Scratch the Surface (Wolf Within)

by Amy Lee Burgess

  “I guess you know me,” he said and Murphy grinned ferociously.

  “Narrow squeak you had getting out of that thing with that German guy at the Great Gathering, huh, Stanz?” Jonathan made matters even worse with that statement.

  Jonathan referred to Rudi Grunwald who I’d promised to bond with at the Great Gathering in Paris three months ago. He’d been poisoned by the grandmothers and grandfathers involved in the conspiracy. I’d been blamed at first but Allerton and Murphy had rescued me. His death was pretty much the whole reason why Murphy and I were bonded.

  Murphy’s maniacal grin almost gobbled up his face and I slipped my arm around his waist to hold him back. Although I would have dearly loved to see Jonathan’s face beaten to a bloody pulp, Murphy was an Advisor and had to be above such petty actions, deserved or not.

  “His name was Rudi. Funny how that should escape your memory, Jonathan,” I said. He’d opened himself up for this and I intended to eviscerate with words and spare Murphy from having to do it with his fists.

  “Is it?” Jonathan blustered. Yeah, right. As if the bastard couldn’t fucking remember. The shifty way he kept glancing out of the corners of his eyes and never at me gave him away.

  “Well, the way you came up with that nickname for him at the Great Gathering in New Orleans, I thought for sure you’d remember him.”

  “That was him?” Jonathan said with unconvincing astonishment.

  “Please.” I shook my head.

  Everyone in the room hung on our exchange with varying degrees of fascination and dread. They all thought Jonathan and I had met for the first time when Grey and I had joined Riverglow. Instead, we’d met as teenagers when we’d both belonged to our birth packs. For a decade we’d pretended the meeting had never taken place, but I was damned if I’d stay silent one night longer. What did I have to lose anymore?

  “Rudi the Cutie, remember?” I said with a saccharine smile. “You came up with that and hounded him with that name until everyone else in our group called him that too. Except me.” I stopped smiling.

  “Well, he was one of those asshole pretty boys and he couldn’t speak English for shit. There was more to it than that as well. He obviously pissed me off about something only I can’t remember now what it was. He deserved it, and anyway, we were kids, Stanz. What were we? Eighteen? Nineteen?”

  Murphy’s ferocious grin became positively gloating. I’m sure he halfway suspected the reason behind Jonathan’s animosity. Everyone else also had a fair idea, so I almost didn’t have to say it, but I’d come this far and I’d waited years to do this. In the past, I’d always held back because I hadn’t wanted to jeopardize my chance to join Riverglow. Then later Jonathan had been named the Alpha of my pack. I had no further allegiance to him or to his pack and I was free to say what I wanted. And I wanted to say this. It explained everything, the whole reason why Jonathan hated me and had made my life in Riverglow as miserable as he could.

  “You were nineteen,” I replied. “And you didn’t like him, Jonathan, because he stole me right from underneath your nose. Remember?” I gave him a nasty grin and his eyes became very black.

  “Oh, yeah,” he said, obviously pretending it was all coming back to him after all. By everyone else’s expressions, he fooled absolutely no one. “You were really into me, Stanz. I remember that now. Always trying to drag me into corners to make out. And then that goddamn pretty boy pulls the wounded, ‘I’m a foreigner and I’m lost and lonely’ act and you fell for that. You always were a sucker for the pretty boys with moody eyes.” He looked at Murphy and grinned insinuatingly. He also managed to ding Grey’s memory with that pronouncement too, the asshole.

  “I prefer to think I came to my senses. I dragged you into corners to make out with you in the vain attempt to teach you how to kiss. I thought with practice you’d get a little better. I can only hope the intervening years have taught you the lesson I never could,” I said with a rueful shrug.

  Nora uttered another one of her drunken high-pitched yelps of laughter. I couldn’t have asked for better timing.

  “You weren’t exactly a pro yourself,” said Jonathan in a vain attempt to regain some of his lost dignity.

  “Aren’t we supposed to be letting bygones be bygones?” Callie wondered.

  Peter chimed in with a heartfelt, “Please, let’s.”

  “Ha. You two knew each other before Riverglow. I always knew you had the hots for Stanzie,” declared Nora with a little smirk.

  “For Christ’s sake, go sit down and put something in your stomach,” snapped Jonathan. He tried to lower his voice but did not do a very good job. He looked at all of us appealingly.

  “Look at her,” he said. “Skinny as a walking skeleton. I keep telling her to eat but she’s got a screw loose or something. Thinks she’s fat.”

  “I do not,” huffed Nora with a drunk’s haughty self-assurance. Her gaze sought out and found the drinks cart and she made a beeline for it, but Allerton got there first and adroitly steered her to the canapes and cheese platters, helpfully piling a ton of all of it on a small, clear glass plate before he sat with her on the sectional sofa.

  Jonathan muttered to himself, as he stalked to the side of the sectional farthest from his bond mate. Kathy offered to mix him a drink but he asked for Perrier. He apparently had at least a little common sense left.

  “Were you two really an item at a Great Gathering?” Peter drew closer, his expression both fascinated and repulsed. “I cannot even fucking believe it. I had no idea you’d known him before you joined Riverglow. He’s always had it in for you, Stanzie, and I never could figure out why. Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

  “Well, for most of my time in Riverglow he was my Alpha,” I said and Murphy’s arm tightened around my waist.

  “Alpha my ass,” whispered Callie, twin spots of color staining her white cheeks. “If I were you I would have said something. I wish you had. It explains everything. And if I’d known that, I don’t think I would have sat there during your interrogation and not said anything in your defense.” Her voice dropped and her eyes became pleading. “I never said anything against you, Stanzie, you remember, don’t you?”

  I remembered her condemning silence. It had been twice as loud as words would have been.

  “I want you to sit down, Callie.” Vaughn put a sheltering arm around her frail shoulders. “I’m going to get you something to eat. What do you want? The salmon and cream cheese looks good. You want some? And how about a drink? Some wine? Champagne?”

  He led her away, his head bent protectively close to hers. Peter watched them go, effectively stranded.

  “She just had a miscarriage last week.” His voice was soaked with pain. “The third one since we became Alpha last June. I don’t even think she should be out. Vaughn and I didn’t want to come tonight, but she wanted to see you, Stanzie.” He glanced at Nora seated on the sofa with Allerton. He had persuaded her to eat one of the cucumber-and-salmon canapes on her plate and I hoped she wouldn’t get sick later in the evening. Peter followed my gaze and grimaced.

  “Don’t mind Nora. Her baby was stillborn last April. She hasn’t been the same since.”

  I wanted to harden my heart against both of them, but it was impossible. Even Murphy, quiet as he’d been, looked concerned, and I suspected he was thinking about Sorcha and their lost baby, suffering his own grief even as he sympathized reluctantly with Nora and Callie.

  “I’m sorry, Peter,” I said and he flashed me a grateful smile. “Besides all this shit, how have you been? Okay?”

  “I’m fine. Just worried about Callie. I want to step down as Alpha so badly. She just can’t carry a baby and she refuses to acknowledge that. She won’t take birth control and Vaughn and I are even talking about secretly putting it in her food or something. Anything so she won’t have another miscarriage. It was the same damn thing when we were Alpha the first time. She blames it now on her age, she turned forty last year, but it was the same when she was twenty
-five.” His eyes filled with tears. “Some women just can’t have babies and she refuses to believe she’s one of them. Vaughn and I don’t give a shit about being Alpha, we just don’t want to lose her, but do you think she’ll listen to us?”

  Before the tears could leak out of his eyes, I put my hand on his arm in a gesture of sympathy and compassion.

  “I thought this new duo were supposed to take over,” I said. Murphy’s arm slid away from my waist and he took my empty champagne glass as well as his gin and tonic glass, and went to the drinks cart for a refill. I cursed myself, but I had to get Peter’s mind off Callie.

  Peter grimaced and put his free hand over mine for a gentle, grateful squeeze before he let go.

  “Yeah, they are.” Peter blew out his breath. “Only Callie wants to wait until she’s sure she’s past being able to get pregnant. Goddamnit, Stanzie, it’s a shit mess with Riverglow, I’m telling you. Vaughn and I only took our pack to the Great Gathering so we could maybe find new Alphas and you’d think we’d knifed her in the back to hear her tell it. We’re only trying to protect her.” His voice shook and more tears filled his eyes, but luckily Murphy reappeared. Not only did he have a new glass of champagne for me and refill on his gin and tonic, he also had one for Peter.

  “Not sure if you like gin, mate, but I thought you could use it.” He thrust the glass at Peter. It was a gesture of reluctant acceptance, if not outright amity, and Peter was astute enough to grasp that. I was pretty sure he did not like gin but he drank it as if he loved the stuff.

  “Stanzie, why don’t you get something to eat?” Murphy suggested and I looked at him, wanting to make sure he didn’t mind being left alone with Peter. He gestured at the food-laden coffee table and, with a shrug, I left them.

  With a plate piled high with cheese, crackers and lots of the canapes with the olives, cheese and maraschino cherries, I sat next to Nora, who had managed to eat half the food on the plate Allerton had made up for her. I was impressed.

  “I’m thirsty,” declared Nora. She gave me a plaintive look as if I would take pity on her and jump up and get her a whiskey sour.

  “I’ll get you a Perrier,” declared Allerton, as he rose gracefully to his feet.

  To our left, Jonathan and Kathy seemed deeply involved in conversation, mostly from her side. To our right Vaughn hand fed Callie a cracker and she laughed a little.

  Go, Vaughn, I thought with a small inward cheer.

  I stole a look at Murphy and Peter, as they conversed. I’m sure it was small talk and nothing of great import, but Murphy was making an effort.

  “Perrier,” said Nora with a pout. “I want a scotch on the rocks.”

  “There isn’t any scotch,” I told her. “Damn, these maraschino cherry things are good. You wouldn’t think olives and cherries would taste good together, but it’s actually kick ass. You want one?” I held my plate enticingly under her nose and her eyes crossed as she tried to focus.

  “I guess I could try one,” she allowed.

  She gnawed her way up the toothpick and would have tried to eat that, but I hastily removed it from her skeletal fingers and set it aside.

  “These crackers are excellent too.” I offered her one piled high with a wedge of Vermont cheddar.

  She obediently opened her mouth like a baby bird and I popped the cracker and cheese in, hoping like hell she didn’t choke.

  She had to chew an awfully long time, but she didn’t choke.

  I began to feel more and more resentful of Jonathan. If I could get her to eat and if Allerton could, he damn well could if he halfway tried. She loved him, the poor deluded soul.

  “Sorry I spilled that red wine on your party dress in Paris, Stanzie.” Nora’s voice wobbled with a drunk’s all-consuming contrition.

  Allerton sat beside her and held out a blue-tinted glass filled with bubbling water and a slice of lime. She took it tearfully and gulped half of it down.

  “You forgive me, don’t you? I was drunk. I didn’t know what I was doing. I’m drunk a lot, you know.” Her voice lowered to a conspiratorial whisper. “My baby died.”

  She looked at me with huge brown eyes and waited for me to sympathize.

  “That was last year,” I said in a deliberately nonchalant voice. Allerton met my eyes over the top of her head and he gave me silent approval to carry on.

  Nora’s mouth dropped open in protest.

  “You’re supposed to be sorry for me, goddamnit,” she cried and, for a moment, all talk ceased as everyone stared at her. “Shut up!” she yelled at them, although no one had said a word. “I’m talkin’ to Stanzie. None of your damn business.” She all but smashed her glass down on the coffee table and glared at the whole room.

  Murphy was the first one to look away. He said something to Peter, who responded, then Vaughn whispered something in Callie’s ear and she nodded, lifting her face to his for a gentle kiss.

  Jonathan scowled fiercely at his bond mate, who blithely ignored him. Kathy Manning gallantly tried to recapture his attention by leaning close and whispering something in his ear.

  “My baby died. Say you’re sorry about it,” Nora hissed at me, but her voice was barely above a whisper and the classical music drowned it out for everybody’s ears but mine and Allerton’s, unless they really strained to overhear.

  “Say you’re sorry for treating me like shit and kicking me out of the pack then,” I retorted. Allerton smiled behind his wine glass, but quickly schooled his features into blandness when Nora turned to him for support.

  “She’s supposed to be sorry for me. My baby died.” She clutched the lapels of his jacket and he gently took both of her hands in his.

  “I’m sure she’s sorry, Nora,” he told her, his expression kind and patient.

  Nora’s eyes filled with easy tears. “She’s the lucky one. She got out of this damn pack. I know Grey and Elena had to die for that to happen, but she was lucky. I voted to kick her out because I felt bad for her. She didn’t need our sorry asses. I knew she’d do better if she got out and I was right.” She struggled to free her hands from his grasp, but he held tight.

  “She’s an Advisor now and that’s a good thing, isn’t it? She’ll go far, won’t she? Not like me. Not like Callie. She’ll do better than us, won’t she? You’ll make sure, won’t you?”

  Tears streaked down her face, making her mascara run.

  “Nora,” I said, aware that she was getting looks again. “Come upstairs with me. We can wash your face and I’ll show you my room. It’s got a fireplace with gas logs. And the nicest quilt. I think it must be one you made, because I recognize the pattern.”

  Nora spent every winter night she could quilting. It was her hobby, her avocation, her passion. I always thought it was also a means to keep her hands and mind distracted from the fact she was trapped with an asshole like Jonathan for a bond mate, but then I was probably just a little bitter.

  “I...I think it might be. I gave one to the Regional Council a long time ago.” Her lower lip quivered.

  Allerton let go of her hands and she turned to me and I helped her to her feet and put my arm around her bony shoulders.

  While I told her all the colors in the quilt and the pattern I thought it was, I led her out of the room and up the stairs.

  Jonathan’s gaze was hot and resentful on our backs, but he didn’t try to stop us. I’m not sure Kathy Manning would have let him anyway.

  In my room, I showed Nora the gas log fireplace and got her to wash her face free of the tears and mascara smudges.

  Then I showed her the quilt, somehow persuading her to lie down so I could spread it over her.

  I sat on the edge of the bed with her, smoothing back her rough, lackluster hair as she babbled at me about the quilts she’d made in the past, begging me to remember the one she’d given me and Grey as a gift when we’d joined the pack.

  “You still have it, don’t you?” She asked feverishly, as if it were life and death that I still had that quilt and cherished it
.

  The last time I’d seen it, it had been in a dozen mangled pieces smeared with ketchup and mustard on my bedroom floor in New Britain. But of course I didn’t tell her that.

  I told her I had it at my condo in Boston and Murphy loved it, and insisted on covering himself with it every night or he couldn’t sleep. I made him sound like something of selfish pig because he wouldn’t even share it with me, but that made her laugh, pleased that someone like him would care so deeply for a quilt she’d made.

  “You were so beautiful, Stanzie, in that party dress and those nice shoes. You always have the nicest shoes. I was always jealous of how much Grey loved you. You do believe I voted against you only so you’d get out, have a chance to...be...diff...” She fell asleep in the middle of a sentence.

  Chapter 7

  Halfway down the stairs on my way back to the others, the doorbell gave its distinctive three-tone chime. Since I was right there, I opened the front door.

  Cold air swirled in with two bundled figures, one male, one female.

  He helped her off with her voluminous coat, and she was revealed as a tall, voluptuous black woman in a long, gold gown. Striking without being classically beautiful, she was a knockout.

  He was no less appealing, with aristocratic features, tousled blond hair and keen blue eyes. Together they were arresting—her so dark, him light.

  “Hello,” she said. Her accent was British. “I’m Devon Talbot.” She thrust out her hand and her fingers dazzled with flashy big rings of a doubtful provenance.

  “Constance Newcastle.” I shook her hand, noting her strong and confident grasp.

  “Ah, you must be Liam’s latest,” he said. He had on a pair of dove-gray wool trousers and a dark blue blazer with a red-and-blue figured tie. He didn’t precisely sneer at me, but there was a certain reserve. “Colin Hunter.”

  He shook my hand too, searching my face with his keen blue gaze as if he wanted to memorize it for some future, obscure use. “So was it you who fancy footed Liam’s way back into Mac Tire or was it his pet Councilor then?” Although his features were upper crust, his accent was not.