by Mason Sabre
She drained her glass and closed her eyes as she did. When she took the last swallow, she exhaled through her nose and then opened her eyes again. “You were taking too long. He needed you to take Gemma away.”
Cade frowned, his wolf grinding to a halt inside. He felt his irises flare, the world tinged with colour for a second. “He has a funny way of showing it. It is his fault she is mated, not mine.”
“You don’t understand,” Emily said. “His hands were tied. He is head of the Council, head of the pack. He …”
“He made that choice. At the end, it was him. He told us that this had to stop. Okay? That was him. Now she is upstairs with her mate, her heart broken because I have a mate too. We have this fucking wall between us that no matter how many times we climbed it, you, and him … you all kept putting a new layer on the top till it was impossible for us to climb over. Now I can’t see her. I can’t touch her. I can’t even fucking go to her when she is upstairs in my parents’ house. Do you have any idea what that does to me?” He walked back to the counter where he had started and slammed his glass down. Leaning with both hands on the edge, he rocked against his heels, trying to calm himself down when all he wanted to do was charge upstairs. “You should have helped us instead of fighting against us for a show to the Others.”
“Malcolm does what he has to do.”
Cade scoffed again. “That’s a cop out and you know it. Whatever is going on, if he had come to us …” He paused and swallowed, then he looked back and met Emily’s gaze. “Are you saying your husband is weak, Emily? Is that what it is? That his hands were so tied he ended up selling his daughter off, for what? I don't even know. You both do all this stuff … these games. One minute you’re telling me not to give up, the next, you’re giving me the cold shoulder and he’s threatening her with my death. Now this … what is it that you want?”
“Peace,” she said after a moment’s pause. “Peace and safety for my children … for my daughters.”
“Then why the games? Why push her to mate with someone else?”
Emily stood alone in the middle of the kitchen. She had gone from a woman who seemed larger than life, to something smaller. A sadness cloaked her right then, like a dark cloud wrapping itself around her. “He mated her with Karl to keep her—”
“Safe?” He stepped closer to her. Two long strides and he was in front of her. She put her purse and glass down. His shoulders squared. “I would have kept her safe.” He jabbed a finger at his own chest. “Me. I would have died for her if I had to. No one … I swear, no one in this world would ever touch her,” he paused, searching Emily’s eyes and letting his own anger simmer a little. “Didn’t he think I could?”
“Your father found you. He knows …”
“I am not afraid of my father.”
She shook her head and cast her gaze down. “There is so much you don’t understand. When your father—”
“Tell me,” Cade said. “Let me understand.”
She lifted her eyes again and stared at Cade, searching his face. “It’s too late now. You have a child on the way. You aren’t going to abandon that no matter how much it tears you apart. Not even for Gemma. She knows too.”
Cade gritted his teeth, sucked in a breath and stared back at her. His chest constricted so much that it felt like his heart was being crushed beneath his ribs, tearing into more shattered pieces than he could ever imagine. Pain ran through his veins … his pain … his agony, and every ounce of love he felt for Gemma rode through him like someone had taken a rose and pulled its thorny stem through his body.
For the first time, Emily’s eyes welled, they glistened with hues of green. She raised a hand to his face and cupped his cheek. “Promise me you will always keep her safe. Even if you have Natalie and she has Karl … I trust you. No matter what happens. You keep her safe.”
“You know I would.”
“And Evie,” she said. “Both of my girls, okay? Whatever happens next, you follow your heart and keep them safe. I don’t care what you have to do. Malcolm doesn’t care, either. You might not believe that, but I promise you. The only reason he ever let Gemma move out of the pack house in the first place was, so he couldn’t see what he needed you to do. He could play his role as alpha and pretend you were both fooling him.” She swallowed and then raised her other hand to the other side of his face. “You’ve always been like a son … part of my family, part of hers. Even if you can’t be with her, you keep her with you. Somehow.” She smiled. “Even if you have to hit her over the head and drag her.”
“Emily …”
“Promise me.”
He raised his hands to hers and held her at the wrists. She lowered her hands then, and he held them between them. “You’re talking like something big is coming.”
Emily only nodded, then she slipped her hands from his and picked her bag back up off the counter. She took out a piece of paper. Cade stayed back as she scribbled something down. “One day. Not today, but maybe soon. I think … You two find this man. He will help you.” She handed him the piece of torn paper. “And don’t you ever look back.”
She walked out then, leaving Cade to stand there, more unanswered questions lodged in his throat. He opened the piece of paper she had given to him. “Nick Mason,” it said, and then she’d scribbled some numbers he did not understand what they were for. A code … something … but who the hell was this man?
Chapter 37
Gemma
When Gemma came down the stairs and into the main hallway, some fifteen minutes later, the world had changed. Not the world around her, but the one that existed in her head. There was a cold, hard fracture that had made its way into her heart. A wound she knew, even then, she would never heal from. Every breath she took was laboured, like if she were to just stop … just pause, maybe she wouldn’t breathe at all. She moved with limbs weighted down with a sudden heaviness she couldn’t even put into words. She was tired inside her own mind even though she had done nothing to bring it on. Everything about the world she was used to, bordered somewhere on her radar now, as alien. She was out of place … not belonging in that space anymore.
Two years had passed since Stephen had died, yet, standing there, she felt the most loss without him right then. If she could just close her eyes … just reach to him and have him wrap her in that familiar brotherly embrace, she would have. She’d have given her life just to feel that from him right then.
Karl walked behind her, and when he joined her at the bottom and took his foot off the last step, he rested a hand on her shoulder and pressed his solid, warm body against hers. She pressed a cheek into his fingers and took a second to let herself find her place, more mentally than physically. If she focused enough, she could pretend that it was Stephen holding her … pretend enough that she could almost fool herself into believing it. His touch was comforting, though. Her tiger reached for his … she clung to him, her claws wanting to grab onto something solid … something real after she had just had the rug pulled from under her.
She was a liar, though. The words echoed in her head with an accusing finger jabbing right into her chest for what she had done—what she had said. False words to her mate. Lies. She had told him lies, and in doing so, she had betrayed him. What a terrible way to start their lives together when she was already covering her emotional tracks. But it was the only way to protect him, and to protect Cade. What good would it do any of them if Karl found out the truth of things she had done? Of the laws she had broken. She was no better than Karl’s mother, and he had made it quite clear he hated her with every breath he took.
Even just looking at him, at the way he spoke about how his mother had hurt him. She knew she could never whisper the words of Connor’s existence to him … or non-existence, as it was. She might not have known Karl for long, but she had already decided she would not hurt him in such a way. She had caused enough pain in Cade. She could see it reflected in his eyes, his mannerisms … in every time she saw him. Why would she knowingly
do that to another? Maybe she couldn’t fix Cade now, but she could protect Karl. He had done nothing to deserve anything bad from her.
If Karl believed her or not, he didn’t let on, but she selfishly took comfort from him when he had offered it to her for free. She pressed her body back against his, against the solid line of him behind her. He still held his hand to her shoulder, but his other … she slipped her hand into it, and he placed a kiss against her head. “You’re okay. I promise.”
She nodded and leant her head into his. He held her that little tighter.
The front door was just a few steps away. It would take nothing to walk across the hallway, open it, and leave. Her heart wanted nothing more than to do that right then. It almost pushed her close to doing it without even thinking about the consequences. At home, she could go to her room. She could hide. She could close her eyes and exist in a place where she didn’t have to picture Cade holding his child … a child she hadn’t birthed.
Just as Gemma moved to step forward, her mother rounded the corner and nearly knocked into her. Gemma stepped back, and the faint whiff of whiskey made her frown. Her mother didn’t drink, not normally at least. If she did, it was the odd glass of sherry. “Mum? Is everything okay?” she asked, cutting her mother off before she noticed something was wrong with her daughter’s emotional state.
Emily paused and gave Gemma a confused expression as if it hadn’t registered that it was her daughter standing there. She nodded and smiled … a weak smile. “For now,” she said. Her voice held an edge of something—something she wasn’t saying, but her mother nodded at Karl and then was gone in an instant toward Trevor’s meeting room. She didn’t mention Gemma’s bloodshot eyes, or the way her face was puffy … that was almost as odd as the smell of booze.
“Something big is going on?” Karl asked. His hand had slipped from Gemma’s to slide around her waist at some point, and she hadn’t noticed it, until just then. It wasn’t a problem. She rested her own hand on top of his.
“Maybe …” Gemma sucked in a breath slowly, then let it out again in a long drawn out sigh, as if that alone would clear the chaos in her head and her body. “Are you ready for this?” She tilted her head back, so she could see Karl. He had his face close to hers, close enough she could feel his breath against her skin.
“If you are.”
She wanted to laugh out her response. Would she ever be ready? She didn’t think so. “Maybe I should have made my dad let you stay at home. A Trevor show, perhaps isn’t the wisest choice for your first Council meeting.”
He cast his glance toward the closed door of the meeting room. “I can handle it.”
“Tell me that again when we’re home.”
Her tiger had curled up at Karl’s feet … oddly. She was content with her own kind, at peace almost … if no one looked too closely. But inside, somewhere locked inside, she was a ball of fury, of anger … of screaming rage at the injustice of everything. It was all too much perhaps that everything inside had just stopped. The centre of a raging storm.
Blinking hard, she went to move forward, a battle for rational thought made her tiger stretch out inside her. She took another breath and then moved.
As far as meeting rooms went, Trevor’s wasn’t all that different to her father’s. They didn’t do many meets here, but when they did, Gemma always realised how her father’s place felt more like a safe zone than this. She was thankful that few wolves fell out of line. If they did, it was dealt with in this house. Gemma could only remember a couple of occasions where meetings had been called for wolf business, but back then, it had been Stephen’s problem to play second to their father. She had never asked what happened. She didn’t care that much. There was only one wolf who mattered to her and as long as he was fine, she didn't care for the rest. To her, it was all just meaningless politics.
There was a table in the middle of the large room. It was positioned the same way her father had his. It was a long, boardroom table with individual lights that went along the centre. Not that any of the shifters ever needed lights, but when it was Council business, not all species of Other had the superior sight. Tonight, some lights were on. Other species had come to attend this. They were all bound by the same laws … laws that had been voted in by the Council before them. One seat at the far side was supposed to be for Shelley’s mother, Margaret, but she hadn’t attended a meeting since her daughter had disgraced her. Not that she had been removed from the Preternatural Council, no, she had stayed away by her own volition.
All the seats were filled, except for hers. Her eyes found Cade and Natalie instantly and she couldn’t fight that jolt inside her that made her freeze for a second and then made her want to turn around and bolt out of there. He was watching her, his predatory gaze locked onto hers and seeing right inside her the way he always did.
“Please stop it,” she said to him in her head. She knew he could hear her. Knew he had that link open between them. She also knew when he got her message, because the mental shutters slammed down between them and turned her stomach, leaving her with a vacant niggle where he was supposed to be.
Malcolm wasn’t sitting in his usual spot at the head of the table. Surprisingly, Trevor wasn't either. It was a meeting for the wolves. When these happened, the Other needing the meeting would take the head seat with her father at the side, acting like a beta. But, instead of the head chair at the centre point, there was another kind of chair. The sight of it made Gemma stop, made her, for a split second, forget everything else. It was more of a torture seat than an actual chair. There were shackles at the armrests and legs.
“Who—”
Gemma shook her head as Karl went to speak and twenty heads all turned in his direction. “Don’t,” she said. She gave his hand a squeeze. Both their hands were clammy. She wasn’t so sure if it was him or her causing it. Her entire body was tense, her skin was on fire. Her eyes were fighting with her to look over to Cade. He wasn’t sitting. No. He was standing behind Natalie, having given his seat to his mate, an offering and a welcome for her to join them. Gemma would do the same, putting Karl into the seat beside her father. It was to show respect and trust.
Just walking into there, though, it brought so many things … so many feelings. She had to make herself take each step. She had to make herself move on, not just here, but inside too. Karl made a sound and she realised she was holding his hand too tightly, but she had to. She was clinging to him for her own sanity, for her tiger. She had to do something because Cade was there. He was right there, and she couldn’t go to him, couldn’t touch him, couldn’t answer the craving inside her body. Natalie smiled at her. Natalie … his mate …. His pregnant mate.
She tore her gaze away from them, and in her head, it felt like she had severed her lifeline. In a moment, she would stop breathing. Maybe she would welcome that. At least it was would make everything stop hurting so damn much. She pushed to where her seat was, stepped behind it and let Karl sit.
They were the last to take their places. When she took her position behind Karl, three wolves entered the room. They walked past Cade and then went to stand in the spot between him and his father. Gemma locked eyes with one of them. She recognised him. He had been there when Trevor had come to her home and dragged Cade away. Heckles rose on her neck and she gripped the back of Karl’s seat.
Malcolm stood. “Good evening, everyone,” he said, hands clasped together. “As alpha of this Council and pack, tonight I step aside temporarily and loan my powers of authority to Trevor MacDonald, my second and beta. He comes to you with a matter of the utmost urgency. I am thankful that you have all already graced his request with a unanimous vote.”
He spread his hands in an open gesture to Trevor, nodded and then sat back down, leaning a little closer to Gemma.
She shifted with unease. How could Stephen ever stand these things? They were so pretentious. Trevor stood, squared his shoulders and then cleared his throat as if he were some kind of royalty. The way he held himself,
throwing out his chest, putting his head so high he couldn’t possibly see properly … it was all fake. This was why he would never truly make it to the top in place of her father. He was much too concerned in owning the badge rather than honouring what it meant to be at the top.
Her father, Gemma noted, was leaning back in his seat, one leg resting at the ankle across his knee. He had his head leaning on his hand, his thumb tucked under his chin, his index finger up the side of his face and another finger across his mouth. The watcher. To anyone else, it would seem like Malcolm was relaxed, sitting back, but his other hand was on the chair’s armrests, gripping it so tight that his knuckles were white.
“As you are all aware, rule 23 of the Procreation code states we are forbidden from procreating with a member of another species. Under section B of that same ruling, we also know a euthanasic execution is to be carried out. In addition to this, the Council can further discuss punishment for the actions of the perpetrators.” Trevor met everyone’s eyes as if he assessed that they understood what he was saying. When his gaze landed on Gemma, her face flushed, but she didn’t look away from him. No. She’d never give him that kind of satisfaction. “We all know accidents happen. We are not monsters here.”
Gemma wanted to laugh.
“Things happen in the heat of the moment, but it is then down to how both parties deal with the situation at hand.”
Deal with it … that was a loaded sentence. Deal with it. Just end the baby’s life and move on. Trevor spoke like it meant nothing. Like it wouldn’t rip the very soul from a person to do that. She had almost done that herself. When she had found out she was carrying Connor, that had been her answer, programmed into her like a Society drone. To save Cade’s life, she had been almost willing to end their child’s life before it had even begun. That thought dug into her. This was her punishment. She deserved it. Deserved every ounce of agony she would endure. Their child had died anyway. If she had done the termination at the start, she could have saved them both the heartache of what came after. She would have never felt that life growing inside her, moving … the connection with him, with Cade.