by KT Strange
That’s why we put a call in to Willa. Asked her to join us on tour. Things were getting so hot they were weighing Darcy down, and if we didn’t get her the logistical work help soon…
Wolves don’t often kill themselves. Of course, it happens to any creature who’s pushed to the point they’re just begging for the pain to stop without caring how that happens. I’d missed the signs in Darce, and I’d never forgive myself. She’d been going through the motions, and we were just so happy to have her with us…
I hadn’t seen it.
“You alright, bro?” Finn asked me, while we waited at the airport for Willa to show up. She was on a red-eye, and Finn was holding a little sign on it that read Queen of Everything. She’d know we meant her.
“Just thinking.”
“Don’t, it’s bad for your health,” Finn said, his usual wise-cracking grin not dimmed, despite everything swirling around us. I rolled my eyes. There were times it was very obvious which one of us was the older twin.
“Idiot,” I growled at him.
“Same DNA,” he replied with a laugh, winking carelessly and with total disregard to the fact that I could shred him. “Apple doesn’t fall far from the other apple. Or whatever. Right?”
“Boys!!” Willa’s overjoyed shriek filled the air, and we both turned to face one of the best people in the music biz. My grin faltered.
A step behind her was Gemma.
Oh, fuck.
“Am I going crazy, or have we just descended into hell?” Finn asked, his voice pitched low.
“Did Charlie know and not tell us? I’ll kill him,” I said. The women drew closer to us, and Finn threw his arms out to hug Willa tight as she laughed and stumbled into him.
“That flight was so long,” she moaned into the collar of his jacket.
“If you’d sat in first with me, it wouldn’t have been so bad,” Gemma offered her bag to me, her eyes hidden behind sunglasses, despite the fact that the sun was setting and how, y’know, we were in England. Where the sun never emerged. Ever.
I had no idea why all the vampires weren’t living in England. I’d suggest it to Wolfe next time I talked to him.
“I wasn’t going to expense out a first class ticket; Troy would have murdered me,” Willa said, turning to Gemma, her own exasperation nearly boiling over. Being stuck in a plane with Gem for ten hours had obviously gotten to her, even if they’d been sitting in different areas.
“The champagne was worth it,” Gemma said, greeting Finn with a kiss on his cheek and a smile for me. “So, my debauched band came to pick me up from the airport themselves. I’m impressed. Car service?”
“A discreet black car is waiting for us,” I said. “I thought a limo was a little much.”
Gem tweaked my cheek and began walking toward the doors.
“You need help with your bag?” Finn reached for Willa’s backpack.
“No, no, I’m good,” she said. “I need something to weigh me down so I don’t rabbit punch her.”
“Hooboy,” Finn said.
“Hormones. Let’s not talk about it,” Willa said, raising her hand in dismissal. “C’mon, before she takes off without us and then pretends she had no idea we didn’t get into the car with her.”
Gem was unusually quiet on our trip to the hotel we were staying in for our dark night. Since the buses were all rolling to the next venue, and we needed to pick up Willa, we’d opted to take a plane the next day to get to Leeds.
“I’ll add another hotel room on,” Willa said, shooting a significant glance at Gemma. She mmm’d in response and continued to stare out the window.
Finn and I exchanged looks, as Willa shook her head at us, a silent command not to comment. The drive was long and painfully quiet. I drummed my fingers on my thigh and checked my phone. Darcy hadn’t sent me any messages, but I figured the other guys were keeping her occupied. Plus, Chelsea had said she was going to make Darcy watch bad 90’s teen movies with her, or something. I could always count on Chelsea to be the warm presence she needed to be.
Unicorns. Annoyingly right all the time, but very helpful. Assholes couldn’t just be one way or the other, could they?
I flicked open Twitter and scrolled through our band hashtag, my heart clenching at the messages being sent out.
It was mostly good, photos of people with their merch on, quoting lyrics, sharing our videos. But some of them…
I let my cell phone drop into my lap and looked out the window, trying not to allow my jaw to clench too much.
“You’re doing the grumpy, broody thing,” Willa said quietly, taking my cell phone and glancing at the screen.
“They’re children, Elias, you should pay them absolutely no attention at all,” Gem said, breaking her silence. I lifted my head to glance at her. Her lips were a thin, drawn line. She looked… almost disappointed. In us? “Your relationship may be unconventional, but it’s not entirely unexpected,” she said, lifting one hand in the air as if weighing what we had with Darcy on her palm. That’s when I noticed she was wearing thin leather gloves, like the ladies used to back in my day.
I wasn’t gonna mention that to any of the other guys. Charlie liked to tease us something awful over our “old timey memories,” as he liked to call them. Idiot.
“It’s been rough on Darcy,” Finn said.
“I wouldn’t say she chose this, but, in a manner of speaking, she had to know that this wouldn’t be well-received. She should have at least expected it,” Gemma said. My shoulders tensed. Beside me, Finn inhaled, the sound angry and shocked.
“It’s one thing to expect it, it’s another to live it, Gem,” Willa said, putting a hand on Gem’s arm, and looking her intently in the eyes.
For a moment, the two women were locked in a stare-down before Gem’s expression melted into something softer.
“That’s true,” she said. “But that’s why we’re both here, boys,” she said, turning her head ever so slightly, acknowledging us more than she had since arriving. “Whatever control needs to be wrought on this damage, we’ll do it. How is she coping?”
“Shitty,” Finn said, voice blunt. “She got into it with a fan at a corner shop, got called a few names, I guess. That’s the in-person stuff. Her Twitter is swamped with… well. Garbage. There’s no other word for it.”
Willa made a disgusted noise.
“We can’t stop that from happening, but I can confiscate her phone and mute all the bad comments on Twitter for her each day before she looks at it. Maybe she should just take a social media break altogether?” Willa offered. I thought about it. Darcy wouldn’t like being so disconnected, and maybe it was cavemen of me, but I was at the point that I didn’t think she had much of a choice. If she was going to be inundated by waves of negativity at every single turn, every small time she turned on her phone? What was the point of her being online? She was our mate first, and our tour manager second. We had to protect her.
Gem retired to her room immediately after we got to the hotel, saying she would catch up with us later after she refreshed herself from the long flight. It was a small thing I was very grateful for, as I didn’t think Darcy would handle seeing her all that well.
“Well,” Willa said with a smile, “let me at your girl.”
I opened the door to our hotel suite, and Darcy was a blur as she sped across the room, burying her face in Willa’s shoulder.
“I missed you, I missed you, I missed you,” she murmured, her fingers fisting in Willa’s oversized sweater.
“Me too, kiddo,” Willa replied, holding her close. “It’s all good. You’ve done great.”
“You’re not here to pick up the mess I’ve made?” Darcy asked, the heartbreak on her upturned face nearly doing me in. I turned to Cash, who stood beside me. His expression was equally dark and guilty.
“We did our best,” he muttered to me, sounding defensive.
“I’m here to give you a well-earned break,” Willa said instead.
“But, you flew, and you’re-
” Darcy motioned to Willa’s midsection.
“Y’know, it’s going okay. I’m not going to break. This body is strong,” Willa said, smoothing back an errant curl of Darcy’s, tucking it behind the younger woman’s ear. “You need to be good to yourself now, and let mama bear take over for a little bit.”
Darcy let out a breath, the pain in that one sound cutting me up from the inside out.
“I’m so fucking glad, you’ve got no idea.”
“Don’t get too excited, Gemma came with me. Hey-” Willa held up a hand before the rest of us could protest. Cash eyed me.
“I thought I smelled pure, distilled evil clinging to your clothes,” he said. I snorted, trying not to laugh, shaking my head instead.
“Don’t be an idiot,” I replied.
“It’ll be just fine,” Willa said, “the grand duchess is losing her fangs, a little bit. Her edges are softening. I think she even likes Troy now, which is a huge accomplishment. I thought for a little while she was going to sneak into his house and murder him while he slept. Now, what’s a pregnant lady gotta do to get some grub around here?” she asked with a grin.
“So, tell me,” Gem said, cutting through a thick slice of fried ham the next morning. She eyed down the long table we made at the hotel’s restaurant, half the crew joining us for breakfast. “Who, exactly, is that?”
I knew in a blink who she meant. Craig was sitting a few seats down from Darcy, his plate empty, and a cup of coffee in front of him. He had his back to the wall, his eyes wandering the restaurant’s patrons instead of focusing on his drink or the conversation of everyone around him.
“Bodyguard,” I grunted, shoveling a forkful of potatoes into my mouth. My stomach was a yawning pit that demanded to be filled before my brain would work for the day. That was new. My appetite had been picking up lately. My eyes skipped over to my brother’s plate, and then Charlie’s beside him. Each one of us had a heaping serving of meat waiting to be devoured, more than we’d usually take.
“Hmmm, he’s new, then. I don’t recall seeing his name on payroll,” Gemma mused.
“We pay him under the table,” Cash said, “so there’s no paper trail. He’s not technically supposed to work in the UK, or whatever, but he’s one of the best. Came recommended to us by the guys in Glory Rev.”
“Oh, well then,” Gemma said, seemingly satisfied with that answer. “I suppose it couldn’t hurt to have a few more of those around. He seems… well-muscled.”
I exchanged glances with my pack. Craig, a little ways from us, tilted his head ever so slightly. He was listening. His mouth quirked at the corner as he sipped his coffee.
Shit, did Gemma have a thing for Craig? She tapped her nails against her water glass and sighed.
“I’m quite pleased you were thinking far enough ahead to hire extra muscle,” she said. “Let’s fill out that roster. Your sales have been incredible, and the turnout at shows has more than justified Troy opening up his pocketbook to pay for whatever it is you want, at this point.”
Darcy sat forward, turning toward Gemma, a hesitant look on her face.
“I think we’re okay,” she said. “Really. With the crew we have, things have been fine.” I smiled at our girl. We did have things mostly locked down. At least, in the safety realm. Darcy’s emotions? Not so much.
My stomach growled at me for slowing down my eating, so I grabbed a slice of bacon and another portion of toast liberally spread with butter. Fuck, I was hungry.
“Fuck, man, where are you putting it?” Dean asked from down the table, pointing at the mound of eggs that Ace was plowing into.
“The boys work hard, and they deserve to eat well,” Gemma said with a delicate sniff. But, from the way she was eyeing our plates, I was pretty sure that she was concerned with our eating habits.
“It’s been a hard tour,” Charlie said with a shrug. He nudged Finn, who nodded.
“I get you. It’s been one night, and I’m already starving,” Willa said, her plate nearly as full as ours.
She was eating for two.
Her body was making a human, preparing to give birth, preparing for a life-altering-
I froze, my fork halfway to my mouth. The last time I remembered being this hungry was years ago… when we still had a pack. When we still had a heartstone.
When we’d still been able to shift.
I set my fork down on my plate.
“I gotta go make a call,” I said, getting to my feet. Darcy tracked me with her eyes, curiosity burning in them.
Had it worked? Had the heartstone made us whole? Had Darcy… fixed us? I held back the shiver that was building inside of me and stalked away from the breakfast table, leaving questions littered behind me.
Thank fuck I had a reputation for being a salty, surly motherfucker. It meant nobody followed me as I punched the button for our floor in the elevator. It meant that nobody would disturb me as I hung the tag on the door, slipping inside. Our quiet suite was empty, waiting for me to answer the biggest question that had been hanging over our heads since we’d first figured out Darcy could make us a heartstone.
Could I shift again? Had the heartstone been strong enough to let me?
I walked to the middle of the grand living room of our suite and stared out at the unfamiliar city skyline in front of me, my skin tense and itchy.
Now was the moment of fucking truth. I held my breath and closed my eyes.
19
Darcy
Feathers. Feathers everywhere.
I stood in the foyer of our hotel suite, staring at the destruction. The entire room was trashed, the couch overturned, with every single cushion slashed to ribbons.
I dropped to my knees and stared, my muscles like wax and my eyes so wide it felt like they were going to pop out.
“Holy fuck,” Cash muttered behind me. A feral growl resonated from the open doors that led to the bedroom. My heart rate ticked up. The guys grabbed me, Charlie pushing me behind him.
“Ace,” Finn said. Without a word, the youngest of the pack stalked toward the doors, his shoulders flexing under his shirt like he was ready for the fight of his life. He jerked back, stumbling over himself when a wolf, large enough to come up to my breast bone, emerged from the shadows of the bedroom. My lips parted in shock as Finn made a noise that was a cross between a groan of pain and a sigh of relief. Charlie yanked the door behind me shut.
The wolf, its large, blocky head slung low on a neck that led into powerful shoulders, turned to look at me. I knew those eyes. They were too human in an animal’s face. It was Eli. I pushed out from behind Charlie and walked to the wolf, to Eli, my heart thumping in my ears, the sound washing out everything else around me.
He’d shifted. Holy shit, he’d shifted.
My eyes were wet with tears as I reached him. He rumbled a low groan, pressing his face into my chest, his weight nearly knocking me down. My hands flew up, burying in his fur. It was soft, thick, plush, the color somewhere between white and a sandy gray. I knelt down to meet him. I felt the familiar buzz of that weird purring thing that he and the other guys did, but this time, it was much deeper and more powerful. I wrapped my arms around his neck and sighed, my eyes closing.
So this was what hugging a werewolf in wolf form was like. I shivered a little.
“So, you decided to try this shit without us?” Cash asked, amusement coloring his voice. Eli snorted and nuzzled against me, instead of answering his brother. I scratched behind his ears. It seemed the right thing to do, especially as his eyes shut and he nudged against my hand.
“This is cool, but who, exactly, is gonna clean this up?” Charlie sounded annoyed. When I glanced at him, he was frowning as he surveyed the damage. Finn sighed and stepped beside me, kneeling down. He slung an arm across Eli’s back leaning against his brother.
“Never thought I’d see you like this again,” he said, his voice a soft burr. He sounded like he was about to cry, or laugh. “Shit. I can’t…” He pressed his forehead against Eli’
s, the two of them breathing in tandem, wolf to human, their eyes shut tight.
“Let them have their moment, Charlie, we’ll figure out the clean-up crew in a minute,” Cash’s hushed words barely reached us. Instead, I reveled in the feel of two of my mates, one in human form, one in wolf form, their heat thrumming through me.
Eli grumbled when my fingers slipped through his fur to scratch at his chest. He sighed, lowering down and rolling until he was half on his side.
“Sucker,” Finn said, but his throat was still thick with emotion. I smiled up at him as I scratched at Eli more firmly, the fur more coarse and even thicker.
“So, I guess this answers that thing we’ve all been wondering about,” I said, my heart feeling like it was gonna burst right out of my chest. Holy shit. They could shift. I’d done it. I’d really freaking done it.
“You’re a miracle,” Finn said, cupping my face in his hands and leaning down to kiss me. Eli grumbled again, and poked his nose in my face, shoving Finn back with one furry shoulder. He swiped a tongue up the side of my cheek. I laughed, my eyes still watering.
“Well,” I said, turning to the rest of the guys, spreading my hands apart. “This place is already a mess, so… uh… why don’t you try shifting too?”
They exchanged glances—Ace uncertain, Cash thoughtful, Charlie with his brow furrowed, and Finn grinning broadly.
“Fuck, yeah,” he said, pointing at me. “Um, close your eyes. It’s weird if you haven’t seen it before.”
Eli made a sound of agreement and stepped over me, pressing me into the carpet. I yelped and went down on my back as his shaggy, heavy body sprawled out over my belly, effectively pinning me and keeping me from seeing past him.
“Hey,” I whined plaintively. “Oh my god, you’re heavy. Get off, holy crepes.” I listened intently, my fingers fisting in the fur on Eli’s side. He turned his head and blinked at me once, sleepy and relaxed.