by E. A. Copen
“Any truth to it?”
“Who, Osha?” He made a small, disapproving grunt. “Osha wouldn’t harm a fly. She’s old—really old—and that makes people suspicious. As far as I know, there isn’t a single practitioner of magick here in Barrow. A few vampires, but no witches. Just us werewolves.”
That struck Jackie as odd. There had to be close to five thousand people in that town. It wasn’t huge, but statistically there should have been between five and ten practitioners.
“It goes back generations,” Nic continued, as if she’d inquired. “The Inuit peoples aren’t big on anything that can disrupt the natural order of things. In the old days, my people would ostracize anyone who showed any hint of real magick. Send them off into the wilderness. Lots of stories about what happened to those witches. It’s likely they all died, but we’re a superstitious bunch. Stories tell about all kinds of monsters they turned themselves into in order to survive out in the snowy wasteland. Anyway, because we sent all the witches away, and magick tends to be genetic…”
The rest didn’t need to be said. Superstition had successfully weeded out any practitioners in Barrow, at least according to Nic.
“What about shamans?” Jackie asked, placing another dry plate in her stack. Nic was far enough ahead of her now that he’d paused to let her catch up.
“Ninety percent of that was tricks of the voice and sleight of hand. What southerners call a shaman is more of a mediator between this world and the next than anyone who does magick and spells. The old people believe in a lot of spirits.”
“You keep saying the old people or the old days. Aren’t you Inuit? You look like one, at least.”
Nic raised an eyebrow and hesitated with the answer. “Why? Because I don’t dress in seal skins and live in an igloo?”
Jackie felt her cheeks flush. “Sorry, that came out wrong. I’m not very good at talking to people. I prefer numbers. Harder to screw up. I didn’t mean to offend.”
“My father was half white. A southerner from a small place called Trapper Creek.”
“I’ve never heard of Trapper Creek.” She grabbed another plate and hastily dried it.
Nic grinned at her, though she wasn’t sure why. She hadn’t said anything funny. “Nobody’s heard of Trapper Creek. I guess that makes me one of the Inuit by extension. I just don’t keep any of the old ways or traditions. Almost all of us have abandoned old superstitions. You can ask Osha about it tomorrow. She’ll talk your ear off about the old ways and how us youngsters failing to adhere to traditions are responsible for all of our modern suffering.” He mimicked a high voice as he said the last part. When she paused to frown at him, he picked up another dish towel and started helping her dry.
Jackie felt herself flush and let her irritation show in her voice. “I don’t need help.”
“I know, but I don’t want to be here all day. Sometimes it’s worth accepting help in the interest of expediency.”
Nic froze after he’d said the last sentence and his eyes became unfocused, fixed on the empty wall behind the sink. He was probably thinking he should have realized that sooner and called for help. Maybe David would still be alive if he had.
It was a fair assumption. It’d taken two and a half days for David to die from whatever had happened to him. Had Nic called Lou right away, she and Bo might have flown out sooner and found the source of the issue before he suffocated on his own laughter. Maybe not.
Nic was smart enough to know that no good could come from speculation, but his own guilt weighed him down. Jackie watched it tug at him like the lead on a dog, keeping him from moving on. Until he was vindicated in his own eyes, until he healed, he would be an ineffective leader for his pack, and the pack needed a strong leader right now.
She touched his arm lightly. The contact drew his attention from the wall to her. Their eyes locked. Something tugged at her heart and she was almost overwhelmed by the need to comfort him, the absolute need to be in physical contact. Her breath caught in her chest, making her heart dance to a faster tempo. Warmth spread from her ears down into her cheeks. Her jaw shook as she fought the urge and the screaming of the wolf inside her head to step up and embrace him and hold him until all was right in the world again.
Nic’s throat muscles worked as if he were trying to swallow but couldn’t quite manage. “What is this?” His voice was raw and jagged, almost as if it hurt to speak.
“I’m not doing anything. At least, I don’t think so.”
But there was no denying that something was going on between them. The air between them was suddenly thick and electric. The smell of him cut through the afterthoughts of dinner and the soapy scent of the dishwater, the faint scent of snow on spruce. That couldn’t be right because they were too far north for trees, but there was no denying what her nose knew. That was the scent of Dominic Amaruq and her wolf wanted nothing more than to rub his scent all over her.
Someone cleared their throat in the doorway. Nic tore his eyes from hers and gave an irritated glare in the general direction of the door. “What is it, Vince?”
The other wolf quickly dropped his eyes to the floor. “I finished setting up the cots. I didn’t know if there was anything else you wanted me to do.” Vince lifted his eyes to focus on Jackie’s chin, a sparkle of laughter dancing in his eyes. “I guess maybe I’ll go see what’s on the television, unless you want me to wrap up the cleanup effort in here so you can go do, er, more important things.”
Nic cleared his throat and stepped back. “You want to do the dishes, be my guest. I’m sure Jackie’s arm could use a rest.” He started to walk away, but paused next to the table to turn around and address her. “If you want to talk more or have more questions, come and find me. I don’t plan on sleeping. Whatever’s been happening to my people, it’s happening at night. I intend to find out what it is tonight.”
Jackie blinked and finally got a good, deep breath. “There’s no need. Bo will have shifted by now and he already volunteered. Plus, didn’t you say someone was going to be on guard? No sense in all of us staying awake. Besides, I could really use a hot bath.”
Nic inclined his head as if making a concession. “I’ll have some fresh towels brought up for you,” he said before leaving.
Vince watched his alpha go before turning to grin at Jackie. “Don’t let him fool you, ma’am. For as pretty as he is to look at, he doesn’t bring home too many women. They tend to get scared off by his moods.”
“Moods?”
Maybe he meant how testy Nic had been with Bo. It was clear that Nic was the competitive sort. Territorial, too, if he was an alpha. Most human women didn’t like how possessive some werewolf males could be, thinking of them as controlling rather than protective. They didn’t understand that when one of their kind declared something was theirs, it was a caring gesture, meant to indicate a bond of loyalty and protection. For all their complaints, wedding rings were more a gesture of ownership than any mate bond. Only a human would buy his mate a shiny rock to pinch her finger as a declaration to other males of ownership.
Vince winked at her. “Oh, you’ll see if you stick around. He can get pretty worked up. He really doesn’t like it when someone cuts through all that. You’ll be good for him.” He came up and held a hand out for the dish towel. “May I, young lady?”
Jackie smiled and draped the dish towel over Vince’s arm.
Chapter Eight
P anting and sore, Bo laid himself out over the bed and tried not to move. It took longer than it should have to complete the shift, partly because he hadn’t been sure Nic would take good care of Jackie. He should have had better control. It was because it was Jackie, because he was old, because he’d been thinking about his dead mate earlier. It all made him weak.
And this is why I never let her come with me. He tilted his head to the side. Because I can’t afford love.
Lou would scold him if he were here. “It can’t matter that the girl is blood,” Lou had told him when Bo convinced him to hire J
ackie. Even now, he could almost smell the old man’s leather chair, the one he’d been sitting in when they had that conversation. “She has to have the stomach for it, Bo. Constitution. You think your girl has that?”
“Yes,” Bo said with real certainty. Jackie was strong. She’d endured the worst thing that could happen to a teenage girl for the last five years. She’d lived with him.
Lou combed his fingers through thinning white hair from behind his desk. “You said she’s good with numbers.”
“Just started her senior year as an accounting degree at Montana State.” Bo lifted his chin and puffed out his chest. “She’s there on scholarship. Offers from a couple of big firms already. At least one has a Wall Street address.”
Lou wrinkled his nose and smacked his lips as if he’d just eaten a sour pickle. “I don’t need another accountant, Bo. I need another one of you. I need someone who can kill without remorse. You know how these wolves are.”
And he did. Sometimes, they fought. Bo had to put them down hard with claws and teeth. More often than not, they wept at the end and begged. Those weren’t the worst ones, though. The worst ones were the wolves he left behind to mourn. Bo was a destroyer, a reaper. All that he touched withered and died. Now, he was about to do the same to his daughter.
But he was also Lou’s silver bullet, the go-to solution for all his employer’s difficult problems.
“She can do it,” Bo said with a nod. “I will teach her.”
Lou leaned back in his chair until it creaked. The chair was much too big for the slight and aged man who sat in it. “Why her? Why not protect your child from this ugliness? Go and find some angry young wolf out for blood.”
“Because anger has no place in death,” Bo answered. “And whoever kills me will have to be strong enough. My children are the only ones I trust to do this. It’s their duty. And you know that Chanter Silvermoon has robbed me of a son. He wouldn’t do this.”
Lou tapped his thin fingers on top of the desk calendar in front of him. “And does Jackie know this is your plan? Does she know you’re training her to kill you?”
Bo let his wolf peer through his eyes then, just to let Lou know how serious his next statement was. “No, and she must never know.”
A knock at the door interrupted the memory. Bo sat up and sniffed the air. There was meat on the other side of his door. His stomach growled.
“Mister Wheeler?”
Ah, the omega again. Had he not scared her away? Her voice sounded more confident than before.
“Mister Wheeler, I’ve brought you something to eat.” The doorknob turned, and she pushed the door open without stepping in. She had a plate full of caribou, vegetables, and a single biscuit. An old, worn paperback was tucked under one arm.
Bo rose and slid off the bed before wagging his tail once and stopping to wait.
She put the plate down on the floor. “I wasn’t sure what you wanted, so I just brought everything. I’m Mandy, by the way. I don’t think I introduced myself earlier.”
He’d been hungry before the Change, and now he was starving. Bo had already begun tearing through the big chunks of meat she’d brought up. It was a little overdone for his tastes, but then anything cooked would have been overdone for his wolf.
She sat down on the edge of the bed, watching him eat for a time. Normally, eyes on him while he scarfed down overcooked meat would have been irritating, but Mandy was an omega and she was calm. That calmness passed on to him and soon he found the plate empty.
Bo licked his chops and looked up at her, tilting his head in an unspoken question while he eyed the paperback in her hands. Hondo. Good movie. One of The Duke’s best. He’d never read the book because who has time for that?
Mandy must’ve seen him eying the book. “Jackie said you liked westerns.”
Movies more than books, but I appreciate the gesture. He gave a little woof, hopped up on the bed beside her and placed his head between his paws.
The girl had a good reading voice, even if she tripped over a few words here and there. She was no audiobook narrator, but there was a certain crispness to her words, an innocence. He wondered if his daughter had ever sounded like that. Or was Jackie always so closed off?
He sighed. Maybe I should be pushing her toward the alpha instead of getting in the way. It might do her good to open up to someone, and that someone isn’t going to be me. Then he remembered the feeling of cold snow in his boots and the teenaged snicker from behind his back as he grumbled and cursed. A smile touched his wolfish face. If he put them together, Nic would never know what hit him.
Content at the sound of an omega’s words, and the plan for revenge unfolding in his brain, Bo drifted off to the first peaceful sleep he’d had in years.
Chapter Nine
J ackie sank into the steaming tub of water and sighed. Alone at last. Though muted chatter filtered through the walls and floorboards of the upstairs bathroom, the relative quiet was nice. The hot water worked into the tense muscles around her neck and shoulders, finally forcing them to relax. She felt like she’d been digging ditches all day instead of just crammed into tiny spaces with a bunch of other people and all their scents. The plane out of Billings to Whitehorse had been bad enough, especially with the fussy baby two rows back. While she felt for the poor young mother trying to calm the kid down, her wolf had different ideas about how to handle a noisy baby, and most of them involved using her teeth.
Just remembering how hard she’d had to work to resist the urge to turn around and growl made her shoulders tighten with guilt. That wasn’t how a grown woman her age was supposed to act. Every other woman on the plane had been cooing over the child, making kissy faces and asking politely about the baby’s age, sex, and other things strangers had no business knowing. Even on the plane ride, she’d felt guilty over not harboring some maternal instinct. All she’d wanted to do was throttle the kid and retreat to a small space somewhere, away from people.
The private plane from Whitehorse to Anchorage had been a needed reprieve, and she’d used to the time to do a little checking up on Bo. She still couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something he wasn’t telling her about their working together. The way he’d avoided her on the plane, and how well-guarded all his personal accounts were, only served to solidify that suspicion. Bo didn’t have any bank accounts, no credit cards, no credit history, at least nothing flagged in the last ten years, and nothing in the legal system. Online, he was a ghost. The only thing she’d been able to find was a life insurance form, which looked mostly standard. It was the same form and company she used, the same company every werewolf used, thanks to Lou’s instructions. She’d pulled the form, but hadn’t had time to look at it since touching down. Still, in her experience as a corporate CPA, the only people who locked up all their personal information as tight as Bo had and lived so far off the grid were people who had something to hide.
She lifted her toes out of the water and scrubbed away all the bad road. Being in the water was the first time her feet had been warm since Anchorage. Bo had been right, telling her she should’ve brought warmer clothes. Nic, too. But she couldn’t just admit that. Not to Bo, at least. He’d use the opportunity to gloat over her about how right he was.
Speaking of Nic… She sighed and gripped the side of the tub, sinking deeper. What am I going to do about that? Not like it’s the first time some guy’s been interested, but this feels different. Maybe not. It’d been a long time since she’d attempted a relationship. The last one had ended so badly, mostly because men tended to expect things from her she wasn’t capable of. It wasn’t in her to join a pack, to submit to someone else’s will, and it seemed like that’s what every guy she’d ever met wanted. Not a partner, but property. Even the guys she’d dated who spoiled her with expensive gifts, all they’d wanted was to change her, make her theirs in all the ways she didn’t care for. Their love expected too much of her.
Nic probably wouldn’t be any different. Sure, they might have fun fo
r a time. The sex would probably be great, at least until he got tired of flying out to see her, or her to see him. Then the dreaded phrase “next level” would come up and he’d suggest they move in together. That she join his pack. “It won’t be like other packs,” he’d promise. And it’d all fall apart. It wouldn’t be his fault. She just wasn’t relationship material.
Jackie dunked her head under the water and held her breath, focusing on the vibrations coming through the floor, creating otherworldly underwater sounds. Bubbles floated up from her nose and burst to the surface. I have to shut his interest down for his own good. He seems like a good guy and the last thing he needs is me distracting him from what’s really important.
The vibrations in the floor changed, sending ripples over the surface of the water in rhythmic circles. Foosteps coming closer to the bathroom.
She sat up out of the water and looked at the door, expectantly waiting for the knock. It didn’t come, though shoes had clearly stopped in front of the bathroom door. With the scent of strawberry soap fresh in her nose, she couldn’t catch the scent of whoever waited on the other side, but Nic seemed the most likely suspect. So far, he’d taken point in dealing with her, preferring a direct approach to letting his second or third act as a liaison, which would’ve been more practical. As she waited, the footsteps didn’t move away, nor did whoever was on the other side of the door knock.
Dammit, just knock already. Jackie stood and pulled down the towel that’d been left for her, drying off. Rather than putting on the clothes she’d just taken off, she threw on the cotton robe she’d brought and tied it closed, marching to the door. The footsteps tried to retreat before she got there, but she was too fast.
She jerked open the door and found Nic on the other side, a neatly-folded pile of clothes in his arms. He was halfway through taking another step away when she caught him and stopped, flashing a sheepish grin that told her he’d wanted to be caught.
“I was just on my way to drop these off in your room.” Nic lifted the pile of clothes slightly. “Gets cold here at night, and based on what you were wearing earlier, I figured you might not have anything warm enough.”