by R. J. Blain
I swiped my finger across the screen until I reached the last picture. My eyes widened at the familiar face of one of my closer high school friends. “I know the last girl.”
“Name? Age? Where do you know her from?”
“Laurel. We went to high school together. She’s my age. And, well, I guess I was dating her for a while before graduation.”
“You guess?” The devil snickered. “Wouldn’t you know if you were dating her?”
Ugh. The devil made a good point. “Our ‘dates’ involved anywhere remotely private, Mr. Devil.” I cleared my throat. “We had a relationship founded entirely on hormones, the use of condoms and birth control, and nothing at all suitable for a long-term partnership.”
My uncle groaned and slapped his forehead. The devil laughed.
Wendy sighed and covered her muzzle with her paws.
“Well, we now have a motivation. A new bitch with a crush on a water witch.” My uncle groaned. “When did you break up with her, Dusty?”
“Break up isn’t the word I’d use. It was more or less a gradual drift following graduation. She went to a different college. I got busy—among other things.”
“When was the last time you saw her?”
I considered the question. “Before I got shot, I guess. Did she become a Fenerec?”
“She did, and if she was interested in you when she underwent the ritual, it’s entirely possible that her wolf wants you for a mate. So close to the mating season starting, if a desperate, young bitch whined you’re her mate, she’d send her pack into a frenzy, especially if they don’t have a good Alpha to control them. What do you think, Desmond?”
“If the pack did any research at all into Dustin, I think you’re on the right track. How better to get a hold of an Alpha’s puppy than to take the Alpha and make demands of the pack? Dustin’s old enough they’d toss him under the bus to get Rob back, and while a witch, he’s not bonded to anyone in the pack. They likely didn’t think he was Rob’s puppy, based on skin color and scent.”
“Scent? What’s wrong with my scent?”
“You smell so strongly of water witch it’s hard to pick up your father’s scent on you now. With him in the vehicle with you? They likely had no idea you’re his son. Add in the stench of the witchbane, and they would’ve been clueless. I expect they used wolfbane on your father after gassing you both out. They could have easily killed you.” The devil growled. “It took us almost four hours to find the SUV once we got to town, so you were out for at least eight or nine hours. You’re lucky. That’s what you are. Your father’s lucky too. That bitch won’t want her future father-in-law hurt, so the pack will try to keep him sedated until she gets what she wants: you.”
“Are you serious? Why would Laurel think I’d want her after that? That’s insane.”
“This is why people like me exist, Dustin. It’s also why Alphas are monitored so closely, and why healthy packs have witches. Fenerec without structure become nothing more than rabid beasts driven by instinct. If we’re lucky, if I can find a suitably strong Alpha willing to take them in, we might be able to salvage some members of this pack. I doubt it. They’re in too deep, and too many packs like Rob—and Sanders. Most won’t take them. Add in the deliberate attempt to take away your choice of mate, and it just won’t fly.”
“And they’re too dangerous to leave alone,” I guessed.
“Exactly. If they’re willing to ambush an Alpha to get his son so a bitch can have her way, it’s only a matter of time before they target Normals.”
Every lead my uncle tried dried up, and three hours after leaving the crash site, the devil took me to an Inquisition doctor, who was forced to break my finger to set it. It hurt, I growled, and the devil got the show he wanted.
Facing off against a Fenerec surgeon was about as stupid as it got, but I went for his throat and landed a bite before my uncle pulled me off.
“I need to have a long talk with my sister about your biting habit, Dusty. Why haven’t you outgrown that yet?”
“I’m impressed. He made you bleed, Jones.” The devil laughed.
Jones, despite bleeding from his throat, joined in with a chuckle of his own. “Don’t blame his mother, Sanders. Rob’s the one with the biting habit. I just sedate him if I need to patch him up. Just let me know when Rob finds out whoever beat on his puppy. I want to be out of the state when it happens.”
“I’m sure it’ll be memorable. I recommend avoiding Vegas for the next few days.”
I admired the devil’s ability to lie using nothing but the truth.
“Hold the puppy still while I splint his hand and make sure that finger stays put. Now, you listen up, pup. I’ve a bit of fire witch in me, so as long as you keep still, I can get the bone lined up without having to use an x-ray machine or cut you open.”
While I, in theory, liked that idea, Jones didn’t bother with the painkiller phase of things. It took both the devil and my uncle to restrain me long enough for the Fenerec surgeon to splint my hand. “You could have numbed it first, you—”
My uncle clapped his hand over my mouth. “Thank you, Jones.”
“Glad to help. As for his ankle, all I can tell you is that it isn’t broken, but if you want to find out more, you’re going to have to take him a few blocks down the road to the better machines. It’s probably a sprain. It doesn’t feel like a break to me.”
“Feel?” I demanded. “What does a break feel like to you?”
“A lot like what you’re feeling, pup. I’m a direct-line sensor, so no auras for me. It’s useful as a doc, though. It doesn’t matter how bad they are at describing what’s wrong. When I use my witchcraft, I can get a front-row seat to the action.”
Finally. I’d found someone closer to how I felt the world around me, a dark place full of emotion. “How do you control it?”
“Control? That’s funny. There’s no controlling it. There’s a whole lot of ignoring what I can’t change and changing as much as I can, but there’s no getting rid of it. It’s part of me.” Jones shrugged. “On a bad day, I go outside and count blades of grass or rocks. It helps sometimes. Not always, but sometimes.”
The devil took us to a hotel, and I flopped onto the nearest soft surface, which happened to be a computer chair. I passed out the instant I sat and had no memory of making it to a bed. Waking up with three oversized wolves should’ve startled me, but Wendy made a nice pillow and the devil growled when I tried to escape.
My uncle abandoned the pile first, and twenty minutes later, he emerged from the bathroom as a human. “How are you feeling?”
“I think I ate wolf fur.”
“Very likely. Go take a bath and make sure you keep your splint dry. Take however long you need to rein in your witchcraft or whatever it is you do to keep from flooding out the truck.”
“If I knew what to do, I wouldn’t be a menace.”
“No whining witches before noon. Call your mother when you’re done so we don’t get the spoon.”
“You’re joking, right? I didn’t call her yesterday, and it’s your fault. We’re both getting the spoon. We’ll get it twice for failing to find Dad ten seconds after we got rammed off the road. After she’s done with the spoon, she’ll make you shift and skin you alive. She’ll leave me alive to torment for all eternity. She might spare us if we delay until my finger heals and we find Dad.”
“Keep dreaming, pup. Marcy adores me too much to kill me. I let her steal your father. Go take your bath. I’ll get the room ready while you’re in there and find out if there’s any news on the wire. Take your time. No stressed out witches who haven’t played in their element in the truck today. I like breathing.”
Since I couldn’t honestly claim I hadn’t killed anyone with my magic, I grunted and retreated to the bathroom. Ever since I’d been kidnapped outside of my college because of a trio of Dad’s enemies, I tried to avoid thinking about their deaths.
Sharks had eaten them, but my fledgling, uncontrolled witchcraft had
brought them to me. The deed hadn’t been mine, but I was responsible all the same.
The situation would escalate to violence, and if I did what the devil and the Inquisition wanted, I would have to kill again. If it went as I expected, I’d have to kill a woman I might’ve grown to love if one of us had been brave enough to challenge the nature of our relationship.
Could I do it?
No, I knew I could. If I had to choose between her and my father, I’d be taking my father home to my mother without a moment of hesitation and with a ton of remorse. From the beginning, she’d made her expectations clear. I hadn’t meant much to her, but she’d liked my looks and wanted a safe bet.
I’d seen no need to refuse her, but I hadn’t missed her when we’d gone our separate ways. What had changed? Why?
Retreating to the bathroom didn’t help. I found no peace in the water, although I thought I’d come closer to the truth—or a truth. In a world of hate, violence, and discord, the illusion of safety might be mistaken for love—or desired for it.
I could understand that. From the beginning, I’d promised her one thing. No matter what, I’d never give her a reason to fear me. I’d been with other women since, although few and far between, and I’d kept that promise with them too.
After my witchcraft had taken root and grown too strong to ignore, I’d avoided women altogether. Until I could control my magic, I couldn’t keep my secret promise to any lovers.
No kids. No magic. No fear.
Any woman I was with deserved better.
What had turned Laurel into someone willing to go as far as to kidnap my father to get me? All I could do was hope she’d been an unwilling participant.
If I could save her, I would. If I couldn’t, I would hope I could find a painless, humane way to end the lives of Laurel and her wolf.
I hated having to break a promise, but I also couldn’t allow her to hurt others. Her hunt wouldn’t end with me if she’d gone mad. I was only a beginning, and unless I could prove without a shadow of a doubt she could play by the Inquisition’s rules, she would pay for her misjudgment with her life.
I would pay with mine too, but my body would live. I’d never be able to return to my half-hearted denials of the truth.
My magic made me a weapon, one as dangerous as any wolf. All I could do was work to transform myself into a weapon tempered with mercy and founded on the grounds of the truth and justice, no matter how uncomfortable those truths might be.
I delayed calling my mother for three hours, and when my uncle had enough of my shit, he called and handed me his phone while it still rang. On the third ring, my mother answered, “Matt, so help me, if you don’t stop playing stupid games, I’ll kill you with your own fucking spoon.”
Ouch. “Uncle’s very sorry, Mom. It’s not his fault this time.”
“Dustin.” My mother sighed. “What have you done now?”
“Remember how you tried to teach me that sleeping around probably wasn’t a good idea? Well, instead of sleeping around with a lot of girls, I mostly only slept with one girl. This was a parenting failure. I’m certain of that. She thinks I’m a good candidate for being her mate, and she may have whined to her pack until they agreed to take Dad. I’m pretty sure if I’d slept around willy nilly, she might not have fixated on me when she underwent the ritual. Also, I haven’t seen her since before my witchcraft went haywire. I’m blaming Dad for this.”
The devil choked on his laughter, excused himself, and went to the bathroom. The door did nothing to mask his chuckles. Sighing, my uncle flopped onto the bed.
My mother took the news better than I thought; she sighed again before asking, “Which girl?”
“Laurel.”
“Who?”
“Exactly, Mom. We were only in it for the sex at her request.” I shrugged and sat on the edge of the bed. “Yes, she was on birth control, and yes, I used condoms. I was young, hormonal, and male. I try not to be stupid, although being young, hormonal, and male does tend to make me at least somewhat stupid. I hardly know her.”
“So go mate with her, then. Just bring your father home!”
I flinched, although I should’ve expected my mother’s reaction. I came second to Dad in my mother’s world, although I came a close second—and now that she knew I was safe with my uncle and the devil, she would fixate on Dad until he returned to her.
It didn’t change how the sharpness of her tone stung.
“I’m not mating with her. Unless that pack hands over Dad without a fuss, the only plans I have for them involve the morgue. An autopsy won’t be necessary.” I hung up and tossed my uncle’s phone onto the bed, and I took a page out of my father’s book and growled at the wretched device.
“Let me guess. My sister suggested you should go mate with her and bring your father back as soon as you were finished.”
“Close enough.”
My uncle’s phone rang, and he reached over and picked the phone up. “Sometimes, you’re a complete and total idiot, Marcy.”
Well, that wasn’t going to help the conversation much.
“What were you expecting, exactly? He dresses well, has his manners, and turns heads. And don’t you even try to tell me the unmated bitches in the pack haven’t been eyeing him like he’s the best treat in the entirety of Vegas. You’ve called me complaining many times about how you’ve had to establish he wouldn’t be available until he’s at least twenty-one. By the way, he was eligible at fifteen, and we both know it. You’re just upset Rob was taken. As it is, you’re damned lucky you didn’t lose your puppy, Marcy. I told you they’d totally trashed the SUV. I told you we had to take him to see Jones. Did you forget he didn’t walk out unscathed?”
While my mother liked chasing around the big, bad Fenerec, when my uncle decided to stand his ground, my mother lost.
He didn’t choose to stand his ground often.
“Marcy. You’re not going to char Jeremiah on your way out the door. He broke a finger, not his mouth, his brain, or anything really important. Jones set it, it’s in a splint, and it’ll heal fine. Don’t burn Jeremiah. And no, you can wait to apologize to him for being nasty after we bring Rob back, because he deserves that from his mother.”
Ouch. When my uncle decided to come out swinging, he didn’t pull his punches. “It’s all right, Uncle.”
My uncle looked me in the eyes and growled, “No, it’s not all right, Dustin. She upset you. Don’t think you can pull that shit when I can smell your emotions.”
Shit. I scowled, and since I couldn’t argue with him, I retreated to Wendy, who still lounged around as a wolf.
“No, Marcy. He’s sulking with Wendy right now. Apologize to him properly later. Alternatively, you can put Jeremiah on the phone, and he can talk to Dusty, but you’re going to go in time out, cool your heels, and keep your mouth shut so you don’t say something stupid again. I know you, Marcy. You’re a queen of saying stupid shit when Rob’s in trouble, and Dustin really doesn’t need that right now.”
After a few moments, my uncle sighed and said, “I’ll put Dusty on, Jeremiah, but don’t you give that phone to Marcy, not after she hurt him like that. I’ll come over there and beat you myself—and I’ll use my damned spoon to do it. If she wants to get nasty with someone, she can talk to me after I drag Rob back.”
Then, since running away and hiding with Wendy wasn’t sufficient to spare me from any more phone conversations, my uncle handed me his phone. Grumbling a curse, I took it and announced, “I’m not a wuss.”
“No, you’re not. Your mother just doesn’t know when telling her son something like that is stupid. And don’t you look at me like that, Marcy. You already took off one of my damned eyebrows. Cool your heels. Go jump in the shower until you’re sane. I’ll back Sanders this time, and I’ll face off with Rob about it too, if I need to.”
Damn, the pack’s Second had it out for my mother. “Despite appearances, while it was a pretty shitty thing to say, I’ll get over it.”
&nbs
p; “Well, you’re you, Dustin. You don’t let anything get you down long. Hell, that’s probably why she was dumb enough to say something like that. What’s wrong with you outside of a broken heart from your mother’s senseless cruelty?”
“Wow, Jeremiah. You are not pulling your punches today. What did Mom do to deserve that?”
“I lost an eyebrow, pup.”
Right. “I broke my finger, and the devil and his minion already took me to a doctor about it. Probably sprained my ankle, but it’s not bothering me much today.”
“The devil and his minion?”
“Mr. Desmond and Uncle Stud Muffin. Wendy is here, too.”
“Please don’t get killed calling Charles names. Also, your nicknames are usually funny, but calling Sanders Uncle Stud Muffin is one of the most disturbing things I’ve heard in my life.”
“It’s okay, Scorchy.”
“You are such a punk. So, the news on the wire saying Charles Desmond picked you up is true?”
“He’s in the bathroom laughing at me, although I think he stopped laughing when Mom got bitchy.”
“Good. You’re safe, then. Also, ignore all that shit your mother said, please. She really didn’t mean it.”
I didn’t believe him, as my mother had no idea how to be anything other than honest. “All right,” I lied. “Anyway, Wendy is here with the devil and the minion, so we should probably be set.”
“Desmond probably brought Wendy along in case he has problems with your dad. You listen to me, Dustin. If your dad runs wild, you remember he won’t be your dad anymore. He won’t know who you are, and he’ll kill you if he can. Be careful, and do what Desmond tells you to do. If anyone can talk your dad down, it’s Desmond.”
“Don’t discount Uncle.”
“I’m not, but he’ll be worried about protecting you. Never forget you’re as much of a son to him as you are Rob’s son. Be careful. If Matt thinks getting killed is the only way to protect you, he will lay down his life without hesitation. Bring your dad and uncle home safe, you hear?”
