“You and I both know I shouldn’t be Alpha.”
The telepathic communication boomed around inside his head. Without his wolf there to take the magic, that way of talking actually caused him pain. Not that he could say anything.
He stared at Michael. “Brother. I think there’s something I’d like to tell you.”
Michael’s weary eyes met his own. “What would that be?”
Carrie’s beautiful brown eyes flitted in front of his vision. “Nothing. Never mind.”
Tristan approached. “What have you decided, my Alpha?” His brother’s sincere gaze implored Michael to make a decision. Gabriel wondered if Tristan noticed Michael flinched at the word Alpha. Probably not. Tristan tended to only see the good in everyone around them, a trait that would have to be destroyed before he could take his rightful place in the pack.
“We’re going to burn them.”
Tristan’s jaw clenched. “Even Mom?”
“Everyone had a mom,” Gabriel snapped. Anger pulsated in his temple. “Every member of our pack still alive at one time had mated parents.”
Carrie’s mother and father came to mind. The memory of her mother’s proud face on the day of their mating made his stomach turn. They’d been so glad she’d mated a Kane. A royal. Ha! Now the name Kane would never stand for anything but death and destruction.
Tristan looked down. “You’re right, of course.”
“Damn it, Tristan. Don’t you ever look down with me. I’m not your gods-damned Alpha. Your wolf can’t be telling you that’s what you should be doing.”
Tristan met his gaze. “I know it had to be disconcerting when you blacked out earlier. It’s a strange day, and—”
“Be who you’re supposed to be, or go fuck yourself.” Gabriel rubbed his eyes. His wolf would have lambasted him for that statement if he’d been around to take him to task.
Hello? He had to keep checking. Maybe his wolf would, at some point, change his mind and come back to him. Silence answered him again. Damn it.
He charged away from his brothers, ignoring Tristan’s call to him. He knew what they wanted. Gabriel should be taking charge like he always had when things got rough, should be leading the crew to save all of their lives. He was their head warrior wolf. Even if Tristan—who should be Alpha—had been leading, Gabriel would be helping. Since Tristan didn’t seem to know himself to be the natural leader, Michael had to hold the pack together until he did. The gods knew Michael could use Gabe’s help. In many ways. But how could he do that? Carrie had been taken from him. He swallowed, knowing himself to be a selfish bastard.
With the exception of his own mating, which no one could remember, and his aunts, whose mates had killed themselves—as Gabe should have done—in order to keep from killing their mates, every joined couple had died that morning. He didn’t know if his aunts would be able to make it. They were the most powerful magic wolves he’d ever known. But even that might not sustain them. Murder and then suicide. Over and over again.
He still had Carrie’s soul deep down inside him. What would he do if he lost that? Closing his eyes, he made himself count to ten. He’d made a decision to keep her safe—it still resonated as the right choice in his conscience. Hopefully it always would.
Opening his eyes, he ran back toward where his brothers stood. They hadn’t moved. He cleared his throat. “All right. Michael wants to burn them; we need to get that ready. Tristan, would you like to gather everyone together? Let them know? We’ll have a blaze started in no time if we all work together.”
Tristan nodded and took off running. Gabriel regarded Michael. “You know we have to make him Alpha. We have to make him see the truth of his path.”
“No choice now. I’ll hold this together as long as I can, but I’m not going to take the Alpha challenge. There have to be plans made. A way to destroy Father. There will never be peace in Westervelt while he lives.” Michael would never age, not until he mated, but Gabriel thought he looked twenty years older in just the hours since the destruction.
“Then maybe that’s what I can do.” An idea formulated in Gabe’s mind. “I can keep training us. When we attack Dad or he attacks us again we can be really ready. He’ll never see us coming.”
And when he asks me to hold up my end of the bargain by telling him things, I’ll be able to withhold information. Tell him about Michael. Tristan. Az. Not about what I’m doing. He’ll never know how ready we are to defeat him.
Gabriel pointed to the clearing where they always held the mating ceremonies. A vision of Carrie walking toward him that day came and left his mind. He rubbed his eyes. It had only been hours since they’d parted. How on earth would he make it years?
No. He clenched his fists. I told Kendrick I wouldn’t break, and I’ll live by that.
“Put the stuff we need for the fire over there. No matings are going to take place there for the foreseeable future. Let’s honor the ones that did take place by ending their time here where once they were happy.”
“Good idea.” Michael squatted down onto the ground. “Do you think it’s weird that none of us, none of his sons, were mated? Shouldn’t one of us be in that pile too?”
One of us should be there. “No. I guess it’s statistics. I mean, look at Cullen. He’s not mated, and he’s been around forever. There just aren’t that many matings.”
“True.” Gabriel stood. “How could he stand it? After he killed Mom? Why didn’t he kill himself?”
“The aunts are making it. They’re withstanding the pull to die for all of us.”
Michael kicked the dirt. “Are you suggesting Dad is acting altruistically and keeping himself alive for all of our sakes?”
“No.” Gabriel looked up at the sun. How could it be shining today? Shouldn’t it have fallen from the sky in tribute to the world ending? “Dad’s evil. To his core. He probably paid some fucking witch to keep him alive. Mom deserved better. She got the unmated women off the island and then stood there and waited for him. That’s bravery.”
Carrie had waited too. She hadn’t gotten on that boat even when she knew others were dying. Where did the women in his life find their courage? How did they hold on to their love when all the sense in the universe should have them running for their lives away from their crazed mates?
The pack members started to arrive in the clearing. Some were carrying wood, some kindle. Cullen held a large bucket of what Gabriel would bet money held kerosene. He shook his head. Leave it to their enforcer to know just how to make things catch fire. Behind them more of their thirty still living pack members carried bodies.
Tristan walked up behind them. “Everyone’s working on it. You know, I was thinking that we can’t give them individual burials, but maybe we could at least acknowledge them one by one before we put them in the flames. A statement that they lived and that we loved them. They’re all our family.”
Gabriel nodded. “We say good-bye and then we find a way to rebuild from the ashes they leave behind.”
But could the flames burn hot enough to scald away his sins?
* * * *
“Kendrick.” Carrie banged her hands on the bars of the cage he’d shoved her in. At first he’d tried to keep her in a room, but she’d nearly gotten out several times so now she’d been banished to the cage. In her human form. It didn’t matter. Her wolf paced around as much as she did. Shifters didn’t respond well to imprisonment. Now she knew why that lesson had been drilled into her mind.
A woman popped into the room and Carrie growled. The Drea woman that Kendrick had apparently taken to sleeping with. “You.”
“Me.” Drea smiled. “Yes, dear. You’re going to get used to me. You’re here until Kendrick can either turn Gabriel to our side or I can figure out how to magically maneuver him. Then he’ll be no use for you. We’ll even let you leave. Where will you go? No one at Westervelt even knows who you are.”
“I’m aware of my situation, you bitch.”
Her mother would be appalled at her
choice of language. But then again, her father had murdered her mom. Perhaps the woman who raised her wouldn’t care that much about her vulgarity anymore.
“Then why are you screaming? You don’t really expect Kendrick to come here to deal with you?”
Carrie banged the cage bar. Her hand throbbed in response.
Take it easy, her wolf warned.
“I have been here for weeks. I need to know what is going on. I want to speak to Gabriel.”
“That’s cute.” Drea bent over her cage. Carrie could smell the woman’s perfume, and whatever it had been made from hadn’t come from nature. Weren’t witches supposed to be in tune with their surroundings? She smelled like she’d walked out of some kind of factory.
Carrie called the shift on herself before she could change her mind. In two seconds, the white light had transformed her into her wolf. Before Drea could react, Carrie had her paw out of the cage and digging into the woman’s neck.
The witch screamed, blood streaming down her neck. She hadn’t nicked an artery.
I want to kill her.
Carrie nodded at her wolf. I know, but if we kill her Kendrick might take it badly.
Drea darted backward, a scream to wake the dead filling the room. Kendrick burst through the door. In one second, he’d assessed the situation and his wolf appeared in his eyes.
Sick wolf. Her wolf sneered. Notice how his eyes aren’t all wolf anymore? He lost that when he lost Westervelt. He should be put down.
Believe me, I want to. Her mouth watered at the thought.
In the corner, Drea uttered an incantation that Carrie figured had to be a healing spell of some kind. That suited her just fine. She didn’t want the woman dead, or Drea would have died. It had seemed important that they all remember Carrie had claws and knew how to use them.
Kendrick knelt down next to Drea and kissed the side of her face. When he stood up, he had some of her blood on him. Carrie shifted back. As she leaned against the back of the cage, she stared at the red gobs on Kendrick’s face. He made no move to lick the remains off himself or to even wipe it off with his sleeve.
“You’ve got a little something.” She pointed to her cheek. “Right there.”
“I’ve been gentle with you.” He banged the cage doors like she had turned into a zoo animal and he wanted to punish her with the sound. “And you attack my mate?”
“Your mate?” she snarled. “You killed her. Back at Westervelt. This abomination of a woman is nothing but a pathetic hanger-on to whatever power-hungry nonsense you’ve cooked up.” She hoped the asshole she wanted to end that sentence with could be implied.
“I was going to leave you alone. But now I’m going to make you work for your food. If you want to eat, to not die or be tortured, you’re going to do whatever I want you to do whenever I want it.”
“Not. Frickin’. Likely.”
Kendrick growled before he opened the cage. With a hard yank he pulled her out into the room. She clawed at him. Gabriel wanted her to live, and she never wanted to be responsible for his death, but she didn’t know if she could continue on another day. He had the strength to endure. She obviously did not.
“Actually, this is fortuitous.” Kendrick acted as if her struggles meant nothing to him. He’d always been strong. “I need an assistant. You see, I have this idea. I’m making myself an army. Well, Claudius, Drea, and I are doing it together. You can help.”
“I’d rather die.” She would never help him do anything that might place Westervelt in danger. Even if her pack didn’t remember her, she would never forget them.
“That’s not an option. One way or another you stay alive. That doesn’t, however, mean you have to ever be comfortable again.”
She kicked him hard in the shins as he dragged her down a long hallway. Two lights flickered above her head and her eyes hurt from looking at them. “Keeping me in a cage is your idea of comfort?”
Take a deep breath. We don’t want him to lose control because of our rudeness. His wolf isn’t well. He’s got very little control.
That’s exactly what I want. Let him kill me. She heard the weakness in her voice and it made her wince. Or let him kill me.
Think of Gabriel.
Carrie closed her eyes. This isn’t supposed to be how it goes. Dying in battle is heroic. We train for it. Legends are born from these tales. And yet I’m expected to do nothing.
Endurance requires a different kind of bravery. It’s not glorious or easy. Our mate asked us to survive. How can we do any less than that?
Carrie bit down on her lip. Why do you have to be so wise?
Just a curse I get.
Not a good time to make that kind of joke. Curses are not amusing. She groaned.
Kendrick pulled her out into the yard. She didn’t have any clothes on since her shift, and the cold blast of what felt like arctic air assaulted her skin. She cried out.
“Oh. Are you cold? That’s just too bad.” Kendrick tugged her even harder across the yard. “It’s cold this time of year in Canada. What can I say?”
“Is that where we are? Canada?”
He shrugged. “Maybe. Or perhaps we’re in Alaska. Or maybe somewhere else entirely. I’m never going to tell you where we are. I can promise you if you try to leave there is nowhere to go.”
“I’m not going to run away, father-in-law. I’m going to endure.”
Kendrick laughed. “You amuse me, daughter-in-law. I must say. It’ll never be dull with you around. But you will bow down to me. I promise you that.”
He shoved her inside of a shed. Three men in white lab coats surrounded a table. She sniffed the air. Besides the three individuals, one of whom she scented as Claudius—he always stank like old tobacco, not an aroma she could tolerate for very long—one other man resided in the room.
Carrie looked left and right, desperately trying to find who else was around her. Getting caught unawares wouldn’t do, not with Kendrick around.
Finally, she saw a toe at the end of the table. Someone lay in the center of the men in the lab coats.
Kendrick let go of her arm. Drawn by curiosity, she moved forward until she could see the owner of the toe, the male she hadn’t been able to locate upon entrance in the shed.
He must have been young based on his smell. Carrie tried to focus on that fact. The rest of who the man had been—or maybe even still was—had been so distorted she wouldn’t have recognized him as human.
Where his nose should have been, she saw a muzzle instead. His mouth remained human and his eyes, which rolled around in his head, changed from wolf to human and back again in the course of a few seconds. He had fur on his body but his bones had not yet shifted, although given the awkward angle of his arms, they looked like they had tried.
Carrie covered her mouth to try to stop the sound but she couldn’t help herself when it happened. She screamed at the top of her lungs. Kendrick had made a monster.
Chapter 5
Twenty years after the destruction
“Tell the old man I don’t have anything to report and if he wants to keep harassing me for information that doesn’t exist he’s going to get caught and then this whole thing will be for nothing.”
Gabriel didn’t look up at the man who walked beside him. He didn’t have to. Recognizing Claudius’ putrid scent happened to be downright easy. Someone should tell him to take a shower some time.
“He’s getting impatient. You haven’t had anything useful in too long. He’d like to remind you that he has Carrie, and her well-being is dependent on you doing what you said you would do.”
“I’m not likely to ever forget.” Without turning, Gabriel reached out and grabbed Claudius by the throat. With a shove, he had him up against the wall of the building they passed. Winter in Portland meant seasonal restaurants were closed. No one would be coming around the bend to see the scene Gabriel intended to create.
Claudius gasped for air. “If you kill me, Kendrick will kill her.”
Gabe shook h
is head. “I don’t think so. Seems to me that if you were really pivotal to the operations at Kendrick’s place you’d still be there. What’s the matter? Now that he has his plans in place and Drea by his side, you’ve become, what, sort of the fifth wheel to all this insanity?”
His father’s comrade gurgled as Gabriel increased the pressure on his throat. “Tell my dad I’ll report when there is something to report. There’s nothing new going on. Back off.”
He dropped Claudius on the ground with a thump. “If I see you again, if my father sends you here again, I’ll kill you. I doubt he’ll even be surprised. I’m supposed to be breaking down, remember? Maybe I’m out of my mind.”
Claudius didn’t make a sound while Gabriel walked away from him. He had a task to accomplish. Michael had sent him on a mission he had no intention of failing. Certainly even he could manage to buy alcohol without fucking it up too badly.
* * * *
Twenty-nine years after the destruction
Gabriel’s hands shook while he lit his cigarette. Dirty habit. If he didn’t watch out, he’d end up smelling as disgusting as the humans in the shop he’d just left. Still, it gave him something to do while he waited. It wasn’t like he could talk to his wolf.
The man approached him from the side, just as he suspected he would. Gabe didn’t know him, which meant Kendrick had managed to expand his network of people over the last few years. This didn’t shock him in the least. Kendrick had always been horribly charismatic.
Once upon a time, he’d also been thrilled to live by the man’s directions.
“Do you have Tristan back?”
Gabe’s head shot up. Standing at roughly five foot five inches, Kendrick’s henchman stared up at him with venom radiating from his gaze. He smelled like peppermint and spoke with a British accent. Wow. Kendrick had gone international in his plotting.
“I was under the impression that you had him.”
Tristan had been missing for weeks. Rex had missed an appointment with him. By the time his youngest brother had gotten there, scents of Kendrick’s men had been everywhere. No one had heard anything since.
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