Free Hierarchy by Madelaine Montague Page A

control.
    He tasted magic!
    Laced with psychic!
    And female!
    Tensing all over, his hormones abruptly raging for more than the teasing taste he could pull into his lungs, however hard they labored, he narrowed his eyes expectantly on the corner, waiting for his first sight of the owner of the most exquisite perfume he’d ever smelled. She rounded the building at the end of the street just as his gaze settled there and knocked the breath right out of him. For a time, all he could do was stare at her hungrily, every muscle in his body taut, his dick twitching, and his mouth watering.
    It was just as well he was frozen in appreciation of the vision coming toward him.
    His beast was threatening to break its leash and hump the fuck out of her and he sure as shit didn’t want to frighten his little angel.
    A movement closer to hand finally broke the spell and Luke dragged his hungry gaze from her to look for trouble. He found it. The wormy looking bastard that had been 37
    acting so weird was shadowing her along his side of the street, popping up from time to time to peer at her— his woman—over the hoods of the cars that lined the curb.
    What the fuck?
    He was on the point of launching himself at the bastard when a very unpleasant scent smacked him so hard it halted him in his tracks—vamp.
    He bristled wondering what a vamp was doing so close to his territory. He couldn’t abide the cold-blooded, blood sucking, snots!
    He didn’t have long to wonder. The vamp reached the same corner where the future mother of his children had appeared, glanced around, spied his woman and followed. There was no doubt in his mind that she was the vamp’s target and Luke abruptly decided to ignore the wormy man as of no consequence.
    Almost as the woman came even with the building directly across the street, the door opened and Tommy Two Horses stepped out.
    Well fuck! He might have known the bastard’s timing would suck as bad as everything else about him!
    It took him two seconds too long to realize that the enticing scent of his angel was probably going to throw Tommy into fuck-fever as fast as it had him.
    And it did. Tommy’s attention focused on her instantly. For a heartbeat, he merely stared at her with glazed eyes and then he and the two lieutenants that had followed him from the building leapt the string of stairs that led down to the sidewalk, landing directly in front of her.
    Enough was enough! He didn’t know what the fuck was going on, but he’d pegged that woman and no-fucking-body else was going to snatch her out from under him!
    * * * *
    Bronwyn was so focused on her certainty that she was being followed, her mind was sluggish in assimilating what was happening when the three men—dark, with long black hair—landed around her as if they’d fallen from the sky. She gaped at the man in the forefront, who was breathing as heavily as if he’d just run a mile. His eyes were wild, gleaming in a way that sent a shot of adrenaline rushing through her, spawning the instinct to flee. Every muscle in her body froze instead.
    She sucked in a breath to scream.
    He bent over and plowed into her like a line-backer, hooking her over one broad shoulder and knocking the air from her lungs. She struggled to catch her breath, to scream, clawing and shoving at his back uselessly.
    A loud yipping sound distracted her, made goosebumps leap out all over her, and she glanced quickly toward what sounded like an Indian on the warpath—looked like one, too. His face twisted in a feral snarl, his long, black hair flying in the wind as he raced directly toward her and her assailant, the biggest fucking Indian—Native American—she’d ever seen in her life was charging right toward her.
    She managed no more than a glimpse. The cry he’d emitted snagged her captor’s attention, as well, and he whirled to face the wild man racing toward them.
    She caught a glimpse of Marco, also racing in her direction, as she was whipped around.
    Oh god! The