As his situation sunk into my awareness, a part of me wanted to feel bad for him. I had not wanted to ruin his life with our fight. I just wanted him to be a better person to others. I guess the people he stepped on were not as forgiving as I was and had chosen to express their true opinion once I proved he wasn’t invincible. Come to think of it, he wasn’t filling out his shirt like he used to, either.
“Have you been eating enough?”
“That...” Carlyle glanced toward the kitchen. “That doesn’t really matter right now.”
So, no then. Dammit. I don’t mind kicking a rabid mutt who needs it, but the idea of kicking a man when he’s already beaten just did not sit well with me at all. And dominant wolf or not, the longer I looked at the man Thomas Carlyle had become, the more certain I was that he was one or two steps shy of being a beaten, broken man.
There were three seats available at our table… well, technically Sloane’s table. Shit. Fine. Maybe buying Sloane’s breakfast would be a sufficient apology for commandeering her table.
“Sheriff, have you and your deputy eaten yet?” I asked.
“We were just on our way over when we found Mister Carlyle.”
I shot a semi-apologetic glance toward Sloane. “Sorry to steal your table out from under you. Gentlemen, this table has three open seats. Sit down; breakfast is on me.”
Sloane, Sheriff Clyde, and even his deputy immediately protested my decision. But Carlyle looked like he wanted nothing more than to sit, but he waged a war with his pride about being the only one of three—Sheriff Clyde, Carlyle himself, and Clyde’s deputy—to accept my offer. I locked my eyes on Clyde’s and, while doing my best to maintain a non-expression, tried to will him to understand my intent. After several seconds of no progress, I lost my patience.
“Fine. Sheriff, take your deputy and get lost. Carlyle, pick a chair.”
I think my words and tone finally communicated to Sheriff Clyde that he’d missed a cue somewhere, but I no longer cared. This was keeping me from my food, and I was only going to tolerate that for so long. The sheriff took his deputy to another table just as the server swung by to ask if we’d decided what we wanted. I passed Carlyle my menu and told her the bill for this table was mine, even going so far as to weave a minuscule amount of alpha dominance into the statement. She jerked like I’d just goosed her with a hat pin and nodded. I think Sloane finally figured out the situation, because she didn’t say a word. Either that, or she felt the dominance too and chose the better part of valor.
The ladies and I ordered, and when the server turned to Carlyle, his expression proclaimed to the world he was afraid to order anything while being hungry enough to order everything.
“I… uhm…” Carlyle stammered.
I did my best to give him a neutral but welcoming expression. “Pick your three favorite dishes, and order them. If Gladys’s crew doesn’t do it better than you’re used to, you’ll eat here on me for the next three months.”
Truth be told, I was slowly coming around to the idea that I’d be helping him get back on his feet anyway… which meant covering his meals… which meant paying his tab here at the diner. The incident this morning proved to anyone who could smell smoke and hear thunder that I have no business cooking anything.
Carlyle must have seen how serious I was, and he did indeed pick three dishes from the menu. I smiled my thanks. He gave me an answering smile of his own, but it was cautious, almost like he asked for permission.
The picture I slowly built of who Thomas Carlyle had become was not a picture I liked. People—whether Magi, shifter, or human—should stand tall. Stand up for oneself. Not be a doormat with shattered self-worth like I was starting to think Carlyle had become.
I fought the urge to sigh. It wasn’t my responsibility to fix it. For that matter, I couldn’t fix it. Only Carlyle could do that. But he needed a place to start. A foundation to build on. And right now, he didn’t have that. He came to me—the guy who shattered most of the bones in his body and started his downward spiral—and begged mercy.
Our food arrived. The sheer mass of edible goodness coming to the table required three servers to deliver. I was fine with that. If someone copped an attitude, they could speak to me. My ladies chatted with Sloane while we started our meals, and Carlyle tore into his like he hadn’t eaten in a very long time.
I tried setting everything aside to concentrate on my food, but my mind swirled and splintered across multiple trains of thought. Well, not really. It was more like several trains of thought spawned idea after idea after idea. Rapid fire. Like those tiny firecrackers all bound to one fuse, except several sets. No rhyme or reason which train of thought spawned an idea next. Just pop-pop-pop-pop across all the different strands.
I hated when my thoughts were like that. Made it damn difficult to concentrate.
The idea crossed my mind before that I should maybe carry a notebook to write down as many of the thoughts as I could. But at times like these, writing down the cascade of thoughts would majorly interfere with my eating. Most times, it wouldn’t matter… but eating was important.
The ladies were still halfway through their orders when I finished mine. Carlyle was about halfway through his orders, too, but that was okay. After all, he ordered three breakfast platters.
I waited until Carlyle finished. A quick glance showed me the ladies were still going. I think they were chatting more than they were eating. Ah, well… not my circus, not my monkeys.
As the server topped off his coffee, I leaned back against my seat and asked, “So, how would you contribute to Precious?”
Carlyle had the refilled coffee cup about halfway to his lips when I asked, and the cup froze. He stared at me like a deer in a semi’s headlights.
“Dude, drink. It’s okay. Use the time to consider your answer.”
He moved his eyes away from me to look at the tabletop as he sipped and I waited.
After a few more seconds, he said, “To be honest, I’m not really sure. Most of my past experience with packs and shifter communities has been as an enforcer or Beta.”
Yeah… that wasn’t going to happen until he proved to me that he wouldn’t abuse any power or authority I gave him. But I also realized that I wasn’t the person to say he could stay. Not by a long shot.
I nodded my understanding as I replied, “I think it’s safe to say that won’t happen for a while, so some re-training is in order. But I just realized that I’m not the person who should approve your settling in Precious.”
Carlyle—and possibly other people at the table—blinked in confusion. “But… but I thought you were Alpha here.”
“Oh, I am, but in this instance, that doesn’t mean I have the final say, just the first. The person who will ultimately decide your fate is a young lady named Melody. Cute, sweet girl. She works day shift at the hotel’s front desk. I think you’ve met her.”
By the time I stopped speaking, Carlyle looked whiter than the coffee cup he held.
26
The ladies and I left Thomas Carlyle in the care of Sheriff Clyde and his deputy with instructions that they escort Carlyle to the hotel where he would plead his case to Melody after giving me twenty minutes to speak with her. If they came to the hotel and I was still in the lobby, they were to go for a walk around town and check back later.
* * *
The bell over the door rung as I led the way into the hotel’s lobby. Melody exited the back office and beamed upon seeing me and my ladies.
“Hi, Alpha Wyatt,” she chirped.
“Hi, Melody. I have a favor to ask.”
Melody’s smile faded only long enough to allow her to speak. “Anything, Alpha.”
“Thomas Carlyle came to me in the diner and asked if he could try living in Precious. He looks… well, he looks bad. According to him, he’s been run out of every place he’s tried to settle, and if it’s true, I’d say he was a bigger shit to people on his rise to power than what we saw a few weeks back. So, here’s the deal.
I told him that I’m not the final say in whether he has a chance to start over here. You are the final say. The sheriff and one of his deputies will bring Carlyle here after my ladies and I leave, so Carlyle can plead his case. My favor is that you listen to what he has to say. If he tries to coerce, threaten, or otherwise manipulate you into saying ‘yes,’ my answer will be somewhere between ‘no’ and ‘you can have a ten-minute head-start before we hunt your worthless ass.’ If you won’t feel safe living in town with him here, then he will not be here. End of discussion. But I’d like you to hear him out and see what you think. Are you okay with that?”
By the time I finished speaking, Melody lost a little of her glow. She didn’t quite look fearful, but her expression betrayed increased anxiety. She dropped her eyes to the counter that served as the front desk and slowly nodded her head.
“I’ll do it,” she said, her voice meek and not even a shadow of its former happiness.
Damn and blast. I had never wanted to see this Melody again. And I definitely didn’t want to be the cause of her reappearance. Helping Carlyle get back on his feet was not worth dimming the radiance of Melody’s bright soul.
“Okay. You know what… don’t worry about it. I’ll call Sheriff Clyde and have him send Carlyle down the road.”
I was halfway into my turn to leave the hotel when Melody said, “Wait… please?”
I turned back and saw less anxiety in her expression. It was still there but less than it was.
“You said he looked bad?”
“Yes,” I answered. “I told him to sit at my table and order his three favorite dishes from the breakfast menu. His clothes hang off him like there’s not as much of him as there used to be. He’s been living in his SUV. We walked by it on the way in, and the third row of seats is missing to make a large enough space for his wolf to curl up and sleep. I saw no sign of food wrappers or trash or anything like that, so I think he’s been eating only what he hunts. And if people have been running him off, he might not have had permission to hunt. So, he’s probably been poaching rabbits and groundhogs.”
At this, Melody’s expression curled into a frown of disgust, and I didn’t really blame her. No shifter I’d ever spoken with claimed groundhogs as worth eating, no matter their predator form or their hunger level.
“I really think he’s only a day or two away from being at the end of his rope, Melody.”
Melody held her silence for several moments more before she lifted her head and met my eyes. Her expression and demeanor bore no trace of the anxiety she’d held just moments before as she said, “I’ve been where he is. I’ve been the shifter no one wanted. When I came to Precious, I had my mind made up that I was going to kill myself if I didn’t find a place here. Alpha Jace was the first to give me a chance in I don’t know how long, and I’m still here. It would be very poor repayment if I didn’t give Thomas Carlyle a chance when no one else will. I’ll hear him out, Alpha Wyatt.”
Karleen stepped up to the desk. “Would you like me to be here when you do? Just in case?”
“I want to say you don’t need to worry, but I’m not going to say that,” Melody answered. “Thomas Carlyle was the scariest wolf around for more years than I know, and I’m honestly a little afraid at the idea of facing him alone. I understand Sheriff Clyde will be here, and one of his deputies… but Carlyle is just that scary to us, you know? More than one of us wondered why you never took him down.”
“No one came to me. I mean, it’s one thing to hear a bunch of people say such-and-such Councilor is a jerk, but how are you supposed to know it’s just not talk? All I needed was one person to come to me and tell me what he did, how he behaved. It’s no one’s fault; I’m not trying to say anything like that. But at the same time, I never felt good about basing those kinds of decisions on hearsay alone. It could’ve just been a bunch of assholes grouching around because he caught them being assholes, you know? I’m sure Wyatt here isn’t universally liked across all shifters, regardless of just or unjust. So, I’ll buy a paper and go sit in the lounge where I can hear everything that happens at the front desk and read it. Will that make things better?”
Melody’s infectious smile was back, and she bobbed her head in an eager nod.
Karleen turned to the other ladies and me, saying, “I’ll catch up to you.”
“Fair enough,” I replied with a nod. Then I turned, and Gabrielle, Lyssa, and I left the hotel.
* * *
No more than a hundred feet separated us from the hotel’s entrance when my phone buzzed its vibration in my pocket. I retrieved it and saw the caller was Deputy Director Nathanson, and I thumbed ‘accept.’
“Wyatt here.”
“Thank you for taking my call, Alpha Wyatt,” Nathanson said. “Do you have a couple minutes?”
“Of course, sir. How can I help you?”
There was a slight pause before he answered, “I’m doing something I promised I’d never do. I’m checking up on my agents. Hauser’s and Burke’s supervisor just told me it’s been thirty-six hours since he has heard from them. I want to say that’s not uncommon, and on the one side, it kind of isn’t. But to paraphrase so many movies, I have a bad feeling about it. At their last check-in, they were maybe an hour from the coordinates the black ops team gave us for the entrance to their group’s facility. This isn’t the kind of work where we wouldn’t hear from them. Digging around in the agency’s archives for a week? Sure. No one wants regular updates on that, but approaching a black site that has sent people into the field—into America—that have proven themselves willing to kill and burn… I just can’t help but feel they need help.”
I agreed with everything he said. There was just one problem. “Are you asking me to investigate a United States government facility that is in United States territory and not shifter territory?”
Nathanson responded with a heavy exhalation. “And there’s the rub, isn’t it?”
“Oh, I’d say it’s more than a ‘rub,’ regardless of the literature allusion. I have no problem taking a shifter war party up there and hiding them in the trees while I approach the gate. Matter of fact, Hauser and Burke have stored up sufficient goodwill with Vicki that I wouldn’t be surprised but what she activates the 7th Magi Expeditionary Unit and drops an assault rift or two if she learns they’re in trouble. Come to think of it, I’ve heard Grandpa and Grams talk about how Hauser and Burke impressed them. I doubt they would come to the party, but if they do, who needs a Magi expeditionary unit at that point? But… I don’t think it’s wise for any of us to make a move without official governmental sanction. Anyone with an axe to grind—whether against us or against the current administration—would happily charge out of the woodwork to make more hay than Nebraska or Kansas if we or the Magi move to assist without that official approval.”
Another heavy sigh. “Right. You’re right. I wish you weren’t, but you are. Okay. I’ll take this to the Director and ask for both of us to take it to AG and hopefully the President.”
“How did the ‘we have shifters and Magi’ conversation go with the new AG?” I asked.
Now, Nathanson chuckled. “As the Deputy Director in charge of Paranormal Branch, I had to have that conversation, and it would be very impolitic to carry tales. But I will say that she was not prepared at all for the idea we have people inside the country who can become lions, tigers, or even an extinct sabertooth cat. And when we came to the part of the conversation where I said Merlin did exist and might possibly still be alive… well… let’s just say it was a very educational conversation for her.”
“Fair enough. So, go have the conversations you need to have. Regardless of the outcome, I’d appreciate knowing.”
“I’d say that’s the least I can do, after asking you to break a treaty that has existed since 1789. Thanks for taking my call, and you’ll hear from me when I know something.”
I tried to say ‘goodbye,’ but the call ended before I could. I didn’t even consider giving Gabrielle and Lyssa a re
cap of the conversation. Shifter hearing being what it is, they heard it all in real time. I slipped the phone back into its pocket and looked to each lady in turn.
“If you don’t mind, let’s wait until the house to discuss this. I’d like to turn it over in my mind a minute or two.”
The ladies nodded, and we continued our walk to the Alpha’s house.
* * *
“You made the only decision you could make under the circumstances,” Lyssa said the moment the front door closed. “Frankly, Deputy Director Nathanson shouldn’t even be calling you directly. It should filter through either the State Department or the local office… except that we don’t have a State Department representative or a local office yet. After all, there’s such a thing as the chain of command.”
I didn’t quite grimace. “I’m not sure I like the idea of Nathanson needing to go through eighty-seven people to talk to me, especially if he needs to talk to me… such as the situation we have now. There has to be a better way than the normal international relations bullshit.”
Lyssa closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. She might have even groaned. “Wyatt… if you want to be respected as a head of state, you need to act like one, even if that means someone like Nathanson having to go through eighty-seven people to talk to you.”
Gabrielle’s eyes shot wide, and she slipped around Lyssa and walked to the hallway. I wasn’t sure if she was fleeing the field or what, but she knew me well enough to know the minefield Lyssa just found. And it seemed she wanted no part of it. I heard the door to the hall bathroom close and felt a little better. I definitely wasn’t about to ask to see if it was an honest need or just avoiding the discussion.
“You have a point, Lyssa. But help me remember something here. Who wanted me to be a head of state for the shifters? Hmmm?”
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