Queen of the Pack

     While I'm working on the next Sniper book, I thought I'd start posting a weekly blog featuring another story that's in the works.

     In Queen of the Pack, Phillip Prevatte is a werewolf who isn't exactly a werewolf. He was born with the werewolf gene, but unfortunately, that gene has to be triggered in order for him to obtain all his wolfy traits, including shifting. Even more unfortunate for Phillip and all the other fledgling wolves, the trigger is the blood of a royal werewolf, and everyone knows the royal line died out decades ago. Locked in a limbo between human and werewolf, the lowest of the low in a misfit pack run by a sadistic bastard of an Alpha named Jarvis, Phillip struggles to get through each day, knowing he'll never have the chance to reach his full potential.

     Enter Vivian Rayne, a young, up and coming defense attorney from New York. When her adopted family puts pressure on her to take some much needed time off, Vivian chooses to visit sunny Florida for a relaxing, trouble free vacation. When more than just their paths cross at the scene of a car crash, both their lives are changed forever. Phillip shifts, becoming a full-fledged werewolf in a matter of hours. Not only that, but he's morphed into a wolf alpha enough to challenge for leadership of his pack. But before he can do that, he has to find and protect the woman who made it possible. Jarvis has gotten wind of Vivian, and when he learns her true nature, he has only one desire: control Vivian and every drop of royal blood her luscious body can produce.

     Will Vivian learn to trust Phillip's simple honesty in time, or will Jarvis' sophisticated charm lure her into his clutches? Read on for the first installment of Queen of the Pack, to find out.        

CHAPTER 1:1

Tires squealed, horns honked. Headlight beams flew across the median, blinding Phillip Prevatte as he tried to avoid the out-of-control SUV coming straight for him. By the time his brain processed the danger and told his body to react, it was too late.

 Damn human reflexes.

The impact slung him against his seatbelt. Air bags deployed with a woomph, burying him in vinyl. The car flipped. The screech of bending metal and crackle of broken glass heralded the death knell of a $250,000 engine. Sounds that would haunt him later—assuming he didn’t die in the next few seconds. And assuming his Alpha didn’t kill him when he found out Phillip had wrecked his new Ferrari F430 Spider. Jarvis gutted men for far less.

When all movement ceased and he was still alive, Phillip’s first thought was to free himself from the airbag’s clutches. He punched and pushed with a sudden surge of adrenalin until he finally managed to get his face clear. He took a deep breath in reflex. Pain grabbed at him, squeezing his chest and clutching at his side. Air caught in his throat, making him cough. The resulting agony left him gasping, black spots circling his vision.

Do not do that again! Shallow breaths, idiot, only shallow breaths. He followed his own advice as he took stock of his unpleasant situation.

What was left of the car lay on its side, facing down an incline. He knew this because he lay on his side, too, still strapped into the driver’s seat. Everything around him was a blur of indistinct shapes. Nothing unusual about that. A quick check of his face confirmed the loss of his thick glasses. He winced as his fingers brushed against torn skin. Warm blood trickled across his forehead and dripped off his nose. Like vampires and werewolves, airbags and glasses were natural enemies and didn’t care who got hurt during their infrequent altercations.

The smell of gasoline and melted rubber hit him, the sharp odors strong enough to offend even his poor sense of smell. He reached for the seatbelt release. What was that other odor? Burning grass? Hell, it would be just his luck to get caught in a car fire. Being born a werewolf gave him a longer than normal life span, but did nothing to protect him from being burned to death. He needed to rip the stupid seatbelt loose and get out. Unfortunately for him, his super strength, along with all his other wolfy traits were still locked up tight somewhere inside him. Being a fledging werewolf without his powers had never sucked more.

He heard shouts. Footsteps thudding down the hill. He looked up, trying to see through the shattered windshield. Between his bad eyesight, the dark Florida night, and something—probably the hood of the car—crumpled up against the windshield like a discarded candy wrapper, he couldn’t make out a thing.

A male voice shouted an order. “Stay back, that thing’s on fire!”

Yep, it just wasn’t his day.

Phillip jerked at the stubborn seatbelt. Damn if he’d die trapped in a car that wasn’t even his. He paused in his struggles when the car shifted. Someone was climbing the wreck. The movement stopped, and instead of the male voice he expected, he heard a female voice mutter a soft “Damn it!”

Phillip closed his eyes and groaned. Rescued by a woman. Could this day get any worse?