolven form. She had thrown back her head and bayed at the moon, and she had been laughing at him.

  But he had made a promise that she would have what she wanted, and he wasn’t it. No matter how much he might want to be.

  The tiny little dark-haired child had grown into a woman he wanted more than he wanted to see another sunrise. After more than a century of darkness, he would never have thought anything would beckon to him more than that. But if he could chose between being able to walk in daylight again without harm, or having one night with Kit?

  No contest.

  He forced himself to walk past Kit’s door.

  She would handle it. She handled everything. Every fucking thing he threw at her. And he hated himself more each fucking day. He kept waiting for her to grow tired of the orders, the commands, but she never did. She never told him to shove it, never once threatened to walk. He kept waiting to hear that she had petitioned the council to revoke her pledge to him, kept waiting to see her walk out the door. He wouldn’t even be surprised to see an older Hunter come to claim her, even though he would fight to the death before he allowed it.

  He kept waiting for her to leave him.

  That was what he needed her to do.

  He didn’t have the strength to make her leave.

  And she was so fucking stubborn.

  Byron remembered every challenge he had thrown at her, the most recent was when she had walked in knowing full well that he was fucking Melissa. He had expected her to rage and storm out, giving him reason to rant and rave at her for not following orders. Something to anger her, maybe drive her away. Instead she had settled down and started to masturbate, staring at him all the while. He drove himself harder into Melissa’s butt, imagined it was Kit’s and watched the movement of her fingers in her panties, smelling her arousal in the air over that of Melissa’s and Ben’s.

  That had been a month ago.

  And it had been that episode that had pushed Melissa over the edge. Melissa hadn’t realized Byron had sent for Kit just to taunt and torment her. She had rolled from the bed, furious as Kit hummed and pleasured herself. The ignorant little blonde had even tried to launch herself at Kit but Ben had caught her around the waist, while Byron flopped onto his back, still hard and aching, and watched Kit.

  Melissa saw the look on his face and fumed.

  Ben dragged her out of the room just as Kit erupted into her own hand with a cry. Byron slid from the bed, crossed the room and took her hand, unable to stop himself, lapping her sweet cream and burying his face between her thighs. Shoving her skirt high and ripping her panties away, he licked her folds, suckling her clit, and taking her into another orgasm before he moved to the fold between her groin and thigh and pierced her flesh to feed.

  Her blood pooled in his belly, hot, potent and sweet, and he shuddered. Byron was ready to stand and take her there when she suddenly struck out, cuffing him across the head, and rolling away from him.

  “Bastard,” she rasped out, her voice thick and husky.

  “Kit, I—”

  “You think I want you to touch me after you’ve just been fucking her?” she snarled, her dark gray eyes swirling like thunderheads in her dusky face. He moved toward her, the heady taste of her cream and blood lingering on his tongue, and he didn’t care about anything else. He couldn’t keep fighting this need he had for her—he just wanted to love her, to feed from her, to touch her.

  She moved away, wolf-quick.

  He shifted to mist and reformed just as she tried to leave the room and he grabbed her, pinned her by the door, catching her face and trying to kiss her. She jerked her face away and snarled at him, snapping at him with sharp teeth. She caught his chin hard enough to startle, and she used his surprise to move away.

  She shifted, her clothes falling to shreds around her as she changed from human to full-wolf form, not the half-wolven, half-human form she sometimes chose. She chose the wolf—the better to run with, my dear.

  And Byron had to watch as she ran away from him.

  He had stopped taunting her after that.

  Three days later, Melissa had started with her little petty tricks. It shouldn’t have angered him the way it did.

  But it was one thing for him to try to drive Kit away before he lost it.

  It was another for a woman he slept with to taunt her with that fact.

  He ignored it for three days, thinking she would grow weary of it. She did not. Then he thought Kit would take care of it. She did not. After it had continued for a week, he stepped in and told her it would stop or she would be sorry for it.

  Melissa had learned just how sorry when he had led her to her bedroom, tied her down, teased her to the point of excruciating pleasure, and then just walked away. It had been Kit who had dared to disobey him hours later by untying her. When Melissa had thrown herself at Byron, begging to know why he was angry, he had stared at her in dismay before he realized she was putting on a show, solely for Kit’s benefit.

  He hadn’t touched her since.

  Then last week she had placed her naked ass in his bed and now, a day before her time was up in his home, she was crying on Kit’s shoulder because she was getting kicked out. Byron was tired of her. And as always, Kit was handling the clean-up. He paused briefly, wondering if he should just take Melissa into town and give her some money and get her on a plane back to her hometown. But that would mean walking in and see
ing Kit.

  Kit.

  Damn it. He was losing it.

  He stalked out the door.

  He had a fucking job to do, and it didn’t include mooning over a sweet little shifter with eyes like storm clouds.

  By the time he returned that night, he had found the proof he needed to execute a feral vampire who had been running a human slavery ring. Well, slavery wasn’t a good word. What was? Fast food? Byron grimaced. His morbid sense of humor was growing worse the older he got.

  He heard a soft gasping cry and his cock hardened with need, his fangs dropping down in rage. That was Kit. If one of his men had dared to touch her—

  His ears pricked and he vaulted up the stairs before he realized he heard only one voice, one person breathing raggedly. His people were talking, some were sleeping, the low hum of conversation buzzing…but there was just one person in that room. Just one.

  He felt like a fucking pervert, but he shifted to mist anyway and moved to hover outside her window, where she couldn’t see him. She lay on her bed, ass up, while she rode a thick vibrator, quick and hard. He groaned, glad he made no sound in this form unless he chose to. Then he heard her cry out his name and shove her hand between her thighs, probably to massage her clit.

  Kit had never taken a lover while in his house. She most likely had in college…hell, she had been gone three years. And too many times, she had come home late from the few dates he had allowed her in high school, smelling of sweaty sex, semen, and teenage lust. The first time…he hadn’t been home, although he had earlier been pacing the porch and waiting. Benjamin had taken his stead and waited for her when one of the younger Hunters was hurt.

  By the look in Benjamin’s eyes when Byron arrived home, Byron had known simply not to ask. It had happened that night, he suspected. Though she was washed and bathed by the time he saw her the following night, something that damn well hid the evidence, her eyes flashed and sparkled and she blushed at any mention of her date.