by Fiona Starr
I arch a brow at him. “Little spoon, huh? Maybe I should have stuck around.”
Marco lifts my chin and kisses me again. “Don’t get any ideas.”
“Why not? That could be hot. Like, really hot,” I say, eyeing them both. With all the times the three of us have romped in the sack together, they’ve never made a move in that direction. But now the mental picture sends a rush of heat right to my core.
The two of them glance at each other awkwardly and look away. Angus punches Marco’s shoulder and continues walking.
The three of them call themselves brothers, but they aren’t biological siblings. Van is definitely the leader of their little pack, though they have said many times that they haven’t lived by pack rules for some time now, whatever that means. Van did have a biological brother, a twin named Tobias who was killed by Damon Underwood, vampire founder of the Society of Ancient Magic, headmaster of Blakeborne university, and the man they’ve come here to kill.
Van marches past us, his breath coming in white puffs. He doesn’t look at me, he just starts undressing, laying his coat out like a blanket on the snow and folding the rest of his clothes inside. He’s not at all shy about being naked in front of me or the others, none of them are. Though I really do enjoy watching them get ready to shift.
My phone chimes again, this time with a call instead of a text. I pull it out of my pocket to switch it off, but it slips out of my hands into the snow. Marco grabs it and hands it back to me as the ringing stops and a pair of texts come through.
“Is everything all right?” he asks, noticing my discomfort.
I nod and try to smile, but the way he looks at me makes me want to throw myself into his arms. Marco wouldn’t turn his back on me because of what my father did, would he? I mean, when we first made love, he confessed his own secret to me, worried that he wasn’t worthy of my love, worried that I had changed my mind.
Part of me knows that he wouldn’t turn away. But I can’t shake the fear.
Marco wipes away my tears with his thumb and crouches down to my eye level. “Hey. What’s all this?”
I shake my head, forcing myself not to cry. I’m being ridiculous. “It’s my sister. She keeps asking me why I am not there with them for the holiday.”
His brow furrows and I know he’s curious about that very same thing. But he won’t ask. He didn’t ask what happened when Porter Allbright attacked me, and he isn’t going to ask about this. “You don’t owe anyone explanations about anything. If you decide to share your reasons, then you’ll do it on your terms. When you’re ready.” He takes my phone and switches it to silent and then slides it into his coat. “This will keep. You don’t have to make any decisions about it right now.”
“Thank you,” I whisper. “I can’t go home. There’s so much… Kate said that…”
He presses his finger to my lips and shakes his head. “You don’t have to explain to me, either. Until and unless you’re ready.” He turns to the others. “Good news, boys. Joely’s staying with us.”
“Awesome.” Angus’s smile lights up his face. “Isn’t that awesome, Van?”
Van blows into his fists and glares at me. “You guys coming, or what? It’s fucking freezing out here.” He moves toward the trees and in a flash his body shifts into his giant dire wolf. Van’s human feet morph into huge paws, and his white fur shines golden in the sun.
Angus watches Van bound away as he undresses. “Don’t worry about him, Joely. He wants you here as much as we do.”
“I don’t know about that,” I say. I glance into the forest after him, but I’ve lost Van with all the snow.
“You know you can stay for as long as you like.” Marco steps out of his boots and hurries to undress. I can’t help but admire the two of them, standing naked in front of me.
“We have an extra room you can use,” Angus says.
Marco holds up his hands. “Wait a second. I’m pretty happy with the sleeping arrangements as they are.” He pulls me to him again and laughs.
“Oh really?” I say, playing. My face flushes because the last few days have been spent with Angus and Marco in Marco’s king-sized bed.
Angus grabs my hand. “I’m serious. I love having you with us. But staying doesn’t mean you have to… every night… you know?”
“Ride me?” Marco says with a waggle of his brows, which makes the three of us laugh.
“She rode you last night,” Angus says.
Every night at sunset, the boys have taken their wolves for a run, and they’ve taken me with them. I take turns riding on the backs of Angus or Marco, since Van is clearly not interested.
“Very funny. But, Angus is right. It’s his turn. Wouldn’t want it to seem like I am playing favorites.”
“You don’t have a favorite?” Angus asks with a wink.
“You’re all my favorite,” I say. And I mean it. Even Van.
The sky is starting to glow now as the sun drops closer to the horizon. It’s Solstice Eve, one more day before the shortest day of the year, and I’m not at home with my family for the first time in my life. I am here and I feel so alive and there is nowhere else I would rather be.
The air moves as Angus and Marco shift, and suddenly I’m standing between two wolves the size of the biggest draught horses I can imagine. Angus bows down to let me climb on, and I grab handfuls of his shaggy gray fur as I settle behind his withers. Marco’s a blur of blackness as he dashes off into the woods.
We watch the dark wolf go. Angus’s body vibrates beneath me with anticipation. I squeeze my knees and pull my feet in tight against his ribcage, slowing my breath to match his rhythm. I lean down onto his thick neck and rub my face over the back of his pointed ear. “Let’s go,” I whisper as I grab on tight.
Angus takes off like a shot, forcing every single thought out of my head. All except one tiny word that hums in the back of my mind.
Mine.
Chapter Three
JOELY
It’s full dark by the time we get back to the house, and the mood among the guys is festive. After a delicious pre-holiday meal prepared by Marco featuring handmade veggie pizza, salad, and several bottles of red wine, we all move into the living room and settle in around the fire.
I sip my wine and admire the lights and decorations all around the room, from the holiday tree to the pine boughs and red berries draped over the mantel. “I feel like I’m sitting in a postcard,” I say.
Angus smiles. “You can thank Salma for that. She was really big into the holidays. Made us swear that we’d keep doing this for her.”
Marco scoffs. “As I recall, you’re the one who got upset when we voted to only have one tree this year.”
Angus shrugs sheepishly. “What can I say? I love the holidays and I want to keep doing it for Salma.”
“That’s really sweet,” I say, recalling the things they’ve told me about the witch who was practically a mother to them. Salma found them years after they’d escaped from the vampires. She took them in and gave them a home, all while teaching them about their magic as she raised them into men.
“I’m making all of her favorite dishes tomorrow,” Marco says.
“Really? I’d love to hear more about her.”
“You would have loved Salma,” Angus says.
Marco touches my hand. “And she would have loved you. Though she’d be pissed that we are—”
“Marco.” Van cuts him off and shoots his brother an angry glare.
Marco shrugs. “What? Are we supposed to pretend that she didn’t—”
“Enough!” Van pushes his wine glass onto the table and storms out of the room without another word. His footsteps pound the stairs as he goes up and after a moment, his departure is punctuated by the slamming of his bedroom door.
Marco drops into a chair next to me and rubs his face in his hands. “That guy really needs to chill out.”
Angus leans into me and squeezes my shoulder. “Don’t worry about Van. He was really close to Salma.�
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“I’m sorry if I said something I shouldn’t have,” I say.
Angus shakes his head. “Before she died, Salma made us promise that we wouldn’t come after Underwood. She didn’t like the way Van was so focused on avenging Tobias. She said that revenge was for the weak. She said that a life for a life was a hollow victory. That nothing would quench that flame.”
Marco joins him and the two of them speak in unison, their voices small and craggy in an what I assume is an impersonation of Salma. “And if you let it burn forever, it will devour you too, Harry VanDemaar.”
They mean it to be a fun memory, but their words ring through the room with a chilly pall.
Angus sits up straighter next to me. “The first thing Van did after Salma died was magic his way into the Society. He worked forever on a spell to make the three of us test as having Ancient Magic, which, we obviously don’t have. It took him years. But in the end, he went against Salma’s dying wish so the three of us could be here.”
“Because of Underwood?” I ask.
Marco nods. “Yeah. Van was sure that coming here was the next thing the prophecy needed. Nothing had progressed at all with it for the longest time. We were starting to doubt it was real. Salma was against it, but Van thought the prophecy needed a push. Turns out he was right.”
“What do you mean?” I ask. “How do you know he was right?”
Marco looks up at me and smiles. “Because of you. You’re the Nightbird. You found us and because of you we destroyed the Vessel and ended Damon’s hold over us. We’re free for the first time in ages, Joely. We can be our wolves without fear that he can track us.”
“But he’s still out there. He’s still a powerful vampire. Isn’t it more dangerous not knowing where he is?” I ask.
Angus shrugs. “Damon will be back. Van is certain that this isn’t over. It won’t be over until that vampire is dead. But Van’s convinced that with you here we will finally put an end to Damon Underwood.”
I shake off a shiver. “I don’t know how you can be so relaxed knowing there’s a vampire out there who wants you dead.”
Angus takes a sip of wine. “He’s been hunting us since 1844. Since the day we killed his sons and escaped. After more than a hundred and seventy-five years, it stops keeping us up at night.”
Marco adds, “And now that his magical tracking device is no more, it’s leveled things a bit. I’d say it maybe even tips things in our favor. He still doesn’t know who we are.”
“Oh my god. I almost forgot.” I slide my glass onto the coffee table and get up. “I have something for you.” I hurry into the foyer as I gather up my courage. I realize now that I have to tell them about what Kate said—that the authorities are looking for a wolf to answer for the attack on Porter Allbright. But that means I have to explain why Mr. Allbright came after me in the first place, which means I can’t keep my secret from the guys, which means I need to give them my gifts before they have a chance to send me away.
I hate feeling so unsure, but if I am going to bare everything to them, I want to make sure they know where I stand. I have to make them see how much I care about all of them, even if what I am about to tell them makes them question whether or not I belong here. My bag sits on the bench near the door. I toss open the flap and pull out three little packages and hurry back down the hall.
Van stops at the bottom of the stairs and waits for me to pass. I stop short and look up at him, holding his gaze and willing him to stop scowling at me. If he can’t smile, then maybe he can just go neutral instead of always being so angry at me.
“I have something for you,” I say, feeling my face flush.
“Okay,” he says, still standing on the bottom step. He seems neither curious nor interested. It’s like he can see into my thoughts.
Suddenly my small gifts feel stupid and meaningless. “For all of you, I mean.” I wrestled with myself for days about whether to give these gifts to them, but after what Kate said earlier today, I know that I have to. I step back into the living room and drop onto the couch, waiting for Van to come back inside.
My mouth has gone dry. “I have something for the three of you. It’s nothing much. But I wanted—”
Van appears at the door. “Joely, wait. Before you do that. I… We need to give you something first.”
Marco’s eyebrows shoot up. “Really? I thought you said…”
Van moves over to the large wooden desk near the window and pulls open the drawer. “Never mind what I said. I’ve changed my mind.”
Angus looks at Van with real surprise on his face. “After everything? Are you shitting me?”
I have no idea what they’re talking about, but whatever it is, it’s obviously important.
Van shakes his head at Angus and sits on the edge of the coffee table, holding out a small box wrapped in red paper with a shiny silver bow. “I need you to have this before you do whatever it is you’re about to do.” Van’s face is almost soft as he hands the box to me.
I look at each of them in turn, an odd sense of worry washing through me. But he’s handing me a present, so I shouldn’t be nervous, right? Marco smiles warmly and rubs my knee. Angus looks like a little kid about to meet Santa Claus.
I pull on the edges of the silver ribbon and undo the bow, letting it fall to the floor as I tear open the red paper. It’s a square cardboard box, no larger than a paperback novel. I lift the lid and find a green velvet jewelry box inside. I look at the three of them again as I flip the box open.
Inside, laid out on a green velvet cushion, is a circular medallion on a thick gold chain. The medallion is about the size of a silver dollar and it depicts a wolf and a raven in a yin and yang design, with the wolf howling in profile and morphing into a blackbird mid-flight. The two are joined together as one being as they circle around and around.
“The chain is like ours,” Angus says, running his hands over his own necklace. The necklace they all wear. The one Salma made for them that kept them in their human forms so they could conceal their wolf natures from Damon’s tracker.
“It’s…” I don’t know what to think. It’s too much. They should wait until they know who I really am before they give me anything so valuable.
“Salma made this for you,” Van says. “For the Nightbird. The gold is imbued with protection. She knew you would find us one day, and she wanted you to have this.”
I pull the necklace out of the box and fiddle with the clasp. My hands are shaking, and I don’t have any words, but I feel like something very big is happening here, some threshold has been crossed for me and Van. I don’t know why, but I want so badly to make him happy.
Van takes the necklace from my shaking hands. I shift on the couch and pull my hair over one shoulder so he can place it around my neck. His fingers brush softly against my neck as he does the clasp. “There.”
As soon as the metal settles on my skin, a ripple of magic rolls through my body. It’s like I’m made of water and the medallion is a pebble dropped into me. The magic undulates up over my head and through my hair, down my torso, and out to my fingertips and the bottoms of my feet. I close my eyes and take in the sensation and I’m bombarded with the sense of them. The power of these men, these wolves. They feel like a field of impenetrable energy. And it’s not just the three of them. I feel something else too. It’s new and at the same time familiar. It’s…
“Tobias.” Angus gapes at me. I meet his gaze and I feel the sense of desire and awe wrapped in his earthy essence. It’s like his energy has become a physical thing, joining with mine and grounding me right here in this moment.
Marco gasps as he stares. His bubbly airiness surrounds me and I swear I can feel it brush against the tiny hairs all over my skin. He falls back against the cushions, stunned. “Amazing. It’s him. Can you feel it? Can you feel him, Van?”
Van’s face goes pale as his cool, fluid energy wraps itself fully around me. He’s inches away from me. I could slide my hand forward in my lap and touch him, bu
t something makes me hold back. Something in his eyes. Van wasn’t expecting this.
He blinks as if he’s confused. “I had no idea. I… She never said…” His breath catches.
I place my hand over the medallion and breathe deeply, feeling the sensation of the four of them settle just a tiny bit. I feel so close with all of them, like we’re one person… almost. But that isn’t exactly right.
Awesome. I don’t know how I know it, but that word comes from Angus. I can’t hear him say the actual word, but I can tell that’s what he’s thinking as clearly as if he had.
Marco is smiling at me and when I focus on him, all I get is an overwhelming sense of devotion from him. I get the sense that he’s thinking about the three of us in bed and the thought makes him really, really happy.
“What is this?” I ask, turning to Van, wanting to feel his cool watery cocoon again. But when I focus my attention on him, it’s like a dark wall has been put up, blocking me out.
He shakes his head. “I wasn’t expecting…” Van says. “Salma said…”
“What?” I ask. “What’s wrong?”
Van won’t look at me. “Salma said this was meant for you. That we would know when it was time. I didn’t expect… I can’t do this.” He turns away, his face flushed as he walks out of the living room and leaves me there, staring after him, wondering what the hell is going on. I hear him head down the hall and grab his coat from the hook, then head outside into the snow. A patch of cold air rolls through the room from the hall.
“What just happened?” I ask. I feel like something died.
Angus takes my hand and smiles. “Give him some time.”
“Time for what?” I ask.
“I don’t know. Just time.”
Chapter Four
JOELY
Angus and Marco and I sit up in Marco’s bed, talking about Tobias until well past midnight. It’s weird hearing them describe Van’s twin, as if I wouldn’t recognize him if I saw him in person. It’s strange to think of another Van. An identical twin. But it’s also oddly comforting to be able to picture his brother so clearly.