Binds that Burn: A Werepanther Romance Suspense (Urban Dwellers Book 3) Read online

  Binds that Burn

  Urban Dwellers, #3

  By Ivy Sinclair

  Copyright 2016 Shadow Creek Press

  ebook Edition

  ebook Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to the online retailer of your choice and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Eric Carmichael woke up with a headache from hell. The first thing he thought about was the fact that today was the day that he was going to announce to the media the IPO for his company. It was a big day.

  Then the bolt of pain shot through his temple, and he wondered how much he had had to drink the night before to celebrate. It had to have been a lot. All of the memories around the night were cloudy and fuzzy around the edges. He groaned as he rolled over and put his hand on the bed next to him. The sheets felt warm, but the space was empty.

  “Shit,” he mumbled. He didn’t remember picking anyone up at the bar, but it wouldn’t be the first time that he had done that and not remembered. He had a bad habit, and it was something that Tony and Kyle often gave him a hard time about. But he had a stressful job and a stressful life, and he was entitled to a little bit of fun every now and then.

  He turned over onto his back, but he still didn’t open his eyes. The throbbing behind his eyes told him it had to have been at least several bottles of booze. His shifter metabolism made it that much harder to get a buzz, so when he got so wasted he forgot the night entirely, it was a guarantee there would be a price to pay the next day.

  It was the stupidest thing he ever could have done in prepping for the biggest day of his life. Getting so drunk that he blew his memory out the night before standing in front of over a hundred members of the press. This was going to be fun. He could just imagine what his publicist was going to say. He knew that he had to get up, but he just wasn’t sure if he could make it yet. He rolled over to the other side and opened his eyes just enough to catch a glance at the red numbers on the alarm clock. He saw that it read 4:30 AM.

  He realized with relief that he had at least another hour to sleep. He wasn’t sure what woke him; it was probably the woman getting out of bed to use the bathroom. He moved his head just enough so he could see the bathroom door. It was closed, but he could make out the faint outline of light behind it. In a way, he kind of hoped she just got dressed and left.

  Forgetting the woman, Eric let himself fall back into a dreamless slumber.

  It was the sound of the blinds opening that woke Eric some time later. He knew he had the timer for them set for 6 AM, and he was relieved to note that the throbbing in his head had started to abate. Hopefully, that meant he wouldn’t look as much like shit as he thought he might when he arrived at the press conference. It was scheduled for 9 AM on the nose.

  If he managed his time, he’d still have time to grab a quick jog on the treadmill before he got his coffee and got on his way. He’d stroll in right before the conference was set to start, which would drive his publicist crazy, but in a way that kind of amused Eric. Pushing people to their limits was something he did well.

  Eric felt the space in the bed next to him. The sheets were cold. Perhaps he was going to get lucky. He thought about the woman who had exited his bed an hour and a half before. He didn’t care if he remembered who she was or not. Clearly, the sex hadn’t been good enough to write home about.

  He moved into a sitting position and gave a low moan. Although the throbbing in his head had subsided from earlier, it seemed to be intent on coming back in full force. He was going to have to use something strong to get rid of it. He looked at his nightstand and saw a glass and a half-empty bottle of bourbon. He poured himself a glass.

  He raised the glass in the air and toasted himself. “To my success.” Then he downed the shot. It was the hair of the dog method of getting rid of a hangover. He figured when a hangover was that bad, he might as well start drinking again. He made a mental note to send his publicist a text to tell her to bring mints to the press conference. After pouring more bourbon into the glass, he stood up. That was only slightly better than sitting; his stomach started to settle, warmed by the liquor.

  He quickly pulled his exercise clothes out of the dresser. It was absolutely the last thing he wanted to do, but he needed to sweat out the booze. The sooner he got it out of his system, the sooner he would be able to think with a clear head. He knew those fuckers in the press were going to grill him over the coals about some of the decisions he was making with taking his company public. He wanted to tell all the doubters to shove their commentary up their asses, but he had to play nice. He’d promised his publicist.

  Eric walked out of his bedroom and into the main part of his open concept condo. He had his treadmill set up so that it overlooked the skyline of Copper City. When Eric was on the treadmill, he felt like he was a king.

  He chuckled to himself as he got on the treadmill and shifted up its incline. The thought was funny because, most days, Eric felt like he was a king. He was rich. He had everything he could possibly want. He ran one of the most successful software companies in the world, and now he was getting ready to take it public. Once that happened, he would be set for life, and he would have accomplished more than even his father had done in his lifetime. Not that Eric benchmarked every success in his life against his father’s legacy. All too often, Tony had a field day psychoanalyzing Eric on that particular front.

  He still wasn’t quite sure what he was going to do after the stock offering was final. He figured he would stay on as CEO for a period of time, but he was ready for his next new challenge. He felt like he had conquered the world. After that, what was left? That was what he had to figure out, and it was a disconcerting feeling to realize that even after making it this far, he still didn’t feel quite satisfied.

  He saw he had a text from Tony. Tony had gone back to their alma mater for homecoming week. Eric was glad that he hadn’t gotten suckered into that gig. He was glad to be done with that place. Back then, he had been gangly, awkward, and out of control. Three things that definitely didn’t apply to him now.

  Eric started to run and looked at himself in the reflection in the glass looking out over the city. He admired the planes of his bare chest. He flexed his arms up and out. He was glad that he had decided to run. The only thing that would have made it better would have been if he could actually phase and run in his panther form. Extreme exercise was one way that Eric knew to keep his panther in check. Because Eric’s life had such an aggressive bent to it, he often felt like if he didn’t pay attention, the cat would get loose and take control.

  Eric and his cat had had many a fight of dominance since his first phase. It wasn’t something he liked to talk about, because he didn’t like the idea that anyone or anything had any influence or control over him. He had built his business from the ground up. He had no one to thank for his success except for himself, and that was exactly the way he liked it. As he finished his run thirty minutes later, Eric took the last swig of the bourbon from the glass and set it down. He remembered that housekeeping was due to come in that day. Knowing that, he left the glass on the treadmill.

  It was only as Eric was making his way back toward his bedroom that he saw something in the hallway tha
t gave him pause. There was a pair of red stiletto heels sitting on the mat beside the front door. That was strange. He thought the woman from the night before had left. Eric realized that he had never actually heard her leave. It was possible that she might have been as drunk as he was or worse. If she was human, she wouldn’t have had a metabolism designed to flush out the toxins and recover quickly.

  Eric wiped his face with his hand. He was sweaty from his run, and he just wanted to take a shower. He needed to make sure that he was at the press conference on time, and he didn’t have time to deal with a hungover, clumsy woman.

  “Just what I need,” he grumbled out loud. Eric walked back into his bedroom. That was when he noticed the detail that he had missed earlier when he woke up. The door to the bathroom was still closed.

  Eric walked over to the door and considered his options. On one hand, he could just take his clothes and go to the club. He could take a shower and get ready there. He wouldn’t have to deal with any of the business with the woman in the bathroom. He could leave a note for his housekeeper to make sure she cleaned up whatever mess the woman left in the bathroom. It was a tempting option.

  He looked at his clock, and he saw that he was running a bit behind already. If he had skipped his workout, he would’ve been able to do that. Now, going to the club would mean that he would be late. That meant he only had one option left available to him. He leaned against the wall next to the bathroom and casually rapped on the door. “Hey, sweetheart. I need to get in there. It’s time for you to go home.”

  He knew he sounded like a prick, but then again, he was a prick. No reason to go counter to his personality now. He didn’t give two shits about the woman in the bathroom. She had been an unremarkable lay who was now fucking with the timeline of the biggest day of his life. That pissed Eric off. He thought about getting another drink just because it annoyed him so badly about the woman. It had the potential to ruin his entire day, and on a day like today, that was unacceptable.

  Eric didn’t hear anything on the other side of the door. Great. Just his luck. She was probably passed out in her own puke on the bathroom floor.

  Eric rapped on the door again. “Hey. You in there. I need to get in my bathroom. Come on now. Open the door.”

  He still didn’t hear anything. That started to worry him a bit. He tuned his hearing, and he still heard nothing but silence. That was not promising at all.

  Now he was starting to envision something crazy. The woman choked on her own vomit, or she did something where she slipped and hit her head and was unconscious. That was just what he didn’t need. Some random broad getting out of his bed and then getting injured. He could just imagine the field day the press would have with that one.

  That was when the first swirl of an unusual scent hit his nose. He jerked in surprise. He knew what it was. It was a smell he had not smelled in a very long time. It was one that sent a spark of fear straight to his core, and he barely noticed that his headache completely disappeared.

  He smelled blood. Eric rapped on the door more urgently this time. “Look, if you don’t open the door in thirty seconds, I’m coming in. Even if I’ve got to break the goddamn door down.” He waited and listened. There was nothing.

  “Shit,” Eric said again. The situation was growing more urgent by the moment. Something had happened in his bathroom, and he had a bad feeling about it. He looked at the clock again. He was going to have to text his publicist soon and let her know that he was running late. This was not the way that he wanted to start this morning, of all mornings. He just hoped that the woman inside the bathroom had not hurt herself too badly.

  He did the mental countdown in his head. 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, and then he tried the doorknob. It was as he expected; it was locked. Eric rammed his shoulder against the door. It didn’t give. He thought with a sick sense of amusement that was what he got for putting in the best quality doors money could buy. He hit the door again, and this time, it burst open.

  As his feet crossed the threshold, he overcorrected, slipped, and went down heavily. His ass hit the floor, and he realized why he had been able to smell blood even on the other side of the door. There was blood everywhere. He didn’t see her at first. All he saw was that every inch of his normally immaculate bathroom was now covered in sprays of blood. It brought back of a vision of something he had seen in his teenage years, and Eric stopped thinking. He muttered curse words to himself and started to get to his feet. That was when his hands connected with something on the floor. He picked it up and stared at it. It was as if his mind went blank for several moments because it couldn’t process the scene in front of him.

  It was a hatchet. What the fuck was a hatchet doing in his condo? That was when he finally got to his feet again and saw her. She was in his bathtub. Her body was in a state that he could not even process in his mind. All he knew was that there was no question that the woman was dead. But that wasn’t the thing that truly rattled him. The thing that made his mind practically unglue was the woman’s face. Her face, with her sightless blue eyes, was untouched. A pale figment against the canopy of red all around them.

  He knew her. He knew her from that time in his life that he wanted to forget.

  Her bright red hair was unmistakable. But the thing was, she looked exactly as she had when he had met her eighteen years ago. All of his memories of that time swept back into the gaping black hole that had existed there for so many years. His amnesia was gone.

  He knew her. He had known her.

  Her name was Jillian.

  How she was there now, he had no idea. He still stood there in shock when he heard the yells flooding into his condo.

  Eric looked around. He saw a man standing in the threshold of the bathroom. The man was dressed in full SWAT gear and pointed a gun at him.

  “Drop the weapon!” the man yelled.

  Eric realized the man was talking to him. “I didn’t, I didn’t….” But that was all he got out before the SWAT team member pointed the gun at him and cocked it. “You heard me, motherfucker. Drop the weapon!”

  Eric slowly brought his hands up as he dropped the hatchet onto the floor. He looked down at himself. He was covered in blood. Her blood. He knew what it looked like. He had to do something fast.

  “Thank God you guys are here. I don’t know what happened.” Not smooth at all. Apparently, the situation had turned him into a bumbling idiot. He heard the officer start to recite his Miranda rights before they even reached him. Then Eric realized as they moved into the room that he needed to do the one thing that he was not good at.

  Eric needed to shut the fuck up.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Nina Rodriguez pretty much believed that one of the nine circles of hell had to be arguing with a two-year-old to get ready in the morning. “Sweetie, I need you to get dressed,” she said to the toddler.

  “No, don’t want to,” Carlos said with a defiant shake of his head.

  Nina wondered again how she had let her sister, Mia, talk her into taking Carlos to daycare that morning. Well, she did know. Nina ran her own business, so she worked her own hours, and that was something that Mia would take advantage of whenever she got called into work early. Usually, Nina didn’t mind so much. She loved her nephew more than life itself. But taking care of him while he was starting to go through his terrible twos was proving to be more difficult than she imagined. He was currently running around her sister’s apartment with just his diaper on.

  Nina went back into his bedroom and picked up the outfit that Mia had left on the bed. She took it back out to the living room. “Okay, Carlos. Let’s try this again.”

  Carlos shook his head animatedly while waving his hands. “No.”

  Nina wondered if that kind of tactic would work in adult life. If you didn’t want to do something or it seemed particularly distasteful, you could just say no- no further explanation needed. She didn’t think that she would get very far. She wondered at what point a child realized that some kind of justificati
on was needed for their refusal.

  “If you put on these clothes, Aunt Nina will let you have another banana for breakfast,” she coaxed.

  Carlos gave that one second of consideration before he shook his head again. “No.”

  The kid was going to play hardball. It was a tactic that she appreciated. Everything in life was a negotiation. “How about if you get dressed, I will give you a banana and an orange for breakfast?”

  Mia was on a health food kick at the moment. It wasn’t something that Nina particularly ascribed to, but she appreciated her sister’s attempt to make sure that Carlos ate healthy. Although, she couldn’t blame the kid for wanting a sweet every now and then.

  “No.”

  Nina rocked back on the sofa with a sigh. She wondered what she was going to do to try and get him into his clothes. Every time she got up to go after him, he started to squeal and ran away from her like it was some kind of game. Of course, it was game only he was playing, and he made the rules. She was getting increasingly frustrated.

  Nina flipped on the TV. She thought perhaps she would be able to get Carlos to sit down in front of it long enough so that she could grab him. Then it would become a fully-fledged wrestling match, but she had a hundred pounds on him, so she should win. She just had to account for the wiggle factor.

  Her finger was ready to switch the channel to cartoons when she saw a ‘THIS JUST IN’ news banner float across the bottom of the screen.

  A pretty blonde reporter stood outside of a building looking grim. “Police have converged on this high-rise apartment building in the exclusive neighborhood of Brighton in downtown Copper City. No news yet on what transpired to bring them to the scene, but sources close to the situation say that it was a homicide. Those same sources say police already have a suspect in custody.”

  Nina realized that she knew the building. Her thoughts darkened. For a brief time three years ago, she thought it might be her home. Then she had gotten one hell of a reality check. Her finger moved on the remote control to click it again when she saw the reporter eagerly waving to the camera. It appeared they were moving toward the front door.