Isaac was sitting at the bar when we entered, and he walked us downstairs. Duke and Abbott were already there, and I smelled Brain.
I introduced her to Abbott and sat with her on the sofa — I needed her in my lap, but she was so uptight I was certain that wasn’t going to happen in a roomful of people. The door opened and Harmony stepped in, and I was grateful when she sat beside Connie.
I looked to Abbott and he nodded, so I turned sideways to tell Connie, “Normally, I’d be the one to demonstrate, but I feel like you need me to hold you through this, so Brain will demonstrate.” Also, I still couldn’t access my wolf, but we’d have likely done it this way even if I’d been okay. I took a breath. “You know how the twins and I can see in the dark, and hear really well?” She nodded. “I can also smell things most humans can’t, and I’m faster and more surefooted. All things the twins got from me. The thing is, what I passed down is really a… fuck, there’s no easy way to say it. Werewolves change for the first time during puberty. I’m a werewolf and so are Chloe and Declan, they just don’t have a wolf form yet.”
I smelled anger, and I nodded toward Brain, who must’ve been in the room where we couldn’t see him, but he’d stepped out and was now on the other side of the office. He wore a towel around his waist at my request — it would fall away when he shifted, but this kept Connie from having to see a penis in real life.
He leaned forward and began shifting, and in a handful of seconds he was a wolf.
Connie screamed until the air ran out of her lungs, and then she pulled more in and screamed again. I pulled her into my lap and she fought me, but I held her until she stopped fighting as I repeated, “You’re safe. You’re safe. It’s okay. I’m here. You’re safe.”
Finally, she stopped fighting and screaming, and looked around the room.
“Please tell me this was some horrible idea of a joke.” Her voice didn’t work quite right from screaming, and the scent of her terror filled the room. She’d reverted back into the scientist portion of her mind, otherwise she’d have still been in full-on panic mode.
I shook my head. “It’s my reality. Harmony’s a human like you, and she’s married to Brain. I’ll answer whatever questions you have, but if you have some for Harmony, she’ll answer anything that isn’t too personal.”
She focused on the wolf a few seconds. “He’s beautiful. Can he understand me?”
“Yes,” Harmony told her. “Would you like to see me pet him?”
“I… yes. Please.”
Harmony took two steps from the sofa and sat on the floor, and Brain walked to her and put his head in her lap. She rubbed and scratched him from head to flanks, and they pretty much cuddled together on the floor.
“Can I pet him?” asked Connie.
Brain stood and slowly walked to us, and I said, “Looks like a yes to me.”
She tentatively touched the top of his head, and then spent a few minutes feeling his fur as she rubbed his head and down the back of his neck.
“My babies are going to do this?”
“When adolescents first change they have to learn how to control the wolf,” I told her. “There are things kids learn as they’re growing up to help them learn control in other areas, so they can easier learn it with their wolf. They can be dangerous to be around until the human is always the one calling the shots.”
“So if I hadn’t contacted you, they might have killed me one day?”
“They probably would’ve either killed you or at least bitten you and turned you.”
“If you bite me then I’ll be able to handle them, right?”
I was speechless. Never in a thousand years had I expected this response, but in retrospect I probably should’ve. She’d do anything for the twins, even be turned into a werewolf.
“It isn’t that simple, but it’s something we can discuss at length later.”
Duke opened a door and Brain left, though I knew he’d be back in a few minutes with clothes on.
“Why is he leaving?”
“He’ll come back to human naked. He’ll change and eat, and then put clothes on before coming back.” I could see the question forming, so I told her, “Most wolves have to eat every time we change. Some can manage two changes without food, but we’d still rather eat every time, given the choice.”
She looked around the room. “I understand why Duke, Brain, and Harmony are here, but I’m assuming Abbott has a purpose?”
“I’m a witness,” Abbott told her, his voice possibly a little more gentle than usual. “Our world has very specific rules about humans not knowing about us. There are exceptions, but procedures must be followed.”
She was still in my lap, and she stood and sat beside me again. “Tell me.”
“You’ll be required to make a promise not to tell of our existence. It’ll be a binding promise — one you can’t break. Not one you won’t have permission to break, but one you will not physically be able to break.”
“How’s that possible?”
“How are werewolves possible?”
She shook her head. “And if I refuse?”
“Then your memory of what’s happened since we arrived will be wiped, so you won’t remember any of it.”
“You can’t do that!”
I knew Abbott was now speaking to her telepathically, to tell her he could do anything he wanted with her memory, and her eyes grew big as she looked at me.
“I’m truly sorry,” I told her. “These aren’t my rules, and it’s the only way I can tell you. The penalty for telling a human when the rules aren’t followed would be death to me, you, and anyone you told. The ruling body over us doesn’t mess around when it comes to keeping our secret.”
She looked at her hands folded in her lap a good twenty seconds before finally looking at Abbott to say. “Okay, I’ll make the promise. What do we need to do?”
Duke walked to us with a wine bottle and two wineglasses. He pulled a small table from the side of the sofa in front of us, and poured the wine so each glass was about a quarter full. I kept a close eye on her expression, and zeroed in on her scent as I produced a single sharp claw, pierced my finger, and let a few drops of blood fall into her wine.
She watched as the hole in my finger healed, and I immediately knew the scientist in her was now in control. She wanted to know how it worked — wanted to duplicate it in humans. Abbott had been right.
Duke handed me an alcohol pad and a pen lancet — the kind diabetics use to draw blood — and I told her, “I need a few drops of your blood, now.”
She took the alcohol pad from me and wiped the side of her finger. I handed her the lancet and she expertly held it and depressed it without so much as a flinch, and then asked which glass needed her blood.
“Mine.”
She squeezed out four drops and I told her it was enough. She was furious, but at least she was doing it.
“You’ll need to repeat exactly what I tell you to say,” Abbott told her, “and you must mean it. Let it soak in, say it again, and then you’ll need to drink the wine all at once.”
Most people ask to be sure the blood won’t turn them, but she didn’t. She thought she wanted to be a werewolf, so she didn’t care.
She lifted the wine and looked to Abbott, and he said. “I need you to look at Gonzo when you say this.” She looked at me and Abbott said, “You say, ‘I will keep your secrets’.” Think about Brain turning into a wolf, think of the things you’ve learned in this room, and then say, ‘I will keep your secrets’ again just before you drink the wine.
“Abbott knows what you’re thinking,” I told her. “Plus, he’ll test the binding to make sure it took. You can’t think of another secret and drink the wine to get around this.”
I could tell by the look on her face that was exactly what she’d planned to do. She closed her eyes a few seconds and then opened them with a nod. Fifteen seconds later she gave the oath and drank the wine, and I drank mine as she did.
I felt the buzz of the connection, and t
hen it was gone, and I looked to Abbott and he said, “I need to speak with Constance alone a few moments before I test her. I need everyone to clear the room, please.”
I opened my mouth to refuse but I heard him in my head. She’s planning to ask her company to relocate her so she can move the twins away from you. That can’t happen, and I need to discuss the ramifications with her. I’d like your permission to bite her with the intent of being able to locate her later, and then erasing her memory of the bite. No extra charge.
I sighed. She was pissed and probably reacting out of anger, but I couldn’t take the chance she’d follow through.
I can’t open a telepathic link to him, but once he’s opened it to me I can use it to respond. Yeah, I give you permission, but please don’t block her from being able to do it. I want her to have as much of her own free will as possible. Talk to her and dissuade her, but don’t use mind tricks to keep her from it. If she leaves me, so be it, as long as I’ll be able to get the kids.
I left with everyone else, and Isaac led us upstairs. I shook Duke and Brain’s hand, and gave Harmony a hug as I thanked them all, and then it was just Isaac and me. I pulled a rubber-banded roll of cash from my jacket pocket and handed it to him. He accepted it with a nod and asked, “You want a drink?”
I shook my head. I hadn’t explained to Connie yet that wolves don’t get drunk, and I didn’t want her to smell beer on my breath and refuse to ride with me.
Isaac went back downstairs so he could bring Connie up when Abbott was finished with her, and I leaned against a wall and observed the people who’d come for lunch.
I waited thirty minutes, and when she came up she walked past me and out the front door without so much looking at me. I followed her out and unlocked the car as I approached so she could get in.
My wolf smelled Abbott on her and wasn’t happy, but I pushed him down for now. I’d try to explain it to him later, but I needed to deal with Connie right now.
She looked and smelled pissed, and I hoped I could change the subject and get her into a better frame of mind. As I slid into the driver’s seat, I said, “I can tell you the parts of the story about hiking the AT that I had to leave out when I told you before.”
“Not interested.”
“Why are you mad?”
“You made baby werewolves and abandoned them. If I hadn’t told you about them then they wouldn’t have known what was happening to them when they hit puberty!”
“And I’ve been severely punished for it. When Sandy didn’t come back, I should’ve found her, especially since the condom broke. I asked about her, but her friends told me she’d moved to Chattanooga to live with her sister, and I didn’t smell deceit — nothing that led me to believe they were keeping something from me. I’d caught her doing lines, so I assumed even if I’d gotten her pregnant, she’d miscarry. You can be mad if you want, and you’re absolutely right — I should’ve checked. The MC is here with permission of the local Pack, and the Alpha tortured me last Tuesday to make an example of me, and when I could finally eat again on Thursday it was all I could do to get my strength up in time so I didn’t have to cancel and not come on Friday.”
She sighed. “I thought you’d been sick, when I first saw you, but then you seemed okay.”
“Sick is an understatement. I’m told my full moon change is going to be excruciating, but once I’ve been through it I should be able to put it behind me. I haven’t heard or felt my wolf since I was tortured. I miss him.”
“That’s why you didn’t change for me?”
I shook my head. “Even if I’d been able to, I’d have asked Brain to do it. You needed the safety of my arms.”
“This is all messed up.”
“I’m sorry. I hope you’re more pissed at the situation than me.”
“When do we tell the twins?”
I started the car, put it in gear, and finally exited the parking lot. “Not for a while. They can’t keep a secret, yet. I was bitten and not born into it, but Duke and Brain will coach me through the best ways to teach them control, as well as when and how to tell them.”
“When I tried to write that you were a werewolf, my hand wouldn’t do it.”
“I know.”
“It scared me.”
“And I wasn’t there. I’m sorry.”
“Abbott said I can’t be turned while you’re in human form, only when you’re the wolf.”
“That’s right.”
“So the kids can’t turn me?”
“Not while they’re in human form, and they don’t have a wolf form, yet.” I shook my head. “You’d have to take from three to nine months off work so you could gain control of your wolf, Connie. Brain made it look easy, but not all wolves have his control. It can take an hour to go from one form to another before you gain strength, and it’s excruciating. Sometimes, you get halfway to human and then the wolf takes over and you get caught in between. If you don’t have another wolf close who can help, it’s… I can’t describe how painful it is. Not just physically, but mentally and emotionally and,” I caught myself grimacing and tried not to, “it’s like your very soul is being stretched and tortured.”
“My babies will go through that?”
“Maybe, maybe not. Bitten wolves have it harder, but some born wolves go through it. Some are strong right off the bat and never take longer than five minutes to shift.”
“Brain was just… one minute he was human and the next he was a wolf.”
“He’s very strong.”
“Are you that strong?”
“No. I’m one of the strongest bitten wolves I know, but Brain and Duke are both either the son or grandson of an Alpha.”
“Explain how the Pack works.”
“Wolves who are happy in a pack are probably the happiest, but when you oath to the Alpha he can take over your will if he wants. Randall, the local Alpha, is one of the better leaders, but I still made the decision to be a lone wolf when it came time to decide.”
“So, the MC is a small pack?”
“No. We aren’t allowed to form metaphysical bonds, so we’re all technically still lone wolves, but we can run together on the full moon, and just being in the clubhouse together feels good. We run the MC as a democracy — we vote on the big stuff, and depend on Duke and Brain to handle the everyday decisions.”
“Will the twins be able to join the pack if they want, since you aren’t in it?”
“Yes. It’s safer to be in one, and I’d trust Randall with them. They can join as a child, and then will have a chance to make the decision of whether to permanently oath once they’re adults. They’ll be able to run with the MC, though, so it’s likely they won’t want to take the child oath into the Pack.”
“How old will they be when they first… change?”
“It’ll come within a few months of Chloe’s first period, and when Declan’s hormones reach critical mass. Duke and Randall are twins. Duke isn’t a lone wolf because he didn’t want to be in a Pack, but because he didn’t want to be Alpha, and he didn’t want to have to kneel to his brother. They both changed together, and were the youngest I’ve heard of — they were eight.”
“Randall isn’t your Alpha, but he punished you?”
“If he hadn’t then the ruling body over us likely would’ve, and it probably would have been worse. By our laws, my death could have been ordered. If the twins had changed and hurt a human, I would certainly have been put to death for it.”
“Everyone in the MC is a wolf?”
We used to have to lie about this because you can’t tell secrets not yours to tell. However, now with Horse, Bobcat, and Viper in the MC, I could tell the truth. “No, and I can’t tell you who is and who isn’t. Also, you can’t ask someone what they are, because they might be a human who doesn’t know about us. Not everyone at our parties, or even in the clubhouse on a random night, will know about us.”
“The twins didn’t win every race because the other kids are wolves, too.”
&
nbsp; Or dragons, but I couldn’t tell her that. “That would seem to be the logical explanation.”
“So Aaron Drake is a werewolf?”
“I can’t verify anything about someone else, Connie. I can answer questions about werewolves in general, and about me personally, but I can’t share secrets that aren’t mine to share.”
“Is the silver bullet thing real?”
This was tricky, because I didn’t trust her enough to tell her how to kill me, and yet I’d just told her I’d tell her anything about werewolves. “We’re sensitive to silver but it won’t necessarily kill us.”
“The twins don’t like to use the real silver when I have formal dinners. When they were little they said it felt funny, now they say it burns them.”
“They aren’t supposed to be exhibiting so many traits this early. Once I’m sure I’ve smoothed things over with Randall, I may need to set up a time for him to meet them and see what he can tell me.”
“Duke’s his twin, couldn’t he do it?”
“Randall has the power of every wolf in his pack, so he’s thousands of times stronger than Duke.”
“There are so many werewolves in Chattanooga?”
“No, he’s the Alpha over several states. I can’t tell you which ones.”
“Will I be able to come?”
“I’ll have to ask him. It’ll be his discretion.”
“Why was Abbott there, and not Randall? Because he can read minds?”
“And erase them. If I hadn’t paid him to witness and oversee it then your options would’ve been take the oath or be killed.”
“How much did you pay him?”
I glanced at her and back to the road. “Five thousand cash.”
She was quiet a long moment before finally saying, “Okay, so I’m angry at the situation now, and not at you. I’m still not happy about…”
“About my not finding Sandy to make sure she wasn’t pregnant.”
She nodded.
“Trust me, I’ve kicked myself a million times for it since I found out about the twins. I missed changing their diapers, holding them as infants, crawling around on the floor with them, watching their first steps, hearing their first words…”
Gonzo (Rolling Thunder Motorcycle Club Book 7) Page 14