Page 1 of Honey Heat (Sin & Steel #9)

Why had Lucio agreed to that damn drinking challenge last night? His head felt like it was being hammered relentlessly, each throb echoing like a war drum. He groaned and leaned forward at the table, a cup of untouched coffee sitting in front of him.

The pounding became even louder, until he realized it was actually coming from his front door and not just inside his head.

“ Joder ,” he muttered, dragging himself from his seat. Lucio shuffled to the door, cursing softly in his native language. He swung it open to find Chopper’s grinning face. Behind him stood Raphael, keys jingling between his fingers.

“ Buenos días , princess,” Chopper said, pushing past him into the house. “Rough night?” The smell of motor oil and leather trailed behind him.

“Thanks for the update.” Lucio squinted past them at the bright sky. “What time is it?”

Raphael checked his watch. “Almost noon.”

Lucio closed his eyes, willing his stomach to settle. The stale heat of the house clung to his skin, sticking his shirt to his back in places. Outside, the faint hum of cicadas filled the silence, undercut only by the low rumble of someone’s lawn mower.

Raphael walked past him, boots heavy against the wooden floor. “Matias sent us. Cameras at the warehouse went dark last night. He wants us to check it out.”

The warehouse was only twenty-five minutes across town, but even that short ride sounded like torture. “Can’t you guys do it?”

“ Jefe wants you there,” Raphael said. He paused at the kitchen table, eyeing the cold coffee. “You’re our tech genius.”

Lucio ran a hand through his messy hair. “Now? Can’t it wait until my brain stops trying to escape my skull?”

“Poor baby wolf can’t handle his tequila?” Chopper opened Lucio’s fridge, helping himself to a bottle of water. “Never thought I’d see the day Percy would drink you under the table.”

“That little human has the alcohol tolerance of a grizzly,” Lucio muttered. “Give me fifteen minutes to shower. Need to wash off the shame.”

Raphael tossed an apple from the counter fruit bowl. “Take your time, lightweight. We’ll raid your kitchen while we wait.”

“How does a human out-drink a wolf anyway?” Chopper called after him as Lucio headed for the bathroom. “Percy must have a liver made of steel.”

Under the hot spray of the shower, Lucio cursed Percy’s inexplicable alcohol tolerance. For a human half his size, the man could put away tequila like it was water. Lightweight jealousy bubbled in his chest as he scrubbed away the stink of last night’s poor decisions.

Hot water did little to improve Lucio’s hangover, but at least he smelled better.

Twenty minutes later, tools packed and hangover slightly dulled by four aspirin, Lucio grabbed his leather jacket from the hook by the door and slipped his gun into his waistband. The weight of it against his lower back provided a familiar comfort.

Lucio joined the others outside where their bikes waited, chrome glinting in the bright sun. He climbed onto his motorcycle. The rumble of the engine sent vibrations through his skull that made him wince. Chopper and Raphael revved their bikes beside him, and they took off.

Heat radiated from the asphalt, making Lucio’s stomach roll. Sweat trickled down his back as they rode, and the wind offered no relief. It was just pushing more hot air against his face like a blow dryer on high. His stomach lurched with each bump in the road.

The ride through town was mercifully short. As they passed Sin & Steel, pack members nodded, a few raising their beer bottles in greeting.

“You good back there?” Chopper yelled over his shoulder.

“Fantastic,” Lucio shouted back, tasting bile at the back of his throat. Vomiting would mean endless mockery from these two pendejos . He swallowed hard, focusing on the road ahead.

After fifteen more minutes of torture, the warehouse appeared in the distance.

Ugly concrete against the blue sky, isolated and forgotten except for the bad memories it held.

Lucio had never understood why they hadn’t burned this place to the ground after everything that had happened here.

Diablo’s kidnapping. Those hyena bastards Matias had killed.

The half-shifted corpses of Rico’s victims. Diablo’s mate held hostage like a bargaining chip.

Gravel crunched under their tires as they pulled up to the building.

Killing the engines, they dismounted and stood for a moment, scanning the area.

Nothing moved except trash in the breeze and a few tumbleweeds caught against the fence.

Silence hung heavy in the air, broken only by distant bird calls.

“Place still gives me the creeps,” Raphael muttered, rolling his shoulders.

“Let’s get this over with,” Lucio said, grabbing his tool bag.

Inside, the warehouse smelled of rust and abandonment. Dust motes danced in the beams of sunlight streaming through broken windows. Their boots echoed on the concrete floor as they made their way to the security cameras set up in hidden spots in the warehouse.

“ Mierda ,” Lucio muttered, examining the first camera.

Clean cuts marked the severed wires, not the work of rats or weather damage. Moving to the second and third cameras revealed the same precise cutting.

“This wasn’t an accident.” He examined the clean cut of copper wire between his fingers.

“Someone doesn’t want to be seen,” Chopper said, voice low.

Understatement of the century.

Behind them, metal scraped against concrete. All three men whipped around, hands moving to concealed weapons. The three of them moved silently through the warehouse, looking for the source of the noise.

A row of crates stacked against the far wall caught Lucio’s attention. His gaze fixed on a pair of bare feet jutting out from behind them, motionless against the gritty concrete. Blood splattered the floor nearby, dark red dots trailing toward the hidden body.

“Over there,” Lucio whispered, pointing with his chin. His hangover instantly forgotten, adrenaline flooded his system as he drew his gun. Nothing sobers you up faster than discovering a corpse.

Chopper and Raphael followed his gaze, weapons appearing in their hands. With practiced coordination, they fanned out across the warehouse floor, moving like shadows despite their size. Years of working together made verbal communication unnecessary as they approached the crates.

Lucio crept forward, senses heightened for any sound or movement that might signal an ambush.

His nostrils flared, catching the scent of blood mixed with something else.

Not wolf, not hyena, but definitely shifter.

He signaled to the others with a quick gesture, three fingers raised then two, indicating an unknown shifter presence.

Raphael took position on the left flank, while Chopper covered the right. With measured steps, Lucio rounded the crates, gun raised and ready.

What he found wasn’t an ambush but a young man sprawled unconscious on the floor.

Blood matted his light brown hair, and bruises covered his face and arms. His clothes were torn, revealing more injuries across his chest. From the honey-musk scent emanating from him, Lucio immediately identified him as bear clan.

“Clear,” Lucio called softly, holstering his weapon. He knelt beside the injured shifter, pressing two fingers against his neck. A pulse fluttered beneath his touch, weak and irregular, but present. “ Dios mío ,” he muttered, scanning the man’s injuries. “Got a bear shifter.”

“I’ll let Matias know.” Raphael cursed under his breath.

Chopper kept watch, his eyes scanning the warehouse for additional threats. Moving quickly, Raphael pulled out his phone and stepped away to call their alpha.

“Hey, can you hear me?” Lucio asked, gently tapping the bear’s cheek. The young man couldn’t be more than twenty-five, his frame smaller than most bears Lucio had encountered. “You’re safe now, osito .”

No response came except for a weak groan. Blood seeped from a nasty gash above his eye, and his breathing sounded labored, each inhale a struggle against possibly broken ribs.

“This is bad,” Lucio said, glancing up at Chopper. “A bear shifter injured on wolf territory? Boone’s going to lose his shit.”

Relations between the Salvador wolf pack and the nearby bear clan had been peaceful but distant for years.

Bears typically kept to themselves in the mountain forests north of town, rarely venturing into wolf territory.

Finding one beaten half to death in their warehouse could easily spark tensions between the groups.

“Matias is sending Santiago with a truck,” Raphael reported, returning to them. “He’ll be here in twenty minutes.”

The bear shifter stirred slightly, another groan escaping his split lips. Lucio placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder, careful to avoid the visible injuries.

“Easy, carino ,” he said softly. “We’re getting help. You’re with the Salvador pack now. No one’s going to hurt you.”

Chopper found a relatively clean rag in his jacket pocket and handed it to Lucio, who pressed it against the head wound to slow the bleeding. “What the hell happened to him? Bears aren’t exactly easy targets.”

“Ambush, maybe,” Lucio suggested, noting the defensive wounds on the shifter’s forearms. “Or he was drugged first.”

When Lucio gently lifted one eyelid, the bear’s pupil was unnaturally dilated, barely reacting to the light. Something about it reminded him of how Diablo had looked after being injected with that serum the hyenas had created, the one designed to trap shifters’ forms inside of them.

“ Mierda ,” Lucio muttered. “I hope this isn’t what I think it is.”

They waited in tense silence, keeping watch over the injured bear. Lucio monitored his pulse, growing increasingly concerned as it seemed to weaken. Whatever had happened here, the bear shifter was running out of time.