Page 1 of Enemy Wolf

Chapter 1

Shiloh

By the fucking moon, this could not be happening.

Someone was not breaking into my bar right now.

But I could hear the footfalls from where I was doing inventory in the back storage room, and my disbelief was not lining up with reality.

The floorboards creaked under the weight of the intruder and I froze, holding my breath to listen. This person was large, most likely a man. They moved slowly across the room, as if taking care where they stepped. From back here, I couldn’t tell if they were going for the cash drawer or somewhere else. For all I knew, it was some rogue vampire who’d come to vandalize my place just because I was near the border of Sanguine, the vampire territory.

I frowned at that thought. Derric, the Howling Death alpha, said the vampires wouldn’t bother us anymore. But who else could it be? My bar, Stout & Spirit, was the most popular watering hole in Vargmore, the werewolf territory, despite my not being a werewolf. I knew just about everyone who came through—which was the entirety of Vargmore, pretty much.

I couldn’t think of a single citizen who would break into my place of business, aside from some naughty children with no malicious intent. But whoever was on the other side of that door was no child, not even a gangly teenager.

So it could only be a longtime enemy of the werewolves, either the vampires or the dragon shifters.

As I went for my phone, the footfalls stopped just outside the storage room door, and I froze again. I thought I heard sniffing, and then a deep male voice muttering to himself on the other side before continuing on.

Scenting the air was a very werewolf thing to do, which again, was odd. My mind flicked through the hundreds of faces I knew, all wolves I was at least somewhat acquainted with. None of them seemed like the type to break in, so what the fuck?

I scrolled through my phone, trying not to breathe too loudly while also calming my racing heart. My thumb hovered over Sawyer’s number, Howling Death’s enforcer.

And my ex-boyfriend, of sorts.

I chewed my lip, for some reason hesitant to call him up. He was newly mated, for one, and at this hour, probably spending some quality time with Riley. And despite him ending things between us abruptly and then falling head over heels for her soon after, I actually liked his mate and didn’t want to impose on them.

Yeah, I was such a good friend. As I so often heard.

I also considered the possibility that I didn’t need him to come to my rescue. I may not have been a werewolf, but I was something even, dare I say, better.

A witch.

I may not have had teeth and claws, but I certainly had other tricks up my sleeve. And damn it, this was my bar. I didn’t need to cry to the wolves for help with every little thing.

Determined, I went for the baseball bat stashed in the corner behind the door. A bar patron had brought it in months ago, saying he’d gone to a game in the human world and gotten it from a player as a souvenir. We didn’t have baseball in Shyftworld, though I’d seen it on some human TV channels. I’d taken it away from the patron for swinging the bat a little too enthusiastically in the dining area. He’d been drunk enough to leave without it and hadn’t come back for it since.

“Thank you, Sacramento Rivercats,” I muttered, hovering my left hand over the thickest end of the bat.

Defensive magic poured out of my palm, crackling with heat as it circled the barrel. I concentrated, forcing the magic out until it fully enveloped the business side of my weapon. When I released my hold on the magic, it sank into the wood like a cloth absorbing water and disappeared.

My bat now looked ordinary to anyone who couldn’t sense it, but the magic would make it feel like shards of broken glass were embedded into the smooth wood. The intruder had no idea what he was in for.

I gripped the bat at the thinnest end, letting the midsection rest on my shoulder as I reached for the doorknob with my other hand and steeled myself for this confrontation. Think like a wolf, Shiloh. Defend your territory.

On a silent count of three, I yanked the door open and burst into the bar. Both hands gripped the bat while I hovered it over my shoulder, eyes darting around for my target to strike.

He was male alright, and a werewolf. He was also stupidly calm for having a pissed-off bar owner coming at him with a bat. In fact, he wasn’t even looking at me.

The intruder was looking down, fiddling with a small black contraption in his hand. I spotted a lens on the thing. A camera? There were more of them on the bar, with cardboard boxes and wires stretched out all over the place.

“Hey!” I snapped, raising the bat higher.

The werewolf looked up and froze me in place with the palest, icy blue eyes I’d ever seen. “Oh, hey. I need to get into your cable closet. Is it back there?” He jerked his chin toward the storage room I’d just come out of.

The question, his bored tone, his eyes. None of it made sense. It was all noise in my brain. I stared at him, bewildered. “What?”

“Cable closet. It looks like a little cabinet in the wall, kind of like an electrical panel. It’ll have your wireless router, ethernet cables, any phone lines—”

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