Operation Wolf: Eli (Wolf Elite Book 2) Page 9

  “Yes!” I cried out, hooking my ankles around him as I leaned back.

  Looking up, I lost myself in the gold glow of his wolf eyes as he fucked me hard and fast. My body vibrated with the speed and force of his thrusts. I panted, trying to match his hip thrusts with my own, but he was inhumanly fast, and I had no choice but to simply hang on for the rough ride.

  “Damn. You have such beautiful breasts,” he growled, reaching down and squeezing them both with his hands.

  I moaned, arching my back into his touch as he flicked his thumbs across my nipples.

  “Can I come on them?”

  “Yes,” I said, smiling at the fact that he’d asked.

  He was the only one who ever had. The few other guys I’d been with often just did it, but Eli was always respectful of my body.

  “Anything for you.”

  He continued making love to me, and the waves of pleasure built up until finally, the orgasm hit me like a gale, stealing my breath and leaving me shaking from head to toe as I convulsed beneath him. Just as my tremors were finally starting to fade, he pulled out of me, groaning long and loud as he came, his hot seed jetting all over my chest. I’d always thought it was disgusting when other men did it to me, but with Eli, I felt satisfaction at the pure rapture on his face as I gave him exactly what he wanted.

  I would truly do anything for this man.

  And the stark truth of that terrified the shit out of me sometimes.

  * * *

  The next morning, I woke up and reached for Eli, only to find his side of the bed cold and empty. Disappointed, I sat up, blinking as I looked around the room, and I was about to go downstairs to see if he was in the kitchen when I spotted a note on the bedside table. Grabbing it, I read the words written in Eli’s bold but messy scrawl.

  Went to town to make a few calls. I won’t be long. I love you.

  Smiling, I put the note aside and then set about tidying up the room, making the bed and collecting all our dirty laundry into a basket. Our clothes were due for a wash. Wrinkling my nose a little at the sight of the overflowing basket, I decided to get it started and then maybe tend to the flowers in the garden. Afterward, I’d head upstairs to work on my painting again. I could hardly wait until it was finished, and I dearly hoped we would be able to take it with us. I knew Eli would love it.

  I was about to leave the room when I spotted Eli’s zip-up sweater on the floor. Picking it up, I frowned as a piece of paper slipped from the pocket and fluttered to the ground. It looked like a letter.

  Maybe it’s the letter Hunter sent Eli.

  I picked it up and sat on the edge of the bed to read it. My curiosity morphed into confusion and then betrayal. Anger rose with every word I read until my hands were shaking with rage. My eyes blurred with tears, and I threw the letter across the room before I gave in to the emotional temptation to rip the damn thing into shreds.

  How dare Eli not tell me about this.

  I knew exactly what Eli had thought—that my dad deserved to die and that he would keep me with him until the danger passed and it was safe to send me back to Chicago again.

  But how fucking dare he.

  Seething, I jumped up from the bed and stalked out into the hallway. Maybe he was right in thinking that Dad had this shit coming to him, but it was not his decision to make. It was mine. And whatever Dad might have done in his sordid, fucked-up life, he was still the only damn family I had left. And I would never just let him die, especially if there was anything in my power I could do to save his ass. Eli knew that family meant the world to me and that I couldn’t leave my dad behind when everything seemed to be falling down around him. I would never be able to live with myself if I pretended I didn’t give a shit that Dad was going to be killed. Guilt would eat away at me if I turned a blind eye.

  No, I can’t do that shit. Family means no one ever gets left behind.

  Pulling out a suitcase from the hallway closet, I dragged it down the hall to my bedroom and started to pack.

  CHAPTER 19

  Eli

  “SO, LET ME GET this straight.” Gunner’s voice crackled through the landline at the back of the general store, a phone which the owner had so generously permitted me to use—for a small fee, of course. “You want me to help you with a retrieval operation? And the target is a mob boss who is being held by the Chicago Outfit?”

  “Yes,” I said wearily, careful to keep my voice low enough so the clerk’s nosy ears couldn’t pick it up. I knew Gunner would be able to hear me easily enough, even through the shitty connection.

  “Right.” Gunner paused for emphasis. “Eli, are you out of your fucking mind?”

  “Look, it’s not like I have a choice,” I bit out. Then I ground my teeth in frustration. “The mob boss in question happens to be the father of the woman I love. If I don’t do something to save him, she’s going to take matters into her own damn hands, and I can’t allow that shit.”

  “The woman you love?” Gunner echoed. “I thought there was only one—”

  “There is,” I interrupted. I’d briefly discussed Olivia with Gunner one night many moons ago when we were all sitting around the campfire, talking about our loved ones from back home.

  “Oh.” Gunner was silent for a while. “Well, I guess, if I were in the same boat with Celine, I’d want someone to help me out. You know I’ve got your back, man, but I think you ought to tell me the whole story.”

  “All right, but there isn’t much time.” I gave him the abridged version, which took longer than I would have liked because Gunner kept interrupting me to ask questions. “And now, I have to figure out what the hell I’m going to do before I call Hunter to tell him I got the letter.”

  “I still can’t believe you went to Hunter for help on this instead of me,” Gunner said with some disgust. “I thought you and I were closer than that.”

  “Hunter has nothing better to do, and besides, he wasn’t a newlywed about to go on his honeymoon,” I snapped. “I didn’t want to ruin your time with Celine.”

  Gunner sighed. “Celine would have understood. But I appreciate the sentiment. Look, do you have any guys on the ground who’ll be able to help us with this mission?”

  “Yeah, some friends from the shifter club I used to work at,” I said, “and a human friend who used to work with the Outfit.”

  “Can he be trusted?”

  “I think so,” I replied after a moment. If Ian was still hiding out with the shifters I’d left him with and hadn’t run back to the mob, then he definitely would be trustworthy.

  “Okay then, here’s the plan,” Gunner replied.

  * * *

  “Olivia, I’m home!” I called while walking into the cabin.

  My heart was far lighter than it had been when I left. I still wasn’t feeling all warm and fuzzy like I had been before I got the letter, but the bulk of my anxieties had been quelled now that I had a plan to fix this clusterfuck. And since I knew what the next step was, I fully intended on keeping Olivia informed so she would cooperate when I insisted I get her to safety.

  But there was no answer to my call other than the echo of my own voice. I frowned.

  Maybe she’s still up in the studio, painting.

  I knew once she was “in the zone,” as she liked to call it, she lost all sense of her surroundings.

  I started by checking the kitchen, and the first alarm bell went off when I saw there was no dinner simmering on the stove or baking in the oven.

  Maybe she just didn’t feel like cooking today.

  I checked the other rooms on the bottom floor before heading upstairs. When I stopped in front of the studio door, my heart sank a little when I neither smelled nor heard her on the other side. I pushed open the door anyway and then stopped and stared at the sight before me. There was no sign of Olivia in the room, but in the center, resting on an easel, was a portrait of a little girl sitting in the sand, dressed in a pink bathing suit as she joyfully shaped a sand castle with her little hands. The
auburn hair curling around her chubby cheeks and her thickly lashed, sparkling gray eyes sucker-punched me in the gut, and I stepped forward slowly, my hand hovering above the still-wet paint.

  So, this was Olivia’s secret project that she’d been working on every day.

  “Our child,” I murmured, the truth of it settling into my heart.

  Olivia had painted a picture of what our child might look like if we ever had one. A fierce longing to bring this wonderful little girl into my life rose up in my chest, and I spun from the room, more determined than ever to find Olivia.

  But she was nowhere in the house. Not sitting out on the balcony, not lying down in our room, not roasting s’mores on the fire pit outside. Finally, I checked her original bedroom and found the answer in the folded letter lying neatly on the bed.

  The same letter Hunter had sent me just yesterday.

  “Oh Christ,” I whispered, sinking down onto the bed as the chill of real fear mingled with the pain of loss in my chest. It spread through my veins like an icy fire, causing my hands to tremble and my inner wolf to growl restlessly before coming forth in the lengthening of my teeth. “She’s gone.”

  Her belongings were missing from the room, and a quick check of the hallway told me she’d taken a suitcase.

  “She couldn’t have gotten far,” I barked, rushing down to the stables to saddle Sunshine and go after her. “Not on foot.”

  But when I got down to the stables, only the mule was there, glaring balefully at me as he munched on a mouthful of hay.

  “Fuck,” I snarled, spinning away from the useless animal. I’d decided to walk to town today, which I now realized had been a damn mistake, as Olivia had clearly decided to overcome her fear of horses so she could escape.

  Why didn’t it occur to me that this shit might happen?

  “I should have destroyed that damn letter,” I growled.

  I shifted, fur, canines, and claws sprouting. As my wolf was released, the mule brayed in fear, its large brown eyes rolling in its head as it stamped and butted against the stall door, but I was already spinning away. My beast had no intention of eating the mule.

  It was going to be a long journey on foot.

  CHAPTER 20

  Olivia

  “AH, MISS GIORDANO. RIGHT on time.”

  I shuddered in disgust as the mobster took me gently by the elbow with one gloved hand, placing the other at the small of my back. A man in his early forties with crow’s-feet and graying temples, he’d been waiting for me at the gate along with a handful of other soldiers to ensure I didn’t try to make an escape. By his demeanor and the way the others showed deference to him, I knew he was the capo of this particular unit, but I didn’t know his name or what he specialized in.

  “I don’t believe we’ve been acquainted,” I answered icily as I allowed him to lead me to the pickup terminal where two black SUVs were waiting for us.

  The very sight of the large, menacing vehicles took me back to the car accident where I’d broken my ribs. It had been less than two months since that incident, since Eli and I escaped those awful people, but it felt as though it were yesterday. Yet here I was, back in their clutches, heading straight for the doom Eli had been trying to protect me from.

  Shit. Shit. Shit. I feel like a damn ass.

  “My apologies, Miss Giordano,” he said as he opened the door for me. “My associates know me as Caesar.”

  Caesar. I recognized the name. He dealt mainly in chop shops and prostitution, with an occasional side of gambling just for fun.

  “Decided to venture down from the Heights, did you?” I sneered as I got into the car. “Get away from your chop shops and whores for a little while?”

  Caesar bared his teeth in a feral grin. “I wouldn’t worry too much about me right now, Miss Giordano,” he said, gesturing to one of the men sitting in the row of seats behind me.

  I screamed as a burlap sack was shoved over the top of my head, and I began to struggle in earnest as someone else slipped zip ties around my wrists and ankles, but it was no use.

  “I would really start worrying about yourself.”

  “You’re taking me to my father, aren’t you?” I screamed as a seat belt was strapped down over me. “Shit. Aren’t you?”

  The definitive slam of the door was my only answer.

  * * *

  Nearly an hour passed before the SUV finally came to a halt. I squirmed in my seat, nearly beside myself with dread and anxiety, wanting desperately to know what was beyond the burlap sack covering my field of vision. I’d cursed myself roundly the entire ride for not trusting Eli, for not staying put with him instead of rushing headlong into danger like this. It was a stupid move fueled by high emotions and loyalty to my dad.

  How did I know that Eli didn’t have some kind of master plan to make all of this shit go away? Fuck! I didn’t even have the damn faith in him to find out.

  Shit! What the fuck was I thinking?

  But on the other hand, if Eli had had a way of solving this whole mess, he wouldn’t have dragged me off into the middle of nowhere to begin with.

  “We’re here, Miss Giordano.”

  I heard the squeak of the door as it opened and blinked in the dim light as the burlap sack was ripped off my head, revealing a smiling Caesar waiting for me on the other side.

  “Untie her hands and feet,” he ordered to the soldier seated next to me. “I don’t want to have to carry her ass inside. But watch her.”

  “Where are we?” I asked, peering out the open door.

  We were parked in an empty lot outside what looked like an abandoned warehouse. An old, factory-like building with boarded-up windows covered in graffiti. I imagined a decent earthquake would send it crumbling into dust.

  “Exactly where you asked us to take you,” he said, grabbing me by the elbow and hauling me out of the vehicle with much less consideration than he’d given me at the airport. “To see your father.”

  “He’s in here?” I asked in disbelief. A mixture of fear and elation set my stomach churning, and I took a deep breath to try to steady myself. “In this decrepit place?”

  “What? You thought Mr. Carideo was going to invite him into his living room for tea with his wife?” Caesar scoffed. Then he gave me a shove between the shoulder blades that sent me stumbling forward. “Come on now. Let’s get inside. We don’t have all night.”

  The inside of the warehouse was dark and vast, the lower floor empty except for some rusting machinery scattered across the space. Dim light came from the upper floors, and it was in that direction where we headed, Caesar pushing me up a creaky metal staircase. With my heart in my throat, I tried to go slowly, but they urged me on, clearly impatient to deliver their package—me.

  “Hey, boss!” Caesar called out jovially from behind me as my feet clattered on the wooden flooring.

  We were in an open area that looked like it had once served as a break room, with a rusted-out refrigerator and sink pressed into one corner and a rickety table and chairs in another. The railing continued past the room and led to what I imagined must be a series of offices.

  The man seated at the table looked up from the papers he had been reviewing, and from the contingent of men standing near him, I knew he was the boss Caesar had referred to. But I barely spared a glance at him. All of my attention immediately focused in on a man who was tied to a chair in the center of the room.

  “Dad!” I lurched forward, but two of Caesar’s men instantly grabbed me, dragging me back. I fought them bitterly, tears streaming down my face as I tried to reach my dad.

  He was dressed in ratty clothing and had a burlap sack shoved over his head, but I knew it was Dad. I’d recognize him anywhere.

  “Let me go, you sick bastards!”

  “Let the lady go to her father,” the man at the table drawled. The soldiers released me. “She came all this way for him, so we might as well let her have him,” he said.

  I rushed over to Dad, tugging at the bindings on his wrists
. “Dad,” I cried, freeing his hands.

  I expected him to rise out of his chair, to put his arms around me, to do anything, but he immediately slumped sideways. I struggled to catch him before he hit the floor. The burlap sack slid off his head before I could right him again, revealing a pallid face with staring wide eyes and a throat slashed from ear to ear. Screaming, I dropped him in shock.

  “You killed him!” I sobbed, turning and flinging myself at the man behind the desk.

  This time, when his soldiers moved to restrain me, he made no move to stop me.

  “Why? Why did you kill my father, you fucking bastard?”

  “He wasn’t worth shit anymore,” the man said, his cold gray eyes devoid of emotion. “But now, I have you, sweetheart, and things are looking up.”

  Someone pressed a sickly sweet-smelling cloth to my face, and the room went dark.

  CHAPTER 21

  Eli

  “HEY, ELI.” A BLACK Mustang pulled up to the curb just as I was walking out of the station, and the driver’s window rolled down to reveal Ian. “Been a long time. Get in.”

  Exhausted, I came around and flung myself into the passenger seat, not bothering to look behind me as I tossed my duffel bag into the back seat.

  “Ow!” someone yelled from the back. “Watch it!”

  “Oh, fuck. Sorry.” As Ian drove off, I twisted around to see Danny, one of my friends from the shifter bar who’d agreed to help, shoving my duffel bag off to the side with one hand and rubbing his face with the other. “Sorry about that, Danny Boy.”

  Danny rolled his eyes. “It’s okay.”

  “Good to see you.” I smiled a little and then turned to face Ian. “You look good, man.”

  “Thanks.” Ian kept his eyes on the road. Eyes that were clearer and steadier than I had ever seen them. There was healthy color in his cheeks now, and he looked like he’d even put on a bit of weight. “Your friends have kept me pretty busy, which has really been helping me to stay clean.”