“What’s happening?” Maeleigh asked me. Even in my head, she sounded rattled.
Watching my dad carefully, I answered, “He says you challenged his authority. I’m trying to tell him that he must have been mistaken. That…”
“I did.”
Going still, I slowly turned around to face her, leaving my angry father behind my back.
“You did what?” I asked her, shocked.
At least she had the decency to look regretful, even if it was fleeting. “I apologized, but I refuse to show him my throat.” Blinking down at her, it took me a moment to piece together what she was telling me. It should have been straight forward, but I couldn’t comprehend at first, or even the second time, why she wouldn’t present herself to the man she thought of as her alpha.
“Maeleigh …” I started to say, slowly.
But she stalled me. “I’m no longer inferior.” Air whooshed out of my lungs as if she’d punched me. What was she saying? Had she just claimed she was an alpha herself? I must have projected that last bit because she went on to tell me, “Something’s happened. I can’t explain it. It’s like…” She took a second, licking her dry lips, even though she was communicating with me telepathically. I recognized it as a motion of nervousness. “… like, I am no longer lower than him as alpha and I’m no longer just wolf. Or druid.”
Tilting my head, I studied her. I had never doubted her, and I wasn’t starting today.
“Show me.” I instructed.
She frowned for a second, but then realized what I meant. If she projected a feeling or thought strongly enough, I would be able to read or see it. I watched as she concentrated, ignoring my dad when he made an impatient sound. Soon, I closed my eyes and opened my own mind up to her, waiting for whatever she was able to throw my way.
Then, I saw it – the conversation she just had with Luna, her wolf, and something else, something that was projecting from within her mind, telling her that she was not inferior. She may be a part of the pack, but she was equal. Not only that, but I felt the thrumming inside her now. It hadn’t been there before; not during school that day nor on the ride home. Whatever had happened with my dad had forced it from hibernation, and it was telling Maeleigh she was no longer subordinate.
“Dad,” I whispered, my mouth dry at what I’d just seen and felt in Maeleigh’s mind. “She’s changed. She’s …”
“What do you mean ‘changed?’” he demanded, his anger fading as concern took over and he rounded the desk to come closer to Maeleigh. As big as he was and as worked up as he appeared to be, Maeleigh still did not back down. In fact, she waited for him to come to her, chin tilted up and meeting his eye. Not defiantly but more in a companionable way. It was the look of one who was confident that they were not in danger of being torn limb from limb because their belief in their own power was so strong.
“Changed how?” Dad asked, making a move to run a finger over Maeleigh’s temple where her silver tattoo had appeared a few days before. The mark of Danu, the goddess: one that the Unseelie queen, Selena, had brought to the surface herself upon her last and only visit to the house, looking for Maeleigh herself. It seemed that everyone wanted a hand in the pot of Maeleigh’s destiny. I’d be damned if I let someone with malicious intent get too close. The trouble was, weeding out the rotten ones.
“Look for yourself, Dad,” I suggested. If he took a moment to assess her inner power rather than just her wolf, he’d see it too. Maeleigh was evolving right before our eyes. Dad grew quiet as he did his own assessment. It didn’t take him long, but when he came back to himself, he looked as though he was just as surprised as I was. As he opened his mouth to tell me something, there was a knock on the door.
“Sorry, alpha,” Danny said, feeling the tension in the room. “The Cearer have arrived.”
Drops of sweat started to bead on the back of my neck. I must have missed their arrival while I was protecting Maeleigh from my dad. The logical part of me knew that he would never hurt her but the wolf in me was always in protective mode. Mates were wired that way and nothing anyone said or did could ever turn off nature. Turning, I looked at Maeleigh with wide eyes. I could tell that she had picked up on my sudden tension.
“What is it?” she asked me, moving closer to touch my arm, comforting me.
Watching her eyes, I said, “They’re here. The Cearer.”
She didn’t look as shocked or surprised as I expected. Instead, she looked reserved and, I noticed, a little annoyed. I saw then, an inkling of how she’d managed to get on my dad’s grumpy alpha side.
“Thanks, Danny,” Dad told his beta. “Show them to the conference room and make sure Jolleen also knows they are here. We want to make sure their needs are met.”
With Maeleigh’s hand still clasped in mine, I pulled her to the door. “Come on,” I urged her. “We’ll go and help, Mom,” I told Dad. As a matter of fact, I knew that we all needed a minute to collect ourselves. The best place for both Dad and Maeleigh was to be apart from one another after what had just gone down.
“What the hell was that?” I demanded as she and I made our way into the kitchen where Mom was already bustling about, filling glasses of water for the guests.
Maeleigh shot me down though, saying, “Not right now.”
“Maeleigh, we have to talk about …” I tried to press her, but she was having none of it.
“Gearden, please, we can talk about that later. When there are less distractions, like the lycan enforcers who are in the conference room waiting for us to explain what happened when we were ambushed by the Westboros, who made a deal with the hunters. And how I killed their alpha and took their beta into custody.”
Deflated, I put my hands on her shoulders and rubbed them. I honestly think it was more for my benefit than hers. My wolf still needed a little more grounding after what had happened in Dad’s office. I did not like the way my stomach had plummeted at the sight of Dad snarling at Maeleigh. The fact that he was my father had not deflected my wolf’s reaction to his mate being threatened, alpha or not.
“Okay,” I sighed. Switching gears, I dropped my hands and moved to help Mom fill cups with water and ice and place them on a large serving tray we hardly ever used. When it was full, I picked it up and carried it to the conference room, Maeleigh leading the way.
Chapter Three
Maeleigh
There were five newcomers – presumably the Cearer – two women and three men, all completely different from each other. One man looked as though he’d just come from Wall Street: his three-piece, dark gray suit was more than likely hand tailored and his well-trimmed black hair was styled with crazy precision. My gaze was drawn to him more than the others for some reason. He reminded me of someone. Spotting Liam, I looked back and forth between the two. They could be brothers, based on their attire alone. “Wolf”, Luna whispered. Ah, that made sense. I wondered if wolves were predisposed to liking their money and the business of it.
Gearden placed the tray on the long table and then took a guarding stance at my side. I didn’t need to see his face to know that his gaze at the newcomers was filled with deadly threat.
Nervous that he might revert to his wolf persona, I leaned into his side and laced my fingers with his, grounding him. “Easy. They aren’t here to hurt me.”
“They could,” he shot back and I felt him slam down a barrier between our minds; something he’d never done before. I shook off the hurt this caused me, knowing he was trying to protect me, and looked over at the woman who looked to be the most relaxed of them all. She wore a simple black, V-neck shirt, blue jeans and well-worn tennis shoes. Her straight black hair was in a high ponytail that reached the center of her back. The smile on her face when she caught me analyzing her told me she was probably the most carefree of the five. She strode over to me, breaking from the other Cearer, and shook my hand. She spoke rapidly, and despite me not catching anything she said, her energy had me smiling. When she was done, Gearden must have said something to her
because she turned to look at him then frowned at me, unsure of how to move forward.
Dropping her hand, I met her gaze and told her, “I’m Maeleigh.”
Another smile, smaller than the last one, lifted her full pink lips and reached her whiskey-colored eyes. “Julie,” she said slowly.
Nodding, I looked about her to indicate the other four. She stepped aside and with her hand, she pointed first to Wall Street, and gave his name, “Pierce.” Then she pointed to the other woman, who had short blonde hair styled in wide curls and wore dark slacks and a rose-colored blouse, and said, “Italia.” Then she introduced the other two men, “James” and “Thorn.” They were all extremely different in how they looked and they weren’t all wolves.
Luna sniffed in annoyance. “Faerie.” My eyes widened at that, and I looked at the others to try and figure out who was who. Suddenly, Luna roared in my mind, taking over all other thoughts, “Vampire!” Instantly, my hackles rose and I felt my canines lengthen. Though I couldn’t stop that, I was able to keep anything else from shifting.
Gearden picked up on it right away, twisting his body to pull me behind him. Julie scuttled back to her friends. She might have looked surprised, but her stance told me she was ready to tangle if I attacked. Liam jumped between us, eyes on me, rather than Gearden, which made sense as I was the one who had started this ruckus. Looking up to him, Luna acknowledged him as alpha, thank goodness. No rebelling this time around, which given the amount of tension flooding the room, wouldn’t have boded well for anyone.
“Stop!” Liam commanded, his deep baritone voice seeming to vibrate in my chest. His alpha power helped calm me, distracting me from my murderous thoughts. “They’re guests. They aren’t here to harm anyone,” he reminded us both, pinning his son with a disappointed look. Gearden probably could not have cared less as he was in full-on mate-protection mode.
It took a minute, but it was a lot easier than the last time. I calmed down and retracted my canines, pushing Luna to the back of my mind.
“Vampire?” I looked at Julie, nodding towards the man with the shaved head, the same height as Pierce but with a leaner build. Now that I thought about it, though he was black, there was no doubting the pallor that contrasted with the ruddiness of his lips, which curled in a sneer as he looked me up and down.
Julie nodded and slowly eased herself between me and her vamp pal. Speaking as clearly as she could, she said, “He’s one of the good guys. Like the rest of us, we keep our kind in check.”
Although I was still wary, I trusted her for some reason, and slowly relaxed – if only to save face for Liam. As the alpha, this was his show and the last thing he needed was for a fight to break out. I reminded myself that I needed to keep a low profile and that all my special talents needed to stay off their radar. Nodding to Liam, I let him know I was good to go and back in control. The glare he gave both me and Gearden told us we had better have it under control, or else!
I looked at Julie and said, “I need an interpreter.”
The confusion on all their faces only annoyed me, but I didn’t let it show. Liam nodded and after saying something to the Cearer, he pressed a couple buttons on his phone before putting it to his ear. When he put the phone down, he had a contrite expression when he looked back at me. “I’m sorry, Maeleigh. I didn’t think to call Sally sooner…. another thirty minutes.”
I assumed he was telling me it would another hour before Sally could get here. It sucked, but I was sort of used to having to wait for interpreters. There weren’t many in general and being in a smaller town, made them even rarer. Not to mention the sensitivity of the matter we’d need to discuss. We were dependent on Sally and she had a life, after all. I smiled at Liam, trying to lessen the obvious blow he felt at letting down one of his pack, even though it still stung. It wasn’t his fault I was deaf, but I appreciated how he handled it. Needing an interpreter wasn’t just a frivolity. It was a necessity.
Awkward silence, so to speak, filled the air as we all just looked at each other, wondering what we do between now and then. Just then, Bri walked in, stopping dead in her tracks as she screeched, “Julie?!”
The other woman rushed over and crushed Brianna in a bear hug. She wasn’t wolf, of that I was certain, but Bri seemed to know Julie and was comfortable with whatever she was. At least she wasn’t the vampire. Luna bristled at the thought of the vamp, but I ignored her. Liam needed me to be calm and polite, so I would be, unless the blood sucker gave me reason not to.
When they separated, Bri dragged Julie over to me and signed, “This is Julie. I trained with her a few years ago. Well, Dad trained her, that is.”
It was a jumble of signs, speech and spelled words, but I appreciated her inclusion. Bri seemed to be the only one who had really tried to learn my language, which kind of rubbed me up the wrong way at times, but I tried not to let it bother me.
“Trained?” I asked, signing at the same time, always trying to teach whoever was around.
Julie nodded, “Yep!”
She went on to say more, but Bri stopped her, reminding her to speak slowly, so Bri could interpret as best she could, bless her heart.
“Danny taught me how to fight before I joined the Cearer.”
Just that sentence took Brianna nearly five minutes to get across. I took pity on her, though, and nodded, giving them both a big smile. Leaving them to reminisce, I turned to watch Gearden move to stand with his dad. He kept glancing over at me, though, a wary look on his face. Sensing he wasn’t comfortable with me so far away; I made my way over to him.
“You need to calm down,” I warned him.
“You’re one to talk,” he grumbled.
Touché. “What is your dad saying to Pierce?” I asked.
“They’re talking business,” he told me.
I rolled my eyes. “Figured.” Glancing around the room, I noticed that everyone had gone into separate groups: the other three Cearer were huddled together, Bri and Julie were giggling about something, and then there was the four of us – well, three and a fourth wheel – me.
“I thought the Cearer was just one person,” I told him, drawing him away from an interesting – no, not really – discussion about the latest tax on imports of something or other.
Frowning, he turned his head to look down at me. “What made you think that?” As much as I loved him, I wanted to smack that incredulous look off his face.
“You never said otherwise. You just said ‘the Cearer’,” I said defensively. “I hate to remind you that Celtic is not my first language, nor my second.”
Smart man that he was, he looked contrite. “There is a representative from each one of us: lycan, vampire, druid; Seelie and Unseelie.”
Surprised, I looked over to the other three whispering to each other. “They’re fae?” I asked, thankful this conversation was telepathic.
Gearden quickly also glanced at the group. “Yes. Thorn and Italia are fae.”
At least Luna hadn’t lost her touch. “Which is which?” I tried my hardest not to stare at them, even though they kept throwing their own judgmental looks my way.
“I’m not positive.” I could tell by his tone that it bothered him that he couldn’t tell which court they derived from.
“But I thought the Seelie didn’t come above ground. The whole treaty thing.”
He nodded, seeing where I was going. “As part of the pact they made with the humans, the Seelie agreed to keep any delinquent defectors in check. It’s rare, but if Seelie fae should be found above ground, it’s the Seelie Cearer’s job to return them.”
“Or dispatch them from this world entirely,” came a new man’s voice, making me jump. Twisting my neck around, I found Thorn leering at me.
“What are you doing? How …?”
“What is it?” Gearden picked up on my panic. But I could see that he hadn’t heard Thorn’s words. I started to tell him, still staring at the Seelie fae, but I stopped myself. If I told him, it would only rile him. We were already
in hot water from earlier with Liam and with Gearden as shaky as he was with his temper and his wolf, I decided not to. At least not yet.
Trying to look calm, I smiled up at Gearden, ignoring the look the Seelie was still shooting my way, a sort of measuring one. “Nothing,” I told Gearden. “Luna is just uncomfortable."
He nodded and placed his hand at the small of my back, lending comfort to my wolf. Looking at Thorn, I saw he’d turned back to say something to James, to which James chuckled. My first thought was that he was sharing what had just happened with his partner, but something told me this wasn’t the case. I filed Thorn in my “Dangerous and Not to Be Trusted” mental drawer and watched as James walked over to pick up glasses of water, handing one out to each of his friends. And there went the vamp, surprising me in a whole different way. He was thoughtful, at least when it came to his fellow Cearer. Still, it didn’t place him in the same file as the Seelie, which had me frowning at both of them, trying to figure them out. I pulled my phone out, pecked Gearden on the cheek, and made my way to sit down on the nearest cushioned bench. I texted Ro: ETA on the queen?
Liam didn’t know we’d set Ro on queen detail, at least as a spy, and we wanted to keep it that way. We were pretty sure it would be a breach of trust between the pack and the Unseelie queen if Selena were to find out, so it was better if he didn’t know. We did have to keep up with the lies we told the school, though. He had mono, at the moment anyway, and thank goodness that virus could last a long time. Good god – nobody was anxious to see him back at class with that nastiness. We had another two weeks or so before he’d have to return to school or risk his dad finding out. Hopefully that was enough.
He replied, “One hour, give or take”
Damn. That meant they’d arrive at the same time as Sally and the Cearer would still be here. Crap! Crap! Crap!
“The queen is on her way over,” I told Gearden. “Ro says we have about half-an-hour.”
“Damn,” was all he said, nodding to something Pierce was saying.
The Kill: Book 3 in The Hunt Series Page 2
