by CJ Cooke
“Okay, I’m ready,” Aidan said, giving Grey a cautious look, no doubt sensing that something wasn’t right.
“Grey should go first,” Calli said quietly. “We should go in order of importance in case there isn’t enough ink.”
“That makes you last,” Grey sneered at Aidan.
He might as well have punched him in the face for all it was worth. We didn’t assign rank in this pack. We never had. It was the one thing we were all adamant about when we formed the pack—no one was more important than any other pack member. Grey might have been pissed right now, but that didn’t mean he got to take it out on the rest of us.
“Just get it done and then go and cool off,” Tanner snapped at Grey. “You’re no use to the pack when your emotions are all over the place like this. We need your head in the game.”
Grey locked eyes with him, and the situation had the potential to spiral quickly out of control. Something was going on with Grey. This wasn’t like him at all. His alpha power slowly started to seep out into the room. It felt like an invisible fog creeping out, wrapping around us. It wasn’t the comforting embrace it usually was, this was tainted with his anger, and it was so much more powerful than I’d ever felt before.
Tanner cast his eyes to the ground, and the alpha power was sucked from the room as Grey seemed to realise what he was doing. Dropping to the ground in front of Aidan, Grey grunted, “Back of the neck,” and proceeded to ignore everyone else and what had just happened.
Calli wandered away to the bookshelves, withdrawing from the situation, and I couldn’t blame her. It was probably for the best, if I was honest. Tanner watched her with sad eyes before he looked at me in panic. I just shrugged at him again; what was there to say? This was Grey’s problem to sort out. I nodded my head over at Calli, and he moved across to the bookcase, wrapping his arms around her as she looked through the books on the shelves. She stiffened in surprise but as soon as she realised it was Tanner, she relaxed into his embrace, and I saw the tension drain out of his shoulders. Calli took a moment to soak up the comfort her mate was offering her, and then she turned back to the books and started to pull some from the shelf. She and Tanner started murmuring together as they looked at the small pile she was selecting.
I turned back to Aidan and Grey as a worried looking Aidan finished the last prep steps of where Grey was getting the tattoo, and then with a sigh, he started the tattoo gun and leant in to make the design. Thankfully, it wouldn’t take him long.
I almost felt lost for a moment, stuck between two places and not knowing where to turn. Grey was my brother and my alpha, something wasn’t right with him at the moment, and I needed to do something. I wanted to understand, to try and help him work through it, anything! But Calli was my mate, and his terse words and cold manner were hurting her. She didn’t deserve that, she hadn’t done anything wrong, and even if she had, Grey should be adult enough to talk to her. Whatever this was, he’d regret it, and he was at risk of damaging the very new relationship he was forming with Calli.
In the end, I just stayed where I was, watching both sides cautiously, ready to move to wherever I was needed. It didn’t take Aidan long to tattoo the rune onto Grey’s neck. As soon as he told Grey it was done, Grey was back on his feet and striding to the door.
“Do Tanner next. I’ll let the rest of the pack know to come here and receive the tattoo.” And then he was gone. He didn’t say anything to Calli or the rest of us. The dismissal was well and truly felt by all.
“Fucking, fuck,” Tanner murmured under his breath as he moved past me to Aidan. Rolling up his shirt sleeve, Tanner knelt in front of Aidan and tapped the inside of his forearm.
I didn’t need to watch to know what Aidan was going to do. I’d seen him tattoo the others to know that he’d be cleaning down his equipment and then getting straight to work on Tanner. It wouldn’t take long. The tattoo itself only took a few minutes.
Not being needed to stand sentry any more, I turned to Calli and went to join her. She was pulling books from the shelves and starting to flick through them before either adding them to her pile or putting them back on the shelf.
“How do you know what you’re looking for?” I asked in interest.
“I already know there wasn’t anything in the books we looked at before about shadow demons, so I’m putting those back and pulling out the unfamiliar ones,” she shrugged. It was a good idea. It would save us from going over old ground. “We should have tried to keep them in the same order,” she sighed, looking at the shelves with tears in her eyes. I had a feeling it wasn’t the books that were making her look like that, but I wasn’t going to say anything in front of the others.
Blake and Nash came to join us in the room. Nash looked the most excited I’d ever seen him to see all the books being moved into the packhouse. I knew he’d been desperate to go through them the last time, but it just hadn’t worked out that way at the time. He’d be keen to help out this time, and if the situation were as time-sensitive as it seemed to be, we’d probably all be on research duty for the next couple of days.
“We’re going to need some more chairs in here,” I said randomly as I looked around the room.
Calli nodded and looked over by the window with a sad smile on her face. “I can’t believe you all did this for me. I ordered a desk the other day that would be perfect for by the window. It’s going to be delivered in a couple of days.”
“Grey did it,” I told her. He was being an ass, but she needed to know it wasn’t how he really felt. “He wanted to do this for you on his own. I think it was supposed to be a surprise, and you weren’t supposed to see it until it was finished.”
She looked sad, and even though I felt guilty for making her look that way, I could see the glimmer of appreciation in her eyes that Grey would do this for her.
“After I get mine done, let’s take some food up to my room, and we can look for a sofa to order,” I suggested. It was way past dinner time, and I knew Calli hadn’t eaten for hours. There was leftover pizza from dinner we could reheat. We really needed to learn how to cook more than just steak and burgers.
“That sounds nice.” She didn’t look at me as she spoke, and I could hear the distraction in her voice. “What about the kids?”
“Jean has tucked them all up in bed,” Blake said as he came over to join us. “Grey told us to come in here. What’s going on?”
“Aidan and Calli saw what they believed to be a shadow demon at the edge of the warding. We’re keying the pack into the wards with the tattoo now, and then we need to establish if they saw what they think they saw,” I filled him in.
Blake’s eyes widened in shock, but then he turned to the boxes still filled with books on the ground. “If we get these shelved, it will at least make that a bit easier,” he said, ripping open the next box and starting to empty the contents. Nash eagerly joined him, even if he wasn’t getting quite as much done because the books were just too big of a temptation for him.
Aidan finished up with Tanner and was cleaning his equipment when he waved me over.
“You’re up next, then I need to know who else we’re doing and in what order.”
Tanner nodded and moved over to Calli, wrapping an arm around her waist and pulling her into his side. He dipped his head down and whispered into her ear, his words only for her. A single tear ran down her face as she nodded before kissing him softly on the lips. With a sigh, Tanner leant his forehead against Calli’s and just as I felt the buzzing tattoo needle against my chest, he pulled himself away from her and strode out of the door.
29
Calli
“We all love you so much it’s hard to see reality outside of that,” Tanner whispered in my ear. “Please don’t judge him too harshly. He’s scared, and he’s never had to deal with that emotion before.”
I felt the tear run down my cheek, and I didn’t even try to stop it. My heart was hurting, not because of how Grey had so roughly dealt with it, but because I knew Tanner w
as right. My mate was in pain right now, and he was lashing out. I should’ve seen that rather than raising my defences and not seeing the situation for what it was.
Gently kissing Tanner, I could feel his love radiating back at me in the way he gently pressed his lips against my own. His hand at my waist clung to me as he pulled me as close as he could. I knew there was so much more he wanted right now, but time just wasn’t on our side, and Grey’s need was the most important thing for both of us right now.
Tanner leant his forehead against mine, and the soft, content smile on his lips screamed volumes for how he truly felt. I could feel his reluctance as he pulled away from me with a sigh, striding out the door in search of his alpha and friend.
I looked across to where River was sitting getting his tattoo done. He’d leant back on his hands as Aidan concentrated on making a replica of the rune on his chest. I licked my lips as I took in the sight of my shirtless mate lounging on the floor as Aidan gave him the tattoo I prayed would protect them. The gentle laugh from Blake behind me reminded me that not only were we not alone, but the others were very much aware of the thoughts moving through my mind right now.
Turning to Blake and Nash, a blush heating my face as they both grinned in amusement at me.
“We can get these books shelved and organised, Calli. Maybe you should go rest, and we can get into this properly in the morning,” Blake suggested.
If that wasn’t embarrassing, I didn’t know what was.
“Thanks, but this is too important to put off until the morning,” I murmured before going back to the books I’d been looking through. I might be avoiding talking to the pack about how I’d much rather be screwing my mate right now, but I was serious. This was too important for us to keep putting it off.
I’d added two more books to my pile when I felt River move up behind me.
“Calli, you can’t run forever on nothing. You haven’t eaten for hours…”
Before River could finish, Hunter and Cassia walked into the library. Hunter quietly closed the door behind him, checking the corridor before he did.
“Tanner and Grey sent me across to get the rune tattoo, and they thought Cassia might be able to help you identify what you saw. They’re going to run interference with Maverick for us.”
I nodded sadly. I didn’t like how we were all treating Maverick like the enemy. Logically, I knew we shouldn’t trust him. He’d been sent here by his father, and if there was one thing we knew about the Councillor, it was that he hated Tanner. I was pretty sure he hated me too; he didn’t do anything unless something was in it for him. But my heart was telling me we needed to give Maverick a chance. We needed to show him what it was like to be part of a proper family. To show him he could be loved, and nothing was expected of him in return. At the moment, I didn’t feel like we were any better than his father. We might not be treating him as poorly as I suspected he’d been in his childhood, but we weren’t exactly doing a bang-up job of proving to him that we were better.
“You go next, Hunter, then you can get Cassia back to the house as quickly as possible,” River suggested. Everyone else agreed, and I was surprised they’d accepted Hunter so readily into the group when he was probably sent here initially with the exact same purpose Maverick had—to infiltrate the pack. How was it any different?
“I think we’ll have enough ink. In fact, we might even have a bit leftover,” Aidan told us, holding up the ink bottle and peering inside as Hunter took up position in front of him and rolled up his sleeve.
Cassia came over to join me by the books, and I could see the awe on her face as she swept her eyes over the shelves.
“Incredible,” she murmured, slowly reaching out a hand to touch them before she snatched it away, almost like she was afraid to. Shaking her head, she turned to me instead. “Tell me about the creature you saw on the edge of your wards.”
“It was some kind of humanoid form, but it was almost like it was made out of liquid shadows. You could sort of see through it, and the shadows were running off it, dripping to the ground, and then they seemed to move on their own to reabsorb back into it.” I shuddered as I recalled the creature we’d watched—so close to the packhouse, so close to the kids.
Cassia nodded thoughtfully. “It definitely sounds like how a shadow demon was described to me. A creature formed from the corrupted shadows of the souls it harvested. I’ve never seen one, though, thankfully.”
“As if it wasn’t fucking creepy enough,” Aidan swore from his seat. “The corrupted shadows of the souls it’s harvested, are you fucking shitting me right now?”
There was an edge of panic in his voice. We were all feeling it.
“How do we even fight something like that?” I murmured to myself as the reality of our situation slapped me in the face.
Cassia just shrugged and turned back to the bookcase with a curious look. “Not a clue. I don’t think anyone has even tried before. The advice I got was if you see one, run for your life.”
“Filling us with confidence there, babe,” Hunter muttered from the ground. He had his teeth clenched as Aidan finished up his tattoo. He didn’t seem to be a massive fan of the needle, which was quite funny given the burly shifter’s size.
Cassia blushed at his use of the word babe, and she looked at the books like they held the answers to all her problems—they probably did, but it was a definite avoidance tactic right now. I should know. I’d been doing it just moments before.
She reached out for the books again before she snatched back her hand and frowned at it.
“Why do you keep doing that?” Nash asked, looking at her curiously.
“There’s a barrier spell on these books. I cannot touch them.”
Nash looked at the book in his hand and then at Cassia, almost like he didn’t believe her.
“It must be spelled against witches,” Cassia explained, and he nodded like he was trying to say he’d already known that. Blake just chuckled in amusement next to him, not buying it, no doubt like the rest of us.
“That’s going to make this whole process a lot more difficult,” I said in concern. “I have no formal magical training. We were counting on your help to get us through this.”
This was really fucking bad.
“There may be a way around it,” Cassia shrugged. “But all I could really offer you would be another pair of eyes for reading. As I said, I know very little about the creatures. In fact, I’ve made it my life’s mission to avoid them. I’ll be on hand for any questions, though.”
That didn’t sound as helpful as I think she thought it did. She might not know anything about this particular subject, but she would be an invaluable resource to us.
“All done, next,” Aidan chirped, cutting through the silence in the room as he started to clean his equipment again. At least there was only Nash and Blake left to go.
Nash and Blake looked at each other in question, and then with a shrug, Nash went over to Aidan to take a seat. They were right. It didn’t matter who went next if there was plenty of ink for all of them.
As Aidan concentrated on cleaning his equipment, he gave me a quick side-eye before he quietly said, “You need to tell them everything that happened.”
My spine stiffened at his words. He was right. I should have said something earlier, but I was still trying to lie to myself that it had all been in my head.
“What does he mean, Calli?” River said, pulling out his school teacher voice like he was getting ready to chastise me. It was strangely hot.
With a reluctant sigh, I started to explain. “Something weird and absolutely fucking terrifying happened when we saw the shadow demon,” I admitted.
River’s eyes hardened, and I knew I was in trouble. Hell, Grey was going to absolutely lose it when he found out. He was going through so much, and I didn’t want to lay this at his feet at the same time.
“I don’t even know how to describe it. We were hiding, watching what it was doing, and then, it suddenly turned and locked
eyes with me. It was… it was almost like I went somewhere else. Like when I looked into its eyes, I was transported somewhere else. I know that sounds crazy. But I found myself somewhere dark and cold. I couldn’t see anything around me, but it felt… it felt like something was watching me from inside the darkness—a lot of somethings.”
River quickly spun to look at Cassia. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t really need to. The question was clear—what the fuck?
Cassia had listened to my story with interest, a crease of concern on her forehead. “How did you get out?” she asked.
“Aidan bit me,” I shrugged.
“I, erm, didn’t know what else to do,” Aidan cringed. “She was just completely out of it, and I couldn’t get her to respond.”
Cassia nodded thoughtfully. “I don’t know what happened, but I think it’s safe to say, if you see another one, if any of us see another one, don’t look it in the eye.”
Don’t look at the monsters, Abby’s little voice echoed through my mind. Is that what she’d meant the first day we’d brought her to the packhouse? It couldn’t be, surely. It had to be a coincidence.
“There’s nothing we can do tonight,” Cassia added quietly.
“Yeah, don’t take this the wrong way, Calli, but you look exhausted,” Blake said with a visible wince like he was waiting for a comeback. I just laughed because he wasn’t wrong; I was. It had been a stressful day, to say the least. “Why don’t you go and get something to eat and rest like River suggested, and we can get the rest of the books put away and sorted.”
I wanted to argue, but my stomach was starting to hurt with how hungry I was, and I needed to check on Jacob and the other kids. River must’ve seen I was about to cave because he took hold of my hand and started to pull me out of the room, shouting thanks to the others as he did.
I shook my head but followed him. Blake was right. We wouldn’t get much done until we had all the books sorted. Yes, it would go faster if I was helping, but then I was probably guaranteed to fall asleep while I was trying to read them. If I recharged for a bit now, I could at least get some solid research work in for a couple of hours before the kids got up.
