“What’s wrong, angel?” Kyle asked as they listened to Gabi’s car roar off down the road. He slid a hand under her hair, around her neck, turned her towards him and tipped her face up to his. “I know this thing with Bree is a bit of a shock, but we knew it was a possibility.”
She raised her hands and put them on his chest; the strong, steady thump of his heart soothed her.
“We’ll get through this fine, so will Bree.”
“I know,” she whispered, glancing down as tears welled behind her eyes. “I know we will.”
“Then what?”
“It’s just…” She swallowed against the lump in her throat. “It’s the reminder that she isn’t actually ours.” She dropped her head forward, letting her forehead rest against Kyle’s shoulder. “We will have to fade into her background one day, and that day gets closer every hour we have with her.” Her voice hitched, and she stopped talking, knowing Kyle understood the rest.
He slid his hand up into her hair as his other arm slid around her shoulders and held her tight. “We’ll be alright, all of us,” Kyle assured her. “We get the very best part of her life, and she will always, always be ours. Even when she’s fifty years old and finally allowed to date.”
Kyle’s words brought a hiccupping chuckle. He and the other males in the Pack liked to joke that they would dissuade every boy who looked at her, but they all knew they would have little say once this determined and feisty little soul decided something for herself.
“Hey, did you manage to dig up anything on the case of the missing corpses yet?” he asked. “I suppose we should have asked Gabi if any of the Vampires have heard anything.”
“No, I hadn’t formulated anything when Gabi arrived, and it completely slipped my mind while she was here,” Trish replied, stepping back and collecting herself. She was hit with a little frisson of guilt that she’d lost most of the day to catching up with Gabi.
“I’m still not sure it’s our kind of case to solve,” Kyle mused.
“I might agree with you if it wasn’t for the strange scent the wolves picked up around the morgue,” Trish said. “You’re right, we should check in with Gabi. Doesn’t she know the City coroner?”
“Teddy is retired now, but he probably would still have a finger on what goes down.” Kyle nodded. “And the fact that he’s a Shifter helps; we don’t have to dance around the questions.” He strode over to the hall table and picked up his phone. “I’ll call her and fill her in on the drive home. Let’s see what that turns up.”
“Good thinking.” Trish checked her watch. “Casey is still on duty with Bree for another hour. I can get some research done and flick an email to Gabi with what we have.” Trish brushed her hair away from her face, turning back towards the rest of the house, when quick, heavy footsteps pounded up the stairs outside the front door.
“Butch, what is it?” Kyle asked, throwing open the door.
“Alpha,” the Enforcer said respectfully, but Trish could hear a note of urgency in his tone, “we’ve caught someone spying on Haven.”
“What?” Kyle frowned as cold unease splashed down Trish’s spine. “Where is he now?”
“She,” Butch said, with emphasis on the pronoun, “is being taken to Pack quarters as we speak. By the scent trails we found, she’s been lurking around the neighbourhood for at least a day or two.”
“She’s a Werewolf?” Kyle checked.
Butch nodded.
“Newly Changed, perhaps?”
“No, I don’t think so.” Butch shook his head. “She’s too well controlled to be a newbie.” His voice lowered, as though he was mulling something over. “In fact, if I couldn’t smell the Werewolf on her, I wouldn’t have guessed she was even one of us.” Silence fell for a full three seconds as the implications of what he’d said sank in. Butch had been a Werewolf for over three decades and a special forces soldier for nearly a decade before he was turned; he was renowned for being able to pick a Werewolf out of a crowd of thousands.
“Trish, check on Bree while I sort this out,” Kyle told her. “I’m sure it’s nothing serious. Probably just another lone wolf looking for a Pack. I’ll be back for dinner.” He gave her a reassuring wink and followed Butch down the front steps towards the large building that nestled in the shadows to the side of the house.
********************
Trish entered through the rear door of Pack quarters, affectionately known as the Hive, a sprawling building that now took up most of the quarter acre of land to the right of the original cottage. The converted double garage they’d started out with three years ago had soon proved way too small to accommodate the growing Pack and, with Gabi’s blessing, they’d constructed a purpose-built structure that incorporated not only small suites for Pack members who needed a place to stay, but also a large kitchen and dining area, a huge entertainment room, a fully equipped gym, a secured and solidly constructed medical bay, including an isolation room for those newly Changed, a security control room, a conference room and office space for Kyle.
Trish worked, for the most part, from CenOps, a repurposed war bunker on the outskirts of the City that served as the Alliance’s headquarters. While the bulk of the Alliance’s duty lay in patrolling the streets and physically dealing with any trouble, another of the more vital aspects of their responsibilities was to keep all supernatural activity out of the public human eye. The bulk of that work fell to Trish’s team of tech experts.
The rear door opened into a tiled laundry and wash-up bay. With dusk not far off, automatic lights had already come on, illuminating her way. Along one wall ran a solid and very secure storage area that looked like conventional linen cupboards but in fact housed the various weapons and gear needed for keeping the City safe. It contained the kind of weapons that could deal with the most dangerous Supernatural predator but were highly illegal in the City, where even handguns were outlawed. This wasn’t their primary armoury; they had another small facility beneath the building Derek and Kimberley used for their youth programme and self-defence school. The larger stash was easily accessible to those living in the City as well as for emergencies when greater firepower or more specialised equipment was needed on short notice.
Trish could hear activity at the far end of the main corridor. She pushed her way through the door beside the communal showers, ignoring the heavy security door on the left that led to the med bay, and into the passageway that ran past the gym and the soundproofed control room to the left. To her right the kitchen and dining area were quiet and dark. At the end of the corridor, almost at the very front of the building, stood Ben, one of their younger wolves, who had joined the Pack in the earliest days and had recently been promoted to Sentinel position. He was poised just outside the open doorway to the conference room, which the men liked to call the war room, with his arms folded, a stony expression on his face. As she neared, he stepped into the doorway in front of Trish, effectively blocking her way. The human part of Trish raised an eyebrow at his apparent rudeness, while her wolf growled softly, surging forward to allow her presence to be felt.
Ben immediately ducked his head, lowering his gaze to the floor in a show of submission, but didn’t move from obstructing her view of those inside.
“Orders,” he whispered to her in a pained voice.
“Kyle,” she ground out, throwing as much authority into her voice as she could dredge up. After a moment, the tension left Ben, and he moved out of her way, allowing her into the room. Callum, their other Sentinel, was already in the room, on the far side of the large dark-wood conference table. Trish was surprised to see him, given that it was his night off. His arms were folded and his eyes fixed alertly on the stranger lounging in one of the chairs at the table. Trish assessed the intruder as she moved to Kyle’s side where he stood with his arms across the back of one of the conference chairs, his casual stance belied only by the tightness of his shoulders. Ben and Butch moved to either side of the table, placing themselves surreptitiously between their Alphas a
nd the newcomer.
The woman couldn’t be too much older than Flora, Trish thought, early twenties at best. She was beautiful. As in head-turningly beautiful. One of those girls that made both men and women do a double take. Her lips were so full as to seem like she was pouting, her eyes almost too large in her heart-shaped face, making her seem vulnerable and doe-like. Her caramel hair was artfully sun-streaked and fell in soft waves to just past her shoulders. Long wisps trailed across the left side of her face, allowing her to hide some, but definitely not all, of the predatory gleam in the topaz blue depths of her eyes. While Trish couldn’t see her figure, largely positioned behind the conference table, she had no doubt it was perfectly toned and muscled in all the right places. The Lycanthropy virus had its upsides.
“You’re persistent, I’ll give you that,” Kyle said, surprising Trish with his words and his tone.
She dragged her eyes from the girl to glance at him, wondering how he knew this woman. Her gaze was drawn back to the girl when she sighed and stretched, leaning back in the chair in a languorous way, her snug-fitting, sleeveless tank top straining a little across her pert breasts. The way her gaze surreptitiously assessed each of the men around her told Trish she was used to attracting male attention and wielded her sensuality like a weapon. Probably a very effective one.
“I tried the subtle approach.” She spoke at last; her voice suited the rest of the package—rich, sultry and just a little husky. “But it wasn’t working.”
“If you call that subtle,” Kyle muttered. “Is your name even Bethany?”
A wry smile twisted her mouth, and she brushed a stray curl from her face to tuck it behind one ear.
“Actually, it’s Riley,” she said. “Bethany is my middle name.” She spoke to Kyle, but her eyes were narrowed on Trish. Whatever she saw, she didn’t appear very happy about it.
“I met…Riley…about two weeks ago,” Kyle told the rest of them. “She was playing poker at the Club when I did my rounds.” The Club was one of Julius’s many businesses, a nightlife hotspot that attracted the rich and the famous as well as anyone else with money to burn. It was one of a handful of places considered ‘open’ to the supernatural community, and, as such, it was part of the regular Alliance patrol sweep. “She assured me she was only in town for business and hadn’t known the protocol for requesting visiting rights from the Packs.”
Riley’s eyes narrowed just a fraction, and Trish realised there was more to the story than Kyle was saying, but this wasn’t the time to press him for information. Kyle would tell her everything later.
“What I told you was the truth,” she told him, “just not the whole truth.”
“Then I assume you’re here to tell us the whole truth now?” Kyle checked. “Do you realise how easily you could’ve been killed for snooping on a Pack Haven?”
“I told you, I don’t know a lot about Pack law,” she retorted, annoyance sharpening her features and her voice. “I wasn’t lying. I have never been part of a Pack. I’ve never really come into contact with others…like us.”
“How long ago did you go through the Change?” Trish asked, feeling a twinge of sympathy for the woman; what would she have done if it weren’t for Kyle, Gabi and the others who had helped her and Derek through those first few terrifying months? Doing it alone would be very traumatic.
“My business was with you, actually.” Riley spoke directly to Kyle instead of answering the question. “I have something of a…delicate nature to discuss with you.” She sat forward in her chair, clasping her hands together in front of her on the table. Her nails were short but well-manicured and painted deep red.
Trish’s wolf growled low in the back of her mind; she didn’t like the girl’s forwardness.
“I had hoped to do this the easy way and be out of the City before this turned into any kind of circus, but clearly I’m not getting what I came for the way I thought I would.” She turned a sardonic smile on Trish. “I had heard that monogamy amongst wolves was rare; it seems I was misinformed.”
Wait…what? Trish felt as though she’d been slapped. Had she heard right? This woman had hoped to have sex with Kyle? The world dipped a little, but her wolf kept her upright with a vicious snarl that stiffened her spine. The telltale twinges of an oncoming Change tightened her muscles.
No. She would not lose control. She was human by nature; she would not Change to wolf and tear this woman limb from limb for assuming she could have sex with her mate.
A warm hand touched her shoulder. Kyle’s wolf was suddenly a calming presence against her mind, soothing and reassuring. Kyle hadn’t touched this other wolf, nor would he ever. Not in that way.
But she was so beautiful…
Only you, his wolf assured her, no one else.
“You’re not too bright, are you?” Butch muttered at the woman. “You can count yourself lucky you chose Kyle and not one of the other Alphas. Their mates would’ve already torn you to shreds. You managed to pick the only one with a sane Luna.”
Trish glanced over at Butch, suppressing a grateful smile. Trust him to turn it around and make the fact that she wasn’t a strong, dominant Alpha mate sound like a good thing. At least it had given her a few precious seconds to regain control.
“I think the best thing would be for you to leave the City in the morning,” Kyle told Riley. His voice was cold. “If you are interested in becoming part of a Pack, I can give you a contact person who will help you with that. They could also give you some coaching on Pack protocol.”
“I can’t do that yet.” Riley’s face had lost all the feigned casualness. She dropped her eyes to her hands; she was picking at a perfectly manicured fingernail. “I have to discuss something with you first.”
Kyle looked at Trish as she glanced over at him again. She gave him a tiny nod; it would cost them nothing to hear what this woman had to say. Or so she prayed. Kyle stepped forward to pull out a chair for Trish and took the seat next to hers, so they were on the same level as Riley.
“You have our attention,” he told her. “Make it quick.”
Now that she truly was the centre of their attention, Riley seemed to shrink a little, her heavily laid-on sex appeal had disappeared, and she was gnawing on one side of her bottom lip. She suddenly looked very young, and Trish had to rein in the maternal surge inside her.
“Well,” Riley cleared her throat a little, “you asked when I first went through the Change. The truth is…I haven’t.”
Her words shocked Trish, and by the stiffening of Kyle’s spine and the twitches of the other Werewolves, she wasn’t alone. Victims of a Werewolf bite always went through their first Change as soon as they made it through the fever. That was just the way it was. There was no way she could have been bitten in the past few days and be wandering around like a healthy person.
“You haven’t Changed yet.” Kyle spoke each word very, very slowly.
Riley looked up at the ceiling and took a deep breath as though bracing herself. “I wasn’t bitten,” she said at last, her gaze locking on Kyle. “I was born with the virus in my system. I’m like you.”
Her words robbed Trish of breath.
The silence in the conference room was absolute. No one moved; no one even breathed for several moments. Trish was finally able to glance from Riley, who looked genuinely worried, to Kyle, whose face was a narrow-eyed mask. He opened his mouth to say something, but a loud beeping interrupted him. Any other sound probably would’ve been ignored, but no one in the Pack ignored this particular alarm. He snapped his mouth shut and dug into his pocket for his phone. As he pulled it out, four other identical phone alerts echoed around the room. The rest of them reacted, reaching for their own phones, the men’s faces as grim as Trish felt. This level of alert could only mean one thing.
“Code one threat, unspecified,” Kyle muttered darkly, already out of his seat. “South-east of the City.”
Butch, Ben and Callum all snapped to attention, awaiting instructions like military personnel.<
br />
“Alert Sicarius we’ll need him in early, call in extra staff to cover protection duty here, then gear up and fill the vans with everything we have. Trish, tell Flora what’s happening, make sure she has help with Breanna, tell her Sicarius will be here soon, then get to CenOps as quickly as you can. Murphy will already be en route.” Orders flowed from Kyle’s lips, a world away from the man shocked speechless just a few moments before.
Trish nodded, giving his arm a surreptitious squeeze as she rose from the chair. They hadn’t had a code one threat for almost two years; no one called that particular code lightly. This could be bad. At least Gabi and Julius were in the City; there wasn’t a lot that could better those two. She was beyond relieved that Sicarius would be here watching over Flora and Breanna. The man was full human, but his name was less a name and more a title: until Flora’s arrival in the City, he had been the official assassin of the Decuria. Any human who could hold his own in the world of the most powerful supernatural creatures on Earth could only be considered formidable. And this man was. He’d even captured Gabi once. He was honour-bound to protect Flora with his life, and Trish could think of no better person to have watching over the girls.
“What about this one?” Butch asked, nodding his head at Riley.
Kyle frowned and contemplated her for a moment, a muscle ticcing in his jaw. Trish knew what was going through his mind; locking up the woman seemed like overkill, but leaving her here could put Flora and Breanna at risk, and there was no way they could take her with them on a hunt for something unknown.
“She can come with me,” Trish said, injecting confidence into her voice.
Kyle gritted his teeth. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. She can stay in the med bay until we’ve finished. It’s secure inside and out.”
“We might need med bay,” she pointed out. If they had to open the medical facility for incoming injured, Riley would be free to walk Haven. Kyle knew she was right, but he clearly didn’t trust the other woman, and Trish couldn’t blame him.
Raising Hell: A Hellcat World Novel (Hellcat Series Book 7) Page 6
