Lucky stiff. At least he had an excuse to leave. I had to stand there on the porch and wave back with a fake smile plastered on my face. As much as I loved this neighborhood, if we ever got in good with the Georgia Pack, we'd have to move far from Ms. Grapevine.
* * * *
Six and half hours later, I marched into the lobby of the Garden Inn and Suites, rolling a suitcase behind me while carrying a duffel bag slung across my shoulder. Whenever we hunted, we stayed at a suite hotel because they had more room in case we needed to prep the corpses for travel. The lobby itself had the ambiance of country-style furnishings with careful attention to detail on the floral-patterned couches and chairs. On the other side of the lobby area was a small gallery with a bar to one side and restaurant across the hall. Though the dim gallery went deeper into the building, I couldn't see much past the bend. Since this wasn't a sightseeing trip, I didn't bother to investigate.
"Ms. York, your room has been taken care of,” the receptionist said. “When would you like to set up your in-room massage?"
"Massage? You give those away free?"
What made me so special? Dane never went out of his way for us. The most we ever got from him was a private room with an open bar so we could celebrate our victory in style. Or drunkenness, depending on your point of view. Until now, hunting trips were not all-expenses paid.
"No, ma'am,” the receptionist replied. “It's already been paid for."
"By who?"
"Me."
I clenched my teeth at the sound of that voice. Cutting my eyes to the side, I turned around and honed in on the observers.
Dane stood in front of the gallery wearing a pair of jeans and an oversized, dark gray sweater that needed the needlepoint tightened. The smile on his tanned face pulled back to expose a string of pearly white teeth. His six-one frame appeared to have put a few more muscles, but the beanpole look had yet to fade. Either he used hair gel to get his short-cut waves to gleam against the lighting or he had just washed his hair.
Riley's face beamed its ever-irritating charm. He wore a pair of black jeans, but had opted for a short-sleeved shirt painted on his muscular upper arms and chest. His long black hair stood out against his blood red shirt making it impossible to miss. Knowing him, that was his intention.
Strolling across the lobby, Dane reached me first and tried to place a kiss on my forehead as in days of old. I pulled away from him and turned back to the receptionist.
"You can cancel the massage appointment,” I seethed, shoving my wallet back in my purse. “I don't want it."
"Are you sure? You get a complimentary terry cloth robe with the package you've selected."
She was all smiles, clueless about the monsters standing in front of her. I fought the urge to drag her over the counter by her lapels and peel back her eyelids.
"Come on,” Riley pleaded, advancing on me. “I interrupted your last full body massage. I figured this was the least I could do to make up for it."
"Your going to hell would have been a better atonement.” I snatched the key card off the counter and shoved it in my back pocket.
Riley glanced at the wide-eyed receptionist. “Girlfriends. They don't appreciate anything you do for them."
"Girlfriend? You fucking—” My hand wound back to slap him, but Dane grabbed my wrist and stopped me.
"I think the young lady has seen enough of you guys’ dirty laundry,” he said in a calm voice. “Shall we take this argument to the bar?"
I yanked my hand away from him. “Take your dog with you. I'm going to my room."
"This can't wait.” He stepped closer, keeping his voice low. “Everyone's edgy, especially you. We have a table in the back corner and drinks all around. With this being our first hunt in months, we need to get our minds back on track.” He skewered me with glare; just enough to imply that it was an order.
If went to my room and ignored everyone for the rest of the trip, it could damage our trust. Going out on a hunt meant we had to rely on each other if we wanted to make it back alive. Though I knew everyone in the Club, so much could have changed during our eight month hiatus.
"I'm putting my things up first,” I seethed, meeting Dane's challenge. “Then I'm calling my husband to let him know I got in okay. When I finish, I'll come down. Will that suit Your Preciousness, or would you rather have me lug a duffel bag full of weaponry through the bar?"
I still couldn't get over the fact that they had known more than a week ago about the bounty on Matt's head. If that didn't give me the right to be pissed at them, then what did?
A half-smile peeled back Dane's lips. “Of course ... I'll give you five minutes."
"Fifteen."
He turned with his back to me, strolling toward the gallery. “Five minutes or I send Riley up to fetch you."
"Insolent prick,” I muttered.
Sad to say, I knew my place in the Club because the wolf inside me identified Dane as the leader. Our nature dictated strict obedience to anyone we regarded as higher in the ranks. I'd put aside my annoyance at him for the sake of my husband's life and let him run the show.
* * * *
Dane and I had so much history that I could barely keep track of it. I remembered sitting on his thigh as a child in front of the fireplace at his plantation home in Charleston, South Carolina. I was ten at the time, but old enough to know and understand the way of the werewolf life. So he made it a point to tell me anything I wanted to know without any sugarcoating.
I pointed at the picture on the wall. A beautiful woman sat in a chair with ringlets of red hair curling around her face. She held a tiny baby in her arms while two young boys, ages ten and six, stood behind her.
"Do you talk to them?” I asked in a small voice, interrupting Dane's reading of Peter Pan.
He placed the book on the floor and snuggled me against him so that my head fit perfectly under his chin. “No, I don't. It's hard keeping close contacts after you've been bitten by a werewolf. They wouldn't understand why I don't age and why..."
He hesitated. I knew it was hard for him, so I let him have a moment while his warm cheek rubbed the side of my head.
"That's not entirely true,” he confessed. “I don't talk to them because I'm afraid they'll see me as nothing more than an animal."
"Because you kept the monster for a pet?"
A tiny snort chilled the top of my head. Dane scooted me up on his thigh. “It wasn't a pet, Angel. That much I knew. But I didn't respect the power of the beast. Being the industrious business man that I was, I thought I could make a fortune by putting the wolf on display in a sideshow. Like I needed the money. As if owning the cannery wasn't enough."
"But I thought you—"
"You know the story, sweety. I caught the female wolf while out hunting with my friend, Halsten. She changed back to human form, but waited three weeks before changing again. What happens if a werewolf waits that long?"
"They go nuts!” Genevieve shouted as she scampered into the living room with her nightgown flapping around her ankles.
Full of energy for a thirteen year old, she flopped onto Dane's other thigh and plastered a huge kiss on his cheek. She wore her hair in a bob that bounced around her pierced ears, unlike my textured locks. We had the same olive skin and almond-shaped eyes. I always thought her nose was too small for her face and that one day it might stop growing all together. Like Daddy, she had bushy eyebrows and a huge smile that seemed to let everyone know that she was center stage.
Chuckling, Dane pulled her onto his other thigh and laughed. “That's right, pumpkin. They go crazy."
"So then that female wolf broke out of the cage you keep out back, right?” I asked, ignoring my sister's rambunctious self.
A heavy sigh escaped Dane's mouth. “Yeah, baby. The female got out and came up to the house."
I didn't want him to tell me the rest because the sadness in his voice made me sad too. Even Genevieve quieted down a bit. Both of us knew the story anyway.
The p
sychotic female wolf wanted revenge because Dane and his friend Halsten had hunted down and killed her entire pack. So she attacked the closest thing to Dane's heart. She killed both his wife and his baby girl. The boys escaped only because they hid in the attic. When Dane returned and found the carnage, he went insane and swore that he would spend the rest of his life destroying all werewolves until he wiped them off the face of the planet.
He never grasped the peril or enormity of his plan. When he hunted down a pack in the Oxbow Region, he had managed to kill everyone except for the Alpha and two of his beta wolves. So being what they were, and given their hunger for revenge, they hunted Dane without his realizing it. After he had drunken himself into a stupor and passed out with a whore in his bed, the three wolves had broken into the room, killed the prostitute, and framed him for the murder. But that wasn't enough. The leader had to leave one more thing to remind Dane of what he had done to his innocent pack. He bit him and left him for dead.
The cycle of revenge seemed to stop after that. Dane was too busy trying to keep himself from going rogue. When he finally got a grip on his sanity, he applied his skills in a more assiduous manner. He hunted rogue werewolves. Of course, that opened his world to more than just werewolves living among us. So in time, he learned how to cope with them too. A bullet to the brain was 100-percent effective every time.
"You should talk to your boys,” Genevieve suggested. “They need a daddy, just like we need ours."
He chuckled. “Well, how about you let me worry about that? And isn't it past your bedtime?"
"No,” I replied.
"You want to rephrase that?"
All of our heads turned towards the doorway. Our Navaho father stood there with an arched bushy eyebrow and a long ponytail slung over his shoulder. He had the bulk of a lumberjack, and wearing that plaid shirt didn't help.
Momma slipped her five-foot body underneath his arm and snuggled against his side. She was a beautiful shade of medium brown with a short black afro on her head. Standing next to him, she looked almost like a kid herself. Nonetheless, Momma mirrored Daddy's face, hers pretty much saying we needed to get our behinds to bed or else.
"All right,” I conceded and pushed off Dane's lap. I placed my hands on his shoulders for balance and kissed his cheek.
Dane's eyes met mine, an unasked question behind them. “You can read your mother, can't you?"
I blinked, unsure of what he was asking. “Huh?"
"Your mother. You read her gestures like a wolf, Angel."
I shrugged. “Anyone can look at her and know what she's thinking.” I looked at Genevieve. “Can't you?"
She shook her head, her eyes as quizzical as Dane's.
"I'm tired,” I said, yawning to prove my point. “But when I look at Mommy and Daddy the words just pop in my head."
A smile worked into Dane's tanned visage. He helped Genevieve to her feet and patted her on the back, edging her towards my parents. I started to go too, but he grabbed my hand and stopped me a moment, smile still stuck on his face.
"If you ever feel the need to ... I don't know. I guess ... if you ever feel like you need another wolf to talk to, Angel, you know where I am. All you have to do is call and I'll be there."
I returned his smile. “I know."
With that, I scampered off to bed behind my big sister.
Chapter 14
Our secret coalition had hunted rogues for decades, even though packs considered us to be the bottom feeders of the werewolf world. We preyed on our own kind, but not for territorial rights or to gain power; we preyed on them for their dollar value alone. More than three-quarters of the rogue population had bounties on them. Concentrating our hunts on rogues was the best use of our skills. Contracts involving pack politics and bumping Alphas out of power would only cause trouble for us. In the end, every pack knew that it was up to them to police their own territory. Those who didn't want to dirty their hands or couldn't handle the large jobs, such as a rogue pack, called on us. If an adequate number of zeros wasn't attached to the price, then we didn't bother at all. Sometimes our hunts went beyond rogues, crossing the line into other preternatural realms. Since we specialized in rabid werewolves—things like vampires, zombies, and ghouls were outside the specs—we doubled our fee.
Seeing the Club members for the first time in months made me ... Well, it pleased me. Their faces might be enough to get me through this trip. The werewolf members were my closest friends because they understood me better than the humans. That didn't mean I liked the humans less. Everyone here loved and sheltered me as only big brothers would, but we always butted heads when it came time for me to exert my will.
Anxiety filled my head and knotted my belly as I made my way down to the bar. If Dane had sent Riley up to my room, he would have left with an arrow in his head. Perhaps he sensed as much and decided against carrying out his threat. After all, I was still pissed at them for keeping Matt's contract from me.
It didn't take long to search the dimly lit bar and catch wind of werewolf scent hovering in the air. Working my nose through the miasma of alcohol- and tobacco-scented atmosphere was like swimming through a vat of cake frosting. People cluttered up the bar; laughter and jumbled conversations trickled above the noise of rock music and sports playing on sporadically mounted televisions. Following the scent brought me to a rounded booth in the back. Of the eight men, the two I didn't recognize were the only werewolves in the group. Uncle Graham sat on the end.
Before the Club dispersed, Graham had been a determined, seventy-five-year-old man. Between the animal carved cane he balled his waxen first around, twice the number of wrinkles on his saggy face, and longer white hair, he looked as though he had aged five years in eight months. His caramel-colored skin looked more tanned than usual, and a few extra pounds filled out in his stout chest.
Neither Dane nor Riley was present. I bet anything they were off gathering drinks at the bar. When it came to taking off the edge with a beer, even a stinky tavern wasn't enough to keep the werewolves away.
The two unknown werewolves stood at the same time as my uncle, followed by the rest of the humans. Apparently, Dane had kept my attendance a secret because he wanted to see the looks on their faces.
Graham tried embracing me, but I pulled away from him. He had nerve, thinking I wanted to see him. My animosity toward him still burned fresh. Ignoring our tense moment, my old comrades gave me warm greetings.
The werewolves introduced themselves. Gregorio was a rather tall lanky guy with medium length brown hair and a natural tan, similar to mine. He had bright blue eyes and an innocent youthful look. He couldn't have been more than twenty-five years old. Scott was a five-ten bulky blond who hadn't bothered shedding the pounds before packing on the muscle. He also had blue eyes and the beginnings of a blond beard.
Uncle Graham offered me a seat by him, but I sat on the opposite side, next to my best human friend, Fisk. He had strawberry blond hair and wore his trademark black Pittsburgh Steeler's cap. Much of his hair had thinned out in the last few years. He was in his mid to late forties and the laugh lines proved it. He, too, had bulk instead of muscle and stood the same height as Scott. He had a soft voice and demeanor; at least that was how he acted around me.
"Nice to see you, Angel,” Dane said as he approached the table with his hands looped through the handles of three glass pitchers filled to the top with foaming beer. Excited and thirsty, everyone looked straight at the pitchers as he sat them on the table.
"Here you go,” Riley said, handing me a chilled glass filled with lemon lime soda.
It was a miracle that he remembered how much I dislike alcohol, since he always tried to get me drunk. He said it would loosen me up, but we both knew he wanted more than my attitude loosened up. He passed several chilled glasses around the table before returning to the bar for more.
Dane pulled up a nearby chair and sat at the front of the table. Each man poured his share and passed the pitchers around.
R
iley came back, handing out more glasses. When he finished, surprise surprise, he parked his ass next to mine, grinning from ear to ear. I should have followed Dane's example and pulled up a chair. Given the choice of sitting next to him or next to my uncle, I'd choose to sit on a glacier in the middle of the Antarctic, stripped naked and left to die by polar bears. Graham sat on the other side of the table, a large grin stuck to his drooping face, looking back and forth between the two of us. Blood relative or not, I wanted to smack him for thinking Riley and I could've ever hit it off. To make matters worse, he gave the overstuffed sack of testosterone his blessings when it came down to courting me.
"Why didn't you tell us about Angel?” Fisk asked, smiling at me with a beer mustache glistening above his lip. “How's that Chippendale's hunk you have for a husband? Too bad my boys haven't followed in your footsteps and brought home Playboy bunnies from college."
Shaking my head I said, “He's fine. You gonna stick around long enough to give me marriage advice?"
We kidded around all the time because we respected each other's boundaries. I couldn't say the same for the other guys. Being the youngest female in the Club, I had to stay on my guard because they always went too far. With Fisk, it wasn't an issue.
"Shoot,” he laughed. “I'll bet you could give me a run for my money in the marriage arena. You always had a good head on your shoulders."
"That's my girl,” Riley said, snaking his arm across my shoulders.
Fisk leaned across the table. “Her managing to stay away from you for eight months proves my point."
Everyone laughed. I shoved Riley away.
Decker leaned across the table. The Alabama native was the human version of Riley. His stringy blond hair and light gray eyes had women swooning at his feet on a few of our trips. However, when they caught sight of Riley, roles changed. Like his werewolf counterpart, he tried pushing his way into my life a couple of times. At least he had the sense enough to give up when he realized he didn't stand a chance. Don't get me wrong; he had the cutest smile and was gorgeous, but his constant boasting as the human who with the highest number of kills ruined everything he had going for him. Whenever I mentioned who had the highest ratio—my 36 out of 37—he went silent on me.
Half-Breed Page 10