Hunter

  This man was meant to change her life for all time.

  He smiled down at her before he lurched to his feet and, using their still joined hands, yanked her up out of the mud. He pulled until she slammed into his huge body, wet sticking to wet, the soaked silk of her dress completely useless and rendering her practically naked as it clung to every chilled curve of her body, outlining the shaped satin and lace of her bra and panties as she shivered like a drowned rat against him.

  He held their joined hands between their bodies, their mingling blood running wet with the icy water and the mud sluicing down their forearms. His opposite arm, still bearing the blade in hand, wrapped around her waist and drew her very tightly against him.

  “Now we will see what we will see, Tatyana Petrova,” he said in a low, rough tone of voice. The remark was ominous at best, but Tatyana was surprisingly unafraid within the circle of his secure arms. She looked up at him, her body shaking and her teeth chattering, and when she met those mystically bright eyes, she realized that her life had just changed irrevocably....

  OTHER BOOKS BY JACQUELYN FRANK

  The Nightwalkers

  Jacob

  Gideon

  Elijah

  Damien

  Noah

  Adam

  The Shadowdwellers

  Ecstasy

  Rapture

  Pleasure

  The Gatherers

  Hunting Julian

  Stealing Kathryn

  Drink of Me

  Hunter

  JAX

  eKENSINGTON

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  This man was meant to change her life for all time.

  OTHER BOOKS BY JACQUELYN FRANK

  Title Page

  Prologue

  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

  Charter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Epilogue

  Copyright Page

  Prologue

  It had been ten years.

  He turned his face up toward the night sky, feeling the sharp cold of winter across his skin, seeking the kiss of the moon as its thin light shone through the veil of clouds skimming its surface. Frost coated the hardened ground; every step he took crunching into dormant grasses and autumn’s discarded leaves as he moved deeper into the woodlands. There was no snow, neither fresh nor old. Not unheard of, but rare for this time of year. He wondered if it had snowed at all this season yet.

  He didn’t guard his steps, the feeling of being on home soil relaxing his normal vigilance. The vibration of his power and presence brought nature to awareness, rippling through it in some ways, meshing with it in others; as foreign to it as it was familiar.

  At last, he spied the breach between the two slanted oaks that marked the clearing. When he stepped between the thick trunks of these two old sentries, he saw the lone willow in the center of the uneven terrain of the clearing, and he felt his heartbeat quicken in anticipation. After all, it had been a decade since he’d last seen the Blessing Tree. A decade too long.

  Oh, how he had missed this place!

  The magnificent old tree whispered of its ancient power, tantalizing him with its hum of familiarity and homecoming. This was the center of his world. It had been since he was only seventeen. His blood stained the bark of the old willow, and so did the blood of his family. He had roamed very far from this core place, but distance had never changed the fact that his roots were here, just as much as the old willow’s were.

  It had been the agony within his family, caused by his very presence, which had driven him to abandon his home. He had been in pain, blinded by anger and guilt. All of the turbulent emotions young men are prone to succumbing to. Those feelings had spurred his decision to leave. Even now, years later, the hurt still lingered in his slightly tarnished spirit.

  He moved closer to the old tree, the ground lumpy now with the running of its massive root system. Its gnarled trunk shone silvery luminescent in the frail moonlight, even through the curtain of thin, naked branches. He passed through them and headed farther in.

  When he reached the base of the Blessing Tree, he carefully stepped up the steep knots of inclining roots. He touched the light gray of the bark, watching the weak moonlight dance with dappled patterns over the back of his hand. His palm warmed and prickled, the energy of the tree flowing through him. He couldn’t help the deep sigh that rushed out of him as he was infused through every cell with the blessing and wisdom of the august tree. It swept away all the remnants of poorly managed emotions, lingering bitterness, and the disappointments of the past, giving much needed succor. His mind and heart cleared, his pulse pounded with joy.

  He was home at last.

  Chapter One

  Tatyana Petrova bent her head forward and banged her forehead on the upper rim of her steering wheel.

  “This isn’t happening to me,” she announced to the quickly chilling interior of her car. “This is the sort of thing that happens to stupid, unprepared women. You see,” she explained, “I’m neither stupid nor unprepared. Therefore, logic dictates that this isn’t happening to me.”

  She reached for her key, confident that her speech would make all the difference in the world. It turned in the ignition ... and a nifty little click echoed into the car. This was followed by immediate, deafening, highly discouraging silence. Tatyana growled with disgust and yanked the useless key from the ignition of what had always been the most incredibly reliable automotive companion she had ever owned. She loved her car. From its multi-disc CD player to its in-dash hands-free cell phone, and even its cup holder that fit perfectly around her favorite cup.

  “I have triple A. I have a cell phone. I even know how to change a damn tire!” She made an exaggerated sound of frustration. “But of course I can’t get a cell signal in the middle of nowhere because I’m surrounded by mountains, and I don’t have a flat tire!”

  Tatyana sighed, laying her head back on the headrest. She cast a mean look at the cell phone on the passenger seat, and then decided it was time to end her temper tantrum. She was a modern gal and she could handle any crisis. It was just that she needed about five minutes of woe-is-me, PMS-worthy despair before she took action. Scooping up the phone and shoving it in her bag, she swung herself out of the car and marched back to the trunk. After popping it open, she rummaged around in her gym bag until she found her sneakers. She traded her heels for them, sliding her stocking feet easily into the Nikes. Granted, it didn’t make a fashion statement when she was wearing a designer silk dress in shocking red that sparkled with a light dusting of glitter, but she wasn’t about to trek up and down mountain roads in spiky leather stilettos just because they looked good. It was bad enough she had chosen a fringed shawl for a wrap and was likely to freeze her butt off by the time she found a working phone.

  And that wasn’t even the worst of it.

  No, the worst of it was that her best friend, her confidant, the man she adored and loved most in the world ... was going to kill her. Possibly even literally. She sighed as she slammed the trunk shut, then shivered.

  “Happy freakin’ New Year!” she cheered to
herself, watching her breath cloud ominously in the air.

  She was supposed to be in Manhattan at one of the swankiest New Year’s parties in town. The firm she worked for was notorious for going all out, reserving the entire Panorama Grill, the restaurant at the top of the building she worked in. There was also the minor technicality that it was considered very bad form by your bosses if you didn’t show up at the year-end party. Promotions could be gained or lost at this event based solely on appearances.

  But was she making a fabulous impression on her bosses like she was supposed to? Nooo. Of course not. Here she was, her car broken down in the back of beyond with her unhappily freezing her cha-chas off, all for the sake of a beloved brother who was going to murder her for the effort.

  “Dimitre, I love you very much and I know you are worth this, but why in hell did you have to move to this scene straight out of Deliverance? God, I can’t see a single light anywhere.” She turned herself in a complete circle, to no avail. If the skyline around her was any indication, she was currently in a valley and the Catskills surrounded her with their sparsely populated mountain faces. “Well, at least the roads are paved and I don’t hear any banjos in the distance,” she quipped to herself as she shouldered her purse and began to trek off in the direction she’d been headed.

  It was really her only choice. Tatyana was closer to where her brother lived than the nearest town, so it just made sense to keep going.

  “And someone should have warned me about the sucky cell phone reception out here. I can’t believe that, with what I pay for this phone, I can’t even get a signal in an emergency. Now, here I am, a stranded woman marching down a spooky, remote road with no one to hear me scream. I’m in a damned plot for a B horror flick!”

  Tatyana kept marching down said remote road at full steam, promising an ignorant Dimitre that he would be very sorry if his sister met a gruesome death by chainsaw. Of course, at the rate she was talking to herself, and considering her present frame of mind, maybe she’d be picking up her own chainsaw.

  If she could only find a hardware store.

  “Annali, love, what are you doing?”

  Annali waved off the taunting query with a graceful hand, the filmy material of her blouse fluttering like the petals of a lavender orchid around her wrist. The romantic cuffs at the ends of the snug sleeves made for an incongruous picture as she leaned over a massive worktable, one that was cluttered to the very edges with a hundred or more labeled bottles and pouches filled with all manner of curiosities. Adjoining tables held burners, sinks, a heavy mortar and pestle of marble, and a network of beakers, flasks, and distillery equipment. She toiled over all of these while dressed in an outfit spun of the finest silk, yet she hadn’t even bothered to don an apron to protect her blouse or skirt.

  She was clearly in the middle of something complex. Her right hand was toying with a strand of pearls at her throat in a rapid, absent gesture, while the notebook she was scrawling in was filled nearly corner to corner with notations by her left hand.

  Only half of her hair, a myriad sandy blond tones, remained swept up into its original coiffure; the other half was a tumble of wayward curls that bounced happily on her shoulders at their parole from the severe upsweep. She was missing one of her shoes, her bare foot swinging in tempo to some internal beat only she could hear. She had a smudge of ink on her cheek that had an eerie Rorschach effect when stared at too long.

  “Stop hovering, Ryce,” she scolded as she continued to write furious notes without even bothering to look up.

  “How long have you been closeted away here, Annali?” Ryce persisted, looking for clues. There was a half-drunk cup of tea on the table behind her, but he knew it was long cold. There were no indications as to whether or not she’d eaten. It was par for the course when she worked in a fever like this that she’d always forget to eat.

  “What day is it?” she countered.

  “Friday.”

  “I’ve been here since Thursday.”

  Ryce was not misled.

  “Of what bloody week?” he shot back.

  She made a little moue with her pretty lips and finally looked up at him so she could give him a full-on pout. “Please stop pestering me. I’m a grown woman and I’m quite capable of caring for myself.”

  “That remains to be seen,” Ryce said dryly, reaching out to sweep one of her slender hands in his, drawing it to his lips in a flutter of soft, lavender ruffles. He kissed the back of her wrist. “You know, Dimitre would never forgive me if I allowed you to starve to death. Come on, let me take you to dinner. Once I’ve fed you, I promise to leave you be.”

  “In the middle of all this?” she demanded, clearly aghast at the suggestion as she swept her free hand over the large work area, the pen in her fingers almost being flung away in her enthusiasm. “Ryce, you know very well I can’t just get up and abandon things mid-experiment.”

  “It’s nice to know that some things never change.”

  Annali gasped even as Ryce pivoted around sharply on the ball of his foot to face the new voice. The familiar new-corner had entered via the exterior conservatory doors, by way of the outlying gardens, and held the knobs, one in each hand, as he grinned at their gaping expressions.

  “Hunter!”

  Leave it to Annali to recover herself the quickest, Ryce thought with humor as she whipped her hand out of his grasp and flew at the fresh arrival like a beautiful lavender flamingo, all slim, delicate-looking arms and legs. She coiled her wrists behind Hunter’s neck and drew him down for an enthusiastic welcome home kiss as he caught her around the ribs. Hunter flushed as her kisses moved to his cheeks with repeated enthusiasm. He flicked up brilliant blue eyes to see Ryce smirking at him, enjoying this display of Annali’s affections. Hunter grinned and gave him a rude hand gesture behind her back as he bent to kiss her supple cheek affectionately.

  “Blessed be. It’s good to see you, Annali,” he said warmly when she finally settled back onto her heels.

  “Well it’s not good to see you,” she declared in contradiction, her Southern accent exaggerated by pique as she reached out to slap him smartly on his shoulder in true Scarlett O’Hara style. All she was missing was a hoopskirt and a fan. “You are such a fiend, staying away so long!”

  “Anna,” Ryce scolded her from the worktables.

  “Well, it’s true,” Annali said, whipping out one of her infamous pouts. There was a collective sigh from the men. It was very hard to resist Annali’s adorably perfect little pouts.

  “I had my reasons, Annie,” Hunter said simply, putting her a little farther away from himself, trying to ease the discomfort of her little guilt trip.

  “I know. But, in the name of the Lady, Hunter, this is the information age! You could have written. A few lousy e-mails here and there to let us know you were still alive wouldn’t have killed you.”

  Hunter glanced up at Ryce in a silent plea. Ryce gave him a meaningful look and shook his head. Both men knew Annali had never, and would never, fully understand the reasons behind Hunter’s departure so long ago. Neither would she understand why Hunter had cut himself off from all contact with his friends. It had been difficult for Ryce to comprehend as well; but though he didn’t agree with all of Hunter’s reasons, he respected them. For ten years he’d left Hunter to his own devices, never contacting him, as per his wishes.

  Until now.

  It was painfully good to see him, Ryce thought as he clasped his arms behind his back in a casual movement that belied the emotions he was feeling, taking the opportunity to look over Hunter. His old friend had changed in many ways. He was as vigorous and sturdy a man as he’d ever been, in a physical sense, but time had matured his body, making him seem far more at ease within the roped musculature of his build. It took discipline to maintain such a physique. Ryce wondered if it was still Hunter’s passions for Thoroughbreds and martial arts that kept him fit and motivated. A person could change a great deal in one decade, but Ryce doubted that those essentials h
ad altered. Hunter was born to ride and fight. His seat on a horse was a phenomenal thing to behold, poetry between man and beast. His hand-to-hand reactions, the ease of his uncanny reflexes, and his succinct choices in the heat of a fight made him unbelievably valuable at one’s back.

  Hunter had also cut his hair. That was a sharp difference. He’d previously kept the pitch-colored locks long enough to touch his shoulders, sweeping them into a tail as Ryce himself did. Now his hair was severely shortened, cropped to a perfectly manicured line over the back of his neck, with only the front and top showing a slightly rakish length that hung in curving spears over his forehead. His eyes, the remarkable cerulean blue that leapt out at anyone he glanced at, were notably less shadowed by pain and grief, and Ryce was glad to see it. As for the rest, he could only guess at this juncture. Who knew how time had treated Hunter? It had treated them all so differently. In fact, it was time that had compelled Ryce to draw Hunter home at last, back into their fold where he truly belonged.

  Time and danger.

  “Well, anyway,” Annali said breezily, “I forgive you. But only because I have so much to tell you and I need to hear absolutely everything about you as well.”

  “Since Ryce is intent on feeding you, pet, why don’t we all go out to eat?” Hunter suggested. “I’m starved, as well as jet-lagged, and I think dinner and a fresh bed would make all the difference.”

  “I don’t doubt it,” Ryce said at last. “Annali, go and change for dinner. Hunter and I will be waiting for you in the front parlor when you’re ready.”

  “Ryce,” Annali used his name as a gentle scold, her fair lavender blue eyes holding a world of admonishment. “Hunter’s only just come through the door. I don’t want you harping on him already, okay?” She spoke with lightness, but knowing her so well, Ryce knew there was a little bit of an irrational fear that if he upset the apple cart, Hunter would just walk off again and this time he wouldn’t come back for good.