Jaxon didn’t miss the anger that flashed across his face, though. It wasn’t the anguished expression that would tell him the female panther wasn’t walking the earth anymore. It was a reaction that told Jaxon she was probably spiraling because of what Brody had done.
Three women hurt—some female named Winter, Brody’s mate, Lynn, and now Annalise. Brody was a beast—a destroyer of bonds, a creator of monsters. He was a life-ruiner. A woman-ruiner who left a trail of shattered hearts in his wake. Turning someone against their will was the biggest law broken in his world. It created shifters like Annalise, whose animal had been born in violence and would never be easy to manage. It created shifters who had to be put down if they weren’t strong enough to control the volatile animals inside of them. It created She-Devils.
This was it. This was the hunt his bear lived for. Blood for a cause. Blood for vengeance. Blood for justice.
It would be the most satisfying hunt of Titan’s entire existence.
Chapter Six
Jaxon Barns was sex on a stick…whatever that saying meant. Annalise adjusted the floral bag of shower stuff on her arm and switched her fluffy purple towel to her other hip as she made her way toward the communal restrooms down at the end of the row of Red Havoc cabins. Her flipflops clacked loudly with each step, echoing across the empty clearing.
She couldn’t stop thinking about the way he’d touched her last night. The way it had felt like a match carelessly flicked into a puddle of gasoline the second their bodies had collided in that soul-altering embrace. Making out on the hood of his truck and his hand down the front of her shorts. She’d woken up way too early feeling feverish to see him again. Not just for sex, but for that high of feeling safe around him.
“You’re thinking about the grizzly,” Jenny said, appearing right beside Annalise.
Annalise startled hard and skittered to the side. She didn’t often get snuck up on now that She-Devil existed and paid attention to everything.
She gave Jenny a sideways glance and steadied out her pace again. The alpha’s mate had her dark hair piled up in a messy bun on top of her head, not a stich of make-up on, and she still somehow managed to look glamorous. Annalise was all baggy sweat pants, a tank top that was too long, and looked exactly as though she’d only slept fitfully for three hours last night. That part was the fault of Jaxon and her perverted mind that kept swirling around the sexy way his abs had flexed against her stomach every time he pumped his dick deeper into her.
“N-no, I’m not thinking about him.”
“Your pants are in serious danger of catching fire there, Annalise. Even if I couldn’t hear the stutter or the false notes in your voice”—Jenny pointed to Annalise’s face—“you’re stroking your lips like a weirdo.”
Oh, God, she really was. She yanked her hand from her mouth.
“Ben busted you two last night, just so you know you didn’t get away with anything. He sees everything that happens in and near his territory.” Jenny arched her delicate eyebrows high and gave her a serious look. “Careful with the grizzly. Ben and the boys can’t handle other dominants in their territory, and I don’t know if your instincts are firing on all pistons yet, but your boyfriend? He’s a frickin’ monster. It’s like a wasp in a hive, girl. You don’t want to get these boys all riled up. You’re gonna get blood on their hands if you aren’t more careful.”
“Jaxon was defending himself just fine yesterday,” Annalise muttered, feeling defensive.
“Oooh,” Jenny drawled out. “He has a name to you. So real feelings attached, too?” Jenny hugged her white towel to her chest and shook her head. “You’re gonna give my mate gray hairs prematurely. I’m calling it now. You’ll be worse than Lynn.”
Annalise cast a quick glance back toward the cabins sitting quietly in the gray dawn light in the shadow of the Appalachian Mountains. “Which house does she live in?”
“None of them right now. She’s in the treehouse. Lynn has some stuff she’s working through, but if she comes back to us, she’ll live there.” Jenny pointed behind them to the cabin right next to Annalise’s, second from the front.
Well, okay. Maybe Lynn was crazy, but Annalise was actually relieved that there might eventually be another girl in the crew. “Admission,” Annalise said softly as she pulled open the door to the bathroom, which looked like a little log cabin. “I don’t have any girl-friends anymore.”
“Welcome to the club,” Jenny said, pulling a toothbrush from the bag on her shoulder. “That’s one of the pitfalls of getting your ass bitten by a panther shifter. Girls are harder to come by in the big cat community. It’s a boys’ club. Sometimes the ladies don’t make very good monsters, if you know what I mean.”
“Yeah, actually, I completely get what you’re saying. I make a terrible monster.”
“Oh, my God, the worst,” Jenny said with a giggle as she started brushing her teeth at the sink. Around a frothy mouth of toothpaste, she said, “I saw your claw marks on Barret’s face, remember? Those were deep and intentional. You went after your own people and gave your back to a Gray Back grizzly. You’re crazy.”
Annalise’s frown deepened so much it made her forehead hurt. “Thanks.”
“Lynn’s crazy, too, and so am I, so don’t get your panties in a twist. You’re a black leopard, right?”
That question left Annalise completely baffled. “No. I’m a panther.”
“Yeah, but there are two kinds of big cats that fall under the panther shifter category. Get it? Cat-egory?” Jenny spat toothpaste in the sink and dipped down to fill her mouth straight from the faucet. She gurgled, spat again, and then said, “I saw your spots. We’ve only had one black leopard in the crew before, and he was a douche-canoe of the highest level. I’m a Jaguar. The boys are all Jaguars too, and so is Lynn. All black big-cats are called Panthers. But you’re a rare one, Miss Ma’am.”
Huh. Well that actually answered a burning question she’d had about her spots. Cool. A black leopard. “Can I play twenty questions?”
“Let me guess,” Jenny said, making her way into one of the shower stalls. “The boys haven’t explained anything to you.”
“I asked questions the first couple days but gave up when Anson answered everything with ‘your momma.’”
“Ha!” Jenny blasted out a laugh that echoed through the bathroom. “And asking Greyson would’ve gotten you the silent treatment. And Barret would’ve probably just tried to bite you. That man is a savage. Did you ask Ben anything?”