Pack Witch (Captured Souls Book 1) Read online

  Pack Witch

  Captured Souls: Book I

  Brenna Clarke

  Copyright © 2019 by Brenna Clarke

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  All company and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders. Their use does not imply affiliation with or endorsement by them.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are fictitious or have been used fictitiously. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental and not intended by the author.

  ISBN eBook: 9781988212296

  ISBN Print: 9781988212319

  Cover design by We Got You Covered

  www.brennaclarke.com

  Contents

  Preface

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  What now?

  Preface

  I stood rooted to the sand as three hunters broke through the darkness and sauntered toward me, swords in hand. Their tall, foreboding presence both scared and mesmerized me. People didn’t get an audience with them and live to tell about it. They were legends. Ghosts.

  When they were about twenty feet away, they finally stopped. I could almost breathe again.

  Amira, a woman who looked too much like me, was on the right. In the middle, an older man of about forty or so. He was tall and lean under the long trench coat he wore. His dark hair fell to his shoulders, but his facial hair was trimmed. On his left stood another man I’d never seen before. He had short blond hair, and like the others, his eyes glowed crimson.

  The man in the center, the brunet, tipped his head and regarded me from my toes to the tip of my head. He scratched at his wide jaw and then smiled. It seemed almost genuine, though it didn’t make me feel less scared or intimidated.

  I trembled and balled my fists to try to hide it. Every muscle inside of me vibrated to the tune of fear.

  “I’m here,” I told them.

  The brunet took several steps forward, his sword still firm in his hand. Would he kill me? Had I made the right choice? Would I do it again?

  I only knew the answer to the third question. Yes, I would do it again. For Noah, there was no limit to what I’d do. Give up my life? Gladly. Like I knew he’d give up his.

  One

  I looked up and down the hall before entering the patient’s room. Many of my coworkers were on break, and the others were getting their patients ready for supper. Not a single visitor sat at Catherine Northam’s bedside. I slipped inside her room and glanced out the wide window opposite her bed. Her room overlooked Black Harbor and was on the fifth floor. It was a beautiful view, with naval ships and tall ships in the harbor, and a small island off the coast with a single lighthouse in the center. It was just too bad she’d never see it.

  I watched her sleep as I approached her. Her brittle skin looked plumper since she’d been on IV medication all day. She’d fallen in her yard while gardening and had stayed there for two days before a neighbor had found her. Her leg had been broken and fixed with surgery earlier today. But when they scanned her body for other injuries, they found she was riddled with cancer. Her surgeon wasn’t sure how she’d still been walking and talking. How she didn’t have pain or any other side effects, the doctors couldn’t say. It seemed her fall had triggered something. She hadn’t woken since the surgery, and they weren’t sure she ever would.

  I wanted to help her. And not just because I was a nursing aide.

  Once upon a time, I’d healed a bird. Healing its mended wing had been an accident, a very fortunate one. Before then, I knew I had magic inside of me, but I’d always tried to hide it. I’d been afraid of what normal people would do to people like me, who are different in unexplainable ways.

  I’d had other slips in my life when it came to magic, but that was the only positive one. The only one I couldn’t seem to replicate. Though I’d tried. Because I worked in a profession that helped others. It seemed like the right thing to do. If I could heal or cure someone, why wouldn’t I?

  I put my hand on the woman’s body and tried to draw out my magic, to suck all the badness in her cells out. But no matter how hard I focused or how much I strained my muscles, I couldn’t fix her. All I felt was heat radiating through my palm.

  “Maisie?”

  I spun around quickly, curled my fingers into a fist and hid them behind my back to hide their faint icy-blue glow. I tried desperately not to look guilty, which made no sense because I wasn’t doing anything wrong. If anything, I was trying to do good.

  “Yes?”

  “Everything okay?” Lennie, one of my coworkers, asked me. She pushed her black glasses up her steeply sloped nose and propped her hands on her wide hips.

  “Of course. I just thought she needed some company.”

  “The palliative nurse should be by tomorrow, and she’ll set up a care plan.”

  “Right.”

  “Can you help me boost up the woman in twenty-nine? She’s naked in a ball at the foot of her bed.” Lennie chuckled. “I swear that woman has an allergy to clothing.”

  “Of course.”

  Lennie walked forward and gave Ms. Northam a quick glance. “Poor woman. She has two sons in the States, and they’re fighting to see which one of them has to come home and ‘deal’ with their mother. Remind me never to have kids.”

  “Don’t have kids.”

  “Noted.” She smiled wide at me. Her cherub cheeks were bright pink as if she’d just done something strenuous. She removed her hair tie and picked some of her wavy blonde strands free before putting the rest up into a ponytail. “Shall we?” She waved to the door, and I followed her out.

  I finished my shift well after it was supposed to be over and found myself trudging outside the hospital at half-past seven because I’d been helping a nurse who’d received an admission to the floor ten minutes before the end of the shift. She was about to have a panic attack, so I told her I’d help. It wasn’t much work, really.

  I found my car in the parkade, though it took me a few minutes to remember where I’d parked it, and on what floor, before I could leave. In rush hour, it took me almost forty minutes to get from downtown Gravewood City to the suburbs on the West side.

  My boyfriend’s Jeep sat in the freshly paved driveway of his two-story Craftsman home. It was a rental. Newly renovated as of last year, with a professionally landscaped garden. I’d moved in with him about two months before, only a few months after we’d started dating.

  I’d like to say it was love at first sight, but it really wasn’t. We’d met at the hospital, and he must have asked me out ten times before I finally said yes. I’d heard horror stories of staff members dating and the aftermath that followed if it didn’t work out. I’d wanted to keep things professional. Eventually, his dimples, smooth blonde hair, and his dreamy big, brown eyes sucked me in.

  He was a catch. Everyone told me
so. Including my mother. It didn’t matter to her that I was barely twenty-one and he was almost thirty. He was a doctor, and he came from a well-respected family. His father was a judge and his mother was a socialite—I didn’t even know what that meant until I started dating Mason.

  I parked next to his car and climbed out. When I entered the house the smell of warm tomatoes and fresh basil greeted me along with the sound of Paul Anka. I also hadn’t known who Paul Anka was until I met Mason, but the music reminded him of his grandpa, and I’ll admit I’d grown to like the music. I even found myself humming some of the lyrics sometimes.

  I followed my nose and my ears into the kitchen, where he stood barefoot in jeans and a button-up Henley shirt. His hair was neat and trim. He had it cut on the third Thursday of every month, no matter what his schedule looked like. He stirred his sauce as he looked up to smile at me.

  “That smells delicious.” My stomach groaned and begged to be filled. I hadn’t eaten supper yet. And Mason was so awesome. He always waited to eat until I got home.

  In our house, Mason mostly cooked because I burned everything. Hell, I couldn’t even make rice. This came as a complete surprise to the both of us since my mom owns a cafe and bakery, and he grew up in a house with a maid and a chef.

  I hugged him from behind and managed to wrap my arms around him completely. Thanks to his love of running, he was lean but firm. I couldn’t say the same. I was underweight, but every ounce of me was definitely on the softer side. I preferred to watch television and veg out than break a sweat. I think that bothered him sometimes. It was one of the many interests he had that I didn’t share. I tipped my head forward and kissed his shoulder. He stood so much taller than me, so I couldn’t have reached his cheek if I tried.

  He leaned to the side and I let go of him. When he turned, he blew on a wooden spoonful of sauce before offering it to me.

  I took a long drink and let out a moan. “Wow. How did I get so lucky?”

  “I have a thing for stubborn brunettes.”

  I chuckled and slapped his shoulder. Then I took a step back from where he stood at the island, leaning against the countertop behind me.

  His smile faded as he looked down at my feet. I’d been so tired I’d forgotten to remove my shoes. He didn’t tell me to take them off. He wouldn’t. He just gave me looks when I did things that bothered him.

  “Just a sec. Let me get my shoes off.” I removed my shoes and walked back to the entryway. I opened the closet and set my shoes down on the empty space on the shoe rack, neatly, flush with the others. Mason was great, but his OCD killed me.

  I returned to the kitchen.

  “How was work?” he asked.

  “Good.”

  “Anything exciting happen?”

  Smiling, I shook my head. Nothing happened. But I’d wanted something to. I’d wanted to heal an elderly lady, and I couldn’t find my magic because I’d never been taught how to control it. I didn’t say that though. He didn’t know I was a witch. In fact, he didn’t know a lot about my life before I moved to Gravewood City. I wanted to keep it that way. Not because I thought he’d leave me or anything like that. For my guy, I felt it wouldn’t matter. But I preferred to think that was true rather than find out for real. He made me happy, mostly, and I hadn’t been happy in a really, really long time.

  Mason’s phone beeped, and he checked his messages before shoving his phone back in his pocket. “One of my patients is in labor so I might get a call to go in soon.”

  He turned on another burner and rooted for pasta in the cupboards, I grabbed a glass from the thick wooden shelf above the stove. I stepped over to the sink and turned on the tap. I let it run for a minute to let it go cold while I stared out the window. The tall trees in the backyard waved, and the wind charm sang just loud enough to overpower Paul Anka. I smiled at my life. Normal. Safe. Predictable. Everything my mother had always wanted for me. And it felt nice. Well, better than nice. I’d never thought that possible after my mom married a werewolf, but here I was.

  I filled my glass, shut off the tap, and my gaze flickered up to the backyard again. A tall, tan-skinned man with golden eyes and messy black hair walked through the open back gate and sauntered straight toward the sliding doors adjacent to our small circular dining table. My eyes went wide, and my glass slipped through my fingers and fell into the stainless-steel sink, shattering, as my water went down the wrong hole. I hacked and coughed, and water spurted out of my nose.

  Noah Rake. He was in my backyard, and I couldn’t understand why. I hadn’t seen or heard from him since I’d left Clover almost three years before.

  “Maisie?”

  I spun my head in Mason’s direction. He hurried toward me and began to pat my back. I desperately tried to swallow down my water and also my shock.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yep! Fantastic.” My eyes trained back to the window, and so did his. I had to think fast. I yanked him forward and pressed a hard kiss on his lips. Our teeth clanked together, and I felt my teeth vibrate. It was a sort of desperate kiss that probably ranked worse than many firsts.

  He broke away, chuckling. He touched his fingers to his tooth.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” Though his smile spoke of humor, his arched eyebrow indicated he thought I might be losing it mentally.

  “I saw a spider.” My words spewed from my mouth. His impossibly green eyes sparkled as he took my hands in his. “I didn’t think you were afraid of anything.”

  I didn’t fear much, and even though Noah Rake was a werewolf, I certainly didn’t fear him. But I knew better than to think he’d come here for a friendly visit. I knew that with certainty. And if Mason saw Noah, I worried Noah might blow up my life. I’d given Mason limited details about my life in Clover. In fact, I never talked about Clover at all. He hadn’t even met my mother yet.

  “Where is it?” he asked me.

  “Where’s what?”

  He grinned. “The spider.”

  “Oh, it’s gone. I don’t know. It’s around here somewhere. Maybe I scared it off with all the commotion.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Perfect.”

  He smoothed my long hair out of my face and pecked me on the cheek.

  “Why don’t we sit at the table tonight?” I asked him. “Do you want to go upstairs and get that tablecloth Mom sent us a few months ago? The green one?”

  “I think that sounds perfect.” He stared at the sink. “I’ll clean that up first.” He attempted to step around me, where he’d get a good view of Noah.

  “No!”

  He nearly jumped out of his skin. His eyes went wide.

  “I did that. Let me clean it. I don’t want you to cut your hands if you’re delivering a baby later. It’s my mess, anyway.”

  “It’s fine. I’ll wear gloves.”

  “No, I said I got it.” I laid my hands on the sides of his upper arms. “Please, just go get the tablecloth. I’ll take some crazy pills and clean up this mess. Okay?”

  “Which crazy pills?”

  I frowned at him. “You know, I’m not on medication, unless you want to prescribe something.”

  “You joke. I’m considering it.”

  I slapped his arm.

  “All right. I’ll be back in a minute. You know, one of these days I’m going to have to meet your mom so I can thank her for the tablecloth in person.”

  “Mmhmm.”

  His tone became serious. “I’d really like to meet her. I think it’s time, don’t you?”

  Oh, God. I can’t have this conversation right now when there’s a werewolf in my backyard. “Sure. I’ll set something up. But I need you to get the tablecloth because I’m starving. Top shelf. Hallway closet.”

  He smiled wide, and then it faded as he brushed the back of his hand over my cheek. “You’re the most important person in my life, Maisie. And I want us to share everything. Family included. Okay? I know you’re reluctant, and I know
part of you worries this might not work out, but I’m not going anywhere. You have to trust me.”

  “I do trust you.” I didn’t feel as confident as I sounded. But my lack of confidence had nothing to do with him and everything to do with me.

  “Good.” He pecked me on the forehead before turning and walking away. “So you’ll call her?”

  “I’ll call her tonight.”

  He glanced over his shoulder and grinned at me before disappearing around the corner at the end of the hallway. I had maybe a minute to deal with Noah, and that would never be enough. I also knew no amount of talking or begging would make him leave before he was good and ready.

  I hurried to the sliding doors by the kitchen table when I heard the stairs creak under Mason’s weight. I pressed my hands to the window, and Noah appeared before me, smiling. He was still lean but defined, and his face had filled out some, his jaw just a touch wider and his cheekbones a little more chiseled, like his arms and chest under his fitted long-sleeved tee. His golden eyes walked up and down the length of me. I tried hard not to let that affect me. And I tried not to give him a once over too.

  Noah and I had history. We’d been close once. After my stepbrother, he’d been my closest friend. And I’d have been lying if I said he hadn’t also been my first crush, perhaps even my first love.

  I unlocked the door and opened it just wide enough for my face to fit through. “What are you doing here?” I whispered.

  “Stupid me. I thought you might be happy to see me.” He didn’t look wounded at all as he delivered his words through a grinning mouth.