Fifteen minutes later, Jade was trotting north on one of the Mintons’ horses. Out of practice as she was at riding, she didn’t dare take one of the feisty cutting horses, so instead she chose an Appaloosa gelding named Ace that she knew to be a favorite of the dude ranch guests. Horses were like cars, sometimes you wanted something sporty and flashy, and sometimes you just need reliable transportation. At any rate, Ace seemed happy to be out of the barn, and he was a handsome enough fellow, a bay with a white and spotted blanket on his rump.
It seemed to Jade like it took no time at all for the old branding shed to come into sight. Lori’s SUV was indeed parked nearby, as was a late model pick-up truck she didn’t recognize. Easing to a walk, she guided Ace into a thicket of trees, hopped off, and looped the reins around a low-hanging tree branch. Ace snorted a little, shaking his head, and Jade scratched him behind the ears. “I don't have any apples or carrots,” she whispered, “but I promise you’ll get your reward later.” Ace bumped her with his big head, and Jade gave him another quick pat before running her hands around her utility belt in a habitual check—handgun, extra ammunition, pepper spray, baton, flashlight, handcuffs, and radio. She clicked the radio off, so no random squawking would give her away.
Jade stayed in the cover of the trees as much as she could; the snow wasn’t as deep, plus she wanted to delay the chance of being seen for as long as possible. When she got near the old building, she ducked and ran to it, flattening her body against the dilapidated clapboards. There was only one window, with a piece of glass missing from one corner. She tried to quickly peek in, but the panes were clouded with years of grime, obscuring her view. Then Jade realized the hole in the corner was allowing sound to leak out. A woman—whose voice Jade recognized to be Lori’s—was pleading with someone.
“Look, there’s no reason to hurt them, it’s Conall you want. Issue a challenge to the O’Faolán Taoiseach if you must, but kidnapping and torturing their females is no way for a wolf to act.”
There was a sickening smack as an unseen hand made contact with flesh.
“Shut up, Lori, or there will be more of that for ye as well as for them. What do you know about how wolves should act? You and yer eejit Omega da have caused me enough trouble. How he ever let you escape from the clan is a wonder.”
Well, Jade thought, that answered the question about whether Lori was a wolf or not, and from which clan she came.
“Me da loved me—and he wanted me to have a better life than rutting with the likes of you,” Lori spat back.
The unseen male laughed humorlessly. “Well, now you are going to be back where you belong—and I’ll screw you whenever I damn please. Since you won’t be sending me any more checks, we’ll need a new kind of payment plan.”
Jade heard the two of them scuffling, and she could only imagine what the man was trying to do to Lori. There was the sound of fabric ripping, then Jade heard Aoife’s unmistakable voice, “Get ye hands off her,” followed by the sound of someone falling to the floor.
The man roared in anger, “Ye little bitch! Let’s see if yer holier-than-thou men folk will want ye back after ye’ve been branded.” He scrambled to his feet, and the dull thud of kicks being delivered to soft tissue was interspersed with grunts of pain from Aoife.
Lori’s moment of defiance melted. “Taoiseach, please, I’ve returned to the clan, I’ll do whatever ye say, but there’s no need for this. Do ye want a never-ending war with the O’Faoláns?”
“We already have a never-ending war with the O’Faoláns. It’s my intent to finish it,” he growled. “A fight to the death between the Taoiseachs—winner take all.”
A surge of panic crept over Jade; time was running short to help the three women inside, and clearly this wolf thought he could take down Conall. Colleen’s silence scared her most of all, though.
Jade felt confident she could get the jump on the Carey Taoiseach, but the question was whether or not she could maintain control of him without putting his hostages at risk. She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, trying to think. Where the hell were Conall and Don? Why couldn’t she reach them?
In the distance, she heard the sound of a motor, and wondered who could be coming up to the branding shed. She looked around for a place to hide, as she stood out against the snow like the dark spots on Ace’s white rump. To the side of the shed was an old, galvanized metal watering trough that had rusted and fallen off it legs, landing sideways. Quickly, she dived down behind it. The snow was cold, but at least firm enough to not immediately soak through her clothes.
A rattletrap pick-up—with more rust on it than the old water trough—eased to a stop next to the other vehicles. Jade dared to snatch a glance over the rim of the trough, and to her surprise, she saw Frank Lemmon get out. He looked around nervously, and then Jade noticed some movement under a tarp in the bed of the truck. What on earth was he transporting? Whatever “it” was, it was clearly alive.
Frank rubbed at the two-day growth of beard on his face, hitched up his pants, and tried to walk toward the door of the shed with confidence. His Omega status seemed to overtake him, though, and by the time he reached the entrance, his tail was between his legs—figuratively, at least, if not literally. His solo appearance puzzled Jade. Where was Biggy?
It was more difficult to hear what was going on in the shed now, although Jade was sure she heard Lori exclaim, “Da! What are ye doing here?” when Frank opened the door.
Frank Lemmons was the father of Lori Minton, high school chemistry teacher and wife of Duke Jr.? It boggled Jade’s mind almost as much as the idea that Lori was secretly an Irish, shapeshifting wolf.
When the door closed, Jade noticed the tarp in the back of Frank’s truck rustling again, and suddenly, it floated up and eight legs appeared underneath it. Two canine forms slipped over the tailgate, and a moment later, the piercing amber eyes of a huge gray wolf were staring into hers. The other wolf, which Jade could only presume to be Don, was almost as big as Conall. He was brown with a white blaze on his chest and deceptively soft brown eyes. Jade was pretty sure, though, that Don could be quite terrifying if he so chose.
Communicating with Conall in wolf form had its own challenges, Jade realized. While she knew he could understand everything she said, since he couldn’t speak it was a bit like playing a game of twenty questions, where the responses she needed from him had to be simple yes or no answers. The two wolves hunkered down next to her, using the trough for cover.
“Aoife and Colleen are inside, I think they are hurt. I don't know how badly,” Jade whispered.
Don whimpered a little in response to Jade’s statement, while Conall dipped his head to acknowledge what she’d said.
“Lori Minton is in there too, with the Carey Taoiseach. I think he’s blackmailing her or threatening her somehow.”
Again, Conall nodded.
“Is Frank Lemmon Lori’s father?”
Conall nodded affirmatively.
“Where’s Biggy?”
Don’s bared his teeth as he growled a little.
Jade raised an eyebrow; it was hard to feel much sympathy for Biggy. “I take it Biggy is no longer a problem.”
Conall tilted his head sideways, a little sheepishly, before nodding.
“The Carey Taoiseach wants to kill you, Conall.” Jade wasn’t sure if she meant it as a question or a statement.
Conall nuzzled the side of Jade’s face and neck in a reassuring way, and Jade felt the electric crackle of energy fly between them. Then she felt the place between her legs grow warm and achy, and it was more than a bit disconcerting that the touch of an animal was having that effect on her. Jade tried to stay focused on keeping everyone alive.
“Will the Carey Taoiseach have a gun?” Jade asked. The amber eyes blinked to signal that he didn’t know. Jade sighed. “What are you going to do? Do you have a plan?”
Conall’s lips curled back, revealing the fearsome nature of his sharp teeth and powerful jaws. His eyes narrowed as he issued
a low rumbling threat.
“You’re going to fight him for control of both clans?” A lump rose up in Jade’s throat. “How do you know that he’ll fight fair?” But all she got was a wolfish shrug in response.
Jade turned to Don. “You’re going to allow your Taoiseach to do this? What if he loses? The Careys will kill you and every other adult male—think about what they will do to Colleen.”
Don turned his gaze away, refusing to look directly at Jade. A tear welled up in Jade’s eye, and then she felt a paw on her arm. She turned back to Conall, allowing herself to fall into the spell of his amber eyes. Her breathing slowed down, and she felt strangely infused with courage.
“One last question—when push comes to shove, will Frank go against his Taoiseach to save Lori?”
Once again, all she got was the wolf equivalent of the ‘I don’t know’ shrug. Jade sighed. “Alright, but I’m going to go first as an officer of the law, and if everybody turns to wolves in there, I guess all hell is going to break out.”
Conall pushed at Jade, signaling his dislike of her plan.
“Com’on, Conall, do you think Lori Minton wants me to see her turn into a wolf? Or that the Carey Taoiseach is so stupid he’d do something that he thinks will give their secret away? They don’t know that I know more than I wish I did about shapeshifters in our midst.”
Wolf Conall rolled his head back and forth, noncommittally.
“If I’m in trouble, you and Don can help me out like you did when we rescued Nicolette, but for Duke Minton’s sake, I’d like to put these assholes in prison the normal way.” She watched as sadness crept into the amber eyes regarding her. “I realize that to avenge Claire and Rionna, you might prefer to do it another way, but I have to uphold the law.”
Conall’s furry chest lifted and fell in a wolfish sigh, and Jade felt satisfied that he was resigned to doing it her way.
Scrambling toward the door, Jade tried to stay low as Conall and Don silently trailed her. Surprise was going to be the best advantage Jade had, so she cocked her pistol, took a deep breath, and slammed through the door.
All eyes fixed on Jade as she stood there like an Old West gunslinger barging into the local saloon. Aoife was in bad shape, but Colleen was worse; Lori looked like she wanted to run for the door, and Frank stood there dumbfounded. Only the Taoiseach didn’t seem too perturbed by her appearance.
“Why look, a deputy sheriff has come calling,” he said to no one in particular.
Jade kept her gun pointed at the Taoiseach as she took him in. He was huge, at least six and a half feet tall, with the thick neck and knotted musculature of a professional wrestler on steroids. Straight, black hair fell across one half of his grizzled face, and when he bobbed his head, Jade could see a terribly scarred and empty eye socket. She remembered the slathering one-eyed wolf from her dream and couldn’t help but shiver.
“Like my pretty face?” He struck a bodybuilder’s pose, curling one powerful bicep in profile. “Or is it just my body you lust for?” Relaxing the pose, he took a step toward Jade. “I’ve always been a little partial to busty blondes, meself.”
She couldn’t let him rattle her, Jade reminded herself. “Lori, are you okay?” Jade asked without taking her eyes off the Taoiseach, as if she didn’t know that Lori could produce three-inch canine teeth on demand.
“Yeah, yeah I’m okay.”
“I want you to get Aoife and Colleen out of here. I know this asshole has been blackmailing you, threatening you somehow. We can sort that out later, but right now, I want the three of you out of here.”
Aoife tried to rouse Colleen, whose head rested on her shoulder. Lori seemed paralyzed; she looked back and forth from Frank and the Taoiseach to Aoife and Colleen.
Finally, Frank swallowed hard and then spoke. “Get’em out of here, daughter.”
A wave of panic swept over Lori’s face. “They’ll kill ye, Da!”
Frank shook his head. “They’ll have to find me first. Deputy Lundgren, I confess to the murder of me cousin Doolin Lemmon, otherwise known as Biggy.” Frank dropped to his knees and put his hands behind his head in surrender.
Rage lit up the Taoiseach’s face as his own Omega betrayed him. The chieftain whirled and grabbed something behind him, and when he turned to face Jade he held a glowing hot brand he’d pulled from a makeshift hearth of white hot coals.
Things were not exactly proceeding according to plan, and the only thing Jade could be thankful for at that moment was that she wasn’t standing in the middle of hostile wolves. She cleared her throat. “Lori, free Aoife and Colleen, right now.”
Lori snapped as if she had woken from a very bad dream and scurried to untie the ropes restraining Aoife and Colleen. The Taoiseach brandished the red hot metal in his hand while Jade kept her gun trained on him. She was sure he was going to rush her, use his size and her fear of the burning brand to overwhelm her. In her years on duty, she had never killed anyone, and she wanted to make sure if she squeezed the trigger on her gun that it truly was a matter of life and death.
Once Aoife was freed, she tried to help Lori get Colleen untied, but the smaller shapeshifter remained unconscious. Then the Taoiseach did something Jade had not anticipated; instead of rushing toward her, he barreled toward the other three women. Afraid to shoot for fear of hitting one of them, either directly or with a ricochet, Jade did the only thing she could think to do.
“CONALL!”
Jade yelled as loud as she could, and Conall and Don came flying through the door. Distracted, the Carey Taoiseach turned his head, rushing toward the wolves with the dangerously hot brand. In that instant, though, there was a shimmering in the air, and Aoife transformed at the same time she leapt, latching wolf jaws on the Taoiseach’s neck. He flailed at her with the brand, searing her flesh in a dozen places, even as his face registered utter surprise. Despite her agony, the beautiful red wolf held on, the blood from the Taoiseach’s wound staining her face and coat. The huge man fell to his knees, dropping the brand as he did, just as Conall and Don managed to reach him.
Jade watched in shock as the Taoiseach’s life ebbed away into a pool of red, and Aoife, letting go, once more took her human form, rolling to her back. She looked up into Conall’s amber eyes. “I did it for Riona and Claire, and I did it for me Brendan. And that arsehole needed to know that females count as more than things to feck.” She forced a gentle smile though the pain as her life force began to wane. “And besides, I’m no Riona and ye certainly are no Brendan. We would’ve hated being mates for life.” She brushed her hand along the furry ruff around Conall’s neck. “Take care of the clan and follow ye heart.” And with those whispered words, Aoife was gone.
***
Over the course of the day—and into that evening—the story unraveled, revealing the means, motive and opportunity behind Duke Minton’s death. Biggy, in his desire to become an Alpha, had revealed the whereabouts of Frank’s long-missing daughter to the Taoiseach. At first, the Taoiseach merely threatened to hurt the Minton family if Lori didn’t pay him off. The checks to OEW Productions—which Jade finally realized stood for “One-Eyed Wolf”—were blackmail payments disguised as marketing services for the dude ranch. No one investigating had realized that neither of the Dukes had kept the books for the Bar Double Star; it had always been Lori in charge of the ranch’s finances.
Then the Taoiseach decided that if the other females ever found out about Lori living the independent life of an ordinary human, the Careys might have a feminist revolt on their hands. So he decided to test Biggy’s readiness to move up to Alpha status and punish Lori at the same time by having Duke Jr. killed. Biggy had indeed botched it, killing Duke Sr. by accident, and then killing young Claire, who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, in an attempt to cover it up.
For her part, on the day of the funeral, Lori claimed to have the flu, in order to slip back to the Carey clan, feeling it was the only way she could keep her husband and mother-in-law safe. She hadn
’t counted on being made a witness to Aoife and Colleen’s abuse, and she certainly didn't know that her poor Omega father would finally find his grit. She wasn’t particularly thrilled that Jade now knew her true identity, but she managed to make it back into bed at the ranch in the nick of time as Duke Jr. and Evelyn returned from the cemetery. Her doting husband attributed her sweaty, red face to nothing more than a viral fever.
Don had quickly gone human once the Carey Taoiseach was down and was able to use his paramedic skills to stabilize Colleen. She had a skull fracture with an internal bleed, but everyone was relieved that the spunky little paramedic was going to make a full recovery. They disguised any evidence of Lori or Frank having been at the site by first riding Ace back to the barn, then driving the Bronco through all the tracks in the snow. Once the danger was over, Conall quickly called in support to discreetly escort Frank to the sheriff’s department. As it turned out, Frank really had killed Biggy—not Conall or Don— when his cousin threatened to hurt Lori. Frank signed a full confession, swearing under oath that he killed Biggy in the heat of a drunken moment because he was upset when he found out Biggy had killed Duke Minton. No one seemed to question the legitimacy of it, and Biggy accepted a plea bargain for second-degree murder with a sentence of twenty years to life.
The problem for Jade was the scene at the branding shed and how to explain everything in a rational way that didn’t include mention of opposing clans of shapeshifters, or stir up the mostly dormant wolf problem with the mention of a dead human savaged by wolves. After some serious brainstorming with Conall and Don, she came up with a story that at least seemed remotely plausible.
Jade told Wilson and Dougie that she and Don had gone off informally on a drive looking for Colleen when she didn’t meet Don as expected. While they were out, she got a call from Conall O’Faolán, who had noticed some suspicious activity around the branding shed while working on the adjacent BLM land, and that was how the three of them ended up on the Minton’s property. Jade painted the Carey Taoiseach as a random psychopath—and indeed there was no record of him in any criminal database— who kidnapped and tortured women, and Aoife O’Hara had not survived. Apparently, during the struggle with Aoife, the perpetrator was also burned numerous times. When Jade discovered him, he was getting ready to do the same to an unconscious Colleen, and when he turned on her, she had to shoot him. Fortunately, Don was there as a witness to vouch for her.
Broken Wheel Wolves: Boxed Set (The Complete Collection, Books 1-6) (Werewolf Romance - Paranormal Romance) Page 15
