Once we were back home, Sam carried in the take-out and I grabbed the movies.
“Where do you want to eat?”
“Take it in the sitting room. We’ll eat in front of the TV.”
The entertainment center and television sat sort of in the corner of the sitting room. It was on the wall opposite the fire place, and just to the left of the open entrance past the stairs. I brought in two large glasses of tea and propped my lunch on a pillow across my lap while Sam started the first movie. I couldn’t help admiring how good he looked in those faded old jeans. Marco still had him beat, but Sam was worth a second look. Maybe there was something about werewolves that just made them more noticeable. That was a possibility, but something told me Sam had always had a way with jeans.
“So how come you have a sitting room and everybody else has a living room?” he teased.
“Because this house was built before everyone lived around the television. So therefore, in a house this old, it’s a sitting room.”
We ate lunch while making occasional comments about the movies, but we were mostly quiet. No matter how hard I tried to pay attention to our little movie marathon, I was nervous and kept fidgeting.
“Come here,” Sam said and stretched out his arm toward me.
I hesitated for a minute and he added, “I won’t bite.”
I scooted closer and let Sam put his arm around me. It wasn’t quite the comfort I got from Marco, but it helped.
*****
At four o’clock Sam woke me.
“You all right?”
“Yeah,” I mumbled. “What did I miss?”
“Darlin’ you missed it all,” he said with a smile.
He asked if I wanted to go to bed or stay there while he watched some show about Egyptian pyramids. Both of us knew we would most likely be up all night anyway, so I decided to stay with Sam. If I went upstairs my mind would start working overtime again. Besides, falling asleep next to him was the first rest I’d gotten in a week that hadn’t required serious meditation. I tried not to wonder why I was so comforted by the presence of an alpha werewolf.
*****
Early the next morning I woke up with my head on a pillow in Sam’s lap. I looked up and found him watching me.
“It’s over,” he said.
“How do you know?”
He pointed to the clock. “It’s time for him to be back.”
Before I could sit up straight the phone rang and I ran for it. Screw pride, I needed to know that Marco was safe.
“That was quick, Red,” Marco’s deep voice rumbled through the phone.
“I hate you,” I panted.
“Yeah, I know. That’s why you sound like you ran to the phone, so you could go on hating me, right?”
“Exactly.”
Both of us knew the real reason I ran to the phone, but neither one of us spoke up. We talked briefly and he told me the hearing seemed to have gone well. I could hear the relief in his voice, and it did me good. I felt a tension I had not previously noticed begin to loosen within me as he spoke. Even if the council didn’t go along with his ideas, they hadn’t killed him. It would be several weeks at least before I would find out if that was still my job.
“Aldan Medwin in particular seemed to be interested in what I had to say.”
Aldan Medwin was the wizard who had taken the council seat vacated by Mathias, after Alek Ambrose refused the appointment.
“Really?”
“Yes, he seemed quite sympathetic.”
After a few minutes my heart began to beat normally again and I passed the phone to Sam as he sauntered up behind me. Relief was not an accurate word for what I felt. The sound of Marco’s voice never failed to thrill me and that day was no exception. When Sam hung up he turned to me and said, “Now all we have to do is wait for their decision.”
“God knows how long that might take.”
“Yeah, and I’m in no position to ask Him,” he joked.
Sam stayed through the rest of the week. I stood on the front porch Monday morning and watched as he disappeared down my drive way.
Elijah called a few days later to apologize for having been so busy. I didn’t bother to tell him that was all right, because everyone in town thought he’d been busy with me. We made plans for the weekend. I genuinely liked Elijah, but I mostly wanted to go out with him to dare people to say something else. He said there was somewhere he wanted to take me. I didn’t feel much like going out, but once Elijah smiled at me with those big blue eyes, I’d agree to go most anywhere.
Being by myself again wasn’t as bad as I’d expected. Besides, with Mathias lodged somewhere in the back of my mind, I was never completely alone. Of course, no one knew that except me. How would you go about explaining that to someone? “Oh yeah, my great, great, grandfather’s consciousness still exists in the back of my mind and we chat sometimes when I meditate.” If I was ever looking for a room in the local nut house, that was a sure way to get there.
*****
Elijah called again on Thursday and informed me I needed to bring my swimsuit. He said I was going to the beach if he had to drag me kicking and screaming. I don’t know why people got the impression I never went outside. I’m just naturally pale. The best I get is a honeyed sort of cream color which is not exactly tan.
Because it had been at least a few years since I’d been swimming, I called Kat and informed her we were going shopping. We went to a local mall. Shopping on the beach was a good way to get ripped off. Once we were inside the store, Kat immediately started looking at some suits that could only be described as vaguely obscene.
“No way in hell,” I said, before she could even suggest it.
“Not for you, for me,” she joked, but I could see through her lie.
“Oh, sure. Like you could fit any more than I could into that top.”
Kat and I were both very well endowed, so selecting a swimsuit that didn’t look like an old lady or flash parts you wanted to keep private always proved a challenge.
“It’s a conspiracy,” she announced finally.
“What’s that?”
“I think all the women in the world who have small breasts get together and design clothes the rest of us can’t fit into.”
“Most likely. I guess that’s their revenge.” I laughed.
“It has to be! How else would you explain this?”
After narrowing down my search to a few pieces, I decided to try them on. From the changing booth beside me I kept hearing Kat make comments like, “You’ve got to be kidding me!” and “No fucking way!”
Every time I squeezed into another unflattering suit, I just laughed and agreed with her. I finally decided on a sort of faded green and blue one piece. The top began as an earthy green and faded gradually into a blue. It went well with my hair.
Before we left, I also bought a large white mesh tunic to wear over the suit. I wasn’t embarrassed, or ashamed of my figure. On the contrary, I had worked hard for my shape and was quite proud of it. I just didn’t want to feel so naked around Elijah all day. Not that a see-through tunic would do much good at hiding anything, but it made me feel better.
When I showed Kat the suit she said, “Ooo, nice. I think he’ll like that.”
“And what makes you think I care what he likes?”
“Because if you didn’t you’d just go in a pair of cut off shorts and a tank top.”
“Bitch.”
“Slut.”
About this time a little gray haired old lady passed by where we stood and gave us the strangest look. Kat and I both burst out laughing which judging by the woman’s facial expression, only proved we were insane.
*****
My father called early Friday morning. I heard my communicator beeping on the table beside the bed and pressed the call button. Immediately my father’s very disgruntled image appeared before me.
“Good morning, Daddy.”
He grunted.
“Is it that bad?”
“I’m not really sure. I suppose you’ve been wondering what I found out this week?”
I nodded and pretended I hadn’t heard anything about the hearing before then. It wouldn’t do to let him know I’d already heard how things went from Marco. But then again, it wouldn’t do for the council to realize my father had a bug in the building during the hearing.
“From what I was able to hear, things look very good for the lycans.”
“Really? How much did you hear?”
He shrugged. “Everything, of course. Jacob Mercury doesn’t do half assed spying.”
“Get over yourself and tell me what you heard,” I teased.
“Well the thing is ... he had a good point.”
“What?” I hadn’t expected to hear that.
My father ran a hand through his hair and sighed heavily.
“What he said made a lot of sense.” He paused before continuing, “At one point he said that what happened to him could have happened to any of the Hunters. Men and women who had served their purpose well only to have their government turn its collective back on them when something went wrong.”
My dad looked positively horror struck. “He’s right. I was there when Marco Barak was attacked ... and it could have been me ... it could have been anybody.”
I was quiet for a few minutes while he seemed to be lost in a terrible memory.
“You never told me that.” I paused. “What happened?”
“Alfred and I were called in to help take down a real sicko. This guy had contracted the virus a few years earlier and seemed to get a sick thrill out of spreading it to the most beautiful women he could find.”
“I take it he didn’t attack them?”
“No, he would bite or scratch them during sex. Sometimes the mark would be so slight that the poor women would have no idea what had happened until they grew fur. If you ask me that’s a hell of a wakeup call.”
I watched as my father’s hologram walked over to the cabinet and took out what looked like a bottle of whiskey. He poured himself two shots before continuing with his story.
“I had to kill some of them,” he said in a quiet, haunted voice. “They were raving mad. They hadn’t had the slightest idea something was wrong with them until they started to turn. Some committed suicide.”
“Why was he let go for so long?” I asked.
“Because we could never quite get our hands on the bastard.” He sighed. “So this time, they called in two units. One was Barak and his partner, the other was Alfred and me. When we got there, Alfred and George, that was Marco’s partner, went to the front. Since they both wanted to go in guns blazing, we figured the front door would be the best place for that.”
He sat back down at the table and stared into space for a minute or two.
“Daddy?”
“Yeah?” he answered absently.
“You don’t have to talk about this if you don’t want to.”
“It’s all right,” he said. “It’s just been a long time since I’ve thought about any of this.”
After another minute he continued, “So, we heard them bust in the front and we knocked down the back door. Neither one of us was prepared for what this guy had in his kitchen. One of the women he’d turned was on a leash attached to the floor with a silver chain. See, we also didn’t know that he was an alpha male and because of this was able to force those weaker than him to maintain their animal forms.”
“That’s horrible. So, she was in wolf form chained to the kitchen floor?”
“She had been forced to hold a form somewhere in between. So, when we broke into the kitchen, there was a she-wolf chained to the floor that was not only frightened and angry, but she had been starved for weeks.”
I was afraid to ask what happened. Part of me wanted to know, but I almost told him to stop.
“Once Alfred and George were halfway through the house, a stray bullet hit the chain and she lunged at us. Marco was standing slightly in front of me and she just happened to take him down first. George came running in and stabbed her in the back several times before she let go, but the damage was done. Marco’s chest was torn to shreds and the flesh hung back from one of his forearms.”
“What happened to George?”
“She turned on him next and tore his throat out. Alfred was out of bullets and I was pinned beneath Barak. Marco had a blade in his right boot, the kind that extends from beneath the toes when you hit the heel.” He looked stricken and kept running his fingers absently through his hair.
“When she was done with George and turned back for us, he stabbed her underneath the chin. He held his injured arm to his chest, got to his feet, and with his good arm took the silver machete from his belt.”
I knew what was coming next, but I couldn’t bring myself to tell him to stop talking. It was sort of like driving by a car accident. You don’t really want to see something terrible, but you can’t stop yourself from looking.
“I got to my feet, but couldn’t seem to go farther. I can’t say how long Alfred and I stood there while he chopped that werewolf to pieces ... screaming ... it was the most awful sound I’d ever heard. He sounded like his soul had been violated ... it was terrible.”
Hearing about Marco’s attack upset me much worse than I’d thought it would. It was similar to my own, except in my case, my father had chopped up the werewolf. I was torn between crying and wanting to throw up.
“What happened? What did you do?”
My dad seemed to come out of a fog as he answered, “Alfred and George had killed the one we were sent for on their way to us.”
“What about Marco?”
“Well, after he was done we just looked at each other for a while. I think if Alfred had had any bullets left, he’d have shot him. But I just couldn’t. I know that’s what I was supposed to do, but part of me kept saying, that could have been you.”
He looked back up and said, “Lilith, that could have been me, and it nearly was my daughter.” He paused again. “I let him go. I watched while he walked out and Alfred looked for a bullet.”
My dad had another call coming in, so he excused himself. The moment the call ended I began to cry. I cried so hard I pulled my stomach muscles. I had known that Marco was attacked, but I had no idea that my father and Alfred were both there. I never expected to hear an eye witness account of him being ripped to pieces.
I went into the bathroom and put a cool wash cloth over my eyes. No matter how much I tried to calm myself, all I could see was Marco covered in blood. My mind ran through memories of rubbing my face against his chest. The image was so strong I could feel his hair as it brushed my cheek.
The next image that filled my mind was his muscular tanned chest hanging in shreds. I lunged for the toilet and barely made it. I must have spent at least an hour in there throwing up what felt like everything I’d eaten for the past month. Once I finally stopped gagging I just lay there on the floor and fought the urge to run to Marco as if it were a physical thing. My desire to be near him, to comfort him, was almost tangible.
Chapter Four
Somehow I made it through to the next morning when Elijah came knocking at my door. I had packed a change of clothes in my usual black leather bag. Elijah wanted to go to dinner after a day at the beach, and I didn’t want to wear a transparent tunic to a restaurant.
When I opened the door the smile faded from his face as he asked, “Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” I lied.
It had taken every ounce of will power I possessed to get out of bed that morning. I wanted to be near Marco and the more I fought the urge, the stronger it seemed to become.
Elijah stepped inside the door and hugged me close to him. For a moment I wondered if he could read minds too. I wrapped my arms around him and buried my face in the curve of his neck. Since Elijah was only a few inches taller than me, he was easier to snuggle. The more I was around werewolves, the more touchy feely I was becoming. I had always been the kind of person who like
d to be casually touched, but not by strangers. Then again Elijah wasn’t a stranger. My desire for closeness had been largely ignored, however, due to the fact that direct contact with their skin might accidentally result in me reading people’s minds. For years the only person I ever hugged was my father.
But Elijah was safe. He’d had a nice childhood and a nice family. He had good memories. Nothing terrible was going to jump out at me from behind that gorgeous smile.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked as he pulled back from me.
“Yeah. I was just a little sick last night, something I ate.”
“You sure it isn’t all the rumors I’ve been hearing?”
“Well, that didn’t help, but the thought of being associated with you doesn’t make me sick.” I attempted to sound upbeat about it, but failed miserably.
“I’m really sorry about that. I want you to know I haven’t said anything to give people the impression that—”
“It’s all right,” I interrupted. “You don’t owe me an explanation.” I forced myself to smile as I added, “or an apology. I’ve lived in this town off and on my whole life. These people are assholes.” The smile was genuine after I said that and my spirits began to improve.
“So, you feel like snorkeling?”
“Sure. Just let me get my flip flops.”
Elijah had an old red Jeep that was perfect for going to the beach. He tossed my bag in the back along with his and we were off. The nearest beach is about a fifty minute drive from my house, so we had time to enjoy the breeze and each other’s company.
“So, what have you been up to?” He raised his voice slightly so I could hear him over the wind rushing past our ears.
Immediately I was plagued by the image of Marco crawling toward me in the bathtub and I felt myself begin to blush.
“Oh, nothing really.”
“Do you burn easily?”
“Huh?”
“You look a little flushed.”
“Oh, it’s just the heat,” I lied.
For the rest of the drive he told me about his visit home. Both his parents were doing good, as well as a few other relatives he’d visited while he was gone. Elijah had worn deep blue swim trunks that were nearly knee-length with a pale blue t-shirt. As he spoke, I couldn’t seem to stop my eyes from wandering. He had nice legs. Then again, I hadn’t seen anything on Elijah that wasn’t nice. I felt a little guilty for noticing, but then reminded myself there was no harm in looking. Like I’d told Kat once, “If I ever stop looking, check for a pulse.”
Lilith Mercury, Werewolf Hunter Series (Boxed Set, Books 1-3) Page 35
