by V. Vaughn
Lucian’s dramatic display about how the spell to cut the bond with Victor would work comes to mind. My stomach flips as I imagine all the things that could go wrong. Not only could we lose Tally, but to have so much magic sucked out of us and fueling the rogue coven and Victor would be a catastrophe I’m not sure we’d be able to overcome.
I slow as I approach my exit off the highway, and when I turn, the car rumbles onto a dirt road that leads home. Henri’s truck approaches us, and I wave as he and Rachel drive by. I assume that because Kelsey is safe and we realize she was taken as a distraction, there’s no reason for the two of them to stay with us. Although I suspect Henri will insist Rachel stay at his house with his nanny, teenaged children, and guards assigned to him as the second-in-command to help keep her safe.
When I get in our driveway, the truck clunks as I put it into park, and I turn to my guards to say, “Thanks, guys. Be safe driving home.”
The two warriors say their good-byes before climbing on motorcycles and roaring off. I enter to the aroma of garlic and beef, and I smile because Grace has made something hearty for lunch. She knows I’ll be hungry for her home-cooked food after being on the road. “What smells so wonderful?”
Grace glances up from her crossword puzzle. “Spaghetti and meatballs.”
“Good. I’m famished.” I drop my overnight bag by the door and walk over to the stove, where steam rises from water that is simmering. The dial is smooth in my fingers as I turn it up to high. “I saw Henri and Rachel driving away. Is she going to stay at his house or Kelsey’s?”
Grace answers, “Henri’s.” I glance over at her when I hear the suggestive tone in her voice, and she grins as if she’s the cat that ate the canary. “They’re doing quite well.”
I grin back. “Well. Perhaps we’ll have two new werebear in our clan soon.”
“Did you hear Kelsey is changing tonight?”
“No. But I knew Jean Luc wanted it to happen quickly.” I turn to the sauce and stir it. A drawer scrapes open as I tug it to retrieve a fork.
Grace says, “Annie De Rozier should be here soon.”
I stab a meatball as I think about how open Jean Luc has been to allowing mixed breeds to become part of our clan. My hope for Tally and Marcel blossoms. I turn to Grace as I blow on my food. “With Jean Luc so quick to allow Kelsey to change, what do you think the chances are he’ll eventually give in to Tally and Marcel having a relationship?”
My mother-in-law frowns. “I don’t think he’s opposed to it now.”
“Oh, I know he’s okay with them dating, but I mean something long term. I swear there is a connection between Tally and Marcel that goes beyond the usual human-werebear infatuation.” I bite into the spicy beef and let the flavor fill my mouth before I swallow it.
“Do you? Well, that’s interesting.”
Grace has a sly smile on her face, and I think I’m about to get some clan gossip or history, or both. The granite counter is cool on my arms as I lean over it toward her. “Talk to me.”
“Well.” She leans forward too. “Tally’s grandmother had a long-standing secret affair with a werebear in her day. Back then it was taboo for species to mix like that, so imagine the scandal it would have been if the clan found out their medicine woman was dabbling in clan fringe benefits.”
“Wow.”
“Mm-hm.” She taps her pencil on her lip for a moment. “As I recall, he might even be Marcel’s great-uncle.” She shakes her head. “His name escapes me, but I’m sure it’ll come to me.”
“That is interesting. Does Jean Luc know about this?”
“I doubt it. I got the information from my husband’s mother. We Prima tend to keep those secrets close. It’s important our clan medicine woman be happy.” She gives me a stern look that makes me think she expects I won’t be sharing this with anyone but the next Prima either. “Tally’s grandmother never married after her husband died, and the werebear she was with never took a mate.”
While it occasionally happens that a werebear doesn’t take a mate, it’s rare. “It sounds like they were really in love.”
“It does. And if Marcel and Tally want to stay together forever, I don’t think Jean Luc would put a stop to it. But...”
“He also won’t let them make anything official.”
“I don’t know. Doesn’t Tally want children?” asks Grace. “Because purposely created halves sets a precedent that could be dangerous.”
I nod, because she’s right. It would weaken the clan to have to protect them, and I wouldn’t want to open up the door to that either. The pot of water is boiling, and I turn to tend to it. The box of pasta tears open as I pull, and dry noodles swish into the water as I pour them into the pot. I know it’s foolish to push Jean Luc to allow Tally and Marcel to be something more than lovers, but I still can’t shake the feeling they already are.
Grace asks, “How is Tally?”
I sigh. “Not good. Tori Veilleux is doing everything she can to find Victor and Kimi so we can break the bond, but we don’t have much time. If they don’t find him by tomorrow, we need to look at alternatives.”
“What do the other witches propose?”
I shake my head. “Craziness. They want to perform a spell with me and Carly Le Roux as werebear anchors while Bella, Lucian, and Leanne go through Tally’s connection with Victor to break it.” I turn to her. “But the connection was formed with black magic!”
Grace scowls. “So they take the chance that they aren’t strong enough and could lose their magic to Victor?”
I nod. “Along with mine and Carly’s, as well as killing Tally in the process.”
“No.” She shakes her head. “Victor Veilleux cannot get access to that kind of power.”
“My thoughts exactly, but we may not have a choice if we plan to save Tally.” I imagine losing my tiny friend, and my chest tightens. “Lucian is convinced it will work.”
“Forgive me for being sexist, but that’s typical behavior for clan medicine men. So cocky.”
I smile at Grace. “Lucian does think he’s something special.”
She gets up and walks over to the stove. “Let’s hope we don’t have to depend on witchcraft.”
“Or cocky men.” One of my babies kicks my stomach hard, and I let out a small noise as I place my hand on my stomach. Grace turns to me with wide eyes, and I say, “One of my children agrees, and I bet it’s the girl.”
Grace chuckles. “Wouldn’t it be something if she ends up being the alpha.”
I smile at the thought before my fear takes over. As long as she’s not cursed. I suppress my shudder and am grateful Grace has her back turned to me as I force myself to speak in a cheerful tone. “It sure would.”
Chapter 16
Nadia
When Kelsey mentioned she wanted to help Linda and that the woman was good friends with Caitlyn, I knew I had to be the one to find out more. With Jean Luc’s blessing, I set out toward where Caitlyn is staying. Even though I gave her the day off to nurse her hangover, I’m going to make her get out for fresh air so I can get information.
It’s warm, and my polar-bear internal temperature thinks it’s sweltering. Sweat trickles down my back as I approach Caitlyn’s cabin. I smile at Jurgen. “What’s on TV?”
“She’s binge-watching something about picking out wedding dresses. Clearly this is a bigger deal to women than I knew.” He grins. “I’m going to remember this when I find my mate.”
I chuckle. “The things you learn on this job.” My knuckles rap lightly on the door, and I call out, “Caitlyn, it’s Nadia.”
She opens up and looks much better than I expected. She showered, and her hair is pulled neatly back in a ponytail that displays her pale skin and emphasizes the Ouellette teal-colored eyes. “Hey,” she says. “I didn’t think I’d see you again today.” She steps back to let me in.
“Yeah, I feel the need to get out and thought you might want to go on a walk in the woods with me.” I survey the room quickly to see she has a glass o
f water on the coffee table next to a small container of nuts instead of soda and junk food.
She frowns. “You walk in the woods? As a human?”
“Sure. Why not?”
Caitlyn shrugs. “In this clan, it’s more of a bear thing.”
I smile. “We polar bear are odd creatures.”
“I guess. Let me grab some shoes, and I’ll be ready to go.”
Once we get outside, I lead her to the trail. “You must know these woods like the back of your hand.”
Our feet thud on the solidly packed dirt as she says, “Yeah. We played in them a lot as kids.”
“So.” I glance back at Caitlyn to see her reaction to what I’m about to say. “I don’t know if you heard, but Kelsey was kidnapped.”
Her brow furrows for a second, and I don’t think she’s surprised by the news. “Eradicators?”
“Yeah. What do you think they want with her?”
“Don’t know. They didn’t tell me much.”
I stop walking and turn to face her. “Fortunately, we managed to rescue your sister this morning.”
Now she does look surprised as her eyes widen. “Good.”
I start walking again at a faster pace. “Seems she wasn’t hurt at all, and someone named Linda was really nice to her.” I give Caitlyn time to say something, but when she doesn’t, I continue. “Nice enough that Kelsey would like to help her get out of the Eradicators.”
Caitlyn lets out a noise of disgust. “Good luck with that. Besides, who says she wants to leave?”
“Kelsey said some guy named Buck hits her. Who’d want to stick around for that?” Caitlyn’s panting from exertion, and I move a little faster.
She mumbles, “You’d be surprised.”
I stop abruptly, and she almost bumps into me when I turn to her. “Actually, I wouldn’t. But that’s not the impression Kelsey got. She says you were close to Linda. Is that true?”
Caitlyn’s eyes are hard as she says, “Yes. And I don’t like that Buck beats her any more than you do. But you’ll never get her out alive.”
“You underestimate us. What if I told you we could? Do you think she’d want to leave?”
She squints at me. “What’s the catch?”
“Tell me what you know. Help me get her out alive.”
“Do you think I’m stupid?” She lets out a low sound of disgust. “You don’t want to be my friend. You want to use me just like the Eradicators did.”
I expected this reaction. “Nope. I know you can’t believe it right now, but I actually like you. But that’s beside the point right now. Will you tell me all you know to save the woman who claims to be your friend?”
“She is my friend.” Caitlyn crosses her arms as she glares at me. After a moment, her good heart wins out. “Fine. But I’m not hiking while I do.”
I smile, and I welcome the cool ground on my bottom when I sit. “Deal.”
Caitlyn’s scowling when she joins me on the forest floor. “The main goal of the Eradicators is to rid the earth of all werebear. When I was first recruited, they wanted me because I’d grown up in a clan. I told them a lot because I was angry at my parents for throwing me away as if I didn’t matter. But I figured out pretty quickly they weren’t nice people, and I began to hold back. Mostly so I could be useful in the planning conversations they had to make sure they were predicting things correctly.”
“You were their werebear expert.”
She drops her gaze and speaks more quietly. “Yes, it made me feel special.”
I imagine that while Buck isn’t a good guy, he’s smart enough to know the value of making Caitlyn feel important. “Were you still going to planning sessions at the time you escaped?”
She glances away as she speaks. ”At that point, I was sharing information because my life depended on it, not because I wanted to.”
I recall how she was with the men who tried to capture Julie. Even though Caitlyn was hurt by her, I was in her head, and I know she still had love for the woman who she had thought was her biological mother. She’s not lying about her reluctance to go along with the Eradicators’ plans. My voice is quiet when I say, “Sometimes we have to do awful things to survive.”
Caitlyn picks up a twig and snaps it as she avoids my gaze. “It was the only thing I was good for. I sucked at all the other stuff.”
”I hung out in your head for a while, remember? Just like with fighting, you didn’t get proper training.”
She snorts. “Yeah. Well, Linda and I weren’t meant to go on missions anyway. We were better suited for taking care of the real fighters.”
I think about how she was belittled by the men she worked with. I recall her lack of confidence and think the expectation she couldn’t do things is the reason she couldn’t perform as well. “I bet that pissed you off.”
“Linda more than me. I was fine not having to go kill, but she’d get all worked up about equal rights and all that.” Caitlyn smiles.
I smile back. “She sounds like someone I’d like.”
“You would.” Caitlyn gives me an intense look as she pauses. “She’s a survivor too.”
I nod to acknowledge the common bond the three of us have. “Then let’s get her out.”
“Okay.” Caitlyn stretches her legs out straight and positions herself to lean against a tree, as if she’s trying to pretend this doesn’t matter. “The plan for taking out the Northeast Kingdom of werebear along with the Ouellette clan is simple. Make them weak, and then ambush.”
“Standard war procedure. Go on.”
Caitlyn sits up taller and crosses her legs. “Buck hooked up with witches who are angry with werebear, and the first step was to disable each clan’s medicine person. I’m not sure how it was supposed to happen, but Cassandra, the leader of the witches, said she’d take care of it.”
I assume she’s talking about the tainted protein powder that turned people into portals and was the reason I was sucked into Caitlyn’s head. I nod so she’ll continue.
“Then they grab the weakest members that the alpha wouldn’t think twice about saving, like his kids or the ones of the second-in-command.”
Henri is the one who would assist the Prima in our clan if something were to happen to Jean Luc. I say, “Kelsey.”
“Exactly.”
“How do they know who those people are?”
“Cassandra knows lots of clan witches and has ways of getting that information.” A bird calls out overhead, and we both glance up at the distraction. “Anyway,” says Caitlyn. “They wanted to weaken the warrior teams by having them out on rescue missions.” She frowns for a moment. “I don’t get why you were able to rescue Kelsey so fast, though, because once the clan was vulnerable, Buck planned to come in, kill everyone, and then burn the town to the ground so the warriors out of the territory would return to nothing.”
“Perhaps they underestimated our abilities like you did?”
“Maybe. I was never into the warrior thing and don’t know much about how you guys work.”
That fact is valuable, because I realize while the Eradicators have firsthand knowledge of werebear culture, it’s from a child’s perspective. They don’t have more sophisticated information. I need to relay this to Jean Luc, Henri, and René, and I think we need to get Linda with us as quickly as possible. I stand up as I say, “Thank you. You’ve been very helpful.”
“Linda hates werebear more than the Eradicators.” Caitlyn gets up too. “I should go with you. She and I were the ones to go on supply runs, and the grocery store would be the easiest place to get her alone.”
While Caitlyn may be telling the truth about needing to be there when we grab Linda, I’m not foolish enough to believe she couldn’t be lying. I wonder if the two of them had a plan to run away, and if she’d want to act on it. We’re back at the cabin now, but before I leave her, I say, “You two must have spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to escape. I’m glad I get to help you make that happen.”
“We did. L
inda thought we should go to Mexico, but I would have been happy to get over the border.” She laughs softly.
“I meant it when I said I think of you as a friend, Caitlyn. Thanks for helping me.”
She gives me a small nod, and I think she might believe me, or at least wants to. “Sure.”
“I’ll be by in the morning to get you for our workout.”
“Okay. See you then.” The door shuts with a solid thud. I turn to leave, and Jurgen asks in a quiet voice Caitlyn can’t possibly hear, “Did you get what you came for?”
“I did.” Once we get Linda, we’ll have exactly what we need to take the Eradicators down for good.
Chapter 17
Kelsey
After Val and I made love, he spent the rest of the day pampering me. He bathed me, fed me until I was full, and then made me take a nap in preparation for the physical exertion I’ll experience tonight when I change. I’m on the couch reading when a woman with dark-blond curls approaches me and sets her bag down with a thud. “Hi, Kelsey, I’m Annie De Rozier.”
Nerves are making me jittery, and I wring my hands in an attempt to stop shaking. “Hi. Can I get you anything to drink or eat?”
“I’m fine. Sit.” She smiles and turns to Val, who followed her into the living room. “You too, so I can explain what’s going to happen.”
Val sits next to me on the sofa while Annie takes the chair across from us. She says, “I’m not going to lie--what you’ll experience with the change is going to make you wish you were dead.”
I stiffen as Val grabs my hand and traps it between his. “But there’s no chance I’ll die, right?”
“Not as far as I know. I’ve witnessed a few changes, and they’re all pretty much the same. However, learning to shift and how to control it varies. Some find it easy, while others have a more difficult time.” She glances at Val. “Just like when we learned to shift, Kelsey’s going to need to practice.”
“I’m prepared for that,” he says.
“Good,” says Annie. “The hardest part for you is going to be watching her while she changes. Are you prepared for that?”