“She doesn’t understand, Daddy’s always said she was too soft,” Birdie mutters when Mama is out of the room. Then she cuts him a dirty look with those deep blue eyes and adds, “Daddy says you’re a damned soft disappointment too.”
Sterling’s grin is sharp with his rages at this dysfunctional family—the one he’d hoped to leave far enough behind that they’d become a forgotten nightmare. Too bad he couldn’t put enough distance between them and himself to make that happen.
“Well, one of us had to be soft, Birdie Mae. One of us had to be lovable.”
Birdie snarls like the wolves she so hates, as she spits at him, “I’d rather be lonely than loved by a monster.” A low fucking blow to call Tallulah a monster when Birdie’s the only evil entity, in a woman’s body, that Sterling has ever known.
Sterling doesn’t stick around to bother with her bullshit. He goes out the screen door, in search of Violet, in the hopes that his other sister can make them all see sense.
A hope that goes out the window when Sterling spots Beau out in the yard with Violet, clutching her by the shoulders with a crazed expression on his face. Rattling off words Sterling can’t quite here from this distance.
He doesn’t have to hear them Sterling realizes when he gets closer. Violet turns to him with a hard expression. Her face morphs into that of an enemy and Sterling stops before he is close enough for her to strangle.
“You fathered a monster?” She hisses—her voice a low whisper of rage.
Sterling glares over her head at his brother. The one he holds a little less love for now. The one who always manages to make him look like a worthless piece of shit to his own blood.
“He’s not mine. You heard what Beaufort was told by Tanner Grace.” Sterling says, hoping to defuse the bomb that is preparing to detonate within Violet.
Beau’s expression is grim. “You should know best about how readily wolves lie, Sterling.”
“Wouldn’t know a thing about that, son—I’ve never been lied to by a wolf. But, I’ve sure as hell been lied to by my kin.” Sterling knows the words will draw out a reaction.
Beau is on him in an instant. Large hands and fists grabbing at Sterling to beat him. Only Sterling is bigger now and better prepared for a fight with his brother.
He gladly welcomes this release for his fury.
14
Lyric
“I hate you.”
Three words that shatter his mom’s expression. Even as he regrets hurting her, Lyric doesn’t regret the words. He means them—right now she’s a stain on his world.
“My whole life you acted like my dad was some drifter who wasn’t worth a damn.” A tryst from her job at the bar. Lyric has been living his life, up until now, feeling out of place, in a small town where most people are born from unions of love. He’s suffered the whispers and looks of disdain his whole life long. In school, in church, in every sport his uncles forced him into until they finally admitted he was too soft for sports. Lyric has always felt like a puzzle piece that doesn’t fit into the picture of this town—he’s always longed for a father like himself. One he could relate to and see those same tendencies in, a person who he could label home the way Mama was home.
Yet, his dad had always been nothing more than a one-night regret in his mother’s recollections of the man and the elusive man’s role was filled by the big, strapping men of the Grace family. Lyric loves his grandfather and his uncles, but they are a salve for a wound. While they ease the ache they can’t stitch the gape of it back together.
Now, however, it seems his mother has lied to him all these years. His father isn’t a faceless stranger in the night. He’s a real person, one whose face happens to be on billboards and in magazines. He’s the man girls in Lyric’s school swoon over. The one they fantasize about knowing the way Tallulah Grace once knew him. Whispering and giggling about how he could one day come back to this nowhere world to take home a bride. A role that they desperately want to fill.
Imagine if he came back for love. The girls at school sigh wistfully—Sterling’s music is full of longings and regrets over a love unspecified. A love Lyric discovered when he opened up the forbidden trunk in their home’s attic. Where Lyric found pictures his mother decided to lock away.
A love abandoned beneath his grandmother’s wedding dress.
As soon as Lyric had called for Sterling he came running right back for the woman he left behind. When she stayed out all night, after whispers Sterling Savage was in town, Lyric knew which one of them his father came back for. Wasn’t the son he might’ve created in a moment of passion—it was the woman who clearly climbed inside of his soul and hadn’t released her hold on his heart.
Maybe his hatred for his mother stems from the fact that he feels abandoned by his elusive father again, but he’ll be damned if he admits that. It’s easier to place blame on Tallulah.
Her full lips are pressing against each other in a thin line. Tallulah looks to be contemplating something—an apology most likely. One Lyric isn’t ready to hear.
She doesn’t get the chance, however. Not when Merle calls out for Lyric’s mother.
“Tallulah Rose, it’s time.” Merle rumbles from down the hall. She casts a look at Lyric; one that’s full of emotions he cannot place.
“You need to run,” is what she tells him.
Tallulah pulls her locket over her head. Pressing the precious metal—still warm from her body—into his hands. A motion that causes fear to spike through Lyric’s being. The silver locket, full of his grandmother’s only picture, is something his mother never removes.
“Go to Memphis Boone—I’ll find you when it’s safe.”
“Why not Miss Jorie?” He asks, hoping to prolong his stay. I can’t leave now, the most prominent thought running through Lyric’s mind.
“That’s the first place they will look.” Tallulah’s smile is sad as she cups his jaw. “I love you, even if you hate me. We will speak soon. I promise.”
Tallulah forgets that promises are not made to keep.
15
Tallulah
She watches Lyric run out the back door with terror swelling in her chest. Yet, she never calls him back. Tallulah knows Memphis will keep her son safe. Her priority now is to subdue the threat is coming their way in the shape of a Savage.
Beaufort marches across the paved road with a purpose. A shotgun made of blessed silver thrown over his broad shoulders. He moves leisurely, spitting his foul dip as he makes his way closer. He has the audacity to hum a jolly tune.
“Is he alone?” Tanner asks. His eyes darting around—searching in the growing gloom of evening for other would be assailants.
Tallulah holds her breath at the notion that more of them could be closing in—she’s only fought a hunter in theory. Her knees rattle, something they never did when Judson and Tanner would roll with her in the dirt. Demanding more of her when they inevitably pinned her to the ground.
A pretend death Tallulah never took seriously, because she never thought she would need to fight a tangible enemy.
Merle closes his eyes and from the way he cocks his head, Tallulah knows he’s listening for the sounds of other heartbeats. Other near silent steps. Of the four of them he has the best senses. Being the only one of them trained to serve a Dark Master—a demon king who taught Merle things they will never know. It’s something she regrets in this moment when her family is being approached.
I should’ve gone off to train to serve a Dark Queen or Master—could’ve avoided all this mess.
“Two on the roof.” Merle finally answers, drawing Tallulah back into the moment. Merle opens eyes that no longer resemble a human’s—glowing, golden wolf eyes dart over to Tallulah. “You take the small one in the back of the house.”
She nods, swallowing as she accepts the two daggers her brother Jud hands her.
“Be careful,” Judson tells her. His words an animalistic growl through his sharp teeth. To Tanner he says, “Stay with Merle, I’ll tak
e the ones on the roof.”
He’s gone in an instant after that remark, not waiting around for further instruction. Judson has always been the leader after Merle.
“I can handle Beaufort,” Merle rumbles. “Tanner, you watch your brother.”
“Yessir,” he says as he hurries after Jud.
“Go, Tallulah. You shouldn’t have to watch your father destroy a man.” He marches out of the front door—the bulk of his frame growing bigger as he moves. Something between a man and a wolf—something an archaic story would label a monster. Tallulah watches her daddy with a growing pride. The last thing she stays to watch is her father throwing back his head with a sound that is more roar than howl.
A signal to the fool who is coming to disrupt his den.
Tallulah hurries off, through the back door, and into the yard where she comes face to face with Birdie Savage. The older twin of Beau Savage. As terrible as Tallulah knows Beau to be, Birdie is worse.
A monstrosity that is wrapped in a tall female package—Birdie is the pride of Beaufort Savage. A rotten apple that clings on to the gnarled branches of Beaufort’s awful family tree.
“Shit,” Tallulah mutters as she clutches each dagger with her hands. Holding fast to the cool hilts the way the nuns in school held fast to their rosaries, hoping that something so small and tangible could save them.
“So you’re the reason he came back home—not Mama, not Daddy, but a whore like you?” Birdie releases a cruel laugh. Despite her astonishing beauty, Tallulah finds her hideous. An evil Tallulah never mourned the loss of when Birdie left town. “I knew Daddy should’ve slit your throat. I guess I’ll have to do it for him.” She says the words with a sweetness that causes cold to slither into Tallulah’s gut.
“Sterling won’t forgive you if you do,” Tallulah tells Birdie with a confidence she doesn’t actually feel. She all but told him to fuck off this morning—it’s easy for him to tell Tallulah he loves her but another thing entirely to put those words in motion. Empty words followed by empty gestures, Sterling excels at that.
Birdie’s smile is sharper than Tallulah’s daggers. “You really believe that? There’s a million just like you waitin’ to take your place, Tallulah Grace. All you are is a moment of stupidity in a long, fulfillin’ life.”
The words slice her—a razor against her sensitive skin—bleeding Tallulah in ways a knife never could.
“He loves me,” she shouts. Tallulah’s jaw trembles making the words a warble of a sound, but she says them anyways. Again and again, until Birdie rushes her with hate twisting her face.
One hit causes Tallulah’s world to go dark.
16
Merle
“I don’t want any trouble with you, Merle,” Beaufort tells him with a smile that’s full of cruelty. An obvious lie if Merle’s ever heard one.
“Funny how I don’t believe you.” Merle replies, rolling his neck to make his muscles less stiff. It’s been many years since he’s ran in the fullness of his animal skin. He had hoped he’d go to the grave without ever having to wear this hide again.
Hopes rarely sore for men named Grace.
“Give me the boy and I won’t bring no harm.” Beaufort points the barrel of his blessed silver rifle at the ground. A performance of truce that Merle doesn’t trust. “I’ll give you a hunter’s oath, Merle. I’ll take the pup and I’ll never bother you again.”
At one time—when Lyric was a wee thing they didn’t yet know and love—Merle might’ve been willing. Back when he was a colder man—still more monster than human. These children of his, along with his vibrant grandson, have softened him into something less than the warrior he once was. They’ve also made him so much more than Merle had ever hoped to become.
He sighs, “ ‘Fraid I can’t do that, Beaufort. The boy is my blood. Won’t give him to you so long as I breathe.” Beaufort might not be willing to die for his kin, but Merle would die a thousand deaths to save his.
A gleam of delight sparkles in Beaufort’s eyes. “That can be arranged, Merle.” For an old man he’s still fast—kicking the barrel of that gun up so quick if Merle wasn’t something more than human he’d have taken a bullet to the heart. As it stands the silver bullet whizzes by, grazing Merle’s bicep with a burning cut.
“Glad to know you ain’t gonna make this easy.” Beaufort tells him with a jovial tone. One that is better suited for Christmas morning than it is to a bloodbath.
Merle darts to the left—Beaufort’s weak side—and another shot rings out. Again missing him, but just barely. It takes nothing for Beaufort to reload his gun, snapping it open with one hand as he throws a blessed dagger with the other. The dagger catches Merle in the thigh and he releases a pained roar. Gettin’ rusty, Merle thinks as he clutches the hilt of the dagger. Pulling it easily from where its buried in his flesh, causing a warm, wet gush to stain his thigh.
Two similar howls echo Merle’s—a worried question in the sounds. He whispers for his sons to remain at their posts. Assuming Tallulah’s silence means that she is hiding from whichever damned kid of Beaufort’s she’s up against. She’s fast and but not a killer. Of the three Merle worries over Tallulah the most.
Let it be Beau, that boy’ll let her go.
Guns are man’s evil. Merle has never stooped to owning one. However, he’s not against combat weapons and while Beaufort is cocking his gun Merle takes the opportunity to throw his own dagger. He’s not looking to kill Beaufort—the man is an established person in this community and his death would bring more troubles than the joy of ending him is worth. Law enforcement snooping around or possibly other hunters—coming to avenge a highly respected retired man—isn’t the sort of disturbance Merle needs. Nobody Merle wants knocking at his door.
He promised his long-gone love he’d stay in that home until the day he drew his last breath. So that Merle could be laid beside her in the same square of earth. Merle’s not breaking that promise for anyone—let alone an old sonofabitch like Beaufort fucking Savage.
The dagger Merle throws embeds into the bicep of Beaufort’s dominant arm, and he fumbles his weapon enough for Merle to sprint closer. To grab it out of Beaufort’s hands.
Though the blessed silver stings, Merle wrenches it from Beaufort’s still strong grasp. Merle tosses the weapon far behind him. Listening to the satisfying clatter of metal against earth.
“I don’t want to kill you, son. But I will if I have to.” He hisses as he grabs ahold of the front of Beaufort’s button-up shirt. Hauling him close enough to rumble the words in Beaufort’s face.
Beaufort laughs. Tobacco pungent spittle smacks Merle’s cheek. “You were never my intended target, you old fool.”
Merle listens—straining his ear. He cannot hear Tallulah’s heartbeat.
Tallulah Rose…not my girl.
He’s about to start tearing into this vile man when a cloud of fine powder hits him in the face.
Merle’s world goes black and silent.
17
Tanner
Violet and Beau are on the roof. Looking like monsters from old fables come to life.
Hunters in the night…
While he and Judson stand opposite of them, Tanner has a sudden moment of doubt. Both Savage children have been raised to kill. Tanner is in the business of killing animals for money and to eat. He’s not sure he can kill another person.
Not again.
Not now that they’ve settled their debts and made their peace with the Children of Michael.
An eye for an eye—a loved one for a loved one.
No matter how much he can’t stand the annoyances standing in front of him, fouling up his air, Tanner’s not sure he wants to be back in the business of killing people.
Beau’s always been a bully, and the bastard starts right in on the taunts.
“Always knew you mutts would need putting down,” he begins without much creativity. The same shit he’s been muttering since high school when Jud got to be varsity quarterback and Beau came
second string. He’s always been falling below Jud in all things—forever a pace behind. Beau’s still desperate to be exactly where Tanner’s brother stands.
Tanner doesn’t doubt that Beau’s jealousy lies rooted in the truth of what Judson is—an animal of a man but still better than Beau Savage can ever hope to become.
“Thought you’d be able to do better than that by now, Beau.” Judson replies with a calm Tanner envies. Tanner, on the other hand, is wound like a too tight fishing line. One that will snap with the slightest provocation. “But you never were very smart, were you, son?” Even Violet has a a smirk on her face from Judson’s jab.
An expression that has Beau sending Violet a murderous glance. She shrugs without care, “He got you good.”
“Well,” Beau mutters in his mutinous way. “I’ll have one up on him when I get Miss Jorie to marry me.”
That, Tanner notices, causes Judson to flinch.
Even still, Jud shoots Beau a cocky grin. “That’ll be hard to do. She’s already had a lil bit of Grace in her and I hear it’s hard to go back from that.”
Tanner knows his brother doesn’t kiss and tell. Judson must be pissed beyond reason if he’s spilling romantic truths to the world. Especially ones about Jorie Madison.
“You fucking bastard,” Beau shouts.
Rushing Judson is foolish. Beau does so anyways and Jud takes him down so hard, on the roof, that Tanner’s afraid the beams are going to cave in beneath them.
Beau gasps out a cough. “Goddamnit.”
Jud clicks his tongue, “I’m gonna have to tell your preacher about that blasphemy, Beau Savage.” Jud presses his boot down against Beau’s thick throat. Calmly, he continues, “Or I can send you straight to God now, and let him sort you out. What do you think?”
The Grace of a Savage Page 7
