Destiny: A Hunter's Novel, Book 3 Read Online Free Page A

viciously. He was a little over six feet tall with jet black hair. He was good looking, with square features. He looked exactly like I remembered him. No really, he couldn't have aged a day since the last time I’d seen him, at least twenty three years ago.
    I was frowning, when he took a deep breath and all the punishing wind around him stopped. He opened his eyes, my blue eyes staring back at me, a shrewdness emanating off of him that couldn’t be taught. He studied me for a moment longer, then smiled.
    "Get your arse over here my little grandbaby!” He opened his arms. "Give me some love!" I got up from the bar and walked quickly into his embrace.
    He wrapped me in his strength and warmth and at that moment I knew I was not alone. He pulled back, arms still wrapped around me, and looked over my face.
    "God, ye look like your Ma," He said.
    My hair was dark like my Mother's and my eyes clearly came from her side. But my height and build I got from my Dad. I blushed and pushed my face over his shoulder to hide it. My Grandfather released me and bellied up to the bar next to the stool I had just vacated, and shook the bartender’s hand.
    “Two pints and two pies,” He said to the behemoth.
    There was no exaggeration. The guy was massive. I looked up to his face and found the bartender smiling down at me again. Then as though the scowl on my face wasn’t even there, he wagged his eyebrows at me.
    I instinctively leaned forward, I didn’t like being flirted with, but I wouldn’t back down from a perpetual flirt. Az wasn’t mine, but he was the only one I wanted. Yes, the bartender was attractive. I could appreciate his good looks. I was committed not dead. But I also didn’t want to encourage him, either.
    “Donovan is it?” I asked him. He nodded. “Keep your eyes to yourself or I will take them. Are we clear?”
    He threw his head back and bellowed his laughter. I didn’t see what he found funny.
    “You’re truly your mother’s daughter.” Donovan looked over at my Grandfather, sobering in the moment. “You’re definitely your Granddad’s, too.” And with that, he disappeared though a door next to the bar. Maybe he was bipolar. He had gone from laughing to somber in the blink of an eye.
    I was jealous this bartender knew more about my family than I did and I was determined to change that. My Father and I had not really spoken of my mother in much detail while I was growing up, since the Black Shadow had not been interested in talking, just punishing.
    I knew I looked like her because the pictures on the walls of the Hunter’s HQ had told me so. I looked very much like her these days. My Granddad cleared his throat and I turned to him.
    “So Lass, what brings ye back? Not that I’m complaining mind you – I’ve missed ‘ya. But why now?” And, like the Hoover Dam had busted, every confusing emotion I had been suppressing since I had learned I was some sort of supernatural cocktail came rushing forward. I was still working through so much – too much, if I was being honest.
    “I needed a place no one would think to look for me.” I said, as a single tear rolled down my cheek. That was the sum of emotion I allowed myself, swiping it away quickly.
    “Tell me all of it, Love. I need to know.”
    “Is it safe?” I asked, looking at the walls of the old tavern. There were no symbols etched in the walls that I could see. My Granddad waved his hand, and like a drop of water ripples a lake, the walls of the tavern pub came to life with symbols, some familiar and others I’d never seen. But they weren’t Hunter’s symbols, they were Wiccan marks.
    “Okay, you’re going to have to teach me that. That was awesome.” And for the first time since I had placed the protection spell on my inner circle and lost Az in the process, my face split with a smile of excitement, pleasure, and anticipation.
    “First things first. Spill.”
    I studied his face. Looking for a hint of deceit, a lie, a hidden Black