by Christa Wick
That's the Bogeyman...
Oscar strangles the name before it can escape his lips. Another cub called the dark man that -- once. No one has seen the boy again. The Bogeyman insists all the boys call him father. But Oscar is the only child with the same dark hair and black eyes and the realization makes his stomach churn.
The cub tries to move off the table, but other men have entered the room and one blocks him. This one wears clothes like the Bogeyman but colored green. The mask is green, too, with shaded goggles to cover the eyes. A second man just like him waits at the pregnant woman's table, standing at the end with his hands alongside her head.
"I want him on his stomach," the Bogeyman orders, removing the fabric covering the tray. Several scalpels and a row of five ametrine crystals lay beneath. Selecting one of the surgical blades, he pulls the sheet from the woman. He balances the instrument on her naked belly and then uses one gloved finger to trace the curve of a smile on the underside of her stomach.
"A shame she doesn't scar each time," he murmurs. "I've lost count of how many cubs I've put in or pulled from her belly."
Oscar's stomach claws its way up to his throat as he instinctively understands the man's intention. He averts his gaze from the woman's torso to her face. Dark blond tendrils escape the plastic cap holding her hair in place. The lips are plump, the nose refined. Oscar has the sense of having seen her once before and remembers her blue-green eyes as clearly as if they are open.
The Bogeyman looks at the man behind Oscar. "I said I want him on his stomach!"
Each word issues slow, precise and louder than the one before it. Some of the other boys say that is the Bogeyman's angry voice, but Oscar knows the man is always angry. Menace coats every syllable, no matter how softly spoken. A strike prowls behind each pat on the head with his big hand.
The assistant flips Oscar roughly onto his stomach. The boy's testicles shrivel as they touch cold metal and he loses the fight to be brave. The Bogeyman doesn't notice or doesn't care. His fingers move over Oscar's spine, tracing the vertebrae and delivering small pinches to the flesh every other inch.
On the opposite table, blue light begins to dance in the space between the male assistant's hands and the woman's head. Her eyes open and roll toward the cub, confirming his memory of their sea-green color. The dance of light against her temples intensifies as the second male's hands wrap around Oscar's head.
Everything dulls, the white room, the once brilliant green of the woman's irises, the cold metal and even the dreadful sound of the Bogeyman talking to his assistants.
Returning to the woman, the man takes the scalpel in hand. With the tip of the instrument no more than a millimeter from the woman's flesh, he repeats the shape of the smile, memorizing just where he will cut.
"Time to meet your baby brother, my boy."
********************
Heat surging through her body, Iris released her hold on the squirming, screaming cub. She tried to detach from the boy's mind but her thoughts felt heavily sedated. Her body stopped taking orders from her brain as Oscar twisted in her arms. Heavy limbed, helpless, she watched as the change violently overtook his small form and he shifted to his were state for the first time. Arms and legs lengthened, nails sharpened to claws and teeth to fangs. Hair sprouted along the snout that had replaced his nose.
Howling, Oscar swiped at her face just as Cade broke through the door, Dana hard on his heels. Pain sliced through the haze, but Iris still couldn't control her movements. She had ventured too deep into Oscar's memories and her body was no longer hers to control.
Her lips moved with the boy's as he screamed, his small, sharp-tipped fists pummeling the big wolf's chest. "You're not my daddy!"
Another hot flash of pain cut Iris's connection with the cub as her body rejected the silver jewelry embedded in her skin. Flesh separated, her nipples splitting. Further down, between her thighs, pure agony engulfed her.
She slid onto the floor. Cade cushioned her fall. Esme swarmed in front of Iris, the witch's attention pulled in two directions at once as Oscar continued to cry and thrash in Dana's embrace and Iris howled in pain. Next to Esme, an arm flailed. Fur the color of iron left to rust covered the flesh. Dark purple paint visible at the tip of its sharp claws flecked and drifted away. The arm took a swing at the witch, just missing as Cade wrapped his hand around the wrist.
Her wrist -- she could feel Cade squeezing, restraining, his voice and all his energy directed at her. "Calm your wolf, baby," he urged. "Feel me, let my wolf guide you."
She wanted to obey, but struggled against Cade and Esme. Her field of vision shrank. All the voices in the room coalesced into a single buzzing drone, save one as Oscar's shrieks chased her down the black hole of unconsciousness.
"I don't want you to be my daddy!"
Chapter Twelve
Waking on a bed in strange surroundings, Iris peeled her eyelids open. Her nose lifted to scent the room while her vision took its sweet time unblurring. Sensing no immediate danger, she lifted her hand and examined it. Relief swept through her upon seeing the pale, rounded flesh and light dusting of hair so fine it was almost invisible.
With that question answered, she lifted her aching head high enough to look down her body. An uncomfortable image greeted her. A thin white sheet draped her flesh, the fabric's color and weight distressingly similar to what she had witnessed covering the woman in the operating room. Like the woman, she seemed naked, as well.
Hesitant fingers plucked at the top edge of the sheet. One of her last memories was of the silver separating from her flesh, slicing at some of her most sensitive areas. She looked under the cover and a little more tension fled her body. The silver bars were gone and the nipples appeared to have healed completely. For the moment, she would take it for granted that the flesh from the other piercing was whole, too.
Starting to sit up, she changed direction quickly to clutch at the sheet as she heard movement on the other side of the door. She didn't need to scent the visitor because his wolf pushed ahead of him, entering the room before he twisted the handle and the door swung open.
Cade looked at Iris, his breathing labored and his eyelids fluttering with stunned blinks. Now that he was in the room, he filled her senses. The clean spray of wintergreen and pine tickled her nose while the comforting heat of his wolf wrapped around her bare shoulders.
Bare shoulders...
Right, she needed to fix that, especially since Esme and Dana were coming down the hall at full speed, Esme's hand reaching out to jerk Cade by the collar if she managed to get close enough to him.
Sensing them, Cade moved the rest of the way into the room and shut the door, calling over his shoulder for the pair to wait. Turning his attention to Iris, he studied her face. Then his gaze moved lower, a smile playing at the corner of his mouth.
Iris knew the smile, knew he was about to turn insufferable from having been so right for so very long.
"Don't say it," she warned.
Grinning a little wider, Cade shook his head. "The words didn't even cross my mind, baby."
Yeah, right.
She rolled her eyes at him and pulled the sheet closer to her body. "I need clothes."
"Not from where I'm standing," he countered and took another step closer to the bed. His wolf reached out, searching for its mate and nuzzling along her neck and shoulder when he found her.
"This isn't the time or place for that," Iris growled, no menace in the sound because her wolf refused to ally against her mate.
"You're right," he smirked. "We should go now. We can be at Esme's cabin in fifteen minutes or so."
Great! His hormones were overriding his responsibilities. In some ways, he was still that twenty-year-old wolfling who had turned her drunk with need whenever he came near.
"Esme," she said, raising her voice just enough to catch the witch's attention on the other side of the door. "Some clothes, please."
That was all Esme needed as an excuse to barge in. In th
e short time since Cade had shut her out, she had retrieved a fresh change of clothing in Iris's size.
"Do you need any help?" Esme asked.
Interlacing his fingers, Cade stretched them, the joints popping in relief. "If she does, I'm available."
Iris rolled her eyes in his direction. She would wait until she was dressed to work on his attitude of entitlement. He was crazy if he thought her shifting had solved everything. She didn't care how delicious he smelled or the effect his presence had on her now that the silver was out of her body.
Turning her gaze on Esme, Iris smiled. "Can you get him to give me a few minutes of privacy?"
"My pleasure." Esme waggled her brows and then she rolled her fingers, witch light dancing along their tips.
"Ems..." Caution entered Cade's tone. He'd seen what happened to wolves she turned her magic on, including her own mate. He didn't want to be on the receiving end of one of her more aggressive spells. "This is between mates. You know that."
Iris growled and he growled back, but with an entirely different intent, one that wasn't appropriate when they had an audience. The vibration continued to roll through his throat, her resolve to make him leave receding.
Damn that sound was...
She shook her head. She'd think about what that particular growl of his did to her later, hopefully when she was alone. Right now, she needed clothes. She had to talk to Dana and Esme about what she'd seen inside Oscar's memories.
"Out," Iris ordered. Extending her arm, she pointed at the door. Her entire arm glowed with magic and she pushed her wolf at him.
Cade stumbled backward for an instant then dropped his head like a bull ready to charge. She abandoned her order, retracting the command but not the request.
"The cubs don't have time for us to argue about this," she soothed. This time, when she pushed her wolf at him, the gesture was a gentle caress of fur on fur. "Please," she added.
Cade left, his feet dragging with reluctance. Esme followed a few seconds later after Iris said she could manage on her own. With her immediate need for clothing satisfied, she spent a few seconds taking stock of her body. Her muscles were stiff and her mouth felt gluey, as if she'd spent a full day knocked out. A glance at the clock next to the bed confirmed that at least a day had passed.
Running a hand through her hair, she opened the bedroom door to find Cade, Dana and Esme standing in the hall. Dana flashed from barely holding back in confronting her while she remained in the bedroom to full in her face, his topaz gaze boring into her skull.
"What did you do to him?" he barked.
Esme and Cade moved immediately to intervene, the witch calming while Cade snarled and bristled. Iris slid a hand onto Cade's shoulder and lightly squeezed. It was the first time she had touched him since she had shifted and the realization threatened to smash the calm facade she projected to dust.
Forcing her attention to the angry shifter looming over her, she smiled. Before yesterday, she'd only had her own will and her magic to push Dana back.
Now? The boy wouldn't know what hit him.
Chuckling, Iris let her wolf, cloaked in all the power of her magic, rise up to greet the clan leader. His gaze remained as hard as diamonds, but she saw his wolf blink. Just a little, but it was enough. Easing back, she stopped the laugh that had continued gurgling up her throat. She dipped her head, acknowledging Dana's status as clan leader, and then she pointed toward the living room visible at the end of the hall.
Dana led the way, Esme behind him. With his palm intimately placed against the small of Iris's back, Cade guided her forward.
"I think that's a first for him," Cade whispered into her ear.
Iris pushed down a victorious whoop. She needed to work with Dana instead of having him constantly fight her at every turn. She also wanted to remain friends with his tenderhearted mate.
Entering the front room, Iris looked at Esme first. Kindness danced in the witch's gaze and she threw Iris a discreet wink. Relieved, Iris sank onto the couch. Cade slid next to her. Out of sight of Esme and Dana, he gave her flesh a reassuring squeeze.
"Well?" Dana prompted.
His expression didn't look like he was ready to listen. Iris mashed her lips together as she weighed how much information she should parcel out at the moment. Deciding she would have to decide detail by detail, she began.
"Oscar's last memory from before he was discovered by Dana was an operating room."
That hooked Dana's attention immediately. "Was he hurt?"
She shook her head then drew a deep breath. "Nothing seemed to be wrong with him. There was a woman in the room...pregnant..."
Her gaze jumped to Esme, recognition slamming Iris hard in the chest. Words jumped from her before she had a chance to consider whether she should hold the information back. "Her face and eyes were an exact match for yours, but she had a wolf's form."
Esme's face went slack before her expression sharpened. "What do you mean?"
"A twin--"
Their reactions identical and simultaneous, Esme and Dana shook their head, dismissing the idea. They both spoke, their words overlapping with the same message.
"There has never been a birth of twins, let alone one wolf and the other not."
Iris shrugged. "And I'm the first wolf to cast."
Cade pushed a little closer to Iris at her admission. Warmth flooded her chest but she forced herself to ignore the sensation for the moment. She needed time to figure out what it meant to be both and what it meant for any possible future between her and Cade.
"So the woman looked like Esme and she was pregnant," Dana countered, his tongue stalling on the final word. Leaning closer to his mate, he curled his arm behind her, his hand resting on her opposite hip. He pushed his nose against her hair and then his lips pressed against her cheek.
Casting an apologetic look at the witch, Iris continued. "There were three men in the room, but one was clearly in charge. He referred to Oscar as 'my boy' and they had the same coloring with their black hair and eyes--"
"Are you saying the man was a shifter?" Cade asked.
"No," Iris answered, her gaze still on Esme. The witch seemed to take a long time processing the information, her body physically backing away from some realization she didn't want to accept.
"I think she's describing Quentin," Esme said after a few more seconds of deliberation. "I never considered--"
"No," Dana interrupted. He softened his sharp denial a second later as he nuzzled Esme's cheek once more. "Baby, Leah and I have seen that bastard just as clearly as you did. Don't you think one of us would have already noticed?"
Esme looked away from her mate, the gears in her head still chewing at the question until she finally found the answer. "Why would we notice the impossible? Quentin isn't a wolf, he couldn't father Oscar, at least not naturally."
Forgetting her earlier desire to proceed with caution, Iris decided to throw a little kerosene onto the conversation. "Is it possible that some of the Hunters are basically latents -- the source of their magic the same as female latents and capable of impregnating a female shifter? Camille is a latent, she could have gotten pregnant by a shifter, had twins and..."
All the air seemed to leave the room at what Iris was about to suggest, the tension broken only by Dana renewing his disbelief.
"We only have a cub's memory," he said. "Not even that, really, just what you thought he experienced."
"Iris has never seen Quentin," Cade reminded them.
"That's true," Iris agreed, glad that Cade was there to plug the gaps in her claims. Leaning forward, she focused her attention on Dana, her mind examining Oscar's memories for a detail that might convince the big wolf in front of her.
"When you picked Oscar up as he was shifting," Iris began, her heart starting to knock around in her chest as she realized what she was about to say could tip Dana's opinion solidly against her. "He was screaming, 'You're not my daddy' and then 'I don't want you to be my daddy.' Do you remember?"
&n
bsp; The look on Dana's face told Iris that he would never forget those words. Misunderstood, they had stabbed him in the heart.
Softly pushing her wolf at him, she tried to ease his heartache. "Those words weren't directed at you. They were for the black-haired man in charge."
There -- she saw it, a crack in Dana's resistance. Now if she could just pry it open a little more instead of saying something that would seal that crack forever. She hesitated, thinking it through, what each detail she had seen meant and how accepting of those details Dana and Esme would be.
"Don't hold back," the witch whispered. She had remained motionless since her last question, her gaze locked on her hands as they twisted in her lap. She held herself slightly apart from her mate despite his attempts to pull her close and ease the pain from the conversation's repeated reminders that she had not yet conceived his child.
Giving a nervous lick of her lips, Iris pushed forward. "The man placed Oscar on a second operating table. Between the two tables, there was a tray loaded with scalpels and ametrine crystals, each about half as big as the tip of my thumb."
That caught Esme's attention. Blood drained from her face and she shook her head.
"I didn't see what was done with the crystals," she assured Esme and Dana. "But the man seemed to be measuring the spaces between Oscar's vertebrae and then he picked up the scalpel and turned to the woman..."
Unsure of how she could possibly tell them the last detail, Iris drew a deep breath. They had to know and she had to tell them, no matter how much the visions had made her gut clench and threaten to spew. Cade pressed against her back, his thumb gently stroking her flesh in a gesture of support. At least she hoped it was support. It felt amazing to know she wasn't alone any longer and that she hadn't permanently pushed him away.
Ignoring the urge to look away, Iris met Esme's gaze. She saw a flash of fear, but also forgiveness and friendship. Drawing strength from Cade and the witch, she pushed the words out of her mouth, praying Dana would at least turn them over in his mind before rejecting their validity.
