“Not yet.” Renee bounced with excitement.
“Gotta to keep this girl on her toes.” Mike swatted Renee’s arm. She squealed, and I threw up in my mouth. Out of envy more than anything. “We took a cruise for our anniversary. Fifteen years. Renee dragged me parasailing, and I loved it. Now we’re looking for the next high.”
“This is going to be awesome. We’re going to take riding lessons over the winter, so we’ll be ready to take the bikes into the mountains in the spring.” Renee grinned. “We’re getting matching outfits, too. I can’t wait to see this guy in leather.”
“And we like to support our own, Major.” Mike motioned to the paw print decal in the window. We called it the Sawtooth Business Association, but it was a secret code so shifters in Granger Falls could take care of each other.
Renee climbed off the bike, squeezing my arm. “We want to support you.”
I took their money with a smile but the sale felt dirty. Cass and I were no secret, and I’d been too lust-drunk to pay attention to what was going on around me. No more. I needed to strike before Walter took me down at the knees. He had many more supporters than I did.
The Lowes had a bad reputation, hard-earned with bloodied knuckles and busted lips. It worked in our favor. I didn’t have to prove anything to anyone. Shea fought no matter what form he was in, but I liked to settle my trouble when I was a wolf. I didn’t have that luxury this time.
“What do you know about engines?” I asked X. I’d been wound up all day, unable to stop thinking about Cass, her body writhing with me inside her. Where I fucking belonged. But Walter, that bastard, crashed the party, even in my head. My blood ran cold every time I thought of what waited for her at home.
Shea, bored out of his mind with no job, picked up grinders. He cracked open a beer, and passed the rest of the six pack around.
“Take ‘em apart, put ‘em back together, pretty basic stuff. Why?” X narrowed his eyes over his beer.
“Can you make them run independently? Or give them commands?” I did finishing work and ran the business. I knew nothing about the electrical end of things. This was all X’s department. He was a magician with that stuff.
“Like a robot?” Shea talked with his mouth full. He sat on the front of X’s desk, legs spread wide. “Cass is a screamer, huh?”
X snarfed his beer behind him. I glared at them both. “Fuck you, Shea,” I growled.
“Absolutely. I can holler like that, too.” He wiggled his eyebrows. “Since that’s what you’re into. But if you really want to turn me on, you’ll tell me you got me that job.”
“You have to talk to Trina. She’s really the alpha.” I laughed when his mouth dropped. Good luck to him. Trina blamed herself for not getting in between Shea and Archer before the fight turned fatal. If he got that job, both my brothers were magicians.
Shea jumped off the desk, dropping his grinder wrapper in the trash. “Once she gets to know me, she’ll see I’m not an asshole.”
Poor X wore more of his beer than he drank. “Shadow said he’s coming later,” he said as Shea grabbed another bottle and passed second ones to both of us. “Back to the engine. What the hell do you want that for?”
“Of course he is.” I groaned. I hadn’t solidified my plan yet, still playing around with ideas. “I want something I can detonate.”
“That must mean I have the job,” Shea said. We both ignored him.
X his beer down. “You want me to build a bomb.”
“Pretty much.”
“I can’t fucking do that.” X raked his hand through his hair and paced in the small space between desks, stepping around Shea.
“Why not? If I sent you out in the forest as a wolf and told you to rip Walter’s head off with your teeth, you wouldn’t think twice about it. This is simple. Clean. What you do every day. Hit a button and it’s done.”
“I’d do it, but I don’t know shit about building engines.” Shea shrugged. “And I’d rip Walter’s head off, too. Whatever you need.”
‘Thank you’ didn’t seem appropriate, but I did appreciate it.
X shook his head. “Pack business is pack business. You do this, humans get involved. You’ve been a prisoner once—do you want to risk that again? Think about the full moon. You get stuck as a wolf in jail and you put the whole forest in jeopardy.”
“That’s not what I want at all.” I sighed, pissed he was right. That bastard had me at every turn. “I have an agreement with Walter—“
“You have a what?” X’s eyes were about to fall out of his head. “You’ve lost your fucking mind. I get it, I want a wolf mate, too. But they’re not all miserable like Cass. More of them are like Renee, happy as shit with the rich guys. Would you want me to tear her out of her home, away from Mike, to prove your point?”
“I want her to have a choice.” I slammed my fist on the desk, scattering the rest of my sandwich. “If Renee, or any wolf, is happy with her husband, then she should be with him. But if she isn’t, she deserves better. Anyone who sold their daughter and didn’t think they could be bought and sold next is a fucking fool. It won’t stop with the women. Next it will be us. We’ll be slaves on our own land.”
“Still doesn’t explain why you made a deal with the devil,” Shea said, backing away from me.
“No one ever lets me finish.” I glared at both brothers. “Everyone’s so quick to remind me that Walter’s going to fuck me over, but never does anyone think that maybe that’s my plan, to fuck with him.”
Shea’s mouth dropped, then formed a toothy grin. He held his hand up to high five me, but I shook my head.
“Still crazy,” X muttered, craning his head to the showroom. “Shadow’s here.”
I pushed Shea, trying to get him to shut up before Shadow changed his mind about giving him a job. I doubted that was the reason for Shadow’s visit, but Shea had enough working against him already.
Shadow smirked when he came in the office. “Surprised I didn’t see you guys the other night.”
“Yeah, we missed the run.” I’d given him shit for the same thing last month.
“Didn’t expect it, since we had a deal.” Shadow came deeper into the office, leaning against my desk. My brothers narrowed their eyes in confusion. “Thought you’d want to get some work done.”
“We didn’t have a plan.” I didn’t like Shadow thinking he had an edge over me. Captivity had made him bloodthirsty. His lack of expertise in the area made him dangerous. After years of fighting, I knew when to throw a punch, more importantly, when to hold it. Since our rescue, Shadow swung first and asked questions later. If at all.
“Turns out we didn’t need one.” Shadow grabbed the last beer, twisting it in the hem of his shirt to open it.
Fuck. “You killed him.”
Don’t get me wrong, I wanted Walter dead. But that was supposed to be my kill. It would never give me the same satisfaction unless I felt his heart stop beating.
“Nope. Didn’t have to. We forgot something very important. Walter isn’t like his father. He hid behind Ryker his whole life. Let his daddy fight all his battles. One on one, he couldn’t stand on his own. His guys wouldn’t fight our new guys, since they’d all worked together for so long. So it was me and Dallas against Walter.”
“What happened?”
Shadow look a long sip of his beer, trying to suppress a laugh. “He fucking ran off a cliff. Full speed. His eyes must’ve been going or something. At first, I thought it was a trick. Like he disappeared and was planning some sort of retaliation. But I went back today, and he was pretty easy to find. The buzzards are picking him clean.”
Holy shit. Walter was dead. Which meant...
“You all right, Major?” X asked. “This is pretty fucking good news.”
“Yeah.” I shook away the shock and turned to Shadow. “We’ve got some work to do.”
Chapter Ten
Cass
“Calm down.” Connie glared at me. Emma snuggled against her, and Connie smoothe
d her hair down, rocking her back and forth. “You’re upsetting the baby. And Walter will come home when he’s ready to be here.”
Three days since he’d been home. It wasn’t unusual for him to disappear, but never for this long. He hadn’t answered my calls or texts, and his voice mail was full. No one on the ranch had any idea where he was, either. Weird. A strange chaos swirled around the property. He hadn’t left instructions. No one liked to guess what Walter wanted. It was a recipe for disaster. I punched code after code over his voicemail message, trying to open his mailbox. Hip to my game, he changed the password frequently. “She’s not a baby. And I don’t care what he does. He should at least have the decency to call.”
Connie rolled her eyes. “Don’t try to convince me you’re concerned about your husband.”
“It’s about respect.” I wasn’t familiar with the emotions churning inside me. Something wasn’t right. And last night with Major skewed everything. I’d always felt like a visitor who’d outstayed her welcome in this house, but now my wolf was rumbling under my skin and she needed to run.
I’d made up my mind. I was leaving Walter. Our marriage was an unpleasant necessity, and everyone knew it. This was bigger than me. I had to think of Emma. She watched us fight and claw at each other constantly. Before last night, keeping her here seemed like the best thing, but my eyes had been opened. I was setting her up for disaster. A life of not knowing what love was. My daughter deserved better than that.
“He doesn’t have any respect for you, Cassidy.” Connie smiled, setting Emma down. She turned to Emma, dismissing me like I’d disappeared. “I think Rudolph is on tonight.”
“What do you want for dinner?” I caught Emma before she ran off. Connie brought her home late and probably filled her up with garbage.
“Not hungry.” Of course not. She wriggled away from me, distant like she always was with Connie around.
“You have to eat something.”
“She had her playdate today. We made ice cream sundaes.” Connie wiped the counter. I cleaned it minutes before this argument broke out, but of course, that wasn’t good enough either.
I blocked Connie from following Emma to the living room. “Listen. I appreciate your help, but that’s exactly what it is. Help. I set the rules, you follow them. Emma gets confused when you’re around. She needs a consistent message.”
“Emma’s not the one who’s confused. You are.” Connie backed me against the counter. I shook with rage. “Walter has me here because he doesn’t trust you with his daughter. I’m not here to babysit Emma—I’ve got my eye on you.”
“Go home, Connie.” I pushed past her, fished my checkbook out of my purse, and wrote her a check for too much money. She didn’t take it when I held it out to her. “Don’t come back until you hear from Walter.”
Finally, she tore the check from me, looking at it before shoving it in her pocket. “You’re going to break Emma’s heart, you selfish little bitch.”
For someone who was so concerned with my daughter’s wellbeing, she stormed out without saying goodbye to her. We both knew she’d be back, even more awful than before. Connie gained power every time I lost an argument against her, but I gained a totally different power.
“Where’s Nini?” Emma jumped back, eyes wide, when I kneeled beside her. She was wrapped in her favorite blanket on the family room floor. She’d built a fortress with pillows and was ready to watch her shows. I prayed she’d been too busy building to hear our argument.
I untangled the blanket from her body, crawled next to her, and covered us both. Emma giggled watching me make myself comfortable. “She went home. Where’s the remote? Let’s watch Rudolph.”
“Okay.” Emma handed me the remote, snuggling against me. “I love it when his nose lights up.”
“Me too.” Something awful occurred to me as I looked for the show. My daughter wouldn’t come near me until she knew the coast was clear. Sneaking around on Connie to make sure she didn’t see us cuddling. She’d defied me many times, taking Connie’s instruction over mine, and acted distant, but she’d never jumped away from me like that before.
Emma was afraid of Connie.
This had to stop. I pulled Emma’s warm little body against mine, staring through the cartoon snowman on the screen and saw nothing. I heard the Rudolph song but was numb when I should’ve been as excited about Christmas as Emma. I was busy trying to survive. My worst fear, that Walter could take my daughter away from me, was coming true and it was happening in my own home. I told Connie that Emma wasn’t a baby, but that wasn’t true. She was my baby. Connie and Walter would argue this wasn’t my home, and they were right.
My home was in Sawtooth Forest. Abandoned. Waiting for someone to love it again.
I didn’t care anymore about contracts or vows. I cared about my daughter. Showing her what it really meant to be a wolf, surrounded by a family that loved and wanted the best for her, was much more important than living in a big house, thinking she was better than anyone else because her parents had money. Those weren’t values I wanted my daughter to have. I wanted her to be strong in her convictions, and I sure as hell didn’t want her to be afraid of anyone. Most importantly, I wanted her to know what love was.
Connie and Walter could die trying to take her away from me.
I texted Major: I’m on my way. All my other visits had been surprises, but I hadn’t realized what exactly was on the line until now.
“Want to go for a ride?” I asked Emma when Rudolph ended.
She nodded, excited. Emma loved getting out of this house as much as I did. They might try to break her, but she was my girl through and through. “Where are we going?”
“To see my friend. Remember, the one that came over the other day?”
Emma’s eyes lit up, like she could have any idea how scandalous this was.
“Put on your jammies. I’m going to pack bags for us.” We held hands on the way upstairs.
Her eyes widened. “Is it like a sleepover?”
I had no idea what it was. “Maybe. Let’s call it an adventure. See where it takes us.”
**
“Need any help?” X jumped up and took Emma’s giant teddy bear out of my free hand. I’d grabbed that and her favorite blanket, running through the house like it was on fire, before we went. As excited as Emma had been about our trip, she conked out as soon as I put the SUV in reverse. Now she was thirty-five pounds of dead weight on my shoulder. I don’t know who was more shocked: The living room full of wolves because I brought my daughter to Major’s house, or me because the Channings were there, too.
“I have some bags in the car,” I told X, then sunk down in the only open seat on the couch. “What’s going on?”
“Didn’t you check your phone?” Major asked, standing up.
I shook my head. I didn’t want to look at it, afraid I’d see something that would change my mind. Or an answer from Walter.
“Let’s go in the kitchen so we don’t wake Emma.” The way Major looked at my daughter, soft eyes and dreamy smile, melted my heart and reinforced that I did the right thing.
“Good idea. She’ll freak when she wakes up some place she’s not familiar with. I don’t want to be far from her.” I positioned her against the pillow, wrapping her blanket around her. In her sleep, she clutched the edge of the blanket and sighed.
Everyone gathered in the kitchen, not enough seats for all of us. I scanned the room, trying to get a read on why the Channings were here. The other dominant family left in Sawtooth, they never saw eye to eye with the Lowes. I used to tease Major about it, because I thought the rivalry was stupid. The Channings were good guys. I didn’t get much pack gossip anymore, tucked away in my castle, but I knew Shadow killed my father-in-law and that gave him alpha status. Major didn’t have to tell me how much that ate at him; that was the title he’d always wanted. Tension swam thick in the room, and none of the men said anything.
So I took the lead. “I know I’m putting us all in dang
er, bringing Emma here. But I can’t keep her in that house another second. That old witch Connie is intimidating her, and Walter is going to turn her against me. No. No more. She can’t grow up thinking love and fear are the same thing, only to wind up with a man like Walter.” My voice broke on the last word. Saying his name out loud made what I did tonight real. I left my husband, a man who didn’t take no for an answer. I’d put everyone in this house in danger.
I dissolved into tears, the gravity of the whole thing hitting me like a kick to the gut. There was no good solution to this; Emma was in danger no matter what I did. But at least now she had a chance. Major crouched down beside me, his scent enveloping me as he rubbed my back. “It’s over,” he murmured.
“It’s never going to be over!” I was dizzy, looking around the room. Everyone sat motionless while my world spun violently around us. “And I don’t even know where the fuck Walter is. He hasn’t been home since the full moon.”
Everyone looked at each other, mouths open. Major’s hand stopped moving on my back.
“What?” I asked. Nausea roiled in my stomach and I couldn’t breathe as I searched the room for something I might have missed. Details were my thing, they’d saved my ass on more than one occasion. Walter taught me always to be on my A-game. “Is he here? Did he come here? Oh my God, you have him in chains somewhere, don’t you?”
My husband was a sick and twisted bastard, but Major had never let anyone get the best of him. Shadow proved he didn’t leave scores unsettled, either. I gasped for air, thinking of what they could’ve done to him. What that meant for all of us. There was no halfway with Walter. Only all the way.
Major brushed the tear-soaked hair away from my face. “Sweetheart, Walter’s dead.”
Conquer Me (Sawtooth Shifters, #4) Page 6