by Jody Wallace
Maurice, his gaze pinned on the truck bed, said, “If you adopt her, she can register a complaint with the alphas about mistreatment.”
“Hello, dumb ass.” Gavin punched Maurice in the arm, hard. “I’ll be the alpha, and alphas get their pick of pack whores. She’ll be my first.”
“Hardly your first,” Roy corrected. Gavin didn’t bristle when the larger man contradicted him. “Your first pack whore was the Lapin bitch.”
“Like I could forget her.” Gavin fingered his scar.
If something had happened between Harry’s mother and Gavin, that would explain why Harry knew so much about Roanoke. Shifters rarely died from disease—just accidents, old age and severance. Did Harry’s experience have anything to do with how his mother had died and why he had an alias now?
Maurice rubbed his shoulder. “Harry Smith knows we have her.”
“John Lapin would piss his pants before he took me on. Sorta like you.” Gavin fake-lunged at Maurice, who jerked away. “What can one indie do against a pack? Write us mean emails?”
Maurice stared at the ground. “If Smith can go incognito around you and Douglas, who knows what else he can do?”
Gavin’s chest puffed out. “Maybe I did recognize him and wanted to wait until Pop wasn’t around to handle it my way.”
“I call B.S. You didn’t know him,” Roy said. Gavin’s lips tightened but he didn’t defend himself. “Did she tell you how they managed that?”
“Not yet.” Gavin turned back to June. “I’ll get it out of her one way or the other.”
Maurice glanced at her, guilt written on his features as plainly as a book. “If we let her go, Smith won’t have any reason to get on our butts.”
“Would you stop whining? He’s a loser. Hell, I thought he was dead. He never did anything about what happened forty years ago, and he’s not going to do anything now. Look how his wimp ass turned tail. She’s probably a pain in the butt. Most alpha females are, even juvies.”
“She’s a natural?” Roy leaned on the truck and studied June with an avaricious gaze. “I’ve never had an alpha bitch before. I think I’d like that.”
“Trust me, you won’t,” she assured him. “I haven’t done anything to any of you. I’d like to go home now.”
“We should let her go,” Maurice agreed, his brow furrowed. “This isn’t right.”
“I’ve had enough of you.” Gavin shoved him off the truck bed. “You wanna stay in Dad’s pack?”
“No,” Maurice said. June couldn’t see the younger man, but she could hear his pain. “I can’t stay there after what happened.”
“Then shut up and do as you’re told.”
“Yeah, shut up, puppy,” echoed Roy.
Gavin and Roy laughed, and Gavin vaulted over the side. The truck bounced. “Roy, do you want to guard the slut? If she makes trouble, you can give her a good hiding.”
“Maybe later.” Roy took a long swig from his cup and wiped foam off his moustache. “I hate riding in the back of a truck. That’s one thing I’m never doing once we’re out of Roanoke.”
“I’ll ride with her,” Maurice offered.
“Why, so you can let her go like the indie we caught in Virginia Beach?”
“I won’t.” Maurice dusted the back of his jeans.
“Yeah, right. Get me a chain and another beer. She’s not going anywhere.”
Maurice glanced at June one last time before obeying. Gavin and Roy spoke in low voices. She thought about maneuvering herself out of the bed and making a run for it, but Gavin periodically glanced her way. She wouldn’t get ten feet before he’d be on her. On her and angry.
Better to rest and think. Build up her strength. Give Harry a chance. If the bonding ritual was at midnight, based on the sun they had about six hours. Eventually they’d relocate to Millington’s commune for the ceremony, and it sounded as if she were going with them whether she wanted to or not.
Before she lost the light, she began to inspect the foliage for anything she could use in a spell. Trees, bushes, leaves. Cedar. Purification, to hide her tracks? There, on the ground was a clump of ferns—mild confusion sometimes, mental clarity at others. Not reliable. Oooh, mountain laurel. Any shifter she hit with that would vomit for several minutes. But she’d have to affect them individually, and as with any spell that harmed another, it would hit her, as well.
Whatever it took. She had to get away before they bonded her. To her knowledge, no witch had been bonded as a juvenile. She had no idea what it might do to her or how it might endanger the coven. Whether it might endanger witches everywhere.
Goddess, what could she do? She wasn’t a superhero. She was just a woman.
A really pissed-off woman.
A really pissed-off woman who could do magic.
She couldn’t count on the coven, she couldn’t count on Harry, she couldn’t count on anyone but herself. Something would come to her. Until then, she needed to meditate if she could, to refill her well, but remain alert enough to react to anything and everything.
No problem. After all, she’d just had sex with a shifter and kept her own skin. Maybe she was a superhero.
Chapter Fifteen
Fury propelled Harry through the forest so fast he doubted even a pack wolf could have caught him. Fury at June, for forcing him to leave her. At himself, for succumbing to that damn lavender. At the situation, at his stupidity for not jetting out of town like a rocket and taking June with him.
Most of all, fury at Gavin Householder. If anger could lend one strength, he had no fear he’d best the other shifter in battle.
In fact, he longed for it.
Harry reached the tea room in record time. He could have gone back to June’s house, but his efforts would be useless against Gavin’s gang of shifters. That infuriated him too. So he did what she had asked and started sniffing around, tracing who’d been here, who was here, who might have the place staked out.
He had to slink through several backyards to reach his goal. The dogs and cats in those yards were used to him, although the chickens were never happy when he trotted by. He scanned likely routes into the woods—driveways, side roads. He ended in the gravel alley behind the strip of historic buildings that housed the tea room. Ruts in the center pooled with water from last night’s rain.
Harry detected lots of foot and paw traffic. Several out-of-place humans, cops or witches doing their part to locate Sandie. Himself, yesterday. Pack wolves coming and going, unfamiliar scent markers that must be Roanokers. He no longer cared who was involved in the hunt for him because he wasn’t leaving without June.
Gavin would never let either one of them be after realizing who Harry was. Because of that, June had value to Gavin beyond that of victim. Harry prayed to her Goddess that would be enough to keep her alive.
He would do anything he had to—anything—to make sure she was safe.
Harry paused near the Dumpster, the odor reminding him of the sludge. Sustaining wolf form in the middle of town made him twitchy, but he needed his enhanced senses.
One of the busboys popped out the back of the tea room for a smoke, a kid named Vern. Coven? He’d been working there about a year. As far as Harry knew he lived with his parents. Better not risk it.
Harry prepared to shift and remembered what clothes he’d had on before everything went down—his boxers. He wasn’t shy, but he was about to beg a gang of little old ladies to bend their rules, rules as sacred as those held by shifters, and help him save June.
Partial nudity might not be his best approach, not to mention they’d never let him hear the end of it.
Hmm. Was there any truth to June’s notions about shifter powers? He could erase wounds and transfer fabric, even cell phones, from form to form. Could he create them?
Harry concentrated, envisioning himself in clothing. Jeans, T-shirt, work boots, cell phone, wallet and keys. It seemed like weeks since he’d been dressed, but it had only been yesterday.
The prickle of the shift danced
over his skin, and when he emerged he was wearing…
His boxers.
Damn.
Same ones too.
Though Pete was the only coven member confirmed by June, Harry couldn’t imagine approaching the police station like this. He could go to the cops, sure, but the coven would be more effective against the pack—no search warrant required.
Annette, as Pete’s wife, was suspect number one for being a witch. Vern, slumped against the brick wall puffing his hand-rolled tobacco, was not a candidate.
Harry stuck his head out from behind the Dumpster.
“Hey, Vern,” he called to the busboy. “Is Annette here?”
The young man froze, cigarette halfway to his lips. He didn’t look old enough to smoke. “Who’s there?”
“Harry Smith, Smith’s Auto Repair. I’m a frequent customer.” When Harry nodded at him, Vern tensed, as most people would when confronted by a large, naked man in an alley.
“Yeah, so?”
Harry kept his alpha to himself. “I’m looking for Annette Bowman or her husband Pete. Can you tell her I’m back here?”
“Why are you hiding behind the Dumpster, Smith?” Vern demanded.
Harry thought it was rude for the kid to call him by his last name, but if Vern were coven, he could be any age. Hell, for all Harry knew, he could be an eighty-year-old woman.
“I was attacked,” he said. “Had to make a run for it. I was hoping Annette could help me out. I’m a friend of the family.”
“Uh-huh.” Vern mashed his cigarette against the brick wall and pocketed the stub. The odor that drifted to Harry’s nose was sweeter than standard tobacco. “Call the cops.”
Jeez, he’d been surprised enough when June hinted that her supplies weren’t one hundred percent legal. Was everyone who worked at the tea room a pothead?
Harry inched away from the Dumpster so Vern could see he had no weapons. Or pants. “I’m not sure I want to get the cops involved. It was a…personal matter.”
“What’d you do?”
If the kid were coven, he’d have a good idea what Harry had been doing the past twenty-four hours. “Look, Vern, this concerns Sandie. Can you get Annette?”
Vern stalked across the potholed alley, halting several feet from the Dumpster. A foot shorter than Harry, he bristled with adolescent rage. “Where is she? What do you know about Sandie?”
“What do you know about me?” Harry countered, not missing the fact Vern neglected to address Sandie with the honorific “Miss.” Either the kid was a disrespectful punk or he was older than he appeared. Harry tested the kid’s scent, but all he could smell was herb.
Vern shoved his hand into his jacket and withdrew the butt, which he twiddled around his fingers. “I know I’m going to call the popo if you don’t start telling me everything you know about Sandie in the next ten seconds.”
“Please do.” Harry crossed his arms. The police weren’t his first choice of cavalry, but they’d listen after he presented them with Sandie’s busted cellar doors. The obstacle would be their bureaucracy and their humanity, if the investigation turned up anything lupine. “I would have called them myself if I had a phone, which I obviously do not.” He resisted the urge to call Vern “kid” or “little man” since he had no idea if it applied. “I’d rather talk to Annette or Pete about Sandie…and her granddaughter June.”
The kid’s eyes widened. “You know Junie?”
“I met June yesterday.”
“You did, huh?” Vern glanced around the alley, as if looking for something that was about as tall as, say, a wolf. “Did you two get busy? And did—”
“None of your business,” Harry interrupted, in a way he knew would confirm the question.
“Maybe it is my business.” Vern stared at him. “Is there something you want to tell me besides the fact Junie’s a traitor?”
A traitor? Why, because she loved Harry and he was pretty damn sure he loved her back? Did this kid think June belonged to him or something?
Harry felt his alpha rise, along with his frustration and fear. “I don’t want to tell you shit. There’s no time for dominance games, Vern. We both know who’s the alpha wolf here.”
“Don’t you mean alpha dog?” Vern’s nostrils flared as their confrontation heated. “That’s what people say.”
“I said wolf, and I mean wolf. If you aren’t going to get Annette, I’m going to walk into the kitchen and start tearing the place up until I find her.”
“You think I’ll let you do that?” The cigarette butt broke apart in Vern’s twitchy hand, seemingly by accident. Harry might not have noticed if June hadn’t revealed her magic to him, including the fact it involved herbs and bodily contact.
“Do not throw that crap at me.” For good measure he added, “Little man.”
Vern lashed out anyway, flinging herbs. Harry dodged easily. They watched the dried leaves flutter to the gravel. He was coven, all right.
The kid shuffled back a step. “You’d better leave.”
Harry gave up. Vern was infuriating, and Harry was already furious. His alpha side could influence other shifters so he pressed his advantage. He heaped it all on the unsuspecting kid—man, woman, whatever. “Get. Annette. Now.”
Vern ran, calling for Annette.
“And get me some clothes!”
Within fifteen seconds Annette burst out of the tea room, followed by Vern and several employees. “Harry Smith, as I live and breathe. What in the world are you doing here?”
Harry knew shifters. Coven secrecy would be their biggest concern, and they’d sacrifice June to keep it.
He wouldn’t let that happen. This situation endangered them all.
“Saving your ass.”
Annette patted the knot of hair atop her head. “Is that so?”
The employees distributed themselves behind her in a half circle. Most carried twigs or leaves, and all wore resolute expressions. Vern sidled through the line, clutching an overcoat and a pair of large garden clogs. He tossed these at Harry from several yards away.
“I have reason to believe Gavin Householder from Roanoke kidnapped June,” Harry said. Gasps and whispers swept the group. “I can find her if we move fast.”
“You don’t know for certain?” Annette asked, her face pale.
He shook the overcoat violently until a shower of herbs sprinkled to the ground. The employees exchanged glances, right before they crept forward, spreading out. Hemming him in.
“I’m ninety-nine percent certain.” He ignored the people he was ninety-nine percent certain were witches about to wipe his memory. He recognized them all, and they were not all grannies. After turning the coat inside out, he slipped into it and knocked out the shoes.
Annette pulled a face and spoke quietly to Vern, so quietly he couldn’t make out the words. Vern trotted into the tea room, and she turned her attention back to Harry. “Why are you coming to us instead of the police? What does this have to do with saving my behind, kiddo?”
Vern had called June a traitor. Annette suggested he call the cops. Were they prepared to desert June because they assumed she’d wolfed out? To hell with the coven’s secrecy. How could they ignore the threat Gavin posed to June’s life?
“Gavin is bad news,” he stressed. “Bad, bad news. She did not go willingly.”
“I have only your word for this. I don’t know this Gavin person.” Annette’s lips were tight, her eyes moist. According to Harry’s nose, she was lying. Several members of the group broke open paper twists of herbs and cupped them in their palms. “We can’t do anything.”
“Are you saying you don’t care what happens to her?” Snarling, he advanced on Annette. He let his alpha emerge, his teeth sharpen, his eyes pale. He let so much wildness bleed through his facade, he was surprised his voice wasn’t a lupine howl of frustration.
The coven, as one, stepped back. Most dropped their gazes, staring anywhere but at him.
Good. They needed to stay out of herb-tossing distance
. He had no desire to lose his memories before he was able to save June.
Annette spoke first. “We do care but she…she made her bed.” One nervous snigger broke the silence. “I’m sorry, Harry. I don’t know what she told you, what you think you know, but—”
“What I know is June’s an amazing woman. I shouldn’t have to explain that to any of you.” As he spoke he became aware of a pressure in the air, like a plane taking off. The times he’d felt that before, magic had come of it. Annette and the others crept closer to him.
Harry held up a hand. “Let me finish.”
“Make it quick.” She drew what looked like a grass meatball from her apron pocket.
If he had to shift and run, he’d be form stuck as a wolf for hours. That would help him track Gavin but it wouldn’t help him convince the coven to mount a rescue.
Harry crossed his arms, prepared to stand his ground until the oregano started flying. “June is intelligent, loyal, proactive and…extremely resistant to change. Except I don’t think she’s equipped to resist torture. Or a pack bond. I understand both of those can really loosen a shifter’s lips.”
“Resistant?” Annette asked sharply.
“Not to my charms, I’m happy to say,” he confessed, “but to other things, yes. Our girl’s as two-legged as you are, Annette. Are you ready to talk now?”
She lowered the herb grenade. “That changes everything. You’d better come inside.”
After Annette convinced him there were no spells that would crucify Gavin from afar, Harry spent the next thirty minutes telling her everything that had transpired. He would have paced, but when he tried, he got in the way of the tea room employees.
No matter the crisis, the food must go on.
A slice of pie à la mode, large, helped him sit still long enough to spill his tale. Annette asked lots of questions, none about his sex life beyond confirming June hadn’t lost her magic. The rest of the coven members fielded the lunchtime rush, while Harry and Annette ate pie at a table near the back door.
