“Trust me. I wouldn’t have my mate around the kids if she was a danger to them in any way.” He glanced toward the kids. They were both staring at him wide-eyed, their spoons halfway to their mouths. “Eat your breakfast, kids. I promise there’s nothing wrong.”
Milo nodded and immediately returned to his breakfast, but Sana didn’t seem as happy. “It’s okay, Uncle Noah?”
“It’s okay, Sana.”
She slowly began eating again but she kept darting glances their way.
“Iva’s strength is astounding. She would have died if she hadn’t assimilated the black blood.” Noah grabbed a mug and poured himself some coffee. “Come on, we’ll talk in the sunroom.”
Paisley followed after grabbing her own cup of coffee. “Sorry, Noah. It’s my job to worry so you don’t have to.”
“Of course.” Paisley’s reaction mirrored what he’d probably get from the rest of the pack. He’d have to make sure that Iva was cleared by the doctors before he introduced her. “I want you beside me when I introduce Iva. As my beta, it’s your duty, but I’d like it to be voluntary.”
“You’ll have me.” Paisley settled in one of the chairs around the coffee table, putting her breakfast down. “All right. Pack meeting this weekend.” She pulled out a tablet. “I swear, you need a Dominic or an Eddy.”
Noah shuddered. “Eddy would drive me to drink and Dominic is no one’s assistant.” In fact, Noah couldn’t believe that Maggie’s Grove hid one of the last unicorns in existence. Like all of the supernaturals who were aware of what Dominic was, Noah would give his life to keep Dominic safe. Eddy was Dragos’s Renfield and brother-in-law. The kid was way too high maintenance for Noah, but he could be amusing as hell. “Besides, could you imagine someone willing to put up with my cranky ass all day?”
“Ask your mate. Maybe she can.” Paisley chuckled. “Maybe.”
Noah sniffed, then paused. He scented his mate in the kitchen. “Good morning, Iva.”
“G’morning.” Iva came into the sunroom, yawning, with a mug in her hand. She paused when she saw Paisley munching away on some cereal, easy and relaxed. Her eyes narrowed, and Noah would swear he could hear her molars grinding. Could she be jealous of his Paisley’s presence in his kitchen? “Who are you?”
“Paisley Hayes, Noah’s beta.” Paisley stood up and held out her hand. “Welcome, alpha mate.”
Iva surprised him. She instantly relaxed, holding up her hand for a fist bump. “Go, girl. You must kick some serious ass.”
Paisley grinned back and bumped fists with his mate. “I do, alpha mate. I do.”
Iva tilted her head. She sat between Paisley and Noah and put her feet up on the coffee table. Like Noah and Paisley, she was barefoot. She tilted her head, a small frown marring her brow. She blinked sleepily. “You called me alpha mate.”
“I could call you Your Royal Treeness, but I wasn’t certain you’d like that.”
Iva snorted, looking amused. “Are we expecting anyone else this morning?”
We. She’d said we. Noah was almost giddy with glee. “Yes. Carter, Paisley’s brother, is one of my enforcers and is rising up the ranks. My head enforcer, Andrew Price, will be here as well as Paul, my younger brother and our omega.”
Iva’s brows rose as she glanced around. “You need a fifth chair then.”
“I need more than that some days. Paul is the one who handles the pack newsletter as well as the one that goes out to all the packs. He’ll probably be here before we’re done with breakfast.” He’d probably wind up training Sana on how to be a good omega. Paul was just as devastated at the loss of Allan as Noah was and, as an omega, needed just as much care as the children did. Luckily Paul had mated a woman who was more than able to handle Paul’s gentle nature and wounded heart.
“We can move to the table when Paul shows up.” Paisley gestured to where the kids were finishing their breakfast. “We’ve done it before.”
“And what do the kids do? Join in?” Iva bit her lip. “Or I could take them to the Throne.”
“Nah. Let’s put some cartoons on. The meeting won’t take that long, then we can discuss taking them out later.” Noah wanted the two to get lots of fresh air. School would be starting soon and he wanted them to have as much down time as possible. It was important for wolves to devote some of their time outdoors, especially when they spent most of it indoors for school or work.
“I’ll pick the cartoon.” Iva stood, an evil smile on her face. “I bet Milo will love it.”
She walked out of the sunroom and began talking to the kids, quietly helping them clean up. She held out her hand to Sana and spoke softly, earning a shy smile.
“I’ve never seen that look on your face before.” Paisley was just as quiet as Iva had been as she spoke to Noah. “It’s a good one.”
“What look?”
“Pure happiness.” Paisley stood, her empty bowl in hand. “Better tell her she’s going to be meeting the pack this weekend.”
“Shit.” He’d forgotten that the moment Iva stepped into the kitchen and he caught her scent. “Iva?”
“Yes?” She turned to him, already in the family room.
Noah went to her and helped her set the kids in front of the TV. “We’ll be holding a pack meeting this weekend. I’ll be introducing you to the pack as the alpha bitch then.”
Iva’s brows rose slowly as she stared at him. “Alpha what now?”
Behind him, Paisley choked out a laugh.
Pain in the ass. Paisley always had hated that word. “It’s just a title. You can demand to be called alpha mate instead.”
She glowered at him. “Do that. You call me bitch and I’ll make sure your root withers and your berries dry up.”
Noah nodded, fighting the urge to cup his privates. “Right. Got it. Alpha mate it is.”
“Good.” She turned to the television. “Do you have Netflix?”
“Yes.”
“Cool.” She took his phone and had him unlock it, putting on Avatar: The Last Airbender.
He tilted his head, wondering what she was up to. “Why this?”
“One of them is a water bender. I thought Milo would like to watch that.” Iva shrugged. “And Sana will enjoy it just as much as he does. I think she’ll really like Uncle Iroh.”
Having never seen the cartoon he couldn’t comment, but Milo was already watching avidly, and Sana was sitting quietly next to her brother, her gaze glued to the screen. “Okay. If you vouch for it, they can watch it.”
Sana smiled softly at that but kept watching the cartoon. Milo, it seemed, didn’t even hear him. He was fascinated by the image on the screen of a boy in a ball of solid ice floating in the ocean.
Noah turned away and headed back into the sunroom. Just as he sat Iva grabbed hold of his arm. “You’ll have to deal with my dryads just as I’ll have to learn to deal with the pack.”
He nodded. “I’m aware. Mina’s told me some of what your duties are and I can guess at some of the others.” As one of the rulers, she dealt with the issues of the dryads, as well as ensuring that the forest was safe for all of Maggie’s Grove inhabitants. That involved patrolling.
He really needed to talk to Andrew and get some enforcers to shadow her.
“I’ve never been like the others. Remember what we’ve been called? Mina is the soul, Greer the heart, Ash the hand, Iva the brain. I’m supposedly the cold, logical one, the planner, the thinker.”
“Maybe that’s why the Van Helsings grabbed you first. Take the brain and the rest will flounder.” Noah sat, pulling Iva onto his lap, loving the blush that crossed her cheeks. “I’m aware of your place among the dryads, my mate. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure we work together with both races.” The forest was not just the home of the dryads. The wolves held their pack runs there. While most of his wolves hadn’t met Iva, he was certain they would love her.
The ruling dryads had kept to themselves until just recently, when Parker’s curse had caused a crazy witch to try to destroy the town. Worse, that was around the time Iva had been kidnapped, so when the dryads came to town to help out, she hadn’t been there.
She nodded slowly. “It won’t be easy. The wolves of Maggie’s Grove will accept me, but you’re prime alpha. I’m not sure how wolves from other places will feel about your mating to a dryad.”
“They’ll accept you or face me.” Noah wouldn’t have any issues putting other packs in their place if they dared speak out against Iva. “Even better, your dryads are aware of my devotion to you and have already accepted me, so dryads in other territories will back us up. My pack will soon find that you’re more than worthy of that devotion.” He hoped. Iva’s condition was going to cause some serious crimps in his plan unless he could figure out a way to spin it in the pack’s favor.
Iva cuddled against him, relaxing into him. “Mina said she’d set up the appointment with Dr. T. That’s one thing off your plate.”
“Tell her I said thank you, and I want to go with you.” Noah wasn’t sending Iva to the doc without him.
“Of course.”
Noah rubbed his cheek against the top of her head. The more she smelled of him the happier he and his wolf were. “I liked waking up with you this morning.” Having his mate in his arms had been a dream come true.
“I liked it too.” Iva yawned again. “But I need to go back to the Throne soon. My people will need to reconnect with me now that I’m out of my tree and the four of us are together again.”
“Need me to drive you?” He kissed the top of her head, already mourning her absence.
“Nope. You have your own meeting to get through, remember?” She stood and stretched. “I’ll eat with the kids while you and Paisley talk, then I’ll head out.”
“No matter what come and say goodbye.” That hadn’t been a request.
She nodded and walked off. It was obvious she was still tired but he understood what it was like to rule. He couldn’t in good conscience keep her from her people no matter how tired she was.
“She’s gonna be an awesome alpha mate.” Paisley was watching Iva interact with the kids, a smile on her face.
“Damn straight.” With a sigh, Noah turned his attention away from Iva and to his pack.
First things first, setting up his mate’s guards before she left his home. “Siri, call Andrew...”
Chapter Five
Iva stared at her tree, her mind going a thousand miles a minute despite the stillness of her body. A lot of dryads had come to welcome her back, far more than she’d thought, but they’d also lost quite a few in the Van Helsing attacks. She mourned those lost just as she rejoiced in those returned, but it brought home something that she really needed to deal with, and soon.
Noah had cubs, children she was already growing fond of. She had to make sure that the threat of the Van Helsings, and their demon leader, was gone once and for all, or the future of those children wouldn’t be worth squat.
She didn’t want to begin to imagine what they would do to someone as powerful as Noah. Warmth infused her as she remembered how he’d held her in the night, calming her terrors and giving her the sense of safety she’d craved.
She missed him already, and she’d only left his home a few hours ago. This was the first moment alone she’d had since she’d gotten to the Throne, but she wouldn’t begrudge the dryads who’d come to visit. They needed to reconnect just as surely as Iva needed to find an answer to the Van Helsing threat. They had to be stopped.
But how? That was what had her mind going in a million directions. She needed to focus, to figure out how they could take down an organization that spanned continents and had killed more supernaturals than any other. Hell, Iva had once caught a rumor that they had Vatican backing, but Mina had scoffed at the idea, saying that the ties of the Van Helsings were with a different religious organization that was long dead. But what if Mina were wrong? What if the rumor whispered in her ear were true? The Vatican might not have the power it once held in the old days. In the Burning Times, or what humans called the Inquisition, they’d been all-powerful, but since then they’d lost quite a bit of their power to different churches that didn’t believe in the supernatural. While publicly they no longer did either, privately Iva wasn’t so sure. It was still one of the most powerful entities out there with millions of followers and quite the treasury to fund hunts. If they were behind the Van Helsings...
Hell, she wasn’t even sure if the current Vatican believed in supernaturals, but they could do a hell of a lot of damage if they did. Just getting the word out that people like her and Noah existed could wind up killing a lot of her brothers and sisters in Europe and South America. Follow that with an expansive media campaign and...
Huh. It would take funds to do that too.
Maybe that was the way to go. Follow the money. When all else failed, there was always that. Peter Bradley was the host of the demon currently leading them, the human name of the Van Helsing it possessed. The human host owned a company called The Bradley Group, LLC. She could follow the money trail from there and find where it led. It would take a while, but she could do it, she was certain of it.
Perhaps the file that Greer had stolen, CHAMELEON, would give her another place to start. It held the names of those the Van Helsings had tortured and injected with demon blood. Most of the victims were deceased, but Greer had informed her that all of them had the name of a scientist attached to it. She could follow that lead as well. Those scientists couldn’t all be living off the grid.
The third option was to try to find out the name of the demon. With that, the witches might be able to—
“Hey.”
Iva jumped. Fuck, Ash was a sneaky bastard. “Hey to you too.”
Ash put his arm around her shoulder. “What’s got you thinking so hard?”
She smiled. “Life, the universe and everything. You?”
He chuckled, catching the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy reference immediately. “The answer is forty-two.”
“Asshole.” She leaned into him, resting her head on his shoulder. She’d missed the touch of her brothers and sister. His caress had been too much yesterday, her skin sensitive to any physical contact other than Noah’s. Today she was settled into her skin, and contact with her brother was the same as it always had been. Her brothers and sister made her feel like she was fine, even when she wasn’t. “Now I’ve got nothing to think about.”
“Good. I could smell the smoke of your brain frying all the way across the Throne. Time to take a break.” He sat quietly with her for a moment, but something must have made him come to her.
Ash was the quiet brother, the one who spoke when it was necessary, not like Greer. Greer spoke because he loved the sound of his own voice.
Ash put his arms back around her and they sat quietly, Iva’s brain once more wandering to the Van Helsings. She needed to get down to her office and start working. She had a hell of a set-up down there that was currently gathering dust. She hadn’t booted her computers in months and her fingers were beginning to itch. She loved her woman cave, with its state of the art gaming computers, triple monitor set-up, and a firewall the Pentagon would be envious of.
Hell, she’d missed a few important video game launches she’d really been looking forward to. She whimpered at what the state of her bank account was going to be when she was done with her Steam purchases. She was on the town’s payroll. She did background checks on new townspeople, magical research for the witches, and kept the town’s computers running.
Thank the gods for the video game streaming service. She no longer had game CDs cluttering up her office. Every game her little heart could desire were available for download through services like Steam and Origin.
Ash nudged her in the side, interrupting her
thoughts. “Remember, Greer also says you’re in the clear, so stop worrying.”
She took a deep, relieved breath and let it out at the reminder. It was Greer’s opinion that mattered most to her. Sure, her spiritual health was important, but without her physical health in harmony there was little they could do with her spiritually.
“When is your appointment with Dr. T?” he asked.
“The day after tomorrow. Mina wants to be there too.” The kids would be with Paisley, or so Iva thought. She wasn’t sure what arrangements Noah had made, but she doubted her mate would leave the kids with someone unsafe. He might be new to the parenting gig, but she’d seen the way he kept an eye on them even while she watched them. Paisley had gently teased him about his need to keep them under his gaze right before Iva left.
“I want to apologize to you.” Ash tensed next to her. His expression was grim. “I should have found you sooner.”
Ash always tried to shoulder their hurts. Even as a child, he’d been the one to stand between them and the world.
“I don’t think you were meant to. Maybe the gods had a reason for what had happened to me.”
“Excuse me? If I’d found you before you’d been infected, we wouldn’t be talking about spiritual contamination or the fact that your tree now holds black berries.” Ash sounded pissed, but she knew better. The big lug was experiencing guilt he shouldn’t be.
“Listen.” Iva scooted around until she was facing him directly, or at least his profile. He wasn’t turning to face her, not yet anyway. “Things happen, and sometimes they suck. Sometimes those sucky things happen for a reason. We discovered a lot of crap going on that we wouldn’t have if I hadn’t been taken, so I’m gonna go with it’s for a reason. And I need you to back me up on that even if you don’t believe it. I need my family to believe I got tortured and nearly killed because I was supposed to, or it will drive me insane.”
Not many understood the bond she, Ash, Greer and Mina shared. They weren’t brothers and sisters by blood, but by a soul bond, through the Throne, through the Forest, through their very spirits. Nothing would break that bond, not even death. She needed them to be one hundred percent behind her, even if she asked them to believe something that sounded crazy.
Hour of the Wolf Page 5
