Roc

by Robert M Kerns

  Hauser grinned, even though Nathanson couldn’t see it. “Sir, we’re only five hours into the forty-eight we’re allowed to hold them before we have to charge ‘em or kick ‘em out.”

  “Fair enough. I will call you back as soon as I have something.”

  * * *

  Ninety minutes passed, during which Hauser and Burke worked their other new case… the matter of Sloane Martinez. It looked like they would have to visit the small town in Nebraska, because the local officers seemed reluctant to listen when Hauser called. She no sooner ended that call when her mobile rang.

  “Hauser,” she said after accepting the call.

  “This is Deputy Director Nathanson. There’s an AUSA en route with extradition paperwork. We’re giving them to the Magi, with the condition they copy us on whatever information they acquire.”

  Before Nathanson finished speaking, Vicki Magnusson and four other people she didn’t know appeared about ten feet away. Every agent in view turned to stare.

  “Sir, the Magi just arrived. I should probably get them checked in before the building goes on lockdown.”

  Hauser heard a heavy sigh. “Yes, please do. Nathanson out.”

  “You know, Vicki,” Hauser said as she crossed the space to greet Wyatt’s sister, “most people use the front door.”

  Vicki replied with a shrug and an impish grin. “Most people don’t have a way past the pointless authority games… or infinitely more patience for them. So, my grandfather tells me you’re giving us Cavendish and Brenner?”

  “Yes, but we don’t have that paperwork yet. The AUSA hasn’t arrived. You may have your hands full with them. They each have top marks from their SERE instructors.”

  Vicki just smiled. It wasn’t friendly. “Let’s see how they handle a good charm spell.”

  I saw them approaching where I sat chatting with Lyssa… two of Karleen’s brothers. I should have remembered their names, but that was last night. And… well… I hadn’t paid that much attention when Karleen introduced us. I knew they were the oldest two, and the youngest son was Rich? Rick? Ric-something…

  Whoops.

  Lyssa and I continued conversing, and I told a couple stories on myself that brought out a beautiful laugh. Yeah, if I was going to be honest, she was growing on me. Lyssa Westridge was intelligent, well-spoken, well-read, and a complete joy in person.

  “So, you’re the guy that embarrassed Thomas Carlyle?” Not-Rich-One asked as they stopped at the picnic table where Lyssa and I sat. “And you think you’re man enough to mate our little sister?”

  They didn’t see the lioness roll her eyes at their unwelcome intrusion into our afternoon.

  “Listen, guys, we’re not having this discussion,” I said. “The last time I tried having a friendly, no stress discussion about that situation and its fallout—for lack of a better term—I ended up Alpha of Precious and Godwin County. I feel like any conversation I permit between the three of us on this topic will end up in our arena, and I really don’t want to kill Karleen’s brothers… especially when you both have kids.”

  “Get a load of this kid,” Not-Rich-Two scoffed. “He thinks he can take us both.”

  Not-Rich-One gave me a patient look any parent would recognize. “Kid, you’re what… twenty? Twenty-five? Either of us have sixty years on you. We don’t care about whatever fiction the Council threw together to make you Alpha here, and we’re damned sure not interested in being Alpha here… either one of us. So, why don’t you cut the attitude and explain yourself before we have to spank you like the unruly child you’re being?”

  Well, so much for being nice…

  Lyssa just closed her eyes, shaking her head as she spoke, “I feel like I should go find your families to knock some sense into the both of you. Jason McCourtney’s remaining Betas fled after Wyatt ripped off the first challenger’s head, and neither of you are even enforcers in your respective packs. You should leave right now, before this escalates to the point that you find out just who gets spanked. And I promise you both… it won’t be Wyatt.”

  Both Not-Rich-One and Not-Rich-Two scoffed. Not-Rich-Two said, “So, Alpha Wyatt, are you going to hide behind a woman? Sure… she’s a lioness and a councilor, but someone man enough to embarrass Thomas Carlyle and evict him from his seat on the Council ought to be man enough to defend himself.”

  Okay. I was beyond done with this. I stood and stepped away from the picnic table to face the brothers square on. Lyssa looked like she wanted to say something, but she just grimaced and shook her head again.

  “Are there precedents for settling disagreements somehow that can’t be ruled an undeclared dominance fight when one of the parties is an Alpha?” I asked Lyssa.

  She replied, “Normally, the Betas or enforcers handle unruly guests who abuse the Alpha’s hospitality.”

  “Jack! Will!” Karleen shouted as she approached at not quite a jog. “What do you think you’re doing? We talked about this.”

  “And there’s one of my Betas now,” Wyatt remarked and fought the urge to grin. “Should I leave this in her hands?”

  Now, the smug superiority the brothers displayed vanished from their expressions. Not-Rich-One—apparently either Jack or Will—asked, “Karleen is one of your Betas?”

  I just nodded and crossed my arms over my chest as Karleen arrived with her parents in tow.

  “What are you idiots doing?” Karleen demanded, her clenched fists resting on her hips as she stopped to stand at my side. “I told you last night not to mess with Wyatt, and what do you do the first minute my back’s turned? Shove your heads up your asses and do the one thing—the one thing—that just might get you killed. Do you want your kids to watch a sabertooth cat rip your heads off or eviscerate you and write his name in the dirt with your guts? Get this through your heads. He is not some random feline shifter. He’s a primogenitor… like me. Do you want to fight me? I thought you learned that lesson before I was out of ninth grade.”

  The one saving grace in all of this was that these guys’ wives kept their children far enough away that it was unlikely they’d hear the aunt they just met read their fathers the riot act. No one wants to receive a beat-down—verbal or otherwise—in front of his or her children.

  “Can I leave this with you?” I asked Karleen.

  Karleen nodded without breaking her glare. “You bet. If they piss me off, I’ll just have Gabrielle handle it.”

  Now, the brothers frowned. Not-Rich-Two asked, “Who’s Gabrielle?”

  “She’s not one of my Betas,” I answered. “But you’ve probably heard of her professional moniker. The Huntress.”

  Even the brothers blanched at that. Yep. I could absolutely leave this mess with Karleen.

  I turned to Lyssa and offered her my hand. “I do believe our pleasant conversation has been rather proficiently spoiled. Shall we re-locate to a friendlier venue?”

  Lyssa smiled as she took my hand and stood. “Why, yes, kind sir. We shall.”

  I expected Karleen would tell me how she handled the situation. Once she calmed down enough to keep from going back to the hotel and spanking her brothers again just because of the memory. She was fiery like that.

  18

  After spending a pleasant afternoon with Lyssa, I walked her back to the hotel, where we parted ways with a quick, chaste kiss. I then crossed the street to the town’s administration building to see if anything waited for me in my Alpha persona. As I did so, I reflected on how much I had enjoyed Lyssa’s company. My relationship with Karleen and Gabrielle felt like it kind of fell together. But Lyssa and I… that felt more like a conscious choice.

  Nothing that required my immediate attention waited for me in my office at the admin building, so I backtracked out of the building. I was a few hours past the official closing time, but miracles of miracles, the Alpha had a key to the place. I made sure I left the door locked and ambled toward the house.

  It was a pleasant evening for a walk, and I spent the time reflecting on my after
noon with Lyssa. No matter how I looked at the situation, Lyssa becoming my next mate seemed almost inevitable at this point. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. I had never been one of those guys who was into the idea of multiple partners. But Gabrielle and Karleen were very different, and I’m not sure I could choose if someone told me I had to give up one of them. I’m not sure they’d want me to choose, either.

  As I approached the Alpha’s house, half the sun hid behind the mountaintops to the west, and I noticed Karleen arriving, too. She did not look happy.

  “Hi,” I said. “Are you okay?”

  Karleen snorted her displeasure. “Hell no, I’m not okay. I tried talking sense into my brothers again, and my parents even offered a few pieces of wisdom. But it all came to naught. Jack popped off about how I must be a closet pedophile for taking up with someone so much younger than me, regardless of the fact we’re both shifters, and I had him on the ground with my hand around his throat before I realized what was happening.”

  Oh, crap… that’s not good. “What happened?”

  “I didn’t kill him. I wanted to, but I didn’t. It did take my sister, my youngest brother Rick, and my parents to pull me off him. Nadine said my eyes went full wolf.” Karleen clenched her hands into fists and growled. “Seriously… what is their problem? Attacking either one of us is a death sentence to them. I don’t even know how many regular shifters it would take to bring down one of us.”

  I cannot let this stand, the growly voice opined. Family or no, he has slandered my mate’s very person, not just her honor. I cannot allow it to pass.

  “Karleen,” I began. Then, trailed off because I didn’t know how to say it.

  She unclenched her fists and nodded, then spoke in a quiet, sad voice. “I know, Wyatt. You can’t let it stand. I debated not telling you, but you’d find out eventually. I didn’t want you heading off to wherever he lives when you heard about it.”

  “I don’t think you should come with me.”

  Karleen shook her head, still not meeting my eyes. “No. I know you have to respond, but I don’t want to watch. No matter what else there is between me and them, they’re still my family. I don’t know what… he didn’t used to be like this.”

  I turned to go, then stopped and turned back to her. “Which one was Jack? The one standing closest to the picnic table?”

  Karleen chuckled. “No, that was Will. Jack stood farthest from the picnic table.”

  Okay. I was looking for Not-Rich-Two, then.

  With a quick nod, I resumed my trek to the town’s hotel. By the time I reached the entrance, I seethed at the wolf’s abuse of his own blood sister. I hit the doors of the hotel like the V Corps hit Omaha Beach. The doors slammed against their stops with such force the collision sounded like miniature thunderclaps. Melody and the young man standing with her at the front desk whipped around, and the color drained from their faces when they saw me.

  “I’m looking for the Vesper clan, and tell George to send the bill for any damages to me.”

  “They’re not here,” Melody replied. “They walked over to the diner about ten minutes ago.”

  “Fair enough,” I said and pivoted on my heel.

  * * *

  My entrance at Gladys’s diner was more restrained. The doors and entire street-facing wall were glass, and I had no wish to shatter any of it. The moment I stepped inside the diner, every conversation in the place ceased. If this had been one of those old Westerns, crickets would have chirped somewhere behind me, and they would’ve sounded deafening.

  Karleen’s family sat around three tables pushed together about a third of the way into the dining room. From the male faces I saw, I decided Not-Rich-Two sat with his back to me. I strode across the room and reached across with my right hand to grip the back of his neck as close to a vise as I could manage.

  “We need to talk,” I said and turned back to the door. Then started walking. My fingers dug into his neck as I pulled, and my strength was sufficient to pull him backward out of his seat. The man’s heated invectives filled the diner to the accompaniment of his chair clattering against the floor.

  Two of the diner’s customers closest the doors hurried to hold them open for me, and as soon as Not-Rich-Two and I cleared the sidewalk, I gave him my best underhand toss and sent him on a low arc into the street.

  “Who the hell do you think you are?” Not-Rich-Two growled as he moved to stand.

  “I think I am the Alpha of Precious and Godwin County,” I replied as I stalked closer to him. “I think I am the feline primogenitor. I think I am Karleen’s chosen mate. And I think I am fed up with your poor attitude. I no longer care what your problem is. I no longer care about trying to be nice to the family of one of the women I love. And I no longer care whether you leave this town alive. You’ve been spoiling for a fight since you rolled into town, and it’s about time you had one.”

  With a growl, Not-Rich-Two charged me, hunched over like he meant to tackle me. A little less than two months ago, he probably would have kicked my butt. But that was two months ago. I stepped into his charge and delivered a vicious uppercut right to his nose. I heard bone snap as his head flew up, and I put my shoulder and back into a left hook that caught him square on his right zygomatic bone. I felt bone crack under my fist there, too.

  This whole time, his hips and legs continued their forward momentum, and the arrival of my second strike arrested his forward motion enough that his feet left the pavement and he started to roll in mid-air. Gravity soon overcame his force and mine, and Not-Rich-Two hit the pavement on his right side in a bone-jarring crash. The roll continued until he lay on his back.

  I had yet to deal any harm that he wouldn’t heal in a matter of hours with shifter healing—if not minutes, but at the same time, I couldn’t bring myself to keep beating on him. It was beyond obvious to me that he underestimated the challenge I presented, and he was now far enough behind in the fight that I didn’t see how he could pull himself together to present a threat before I had the time to do whatever I chose. I crossed the short distance to where he lay and saw blood running out both nostrils and back across his cheeks to drip and pool on the pavement under him. Upon closer inspection, I saw his right pupil was at least twice the size of his left as well.

  “I’m… going to… kill you,” he gasped between hacking coughs that painted his lips with his own blood.

  “Maybe so,” I replied, “but not today.”

  I crouched and lifted his right foot off the pavement and put my back into pressing down on his knee. When the joint gave way with a savage cracking pop accompanied by a scream, I repeated the action with his left leg.

  I need a claw, I sent to that part of my mind that was no longer human, and my right forearm and hand shifted into the foreleg and paw of my Smilodon. I flexed the appropriate muscle to extend the claw that would’ve been the fingernail on my index finger and leaned over my former opponent’s head. With careful precision, I carved ‘Precious’ into his forehead and stepped back to survey my handiwork.

  The blood had mostly stopped flowing out of his nostrils, but the fresh wound on his forehead bled like a river… as most head wounds do. And since that wound came from a shifter’s natural weapons—my claw, in this case—he’d heal at a rate similar to plain humans. He might even end up with a scar. I nodded my satisfaction at the state of affairs and turned back to the diner.

  And found half the diner crowd piled up against the windows watching. Not surprised, really.

  They parted like the Red Sea before Moses as I re-entered the diner and walked up to the table where Karleen’s family sat. They all sent apprehensive expressions my way.

  “I cannot abide his treatment of Karleen, and what’s more, I can’t say I’m all that fond of his family not doing a better job of reining him in. You have one hour. Get your trash off my street, and get out of my territory. None of you are welcome in Godwin County any longer, and if I see the rabid mutt bleeding on my street within the next year, I�
�ll kill him. Do you understand?”

  Not-Rich-One shot to his feet, his hands clenched into fists and his face a thundercloud.

  Before he finished drawing breath to speak, I said, “Fido outside never laid a hand on me. You think you can do any better?”

  Then, I made my insult plain by taking my eyes off the entire group to look at my watch and said, “Okay. You now have fifty-seven minutes. Gladys, these people are no longer guests of the Alpha; give them the bills for all the food they’ve eaten while in town. Call Sheriff Clyde if they give you any problems.”

  I turned and left the diner, half expecting to hear Not-Rich-One charge my back. He didn’t, so maybe he had more sense than his brother.

  As I stepped onto the sidewalk again, Not-Rich-Two shouted at me in a voice that sounded like a high-volume groan. “You’re a dead man; you hear me? I’m gonna kill you!”

  I stopped, considered the situation, and walked over to him. He looked like his shifter healing worked to put his bones back in their proper places, but his forehead still bled like a burst dam. His right pupil was still outsized, too, so it didn’t seem like his healing had sorted out the concussion yet.

  I shook my head. “I can’t say as I care what you think. I just gave your family an hour to get out of Godwin County and live. You’re welcome to do what you want, but if I see you again within a year, you’re a dead man. Give that some thought.”

  I turned and left him. On my way home, I stopped at the hotel and repeated my spiel about the Vesper clan no longer being guests of the Alpha. Melody told me she was staying to handle the front desk until they left, because the evening guy was new. About that time, Lyssa sauntered out of the stairwell with a newspaper under her arm. She gave me a wink and blew me a kiss as she walked to one of the lobby chairs that faced the front desk and sat, then unfolded the newspaper.