If he didn’t kill her, he would never be able to get the pack under control and that was dangerous to all their existence.
He knew from Gwen that Max had been silent for twenty-four hours since the birth, as was expected. She was following pack law out of respect for the wolves. For him or Teague, he didn’t know, but suspected it was for the baby most of all.
Still, she was allowed to talk when Liam gave her the opportunity. A chance for her to share her dying request. And as she knelt before him, she couldn’t even look him in the eye, not until he told her, “Speak, Max, and tell me what’s on your mind.”
“You can’t let that child pay for my mistakes,” she blurted out, her voice unwavering but the emotion showed in the tear that ran down her cheek. “You have to show mercy. That’s the kind of king you are, Liam. The kind of wolf you always were.”
He wanted to tell her that she never really knew him, but that wasn’t true at all. “I promise you that.”
“Thank you.” She stood, moved forward toward him. She was dressed in a simple white robe, as tradition called for. Cyd had made the arrangements with Gwen, and now Max followed him out through the tunnels and into the field. She remained silent. Stoic. That was the Max he’d once known.
Cyd, Cain and other Weres were standing guard against outlaw attacks. This matter was always done in private, and Liam held the sword, the handle smooth and the metal heavy in his palm.
She turned to face him, chin up.
“I’m not doing this out of anger, Max,” he told her. “It’s for the pack. I’ve forgiven you. Your child will have a chance.”
“Thank you.”
The night was silent. Somber. He did his duty quickly, not allowing her to suffer. As per tradition, he turned and walked away once Max crumbled to the ground. Cyd and Cain would take care of her burial. He smelled the blood and went into his room and into the shower and stayed there for as long as he could stand the hot water on his skin. Stayed until the smell was gone and his body stopped wracking with sobs and he could stand tall and say he’d done what a king was supposed to do.
He toweled off, put on sweats and a T-shirt and walked out to find Rifter waiting for him with a bottle of whiskey and two glasses, already poured. Rifter handed one to him wordlessly, clinked his glass to Liam’s and the men drank. Liam appreciated the hot burn down his gullet and Rifter refilled the glass for him several times in a short span.
Rifter didn’t expect him to speak at all, he realized. He was simply offering support from one king to another. And when Liam had enough to drink, only realizing that when the room spun, Rifter got him into bed and left Cyd and Cain to watch over him. Liam kicked them out of the room after half an hour, too restless to have anyone staring at him. He opened the window for some light and the moon’s touch and found Violet sitting about twenty feet away from the house she couldn’t see, facing the woods he often ran in.
He was still angry at himself for egging her on the other night, but for some unfathomable reason, he leaped out the window and stalked her.
Whether she knew he was coming or not, she never turned. He gave her credit for that, more so when she said, “Rough night?”
Instead of growling or pretending it didn’t happen, he sat next to her. “I’m never mating again,” he told her, because if that was somehow her intention with this whole beta thing . . .
“I’ve never planned on it,” Violet agreed. “Seems like a really good way to get screwed up.”
“Yeah.”
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to rub salt in the wound.” She actually looked abashed.
“It’s all right.”
“My mouth tends to get me in trouble.”
“I know a few wolves like that.” He paused. “I’m supposed to meet with the hunters tomorrow. Are they going to tell me anything about you that you’d rather tell me yourself?”
“How much time do you have?”
“Why did you leave the hunters?”
She stared straight ahead. “They kicked me out.”
“Why?”
“They were scared of me. Said I was uncontrolled during a fight.”
“You’re young.” He realized it just then.
“I’m nineteen, okay?”
Fuck, this was not okay. “Then you’re still in moon craze.”
“I fight it. I didn’t lose control when you fought me,” she pointed out.
“Did your pack kick you out?”
“Yes. The hunters took me in. They think I’m twenty-three.”
She looked it, but for Weres, there was a big difference between nineteen and twenty-one, which was exactly why she lied to the hunters about being well past moon craze. “Betas need to—”
“Keep the peace? Don’t give me that bullshit. That’s what omegas are for. Betas are to back you up. To keep a cool head if you’re fighting. To make sure your alphas, like Cyd, are where they need to be.”
She was right.
“I admire you for what you did, both with Max and the outlaws,” she continued. “You’re a true king.”
There was no sarcasm in her tone, only reverence. And he did need a beta. He needed as many people on his side as possible and his gut told him that Violet was a good choice. Because, even before she’d told him what happened, he’d already known, thanks to his meeting with the head of the hunters. “How about a trial run as my beta?” he asked.
When she looked at him, her eyes glowed. “No mating—that’s my rule. You can never force me or say it’s for the good of the pack.”
“I can accept that.”
“What can I do to help you?”
“Let me sleep. Stand guard. Wake me if I have a nightmare.” He didn’t wait for an answer, just lay back under the moon and drifted off. He wasn’t sure how long he slept, but when he woke, Violet was standing near him, gun drawn and canines elongated, guarding him with her life.
Chapter 27
As dangerous as it was, there wasn’t anything the Dires could do about a newly shifted wolf’s need to run. It was imperative that Gillian be allowed to do so, and separating and bringing her to a different locale wouldn’t do much good. If anything, her pictures were plastered even more places now.
Jinx told her they weren’t able to stop the pictures from getting out, assured her they were using extra security and running in a more secluded portion of the woods, one that humans found harder to get around because of fallen trees and lots of twisted brush and the like. It was dark and coarse and Gillian loved it from the moment they’d arrived.
“This is perfect . . . it’s how I picture the old country when you talk about it—the dark woods where the Dires ruled the night,” she said, her voice hushed. Even though he’d told her that the Dires’ old days weren’t always wonderful, she’d made him tell her some good things about her heritage. He understood why that would be important to her.
So he’d told her about the moon ceremonies, the parties they had still to honor that. How men and women danced and drank and cavorted freely, with no worries about their primal needs. About how many Dires fought side by side with humans through great battles, selflessly giving their lives to help their community. How they never betrayed who they were.
“I want to train in the warrior ways,” she’d told him earlier.
“I think you’ve somehow imbibed the tradition.” He’d meant it. With the speed and strength, that was half the battle.
“Teach me to fight.”
“I can do that.” Needed to. It was an art form, and for her, a necessary one. “Sister Wolf doesn’t need training, but your other form does.”
“So show me,” she teased, her arms outstretched and fingers wiggling for him to come closer. And she was naked, which made him want to come very damned close.
But the mating . . . it meant no sex. Not until she was through all this and ready to make a permanent decision about spending the rest of eternity together. He was mulling over eternity with Gillian and liking the feeling when Brother
growled in his head.
He turned to her. “The weretrappers are back.”
She clung to his side as she shifted. He bent down to look at her wolf. “Sister, you run. Don’t look back, don’t shift back. Go as fast as you can toward the house—I’ll be right behind you. But you’ll get there faster. Go get help.”
Sister Wolf listened, took off at a dead run in the direction of the house while he ran behind her. He needed to be able to fight and if the weretrappers tried to tranq him, it would be far worse on him if he was in wolf form when they did so. They had drugs that they experimented with that were rumored to keep wolves in wolf form forever, and for Jinx, the idea of Brother living like that was too much.
He caught sight of Gillian far ahead of him as the tranq darts whizzed by him. There must also be trappers stationed ahead of them, prepared to drive them back into the woods. He passed several drugged Weres—the ones who were supposed to be helping guard the Dires—before he felt the hits.
Gillian was still moving. Her new wolf’s metabolism was running high and she was able to do as he asked. He was hit three times to her single time, and the last thing he remembered was seeing her continuing to run as he collapsed.
Don’t come back for me was his last thought.
* * *
She’d been hit. She’d been prepared to remain in wolf form, as Jinx had told her, but she felt her wolf’s fear of the drugs. She shifted as she ran, turning around to catch Jinx’s eye.
It was only then she realized that Jinx was no longer behind her. Naked, dazed, drugged, she turned to look for him, knowing better than to yell his name. It was at that moment a hood went over her face and tightened around her neck. Instinctively, she grabbed to loosen it, to pull it off but her hands were yanked behind her.
“It’s definitely Gillian,” she heard and that’s when she began to kick and yell in earnest. Even the police finding her would be better than this.
“Relax, Gillian—we work for your parents. We’re going to bring you back someplace safe.”
No. She bucked and kicked, felt another tranquilizer being injected, taking with her the last of her resistance. From what she’d learned about wolf metabolism, the drugs would metabolize out fast enough. She should remain still, even after they wore off, and she could give a surprise attack.
But if she’d already been taken away, locked up where no one could find her . . . what if she had to shift again?
Don’t panic. You’re strong, just like Jinx said. She went limp for a long moment, even though she knew it would be hard for her to pull herself back up. She heard the man carrying her curse and nearly drop her and she let him bring her close to him before slamming her head back and knocking him in what she assumed was his face with the back of her head. She heard a crack and a cry and she was dropped. She heard yells, a scuffle and she assumed it was from what she’d done. She managed to shove the hood off her face in time to see a tall, handsome man wrap his hand around one of her abductor’s necks. There was a snap and the man dropped to the ground.
And then the tall human came toward her. The last thing she remembered before she passed out was an attempt to punch him in the face and then him picking her up and carrying her away from the van.
* * *
Jinx woke. Blinked. And attacked. Unfortunately, the wolf on the other end of the attack was Vice, who cursed viciously and returned the punches, even when Jinx pulled back.
“Fuck, Vice, come on.”
“You started it.”
Jinx weaved backward, the drugs still wreaking havoc with his system. Vice moved forward grudgingly to catch him before he embarrassed himself by falling on his ass on the floor. “Thanks. Gillian—”
“She’s okay. Well, drugged and unconscious, but she’ll be okay, according to Gwen,” Vice admitted. “She’s right next door.”
Jinx pushed away to try to head that way but Vice held him fast. “Do you think you could maybe sit down for half a fucking second and get yourself together before you race away? Don’t you fucking trust me anymore?”
“Of course I do.” Jinx’s tone came out with astonishment, especially when he realized Vice was serious. “Shit, Vice, I didn’t mean . . .”
“Yeah, I know.” Vice studied his face. “She’s yours. I get it. And you’re going through shit and Jez is helping you. I’m helping Rogue. But you and me, are we cool?”
“We’re cool.”
“You’re keeping shit from me. I don’t like it.”
“I know.” Jinx stared at his bare feet, not able to say anything more.
“You’re going to have to tell me what it is. All of us. You need us to get you through it.”
“I can’t, Vice. Trust me on this. I really can’t. But I’ll make it all right.”
Vice shrugged. “If that’s the best you can do—”
“Thank you for rescuing her.”
“I didn’t. Not exactly. She came to when I got there, told me that some guy rescued her from men trying to shove her into a van. She didn’t remember anything, came to next to you.”
Jinx raised his brows. “Find that guy.”
“The twins are already on it. They wanted to wait to make sure you were okay, but I convinced them they’d do more good for you that way.”
“They know who it was?”
Vice shrugged, then admitted, “Cain thinks it was a hunter. And we know the hunters can’t protect her forever.”
“They shouldn’t be protecting her at all—that’s my job,” Jinx growled.
“Our job,” Vice corrected. “And we can use all the help we can get. One of your twins trusts one of them—it’s that fed, Angus.”
Jinx muttered something and ran his hands through his hair. “Gillian wants to know her heritage—why she was given away or taken.”
“Not an immediate goal.”
Just then, Stray and Kill entered the room, with Stray turning on the TV.
“News conference,” he said, his voice tight with anger as the screen flashed the Blackwells and a man named Joe Hinze.
The crawl under the screen showed he was a former Green Beret working in conjunction with the family on the search. In reality, the man was a leader of the East Coast trappers—and he was no doubt behind the tranq attack of Gillian.
“It has come to our attention that Gillian was spotted in upstate New York. She was with several men who grabbed her when she tried to come in with myself and the men helping to aid in the search,” Joe said.
“Bullshit,” Vice muttered.
“Agreed. And I think it’s time to start checking into Gillian’s background more seriously,” Killian said. “Stray and I overheard you guys in the woods—we know she’s got an ability.”
Jinx shrugged. With wolf hearing, it was hard to keep anything a secret and the door had been open. “I wasn’t going to hide it.”
“They also know you were beaten by a girl,” Vice interjected and Jinx shoved him.
“Could be a reason they gave her away,” Stray said, but he didn’t seem convinced either. “But I don’t think they would’ve known that—not that early. And unless the Elders hid a prophecy from us . . .”
“The Elders, screw us over? Say it isn’t so,” Killian muttered sarcastically. “Look, the Greenland pack believes in that twin curse.”
Jinx had dealt with the fallout from that twin curse bullshit for his first twenty-one years. “So I think that’s the more likely scenario,” Killian continued. “She was hit with the double whammy—being a twin and having an ability. Which means both probably have abilities.”
“Two sides of the same coin, like me and Rogue,” Jinx murmured.
“Who’s going to tell her?” Vice asked and they all looked at Jinx. “Dude, I so totally nominate you.”
“Dude, why did the eighties have to happen?” Jinx groaned. “Can’t you move past it—come at least up to the nineties and I’ll buy you some nice flannel and Nirvana’s greatest hits.”
“Don’t you make fun of
the eighties,” Vice sniffed. “And Stray likes his hair bands.”
Stray shrugged, because it was the truth. “Way better than grunge. And I nominate Vice to go talk to the lawyer who did the adoption for the Blackwells.”
“Why’s that?”
“Guy’s a former Marine.”
“Semper fi,” Vice said seriously.
* * *
There was no noise. The air even stilled and Angus simply froze in place as instinct took over. Good human, Cain thought to himself as he padded silently toward the man’s back.
In seconds, Cain rolled him to the ground, his canines sharp and hovering over Angus’s neck. At least he’d had the sense to bare his neck in that show of submission that made Cain sing with pleasure, but he’d have to do this with every goddamned Were who attacked him. And, as a hunter, they would be lining up to take a shot. Killing hunters was weresport in more circles than he cared to think about.
“Good to see you too, Cain,” Angus managed without moving a muscle. Cain leaned in, let a tooth scrape Angus’s soft flesh and he felt the man’s cock jump. He did it twice more, then licked where he’d scraped and heard the grunted intake of breath.
Yeah, can your boyfriend do that to you? I don’t fucking think so.
“Are you this easy for all the Weres or am I special?” he asked finally.
“Fuck you, Cain,” Angus said, but his voice was soft, not angry. Cain pushed off him, sat back on his heels and watched Angus not bother to try to compose himself or hide how turned on he was. Instead, he propped up lazily on his elbows and stared at him, his eyelids deceptively heavy lidded and lazy-looking.
There was nothing lazy about this man—he was the human form of a predator, and Cain wouldn’t take any chances.
“Did you bring backup this time?” Cain asked and Angus shook his head.
“We’re all alone. Unless you have Weres stalking me in the bushes.”
“I do my own dirty work. Always have.”
“So do I, Cain. Those men with me . . . we were working, but I would never bring anyone with me if I thought I’d see you.” Angus stared at him unflinchingly and Cain felt a tug in his gut.
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