Vincent Thompson, the head of the Council and most likely the one who would take over as Alpha, began the proceedings. “Justin Waylan,” he said, addressing the young man. “You stand before this tribunal as the Accused, charged with the murder of Randall Waylan, the Clan Alpha and your father. How do you plead?”
It took a moment for Justin to find his voice, still overwhelmed by how surreal this all felt. “Not guilty,” he replied. “My dad and I may have had our problems, but I would’ve taken a bullet for him. I would have killed for him. But I loved him, and I never would have done anything to harm him.” He looked around at them. “You’ve got to believe me.”
Justin felt his heart sink lower when, unmoved by his claims, Thompson just snorted and continued. “The Accused will now see the evidence brought against him.”
Samuel entered the room with clear plastic bag containing what Justin recognized as the clothes he had been wearing yesterday, now covered in his father’s blood. He placed the bag on the table.
“Does the Accused concede that the items before him are his property?”
Justin nodded reluctantly. “Yes,” he said.
The wall behind the Council opened to reveal a wide, flat screen television. As Justin watched, the surveillance video from the cameras outside of the main house began to play. It showed Justin leaving the house at just after seven in the evening. The hood on his sweatshirt was down and his face could be seen clearly. The footage moved ahead, showing Warren exiting an hour later. Then, just after the midnight mark, a figure dressed in Justin’s clothes, hood up, returned. Twenty minutes passed and he reappeared, head down but still hooded, the front of the light-colored shirt splattered with blood. Justin frowned. “You can’t see my face,” he muttered. He raised his voice, looking at the Council as he pointed to the screen. “You don’t know for certain that’s me! That could be anyone! Someone could have taken my clothes and worn them to make it look like me.”
“You were overheard arguing with the victim shortly before seven o’clock,” Thompson said, his chair creaking under his bulk as he turned back around. He gave Justin a look that bordered on smug. God, this man hated him. He never made a secret of it, either. More than once and right in front of Justin he had suggested to Randall that his wayward son be sent away for ‘rehabilitation.’ “You were heard to make a threat.”
“A threat,” Justin scoffed, rolling his eyes. “It wasn’t a threat. All I did was tell my dad I was going to be Alpha someday. He didn’t think I would make a good Alpha but I told him I would prove I could be.” He looked around. “Where’s Warren? He’s the one who said he witnessed this conversation, but I’m here to say he overheard wrong.”
“The Council calls the Witness,” one of the women at the table announced.
The door opened and Justin twisted around to watch his cousin enter the room. The hair on his arms and the back of his neck rose as Warren made his way to the empty seat at the table and sat down. “What the hell is this?” Justin demanded. He looked at the others. “That’s the Alpha’s chair. Why is he sitting there?”
“The position of Alpha is always passed to the nearest blood relative,” Thompson stated. “Normally, that would fall to the first born child – but given the circumstances, the title must now go to the next in line.” He motioned to Warren. “As the son of the Alpha’s brother, he is the most likely candidate.”
“It’s a great responsibility,” Warren said, speaking up for the first time. He pushed nervously at the bridge of his glasses. “I wasn’t prepared for it, but if working alongside Uncle Randall taught me anything, it’s that the Clan needs an Alpha at all times. I never thought I would be in this position, but I have every intention of continuing his legacy.”
Justin had to laugh at this. “Seriously?” He looked at the rest of the Council in disbelief. “You’re going to let this – this brown-nosing bean counter be in charge of the Pack?” He snorted. “He’s only a Beta because Dad felt sorry for him after his parents died. I’ve seen Omegas who have bigger balls than he does!”
“The Accused will be silent!” Thompson said sharply. Beside him, Warren looked down at his hands clasped on the table, clearly uncomfortable. Several of the Council members shifted, some cleared their throats. “He has already been sworn in as Clan Alpha,” Thompson said, and placed a hand on Warren’s shoulder in apparent support of this decision. “The Accused will show the proper respect, or be placed under full restraint.” He gave Justin a thin smile. “Is that understood?”
‘Full restraint’ meant being muzzled. The last thing Justin wanted or needed was to be rendered mute. As much as he hated to do it, he swallowed back any further protests and responded with a contrite nod. He averted his eyes, staring at the floor while his mind continued to reel over this surprising turn of events. Warren – the Alpha? This is insane! And it’s his word against mine, being the so-called “witness” to my argument with Dad. He grimaced. God, I am so fucked.
“Will the Witness please give his account?”
Warren nodded. “Yes. I was on my way to see the Alpha to discuss the quarterly accounting when I heard voices raised in anger – I recognized them immediately as my cousin and uncle. I was in the hall just a few feet from the door when it opened and I heard my cousin say ‘I’ll show you, Dad,’ and ‘I will be Alpha, mark my words.’”
“Was this the first time you had heard the Accused arguing with his father?”
“No,” Warren replied softly, with a shake of his head. “I’d been in the room several times when Justin would come in, raging out of his head. Of course, most of those incidents he would be under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. It was brought to my attention that just yesterday afternoon, my cousin was picked up from a bar where he had been drinking with the Human clientele.”
“So the Accused was inebriated at the time of the argument with his father?” Thompson looked past Justin to the two men behind him. “Did you also say you found an empty bottle in the Accused’s quarters following the murder?”
“Yes, sir,” Gerard replied. Justin twisted around to look at him. “Randall Waylan had placed us on special duty to curtail his son’s substance abuse problem. We were ordered to make regular sweeps of his rooms to check for drugs and alcohol. Unfortunately, we missed this one because he had hidden it with something to mask the scent.” He shot a glare at Justin. “I consider it just another act of disobedience to the Alpha – and a major factor in what drove him to take his father’s life.”
“Then you don’t know anything about me,” Justin growled. “I don’t go on murderous rampages when I get drunk. I have fun, and then I pass out.” He turned back to the Council. “Which is what I did last night – after I saw my dad.”
“But you had been drinking prior to your argument,” one of the women on the Council said.
“Yeah, but not that much. You know it takes a lot to get one of our kind drunk.”
“The fact remains that you had been given direct orders to abstain from alcohol, and you defied this order,” Thompson said. He looked up and down the length of the table at his colleagues. “It’s now time to make our judgment. Council Leader Harris – you have the sentence. Please review and if you are in agreement, pass it along to the next member.”
A folded piece of linen stationery began to make the journey down the table, each person reading and giving a silent nod before letting it go to the next. Justin felt his stomach knot as no one contested. At last, the paper made it into Warren’s hands. As Alpha, he had the power to overturn the entire Council’s vote. Justin held out no hope for mercy after the things he had just said about his cousin.
Warren accepted the note. He adjusted his glasses again and began to read out loud. “’Given the Accused’s long and sordid history of criminal behavior and Pack misconduct, coupled with the evidence at hand and the eye-witness testimony, it is the decision of this Council…’” Warren paused and took a deep breath before continuing. “’It is the decision of this
Council to pronounce a verdict of Guilty. The penalty for murder of a sitting Alpha is execution.’” He looked up at Justin as he recited the final line. “’To be carried out before the next sunrise.’”
Shock and panic hit Justin all at once. “No!” He looked around, wild-eyed. “This is all some kind of set up. I’m telling you, you’ve got the wrong guy! Someone is framing me!”
“Why would someone go to such lengths?” Thompson asked, smirking. “Admit your crime and accept your fate.”
“You’re just going to condemn me to death based on some bloody clothes, some footage where you can’t even see my face, and the misunderstood word of a so-called ‘witness’ you just named as the new Alpha?” Justin snorted. “God, this is exactly what I said to my dad! The Pack is living in the past, holding barbaric trials and putting people to death without even bothering to conduct a thorough investigation. If you people weren’t so fucking afraid of the Human world finding out about us, you could call in some real detectives, maybe even a forensics team, and they’d be able to prove my innocence in the same amount of time you took to pass sentence!”
Without another word, they all started to rise and leave the room through the door to the Council chambers. The only one to approach Justin was his cousin. “I’m sorry it had to come down to this,” Warren said with a sad shake of his head. “But you have to admit, you brought this upon yourself. Hopefully, some good will come from it. Your actions might set an example to the younger generation, teaching them what not to do.”
“Fuck you, Warren,” Justin spat. “You’re as backwards as the rest of them. Well, I’ll tell you the same thing I told my dad: the longer our race lives in the past, the less chances of its survival for the future. This whole ‘exclusion’ thing can’t continue. And I know that’s why I was set up – because I dared to speak the truth. Now, you’re all going to silence me.” He shook his head. “I fucking weep for our future.”
“Then you’ll be shedding tears in vain,” Warren said softly. “As of sunrise, you’ll no longer have a future.”
“You son of a bitch,” Justin growled, eyes flashing, and he lunged at his cousin. He took the slighter man to the floor before Gerard and Phil could jump in to break it up. Justin took a swipe at his cousin’s face and Warren’s glasses flew off, one of the lenses popping out and rolling under the table.
“My eye!” Warren cried, immediately covering the right side of his face.
“You’re not fit to be Alpha!” Justin snarled at him in disgust. Suddenly, he felt someone grab him from behind – and that’s all it took to make his adrenaline spike to the level needed to force a transformation. Justin could feel his face contort and extend into a lupine muzzle. His hands grew larger, sprouted long brown hair and deadly claws. Whipping around on his attackers, he snapped his jaws and came within a hair’s breadth of biting Gerard’s cheek. He swung at Phil and sent him flying across the room.
Samuel had the presence of mind to keep his distance as he pulled out his phone. “Code Two!” he shouted. “We’ve got a Rogue!”
Warren, still on the floor, scrambled backwards and crouched under the table in fear; Justin saw the scratch under his eye and snorted. As much as he wanted to belittle his cousin for being a coward, he knew he had to flee – he could already hear the alarms going off around the community with the initiation of total lockdown. He spun around, seeing the other Betas changing to their wolf forms in order to match his strength. Justin had only one recourse: escape by whatever means necessary. And right now, that meant going through the nearest window. His leather jacket provided adequate protection as he covered his head with his arms and leapt. Glass shattered, flying in all directions. Justin started to run the moment his feet hit the ground. He could see others coming, running across the compound. He glanced back and saw Gerard and Samuel following him through the broken window.
Justin cut through manicured yards, weaving his way to the nearest wall surrounding the small neighborhood. He knew the ornamental spikes topping the brick and mortar barrier would be electrified, with enough current to knock an adult werewolf on his ass. Spying a tree near the wall, Justin jumped up, grabbed a branch, and swung himself up and over like a pole vaulter. He continued to run, deep into the small wooded preserve. By the time he reached the nearest road, he had shifted back to his human form. At this point, he didn’t need to draw any additional attention to himself. It would be dark before long. Now, he just had to figure out which way to go.
“Into the city,” he told himself.
Chapter Three
After her run-in with Ceara and Tynice, Savannah took out her frustration on the kitchen, channeling her anger into something productive. By the time she finished, every piece of stainless steel gleamed. Savannah looked around and smiled. They should stop by more often, she thought. “Nothing cleans like woman burning off a ton of pent-up aggression.” Switching off the lights, she left the restaurant and headed upstairs.
The apartment above the café had been Savannah’s home her whole life, but the building itself had been in her family for two generations. Her maternal grandfather, Papa Martelli, had purchased it back in the Seventies when he came home from serving two tours in Vietnam. Back then, the restaurant had been known for serving up some of the best pizza on Chicago’s south side. Twenty years later, he hired a young African-American man named Charles Goode, a fellow Marine who had just returned from fighting in Desert Storm and had a wife and two little girls to support. Papa had rented out the apartment to Charles in addition to giving him a job.
At the same time, Savannah’s mom, Alma, had been helping her father run the family business. She and Charles soon forged a friendship, and when his wife walked out on him and their two young daughters, she had been there to offer consolation. Eventually, they fell in love and once Charles’ divorce had been finalized, they got married. A year later, Savannah Goode was born.
When Papa had made the decision to retire, he sold the property to Daddy and gave his blessings to reinvent the pizza parlor as The Goode Soul Café. Charles and Alma had continued to live in the apartment above the restaurant, raising their family of three girls. Eventually, Tynice and Ceara went off to attend college out of state. Savannah had elected to stay in Chicago. She attended a local school so she could help in the restaurant between classes. She had been there to take care of her mother when she got sick. She had stayed after Mom died, knowing Daddy would need someone to help him keep the café going. Two years after losing his beloved Alma, Charles suffered a fatal heart attack.
Now, Savannah lived alone. Some days, she felt like the proverbial B-B in a boxcar, rattling around in a four-bedroom apartment that took up two floors. After Daddy passed, she had proposed splitting the apartment in to several rental units; she would live in one and continue to run the restaurant. But Tynice and Ceara, who still had some say in the property, had been against the idea. If Savannah had been a different person, she would have thought it unfair that Daddy had arranged to have them share a property that had once belonged to her grandfather. But Savannah understood her father’s reasoning. He had not been blind to the animosity in his house, the resentment his two older girls felt for their stepmother and their half-sister. When he wasn’t sweating over a hot grill, he would be doing his best to keep the peace. Savannah knew he had hoped that co-owning the restaurant would give his three daughters the opportunity to mend the rift between them. Poor Daddy, Savannah thought. He went above and beyond to make them happy, but he should have just learned to accept that some people can’t or won’t ever change.
To get into the mood for tonight’s ritual, Savannah put on some soothing instrumental music. She found her smudge stick and lit one end. The act of using smoke to cleanse negativity from a given area had been practiced for centuries by tribal cultures; even the Catholic church would begin ceremonies by swinging a brass censer of frankincense and myrrh. In her studies of other cultures, Savannah found that a dried bundle of cedar and sage commonly used b
y Native Americans to be more appealing. Now, as she walked around the apartment, she let the smoke fill every room and give the air the earthy scent of Magic.
With her home prepared, Savannah then retreated to the bathroom. She filled the tub with hot water and a few drops of sacred oils. Tonight, she chose Attraction, Luck, and High Altar. She lit candles around the room before stripping off her work clothes and stepping into the tub. As she submersed herself in the soothing water, she closed her eyes and cleared her mind. Bathing, her mother had always said, was another form of cleansing – and not just for washing away the day’s sweat and grime. Savannah had learned to visualize her problems seeping out of her pores and into the water. She did this when she showered, too, picturing the water carrying her troubles down the drain.
After the bath, she toweled off and walked naked through the house to her room. She used to be more modest when she lived with her family, but once she had the place to herself she found she enjoyed the freedom of observing what Celtic witches referred to as “sky-clad.” One of the reasons she had installed tall potted shrubberies on the rooftop terrace had been for a little extra privacy on those nights when she wanted to dance nude under the stars. She didn’t feel any embarrassment about her body – she took pride in the fact that she resembled some of the effigies created by ancient people to honor the Mother Goddess, with her big breasts and hips. Being born under the Earth sign of Taurus made her appreciate all of life’s pleasures, whether it came to good food or the joys of being bare-assed in the comfort of her own home.
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