by Mason Sabre
“If it is Michael, my mother won’t stand for it. Not again. She will bring war.”
Shelley wasn’t even joking. Her mother hadn’t yet recovered from the hurt and humiliation Shelley had caused her when she had gone and chosen a Human over her own kind. She hadn't forgiven her for it, and chances were she never would. Yet for others, Shelley was a hero, offering hope to those trapped in similar situations. Even Gemma had drawn strength from her before things had become so hopeless for her and Cade.
“She wouldn’t hurt him, though?”
Shelley gave a grim smile that said it all. “Who knows? This is my mother. Maybe she’ll ship him off to Exile like she tried to do with me. It’s going to be a bloody nightmare, whatever it is. I’m sorry. I know I’m selfish, but I’m really hoping that—”
“Danny is the father?”
“Yeah,” she said, guilt written all over her face. “I know Trevor, but …”
Trevor wouldn’t be lenient. That was what she was trying to say. He’d probably write and sign the execution warrant for Danny’s head himself and then plaster it on the wall for all to see.
“Yeah—” The muffled sound of voices coming from the back room had Gemma pausing and straining to hear more clearly. “Is Tom with someone?”
Shelley followed the direction of Gemma’s gaze towards Tom’s small office at the back, which was an extension onto the dining room. Cade had helped to build it. “Yeah. He’s working from home. Brought some guy with him ... I don’t know. I don’t ask. He was supposed—”
The sound of the front door being closed as Cade walked in had them both turning their gazes in his direction. The temperature in the room suddenly took an icy dive into the abyss. Ignoring Gemma, he focused his stare on Shelley. “Hey, Shelley. Tom around?”
He said nothing to Gemma, didn’t even look at her. She tensed. Fine. She could deal with that.
“Hey, Cade,” Shelley smiled back at him. “Tom is in the back. He’s got the laptop if you want to go through.”
He gave her a curt nod and muttered, “Thanks.”
When he was gone, Shelley covered Gemma’s hand with her own. “You two had a fight?”
Shelley was the one person in the world whom Gemma could tell everything to … well, almost everything. She wouldn’t tell her about Henry. “I told him to marry Natalie,” she said shakily, clutching her friend’s hand, and biting her trembling bottom lip.
Shelley was quiet for a moment. “Is that what you really want?”
No.
“I have to. He has to.” She shook her head, her stomach clenching as she sat there. “It’s the right thing to do. I just—”
She put her hand over her eyes, trying to hold it all in, and Shelley caught her, wrapping her arms around her neck in a sisterly embrace. “You can do this, Gem. You’re stronger than you realise.”
“It’s too hard—”
“I know.”
When Gemma had calmed enough, she and Shelley went to join the others in the office. Cade was standing behind Tom, and they were both peering at the screen. She tried not to let her gaze linger too long on his broad back, or remember how just a short while ago she was digging her nails into all that hard muscle, screaming out as his body brought hers to climax.
A movement from next to Tom brought her attention to the man sitting there. Gemma didn’t recognise him, but for some inexplicable reason, her tiger slammed hard into her so that she had to grab the door. His scent was strong, his eyes that tell-tale tiger green as he turned to look at her as if he had sensed her. “Gemma Davies,” he said, smiling. He unfolded a tall, lean—as was always the case with shifters—body from his seat and walked over to her, extending his hand in her direction while pressing the other to his chest in a gesture of respect. “It is such an honour to meet you. I’m Karl.”
She took his hand, trying to get a grip on herself. It was like someone had combined both Henry and her brother all into one man. She couldn’t make sense of why his aura seemed to be affecting her so strongly. “And you.” He was tall like all shifters, but he was built much the same way as Stephen. If Gemma hadn’t been able to see his head, she would have sworn that it could have been her brother. His presence had that same dominating call to it. He had the eyes, too—green and framed with thick dark lashes. Like Henry’s ... He had the same black hair, too, but his was longer, stopping just below his ears. “The pleasure is all mine.” Being heir to the pack, her father had taught her that all Society tigers were to be treated like family. If they needed help, she was to offer it. If they needed a smile, she was to give it. These were the legs and paws that helped her and her family stand, and they deserved respect. “You work with Tom?”
Tom worked with computers. He was the epitome of a geek through and through. Even his little rimmed glasses, which were propped on his head, partly the reason he was squinting, added to the look.
“I do,” Karl said, still smiling broadly. Cade had taken Karl’s seat, and while his gaze stayed focused on what Tom was doing, she didn’t miss the murderous looks he kept aiming at the other man as he spoke to Gemma.
“He works in the mailroom,” Tom added without looking up, and Karl’s face flushed with the announcement of the menial job he held. “But he is a whiz with computers. So, I asked him to come and help me on a project. Maybe it can get him a better position.”
It was a shame all Humans weren’t like Tom. He was sweet and lovely and believed that all should be equal. He didn’t care if someone was wolf, tiger, goblin as he said sometimes. As long as they were decent, he was happy to help them. The fact that Karl was in his office was a testament to his nature…. Tom would never let someone he didn’t trust into his home. Not where Shelley and his children where.
“I was at the last pack run,” Karl continued, establishing his position, putting his male pride back into place.
Gemma didn’t remember him there, but then, she didn’t remember most of them. “There were a lot of tigers this time,” she said, her way of apologising for not remembering him.
He nodded over to where Cade and Tom were. “Something important?”
“A case we’re working on.” She wouldn’t have normally divulged details, but he wasn’t asking anything wrong.
“The Cooke killing,” he said. “Yes?”
Four sets of eyes all darted to him at the exact same moment. “How do you know this?” Cade demanded.
Karl frowned. If Cade’s tone bothered him, he didn’t show it. He must have known who Cade was—everyone did. “Every Other knows about it,” he said, pulling his phone from his pocket and offering it to Cade. “It was in the news this morning.”
Gemma tried to angle herself to see the screen. “Young Fox. Dead.”
Cade scowled. “Who sent you this?”
A shrug. “It’s just a thing we have. Don’t you?”
“No,” Gemma said. “What is it?”
“It’s just a news thing. We get a broadcast. I can sign you up if you want.” He looked around at them, his expression one of incredulity. “I can't believe you guys didn’t know about it.”
Maybe they weren’t meant to. But shit, this could mean that Danny and Michael knew about everything, too. “You can sign me up?” Gemma asked.
“Sure. Give me your phone.”
She pulled out her phone and opened it up on the browser for him. He navigated to the page—a sign up form. Quickly, she tapped in her details and hit subscribe. Maybe it wasn’t a bad thing to have this. It was a network, a way to contact all members of the Society. She was sure the Council wouldn’t take it so well, but with the right words, it could be used.
“I’m in,” Tom said suddenly, grabbing their attention. Gemma pocketed her phone again and hurried to where he was, Karl following in her wake. She went to stand on the other side of Tom, unable to be that close to Cade right now. Not after today. Karl stood next to her, and it felt like the most natural thing in the world.
Tom tilted the screen down. “I c
an't work with you lot peering over my shoulder and drooling on me. Move back.” He looked at Shelley, who had just put Rachel in her high chair. “You womenfolk need to calm down and step away from the technology.”
Gemma moved back a little.
“See, even Gemma does as she is told.”
“Of course. And maybe the menfolk would like to sleep outside tonight, like real men.”
Gemma stifled a smile. It was so easy to be around Tom and Shelley. They joked and teased each other all the time. He called her ‘woman’, and she told him exactly what she thought about that. They played and jested, but God, he would do anything for her. They were the dream she had had for herself and Cade—but it was an impossible one to reach for now.
Tom pushed the laptop towards Cade, showing him the screen.
“You got into her emails?” Gemma asked, trying to see.
“Sure did,” Tom said, his chest expanding with pride. “But they only go back about a month. Maybe this is a new account.”
“Does it say anything about Michael?” Shelley cut in, stepping back into Tom’s personal space and leaning over him. Anyone with half a brain could hear the hope resonating in her voice.
“No. Maybe she was seeing him at some point, but …” He read an email out. “Jessie. I love you. You know that, right? You will always be special to me no matter who you are with. I’m not angry. Okay? I wish you both all the luck in the world. If you ever need me, you know I am here for you. I promise.” Tom glanced up. “He signs it off with a smile.”
“Then?” Gemma asked.
Cade was reading, his brow furrowing as he went along, his expression changing, morphing from one thought to the other. “It doesn’t say whom he is referring to … and these … it’s nothing about the—” It was just then that Cade seemed to realise Karl was there.
“I know about the baby, too,” he said, gesturing to his phone. “But I can go and wait in the lounge if you like.”
There was no mention of the baby. No mention of anything actually. Nothing about leaving or even the estate and what she might have been doing there. “Maybe there is another account,” Gemma mused.
“If there is, it isn’t on here. I even recovered her passwords in the browser, but it’s clean. Like this is hardly used. I think this is possibly a new machine. If she has an old one …”
“There wasn’t another,” Cade said, his tone frustrated.
Although there might have been. They could ask Angela about it another time. She’d at least know that her daughter had bought a new laptop and what happened to the old one. If she was anything like Gemma, it was piled somewhere gathering dust, with the promise to herself that she would clear it out, transfer everything and get rid of it.
“We need to talk to Michael,” Shelley said, anxious. “I’ll call him. Maybe he knows who it is.”
“That’d be great,” Cade agreed.
Closing the laptop, Tom pushed the screen down and slid it over to Cade. “I have removed the password for you. Everything is open, but if you have an issue, just let me know.”
“Thank you,” he said, picking it up.
They left the room in single file, Cade at the front and Gemma lagging at the back. As soon as she stepped out of Tom’s office, Karl stopped her, standing in front of her. “Are you going to the pack run next week?” he asked.
Every full moon the packs all met together and ran. The next one, it would seem, was just around the corner.
“I am,” she said, nervously dancing on her answer.
“Maybe … I ... Perhaps we could meet beforehand? If you're not busy, of course. There is a nice little place just near your parents’ home. We could grab a coffee, or a beer if you prefer?”
Everyone suddenly got busy doing other things, trying not to stare—everyone but Cade. His gaze was glued on her.
Her heart gave a protesting tug to Karl’s proposition. “I—I—” She tried to think of what to say to him. It was too soon. Too much. She dared to glance over at Cade and was met with an icy stare that froze her to the spot—he was daring her to say yes.
But this was how she could save him, right?
She met Karl’s hopeful gaze and smiled. “Sure,” she finally said. “Why not?”
Cade’s expression hardened. He turned and strode out, banging the door behind him.
Chapter 18
Henry
Henry’s heart thumped awake with thunderous applause—Gemma was close by. His heart usually ticked over with a faint beat, one that he wouldn’t notice, but whenever she was in close vicinity of him, boom, it sprang to life as if screaming for him to wake up.
He placed his hand on his chest to still the beats a little. He had been sitting outside the side of her house, head down, resting on the disused stump of a tree. His memories rose as they always did when she was near, opening a vault that filled his head with sweet visions of his Mary.
He let out a long breath. He had not breathed in so long that sometimes he forgot he could do it. Every cell pumped around his body with vigour, her impending appearance sending a surge of excitement through him. He really, literally, did only live for her.
The sun was setting, bringing with it the sense of enrichment to his veins. Although he wasn’t bound the same way others of his kind were, he could still appreciate the ways in which the sun set and rose, and the feelings of fortification and strength that came with it. Like a delicious lick inside his body, it sent his mind into an explosive cognitive network. He could think more clearly, see more clearly … every sense within him alive. For some, darkness brought pain and misery, but for Henry, it was the very thing that lit him up.…
That and Gemma.
He snuck around to the front of the house, slinking through the darkness and making sure to stay in the shadows. She had been gone all day. He knew because he had been waiting for her.
A car sat in the driveway, and he could make out Gemma sitting next to a man he didn’t recognise. Jealousy raked through him as he peered through the dark to get a better look.
The man was young, happy, wearing little glasses perched on his nose. Henry narrowed his eyes, trying to read their lips as they spoke. He felt the violence rise in him, his body getting ready to fight, fangs elongating, hands fisted to his sides—he could easily murder any man who came anywhere close to what he considered his.
He watched as Gemma nodded and smiled at something her companion said, then got out of the car without exchanging any forms of physical affection.
Henry’s blood cooled, his fangs retracting once more.
This spectacled male was not the one.
The rain started just as Gemma got out of the car. With her head down, she quickly headed for the front door. Henry inched closer, unseen, unheard, pushing away a branch so that he could get a better view. She was a song that called to him. A part of her reached out to him without her knowledge and grabbed hold of his heart.
He frowned as she approached.
She was saddened. He felt it as a tug in his chest, the link between them allowing him to feel her emotions as if they were his own. As if sensing him, she paused when she reached her door and cast a glance his way. He ducked out of sight, even though he was sure there was no way she could see him from within these heavy shadows.
As he drank in the exquisite beauty of her face, he noticed that her eyes we rimmed red, her face blotchy. At the thought that somebody had made her cry, his jaw tightened and his hands curled into fists. She choked back a sob, swiping a quick hand across her face as she turned back to the door and fumbled with her keys.
Henry bowed his head, the weight of what she was feeling making his chest ache with a loss he knew all too well. He wanted so badly to get up from where he was crouched and go to her, relieve her of all that pain she was feeling.
Digging his fingers in the earth beside him, he entwined them around the roots of a hedge and focused on what Gemma was feeling, drawing it unto himself and pushing it into the earth. Her breathing
seemed to ease as the soil turned sour, her shoulders sagging slightly.
The keys slipped from her fingers, making him lose the connection with her. A curse from her jolted something inside his mind. Words that should never come from his sweet Mary’s lips. When she picked them up again and finally managed to get the door open, Henry snapped out of his momentary surprise and hastily moved out of his hiding spot, his eyes glued to her. She went inside and closed the door behind her, leaving Henry outside, undetected. He could sense her, a beacon through the wall that helped him trace her movements. It was how he had known where she was last night.
The wall was cold and hard against his back as he leant onto it, his back flat, hands spread out beside him. She was going from room to room, and as she went toward the back of the house, he followed.
Keeping himself hidden when she came out the back of the house, he was content to feast his eyes upon her once more. She had removed her jacket and let her long hair fall down her shoulders. He blinked, pure, unadulterated rapture flowing through him. Sometimes, he would forget that this was an incarnation of his Mary, and not the same body he had once held…. Her hair fell just the same, long, auburn locks that shimmered like the sun when she moved.
With no effort at all, he could remember the scent of it. The feel of each strand as it pressed against his face. He ached to touch her now—to hold her in his arms and keep her safe from the world.
With a soft sob, she fell to her knees, wrapping her arms around herself. Henry copied her stance, staying hidden where she couldn’t see. She couldn’t feel him there, couldn’t sense him. Not when it was darker and the coming night gave him power. She rocked herself, hugging herself tighter. Her pain was palpable, and he couldn’t bear it any longer.
Getting to his feet, he slipped out of the shadows from the side of the house. “I know you’re there,” she said. “I can feel you.”
He came closer to her. “How?”
She turned to look at him, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. Her face was wet and flushed, every breath she took a harsh sound in her throat like she was barely holding herself together. “I don’t know. I just—”
