Page 2 of The Enforcers: KANE

And then other eyes. Selina’s eyes. Her voice. Her touch. Her hand, pointing to Israel. He’s our enemy. Hurt him. Teach him not to hurt us.

And something rising up inside him. A word he’d almost forgotten how to use.

NO.

There was fighting and blood and screams, and Selina was angry, so angry, her anger hurting his brain, burning all his nerve endings. He wanted to do what she said and he didn’t want to, and his head felt like it would explode and he was grabbing Israel and running and running.

And then it was all confused. Selina wasn’t there and Raven wasn’t there and the boy was looking up at him and trusting him and Kane had to keep him safe, he knew he had to keep him safe but Selina wanted to hurt him, and that was wrong but it was right but it was wrong and he had to stay away no he had to go back no he had to stay away…

His brain was on fire and he screamed, and Israel bathed his face with cool water and said words that didn’t make any sense, but the sound of his voice was something real, something good that Kane could hold on to until he could shove

all the feelings

into a box

and just

make it

stop.

Chapter 1

Kane Colton sat alone in the lounge of the Silver Cloud Resort and Casino, slowly sipping a whiskey and trying to blend into the shadows. It was the same table he’d been sitting at every night for the last week, waiting for the eleven-thirty show. Waiting for the singer with the smoky voice that stabbed him to his heart, but that he couldn’t walk away from.

Waiting for Raven.

Even the name sent a stab of pain through his chest. A reminder of a past that was best forgotten, a loss that had never healed.

Guilt had a way of keeping wounds open.

A single spotlight appeared on the dark stage, illuminating her as if she’d simply appeared by magic out of the darkness. Her red dress glittered in the pool of light surrounding her, and her dark hair floated around her face in waves, her eyes dark as jet.

She surveyed the room once, and Kane felt as though her gaze focused on him. She took a soft breath, closed her eyes, and started to sing.

She sang songs of love and loss, of times gone by, of glory and sadness. Kane, nursing his one drink in the corner, felt the dark brittle casings around his heart and soul start to crack.

It had been so long since he’d let himself feel anything. There was too much darkness in his past, too much pain. Most of it he’d caused to others. He’d tried to be a good man, a decent man, after his childhood pack had shattered, but he hadn’t been able to do it. Not alone.

He’d drifted down into the darkness, and he’d almost stayed there. Only two people had given him the strength and the reason to find the light again. One was his best friend, Israel.

And the other…well, the other was long gone. She was probably dead by now, and he’d locked the pain of that knowledge deep in his heart with all the other things that were best not remembered.

But Raven’s sultry voice brought it all back.

Kane wondered why he put himself through this. He’d shut down his heart because the only way to redeem himself was to use his head. Make good rules and follow them. Think before he acted, and deliberately put his duty and the good of his pack before everything else.

It was the only thing that kept him from sinking back down into the abyss.

Then, a week ago, he’d walked past the lounge after he finished his security shift, and heard Raven singing. Something in her voice pulled at him, dredging up the parts of himself he kept hidden and cracking the walls he’d so carefully built.

And then she’d started singing that song. Raven’s song. It tore him up inside.

Years ago, Rachelle—his own little Raven—had sung it to him at night. Back when they lived on the street, when he was exhausted from hunting down food and scrapping to survive, from being alone with no pack and no territory.

Sleep had come hard, when he first hit the city. His wolf was always strung out and miserable, hyper-alert for threats, terrified by the noise and the concrete and the enclosing walls.

And the loneliness.