Jacks, Marcy - Mason Returns to His Mate [DeWitt's Pack 8] (Siren Publishing Everlasting Classic Man by Marcy Jacks (free novel reading sites .TXT) 📗

He was nearly there when he heard the door he’d just destroyed  fall completely off the hinges.

“Mason, wait!”

Derek. Mason didn’t want to talk to him right now. He ran into the trees and quickly got out of his clothes. He transformed just as he heard Derek stepping into the thicket of shrubs and trees, and then  Mason went on a cleansing run.

* * * *

Derek nearly ran after  Mason, but the sudden darkness in the sky and the black shadows that made it impossible for him to see through all the trees, had him turning back.

James had come down from his deck and met Derek halfway.  Derek never felt so small in all his life as he did before the brother of

the man he’d just chewed out.

“Will he come back?” Derek asked.

James wet his lips and looked toward the trees. “Don’t know. He’s a grown man, and he’s been away too long to still be considered part of this pack. Unless he counts you, there’s nothing to tie him to this place anymore if he chooses to go wandering for the rest of his life.

Derek’s fists clenched at that comment. “It was just a fight.” And not even a very big one at that. Mason wouldn’t leave him again over one heated argument, would he?

The fact that he didn’t know was something that scared Derek more than anything. He and Mason didn’t know each other anymore.  They barely knew each other ten years ago.

James didn’t say anything. He merely sighed, turned, and went back to his cabin where his partner was waiting for him on the deck

stairs.

“Aren’t you going to help me look for him?” Derek demanded,

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shocked that Mason’s own brother could just go back home after  something like this.

James turned to look at him. “I told you, it’s his choice to come  back or not. I won’t force him if that’s not what he wants. I will tell

you that it would be an incredibly bad idea for you to go into those  woods during the night by yourself.”

“I don’t care. I’ll go anyway,” Derek said, already backing up  toward the black forest.

James clenched his jaw at him, and his hands became fists.

Whatever, alpha boy. I’m not part of your pack. You don’t order me around.

“I would be willing to escort him.”

Derek jumped at the pale figure that appeared at his  side from  seemingly nowhere. The man had the lightest blond hair Derek had  ever seen. It was so light he doubted it was natural. On top of that, the  man had red eyes.

And fangs.

Derek backed away a step. Was this guy another sort of werewolf,  or were those fangs and eyes part of what Derek suspected them to

be?

“You sure about that, Ivan?” James asked.

Ivan nodded. “I have Eric with me. We will be fine. Back within

the hour.”

Ivan started walking toward the trees without even waiting for

Derek.

Derek looked between both men, trying to figure out what was going on, when he gave up and just followed the other man.

He was glad for the company, but now that he had a good look at this guy, Derek was pretty sure that Ivan was the man he’d seen talking to himself on the rare occasion when he happened to be outside at night.

Red eyes, fangs, and outside only during the night.

“Please don’t be offended if I ask you a potentially awkward

74                          Marcy Jacks

question,” Derek said.

“Ask away,” Ivan replied as they entered the darkness of the

woods.

“Are you a vampire?”

Ivan stopped and turned around to look at him. Derek froze up at  the sight of those glowing red eyes. It was all he could see. Like the  man was a ghost or something.

“I am,” Ivan replied. “But you have nothing to fear. I find  the act  of putting my lips onto a strange man’s neck to be repulsive. I prefer  to drink my blood from a glass or, failing that alternative, to hunt for  it in these woods.”

Derek couldn’t help himself. “You’d rather put your mouth on a wild animal than on a person?”

“I find most wild animals to be far clearer than most humans.”

Just the sound of Ivan’s voice gave Derek the impression that

the…vampire was cringing as he made the comparison.

Like when Derek first found himself welcomed into the pack, he  had a  thousand questions, but now was not the time to be asking them,  not when Mason might be attempting to take off on him again.

There were some things he did need to ask. “How will we find  him? Can you smell him? Is Mason even still in the area?”

“Vampires are hunters by nature,” Ivan said. “But, admittedly, the  hunting capabilities of the werewolf are far superior.”

“But we don’t have a werewolf with us. Ivan?” Derek put his hand  on the other man’s shoulder when he didn’t immediately respond. The  quake he felt in Ivan’s shoulder, in his entire body really, had Derek  stumbling back.

What the fuck?

“What’s happening to you?”

His night vision was shit, but he’d adjusted enough by now to be  able to see the outline of the vampire he was with, so he could see  when the shaking subsided.

It hadn’t been a violent thing to begin with, so Derek hadn’t been

Mason Returns to His Mate                    75

worrying that the man was having a seizure or anything like that, but

still …

“Hey, you all right?”

“I’m fine.”

Derek jerked back again when the voice didn’t match Ivan’ s. He tried to see around the vampire, thinking there might’ve been another person in the area with them.

As far as he could tell, it was just the two of them.

“How’d you do that with your voice?” Derek asked.

Ivan turned around. This time, instead of glowing red eyes, the irises that lit up in the dark were gold.

Derek squinted, thinking he might not be seeing this right.  “How’d you do that with your eyes?”

Ivan stepped up to him, and then strangely, held out his hand. “My name is Eric. I’ll be helping you to track Mason. Nice to meet you.”

76                          Marcy Jacks

Chapter Eight

Mason wasn’t much