Page 1 of Heroes & Hitmen
CHAPTER 1
Ares
I’ll be wakingup tomorrow with a headache, hazy memories, and a thousand-mile road trip ahead of me.
Buttonight? I’m going out with a bang.
The Stillwater Tap is buzzing like a hornet’s nest, filled with half-drunk friends and packmates here to send me off. I’m not surprised that my going away party is so well attended, nor am I shocked when a tray of shots lands in front of me, courtesy of my friend Avery.
“Hey, Raines,” she purrs as she turns a smirk on me, resting an elbow on the edge of the table and cocking a brow. “Can I interest you in a whiskey shot?”
“Why not?” I reply, reaching out to pluck one off the tray. It ismyparty, after all.
Avery’s mate shoulders his way through the crowd, coming up behind her and banding a possessive arm around her waist. “This place is fuckin’ crazy tonight,” he grumbles, tugging her body backwards into his.
“What can I say?” I chuckle as I sweep a glance over the sea of bodies crammed inside the bar. “I’ve got a lot of fans who want to see me off.”
Avery rolls her eyes as she tips her head back to rest against her mate’s shoulder. “Ugh, do you have to leave?” she whines, pouting her lower lip at me.
“A deal’s a deal,” I reply with a wink, tipping my shot to her and knocking it back.
About five years ago, our alliance of shifter packs– dubbed thesix pack, for the number of packs aligned– was targeted by hunters and needed firearms to fight back. The shifter pack in Chicago deals in all kinds of shady shit, so they had guns. Money changed hands, but the Alpha there prefers to trade in favors, so the deal had a catch– one year of service from a highly skilled marksman, to be cashed in whenever he deemed necessary in the future.
The asshole finally called to collect.
At the time the bargain was struck, my older brother Archer volunteered to fulfill our end of it. He’s got the requisite firearms skills, and so long as our father was still holding onto the Alpha rank in our pack, a year away didn’t seem like a big deal. Dad retired last spring, though, and Archer assumed leadership. He found his fated mate shortly after. Suffice to say, he’s no longer in any position to up and leave for a year, so I volunteered to take his place.
I’m an expert sharpshooter myself, and I don’t have a pack to lead or a mate to look after. I help train and run our alliance’s security squad, but there are plenty of other squad leaders available to pick up the slack in my absence. And sure, I’ll miss my family and friends here in Colorado, but there’s no reason I can’t come back to visit every couple months. A year is nothing in the grand scheme of things.
The whiskey burns my throat as I swallow it down, slamming my empty shot glass back on the table. “Try not to miss me too much,” I tell Avery as I wipe my mouth off on a forearm, lifting my gaze to aim a smirk at her mate. “Take good care of my girl while I’m gone, eh?”
He frowns back at me, his grip around Avery’s waist tightening. I swear, he makes it way too easy to get under his skin, especially when I derive so much joy out of pushing his buttons. It’s not as if he’s got any reason to be salty. Everybody knows I used to have it bad for Avery Kessler, buthe’sthe lucky bastard who landed her.
“Everyone just play nice and grab a shot,” Avery huffs, reaching out to swipe one off the tray.
I follow suit, more of our friends reaching in from around the table to claim their own. Avery glances around once we’ve all got our glasses up, grinning as she prepares to deliver one of her infamous raunchy toasts.
“May the liquor burn and your partner go down, and not theother way around,” she declares, earning appreciative chuckles from the rest of us as we clink our shots together.
This one’s rougher than the last, the whiskey scalding my throat before settling warmly in my belly. I stifle a cough, knocking a fist against my chest.
“Keep that up and you’re not gonna be able to walk outta here at the end of the night,” my friend Iver comments as he shoulders in beside me, clapping one hand against my back and reaching in with the other to steal a shot off the tray.
“Maybe that’s the point,” I reply, helping myself to another right along with him.
Iver’s expression turns somber. “If you wanna stay, we could probably get you out of it, you know.”
“And make an enemy of a pack that size?” I scoff. “Nah, it’s no big deal. I’m actually looking forward to the change of scenery.”
He snorts a laugh. “You mean you’re looking forward to scamming on some new she-wolves.”
“That too,” I smirk, clinking my glass against his and throwing back the shot.
Yeah, the prospect of sinking into some city girl pussy definitely sweetens the deal.
Not that the girls around here don’t do it for me, but fishing in the same pond gets old after a while. With a reputation like mine, I tend to attract a certain type– women who are down for a good time, but not a long time. It’s all fun while it lasts, but when you’re always surrounded by the same faces, even the thrill of the chase starts to feel like a rerun.
Stillwater’s been my home for twenty-five years, and lately, that familiarity feels more suffocating than comforting. My closest friends are all settling down and starting families, our nights at the bar becoming fewer and farther between. I’m not opposed to settling down someday and doing the whole domestic bliss thing myself, but only if the right woman comes along. Until then, I’ll just keep searching for something that feels fresh– and what better way to do that than starting over in a new city?
