by Holley Trent
Bryan closed his eyes and groaned. “I never said she wasn’t welcome. I said that I wouldn’t want her there.”
“But you would have children there? And the human mates of some of the Bears?”
“That’s different.”
“No, it’s not,” Tamara said. “What’s the real issue, baby? Are you afraid people are going to ask questions?”
“They’re going to, and I don’t know what kind of lies we can possibly tell them.”
“Why lie?” Peter asked. “Andrea didn’t do anything wrong. She got dealt a bad hand and she’s doing the best she can to mitigate the trouble.”
Bryan straightened up from the counter and paced in front of the ancient refrigerator. “You gotta understand how Ridge Bears think. A lot of folks in the clan believe that being Bears makes us sacred, and for a woman to willingly expunge her beast—”
“I thought we’d already decided this,” Tamara interjected.
“Well, we did, but…” Bryan raked his hand through his thick black hair and gave it a tug. “I just worry. I can’t help but to worry.”
“That’s not your job. Don’t worry about all the potential ripples caused by a single action,” she said. “You look at the big picture and let me worry about the small stuff.”
“And you’re not worried?”
She shrugged. “I think the clan is more accommodating than you think. Everyone worries about Drea. They’d want her to do whatever is necessary to keep herself healthy. As much as I don’t like the idea of her not being able to shift, I don’t believe anyone else would think she’s committed some grave sin. If anything, they’ll be relieved that she’s better.”
The alpha rubbed his eyes and let out a long, ragged exhalation. “You’re probably right.”
Tam scoffed and sipped her coffee. “I’m always right.”
“Well, I hope you are this time,” Peter said. “She’s my mate. I don’t want her to feel excluded from the groups she knows. In spite of how and why I brought her here, I’m not so arrogant to think that I’m all she needs.”
“Fine,” Bryan said. “She can choose to go or not go to wherever Bears gather. I won’t make my own sister a pariah, and the decision will be left to her as to whether she’ll speak or not speak on what she had to do.”
Peter nodded. “That’s fair.”
His phone rung at the same time a knock sounded on the apartment door. San was calling.
He hit the button to accept the call and moved through the living room. “Hello?”
“Let me in or not. Your choice.”
He let her in. Why bother calling?
She breezed into the room dressed in all black as if she were going to a funeral, and carrying two bulging totes. Turning toward the kitchen, she canted her head in acknowledgement at the newcomers, and then turned to Peter. “Well?”
“Yes. She wants it done, and we’ve agreed.”
“Who is this we?”
Peter closed and locked the door, then gestured to the Ridges. “The blonde is my sister Tamara. The man is Bryan Ridge. He’s the alpha of the Ridge Bear group, and Andrea’s brother.”
San lifted her chin. “Ah. Welcome to Baltimore, Alpha.”
“I wish I could say I were here for leisure,” Bryan said.
“Some other time, I’m sure.” She turned to Peter. “Are we ready to proceed? This ritual may take some time. I’m using my mother’s notes, so I won’t be as quick about the tasks as she might have been. I’m not going to rush through the parts. This needs to be done right.”
“How long?” Tamara asked.
San grunted. “Could take all night. There’s no way to guess how much recovery time she’ll need between each part. No matter how long the ordeal takes, I’ll be here for the duration.”
“Is the ritual going to hurt her?” Peter asked.
San cringed.
“Don’t lie to me.”
“I don’t lie, and you know that. Don’t even fix your mouth to make the accusation when I’m simply trying to find kind words to give you.”
He put up his hands and muttered, “I’m sorry.”
She grunted. “Perhaps at first she won’t feel any pain, but as she reintegrates into her senses, she will most certainly feel that animal part of her being stripped. If the beast is clinging, it may dig in. You may not see the wounds, but Drea would certainly feel them being made.”
“Fuck.”
“She would tell you to proceed anyway,” Bryan said in a rush—almost as if he were still convincing himself of the truth. “She’d want to get the pain over with, so let’s get started before one of us chickens out and comes up with some half-assed excuse as to why we should throttle this thing.”
They all moved toward the bedroom.
San stopped at the doorway and turned. “This is hungry work. Perhaps you should go find dinner and bring it back. Take a long walk while you’re out. Give me some time to set things up.”
“I’m not leaving her,” Peter said. “Do what you have to do with me here.”
San grunted again and fixed her gaze on Bryan.
“Fine,” Bryan said. “I can tell when someone thinks there are too many people in a room.”
“You’ve got big energy, Alpha.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard that before.”
“Let’s go get some food and check in with Dana,” Tamara said. She looked around Bryan’s body at Peter. “We’ll be back in an hour or two. Keep your phone on. Don’t wait too long to call if anything goes wrong.”
“If I weren’t going to do a good job taking care of her, I would have never called you two in the first place,” Peter grumbled.
Bryan opened his mouth as if to rebut, but Tamara pulled his hand. “I’m in the mood for fish, baby.”
“Go to Sampson’s,” San said as she passed through the doorway into the bedroom. “They fry the best flounder. Bring me back a number four platter and make sure they’re not stingy with the hot sauce packets.”
The pair departed, closing the door softly behind them, and San—still near the doorway—narrowed her eyes at Peter. “You don’t need to be here.”
He edged past her without a word and climbed onto the bed.
“Had to try,” she muttered.
She unpacked some of the items from her bags. Jars, containers, baggies filled with unknown substances. A mortar and pestle. Some black cloth. A knife.
He stroked Andrea’s chin and watched San test the sharpness of the blade with her thumb.
“If you plan on keeping that shirt she’s wearing,” she said, “you’d best take it off her. I never said this was going to be clean work.”
“I’m not going to let you cut her up. She has enough scars already.”
San rolled her eyes. “I need a few drops of blood, not a pint. There’ll be no scars from that. The mess will be from vomit.”
He scoffed. “Well, there won’t be much of that, either. She’s eaten probably four bites in three days. Do what you have to do.”
San nodded and got to work mixing mysterious liquids and herbs, knelt at the bedside. She sang low to herself as she worked, concentrating on pinching and pouring exact amounts into her bowl and seeming to forget that he was there.
He pulled Andrea into his arms and dragged his lips across her burning forehead. “You still in there, sweetheart?” he whispered.
Andrea’s only response was a sharp intake of air.
He missed hearing her soft voice and the way she spun words. People yelled at her all the time at work over the phone, and she always handled conflict so well. She’d deflect the anger, and quickly problem-solve, or else figure out who could solve the problem better. She knew when to call in the big dogs, and though she tried to keep administrative concerns off the desks of the investigation staff, sometimes she had to escalate queries to the others. When she did, the ladies dropped whatever they were doing to take care of her requests. They trusted that she’d do her job so they could do theirs, and there was r
eally nothing wrong with her job, in Peter’s opinion. If Andrea didn’t think she could work in the field, Peter didn’t think she should push herself. Businesses were only as enduring as their admin support, and Dana would be showing a decided lack of wisdom if she tried to replace Andrea for her lack of upward ambition.
“I’m so used to seeing you there at the office,” Peter said. “Every time I go in there, you’re busy. Always so busy. You make your own work, don’t you? Figure out what to do and don’t wait on anyone to tell you what needs to be done.”
“Some people are just suited for that kind of work,” San mused.
Peter smoothed down Andrea’s hair at the temples. “I’m not. I wouldn’t know what to do. Wouldn’t know how to organize things or prioritize tasks. My job is easier in that one regard. I do one thing at a time and the order of business is predictable.”
“I couldn’t do a desk job either, but probably not for the same reasons. I don’t have the attention span. I need to be on my feet flitting about, lifting things, touching things. Making messes and cleaning them up, all in a five-minute period.”
“Not everyone gets to be the superhero, huh?”
“I don’t know, I’d say the dispatcher who sends an ambulance to you when you’re ill or hurt is as much of a hero as the man or woman who runs in with the stretcher and stethoscope.”
“True. I don’t know if she’d agree, though. She wanted to do more.”
“Or maybe she just thought she did.”
“Could be. I’m sure she gets lonely in that office when everyone’s gone. I bet she feels like she’s being left out.”
San laughed. “So get her an office puppy.”
He gave half a shrug and settled Andrea between his legs to lean her back against his front. “Not a bad idea. Maybe something small that can use the fenced courtyard behind the building during the day.”
“No. No no. A bigger dog. A nice, pathetic mutt that no one can make heads or tails of. A happy dog that’ll look out the window all day and chase a ball around the office.”
“The custodian is going to have a fit.”
“He’s getting paid, right? Give him a big tip at Christmas. He’ll get over the mess.”
“He probably will. He’s a pussycat.” Somewhat literally. He was one of the Were-catamounts from Patrick’s group. They didn’t have very many males, and what few they had were too young for the mate-seeking women. Patrick’s number two priority at the moment was to balance the group’s numbers. His number one priority, obviously, was to do whatever he could to protect his Cats from the fallout from the Bears. He’d been doing that in part by moving most willing cats into the Triangle. They hadn’t wanted to leave their homes in the mountains, but, new alpha, new rules. Most saw the benefit of living closer to their alpha’s home turf and only returning to the mountains during the full moon period each month. The few who didn’t relocate—only three—had moved on to other Cat groups.
San propped her knee onto the bed and leaned in to take Andrea’s left hand.
She turned it over in her palm and rubbed Andrea’s fingers briskly. “I just need a few drops of her blood to personalize this mix.”
Peter had never been the squeamish type, but he didn’t want to watch Andrea get hurt. He nodded, and then turned his head.
Moments later, San retreated.
“Never thought I’d ever see you settling down,” she said.
He shrugged again, but she couldn’t see him. She was on her knees in front of the chair and had her back turned to him. “I hadn’t given settling down any thought at all. Having a job like mine,” he said, “you don’t stop to think about mates and children when you’re as busy as I’ve been. And honestly, no one’s had to lock me up during mating season before this year.”
“Yes, well…a job like yours probably isn’t a good scenario for family men.”
“I can do other things, San.”
She stood and shrugged. “I’m sure you can. It’s not my place to say whether or not you should be doing them. Do you have any of her fur?”
Peter couldn’t quite catch on to San’s rapid change of subject. “What?”
“Her fur from when she was in her bear form. Some fur would make this poultice exponentially more efficient.”
“Fur…”
He didn’t want to give San a quick no, so he tried to think back on all the times he’d seen Andrea in her bear form in recent history.
There’d been a recent gathering in the mountains. Peter had dropped by for a moment to pick up some information from Bryan, and he’d been standing around chatting with the alpha. Andrea had lumbered past on four legs, squeezing between him and a tree, and accidentally brushing his leg.
He’d been wearing the same pants, and he hadn’t gotten around to doing laundry.
“Check the bottom of my left leg,” he said to San. “On the outside. There might be a little fur there, but some may be mine or other Bears’.”
“Won’t hurt anything if it is theirs. As long as I get some of hers, I’m happy. I need a bit of her hair, too. If you don’t mind…”
He let out a breath and ran his hand over Andrea’s hair again. “Would have been easier before she gave herself the haircut.”
“Too short to grip. A good thing in a fight, no?”
He grimaced. “Yes. It’s a good thing…for that.”
San scraped some fur off the fabric of his jeans with a small comb and then held out her hand.
He placed a couple of Andrea’s hairs with roots intact into San’s palm.
“This will only take a minute. Open her shirt for me. I need to get to her chest.”
He worked the buttons loose and splayed the plackets to expose her bony sternum.
He growled, and couldn’t help himself. His fangs dropped, skin pulsed with the drive to shift into his protective bear form, but he fought back the urge. The part of him that was beast wanted to take over the care of her because Peter-the-man wasn’t doing a good job. He was doing the best he could, and as fast as he could, but that wasn’t enough for the bear.
“Simmer down,” San said quietly.
“I’m trying.”
“Try harder.” She sat on the bedside and handed the bowl over to him. “Spread all of that onto her chest. Don’t leave any in the bowl.”
“Does the effectiveness change if I don’t do the application?”
“Doesn’t matter who smears the goop on. I’ve already said what I needed to say to it. Won’t make a difference if the mixture is spread by your fingers or mine, just don’t let it dry. I don’t want to start all over with that.”
With a shuddering exhalation, he got to work spreading the mixture. “What do you do after this?”
“I wait,” San said. “I’ll sit there in that chair. I’ll watch on my phone the television shows I’ve missed this week, and I’ll wait.”
He smeared some of the strong-smelling goop between Andrea’s breasts and up to her throat. “How long?”
San shrugged. “Like with any medicine, that depends on how fast her body realizes it’s there. You’ll know when the change happens. That’s all I can tell you. Are you sure you don’t want to just l—”
“Unless you enjoy getting snarled at, don’t tell me to leave. That’s a very unwise suggestion to make to a Bear during mating season.”
“Fine,” San said blithely. “Well, I’ll keep that in mind the next time I find myself doing a favor for a Bear.” She took the bowl from him when he finished spreading the mix and handed him a damp towel to clean his hands with.
Then she spread dry towels on either side of him and waved her hand across Andrea’s chest as if to dry the mud.
“And now we wait.” She took a step back and nodded solemnly. “Maybe you should try to nap. You may need the energy later.”
He grunted.
He didn’t think he’d be getting much sleep—not when he was programmed to keep watch. The actions weren’t compatible.
CHAPTER
TWELVE
Drea was used to having some pretty bad luck, so she wasn’t particularly surprised that the next sensation to reach her in her unconscious state was burning. But different than like with the bear’s fire.
Her skin burned from beneath her chin all the way down to her navel. She wanted to scratch and claw at her torso, to get whatever the irritant was off her. She felt like her skin was disintegrating, that her muscles and bones were being liquefied, and she couldn’t even cry out—couldn’t shed any tears—because she still didn’t have dominion over her body. All she owned at the moment was pain.
And the bear was angry.
If you were better at living, they wouldn’t do this, the bear said. They’re doing this because you’re weak and can’t cope.
They’re doing this…because you won’t go away on your own, Drea said.
This isn’t about me, stupid. I am what the goddess intended.
Drea doubted that, but didn’t have the energy to argue.
The Bear lore had always been that Big Bear—the being who’d created their race—made them to be in perfect harmony between their halves. The beasts were supposed to complement what made them human, and the human parts of them were supposed to temper the beasts’ wild urges. The combination of human and animal was meant to make them stronger—better stewards of Earth and the people who lived around them.
Drea was divergent. She was convinced of that, and she wasn’t going to let that anomaly she’d been living with since puberty make her feel otherwise. There was nothing normal about the inner war she was waging.
She dug deep and found a little strength. She had to trust that whatever Peter was doing was to help, not to harm. What was being done to her was certainly something that only the desperate did. Being split apart wasn’t supposed to feel good.
The bear dislodged from the mental doorway she’d been blocking, and suddenly, Drea could draw in enough air to scream.
She hurt.
I freaking hurt.
Every part of her body was a seared ruin, and her gut was so twisted that she retched. That hurt, too. Her body wanted her to expunge what was inside her.
She barely felt Peter’s thumps on her back. Her consciousness was so close to reintegrating with her body, but not quite there. All she felt was pain and nausea.
