Then Sebastien’s door shut behind him, while Eddie and I were left alone in the hallway to amble past another round of badly painted portraits in search of my own room. This time, it was my host who paused before the farewell. He leaned against the door frame of the frilly boudoir that suited me no better than deer heads suited Sebastien, his tremendous shoulders seeming to cave in on themselves until I could almost imagine Eddie was close to my own height.
It was a cute trick, but I’d seen my own father perform similar acts of body-language subterfuge dozens of times over the years. So I steeled myself against my host’s supposed unobtrusiveness and raised one eyebrow in query instead. Best get the inevitable interrogation over with so I could send my real mother a text and soothe away her worries about the female who’d donated half of my DNA.
“You’re just like her,” my stepfather started after a moment. And as I blinked confusion at the abrupt change of gears between one mother and the next, Eddie backpedaled graciously to take a different tack instead. “A bit like Derek too. Of course, the last time I set eyes on your brother, he was thirteen years old.”
And, as Eddie had likely predicted, my attention was fully hooked at last. “You knew Derek?” I’d somehow assumed Sarah was a new addition to this kind-hearted multimillionaire’s household. Had assumed that Derek—who’d left our shared parent behind eight years earlier—had been long gone before Eddie even arrived on the scene.
But the older male merely nodded, the corners of his eyelids drooping down sadly as he filled in a picture so vivid I could nearly see the long-past events unfolding in front of my mind’s eye. “Derek was part of the package deal when Sarah came to work as head of my kitchen staff. She promised I’d barely see him. That he was self-sufficient and didn’t need anything other than a bed and a bit of food to eat. Of course, that wasn’t anywhere close to the truth.”
Suddenly, Derek’s bitterness toward our shared mother began making far too much sense. For most of his childhood, my brother had been the sole recipient of Sarah’s affections. But if Sarah had found herself strangely drawn to this human while cooking in his kitchen, a teenage son might easily have felt rejected...then slipped away before he could risk getting kicked out.
“Have you been in touch with him recently?” I prodded. Then, in an attempt to reopen the closing window that was Eddie’s darkly hooded eyes, I added, “I need to find Derek in order to help my cousin. Becca’s only twelve and she’s gone missing....”
I hesitated, unable to say any more without giving away facets of the story that this kind-hearted one-body couldn’t afford to understand. And I fully expected Eddie to play along with the subterfuge. After all, our host had been more than patient with Sarah’s evasions and with Sebastien’s and my largely unexplained arrival on his doorstep.
But, to my surprise, Eddie didn’t let the issue drop. “You think Derek kidnapped this child?” the male demanded, shoulders broadening back to their original expanse as he forgot to make himself appear small and unthreatening.
“No!” I almost shouted. Then, more quietly: “No, of course not. But I do think my brother can help me find her. I just need to talk to Derek first and find out.”
And, okay, so I wasn’t exactly planning on talking to Derek for the purpose of getting tips on bringing Becca home. Instead, I intended to betray my only brother in an effort to save my young cousin’s life. Maybe. If I couldn’t think of a better option when the time was finally at hand.
It was almost as if Eddie possessed a wolf-like nose for misdirection. Because an invisible yet very tangible shutter fell between us before he replied. “I’m afraid I don’t know where your brother is at the present moment,” Eddie offered. And our conversation was apparently over, because he ushered me inside without further ado. “But I’ll talk to Sarah,” the older male promised again. “Tomorrow, hopefully, you and she can spend some quality time catching up.”
Chapter 18
I didn’t fall into bed immediately, of course. Instead, I pulled out one of the encrypted cell phones Dad had thrust into my hands in our haste to regain our kidnapped pack mates earlier in the day.
“A single call apiece,” Wolfie had told me as the thin rectangles of glass and plastic clacked together in my pocket. “Or a few texts. Don’t overdo it.” The unspoken assumption—that our prior digital contact had been the reason Dakota found us so easily—added a layer of danger onto the upcoming communication.
I hesitated, loathe to risk Eddie’s household on a message that wasn’t a matter of life or death. But I couldn’t let Terra go to bed wondering what had happened when my birth mother and I met for the very first time. So I sent a brief text promising that I was safe and sound and would soon be asleep.
I should have known that wouldn’t be nearly enough. “How’s your mother?” Terra shot back, proving that she’d been waiting beside her own phone in hopes I’d end the day by touching base. And despite our current lack of a pack bond, I could sense the pain in Mom’s question as clearly as if she’d spoken aloud.
Without any way to send cupcakes through the air waves to soothe her worries, I opted for a wisecrack instead. “I don’t know,” I answered. “How are you?”
And, thankfully, the smart-ass option worked. Terra’s response was one of those silly dancing emojis that she’d discovered—to the entire pack’s amusement—a couple of years before. Since then, Dad had started coding unique animations specifically for his mate, so I was unsurprised to be faced with a werewolf special now. A canine body with Terra’s face pasted on above the snout frolicked and howled and made me thoroughly miss my absent pack.
“Seriously though,” Mom added after waiting fifteen seconds to ensure I took in the full awfulness of her custom animation, “any luck? Does Sarah have current contact information for her son?”
“Hard to tell,” I answered. “But I’ll keep trying. Any word about Becca?”
“None. Your father’s still on the job though.”
After that, we descended into silence. I was usually leery of two-emoji days, but this time I wished Mom had included a second animation rather than leaving me alone with thoughts she clearly shared. Becca, captured by strangers, beaten and starved and in fear for her life. Chase would do everything in his power to protect his young charge, of course...but that equated to pretty much nothing while the older male stood on tiptoes in an attempt to prevent his own death.
So I fell asleep with a confused array of images streaming through my brain. Dancing werewolf emojis, terrified cousins, a mother with Sarah’s body but Terra’s face. And when I woke to the shriek of a siren, the sharp bursts of gunfire, and the banging of mechanized shutters slapping shut across my bedroom windows, I thought for a moment that the cacophony was merely part of the nightmare that had come before.
But it wasn’t, of course. Instead, as I rubbed the grit of salt away from my eyes and peered out into total darkness, I realized the current attack was, unfortunately, very much real.
“EMBER?”
My door flung itself open so abruptly that the knob likely knocked a hole in the plaster. Only I couldn’t see the damage. I couldn’t even see my hand in front of my face.
Or, I guess I should say, my paw....
Because my wolf had stolen my skin at the same time my mate raced to my side through an electricity-free mansion. Now, our lupine nose caught curls of spice on the moving air as Sebastien moved closer, and we barely had time to regain our naked human skin before the professor was patting us down in search of injuries.
“Are you alright?” Sebastien demanded.
I was and I wasn’t. Because my inner beast was still halfway in command of our shared body, and she was far more interested in our mate’s close proximity than in whatever danger had cut off the lights. Pushing forward to rub against Sebastien’s taller form, our breasts slid across the hard muscles of his chest while the roughness of our fingernails trailed across the skin of his arms. Our mate apparently slept without a shirt but
with boxers, and my wolf had only one notion in her head—to tear that annoying fabric the rest of the way off so we could merge with his naked torso.
Then a burst of muffled gunfire reminded us both of imminent danger, putting my human side back in the lead. I slapped the beast down into my belly where she belonged then spoke into the suddenly charged silence. “I’m here and I’m fine,” I promised, forcing myself to take a single step backwards away from Sebastien’s magnetically charged skin.
Which is how Eddie and Sarah found us when they arrived seconds later in a clatter of slippered feet combined with the flash of a super-powered flashlight. It spoke to how deeply I’d been lost in my inner beast’s desires that I’d neither heard nor seen them coming, and our host and hostess’s eyebrows rose in tandem as they took in my expanse of bare skin. But their reactions to my nakedness veered off in two completely different directions after that.
Eddie’s gaze immediately flew to Sebastien, who pulled me in beneath his arm protectively despite not having been responsible for my lack of clothing in the least. Sarah, of course, had more of an idea why we were one person shy in the clothing department. Which may be why her disapproval was made even more evident than that of her human spouse.
“You brought danger to our doorstep,” my biological mother growled, her voice half lupine in its anger. As if to back up her assertion, the muffled sound of automatic gunfire emerged a little more loudly from the other end of the hall.
I bristled, stepping out from under Sebastien’s arms and grabbing a shirt in preparation for snarking back just as curtly. Because, sure, my mother was right. These enemies were here because I was...but we wouldn’t have attracted gunfire in the first place if Sarah had deigned to answer my questions upon our initial arrival.
I didn’t even get time to open my mouth, though. Because the entire werewolf staff was now crowding into the doorway behind their mistress, two dozen shifters all walking on human legs. Despite their overt restraint, though, the scent of fur whirled strongly around two-legged bodies while glints of teeth and narrowed eyes proved that the staff’s lupine natures were only barely under control.
The shifters were also relentlessly protective of their mistress. Wordlessly, the assemblage settled around my mother like an honor guard. And I knew that if I made a single wrong move, every member of Sarah’s pack would spring directly for my throat.
To my surprise, it was the non-werewolves present who stepped into the breech between us. “Do we have any weapons to work with?” Sebastien asked, handing me my pants even as he scanned the assemblage in hopes someone would have thought to pick up a pistol on the way out of bed. His own rifle had been left behind on the other end of the country, leaning up against a wall in the Pinnacle’s living room where it did nobody any good. I could tell from the clenching of my mate’s fists that he regretted the lapse.
“I have plenty. In the tower,” Eddie answered just as quickly. He likely couldn’t hear the subaudible growls filling the hallway, but I still considered the older male remarkably brave when he stepped between two dozen angry werewolves and their potential prey. “This way,” my stepfather added, leading us away from the standoff and deeper into the dark.
Chapter 19
Then we were running. A mostly werewolf pack followed our human leader up the stairs and down a corridor before winding further skyward within what really did appear to be a medieval tower.
The space we emerged into wasn’t quite large enough for all of us to assemble inside comfortably. But we were shifters, used to breathing down each other’s necks. Within seconds, Sarah’s pack had encircled her in an impenetrable wall of protection while I hovered closer to the humans who worked in wordless tandem to wrestle a broad range of weapons out of a formerly locked safe.
There were rifles and handguns and items I couldn’t even identify in the near-darkness. Hand grenades maybe? Possibly even pieces that could be assembled into a rocket launcher or some sort of cannon-like gun. Which begged the question—what did a wealthy human with no evident enemies have to gain from accumulating such a well-thought-out cache of firepower?
Sarah echoed my sentiment, but aloud and in much harsher tones than I would have utilized. “What’s all that?” my birth mother demanded, her voice shrill with the same discomfort I’d felt the first time I picked up a rifle and considered sending a bullet flying into a human body. Now, though, I was surprised to find the two pistols Sebastien pressed into my grip strangely reassuring.
“Protection,” Eddie answered gruffly, not quite meeting his life partner’s eyes as he handed a rifle over to one of the undercooks. “You came here scared to death and jumping at your own shadow. You didn’t stop looking over your shoulder for that entire first year. I wanted you to feel safe in our own home....”
“Well I’d feel far safer if my husband didn’t pack an arsenal into our tower without telling me,” Sarah started. But before she could elaborate on the course of action she might have preferred, my mate was leaning into her line of vision to swap out the undercook’s rifle for something smaller and lighter that I couldn’t quite make out in the flashlight’s erratic glow.
“This one is better in close quarters,” the professor murmured quietly, effectively ending the marital dispute with his reminder of the barrage that continued outside the stone walls. And while I would have expected Eddie to vent his frustrations on Sebastien for such a supreme usurpation of his authority, the older male’s scent instead turned sweet with gratitude.
They understand each other perfectly, I realized, glancing between the two males. The professor hadn’t been stepping on Eddie’s toes with his interruption. Instead, my mate was coming to the latter’s aid so we could all work together in an effort to overcome the real danger breathing down each of our throats.
Because the silence that followed Sarah’s outburst was strangely free of gunfire. The thick metal sheets that protected the tower’s windows from ingress or egress no longer rattled with a systematic barrage of bullets. And even though that absence of sound should have been a relief, it instead felt like the first discordant strain of a horror movie’s soundtrack.
After all, why should our enemies stop shooting unless they’d realized we weren’t keen to retaliate? Even now they were likely concocting a clever plan to vanquish their apparently toothless prey. Perhaps huddling together inside a tower with only one exit point wasn’t the smartest move when faced with unknown foes....
Only, Eddie had outfitted his defense forces with far more than mere guns. At the press of a button, the whine of a generator kicked into gear beneath our feet. Then lights flickered on above our heads while a monitor rose into the air against the furthest wall. Finally, at a nod from our host, Sebastien accepted a keyboard then tapped at the keys to cycle through scenes of surprisingly empty interior and exterior spaces.
We now had eyes on every part of the mansion. It was only a matter of time until we tracked our attackers down.
UNFORTUNATELY, SARAH wasn’t willing to wait. While everyone else’s gaze remained tuned to the monitor, my birth mother wiggled away from her entourage and leaned into my personal space for the first time in...well, in my entire life. And for half a second, I inhaled her sharp scent of peppermint and peanuts, the combination nothing like the mossy aroma I’d grown into before I was old enough to remember any other life.
Then the moment of shared sympathy broke as Sarah stated her mind. “What path did you take on your way here?” she demanded, her voice a nearly silent hiss.
Ah, so she thought our attackers were local alphas protesting my trespassing presence. I could only guess at the hoops Sarah must have jumped through to carve out a place for herself that wasn’t a part of any pack, so I could understand her anger now. Still, I had a sinking suspicion that someone from my past—rather than from my mother’s—was the one responsible for our current midnight melee.
Turning my back on the humans just in case Eddie possessed hidden abilities—like Sebastien’s
knack for reading lips—I whispered a terse reply. “If you’re worried about me drawing local shifters here on my heels, I doubt that’s at the root of our problems. We have far bigger fish to fry....”
Only Sarah didn’t believe me. I could see it in her eyes. Could sense her anger and willingness to toss me out the nearest window if that would save her own skin from further harm. “Maybe,” she countered...then swiveled around once more as a hum of interest emerged from behind our backs.
I understood what the room’s other inhabitants were reacting to as soon as my gaze caught on the monitor. Because Sebastien had finally tracked down the enemy, a handful of black-clad two-leggers using battery-powered floodlights to illuminate their approach. Unfortunately, the men weren’t passing through the interior of the mansion as I’d been expecting. Instead, one tossed a grappling hook while another began climbing...both working their way up the exterior of the very tower we hid within.
Chapter 20
Sarah didn’t wait to see what defenses Eddie might have available. She didn’t ask her crew for help or reach for one of Sebastien’s guns. Instead, she stalked past me then tapped a code into a keypad I hadn’t noticed along the tower’s curved wall.
Immediately, air rushed in through the abruptly opening doorway along with the cool, moist cling of fog. And with that air came man-made light—the exact same light we’d seen on the monitor only seconds earlier.
“Sarah, don’t!” Eddie demanded, his deep voice breaking as he realized an instant before I did that his wife was walking willingly onto a balcony mere meters above our enemies’ heads. The male was too far distant to do anything, though. And he likely didn’t understand his wife’s plan of attack anyway. How could he when Sarah had never initiated her husband into the reality of shifter territorial battles and displays of alpha aggression?
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