Damaged Goods

by Rena Marks

  “I didn’t ask you to. I merely wish you to put it on so you can see something.”

  He shrugged into it.

  “Perfect,” she said, buttoning the front buttons for him. “We’ll put you on a button up white dress shirt underneath. It’ll be gorgeous. Eye-catching. Renegade has one in black, though. And he’s your size. We might even go with that.” She stood back, admiring her handiwork. “I want you to come see in the mirror.”

  Good grief. The doctor in her wanted to prove he had some sort of inner issues just because he admitted he hadn’t looked into a mirror in a while. Fine. He’d prove her wrong. She laced her fingers through his and pulled him to the hallway where the restrooms were.

  “Are you sure you’re from Iota Nine? I understand there’s no touching there.” He squeezed his fingers against hers to prove his point.

  “It’s why I became a doctor. I couldn’t fight my urges. And you’re one of my patients. I’ve always touched you, even when you pulled away from me.”

  He didn’t say anything because there was no argument. She stroked him even when he became a wolf for the first time.

  She yanked him in front of the mirror and watched his reaction.

  The blue jacket fit perfectly—the color deep enough to enhance his naturally dark skin, but bright enough to bring out the light, too. It covered the width of his shoulders and was roomy enough for the unusual bulk of his biceps.

  And then his eyes noticed his face and he froze.

  “What the fuck? That’s not me.”

  “It is you,” she said calmly. “You’re able to speak easier because your jaw isn’t elongated. You were caught between forms, Kieran. In a state of perpetual shift. Your body, trained not to complete the job. But your agitation over losing Alannah to Vien and Potierre’s sponsorship triggered a complete change. You were left in it long enough to reset your muscles. When you returned to the human form, it wasn’t the three-quarter shift you were used to. You went all the way.”

  He brought his fingers up to the mirror—forgot he couldn’t touch through the mirror—and brought them up to feel his jaw instead. Fuck, he should have felt different. He breathed differently without the mock-up snout he used to have. He had no facial hair now except for a very human beard, which he’d mistaken for his usual fur.

  “This is the form Alannah has seen?” He felt like he’d been cheating her.

  “This is you, Kieran.”

  “What if I get stuck again? What if she sees me the other way?” He already knew down deep inside. He’d never shift again. Not if there was that possibility.

  “Shifting is natural for you. I’d like to bring you in for some tests. But I think if we can start getting you to shift by the energy of the full moon instead of utilizing your emotional moods—there’s a magnetic pull with the moon. Our bodies are primarily water and the energy shifts. I think your changes can get nearly pain-free and there will be no chance of stopping halfway. And if you do? It’s no big deal. You’ll just shift completely the next full moon.”

  “I can hide from her until then.”

  “Kieran.” Amanda shook him slightly. It was like a small bug shaking a beast. “Will you let Alannah hide from you if her hair goes back to brown?”

  “No,” he snarled. “I don’t care what color her hair is.”

  “Then don’t expect her to let you hide from her if you can’t complete a shift. Love is blind, my friend.”

  “She really loves me?”

  “She really does. Now, let Beast have a couple more shifts. He’s having some fun with the prisoners. You are coming home with me to raid Renegade’s closet for that shirt I mentioned.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  GETTING READY FOR the party should have been a depressed affair but she was actually having fun with her sisters.

  “Where’s Kieran?” Danielle asked. “It feels strange not to have your beast underfoot, growling at us if we look at you wrong.”

  Alannah laughed. “He is protective. I shooed him off the balcony and into the woods. He’ll come home when he’s ready.” But her heart sank. He would never come back and she knew it. She’d offered him her love and like everyone else, he’d rejected her.

  “Try on this purple one, Danielle,” Ana called out from deep in her closet. She’d been buried in there for at least twenty minutes.

  Alannah smiled. “Purple always looked good on you. Ana should wear red.”

  “What color will you wear? Green?” Danielle fingered Alannah’s freshly curled hair thoughtfully.

  “Vien told me to make sure she wears the blue. He wouldn’t tell me why,” Ana called out.

  “You know we’re not going to take four of your dresses home as souvenirs, right?” Danielle asked.

  Alannah smiled. “I don’t mind if you do.”

  “You should mind, Alannah. We have money, remember? We can damn well have dresses tailor-made if we want them. There’s no reason why we should take yours.”

  Ana came out of the closet. “I’m sending you things, Alannah. You can have them replicated easily enough. But I hate to burst Vien’s bubble that we all flit about in fancy party dresses all day.”

  Danielle giggled. Alannah wondered if she’d ever heard Danielle giggle before. “Potierre actually asked me if I’d be more comfortable in one of Alannah’s dresses when we stepped out yesterday. I was so bemused I simply nodded.”

  “Is that why he asked me for the gold one?”

  She nodded. “He surprised me with it. And then had to carry me over muddy patches so we wouldn’t ruin the bottom. I told him I could just lift the skirts to walk, but he wouldn’t have it. Kept glancing around like someone might snatch me up if they got a glimpse of my naked ankles.”

  “Cankles!” Ana snorted. “The family cankles! No matter how thin we are, we all have cankles. You’re the skinniest,” Ana said to Alannah. “Show me.”

  Alannah stuck her leg out.

  “See? No doubts we’re related.” She laughed like a loon.

  Alannah tossed a pillow at her and turned back to Danielle.

  “I think Potierre wanted an excuse to carry you. For as much studying as they’ve done, they’ll never fit in on Iota Nine. They can’t understand the no-touching concept.” Alannah smiled. It was actually kind of sweet.

  “Do you miss living at The Bella?” Danielle asked.

  “Not one whit. While it’s true that working was captivating and gave me a sense of purpose”—Alannah took a deep breath—“Wilson is a pompous ass. I can’t believe he set me up to take the fall for him. We were supposed to get married in another year.”

  “I still can’t believe he put a death order on you. It’s only been rescinded because he thinks you’ll never return from Xenia and he doesn’t want to waste the money.”

  “He’d be right. I have nothing to return to.”

  “I’m sorry, Alannah. I wish we were enough to return to.” Danielle’s words meant more to her than she would ever know.

  “Maybe one day you both can come here to visit?”

  “Mother would have an apoplexy,” Ana said, her eyes huge.

  “Maybe it’s time we started being more assertive,” Danielle said.

  Alannah smiled. “You’ve already started. Don’t you notice how one of you diverts her attention from the other?”

  “That’s nothing.” Danielle tsked.

  “It’s a start,” Alannah said.

  “Which one do you think you’ll pick when your sponsorship is over?” Ana asked. Her voice was odd. More controlled than it usually was. “Because you can’t come out of hiding. This is really the best place for you.”

  Alannah sat in the vanity chair. “I can’t even…think about it. And I have a lot of time. My sponsorship isn’t close to being over yet.”

  “But one day it will be. One day you’ll be forced to pick between Vien and Potierre. Because you can’t leave Xenia and the law only allows you to stay for so long.”

  “I don’t love either on
e of them like that,” Alannah said. “They’re my friends. They feel like brothers. I can’t tell you all the nights we were up watching corny old movies and practicing various accents. Laughing. Drinking. I can’t imagine marrying either one.”

  “They’re both wonderful men,” Danielle said fiercely. “You couldn’t do better.”

  “I know,” Alannah said. “And they deserve a woman to love them. But what does it do to one to have his best friend chosen over him?”

  “That is a dilemma,” Ana said. “I think Vien will be broken hearted.”

  “Vien? Potierre will be crushed,” Danielle said.

  “Maybe someone else will come along. Someone better looking than Wilson,” Danielle said. “That’s the only reason why Alannah agreed to the offer.”

  Alannah snorted. “I wanted out of the house. Mother picked Wilson and she assured me despite the slim pickings, he was a prime catch. I was excited because I would work in hotel management.”

  Ana leaned in. “I thought mother picked him because he was enraptured with his mother.”

  “Enraptured is a…odd choice of words,” Alannah said carefully. “We did have to spend a lot of time on her grounds, yes.”

  “Did he…were you intimate?” Danielle asked.

  “A few times. It was unsatisfying at first. And then creepy toward the end. I wasn’t sure how I was going to marry him in a year’s time. I was honestly wishing for a way out, though I was resigned to my fate.”

  “How do you mean by creepy?”

  “He took a long time to complete the act. Like…hours. He kept going soft. We began to research ways to get him excited enough to finish. He received a small push toward climax by leaving me dressed and thrusting under my skirts—calling me by my titled name. Then he asked me to change my name to his when we married. He whispered that calling me Lady Nolan in the throes of passion instead of Holland would…well, it would resolve his orgasm faster—”

  “He certainly didn’t call you by your title in private,” Danielle said, horrified. Who would do that? Why?”

  Ana’s laughter was loud. “Danielle, would you listen to the details? The whole picture? Wilson Nolan is a mama’s boy. Through and through.”

  Alannah thought of all the times she was forced to endure his mother’s silly baby-talking, as if she was a little girl. And Wilson smiled indulgently. How his mother glared jealously at her and said she was only agreeing to their union to carry on the family name. Yet how Wilson wasn’t keen on having children and refused to allow her to share that with his mother.

  “Yes.” Alannah winced. “Well. Wilson certainly is sensitive to his mother’s needs.”

  “One has to wonder how sensitive,” Ana said slyly.

  “Ana.” Both she and Danielle spoke at the same time and then burst into laughter, appalled with her snarkiness.

  “I’m glad you both were able to come to Xenia,” Alannah said. “I enjoyed the time getting to know each other. It probably wouldn’t have happened if I had still been in so much pain from the meds.”

  “I’m sorry we don’t know how much pain you were in. And I’m glad we got to see all of this,” Ana said. “It makes me realize you’ll be taken care of.”

  “What in the world convinced you to come out here, anyway?” Alannah asked.

  “We got to meet a Xeno Sapien,” Danielle answered. “New neighbors moved in at the old Carnellepe place. Ana and I went to introduce ourselves when mother wasn’t home and after a while, they told us who they were. Jason, Lily, and Amanda.”

  “And in that state of shock, you agreed to come here? Where there were more? When I first arrived, I passed out. To be fair, I was under withdrawal from the vitamins.”

  “Hell, yes, we jumped to come! You forget, we never get out. The trick was getting mother to agree.” Ana dropped her voice to a whisper.

  “How did you?”

  “She’d told us she was meeting Wilson for lunch. But Amanda had just told us that he was in hiding and no one had seen him in a week or two. And that he had ordered a hit on you. So one, either mother was lying, or two, she was hiding something. Three meant both.”

  “We went home and packed a change of clothes. When she returned, we told her you were being held in Xenia for safety concerns and we were going to visit. To her credit, she looked extremely interested and I assumed she was concerned for your safety, too,” Danielle said.

  “When I asked her how Lord Wilson was, she said worried about you. Worried that you’d call off the marriage and that it was all a misunderstanding. We thought he really loved you and asked her to come with us.”

  “She seemed a little eager,” Danielle said thoughtfully. “But when we saw you, she didn’t greet you as warmly as I’d expected.”

  “She’s up to something,” Ana whispered.

  “She has to know the hit was real,” Alannah said. “Surely she can’t be swayed by Wilson’s lies?”

  “Mother may be uptight,” Ana said. “But Alannah, surely you don’t think our own mother wants you dead? That’s ridiculous.”

  “Why would she meet a man who’s in hiding from the entire world?”

  “Money,” Danielle said. “Perhaps she wants your dowry back if he’s not going to follow through on the marriage contract?”

  “When I was living at The Bella,” Alannah said, “I realized that marriage contracts aren’t as common as we thought. People still do them, of course. But not everyone. If Wilson doesn’t follow through on the contract, it’s not a big loss. Mother doesn’t need to make up that money to marry me off to the next person. I can actually support myself with my education and experience from The Bella. I can travel to any city I want. Or, at least, I would have been able to if there wasn’t a hit hanging over my head.”

  “She’ll tell us before we leave,” Ana soothed. “But I’m sure she wants you back home just like we do. Now that we see you’re healthy, I’m sure she’ll relent a little and allow for a hair and eye color license without worrying about what everyone will think.”

  “Then why aren’t you two married off?” Alannah whispered. “You’re both older than me.”

  “Girls!” Their mother’s voice rang out from downstairs, shrill with lack of patience.

  With one shared look between them, they quickly sobered and scrambled out of the room. All three looked over the landing at the top of the stairs where Potierre waited with mother.

  “Do so get a move on. Vien has gone to get a carriage and should be here any moment. I don’t want to be kept waiting,” she warned. “I’d like to get this over with and get home as quickly as possible.”

  Next to her, Potierre’s lip tightened. “Vien has pulled up.”

  For once, Alannah could feel how appalled her sisters were that her mother didn’t even care to spend as much time with her as she could. Perhaps her sisters had always been aware and she was just noticing it?

  The swishing of skirts was the only sound as they descended down the stairs. For some reason, instead of the excitement she should be feeling, Alannah had a sense of foreboding.

  “I can’t wait to meet all the other Xeno Sapiens,” Ana said, her usual excitement tampered down with their mother’s watchful eye. “We were brought straight here after meeting Vien and Potierre at the gate, you know. I’m glad to get this opportunity before we head home.”

  “What in the world are you so excited about?” Mother asked.

  For a moment, Ana faltered. “To meet new and exciting people, of course.”

  “People?” Her mother snorted.

  “Of course, people.”

  “If you can call this travesty that.” Mother waved her gloved hand around. Thankfully, Vien and Potierre were whispering among themselves a few steps ahead of them.

  “You don’t seem surprised…” All of a sudden, an epiphany hit. “You knew about Xenia,” Alannah realized. “This isn’t first time knowledge for you like it was for us.”

  Her mother squirmed uncomfortably. “I sheltered my chi
ldren from the harsh reality of the world for this very reason.”

  “How?” Danielle asked. “We have live-stream news. How did we never know of this place?”

  “I never cared to watch live-stream.” Alannah shrugged. “I’ve been too busy since leaving home.”

  “I watch it and I’ve never seen nor heard of Xenia,” Danielle said, her eyes focused on their mother.

  “Our home cams are filtered,” her mother blurted out. “The live-stream comes a day later after questionable content has been buffered out.”

  “Questionable content? Upon whose orders?”

  “Upon mine,” mother snapped.

  “So it isn’t really live-stream in our house, is it?” Ana pressed. “It’s actually recycled news.”

  “It is as live-stream as necessary for your needs. I won’t have my daughters corrupted by all of this.” Mother waved her hand around the house.

  Gritting his teeth, Potierre opened the door. “Ladies.”

  One by one, they filtered out to the waiting hovercar. A carriage really, one that should be wonderful for weddings and trips around a wintry city. One she’d like to curl up in with Kieran…if the fool would ever come to his senses and admit he loved her.

  Chapter Sixteen

  THE CARRIAGE PULLED up to the party which was already in action. Alannah caught Vien’s eyes. He’d done perfectly, allowing them ample time to make an entrance. Her mother ought to love that. Or at least, on Iota Nine she’d love that. Here in Xenia, it could go either way.

  Vien opened the car door and sought out Ana. She held out her gloved hand so he could help her from the carriage. Potierre stepped up and helped Danielle.

  Then they looked at each other.

  They hadn’t thought about anything beyond falling all over her sisters, Alannah realized. For once, her mother didn’t seem to notice.

  “Go on,” she said, fluttering her fingers at the men. “Allow Danielle and Ana their grand entrance. Alannah and I will make our own way.” She smiled easily—and held her arm out across Alannah’s midsection like a vice. Like a mother protecting her child in a car without seatbelts.