She twisted her wet hair into a towel turban on her head, approached the medicine cabinet that hung over the sink, and rifled through it until she located Graham’s deodorant. She opened it and indulged in the arguably bizarre behavior of inhaling deeply of his scent: a tangy sort of musk, clean and sharp. Then, lacking other options, she applied it under her arms and plucked a scentless body lotion from the cabinet thereafter, spreading it liberally over her extremities. She felt clean, safe, comfortable, at least for the time being. She hadn’t allowed herself to ask the question of what happens next.
Stepping back out into the bedroom, she padded lightly across the hardwood floor and availed herself of the clothes that Graham had gathered on her behalf. She choose her favorite tee shirt: grey and ratty, with the words “World Cup ’93” scrawled across the front in faded blue lettering. Then, plain black cotton panties and an old pair of Umbro shorts to round out her stylish ensemble.
She was drying her hair with the towel when Graham came back into the room, carrying a bottle of whiskey. He smiled faintly at her and crossed directly to the double doors, stepping into the den to give her some privacy to finish up her routine. She used his comb to get the tangles out of her hair and folded the towels over the racks in the bathroom before she moved into the den to join him. She noted as she went that the only thing that felt off about this place was its total lack of windows. She couldn’t sense what time of day it was, though she figured, by the way her stomach was rumbling, that it was near to high noon.
And her host had thought ahead: there on the coffee table was a spread of fresh fruits and vegetables, meat, cheeses, and crackers, as well as coffee and tea service and, of course, the bottle of whiskey. All of this was laid out in front of a warm and crackling fire; a radio hummed some innocuous classical music from the corner of the room.
Graham looked up when she entered, and offered a broad smile that showed off a set of perfectly white teeth. “I figured you would be hungry,” he said, a genial sort of gaze sweeping over her as he gestured to the spread.
“You figured right,” she said, and brushed past him to take a seat on the sofa. It was plush, with corduroy cushions on a wooden base. She sank into it. “Thank you.”
“It’s the least I can do,” he said and joined her on the couch. Viola reached out for a small plate, piled it high with cheese and crackers, nuts and sliced melon, and leaned back into the couch as she ate.
“Nonsense,” she said, her mouth full of brie and sliced apple. “I didn’t do anything but make a great mess of everything.”
“But you tried,” he said, “and what more can I ask than that?” Graham plucked a few grapes from the plate of fruit and popped them into his mouth. “What exactly did happen?”
“When I returned to the Felidae Headquarters, they took me to see the council,” she said, skipping the part where she’d gone to bed with her best friend and then slept like the dead in his arms for thirteen hours. “I told them that I’d spoken to you, that you wanted to broker a peace, and they took that for treason.”
“Ah,” he said, casting his gaze to the hardwood beneath their feet. “I’m sorry. I should have prepared you for such an eventuality. I had just held out hope that they would have been as interested in keeping this bloodless as I was.”
“Some of them were,” she said, setting her plate aside and uncoiling to her full height. “Most of the council seemed desperate not to go to war. Most of them want peace just as much as we do.”
“That’s encouraging,” he said. “So, then, I take it Alec is the problem?”
“Mmhm.” She made her way to the small corner table where he’d set up the coffee and tea service and helped herself to a steaming mug of dark black roast. She took a sip and felt immediately more awake. “He was the one who had me imprisoned.”
“I see. And Rowan…?”
Viola heaved a sigh and gave a slow shake of her head, returning to the sofa with her mug. She sat down, cradling it in both hands, and stared blankly into the fire. She thought of Rowan, how his smile, his ease, had been the thing that had kept her happy and sane all those years. How he had trained her, taught her everything she knew, and had never wanted anything more than to keep her safe. Or, rather, as safe as possible in her line of work. But then he had confessed his love for her and betrayed her, all in one fell swoop. He’d loved her, abandoned her, imprisoned her, and set her free, all in the span of a single day. She didn’t know what to make of him.
“I think he’s torn,” she said at length. “I think he is fiercely loyal to his clan, and to his father. Furthermore, I think their rules are a little different than yours.”
Graham furrowed his brow. “What do you mean?”
“Well, do you have to tear the throat out of your sitting Alpha in order to take over the clan?” she asked.
Graham leaned back then, pinching the bridge of his nose. “No,” he finally muttered. “No, we don’t do things that way here.”
“Well, they do,” she said. “They make exceptions for illness, but otherwise… it’s bloody, their ascensions.”
“I see.”
“How do you do things here, then?” she asked, propping her elbow up on the back of the couch as she turned to fully face him. “I’d like to know.”
“Well, we don’t kill our Alphas, that’s for damned sure.” He hesitated, as though he weren’t entirely certain that he wanted to grant her full admittance into this world. And perhaps there was a part of her that wanted to believe she was only a visitor here. But they both knew that this clan, as much as Clan Felidae, was in her blood, and she had a right to know.
“Our Alphas are voted in,” he explained. “We have a band of elders who act as advisors to the sitting Alpha, and typically former Alphas serve in the band. But the Alpha is elected by the entirety of the clan, or at least by a quorum.”
“And your father…?”
“My father was an exception,” he said, shaking his head slowly. He leaned forward where he sat and rested his elbows on his knees, templing his fingers in front of him. “My father wasn’t willing to give up power. He wouldn’t put the matter to a vote, and when we challenged him, he became violent. He was power-hungry and had to be put down.” He turned and locked his eyes on her then, and there was a fierceness to them she had never seen before. “I did it myself, and I swore to my people that I would never behave as he had. I intend to honor that promise. I want to bring them away from the fighting and into a lasting peace. That’s all I want; that’s all I’ve ever wanted.”
“But you want to remain in power,” she said, challenging him. “Delivering on this promise keeps you in the seat you took from your father.”
“Yes.”
“So how are you any different from Alec?”
“I don’t want to kill people to remain in power, Viola,” he snapped. “Don’t you trust me yet?”
She examined him carefully, her eyes roving over his entire body, and she found that she did trust him. But her decision to trust Rowan had recently backfired; whether or not he would live up to his promises remained to be seen. “For now,” she said. He sighed. “You still haven’t told me everything.”
“What else do you want to know?”
“How we’re the key to… anything. Verity and me.” She watched him carefully as he nodded his head and rose to his feet, snatching up the whiskey bottle he’d brought into the room and pouring himself three fingers’ worth into a tumbler. He held the bottle up to her in question, and she shook her head, demurring.
“Well, first, I need to tell you a bit more about how our clan operates,” he said, taking a sip of the drink. “I’m not sure what it’s like over in Cat Clan, but here, our den mothers are perhaps the most revered members of our society, claiming a status higher even than my own. A den mother is someone who has birthed a full-blooded Ursling, as we have taken to colloquially calling them. A baby bear, essentially. They maintain the title of ‘den mother’ until the child stops nursing, usuall
y after the first year. Our women, our mothers, are of vital importance to us, and we are to protect them at all costs.”
“Okay…” Viola said, her eyes wide, her expression blank.
“A man’s status as Alpha of our clan isn’t official until after he takes a mate and makes a den mother of her,” he went on. “Thus, my official title is ‘acting Alpha,’ and will remain as such until I have taken a mate and fathered a cub with her. Then, we become the example which everyone else in the clan follows. It’s all… old and symbolic and dates back to an era when we actually lived in caves all of the time. But it’s how we do things.”
“So… you ‘vote’ your Alphas in, but they aren’t really Alphas until they take a mate and become a daddy?” She blinked anxiously. “That seems really bizarre to me.”
“Viola,” he said, finishing off the whiskey. “The entire purpose of these clans is to preserve our bloodlines. If members of my clan just… went off and married humans, our kind would die out in two, maybe three generations. We’d be wiped off the planet. We do things this way because we want to survive, the way any species does.”
“Fine, but what does all this have to do with me and Verity?” She had her eyes glued to him as he moved, desultory, from couch, to table, and back. Finally, he filled his glass with whiskey and sat down again.
“My theory is that…” He eyed her, dubious, and cleared his throat before continuing. “Your sister… her body is at odds with itself. All the swelling from her limbs to her brain, her cells are at war with one another. The two bloodlines didn’t exactly mix so much as they exist side by side, in one body. And she’s fighting it. I think the swelling is her body trying to shift, but she isn’t letting herself because the other side just… fights.”
“The swelling is her… starting to shift…?”
“Sort of. It’s her body trying to change, but it’s also her body fighting that change. But you…” he swept his eyes over her, from head to toe. “It seems to be all harmony inside of you.”
“But you think I can’t shift?”
“No, I think Verity can’t shift,” he said. “I think you can shift into anything in the world.”
“That’s what they said at the Felidae Headquarters, but then they told me that it would have manifested by now if it were possible.”
“Not necessarily. No one has ever showed you how to shift; no one has ever needed to.”
Viola’s head was swimming. Was it possible that she was the only person on the planet who could shift into any living creature? She gave a sharp shake of her head and forced herself to listen to what Graham was saying.
“And if you can, as I believe, then you can unite the clans by mating with both the Alpha of Clan Felidae, and… me.”
That was about when all of the color drained out of Viola’s face, and she squawked a hearty laugh. “Mate? I’m sorry — come again?”
“Bear us each a child, and start the intermingling of the bloodlines that will give rise to more powerful shifters. Shifters that can become anything — not just a bear in Clan Ursus, not just a feline in Clan Felidae, but anything at all.” This was his grand scheme, to usher in a new age of shape-shifters. And the entire plan rested on Viola’s tiny shoulders.
“But… what if they all turned out like Verity? What then?” Perhaps he hadn’t thought of that. Perhaps there was another way.
“That’s why we’ve ruled her out as an option — that’s why one of us couldn’t take her, and the other, you. We don’t want to risk her illness spreading. We believe that your blood is good, and that hers is…”
“Tainted.”
He nodded slowly, setting his glass down on the coffee table and scooting closer to her on the couch. She watched him move, the glow of the fireplace sending dancing shadows across his face. “I know this is a lot to take in,” he said, voice hovering just above a whisper, “and I don’t expect you to agree right away. But please do think about it.”
She shook her head. “I think you’re wrong about me,” she said. “I can’t shift into anything. I’m nothing special, I’m just a girl. A human girl. Totally unextraordinary.”
Graham lifted a hand and brushed an errant ink-black curl off of her forehead. “Even if you are only human, as you say, you would still be extraordinary.”
She couldn’t help but smile. “Flatterer,” she scoffed.
“Viola,” he rejoined, his tone suddenly somber, “I know you didn’t ask for any of this. I know that you feel as though you’ve been set down in the middle of someone else’s crisis, but I believe you are the key to fixing it, once and for all. And maybe then you’ll have the thing you were always searching for, ever since you and your sister were little girls, and she can have it, too.”
“And what is that?” she asked, utterly mesmerized by his words, his conviction, and the way his eyes glowed golden in the firelight.
“Belonging.”
The very word made her heart skip a beat, made her draw in a sharp breath of air through her nose, made her close her eyes at the wonder of it. Could she really belong somewhere? She and Verity were orphans, and though they had found happiness in their lives, they had never once felt as though they belonged anywhere, or to anyone. Maybe they could have the clans, find a place of status and importance among them. Find love, and family, and make a home for themselves, like the one they never got to have as children. Maybe everything could change for them. Maybe it was already changing.
“We are the children of the earth,” Graham said, his voice low and sonorous like he was incanting a spell, “and we beget life. And in this ongoing cycle, I can think of no other woman more worthy of bearing the next generation of shifters than you.”
Viola sighed quietly through her nose and couldn’t help but shake her head. “I’m the opposite of a mother,” she muttered. “I’m an assassin, in case you had forgotten.”
“But that doesn’t have to be all you ever are. Even if you turn my insane plan down entirely and I never see you again, even then, you don’t have to go back to the life you had before. You can forge something new for yourself, and ask yourself what you would be if you didn’t have to worry about Verity’s hospital bills.”
“I will still have to worry about Verity’s hospital bills,” she argued.
“No, you won’t. I swear to you. I intend to take care of them myself from now on.” She regarded him appraisingly, brows raised in question.
“Sure, right up until I turn you down for this little bear-your-children stunt, right?” She was frozen in place, staring at him, daring him to argue with her.
“No. My estate will handle the expense in perpetuity, regardless of whether or not you accept my offer. You have my word. In fact, I’ll have it drawn up in writing for you, so you’ll have more than my word.” He smiled; she responded with a stunned expression. “What, no quick-witted rejoinder at my expense?”
No. No snide remark, no rolling of the eyes. All she could think of to say was, “Thank you.” And it seemed to fall pathetically short of what she was feeling.
“It’s my pleasure, Miss St. James.” He chuckled wryly and leaned back, staring into the fire. “Truly, I would do a great deal more than this for a woman like you.”
Before she could even think about it, before she could second-guess the move, or make even a vague attempt at being logical, Viola sprang to her feet and climbed into Graham’s lap. She had her hands on either side of his face, and she was gazing intently down into his eyes, her lips hanging slightly agape as she regarded him with an expression that bore a distinct resemblance to awe. Then, she kissed him, kissed him like she was trying to show how his gesture had moved her, kissed him like she was trying to indicate just how profoundly it would change her life. She kissed him because she was free to kiss him, freer than she had ever been before in her life. She kissed him, because that was what she wanted to do with her life, in that moment, just kiss him. And she kissed him because he’d made it possible for her to do what she wanted.
He didn’t have to be asked twice. He hoisted her up in his arms as he rose to his feet, cradling her like a new bride being carried across the threshold, and moved with her into the bedroom. She didn’t know what it was he saw in her, exactly. She didn’t feel like anything special. Except for when he looked at her the way he was looking at her, full of such a blatant and vulnerable longing that she could not help but mirror it back to him.
He laid her gently on the mattress, and she sighed contentedly as she peered up at the canopy overhead. He tugged her shorts away so she was in panties and her tee shirt, then set about undoing the buttons of his flannel.
“Take off your shirt,” he said quietly, and she sat up on the mattress and obeyed, tossing it into a puddle at the foot of the bed. “Beautiful. And your panties.” She hesitated a moment but obliged, and wriggled out of them until they were abandoned entirely. “Lie back.”
Viola scooted up so that she could lean back against the plush decorative pillows that littered the mattress, and rested with her hands behind her head, her elbows winging out to the side.
“And your knees,” he said. “Put your feet up on the bed, and spread your knees.”
“Graham, I —”
“Shh,” he interrupted. “Just let me look at you.”
She did as she was told, allowing her knees to fall apart so that he could gaze at the flower of her sex, exposed to him as it was. But she didn’t feel nervous under the weight of his scrutiny. She felt warm, welcome; she liked the feeling of his eyes on her body. She could feel her desire begin to pulse between her legs, and she took one hand out from behind her head and trailed her fingertips down her body, across the slope of her breast and the plane of her belly until her fingers caressed the small mass of cells that made up the pith of her sex. She began to rub it, gently at first, and then with more force, so that she might draw out her wetness and grant him access to the deepest parts of herself.
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