Little Red (Not Quite the Fairy Tale #5) Read online

  Little Red

  Not Quite the Fairy Tale 5

  May Sage

  ISBN-13: 978-1533310828

  ISBN-10:1533310823

  A gentleman is simply a patient wolf.

  - Lana Turner

  Chapter One

  Two Heirs

  Eleven years ago

  Daniel De Luz, prince and heir of Alenia, stood before the male – calling that thing a man would have been too much of a stretch.

  When he and Sandro had cornered him, the creature shocked them by turning into a beast. Rough fur, long snout, pointy ears. They could have said wolf, but the term seemed rather underwhelming: this thing was the size of a full grown bear.

  So that was it; all the rumors they’d heard about Wilderlings held true. Dane wasn’t exactly surprised: if it hadn’t been the case, they would have pushed their pathetic excuse for an army back to their borders months ago.

  The Wilderlings had less than five hundred men, against the tens of thousands Aiden of Jereena commanded, and the five thousand Dane had brought with him but although they were practically fifty to one, the Wilderlings remained undefeated, practically untouched – Dane had shot a guy right between the eyes only to find him back on the battlefield the next day.

  There was what they’d been missing: they weren’t fighting humans.

  Thankfully, Dane and Sandro weren’t entirely human, either.

  The gigantic wolf managed to run out of his tent in one jump before they’d gathered their wits.

  “He’s the Alpha,” Sandro said. “We can’t let him go.”

  Right now all they had to work with were rumors and legends but there were dashes of truth in any myth he’d ever heard, so Dane agreed with his brother’s assessment: if they managed to get the Alpha, the rest of the Wilderlings should retreat.

  Hopefully.

  Dane had enough of war. He wanted to go home and marry that damn cutie whose letter he carried in his inner pocket, just against his heart. If getting rid of the beast sped out the process, he was all for it.

  “Keep him occupied,” Sandro said, sitting down on the floor and closing his eyes. No need to ask what he was up to: Sandro had an affinity with the skies, just like Dane, but his wasn’t instantly accessible; he needed to call it. “Give me five minutes.”

  The Prince nodded, running out behind the animal; it had already cleared out over half a mile, heading for the cover of the forest. Dane knew that there, in his domain, they’d lose his tracks.

  The Alpha’s sudden retreat almost confused him. Wouldn’t a mighty beast stand and fight? Dane ran after it, at a ridiculously slow pace, compared to the strides of the gigantesque creature; at least until the east wind responded to his call, and carried him forth.

  The next instant, he landed in front of the wolf, his sword in hand.

  The creature stopped, baffled and – if he wasn’t mistaken – scared.

  Coward. It hadn’t thought twice before leaving his pack behind.

  The skies were already darkening and in the distance, and Dane could see Sandro slowly approaching, a sphere made of lightning in his grasp.

  Sometimes, it was good to be of fay descent. There wasn’t one force in this world that could possibly hope to win against both of them at once, so Dane felt magnanimous.

  “I will give you a choice, wolf. Surrender or die.”

  A few hundred feet away, the pup cocked her head, her face scrunched up in something resembling a frown. She watched as her father pretended to surrender, only to try an awkward cheap shot at the human.

  She saw the human draw his sword out, holding it high; his comrade threw a luminous ball at it, and when the sword hit her father’s neck, it effortlessly cut it in two, immediately cauterizing the wound.

  Just like that, the pack princess lost her father. Just like that, her world forever changed its course, starting the chain of action that would give the Wilderlings a kingdom of their own.

  Now

  Chase was having a long-ass day, which was just about to turn into an f-ing long-ass month.

  Hell to the censorship. Nothing f-ing about it. It had entered the realm of proper fucking shit.

  First, he’d had to deal with the Queen, and that never failed to exhaust him, physically and mentally.

  Why he’d thought it necessary to go and see how the old crone was fairing on a Monday morning was beyond him. She had been affected by the never ending cold everyone else seemed to have caught, for close to three weeks, so he’d brought some chocolate and pastries from Tarina’s – the best of the best – hoping to cheer her up.

  He was regretting it almost right away. The woman was fine now; she’d outlive him, especially if she didn’t stop throwing him to the wolves. She'd calmed things down during her illness, but now, she was back to her old tricks.

  His visits were always unannounced, yet every single time, save for a small reprieve during her illness, she had a merry band of potential wives lined up.

  Chase wondered if she kept them locked up in the dungeons to ensure they were always available whenever he dropped by. Knowing her? Probably. The woman wanted great-grandkids, and she wasn’t above treachery, trickery and blackmail to get them. As a rule, Chase never drank unless he saw her take a sip from the same teapot, first: she’d slipped in some aphrodisiac in his glass. Twice. There also was the one time when he’d thrown up and passed out – he was quite certain the weird “new brand of tea” might have had something to do with it.

  Yes, his grandmother had spiked his drink with a date rape drug. If he hadn’t managed to crawl to his car and lock himself in, he would doubtlessly have been found in a compromising position and dragged to the altar.

  That Monday, Chase sat in the drawing room, on a large sofa opposing Mimi Hunter’s armchair.

  The Queen seemed rather unthreatening; a regal, still beautiful woman of sixty-something – or so she said. He was pretty certain she actually approached the big 8-0 but as Chase wasn’t quite suicidal yet, he’d never dreamt of correcting her loose understanding of basic math.

  The Queen was telling him about how she’d love nothing more than to go back to her well-deserved retirement. Again.

  When her daughter had gotten married thirty five years ago, she’d taken the reigns of the kingdom; then, quite tragically, she and her husband had died, leaving Chase parentless and the kingdom, without a sovereign.

  Chase was aware that he was very, very lucky to have Mimi. Without her, the kingdom might have ended up in the hands of whatever noble managed to prove a claim to it; without her, he would have been nothing more than a scared, lonely orphan amongst so many. There also was a strong possibility that the nobles next in line for the throne might have tried to kill him, a defenseless, vulnerable seven-year-old.

  But the very day his parents’ deaths were announced, riding a thoroughbred all the way from her distant estate without any guard, the strong, intimidating Dowager had appeared at the palace; little as she might like Court, she came back to raise her grandchild, and to assume the place of Queen Regent, that she’d hold until such a time as when Chase would marry.

  Some stupid-ass rule stated that the monarch of Enom ought to have a spouse before ascending to the throne, to his exasperation.

  Right about now, it was pretty hard to remember why he was so grateful.

  Chase was surrounded by legs and boobs. Most guys wouldn’t complain, but he wasn’t at liberty to even contemplate doing anything with the endless sea of curves before his eyes.

  A while back, the women Mimi had thrown his way had been covered from head to toes in business suits and elegant casual dresses, but she’d grown desperate sometime around when he’
d turned thirty; now, his potential wives walked around with low necklines and very, very short skirts designed to entice him.

  Mimi wasn’t quite certain of his taste and it showed: there was a tall, skinny blonde, a tanned, curvy brunette, a plump redhead, an ebony goddess who somehow managed to pack up crazy curves on a thin frame… Chase adjusted himself with a sigh. It wasn’t that he wasn’t affected – every woman in the room was gorgeous, obviously, and he knew he needed to think about giving the kingdom an heir at some point.

  The issue was that he knew them all and they bored him to death. Not their fault: he was just rather hard to entertain.

  He’d grown up with parents who had loved each other with passion until the day their ship sank. They’d debated everything – from politics to music, travels and sport teams; his mother had been a brilliant horsewoman, and nothing would have ever enticed her to stay indoors on a sunny day – so she’d married the owner of a small horse farm. Call it mommy issues, but that’s what he was after: a partner who shared at least some of his interests.

  His grandmother attempted to pair him up with socialites who had perfectly manicured hands and half polite smiles. They excelled at the art of mundane conversation and knew how to behave in society, but he was after much more than that.

  Chase forced his smile and tried not to poke his eyeballs with the blunt end of his spoon while Mimi did her thing.

  “Dear,” she said, demanding his attention, “Lovely Janice here has been volunteering some of her time to entertain the servant’s children,” she told him fondly, gesturing to the blonde who was, for all intents and purposes, topless: her neckline ended below her belly button. He sincerely hoped she didn’t dress like that in front of the kids.

  Seeing an issue with the ways things were run when a frantic cook had begged to be excused because he needed to pick up his sickly toddler, a sixteen-year-old Chase had brought it up to Mimi and highlighted a well-constructed plan to open a free daycare facility right in the palace.

  “It will save our employees time, money and energy,” he’d said. “They’ll also be able to spend their breaks around their children. I understand there will be some expenses, but I believe we will benefit as much as them, in the long run. It should lead to a lower staff turnover, saving us a considerably amount of money on interviewing and training new personnel.”

  They had the place running within a month and his servants had yet to stop thanking him for it every time they cornered him.

  That day, Mimi had looked at him, startled, before announcing it was time for him to start shadowing her. Four years later, she’d stopped ruling, leaving it all to him. Her name was still on the letterhead, but Chase was the actual leader of Enom.

  He wouldn’t be so bold as to say that he was the best sovereign out there – a handful of his childhood friends were just as efficient – but he was good at identifying and preventing problems before they arose.

  He’d be an adequate King; just as soon as he found a woman he wished to tie himself to.

  Immediately, his mind conjured the image of one particular woman. It was silly and presumptuous, as he’s seen her exactly twice, and had never exchanged so much as a word with her, but he couldn’t help it.

  She was so alluring Chase might have believed she’d been sent by Mimi, if she had paid any attention to him, but she hadn’t. Hell, she hadn’t even seemed to see him.

  She was pointblank the prettiest creature he’d ever seen: small, with pouty lips and dimples that might have made her cute, if she hadn’t been perched on three inch high heeled boots, and wearing a long red coat over a black cat suit. She’d long left the realm of cute and landed in the freaking hot territory.

  What intrigued him wasn’t her appearance – not only that, in any case. It was the fact that the first time, she’d come out of a bookstore, and the second, of an outdoor sport outlet.

  He wanted to know a lot about her – the titles of the books in her brown bag, what kind of sport she practiced, the taste of her red lips – but what he really needed was her name.

  Next time, he swore. Next time he saw her, he’d ask.

  Chapter Two

  An Ultimatum

  The morning wasn’t off to a great start, but he was used to coming back from the palace with a headache and a niggling, annoying little voice in his head telling him that Mimi wasn’t exactly wrong – his mum and dad had been dead before hitting thirty-five, and he was thirty-one now. It was past time he found a potential wife. Perhaps he should organize a party and pick one; it had certainly worked out for Dane de Luz.

  Or he could just mention that girl in the red riding hood to Mimi; he was pretty sure his grandmother could and would track her down.

  Of course, there was the possibility that she might already been attached. Women who looked like her usually were.

  By the time he made it back home and attacked his workload, Chase was irritated, but not quite concerned yet. The real problem only started after lunch, when his PA informed him that Aiden Archer wanted a chat.

  “You’re kidding, right?” he asked, five minutes into the conversation.

  It wasn’t the first time that Chase heard of the Jereenan’s complaints: every single month, they sent a petition right to his desk. Chase had ignored it; uncharacteristic, but their claim had just been preposterous.

  Now Jereena threatened to forbid access to every trade route passing through their borders, unless the problem was resolved. Exactly what a kingdom known for the skills of its artisans needed. They exported most of their trades to Alenia, by train or lorry – and the railway as well as the motorway passed right through Jereena: that embargo would carve a colossal dent in their economy in no time.

  On the other end of the phone, Adrian sighed.

  “Look, I have a petition with over thirty thousands signatures, Chase. I can’t ignore that,” the newly crowned King told him.

  Great. Just freaking perfect.

  “What the heck can I possibly do when I have never seen one single wolf in the woods? Never.”

  Chase lived in Crystalia, to the despair of the Queen, who would love nothing more than having him at the palace, right under her thumb everyday – that meant that he had to frequently travel from the city to the royal dwelling, passing right through the Southern Woods; he took the very road every Jereenan trader was complaining about on a weekly basis, at least, and he had yet to encounter any sort of issue.

  Frankly, Chase was very fond of his wild, untamed woods; razing them, as some of the traders suggested, was out of the question. Not without a valid, undisputable reason, in any case.

  “Mate, just throw me a bone. I have the entire merchant guild breathing down my neck about this one; I have to do something.”

  Chase sighed out loud. It wasn’t like he didn’t know the rules of the game. Regardless of their political views and their public differences, he and Aiden had played in sandboxes, along with Dane of Alenia; he’d dropped everything to attend his bachelor party two months prior and he knew without a doubt that the King of Jereena would do the same for him when he finally got hitched.

  But he also knew Aiden would close his borders, just like he’d threatened to, if his subjects demanded it. It was nothing personal.

  “Ok, how about a show of good faith? Name a few representatives from your merchant guild, as well as some of your soldiers – I’ll personally accompany them for a stroll through our woods. If any issue arises,” which he doubted, “I’ll take care of it. Deal?”

  And thus, with one little suggestion, one hasty decision, Chase Hunter changed his life.

  It wasn’t the first time Lana found herself cornered by a guy demanding her submission; in fact, it wasn’t even the first time today.

  Note to self: don’t use that cranberry shampoo again. It obviously attracts idiots.

  With a bored huff that would have been a sigh if she’d been in her human shell, her wolf broke the dumb bloke’s hold and jumped up, ignoring any pain when he claw
ed at her flesh; she landed on his back and sank his teeth deep in his neck until he yelped and rolled on his back.

  Then, she shifted; the bone breaking process wasn’t exactly what one would call pleasant in everyone else’s opinion, but Lana had never minded it – she did it more often than any other wolf, which was why instead taking a good half minute, her change from wolf to human didn’t last longer than the fraction of a second.

  Most Wilderlings were naked after the change, but Lana had worked her ass off until she’d made enough money to pay a fay for spelled clothing. Lana was no prude, but most of the other enforcers were male and she’d been gifted with a set of assets they never failed to leer over, so it had seemed like a good investment.

  Turned out, Rumpelstiltskin had just wanted a moonstone from the heart of her territory, rather than the pile of gold she’d amassed by taking seventy night shifts in a row. She hadn’t exactly complained, but what the hell did he want with a common rock?

  Fays were weird.

  So now, when she turned, she was wearing her long riding coat, over shorts and a comfortable brassiere.

  She’d asked for a black ensemble, but after learning her name, the annoying fay had simply refused to produce the coat in any shade but blood red.

  “Don’t sweat it, honey,” she told the guy whining at her feet, “You’re not the first idiot who got his ass handed.”

  In fact, he was the ninety-seventh.

  That left fourteen single dominant males who hadn’t attempted to force her in the entire pack. No one had the right to try after she’d beat them once so, soon enough, she’d be free from their attention. There was no doubt in her mind that the others would try their luck, and soon – except one, perhaps. Tarik was marginally more civilized than the rest of them, so she had hopes.