Shadow Wolves: His Black Rose (Book 6)

Chapter 2 - The first target.

Elizabeth

THE FIRST MONTH was horrible. Settling into university life and living a human life made me feel everyone was looking at me. No, no staring at me! I was the new kid. It was high school all over again. Only this time, I had to act completely human and not use magic. To top it all off, I had to blend into the background. I could no longer be part of the popular kids.

I wore a pair of glasses to make me look a little nerdy. Dyed my hair dark brown, so the blonde wouldn’t stand out so much, and always tied it into a back ponytail, instead of curling it to fall around my face in soft curvy waves. Skirts and crop tops were replaced with sweats and t-shirts and the occasional hoodie that was way too big for me.

After a couple of months, I became the character and actually started enjoying just being instead of having to dress up every day. My roommate was out most of the time, which gave me the peace I needed to study. Life was perfect. Until that black envelope arrived. My name was written in silver cursive ink on the front. I could hardly look at it and placed it on my desk as if it was burning my fingertips. Pacing up and down the room with the envelope staring me in the face. Just lying there on my desk. Refusing to go away! So, I moved it to my bed. Yes, I know! Training to be an assassin sounded way cooler than it actually was!

I grabbed it and opened it to find it had a name and surname with an address on the back of a picture. This man, who I didn’t know, was my first solo target.

“I can do this. I can do this.” I paced back and forth. “Nope I can’t.” I stopped pacing. Turned to look at the contents on my bed, and put my hands in front of my face before pacing again. My cell phone suddenly started to ring, making me nearly jump through the roof! The number showed that it was aunt Megan and I hesitated to answer but did so after a second or so.

“Hi Lizzy, I take it you received the instructions?” Her voice sounded slightly different.

“Yes, but is it really necessary? Can’t we find another way to protect the innocent?” I sounded panicked

“As soon as you find it, sweetheart, I will be all ears. For now, unfortunately, this has been the only proven way to deal with such monsters.” She reiterated. She told me this so many times while we were training.

“His crimes?” I sighed.

“The worst of them are abuse, r**e, trafficking, and each time the justice system is about to nab him, he slithers away. I’m sending you a copy of his file now. Take a look at your email, and Lizzy, remember, it is always your choice. Never anyone else’s. If you say no, then that is it.” I nodded even though she couldn’t see me. I knew the crimes were going to be the worst, but I hoped they weren’t, so I could say no.

“Thank you. I will look at his file, and I will remember.” We hung up, and I looked at my laptop to find two emails. One from aunt Meg with the information she said and one from my mom. I quickly scanned through the information about the target, so I could give my answer to aunt Meg, knowing mom’s emails were usually essays!

Now that I was actually there. Facing the moment. It felt nothing like I thought it would. None of the excitement was there, none of the mystery. I didn’t feel sexy at all!! But reading about what this thing had done to innocent people, I knew that he had to be sorted out. I sent my reply to aunt Meg and opened the email from my mom. As suspected, it was a long one. I hadn’t been back home since I started classes, and she had a lot to tell me since I didn’t “have a cell phone”.

“My darling Elizabeth,

Why do you still refuse to get a cell phone? It would make it so much easier for me to reach you. Things at the castle haven’t changed… in forever, as you know, although we miss you terribly. Uncle Julius and I took a trip to the pack lands to visit your brothers. The boys are driving your uncle Anthony and Matt up the wall from the reports I received. Apparently, they get up to all sorts of shenanigans, but I did warn them. Between the lot of them, it seems Christiaan is taking his role as Alpha seriously… serious enough to be the leader of the shenanigans! But in my opinion, they are all good boys and will turn out just fine.

Things have calmed down since the war, and I am feeling that “empty nest syndrome” everyone talks about, now that you and your brothers are gone. With no villains to chase at the moment… I have become obsolete. How is school? How are your classes and your professors? Have you made any new friends? Maybe met anyone special?

Which leads me to my next… how do I put this without you losing your temper… see if you had a phone this would have been so much easier! I guess the best way is to just say it as it is. You and your brothers, together with all the unmated from here, the homelands, the pack lands, and from what I understand… the entire damn supernatural world… have been invited to a mating ball, held by the Alpha King and his Queen and the Vampire Queen.

Yes… none of it made any sense to me either. I asked Julius to explain after we killed the Wolf King, and it took him almost three hours to get to the point where I caught up. Seems this Alpha King is the King of all werewolves. That’s the short version. Come home and I will tell you the entire story. The Vampire Queen is also the Queen of all vampires… imagine that?

Here I thought it was just our little world, and in the meantime, there was this huge world out there! But I digress. Everyone has been invited, and I expect you to come. As the only granddaughter of the moon goddess, it is your duty. I have researched your university exam tables after bugging your aunt for the list of subjects you are taking. You will be done with your exams a week before new year. More than enough time for us to go shopping and find you the perfect set of outfits for the mating week.

If you don’t come, I will be forced to come and get you, and I’m sure you don’t want your mother appearing out of the blue in your room…

Write back, no! Buy a cell phone and come home. As soon as your exams are finished. I miss you. Come home.

Love

Mom”

A Ball! Mating ball of all things! Kings and Queens, we didn’t know about, and she wanted me to buy a cell phone? Typical. I needed to go home, even if it was just to find out what all this was about and make sense of what her email was about. But then what if I found my mate? I started pacing the length of my room again, deep in thought, looking at the lilac comforter on my bed floating down to the ground. My palms felt sweaty. I thought that by coming to university my mom would have given up on her silly ideas of finding me a mate. She had two sons who could give her grandchildren!!

The picture on the bed caught the corner of my eye. I guessed this was one of the big tests’ aunt Meg was talking about. Or at least the first of many. I would have to choose between being just a normal university girl or leading the double life I trained so hard for. Flopping down on my bed, with the picture in hand, I took a deep breath.

“Compartmentalize. One thing at a time. First, I will take care of you, then I will go home and be Elizabeth.” Getting a fright when my roommate suddenly walked into the room out of the blue.

“Have you gone coo-coo since I last saw you, Lilly?” She frowned. Of course, she didn’t even try to get to know my name.

“No, Clara, I’m perfectly sane. I just needed some expert advice on something.” I grabbed my bag, gave her a wink just for effect, and left the room. Knowing that her jaw had just dropped to the floor. “Close your mouth darling. You don’t want to swallow something disgusting now, do you?” I turned and said over my shoulder before closing the door behind me. She might not be in the room much, but I knew how to deal with girls like her. I used to be one of them. I knew I shouldn’t, but if there weren’t any witnesses around. I liked to just bite her back every once in a while.

Skipping down the front steps, I made my way to the bus stop. I had to do a bit of recon on this guy and get this over with. If I could find a way for the police to find the evidence that they need to lock him up for life, it would be so much better than giving him the easy way out! Luckily, one of the subject’s aunts Meg made me take was criminal law. She believed that I should know how deep I was getting into trouble. Haha! As if that was going to make a difference! But I thought she also meant it to be another way to try and figure out not having to commit murder.

We talked about it a lot. She never had any targets, but she read her mother’s Rose Diary, which she found in the main house when she moved back. She did say that after the war, she wished that there was a better way to resolve things. Every time any of the grown-ups talked about the war’s sadness, it was clear in their eyes and their bodies even slumped. I jumped off the bus in front of his office building and ran across the street when I saw a little coffee shop. A perfect place for a student to sit and study. Also, somewhere he would most likely go. I didn’t have to wait long before he walked in, straight to the counter. The poor Barista looked positively frightened!

He had two guards standing by the door while he placed his order. He was clearly flirting with the young girl. Grabbing hold of her hand as often as he possibly could, without spilling anything. I carefully kept an eye on him from behind my computer screen.

She handed him his coffee, stepping back slightly when she asked for payment. He burst out laughing and threw the piece of paper at her, shouting over his shoulder when he turned to walk away.

“Keep the change.” His laugh was a deep throaty laugh. He walked confidently as if he owned the world and he was untouchable. I wondered how untouchable he would feel if he didn’t have his guards around. I watched as they left the shop, climbed into the stereotypical black SUV, and drove into the parking lot across the street.

“You must be kidding me!!” I sighed.

“Would you like a refill?” The girl appeared beside me and smiled politely, but she was still visibly shaken up.

“Sure, are you okay? That guy looks like a real piece of work.” I rolled my eyes.

“I’ll be fine. He is the owner of half of the buildings in the city. But I don’t want to bother you with silliness. He is a very important man, but thank you for your concern.” Hmmm, the kind of man who had everything then chased after what he couldn’t have. Now, that has made things interesting. Opening my browser, I started my research on him. Now that I knew what kind of man he was, I could research who the world thought he was. Usually, these kinds of people were superficial and easy to read. It was the ones who were quiet that made things difficult. Or at least that was what aunt Megan taught me.

Finishing my research, I sent her an interim report, explaining what I saw of him and what I found out. Only detailing his activities. It took her a full three minutes to call me.

“Please tell me you aren’t thinking what I’m thinking you are thinking?” She sighed.

“Huh?” I felt confused.

“Don’t you even dare to try to entrap him! If you read the report properly, you will see that a lot of highly trained officers have tried and quite a few have lost their lives.” She sighed.

“Yes, but they weren’t me, and they weren’t trained by you.”