by Hattie Hunt
To death.
He had to warn Brett and Juliet before it was too late. They needed a plan, like getting as far away from Brett as they could before giving him the cure just in case.
The scent of Elliot territory barely registered in his nose before he barreled into the clearing where the pre-wedding party roared.
Three small fires had been lit in the yard, people gathered all around them. Children ran circles around one. Mick and a few other musicians had taken up station at another. Everyone else had settled into chairs or onto the grass wherever they could find a spot.
Joe dropped his pace to a stalking gate, eyes searching furiously for Brett and Juliet. He found them close to the center fire.
Juliet leaned back in Brett’s arms, smiling. The light of the fire highlighted the glow of affection on her face.
Brett hugged her close, an answering smile on his face as he nuzzled his chin into her neck and kissed her.
Even from a distance, Joe could sense the sadness—the desperation—behind it. Brett knew what he was facing. He knew what he might have to do.
Joe stopped. What if this was one of the last moments of peace Brett ever knew? Could Joe really step in and destroy that for him?
And then another thought hit him.
What if Ripley was right?
Ripley had every intention of returning to her room and sleeping until morning.
As she stepped away from the door, Myrtie reached out with a smile, snagging her attention.
Ripley sighed. “I’m not in the mood.”
“No one ever is, especially us Kents.”
Tuck reached over, filled a glass with the whiskey sitting next to him—which wasn’t nearly as empty as Ripley thought it should be by now—and raised it over his head in an open invitation.
Ripley stared at the glass, a world of hurt rampaging through her. Yeah. She wanted to go lie down on her bed and sleep the rest of the night away. But she also wanted—needed—to talk to the only other family she had besides Sean. She had questions. Like, why this was the first time she had seen her aunt since before her dad died?
But was she ready to hear it?
Ripley took the glass and perched at her favorite spot beside the fireplace. Her old pillow was still there, a little more singed than she remembered. She sat on it and leaned against the stone, staring into the fire.
“You know, when Jib and I were young, he would do this thing with his voice that just irritated the crap out of me.” Myrtie draped one leg over the arm of the brown leather chair. “It always pissed me off, but in the end, I would always laugh and laugh because he would say the absolute dumbest things in that stupid tone.”
Tuck chuckled.
Ripley didn’t have a lot of stories about her Uncle Jib. There were none after her dad died. Jib had disappeared.
“I remember this one time,” Myrtie said, resting her head on the back of the chair. “Daddy was pissed. He came home from work madder’n hell. We never figured out why. But Jib, he went up to Daddy and tried to get him to settle down.”
Ripley leaned her head against the warm stone.
“He would tell these jokes, but he would always get them messed up. I don’t know if he did that on purpose or if he was just really bad at jokes.”
Ripley remembered many really bad jokes. Apparently, it was something he had never grown out of. She had always laughed at them anyway.
“Well, that night, it hadn’t done a thing to make Daddy any less mad and Daddy just reeled back and walloped him, boxed him right across the ears.”
Ripley sipped her whiskey, feeling the gentle burn down her throat.
Myrtie released a breath of a chuckle. “Jib just came up and yelled, “Come in Jackhammer Rebel. I hear you loud and clear.”
Ripley laughed in spite of herself. It wasn’t a great joke. First of all, she was pretty sure they didn’t have call signs like that. Second…
There wasn’t a second. She’d just needed to laugh.
“We wanted to be with you after Alfy died,” Myrtie said quietly.
“Yeah,” Ripley said just as quiet. “I got that.”
Tuck set his glass on the arm of the chair and stared into the fire, his face blank. Distant.
“I had cancer, Rip.”
Ripley looked up, startled by Myrtie’s sudden statement. “What?”
Myrtie nodded. “Your Uncle Jib wanted to tell you. He saw what it meant to you, not having us around. But I begged him not to.”
“Why?”
Myrtie shrugged. “You’d just lost your momma to cancer, Rip. You’d just lost your dad. Your brother abandoned you. I couldn’t put you through that.”
Ripley ran her fingernails along her scalp and turned back to the fire. Yeah. Myrtie was probably right, but she’d rather have had the choice. Instead, she’d been abandoned by everyone in her family just as she’d been chosen.
“I almost didn’t make it, but your Uncle Jib?” Myrtie shook her head and saluted with her glass. “He wouldn’t let me die, the bastard. He came back and took care of the bar and looked in on you. He even moved me closer.”
Ripley frowned.
“I was just in Portland.”
Close enough that they could have seen one another.
“But I didn’t want you seeing me like that.”
“And it took you this long to tell me?” Ripley couldn’t keep the bitterness out of her voice.
Myrtie shrugged. “I might have told you sooner if you hadn’t run away.”
And she probably wouldn’t have run away if she’d felt she’d had something to stay for.
“What are you going to do about Brett?” Myrtie asked, changing the subject with a look of defeat.
Ripley wasn’t going to feel bad about that. She’d had her entire world explode around her and no one to help her through it.
And Myrtie had faced mortality, fighting cancer.
Ripley felt like a complete ass. For the second time in the same day. That couldn’t bode well. She sighed, taking another sip of whiskey. “I don’t know.”
“You have a responsibility to the pack.”
“Last I checked, I didn’t belong to one.”
Myrtie quirked her lips and let her head fall back against the chair again. “Another thing that never would have happened if Alfy had just trained you as he should have. You should be attached to the high alpha’s pack, watching over the region.”
Not likely. Ripley didn’t fit in with others, didn’t play well with them. She shook her head. “I’m fine on my own.”
Myrtie didn’t respond.
“You said Snow didn’t think the cure would work,” Tuck said.
Ripley took in a deep breath, trying to find a better way, a solution. “She didn’t.”
“Go to the Whiskeys.”
Like hell. “We stick with our own, Tuck.”
“You can trust Leslie.”
“She’s still a witch.”
“Who could find a cure, a real cure.”
He wouldn’t understand. How could he? She shook her head and stared into the flame, wishing she had a better answer. “No.”
“Fine.” Tuck’s tone said otherwise. “Sleep well knowing you just killed him.”
Chapter Eleven
Ripley hated waiting. This time, it was killing her.
She didn’t want to tell Chuck about Brett. She didn’t want not to tell Chuck, either.
What she did want was to give this to someone else, let them deal with it. This wasn’t her deal. She didn’t do problems like this.
She needed it to be tomorrow morning so she could set fire to the pyre and then leave. She had a contract waiting for her anyway.
Crap. She had a contract waiting for her.
Sitting up in bed, Ripley grabbed her phone off the nightstand. She searched for Sorgei’s number and put the phone to her ear.
He answered on the third ring. “Good evening, Ms. Kent.”
Sorgei was on the other side of the
world. “Good evening, Mr. Orlov. I was just checking on my order.”
“You will be pleased to know that the order is progressing as planned. I would like to send you an email to confirm the shipping address.”
This time she was contracted to purchase materials for relief efforts. Since she was drawn to death anyway, it seemed like the best use of her talents. If they had somewhere to shelter, they had a better chance of surviving. Sorgei Orlov was providing windows for a new refugee community. Mostly. She only hoped that it remained standing longer than the last one she’d helped build. No sooner than they’d put the finishing touches on it, an air strike leveled the place.
“That is excellent news, Mr. Orlov. I will get into contact with the owner and will verify the address as soon as I can.”
“Most excellent, Ms. Kent. If that is all?”
“It is.” She smiled, hearing the inflection it added to her tone.
“Have a blessed evening, Ms. Kent.”
“You as well, Mr. Orlov.”
Sorgei was always very formal in his effort to appear professional, especially around Americans who potentially already had a sour disposition toward Russians. It wasn’t necessary with Ripley, but he couldn’t know that. She saw all people as equal. In the end, everyone died the same.
She made a few more phone calls and answered several emails from her phone. By the time she’d finished her business, the sun had risen over the tree line.
It was time to see Chuck.
Her stomach settled somewhere between her knees and her ankles. Shit.
Chuck lived far enough away that walking would take too long in human form. She could shift, but she didn’t want to. She didn’t want to see all the death, and she didn’t like the control her padfoot asserted during the shift.
Groaning, Ripley slid out of bed.
Tuck hadn’t left for work yet, which seemed odd for the middle of the week. He looked up from his phone, his breakfast plate empty in front of him. He smiled and lifted his coffee cup in greeting, then gestured to the pot on the counter.
She smiled her thanks, but pulled out a slice of bread and put it in the toaster. She’d never been a coffee person. There were just too many mornings when coffee wasn’t available.
Yes. She could have lived life a lot nicer. She had the money. Her job was lucrative enough, but her padfoot had never felt comfortable staying indoors for long. And, there had been too many times they’d had to leave in a hurry. Which was easier when you were in the habit of traveling light. Coffee addiction didn’t qualify as light.
She sat down next to Tuck with her dry toast and a glass of water. “Can I borrow the truck?”
Tuck had his police car and his old beat up Ford. Most people didn’t even know he had an official car because he always used the truck. He only used the official car when Ripley needed to drive.
He raised a silver, bushy brow at her toast, but shrugged. “You’ll have to gas her up. Jib borrowed her last and brought her back almost empty.”
Ripley nodded.
It occurred to her that she should feel more about Uncle Jib’s death. Remorse? Grief? She only felt…well, nothing. She was here to clean things up, to do what she needed to, fulfill her obligations. She didn’t feel anything else.
Jib hadn’t been horrible to her. Quite the opposite. She’d spent a lot of time in that bar. But she had still felt like an outsider, like she didn’t belong.
Did this numbness make her a bad person?
No. She slid into the creeky, old truck and sat in the seat, smelling old-truck smell for a long moment. What she was about to do made her a bad person. Joe would never forgive her for this. And she had to do it.
Of course, she had a choice. But it wasn’t a good one, and it wasn’t one she felt comfortable with. Someone more experienced should be making this decision. Having just the information wasn’t the same thing.
People were going to die.
A lot of people.
She shut her brain up for the ride over to Chuck’s.
Ripley didn’t expect to find a handful of unfamiliar cars at the end of Chuck’s long driveway. Not that she would know people’s cars, but there was that pang in her chest, that near feeling of guilt at the knowledge that she didn’t because she’d left.
If Chuck was having some sort of meeting or whatever, Ripley didn’t want to interrupt. So, she got out of the truck—because it was too hot and smelled of something rotting—and sat on the front step.
She had only been there a couple of minutes when her padfoot raised his head, sniffing the wind.
Small footsteps approached from the side of the house along the wraparound porch. Leah, the blonde-haired witch child, stepped into view.
Ripley flinched at the slap of judgment she’d just made. It had been so instinctive, so reactionary that she hadn’t even had time to think it through. Yes. Leah was a witch. The truth was, Ripley didn’t know any witches. So, what the hell did she have to judge?
Leah sat down next to Ripley without a word and wrapped her arms around her bare knees. Her shorts were loose and comfortable looking, something Ripley was almost jealous of. She hadn’t even thought of wearing anything besides her tight-fitting clothes in—well, since she left. It hadn’t taken long to discover the power that came with the allure of the female figure, and she used it. She might arrange the procurement of construction materials most of the time, but some other materials were hard to come by in certain areas.
Leah glanced up at Ripley. “You feel good.”
No one had ever said that about her before, not even Joe.
A frown furrowed Leah’s forehead, and her shoulders scrunched up as if she’d been rejected.
Something Ripley understood. She needed to stop being such an ass all the damned time. “I feel uncomfortable all the time.”
“Me, too. Mom tries to make me feel better, tries to get me to be okay with…” She paused and gestured to herself. “…this, but I’m not.”
Ripley could relate to that too. “Yeah. Me neither, but I never had anyone to help me.”
“I could.” Leah’s voice was small and quiet, hesitant. Like she knew what Ripley’s answer would be.
She might have been right, but seeing that reaction on a little girl whose only fault was being born pulled hard on Ripley’s gut, daring her to say something different. “I don’t play well with others, kid.”
Leah snorted. “None of us do.”
Ripley raised her eyebrows and looked out into the sea of parked cars on grass. This kid had a much older spirit than Ripley in some areas. “Okay.” She couldn’t believe she was saying this. “How?”
Tiny hands slapped the back of her arm and then crawled up to her shoulder.
Ripley twisted around, alarm flushing her system. She came eyeball to eyeball with a set of blue eyes set in a round, baby face. He grinned at her, showing off two tiny teeth. Ripley froze.
Leah leaned forward and looked at the baby. “That’s my brother, Bobby.”
What the hell was she supposed to do with a damned baby and where was their damned mother? Or their damned babysitter?
“Ash saw you out here and said you were okay.”
Who the hell was Ash? And why would she say that some stranger was okay for…what? Being felt up by a baby? Ash needed to pull her head out of her ass. Ripley dislodged the baby from her shoulder and set him on the porch at arm’s reach before looking back at Leah. “Is he like you?”
Leah shook her head but didn’t elaborate.
Well, what they hell did that mean? He had to be a witch somehow if he was her brother.
Another boy, younger than Leah by a couple of years, came around the corner. He saw Bobby and then flopped his hands to his sides with a dramatic sigh. But instead of gathering the baby and leaving, he plopped himself on the other side of Ripley, putting his hand on Bobby’s side and pushing him gently away from the steps.
Ripley slid her gaze around, feeling like she was surrounded by armed bo
mbs. She didn’t know anything about kids.
The boy stuck out his hand. “I’m Tyler, Tyler Whisky.”
Oh great. Another damned witch. But she couldn’t make herself feel anything more about it. The boy’s face was just too open and too genuine. Almost surprising herself, she took his hand. “Ripley Kent.”
“I’m a bard,” he said solemnly. “I break glass. With my voice.”
“I’m a padfoot. I see death.”
He nodded once and said in a serious tone, “Mom sees dead people and Leah brings back the dead. You’re in good company.”
What the— Ripley took her hand back and looked around with a breath of a chuckle wedged in her throat.
“We’re here because we have to be,” Tyler said. “What’s your beef?”
Ripley’s unease wicked away from her like sunshine after a large storm.
“Tyler,” Leah said in warning. “Stop it.”
Tyler released a breath, and it got quieter. He slumped forward. “But she needs it.”
“He can also make you feel better when he talks,” Leah said. “He doesn’t do it to be mean, but our moms have both told him not to.”
“But she’s so upset.” Tyler jerked his hands out palm up. “I’m just trying to help.” The last words of both statements ended with a “ah” sound. Upset-ah. Help-ah.
Like, was that a kid-thing-ah?
The storm of emotions came back, but with it came a bit of enlightenment. Yeah. She should be pissed—and a little terrified, which she was—but with the emotions of doom swept back, she could see a little better.
Was she doing the right thing?
“We can help,” Tyler said.
Leah shook her head, staring at something in front of Ripley, her gaze distant. “No. No, we can’t.”
“Sure, we can.”
Leah shook her head.
Ripley stared in the direction Leah was focusing on, her expression blanking like she was listening to something. A part of Ripley wanted to slip into padfoot vision or whatever to see if there was a black shadow standing in front of the girl.
But she didn’t want to risk it.
