Free Feral Passion by Avery Duncan Page A

checking up on me.” Even to her own ears her voice was distant,
entranced by horrific thoughts that didn’t seem to want to
leave.
    He hesitated, forest green eyes worried.
After a moment, he sighed and she watched as his shoulders dropped.
“Okay. . . The people for the security system will be here
tomorrow.”
    Mary nodded, avoided looking at him.
    “See you tomorrow,” he said quietly, walking
out of the room.
    She waited till she heard the car back out of
the drive way, then fell to her head, sobbing quietly.

Chapter 14
     
    Chase and Raff walked to their rooms in
silence, trying to place the facts that they had learned. The girl,
Ashlyn, had been ruthlessly murdered. The body, though charred to
the bone, had been identified by her parents and when the Acutos
doctor has seen the blood red signs he had burnt his hand touching
her.
    Raff had no clue how the runt of a
half-breed knew all of this, but he was grateful for the facts. On
the car ride back, he had asked Chase to look into veneficae, meaning witch, or magic.
Anything that might connect to the red symbol that had seemed to
be. . .burned into her skin.
    Mitch had seen firsthand the evidence of the
incriminating signs. When Michael had pulled out the photos, he had
been more than shocked. In the past, he had seen some horrible
things. Bad enough to give him permanent nightmares, enough to keep
him awake at night when they got bad enough.
    But what he saw in the picture, it had just.
. .scared him. Pissed him off to no ends. Made him feel as if the
world was crumbling around him when he applied that to Mary. Chase
had turned away sharply, coughing and cursing.
    The deformed picture had brought back
memories, brought back the feel of blades in his palm, the feel of
blades in his skin. Life had taken a horrible turn for him when he
had realized that his father had lied, had run, had used him.
    When he had been assigned as leader of
the pacchetto , he had been. .
.disinterested, only slightly angry. As a child he had been told
the day would come, but before that happened he had been recruited
as a monster, or at least that’s what he had thought of himself at
the time.
    “I’ll text you when I’m up,” Chase let him
know, before closing the door to his suite. Raff walked to his,
unlocked it, and stepped into the dark room, flipping on the light
switch.
    Raffaele sighed, staring around the room.
Lately, he had been more relaxed. It was an off and on sensation,
but after his meeting with Mary it had kind of. . .lasted. Like a
while. Till he had gotten to the bar, that is.
    He pulled out his phone, sitting at the
bar in one of the high chairs. He had four texts, two of them from
his beta , the other two being
his secretary. He also had seven missed calls.
    Raffaele groaned with irritation, knowing
that with the time difference they would still be up and about.
Well, at least his secretary would be. The woman never slept, at
least in the closing your eyes sense.
    The phone was picked up on the first ring. “I
tried calling you five times! What are you up to that you can’t
answer the phone?” Hannah asked, exasperated.
    Raffaele’s eye twitched. “I had things to
do,” he said vaguely.
    “Oh, and like what? Because I’m here running your “business”
and you can take time off to get a good lay? Mr. Jaques, I will
quit!” she threatened, the mental image of her stabbing a finger in
the air coming to mind.
    “I’m. . .sorry?” he tried.
    “Well, it’s too late now! If you had answered
your phone sooner, this could have been avoided,” she chastised,
sounding much like the hyper chipmunk that she looked like.
    “What could have been avoided?” he asked,
eyes crossing.
    “Your “beta ” as you like to call the wormy bastard,
came in here saying that you had faxed him estate papers. I’m
guessing he thought that I wouldn’t bother to read them, but I
did,” she said, catching her breath.
    Raffaele froze. “Do you still have