Fate Bound (Fate Bound Trilogy Book 1)

  Fate Bound

  Fate Bound Trilogy #1

  Madeline Freeman

  Contents

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Also by Madeline Freeman

  Copyright © 2016 Madeline Freeman

  Copyright © 2016 Steven Novak

  All rights reserved.

  First eBook Edition: June 2016

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance of characters to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. The Author holds exclusive rights to this work. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  For information:

  http://www.madelinefreeman.net

  Created with Vellum

  Chapter One

  I knew as soon as I woke up this morning that today would be the day I died. Call it a premonition or simply a gut feeling, but the same weight of foreboding sat in the pit of my stomach seven years ago. I knew before my aunt Erica even came to pick me up from school that my dad had finally lost his battle with cancer.

  The feeling alone should’ve been enough to keep me from going out after work, but things at the call center were worse than usual. Typically when people phone in for tech support, no matter how irritated they are, they understand I’m not the source of their problems and that I’m doing my best to help. But today, caller after caller yelled and screamed and belittled me, and going straight home to my crap apartment—with no food in the fridge and neighbors who either can’t stop arguing at the top of their lungs or think everyone in the vicinity should be able to hear what’s on their TV—was out of the question.

  I’ve been to Shiner’s dozens of times. It’s a total dive—the kind of place where the glasses aren’t always one hundred percent clean but where the bartender has never bothered to check my ID, which would reveal I’m only nineteen. I usually only stay for a beer or two and tip as generously as I can—which is partially why there’s no food at my apartment. Every once in a while, a new thirty-something man will join me at my table in the corner and offer to buy me a drink, but I always turn him down, fully aware such offers come with strings. But when a blond guy in his twenties sat beside me tonight, I couldn’t make myself ask him to leave. I wanted to—it’s pretty much my standard rule—but as soon as he opened his mouth, the protest died in my throat.

  I’m tipsy when I leave the bar. It’s late—later than I’ve ever stayed out. I can tell it’s closing time because the staff has started wiping down surfaces and resting upturned chairs on tabletops. My companion for the evening has disappeared, and no matter how hard I try, I can’t recall his face.

  The parking lot is nearly empty, and my car is in the furthest corner under a burned-out lamp. I didn’t think much of it when I arrived, but the spot looks a lot more menacing at two o’clock in the morning. I adjust my grip on my keys the way I learned in self-defense class in sixth grade, preparing to use them as a weapon if necessary, but the alcohol in my veins slows my reaction time and the metal clinks as it hits the ground.

  I should recognize the rough scraping sound of feet dashing across the gravel-strewn parking lot, but it takes me a second too long and the man is upon me before I can react. My balance, already precarious from the alcohol and the angle I’m bent at to retrieve my keys, fails completely as he impacts me from behind. Jagged stones gouge my palm and elbow as I attempt to break my fall.

  “Give me your money,” he growls, his hands already yanking at my purse. His face is shadowed under the hood of his dark sweatshirt and his breath reeks like hot garbage.

  I should just let it go. The bag is falling apart and there’s only seventeen dollars and some change in my wallet. But there’s also a picture of my dad and me from the summer before he got sick. It’s the only picture I still have of him and I’ll be damned if I give it up without a fight. I scrabble at the packed-earth lot, desperate to cobble together a handful of dirt. When he rips at the purse again, I spin and aim my pitiful arsenal of sand grains and pebbles at his face.

  “The hell!” he howls, releasing his grip and pressing his meaty palms to his eyes. I use the momentary distraction to scoop up my keys and clamber to my feet. The adrenaline spiking in my system clears my head, but my movements are still uncoordinated as I dash for my car.

  I’m twenty yards away. I can make it—I know I can. I grip my car keys, wishing I’d spent the money to upgrade to keyless entry. There will be plenty of time for him to catch up when I’m unlocking the door.

  Ten yards away. Five.

  His hand catches my hair and wrenches my head backward, pulling until I stumble. A sharp, searing pain shoots through my abdomen again and again—three, four, five times—until I drop to the ground. My vision swims as I look up. There’s just enough light from the nearest street lamp to glint off the pocket knife he holds as he bends down to relieve me of my purse. “I just wanted your money,” he says as he backs away.

  I want to call out, but the back of my throat fills with blood, choking my words.

  This is it. My end. I’ve thought about it countless times before. I spent so many nights wondering whether my dad was aware of the moment he moved from life in his drug-induced coma to death and whatever came next. I like to think he knew, that he was prepared. I always wanted to die that way, with as little unfinished business as possible. But this death is far more like my mother’s: She was anxiously awaiting the next phase in her life when she suffered a postpartum hemorrhage in the hours after I was born.

  The rushing in my ears is punctuated by the steady crunch of gravel. I try to turn toward the sound, to verify it’s not my imagination playing tricks on me, but my body isn’t responding. If someone is coming and he calls for help, there’s no way I’ll hold on long enough for it to arrive. Hell, even if this guy is a doctor I doubt he could save me. Blackness encroaches on the edges of my vision and it’s getting harder to breathe through the blood.

  A face appears above me. The man’s dark curls are wild like he’s been running, and his gunmetal-blue eyes fix on mine with an intensity that removes me from my body, from my pain, from my struggle to take in my next ragged breath. Fear flashes in his gaze—the same kind my dad always tried to hide when he spoke of his chances for survival. But this man is a stranger. Why does the terror etching his face feel so… personal?

  I gasp, but instead of air, I swallow warm, thick blood. Spluttering and choking, I lift my arm, hoping the stranger will understand what I need. I don’t want to be alone when I die. I want him to hold my hand, to stay with me until I’m gone.

  His fingers lace through mine and squeeze. I stare into his eyes, wanting the last thing I see to be beautiful. The gray-blue of his irises reminds me of the sky before a storm, and I want to lose myself in it.

  The pain in my body ratchets up. It’s as if someone is pouring liquid metal th
rough my body, melting me from the inside out. A scream catches in my throat, blocked by the blood pooling there.

  I want it to be over. How much longer can I endure pain like this? I find the stranger’s face again and stare at him, hoping to telegraph what I need to him. He seems like a kind person, but if that were true, he’d close his fingers around my neck and end this suffering. But the panic in his eyes ebbs.

  Then the color shifts until his eyes flash gold.

  This must be a consequence of dying—seeing crazy things. Soon, I’m sure, my life will flash through my mind—although, in truth, I hope it doesn’t unless I can choose to review only certain moments. But I’m not greeted with visions of my past. Instead the man’s face mutates, elongating at the nose and mouth as hair begins to sprout out of his skin. Something rough scrapes my palm as he removes his hand and slips out of sight. I want to turn to see where he’s gone, but I can’t. My body won’t respond. Blackness creeps into my periphery, covering more of my vision with each passing moment.

  The fiery burning sweeps through my body, filling every atom. The force of it is too much for me to handle, and everything goes dark.

  * * *

  When he slid into the chair at my corner table, I let out an audible groan. I usually do my best to be polite when turning away the older men who try to buy me drinks, but I wasn’t in the mood. Still, he was talking before I looked up at him.

  “I’d love to buy the next round.” His voice was smooth, seductive.

  I opened my mouth, ready to tell him no, but when I locked my eyes on his electric blues, the syllables rearranged themselves on my tongue. “I’d like that.”

  He was handsome in the kind of extremely-hot-boy-next-door way that made my body tingle. His strong jaw was accentuated by the barest hint of blond stubble, the same color as the hair on his head. He bought me one drink, and then another. Somewhere around drink four or five he led me to the dance floor, where we swayed out of time with the music. I remember the scrape of his stubble against my neck and the warmth of his lips on my skin. I blushed, embarrassed to be kissed like that by a stranger in a very public space, but before I could stop him, I felt a shock of pain like he was nibbling at my skin and had nipped too hard.

  Back at the table, I told him about my premonition, how I thought today would be the day I died. He smiled then, and the bar lights glinted off his teeth. “When life is what’s ailing you, sometimes death is the cure,” he told me before lifting my wrist to his lips and nipping at my skin again.

  My recollections of the night are fuzzy after that. I left alone when the bar closed. I don’t know where my blond companion disappeared to. If I’d walked out with him, maybe the mugger wouldn’t have attacked me. But if he hadn’t, I never would have seen the dark-haired guy whose eyes flashed gold. I never would have experienced the thrill of having someone look at me like I mattered. If only I could have met him before I died.

  Is this what death is? Will I simply revisit my regrets for all eternity, wishing things had happened differently? There are so many things in my nineteen years I wish I could have changed. I wish my mom had lived to enjoy the daughter she’d always wanted to have. I wish my father had been strong enough to survive the cancer. I wish I’d never gone to live with my aunt Erica, and that I’d never had the misfortune of meeting her boyfriend Abe.

  If I’m going to be stuck in my own mind, I want to remember the good times—few though there were. I scour my memory for happy moments, but something distracts me. Something tugs at my awareness. How can I be aware of anything if I’m dead?

  Sounds. But if I’m hearing sounds, I must have functioning ears. A body.

  Voices. I can’t make out what they’re saying, but I hear them. And if I can hear, maybe I’m not dead after all.

  Chapter Two

  “I don’t understand.”

  A girl is speaking. I try to open my eyes to see her, but lifting my eyelids takes too much effort.

  “What’s there to understand?”

  A man’s voice. It’s low, filled with a kind of authority I’ve never heard before. I get the feeling he’s not the kind of person you question, and yet this girl is daring to.

  “Should I make a list?” she asks. “It begins with, ‘Does this have something to do with where you disappear to in the evenings?’ and ends with, ‘Why isn’t there a mark?’”

  Other sensations vie for my attention. I’m lying down, but not on the sharp gravel covering the packed-earth parking lot. I’m on a bed. And the air isn’t tinged with the scent of garbage from the bar’s dumpster. It’s crisper, fresher.

  “Good questions,” the man says. There’s a smile in his voice. “But the first isn’t your business, and the second… The second, I don’t know if I have an answer for, Lillie. My best guess is—” He stops short and my skin prickles. “She’s awake. Go check on her.”

  The girl snorts. “You’re smelling things. She can’t be awake yet. It’s too soon.”

  “Trust me. She’s awake.”

  My mind spins as I try to make sense of what’s going on. With effort, I finally manage to open my eyes. It takes a few moments before I can focus on anything. The walls of the room are painted a sunny yellow color, and to my right is a privacy curtain like the ones used in hospitals. But this isn’t a hospital. The bed is too large, too comfortable. There are no machines beeping, no antiseptic smell. I inhale, surprised by the aromas that greet me: campfire and vanilla and honeysuckle.

  A girl pokes her head around the curtain, confusion and alarm flickering across her face for an instant before they’re replaced by a warm smile that reveals a small gap between her front teeth. She’s young—maybe my age or a couple of years older—and she’s in jeans and a light blue camisole, not scrubs. Her elbow-length blonde hair is parted down the middle. She steps toward me. “How are you doing? I wasn’t expecting you to be awake so soon. I’m Lillie.”

  My muscles tense. I’m ready to defend myself, though I’m not sure what from. This girl doesn’t seem to want to hurt me, but I have no idea what’s going on here. “Where am I?”

  “Somewhere safe,” she says quickly.

  It’s not exactly an answer, but at least she didn’t lie and say I’m in a hospital.

  She perches on the edge of the mattress, and I struggle to sit and pull my legs away from her. “What’s the last thing you remember?” she asks, her brown eyes laced with trepidation.

  The brown-haired man’s golden eyes flash through my mind, but I elect to keep that bit of information to myself. No use sounding crazy. “I was in a parking lot, heading for my car. Someone tried to rob me and when I tried to get away, he stabbed me.” The mugger stuck the knife in me so many times I lost count. I should be in more pain than I am, considering I’m not hooked up to any kind of IV dosing me with pain meds. For the first time, I look down at my body. I’m in a hospital gown with a pattern of faded green vines. I touch my stomach through the fabric, but I don’t feel any bandages. I’m not even tender. “How long was I unconscious?”

  Lillie is studying me closely. “About thirty-six hours.”

  I allow her words to sink in, replaying them in my mind to be sure I heard her right. “Thirty-six hours? That’s not possible.” I shift as I pull at the gown, tugging the material until I have enough slack to lift it. I’m stunned by what I see: no stitches, no scabs, and no scars. Something on the inside of my right wrist catches my eye—two white circles about an inch and a half apart—but before I can wonder about them, Lillie is speaking.

  “I don’t want you to freak out, but there is an explanation for why your injuries healed so quickly.”

  I stare at her. “You’re trying to tell me there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for why I’m all healed up less than two days after some dude tried to stab me to death?”

  The corners of Lillie’s mouth upturn in a wry smile. “I didn’t say anything about it being reasonable.” Before I can stop her, she takes hold of my hand with a stronger grip th
an I would have thought her capable of. She forces my fingertips against my abdomen where any evidence of my injuries should be.

  A memory flashes through my mind: the brown-haired guy’s eyes as they turned gold and his face started to change. It shifted until it was no longer a man’s, but that of a wolf. Fur grew in thick, covering the top of his head with dark gray and the underside with vibrant white. He dipped his magnificent head down low and touched his wet nose against my cheek. A voice echoed through my mind: Marked and claimed. Mine.

  I blink and the world comes into focus again. I gasp with the adrenaline that accompanied the memory. I lock eyes with Lillie, who squeezes my hand.

  “You’re a werewolf.”

  Chapter Three

  She’s crazy. This kind-looking blonde girl is stark-raving mad.

  “A werewolf?” I ask, not bothering to hide my disbelief. “Sure, sounds legit.”

  I fling off the cream-colored blanket and swing my legs over the edge of the bed. I scan the room, hoping to find my clothes, but I realize that even if they were lying around, the shirt would be shredded and everything blood-soaked. Besides, I can’t smell the blood, so there’s no way the garments are in the room.

  The thought stills me.

  I stand, frozen in place, as the idea pings through my brain. I’d be able to smell blood if it were near. I sniff the air, feeling silly until I detect a hint of vanilla and honeysuckle. It’s stronger than before, and I’m confident it’s radiating off Lillie. Earlier I’d smelled campfire, too. It must have been coming from the man Lillie was talking to. But the scent is gone now; he’s left the room. No, he’s left the building.

  Lillie isn’t crazy. She’s telling me the truth. I don’t know how I know it, but I can’t deny what I sense. There’s something inside me that wasn’t there before—something primal. There’s a power thrumming in my veins that I’ve never experienced—which is saying something, considering I’ve had to be strong all my life.