by K. N. Banet
“Why are they sitting down there?” I asked, nodding down the table. There were four seats between Gwen and me, and Heath was on the other side of her. It didn’t make much sense.
“Because I will feed them at my table, but that doesn’t mean I want them right next to me,” she answered.
Three people walked out of a side door and put plates down in front of us. I didn’t look at the food, even though I knew I needed to eat.
“Let’s talk—”
“You’ll eat first,” she growled softly, looking down at her plate. “Then we’ll retire to the next room for coffee and talk. Hisao told me you didn’t eat on the plane. Have you eaten at all since you left Texas?”
“No,” I admitted softly.
When she looked up, there was fury in her eyes.
“Have you thought to? Have you taken a moment to take care of yourself, or have you let your twin drive you like a slave to keep her alive?”
“I just never…”
“Have you thought to feed her or Heath?” Mischa’s interrogation continued.
“Why are you acting like this?” I didn’t like being railroaded every time one of them had the chance to.
“Because you are highly intelligent and driven, yet sometimes, I wonder how you can be so stupid,” she snapped. “The werewolves gave you seventy-two hours to make a decision. It took just over twenty-four for you to get here. It’s a ten-hour drive from here to their compound for a trade. You’ve had time to take care of yourself. If you had been just a little too weak, you would have gotten yourself killed in that fight.” Mischa stopped and looked at Hisao. “She doesn’t see it. She has no fucking idea—”
“No idea of what? Damn it, one of you fucking talk to me—”
“You are going to get yourself killed, and I won’t have another Liza!” Mischa screamed, slamming a hand down on the table so hard, it broke off the corner in an explosion of splinters and chunks of wood. Only one person screamed and jumped away from the table, and that was Gwen. Three of us held up a hand to tell her to stop moving—me, Heath, and Hisao. She just did her best impression of a boneless chicken instead and fell to the floor.
None of us moved from our seats as Mischa breathed hard. She glared at the broken table then looked at me.
“You don’t know the pain this family had to go through when we lost her. You just keep throwing yourself into danger. Jacky, how can you be so careless with your life? Don’t you understand what it does to us? You can’t even make sure to take care of yourself while you go out and do these things.” Mischa’s rage turned into pain and desperation. “And for what this time? To save some strangers?”
I looked down at the food and wanted to cry. Mischa had made one of my favorite meals, hamburgers with broccoli as a side, along with macaroni and cheese. It was my comfort food meal.
“Eat,” Hisao whispered. “Mischa, come with me.”
She growled, and he snarled back. They left the room together.
I did as he asked, ignoring the two people down the table from me. Gwen eventually made it back to her seat, and I looked down at her to see her eating slowly. Heath stared at his plate as he ate but looked up and captured my stare.
Another moment where I wished I could talk to him, but the things I wanted to say weren’t something others could hear. I felt adrift, alone. I couldn’t even speak openly to my one friend.
When Mischa and Hisao came back in, my blonde sister sighed.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “You didn’t deserve that.”
“Forgiven,” I said honestly. Her outburst had hit home.
We ate together, a peaceful silence coming over the room as the tension eased. When everyone was finished and the dishes were cleared, Mischa beckoned us to follow her into the next room, where a fire was going, and plush couches were arranged—a meeting room, a place to discuss art, politics, and religion. A place to teach and to learn among peers.
“This is where I meet with the city’s council to talk about changes while I was gone or changes they want to implement,” she explained, sitting down.
“They know you’re a werecat?” Heath asked, obviously curious on a professional level.
“Only this village,” she said, smiling. “You must know a thing or two about that. Did you often work with the city you were based in?”
“And the state of Texas and the United States government,” he said, nodding as he sat down across the room from me.
“You were a member of the North American Werewolf Council,” Hisao said, positioning himself oddly close to Heath. “That council of yours was why Hasan never tried for a bigger presence in the country, and none of us moved there. When he Changed Jacky, she was a native and went back, but I don’t think we’ve ever looked at North America as a place to be, the way you have.”
“I fought for the colonies against the British Empire,” Heath said, shrugging. “It’s home. Most werewolves born or Changed in the U.S. don’t have strong ties to other areas of the world. We spread quickly, too. I can see why we were able to take the ‘New World’ before you.” He quoted that the way most supernaturals did. There was nothing ‘new’ about North America.
“Hasan had plenty of opportunity to claim it, but he was in love with the wildlands of his mate, and it was too far from his place of birth,” Mischa said casually. “What do you do, now that you aren’t in any sort of position? Isn’t that something most werewolves crave once they have it?”
“I want to raise my daughter. There will always be a need for me when I claim or create a new pack.”
“Such confidence,” Mischa purred. “Well, don’t worry, we’re going to get you back to your daughter and son.” She turned to me, and I didn’t like the expression on her face. “Do you have what those damn werewolves want?”
I fished the USB out of my pocket, where I’d kept it since we walked off the jet. I had no intention of giving it to anyone unless I knew it would make its way to the Tribunal, and the Russian werewolf pack would pay.
“Are we going to talk about how to get Gwen’s and my family back?” I asked, holding it up. “Do you know how to get this to…Callahan and Corissa?” I looked at Heath, who nodded. I got the names right.
“We’ll discuss how to get your family back. I’m not going to discuss those two.” Mischa opened a hand. “I’ll also need your cellphone.”
“Excuse me?” I pulled the USB back and eyed Hisao, who was standing much too close to Heath. He stepped closer to the werewolf, and Heath was smart enough to stand and prop himself up by the fire.
“Let’s make this easy,” Mischa said softly. “I know you want to save the world, Jacky. We all do. Your sister wants to save the world. Fine, she can. You can’t.”
“What?” I stood as she did.
“I’ll clarify since you’re having such a hard time understanding. If Gwen wants to risk her life and the lives of your human family to expose a werewolf pack who will see her dead in a day, then she can. You can’t.” Mischa kept her hand out. “We’re going to make the trade. That’s the family’s call. I’m only telling you what every other person in our family will.”
It was a slap in the face of everything I believed in. A heartbeat after her words, I was shocked. Reeling, I stepped away from her again.
In the second heartbeat, I got angry.
“No,” I growled. “We can do this. We can save them and expose the pack.”
“No, Jacky, we can’t,” she said softly. “For one, this is now a family matter. They know about you, and the first thing they will do if you go into their compound and try to free your family by force is say you acted against them, and it will start a war. Isn’t that something you were worried about? Why you tried to keep us out of it?”
“What about them taking my family?” I demanded. “Mischa!”
“They took Doctor Duray’s family. We never publicly said the two of you were related, so they couldn’t reasonably know it. Aside from that, your sister acted against them
. She antagonized them.” Mischa pointed across the room at Gwen. “Then she dragged you into it, knowing full well who you’re related to. Knowing full well the position you hold in our world. Do you really think she called you because she loves you? She used you!”
I looked at Gwen, who shook her head, but I could also see the tears in her eyes.
“Did you?” I asked softly. I was split. There was a chance. I didn’t want to believe it, but I wasn’t stupid enough to completely ignore the chance.
“I didn’t think of it that way. I really didn’t know who else to call, and I did know who you were, but…” Gwen wiped her eyes. “You’re my sister. You were the one person I thought I could trust to have my back. I had no one else who would understand.”
There was no lie in her scent. I looked back at Mischa, who sighed.
“We can’t, Jacky. If we could, I would have tried years ago. Why do you think I protect my people here so viciously? I know what the pack does, I do, but the last thing we need is another war we will lose. We don’t have the numbers, and their population has exploded. They will destroy us. We can’t risk that.”
I refused to believe we only had two options. The world couldn’t be so black and white.
I shouldn’t have to decide between my human family and my werecat family. I shouldn’t have to choose who to save.
I shouldn’t have to make this choice.
I tried my best, running in circles in my head to find an argument. There had to be some argument that would work, that would sway my werecat family to my side.
“So, we’re cowards?” I asked softly. That made Mischa straighten up, her body tensing as her eyes went wide. “We’ll allow a werewolf pack to dictate the terms to our family? Our family is the ruling family of the werecats. Hasan is on the Tribunal. He’s the strongest werecat alive. We’re going to let some fucking sick werewolves tell us how this is going to happen? No. I refuse to believe this family is so weak, we don’t want to cause any fucking trouble. They took people who belong to me, and the moment they realized they had, they should have given my family back. They should have given me all of them back. I don’t care if they knew it or not. I highly doubt they didn’t. The entire damn hospital was in on it, Mischa! How do we know Sarah didn’t fucking tell them? She based her entire fucking plan on the retribution aspect, the threat that others would—”
“You just…called our family cowards,” Mischa said, finally catching up. I really didn’t think she would get stuck on that.
“Damn right, I did,” I growled.
“After everything our family has been through, you would call us cowards?” I had never pissed off my Russian sister before, and now, I knew not to.
She shoved me, sending me into the wall a few feet behind me, causing it to crack. The air flew out of my lungs, and I tried to gasp for air. As I slid to the floor and got away, a piece of drywall fell onto the hardwood floor.
Before I was on my feet, Hisao had her on the other side of the room, snarling at her.
“We don’t fight,” he hissed. “You know the rules, Mischa. We do not fight in this family.”
“That’s because you could kill any of us,” she retorted with a growl.
I brushed off my back, waving away Gwen, who tried to come to my side. She didn’t need to be in the middle of this.
“It’s fine, Hisao,” I said softly. “It’s fine. I apparently crossed a line.”
“Yes, you did,” Mischa snarled, trying to pass our brother to get back in my face. “We’ve fought wars. We’ve saved our kind from extinction. We’ve watched our children die to protect our people. Your moral high ground and naivety are as stupid as they are honorable.”
“Fine, I’m naïve,” I agreed, lifting my hands. “I won’t give up my convictions for my safety, though. I won’t give up and leave people to be hurt because it’s convenient for the family. I can’t and I won’t do that.”
“And you can’t,” Heath said from across the room. Everyone turned to him. He’d been silent the entire time. When he didn’t continue, Mischa waved him on, glaring.
“You have an opinion, werewolf? Say it.”
“If you take the trade, you have no problems now, but you put Jacky in a bad position with the new Alpha.” He pushed off the wall, walking toward us. “I don’t know how many of you grew up with a human family, but maybe that’s why none of you thought of this. I’ve been thinking about it for a while, but since I’m not welcome, I thought someone would have considered the obvious.”
“None of us had or have a human family except this village, which is distant, and the werewolves know not to fuck with them. We were all adopted by Hasan when we were children as orphans,” Mischa answered, her glare turning into a frown. “But Jacky has a human family, and that somehow changes this?”
“He’ll know he can get whatever he wants out of her by threatening her family—Jacky Leon, daughter of Hasan, in his pocket until the leverage is finally gone. Gwen’s children are young. They could live a hundred years and with technology, even longer. Imagine how much damage a werewolf Alpha could do with that sort of pull over her.”
“Like you?” she asked. I hated the way she said it.
“Jacky has pull over me, not the other way around,” he countered. “And there’s no malicious intent, only my daughter’s protection. Smell the truth on me, Mischa.” He spread his arms, and his scent drifted across the room. I caught the scents in it, the frustration about the situation, but I couldn’t smell a lie. Mischa sighed, and Heath nodded politely, the truth acknowledged.
“So, you trade the files for her family—no wars today with the werewolves. Now, you’d just have a new werewolf Alpha—who is over twelve hundred years old, who has seen the War, who has seen the shift into the Tribunal, who doesn’t like the Tribunal—and he has everything he needs to keep Jacky right where he can use her. ‘Jacky, go kill this werecat, so my pack can move into the area. Do it, or I’ll kill your family.’ It’s easy, Mischa. When a supernatural has human family, especially close relatives, ones they grew up with, it’s so easy to hold that supernatural in a net, they can’t escape.”
“So, we have to,” she said, looking unhappy with the idea. “I’m amazed we missed it.” She directed that at Hisao. He shrugged and shook his head, then walked out of the room. When she turned to me, there was something different about her expression. “I’m an idiot. I wanted to be mad at you for getting into another disastrous situation and forgot the obvious. I’ve done this before.”
“During the War,” I reminded her. “Your response back then was expected. We’ve been at peace for eight hundred years.”
“But we’re not at peace. They took your family.” She turned on her heel to follow Hisao. Before she left, she hit the door frame a couple of times, then turned back to me once again. “I should have let Zuri talk to you. She offered to fly over, and I told her I could handle it. She wouldn’t have shoved you or ignored what you were saying. This time, I mean the apology.”
Mischa left the room, leaving me feeling like I had whiplash.
“Does this mean we’re going to rescue our family?” Gwen asked softly.
“It means we’re going to try, but not you.” When I looked at her, she wore this amazingly confused expression. “You’re human. This isn’t the place for you. If I have my way, it’ll be me, Heath, and possibly Hisao—a small group that can get in and out.”
“Oh, yeah. I wouldn’t know how to do this, would I?” She half chuckled, and I could only guess why. A fear response? A drop in adrenaline finally taking over? I didn’t know.
“They really wanted to be angry with you,” Heath whispered as I walked toward him. “Mischa is probably understating it. I think they all really wanted to be angry with you.”
“Really?”
“I think forcing you to make the trade instead of what you wanted…wasn’t just because it was a good political choice. I think they meant to use it to remind you that you are the youngest in the fa
mily, and you need to learn to follow directions.”
“Werecats don’t have Alphas,” I reminded him softly, looking at the door my siblings left through.
“That doesn’t mean they don’t have some loose power structure, which you should be at the bottom of,” he pointed out. “Everyone follows Hasan. Zuri and Jabari are the next most respected. Mischa and Hisao, each a little different for their own reasons. Davor and Niko are always talked a little down to by their older siblings. Then you, the baby, who lives on her own program and doesn’t get into line like everyone else. I think your family is tired of you doing whatever you please.”
“You don’t think Mischa had a point about me always trying to get myself killed?”
“I think that’s why they are trying so hard to get you in line,” he murmured. “If you fall into the place where they expect you to be, they can keep you out of danger.”
“Did you ever do this with your children?”
Something dark crossed over his face.
“I said something to Landon I’ll regret for the rest of my life because I was scared for him,” he admitted. “It’s one of the reasons he tells so few people about himself, but it’s hard to hide when everyone can smell every bodily reaction someone has.”
“Oh, Heath,” I said, breathing out his name. “How long ago?”
“That I said something stupid? I think I do every day, but that? Around 1900,” he answered. “But that’s not the point. I think you need to keep your eyes and ears open to the fact your family wants to bring you in line, and they’re failing. It might explain how some of them act around you and how you might be able to handle it.”
“Thanks. I always appreciate your advice,” I said, meaning every word.
He shrugged, but for a split second, I thought he would do something else.
25
Chapter Twenty-Five
We sat in that room for an hour until a human walked in and looked at me.