Mated To Magic (Stark Creek Shifters Book 1) by Barb Shuler (free ereaders .TXT) 📕

Dalton and I kept our distance from each other. The more stubborn I was, the more he would push back. Right now, I was digging in and refusing to budge. I almost didn’t want to be in the same town as him when he found out what I had done because he was going to lose it and there would be no calming him down. I wasn’t sorry for my actions, though. I would do it again in a heartbeat. It was about time he learned how to compromise. He had one guy on the inside, two if you included him. The rest were just fine out the outside. If Dalton and Liam couldn’t handle it, then we had bigger problems than a spell I put on the place.

The drive home was silent. Once we hit the house, I was thankful we didn’t have neighbors because round two started again. We were talking in circles, going over the same shit, and neither of us were backing down. This only pissed me off more. I tried to get him to calm the fuck down and go for a run, but the son of a bitch was being a stubborn bastard. He wanted to be in my face, pushing my buttons. Until he was in my face, kissing the fight right out of me.

Once our lips connected in a heated kiss, my body pressed against him as his fingers dug into my hips. I left my nails digging into his back as we made up.

Two days of making up that made me thankful that I didn’t open the bar at the beginning of the week so that I could enjoy Dalton and our bed. That was, until he found out what I had done...

13

Dalton

Over the last two days, Mia and I have made up many times, and I have been able to pull my wolf back into control. I can’t guarantee he’ll stay that way, but as Kody would joke, I made the bastard heel for now. Shaking my head, I slid on the black tactical gear Ty had thrown my way. One thing I could say about my guys, they were always prepared. I’d left Liam at the bar, in the office watching monitors and keeping an eye on the girls. Simon and his men were on a rotation of inside and outside perimeters, and I had Max and Kody watching outside. If anything happened, I had plenty of men on hand to handle it.

Using the information Liam had, we now knew where this Peter Sinclair lived. Ty and I were going to do a little recon, get a good look around his home office, and see if we could find some dirt on him. We needed a tie to Josh and the asshole that hurt Mia. We found the note in the locker Josh had used, so that much was at least true, but the tone of the note led me to believe that Josh knew more than he’d told us…and since my wolf shredded him, we’d not uncover those secrets.

We parked on the outskirts of town, a half mile from our target, which sat off the main highway leading in and out of Stark Creek. It wasn’t much to look at, but from the satellite images Liam acquired, there were three out buildings set back from the house, along with a detached two car garage.

The man had to sell his business, yet he lived on all this acreage with cars and SUVs in and out all day. I smell bullshit. I gave in and called Sy. I wanted him to know what was going on before we went in. Just in case things went south.

“Dalton, how's it hangin’, bro?”

“First off, I ain’t your bro. Secondly, it’s hanging bigger and heavier than yours. Look, we are about to do a B&E at Peter Sinclair’s house. This is just a courtesy call in case Mia calls you later to help us out of a jam.”

“She told me she was doing good. Though it’s been a few days since I talked to her. Maybe—”

“Sylvester, stay with me here,” I growled. “We think Peter Sinclair is trying to run Mia out of her bar. Be on the ready in case we need you.”

“You can’t just go breaking into someone’s house. For fuck—”

I ended the call and slid my phone into my pocket. I didn’t need him to tell me what I could and couldn’t do. He wasn’t a part of this equation.

With a chin lift, I took off toward the tree line. We ran, our footfalls silent as we jumped the bushes and the fence on the edge of the property. I scanned the yard, while Ty did the same at my side. No one was out here, no heartbeats sounded from inside.

We moved across the yard slowly to the back door. Ty dropped to one knee, pulled out his kit, and went to work on the lock.

This place was as neat as a show home, but one thing was for sure; this asshole had a lot to hide. No one lived this clean. No one had desks worth more than a rent check if they were broke and selling off assets. Something was fishy here.

I searched the bookcases - nothing. The safe, which was open, had nothing of importance. The last place to check was the desk. This monster had drawers and doors and everything was nice and neat…but I knew better. I crawled up under it and mashed, pressing my fingers into the back of each door and cupboard. That’s when I found it.

He definitely had something to hide. I was elbow deep on the desk’s back hidden drawer when I heard Ty curse. His angry growl had me hurrying to see what was happening. I’d just grabbed a handful of papers when he came into the office. His loud steps echoed in the room.

“Wait. Max! Shut