by RJ Blain
“Markus is dead.”
Elliot’s eyes widened. “You found him?”
“I found him, and I tore his throat out. He was with Nicole.”
The instant the words left my mouth, I regretted them. Elliot’s expression contorted into one of pure rage. The pressure I associated with a brewing storm pressed against me, so intense it stole my breath.
Then something, something close, something warm, and something scented faintly of damp earth, feathered against my senses, subtle yet strong, and chased away the magic before it could burst. I held my breath, watching Elliot’s face as he worked his way through his rage and ultimately controlled it.
The memory of that quiet strength remained, and my eyes widened. “Elliot?”
“I’m sorry. I’m not angry with you. I’m angry I hadn’t been there to protect you.”
I shook my head. “No. That’s not it. Stay here a moment, please.” I held up my finger in a gesture to wait, turned around, and left the room, closing the door behind me. I ran to Richard’s room and knocked until my Alpha’s brother let me in.
“What’s wrong?” he demanded.
“When was the last time Elliot manifested?”
Alex’s eyes widened, he sucked in a breath, and then he spewed curses, digging into his pocket for his phone. Dialing a number, he held the device to his ear. “Alex Murphy. I need you to tap the Shadow Pope’s file. When was his last recorded manifestation? It’s important.”
We waited several minutes. My puppies crowded around me, and I hugged them both. After a short discussion, Alex hung up. “He hasn’t, not since he flooded his house. He’s flagged at high risk of a substantial manifestation. Why?”
“I told him I’d killed Markus.”
“And he didn’t manifest?”
“I thought he would. I felt it, Alex. But he didn’t, not even a drop.”
Alex twisted around and stared into the room, I assumed he looked at his brother. “You’re serious.”
“How close do they have to be to influence each other?”
“We thought within a hundred miles, but we’re not sure.”
“Then he might be close.”
The hope in my voice hurt, and Alex sighed turning to offer a helpless shrug. “It’s possible. You keep Elliot distracted. I’ll see about putting a team together. So close to our turf, if we’re smart, we can triangulate Dante’s location possibly. Amber and Lisa can go back to Yellowknife with your puppies, and we can handle the hunt.”
I glanced at my puppies, who stared at me with wide eyes. “You okay with that, pups?”
They nodded. Emily whispered, “You’ll come home after?”
Alex snorted. “I pity the idiots who try to stop her. I’ve seen what she can do. All we have to do to win this war is point your mom in the right direction. She’ll slaughter anyone who threatens you, and Basin is at the top of her hit list right now.”
My Alex nodded, and I saw his wolf reflecting in his smile and in his eyes. “Good.”
I thanked my lucky stars my puppies were submissive, else I’d be worried they might hunt for vengeance themselves rather than trust me to do what they couldn’t. I kissed them both on their cheeks. “I’ll keep Elliot distracted until it’s time to fly Nicole back home, then we hunt.”
“I’ll let you know if I find out anything important,” Richard’s brother promised.
I could only pray my hunch wasn’t just wishful thinking and desperate hope.
Chapter Thirty-Three
I returned to Elliot, smug he had actually listened and waited, and even more pleased by his pout. Making him pout was quickly becoming one of my favorite hobbies.
No matter what he did, he made it look good, and I’d enjoy teasing new expressions out of him.
“What was that about?”
“I was making sure Alex was going to take proper care of my puppies, plus I asked some questions about the flight.”
“You could have asked me.”
“I could have, but you wouldn’t have given me the answer I wanted, which involves you, me, and Alex staying here while Richard takes my puppies back to Yellowknife with him.”
“You’re up to something.”
“Yes, I am.”
“What?”
“That would be telling, and I don’t feel like telling you right now. I have other plans for you.”
“Like what?”
I made a show of checking his watch for the time since I hadn’t gotten around to getting a new replacement phone yet. While I told a few white lies, I hoped Elliot wouldn’t notice. “I have to keep you occupied and distracted for the next eight or nine hours, as some busybodies next door believe you wouldn’t be willing to let Richard take our puppies to Yellowknife without us.”
His eyes narrowed. “How are you planning on distracting me?”
“I thought I’d give you sufficient opportunity to practice your seduction techniques.”
“Oh.” He blinked, and with wide eyes, he stared at me. “For eight hours?”
“Maybe nine. Got to let the sleeping Alpha next door be suitably refreshed for his flight.”
“For eight hours?”
“You need a lot of practice. Everyone said so.”
“For once in my life, I think I have to agree with what everyone says. You’re serious?”
It was winter, my wolf wanted him, I wanted him, and he was seriously doubting it? “Why would I not be serious?”
“Puppies, Vicky.”
Oh. My wolf’s smugness filled me, and I wished I could roll up a newspaper and swat the furry pervert across her nose to keep her contained—or lock her in a closet. Then I thought about it, and once again found myself liking her type of trouble. We already had puppies. What was another? Better yet, what was another who would be truly ours? “I suppose puppies are a potential consequence should two adults decide to, for some unfathomable reason, keep each other distracted in bed for eight or nine hours. But, as everyone says, that would be dependent on your ability to step up your seduction game.”
“How is it you went from impossibly shy to absolutely wicked in such sort order?”
I allowed myself a smug smile. “You only have yourself to blame.”
“That still doesn’t answer my question.”
As I had promised I’d no longer deny my wolf what she had desired for so long, I’d give Elliot the truth and nothing but the truth. “It’s winter, and we’re making up for lost time.”
“While I approve of what the next few hours could bring, without any hesitation on my part, are you sure?”
I appreciated his candor, but most of all, I appreciated his willingness to wait. “Yes, I’m sure.”
“For the record, I’m nowhere near as crazy as my brother, and while I have no objections to entire litters of puppies under foot, perhaps we should take the sane route and try for one. Just one. One.”
The strained tone of his voice broke me, and I flopped onto the bed and laughed until he mock growled and pounced, proving he meant every word of what he said and intended to prove everyone he knew exactly what he was doing when it came to hunting a wolf during the winter.
Had I been thinking, I would’ve realized Elliot had the advantage over me, as despite my enthusiasm, I was still tired. He knew it, and when I was reduced to yawns and burrowing closer to steal his warmth, he covered us with the blanket, stretched out beside me, and seemed content to serve as a living pillow.
When someone knocked at the door, I growled, tensed, and contemplated murder. Chuckling, Elliot slid out from beneath me, took a moment to tuck me in, and grabbed his bathrobe on his way to the door. Cracking it open, he said, “You haven’t left yet, Richard?”
“You’re really not coming?”
“No, I’m staying here with Vicky, and I’m stealing your brother for a while. No crashing the plane, have my puppies help with the chores, and entertain them when you’re not busy taking care of Nicole. Keep me updated on if there are any changes. If
you need me, give me a call.”
“You’re really keeping my brother.”
“He’s needed here for a while. Don’t worry about Alex. I’ll send him back to you intact. You worry about getting your mate home and making sure she’s settled and on the mend. If you need anything, let me know. I’ll pull together a list of our best neurological doctors and schedule testing, and I’ll also make sure we have access to any machines we need in Yellowknife; I’ll route a charitable donation through the hospital there and stipulate you have access to the equipment. All the basics you need will be on board, and there’ll be three doctors with Nicole the whole time. They’re also some of my better operatives. They’ve been vetted, and there’s no reason to believe they’ve had any dealings with Basin. Amber and Lisa will be with you and her.”
“And Vicky’s okay with it?”
“If Vicky wasn’t okay with it, she’d be tearing both our faces off and feeding them to Snowflake. Snowflake stays with us, though.”
“The puppies aren’t going to like that.”
“Snowflake’s staying with me.”
The two males growled at each other, which annoyed my wolf. “You could stay here with Snowflake if you’d really like, Richard.”
“Damn it, Vicky!”
“Bring me my fox and his litter box. My fox.”
“That’s not—”
“Bring me my fox.”
“Fine. You win this time, but only this time.” Richard sighed, stormed off, and within five minutes, he returned with Snowflake, his litter box, two bags full of supplies, several pairs of chewed shoes, and a dog bed. “I think you’re being really unfair about this.”
“Fly safe, Richard. Call Elliot when you land and keep us updated on Nicole’s condition.”
“Special instructions for the puppies?”
“Exercise them in the pool at least once a day and let them practice their Kung Fu on you. You know the routine. They need the exercise. Keep an eye on my Alex’s leg. And if I hear you shirked on giving them chores, I’ll detail your every sin to Nicole once she’s back on her feet.”
“You play mean,” he complained.
“You’ll survive. Take Nicole home, Richard.”
With a little luck, we’d be taking Dante home soon, too. I’d lost my faith long ago, but I prayed anyway. Even the monsters that went bump in the night deserved a miracle every rare now and again, and we were long overdue.
With Richard out of the way, I went to work, and I began at the beginning, with the database Dante had recovered in Montreal from the Basin outpost he had single-handedly wiped out. While I worked, Elliot played with Snowflake on the floor, both animal and man making happy noises, as though our lives hadn’t become a tragedy-stricken mess.
For a while, I watched them romp, the man often giving the fox the victory for no reason other than to be the recipient of slobbery fox kisses. I couldn’t tell who adored the play more. Watching them gave me a chance to pretend nothing was wrong, that we’d actually made progress in destroying Basin, and I’d succeeded at taking away another one of their infernal labs and a weapon they would have used against innocents in time. I had no doubt of that.
Dante had saved thousands, but we feared thousands more had been murdered, unable to be saved. I remembered the nameless dead in the prison below the farmhouse. They’d been dead a long time, evidence Basin had been active far longer than we’d initially believed.
I worked through the Inquisition’s file on Basin, scowling at the listing of every known outpost destroyed, the list of future targets, of which there were two, and the number of known dead.
Basin had killed forty-seven Inquisitors, and forty-three of them had been witches. The Inquisition had killed almost seven hundred Basin operatives, the majority being Normals. A handful of Basin witches and shaman had also been killed, and all of them had been registered in Inquisition databases, although only a few, including Markus, had any operations experience.
They’d been accountants, lawyers, secretaries, and middle-class men and women who’d likely never witnessed Basin’s true colors.
I combed through the information several times, but if there was some missing link, some stone someone else hadn’t already turned, I couldn’t find it. Even knowing where the farmhouse had been, seeing it recorded in the database with all known information on it laid out, I couldn’t find it referenced anywhere in any of the files the Inquisition had stolen from Basin.
I wanted to murder each and every last one of them for taking Elliot’s twin, ruining his already damaged sense of security, and forcing him to turn all his attention to me and our puppies because we were all he’d had left.
As always, I feared I couldn’t be everything he needed, that I couldn’t fill the gap that his brother had once occupied, and that because of me, his witchcraft would eventually spin out of control.
As I had when I’d first ran to Richard’s room, I clung to the possibility Dante lived and was, somehow, close enough to reclaim. In so many ways, Nicole and Dante were the heart and soul of Yellowknife’s pack.
Compared to them, I felt like I was the silver bullet poised to tear everything down and bring nothing but death and destruction. It would’ve been easy to fall prey to the lies and self-doubt, except Elliot continued to play with Snowflake, both unaware of the passage of time, their scents sweet with their pleasure as they forgot about the rest of the world for a while.
I sniffed again, frowning as I hunted for the marker of a water witch, which I’d gotten used to since Elliot’s first manifestation. I isolated his personal marker, but all evidence of his witchcraft had disappeared.
The pair was so focused on their play neither noticed me tiptoe to the door, slip into the hall, and go to Richard’s—now Alex’s—room. I knocked, and Richard’s brother poked his head out of his room. “What do you need, Vicky?”
“I need your nose. I think mine’s broken. I want you to come with me and check Elliot’s scent. I can’t pick up his scent marker for his witchcraft. I’ve been tired, but…”
“But he’s been noticeably a water witch lately.” Alex frowned and nodded. “What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking Elliot is way too happy right now for the situation, and it’s freaking me out,” I admitted. “And I haven’t found any places to go murder Basin operatives.”
“So you decided you wanted me to come sniff your mate?”
“Yes.”
“I’m never going to understand you, Vicky.”
“You don’t have to understand me. You just need to come sniff my mate.”
His mouth quirked into a grin, and he grabbed his keys from inside his room and followed me back to mine. I cracked open the door and peeked inside, which gave me a great view of the pair still playing. Snowflake was mock snapping at Elliot’s hands while Elliot had the fox on his back rubbing his belly.
“Okay,” Alex whispered. “I’m beginning to believe your cause for concern was justified. The only people he lowers his dignity for in any situation are you and the puppies. He does not, under any circumstance, roll on the floor and play.”
“He’s allowed to have fun, too.”
“His version of fun is driving the Beast and giving us all gray hairs. The Shadow Pope erased fun from his dictionary years ago. The most we’ve gotten out of him is joining us to watch a movie, and he was uptight about it the whole time.”
“He had fun collaring Richard.”
“Point.”
“Just sniff.”
“I’m not smelling anything.”
“So I wasn’t imagining things.”
“You weren’t. What the hell is going on? He absolutely stank of witch just yes—” Alex sucked in a breath.
I glanced over my shoulder to regard Richard’s brother with narrowed eyes. “Yes?”
“Day before yesterday, but same idea. He stank of water witch until we brought you back to the hotel.”
“I’m pretty sure it’s not me, Alex. I can use m
y witchcraft again, and I’m not doing anything to him.”
My mate twisted around while still rubbing the fox’s belly and asked, “What are you two whispering about over there?”
“Conspiracy to take over the world by force,” Alex replied. “Your mate will make a decent ruler, although I’m worried there’ll be no heirs.”
Later, I’d have to thank Alex for his smooth comment, covering up the truth.
“I’m thinking I’ll abuse my privileges as Shadow Pope tomorrow, coerce one of the judges to marry us—”
Alex snorted and shoved me into the room. “No. You don’t get to cheat. You’ll marry the lady properly. If I let you marry her without Richard getting to help plan a big wedding, my head will roll. He’s itching for a big wedding, and you two have been recruited. The only one you need to invite is Desmond, as he might stop nagging us for big weddings for the length of the ceremony.”
“He hasn’t asked me yet, Alex.” I shrugged. “I might ask him tomorrow if he’s nice to me.”
“I’m torn between my manly duties to be the proposer yet strangely intrigued you’d even consider something so untraditional,” my mate replied, grinning at me before turning his attention back to Snowflake, scratching beneath the animal’s chin. “I’ve decided we’re keeping him, Vicky.”
“Your fox, eh?” Alex crouched beside my mate, looking Snowflake over. “I’ll be damned, I think you’re right, Vicky.”
“We’re idiots,” I muttered, sinking down between my mate and our pack’s Second. After what had happened to me, after having spent time as a squirrel, it should have occurred to me Dante was capable of using the same magic on himself, although it left me with far more questions than answers.