Prologue
The forest at the edge of the Mounts Bay, California, city limits are well known for being haunted.
The kids at the local high school have spent generations whispering about the bodies buried in shallow graves, waiting for the wolves to scent them and dig them up for food. There’s even more legends about the souls that walk amongst the towering redwoods. It’s quiet, not silent, but compared to the ever-present sounds of traffic and human experience, it’s eerie and adds to the haunted feel.
While I don’t believe in ghosts, I can feel the souls that linger here.
It’s probably just my guilty conscious giving me the heebie-jeebies as I look over the corpse of my opponent. His blood is still fresh on my hands, cold and congealed, and I wipe them uselessly down my jeans. My clothes are just as stained as my hands, even my face is spattered with the red stains of his life ending. I look like something out of a horror movie, which is about right considering I’ve just bashed a man’s skull in with a rock while a whole crowd of people looked on in sick fascination. There isn’t a person watching that dares to make a noise. The vise-like grip of the Club holds their tongues.
I’m not afraid of being caught.
I’m small for my age. Years of food insecurity have taken their toll, and I was the youngest contender in the Game this season. None of that matters, though; I’ve won. I’ve beaten thirty men and teenage boys to take the victory and the spoils of this war.
I stumble toward the men at the perimeter of the fighting ring. They’re all cloaked in black, hard looks on their faces and black ink etched over their cheeks. My hands tremble at the thought of wearing those same marks. The marks of the Twelve. But I’ve earned them. I’ve earned the right to stand with them and be one of them.
To be free.
“Congratulations, you’ve won the Game,” the Jackal speaks, and I shiver at the cold tones of his voice, so unlike the warmth he usually extends to me.
I nod my head. I want this over with. I want a hot meal and an even hotter shower.
“Welcome to the Twelve. You’re replacing the Hawk. Who do you choose to be?”
Free. I guess a hawk is a good embodiment of freedom, but it feels strange to take a dead man's name, like climbing into his bed with the sheets still warm. I look around at the other men that make up the Twelve. Their names are what they’re known as on the streets, what their gangs cover themselves with as protection and a warning. I could have that too. I could make myself a queen of my own empire. I could rule the streets and never go hungry again.
I could escape the cycle of poverty my mother has left me in.
My eyes land back on the Jackal, and I lift my chin until I no longer feel like I’m looking up at him.
“I am the Wolf.”
Chapter 1
The boy on the stand is so gorgeous, it’s hard to look directly at his face.
Instead, I look at his hands as they clench tightly where they rest on his lap. There are dozens of other teenagers in the room, but I can’t look away from him for long before I am drawn back to him, a moth to a stunning flame. He has broad shoulders and big arms, like he works out more than regularly. His hands are big and strong. I like the look of those hands. The more I look at them, the more I imagine what they would feel like on my skin. I imagine them stroking over my arms, my neck, cupping my face and pulling me in against his chest, tilting my head back. A flush settles over my skin. Who is this guy? How has the mere sight of him turned me into a babbling mess?
I can look as far as his neck without breaking out in a sweat, and as the trial drags on, I manage to make out the script tattoo on his neck. The words ‘honor before blood’ are tucked under his chin, the black ink stark against his pale skin. He has to be a gangster, but that doesn’t suit his fair looks at all. He looks as though he has never done a hard day’s work in his life. His sandy hair is messed artfully, and his nose is straight and unmarred. The tattoo tucked under his jaw is the only suggestion that he’s not a pampered model. When the judge reads out his case, he says the guy is my age, and no boy of fifteen gets ink like that unless they're already out on the streets.
When I spot the Rolex on his wrist, I realize he must be a drug dealer. It’s like a cold bucket of ice over my lustful body. Drug dealers are scum, and I do not want to admire him anymore. I am doing everything in my power to get away from drugs and the people that peddle them. It doesn’t matter how drawn I felt to this guy. I look away and resist the pull of his stunning looks.
The courthouse we are trapped in is a converted historic building that had been built by convicts. The district of Mounts Bay is small enough that court proceedings are held twice a week. All of the children's cases are held here in the morning, and then the adults are brought through in the afternoon. My case was supposed to start half an hour ago, but the beautiful dealer is arguing belligerently with the judge and taking up more than his allocated time slot.
What a dick.
His rap sheet isn’t great, but it also isn’t violent, which made me feel slightly better about ogling him.
Car theft. Breaking and entering. Violating a work order.
Clearly it isn’t his first time in this building. I glance up at him again, I can’t help myself, and I can see how bored and unaffected his eyes are, like this is all such an inconvenience to him and his time. I want to roll my eyes, but once again I’m transfixed.
“You ready, kid?” My social worker interrupts my staring and I startle. She’s looking at me like I’m fragile again, and I don’t know how to tell her that I’m easily the strongest person in this room. You don’t survive what I have without becoming bulletproof. I have five pins holding one of my legs together to prove it.
I’m the Wolf of Mounts Bay, and I can survive anything.
The gangster kid steps down from the stand, and it’s my turn.
As he walks down the stairs, we cross paths. I force myself to look up at him. His face is a mask of disinterest and apathy, but my breath catches in my throat when I see his eyes. The icy blue depths pull me in, and I feel like I’m drowning. He’s angry. He’s hiding it well, but he looks at me and I can see the burning pits of hell in his eyes. This guy is one step away from being a killer. I shiver. I should not find that attractive or exciting. But, fuck me, I do. It’s my curse for being a loyal supporter of the Jackal.
