by Dia Cole
The babe in my arms wriggled.
I looked down.
A pair of large amber eyes blinked up at me from a rosy cherubic face that was framed by a thatch of silver-streaked hair.
My chest tightened. What a miracle! To think that I had a part in creating this tiny beautiful soul. I knew in that moment that I’d do anything to keep her alive. I glared at Tasha. “I swear I’ll never remove the cuffs.”
“Then our bargain is set.” Her teeth flashed white against her golden skin. “I’m looking forward to the day you come crawling to my bed, begging me to set you free.”
“That will not happen.”
Her laughter followed me out of her room and, just now, I swore I heard it in the crackling embers of my study fireplace.
“I will keep my bargain,” I pledged to the fire. “Even if it kills me.” With shaking hands, I found the bottle of wolfsbane Ty had brought me several moons ago. Then I knocked back enough to ensure I stayed in my study instead of seeking out the female my wolf longed to claim.
13
Havana
What the hell did I do to piss Nathan off? I wondered as I stabbed a hole in a slice of Mrs. Pierce's apple pie. For weeks, he’d been avoiding me. He now took his lunches in his study with Mira while I ate alone in the playroom.
I went over our last interaction through my head, but nothing stood out. We’d had a great lunch together and talked about his upcoming trip to New Mexico. He’d even teased me that he’d bring me back some alien tchotchkes and I’d threatened to put them on his study shelf next to his priceless art.
Since he’d returned from his Roswell trip, I hadn’t seen him or any stuffed aliens. It was ridiculous how much I missed having lunch with the man. I looked at the two-way mirror. Did he miss me at all?
Stop it. He’s obviously not interested. I turned my attention back to the pie. I’d become a huge fan of Mrs. Pierce’s food, much to the dismay of my skinny jeans, but as I brought my fork to my lips, I hesitated. The roast beef sandwich had smelled and tasted fine, but the pie smelled strange. Before I could set my fork down, a big glob of gooey apple landed in my lap. Great. Just great. I tried to wipe off my black slacks, but only managed to spread the mess around.
With a heavy sigh, I pushed my dessert aside, grabbed my purse, and made my way to the closest bathroom that just happened to be across the hall from Nathan’s study.
Once inside, I washed off, touched up my makeup, and gave myself a critical look in the mirror. It’d gotten to the point that the collared shirt, black pants, and flats I wore felt normal. Not that Syd didn’t give me a hard time about my nanny uniform every time she saw me.
This morning I’d bumped into her coming in as I was on my way to work. She’d pursed her lips and gave me a long look. “I just hope this is all worth it.” She waved her hand up and down my body. “Because you sure as hell aren’t getting laid in that getup.”
Whatever. It wasn’t as if I wanted another one-night stand or hookup that went nowhere. I was tired of that life. The next guy I ended up with was going to be a serious contender for my heart. He’d be the whole package, attractive, smart, caring, and definitely nothing like creepy Jeremy Riggs.
I looked down at my phone buzzing in my purse. Goddamn it, the guy was texting me from yet another number. It was like playing whack-a-mole with him. Syd thought I should report his harassment to the police, but I didn’t think it warranted their time. Jeremy was harmless. Just another lonely soul, desperate to connect with someone. Although I didn’t appreciate being the focus of his obsession, I could definitely relate to the sentiment.
There was a soft knock on the door.
“Ms. James, are you in there?”
Nathan! I gave myself another once-over in the mirror, pinched my cheeks to add a little color, and opened the door. My welcoming smile died as I looked up into his tense expression.
His brows were furrowed and his full lips were pressed so tightly, white lines bracketed his mouth.
Crap. What did I do now? “What’s wrong?”
“Was Mira acting sick this morning?”
I shook my head. “She was fine. In fact, more energetic than normal.” The little girl had given me a run for my money earlier. After insisting on dancing around the playroom for over an hour, she’d begged to go outside. We’d spent most of the morning swinging and playing hide-and-seek in the backyard. “Why?”
“She’s complaining that she doesn’t feel well.” Nathan frowned. “She’s laying on the couch in my study. It’s not like her. She never gets sick.”
Worry stabbed through me. The canine flu pandemic was getting worse. The news hardly reported anything else these days. “You don’t think it’s the flu, do you?”
Nathan’s bronze complexion paled. “Not until now.”
“Can I see her?” I asked, grabbing my purse off the bathroom counter, and stepping out into the hallway.
“Of course.” He led me straight into his study. It was just as I remembered from my interview. The only difference was the little girl curled up in a ball on the leather sofa across from the fireplace.
“Mira!” I dropped my purse and rushed to her side. “What’s wrong, love bug?”
She looked up at me, her face flushed and her eyes glazed. “My tummy hurts.”
Stomach pain? That didn’t sound like a canine flu symptom. I laid my hand on her sweaty forehead. No fever. I looked up at Nathan who was pacing next to the couch. “What did she have to eat today?”
“A few bites of a sandwich and the apple pie.” He motioned down at the two nearly empty plates next to the coffee table.
“I thought the pie smelled off. Did it taste weird to you?”
“I’m not a fan of sweets. Mira ate my portion.” He stopped pacing, picked up one of the plates and inhaled deeply. “Damnation.” He quickly set the plate down and looked over at me with a mixture of fear and anger in his gaze. “I think the pie may have been poisoned.”
“Poisoned? Why would anyone try to poison us?”
Ignoring my question, he said, “Did you eat the pie?”
I shook my head.
He let out a deep breath. “Good.”
Mira made a whimpering sound.
Nathan looked down at her with panic in his eyes. “What do we do?”
“We have to get her to the hospital. They can pump her stomach.”
He shook his head furiously. “It’s over thirty minutes away and our kind can’t go to human hospitals.”
Our kind? What’s he talking about?
He looked at me, a desperate expression on his face. “There must be something else we can do.”
My mind raced. “Do you have ipecac syrup?”
“I don’t know. What is it?”
“A medicine that induces vomiting.” I’d gotten a crash course in it by a bulimic dancer at the club. Poor thing made herself throw up with the stuff after nearly every meal.
“We can check Mira’s room. Her first nanny stockpiled her bathroom with every kind of medicine.” Nathan bent down and scooped up the little girl. “It’s okay, sunshine. Daddy’s going to make it okay.” He carried her out the study door moving so fast I struggled to keep up with them.
I followed them down the hallway until he stopped at her bedroom door.
“Open it,” he shouted.
I hurried to open the door.
Nathan ran over to Mira’s carriage bed and gently set her down. Then he rushed across the room and tore open the door to a bathroom.
As I crouched down next to the bed, I could hear bottles hitting the floor. It sounded like he was emptying the entire medicine cabinet.
“Aha!” A moment later, he returned with a bottle. “Is this it?”
Recognizing the bottle, I nodded. “You need to pour it into a cup and then follow it with a cup of water.”
He ran back into the bathroom and returned with two cups. He knelt down next to Mira and offered her the cup with the dark syrup in it. “Drink thi
s, sunshine.”
“No,” she moaned. “I feel bad, Daddy.”
“I know. But you have to drink this. It will make you better.”
She shook her head weakly.
“You have to drink, love bug,” I said, rubbing the little girl’s arm.
“No.” Mira locked her lips together a mutinous look in her eye.
Pushing me out of the way, Nathan grabbed her chin and forced her to look into his eyes. “Drink it, Mira,” he ordered, his voice seeming to make the air vibrate.
Mira sat up, grabbed the cup with her small hands, and drank the contents.
“And this one too,” Nathan ordered giving her the cup of water. When she’d complied, Nathan made an approving sound and helped her lie back. He glanced over at me. “Go find Mrs. Pierce and ask her where she got the ingredients for that damn pie and for fate’s sake try to keep her from eating it if she hasn’t already.”
“Right,” I ran out of the room and down the hallway until I passed the dining room door. Next to it was the kitchen door. I yanked it open with enough force that it banged into the wall.
The older woman was at the white-on-white kitchen counter with her back to me. It looked like she was chopping something.
“Mrs. Pierce, Mira is sick. We think it might have been the apple pie.”
The older woman didn’t seem to hear me. She was singing softly and her arm was moving almost robotically fast as she chopped.
I walked closer. “Mrs. Pierce.”
Still she didn’t respond.
Finally, I came up behind her and tapped her on the shoulder. “Mrs. Pierce.”
She spun around and gave me a smile that seemed far too wide for her lined face. “Sing a song of sixpence, a pocket full of rye. Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie.” There was a crazed look in her eye as she continued singing the verses to the nursery rhyme. “When the pie was opened, the birds began to sing. Oh wasn’t that a dainty dish to set before the king?” Fisting her hand around a large chef’s knife, she repeated the last verse over and over.
What the hell? The hair on the back of my neck stood on end. I glanced down at the counter. On the cutting board was a line of finely diced apples. Next to that was an empty pie crust, a rolling pin, a bowl of sugar, and an open box of rat poison. I froze. Oh, God! Did she put that in the pie?
The older woman waved the knife in front of her as she sang louder and louder. “Oh wasn’t that a dainty dish to set before the king?”
My blood chilled. She’s lost her damn mind. “Never mind, I can see you’re busy.” I started backing out of the kitchen.
She blinked as if seeing me for the first time, and then suddenly lunged for me.
Crap! I jumped back, barely avoiding her knife.
She let out a cry and came at me again swinging the knife.
I dodged the blade. “Stop! Why are you doing this?”
The crazy woman shouted the verse to the nursery rhyme and raised the knife again.
Screw this! As she rushed forward, I kicked her square in the chest and knocked her to the ground.
While she scrabbled to her feet, I ran around her, and grabbed the rolling pin from the counter. “Stay back!”
She let out a screech and barreled toward me.
Adrenaline poured through my veins as I lifted the rolling pin like a bat and swung it straight against her hand. Bones crunched, she screamed, and the knife flew across the room.
“Now get away from me,” I warned, brandishing the rolling pin at her.
Instead of backing up, she bared her teeth and rushed me.
Ah hell. I swung the pin again this time directly at her head.
Whack.
She fell to the floor, unmoving.
Oh no. Did I kill her? My hands shook as I dropped down and felt the old woman’s pulse. It was strong and steady. Thank God. I have to tell Nathan. Then we’ll call the police. I backed out of the kitchen and then ran as fast as I could back to Mira’s room. Neither Nathan nor Mira were there. The smell of vomit let me into the adjoining bathroom.
Nathan sat inside the running shower, fully dressed cradling Mira in his arms. Chunks of puke ran down the lapel of his wet suit jacket.
Mira let out a cry and retched.
“That’s it. Get it all out,” Nathan said, rubbing her back. He looked over at me, his expression strained. “I think it’s working. She’s been throwing up everything she ate. What did Mrs. Pierce say?”
I was breathing so hard I had to grab hold of the doorframe to steady myself. “She’s acting insane. There was rat poison on the kitchen counter. I think she put it in the pie. She just tried to attack me with a knife.”
Nathan’s eyes widened. “What? Where is she?”
“The kitchen floor. I knocked her out with a rolling pin,” I panted.
He cursed. “I can’t believe they got to Mrs. Pierce like that.” He rubbed his wet face with his hand.
He must be in shock. He wasn’t making any sense. “Who are they?”
The look he gave me was filled with frustration.
Deciding that he wasn’t going to clue me in, I fumbled for my purse. “I’ll call the police.” Damn it, my purse was still on the floor of his study. “I’ll be right back.”
Nathan raised his hand. “No. No police. I’ll deal with Mrs. Pierce.”
“But—” The old woman needed to be jailed or very likely institutionalized.
“This house is no longer safe for you,” Nathan said, pinching the bridge of his nose. Then he said in a strange voice, “Look at me, Vana.”
Unable to fight his authoritative tone, I looked into his eyes.
“Forget how Mrs. Pierce acted today,” he ordered. “Forget all about Mira being sick and the poison. Go home.”
Pain seemed to crack my head open. Clutching my temples, I cried out. When the agony eased, I looked around the room in confusion. What’s going on? Where am I? My gaze locked on Nathan in the shower with Mira. Why are they in the shower? Is that puke everywhere? Panic swelled up inside me. “What’s going on?”
“Calm down, everything is fine. You were just on your way out.”
“I was?” That didn’t seem right. Why would I be leaving with Mira looking so ill? The poor thing. What happened to her?
“Mira has a stomach bug, but I have it well in hand. You’re leaving now,” he said in a voice that made my head feel like it was being split in two.
Home. I should go home. “I think I’ll head out,” I said, feeling dizzy. “Let me know if you need me to come back tonight to help with Mira.”
“That won’t be necessary.” Despite being soaked from head to toe and covered with vomit, he still managed a commanding presence. “Your employment will no longer be needed. I will send your severance check to your home address.”
“You’re firing me?” Tears gathered in my eyes. “What did I do? Tell me. I can fix it.”
“Nothing, Ms. James. Know that you did nothing wrong. You were a wonderful nanny, but we no longer need you.”
Filled with shock and denial, I tried to reason with him. “But—”
He held up his hand and spoke with that same otherworldly tone in his voice. “Don’t question this and don’t get upset. Just go straight home. Goodbye, Ms. James.”
Nodding, I left the bathroom and stumbled out of Mira’s bedroom. I’ll go straight home. Feeling like I was caught in a dream, I continued walking down the hallway, out the door, and in the direction of my apartment fifteen miles away.
14
Nathan
“The fuckers tried to kill Mira, brother.” I paced the length of my study as white-hot anger consumed me. Thank the fates that after expelling everything in her stomach, Mira had slept straight through the night. Although she’d woke this morning grumpy and tired, she seemed to have recovered from the effects of the poison. At least that makes one of us. I still hadn’t come down from the terror that clung to me the entire time I’d watched her sleep. I’d never felt so helples
s.
Once Mira experienced her first Lykos transformation, she’d be able to heal almost any sickness or injury. But that wouldn’t happen until she was around twenty. Until then, she was as vulnerable as a human child. And human children died all the time.
Ty’s fierce expression mirrored my own as he watched me from the middle of the room. “Whoever did this will pay.”
My hands shook with rage. “Yes, they will pay. But first we have to find them.”
Ty’s gaze narrowed. “My money is on the Moon Valley Faction. They have the biggest ax to grind.”
I shook my head. “No. It’s not their style.” Although I didn’t trust Shoshanna, she’d seemed genuinely concerned for me and Mira. Besides the Moon Hunters were known for their honor. Poisoning a babe would be considered a cowardly act for them. “It could be the Bitter Lake Faction.” That Enforcer I’d pounded into the table could’ve decided to come after me and my family. “Or it could be the Reno Faction.” They’d promised to seek retribution for Tasha having insulted their Alpha at a recent council meeting. And they were not alone. “Hell, it could’ve been any of the dozens of factions Tasha has pissed off.”
As soon as Tasha took my position on the council, she’d sought to punish factions she deemed enemies through sanctions and tithing. That combined with her past homicidal tendencies meant that most of the factions in the country wanted her head on a spike. That’s where my attempts at diplomacy were supposed to come in. Not that I strove for peace for Tasha’s sake. I worked tirelessly for all the other Winterhaven males, females, and young who didn’t deserve to be persecuted because of the crimes of their leader.
“True,” Ty said rubbing his chin. “Have you questioned your housekeeper?”
“She remembers nothing probably due to the skull thumping Vana gave her when she fought her off.” When Mrs. Pierce had finally come to, she’d had no memory of the entire day nor any idea why she had a broken hand and a mango-sized lump on her forehead. I’d compelled the woman to believe she’d been in a car accident and sent her to the hospital for treatment. Of course I’d pay her medical bills and give her a nice severance, but she’d no longer be welcome in my home. She’d been compromised once, she could be compromised again.
