"How do you know that I wasn't in Harmony?"
Again he let out a huff puff, letting me know I asked a silly question. "I can smell it on you," he muttered, tapping his nose.
I ignored his somewhat creepy statement, deciding I didn't want to know what else he knew based on my scent. Focusing on what he'd asked me to do, I frowned. “Why do you want to know about rumors from so long ago?”
“I want to know if you have any enemies you don’t know about.”
“But I was so young then. Why would anyone be holding a grudge against me from way back when?”
Something flickered across his handsome face. Something I couldn’t quite figure out. “Sometimes it’s not about you. Sometimes it’s about the people who know you.”
He looked so sad, I didn’t think. I leaned over and ran a hand through his hair. He shuddered against my touch, and I smiled when he turned and gave me a grateful grunt.
“Aldrich, why do we have to ask someone else about things that happened that long ago? You’d have been old enough to remember yourself.”
He pulled away, nudging me toward the house. “Go, little one. We cannot linger overlong.”
For a moment, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to let him get away with dodging my question. In the end, I decided he was right. We were in a time crunch. I nodded, having to tear myself from his side. “I’ll be back quickly.”
The worry on his face faded and softened into caring. “I know you will be. If I suspect the slightest threat to your person, I will no longer be standing guard.”
He made me smile with that, and I felt his eyes on me as I made my way to the back door. I didn’t know what I was going to say, but luckily I didn’t have to say anything. The door swung open on my first knock, and Mina dragged me inside.
“I knew you would come here, I knew it. Rick is out looking for you right now. He should be back soon. What happened to you, Roux? Where have you been and why are there Hunters again? Most of the town is at some kind of meeting right now, but the Undedicated weren't invited. In fact, we were told to remain in the house. They're saying it’s because of you.”
Everything that happened spilled out of me in a barely comprehensive jumble right there in my friend’s kitchen. I knew I was supposed to be on a recon mission, but all my confusion slipped without clearing it with my mind. “He keeps calling me his mate, and now someone I don’t even know may be trying to kill me. So much has happened, and I think I’m losing my mind. He’s making me so crazy.”
Mina nodded, handing me a paper towel. It was really rare to see the soft, caring look on her face without Ulric around. “I get why you’re freaked out. You’ve had enough excitement in a few hours to last the year.”
I swung myself up and sat on the edge of the kitchen counter. “What should I do? Is he for real about this mate stuff, or is he just trying to get laid or something? How serious is he?”
Mina laughed. “Well, at least you’ve got your priorities straight here.” She continued right past my glaring face. “I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but a lot of wolves mate for life. And it’s not uncommon for us to just know. Love at first sniff and all that. Pairings can even last through death if you want to believe wolf lore.”
My face flushed, and I promptly slid back into her sink. “B-but we hardly know each other.”
“Now, don’t lose your composure or anything, but it smells like there hasn’t really been much of a problem. In fact, if the little whiff I got of you a minute before you decided to wash my dishes with your ass is any indication, I’d go out on a limb and say if he were only out to get in your pants, you wouldn’t have minded all too much, and he would have already gotten his goal.”
“Mina!”
“Well, it’s true, isn’t it? I mean, look. You’re obviously as into him as he is into you, so forgive me if I don’t see the point of not striking while the iron’s hot. Sure, it might not work out down the road, but what’s the harm in enjoying yourself for a little while?”
My nose may not be as good as a wolf’s, but I smelled something fishy. I'd known Mina long enough to recognize when she was hiding something. “What aren’t you telling me?”
Ulric burst through the back door before I could get an answer. Tall and with a swimmers build, Ulric was all lean muscle and bright, hazel eyes. Dressed as he always was in khaki pants and a black T-shirt, he was unchanged, and yet in my eyes somehow…different.
For once, my stomach wasn’t doing its usual jumping jacks with him around. I’d spent countless hours obsessing over his multi-colored eyes, and now they seemed…ordinary. The air about him lacked a measure of arrogant sexuality, and I found myself missing it. I caught myself frowning. Ulric was always so enchanting to me, but now all I could think about was the fact that he wasn’t…right. He wasn’t right for me.
“Roux, you’re all right!” In that short moment of reassessment, Ulric went from hot love interest to doting brother figure, which is where he probably thought he had been the entire time.
With one swift bound, he cleared the distance between us and wrapped me in his arms. “I’m so glad you’re all right, I was so scared you may have been―”
That was as far as he got before his body was literally thrown from mine. It happened so fast, I didn’t see Ulric land. Instead, I was blocked by a back of silver fur while being forced to listen to the sick crunch of a body colliding with something immobile.
“Undedicated or not,” a familiar low growl threatened, “put your hands on her again, and you’ll have to learn to run with stumps.”
“Aldrich,” I snapped, trying to get around the stubborn wall of muscle that blocked my path at every turn. “What has gotten into you?”
I balled my fist up and went to punch him as hard as I could, but Mina’s shocked-drenched voice stopped me. “Aldrich? Your mate is the pa―”
A sharp series of barks from the man-beast in question quickly silenced anything she was going to say.
“That’s it. What’s with the attitude all of a sudden, Aldrich? And Mina, you better be preparing to finish that sentence. Rick, are you all right? Aldrich, stop blocking me!”
A pained groan quickly followed by the rustling of what I would guess to be plaster being repositioned stopped me mid foot-stomp. Rick called out to me. “I’m all right, pup—just tell me what’s going on.”
Aldrich allowed Ulric to stand without incident, though neither would allow me to check the latter for injuries. It seemed like it took forever, but eventually the four of us settled in the living room.
Aldrich demanded he and I sit side-by-side on one couch while Mina and Rick sat opposite us with the coffee table between both sofas. Ulric growled in agitation, something I had never heard him do before. “Now, how about someone fill me in?”
I leaned across the table to begin the story again, but was dragged back by a pair of annoyingly strong hands. While I turned to glare as aggressively as I could at my problem, Mina repeated my earlier summary of the day’s events, minus my personal conflict.
Ulric leaned back and put one of his feet in his lap, openly challenging Aldrich with a look. “And so you believe he has nothing to do with all this, Roux?”
I gasped, wondering why Rick would purposefully provoke the beast. Aldrich gave a little shrug and deliberately ran a hand up my arm. Ulric tensed.
I felt my cheeks heat and focused my attention on Mina, scooting as far away as the sofa would permit. “Okay, since the guys are having some kind of whose-thing-is-bigger contest―”
“Which isn’t a question, as only mine will be put into use.” Aldrich inserted. I could hear Ulric grinding his teeth from where I sat and chose to ignore the whole ordeal.
“It seems we’ll have to come up with the next move ourselves.” I continued in an unnecessarily loud voice.
Mina laughed at Rick's annoyance, but by the time I had finished my statement, she sobered. “Well, this is what I was told after Rick went out to look for you. Granny’s body showe
d up in the town square. She was covered with deep scratches, Roux.” She cast an uneasy glance toward Aldrich. “Five-fingered gouges.”
Something ugly passed through the air of the room and choked away any semblance of civility. Ulric reached across the table so fast, all I saw was a blur of movement.
With Aldrich, I didn’t see even that.
I felt the wind as Ulric's hand passed by my skin but failed to make contact, even as my mind struggled to process the information my mate was no longer there.
I’m sure I would have been concerned by the inclination toward calling him my mate, but my meter was a little full.
Aldrich lifted Ulric clear above his head and slammed him down on the coffee table, which splintered into a thousand pieces under the supernatural strength. A snarl unlike anything I’ve ever heard left his throat, and I watched as his pupils elongated.
Ulric’s feet connected with the barrel chest that threatened to crush him, and Aldrich was thrust backward into the wall across the room. Again Ulric reached for me, but I stood, too dumb with shock to respond. Before I could snap out of it, he found himself against the other wall. A gust of tunneled wind swept through the room, hitting him square in the chest.
“Get out of the way,” Mina screamed, hitting me hard from the side and rolling over the couch with my body tucked against hers.
Aldrich unfolded himself from the raining plaster of the damaged wall, a deep breath held in his chest. His mismatched gaze flickered over me and softened slightly before turning back to the focus of his attack.
Breathing shouldn’t cause hammers to form in the air, but that’s what happened. Clear, solid fists of wind built themselves as Aldrich huffed and puffed and then barreled across the room to beat at Ulric’s already bruised body.
Face covered with half a dozen cuts from the picture frames his back had demolished on impact, Ulric exploded from his own cloud of plaster dust.
“I won’t let you hurt her!” Ulric’s words came out in an animalistic choke as brown fur spread across his body. He dropped to all fours, his bones cracking sickly as they broke and then fused back together. “I’ll kill you first.”
The brown wolf launched toward the still form of a man but met with the anthromorphic body I had almost gotten used to. Sharpened claws slid several inches out of his fingertips, and a snarl hung in the air as Aldrich slashed at the wolf suspended in midair. For all of the bone breaking shifting I had heard tonight, nothing sounded quite like the genuine crunch of the skeletal frame taking too much abuse.
I watched as the silver man-beast raised his hand for what I was positive would be a killing blow and heard my friend whimper beside me. Mina was already on all fours, her sun-yellow hair stretching down her back, but we both knew she would be too late.
I snapped out of my shock in that moment, the irons holding me still in the face of such swift violence shattered in a moment of perfect understanding. I could stop him.
“Aldrich, don’t!” My voice cut through the room, and I watched my mate’s ears twitch. I could see the thrall weighing heavily on his body. He struggled to calm his inner beast, and I felt his mind reach out to mine.
On instinct, I imagined wrapping my arms around him and kissing his furry face. Surprise lit up his expression, and my lips tingled from the mental contact. All went still in the invisible space between us, and then I heard his voice, soft and yet still fierce. Mine.
When he finally stepped back, the anthro had shed from his body leaving a naked man. I took a step forward but stopped when he held up a hand. “You will shield your eyes while your Undedicated shifts. Do not argue with me,” he said softly when he saw I wanted to. “He will show evidence of our battle, and I do not wish for you to see bruises while I wind-weave us clothing.”
I spun in a circle almost to be a smart-ass, but by the time my three-sixty was complete, both men were human again and also clothed. Because they had shifted, their wounds would heal much quicker, but I realized it wasn't an instant process.
Aldrich leaned down and offered Ulric a hand up, which was readily accepted. “You did well, child,” Aldrich said, and much to my disbelief, Ulric let loose a sheepish little laugh.
“Obviously, not well enough.”
Based on the last few hours of my life, one may never have guessed it, but I was actually not the kind of person who went around screaming when she lost her temper. I was more the shy, quiet, responsible type. I feared think-before-you-act girl might just be gone forever. “That is so it!” I shouted at the top of my lungs, dodging when Mina moved to hug me. I watched with satisfaction when Ulric jumped. “One of you is going to explain what the fuck all of this was about, and you’re going to do it both quickly and thoroughly.”
It was…maybe the third time in my life I had made such a demand, and though I knew it was common enough, I never used such strong language, either. Still, Aldrich had been privy to most of those instances, so while Mina stood stunned and Ulric carefully looked elsewhere, I leveled my gaze on him.
“He was testing me,” said his gratingly calm, black velvet voice.
I picked up one of the remaining glass lamps in the living room and threw it as hard as I could at his head. I was more than a little upset, but I expected him to catch the damn thing. Or at the least, I expected him to dodge. Instead, he simply stood there, and when the figure collided with his scalp, he hardly flinched.
Mina and Ulric gasped, both of them tracking the path of blood as it slid down his face.
I gaped. “Why didn’t you move out of the way?” When he didn’t answer, I took a menacing step toward him. I blame all the fighting, but I was suddenly in the mood to make something around me go smash, and he seemed to be volunteering.
Mina stepped in front of me. “Roux, I don’t think he could have dodged even if he wanted to. You moved so fast…it was as fast as Aldrich moved before.”
I blinked dumbly, my mouth tasting of carpet. When I looked at Aldrich again, he shrugged. “Mate. You have the ability to draw on my abilities whenever the need should suit you.”
“Oh my.” I groaned. “What a big mess this is.”
I needed to sit, and Aldrich quickly righted one of the sofas and settled me into it without having to be asked. The four of us remained silent for several minutes before I leaned back. “All right. There are a few things I don’t understand, and we don’t have time for all of this.” I waved a hand toward the destroyed living room. “I’m going to ask questions, and I want them answered.”
I looked around to be sure I had been heard and understood, and then continued. “Ulric, why did you attack my m—Aldrich?” I bit my tongue and dared anyone to comment on my slip up. No one did.
Ulric shifted on the balls of his feet before looking to the man in question.
Aldrich sighed forcefully. “I told you he was testing me.”
“Yes, but testing you for what? For the love of all that is holy, someone spit it out.”
Mina finally spoke up. “It was the five lines. It points to Aldrich and his…special abilities.”
“Ulric thought someone from Aldrich’s family killed Grandma?”
“You don’t…” Aldrich let out a soft growl, which had Mina’s back up, but she didn’t let it go. “Look, I know you don’t want her to know, but you’re going to have to tell her eventually. If you don’t, someone else will and can you imagine what type of stories she’ll hear from a stranger?”
Aldrich took a threatening step forward, and I stood, turning to him. He always seemed so unwavering, but there in the depths of my mind where our mental link stood, I could feel his fear. Just tell me, I whispered to him without words. Tell me, I won’t run.
For a second, I thought he would refuse, but finally he nodded and took my hand, leading me to the kitchen while the siblings got to work straightening out the devastated room.
“I wanted to give you more time to get used to being with me, but I suppose the situation calls for candor. Do you recall asking me wh
y we had to seek others for information on the time before you were born?”
“Yes, of course. You dodged me.”
A wry smile tugged up the corners of his mouth. “Yes. I did. The reason I wouldn’t be able to answer these questions myself is because I was sent to the mountains a long time ago. There I was taught to calm the beast within.”
“I don’t understand. Why would you need to go away to do so? Don’t all wolves have to learn to control themselves?”
He spoke slowly as if trying to pick his words carefully. “Not…exactly. You see, most wolves only have two forms: a human face and a wolf face.”
“But you have a face in between.”
“Exactly. Every so often, a pup is born with a third, much more powerful face. These pups are almost immediately removed from the pack and raised by an Elder because with their increase in power comes a deep madness. An insurmountable thrall.”
I remembered the bloodlust I’d seen in his face with Rick, and a shudder ran through me.
"Almost every story you’ve ever heard of an uncontrollable, violent wolf has been of one of these pups: the murderer of the pig triplets, the one who came after the prankster ensured the villagers wouldn’t arrive…they were all members of this inter-pack group.”
“Even…?”
“Yes, even the wolf killed by the Hunter named the Splitter. That lone wolf who was hunted by the people of Harmony those years ago, the one who ended up bringing this town to what it is now, was the same as me.”
It was a horribly sickening thought. Twenty years ago a young woman was taken by what everyone had been told was a crazed wolf. The town was in an uproar, and for the first time, the Pack and the humans stopped fighting against one another. A common enemy had emerged and they'd come together, only wanting the menace stopped. They searched as a group, and it was a single, valiant Hunter who saved the girl. He earned the title of Splitter that night, but he vanished soon after.
“So, you're the only wolves to have a form with thumbs. That means it had to be one of you to leave those lines. But why assume it was you? It could have been any three-faced wolf.”
The Big, Bad… Page 4