by Becca Van
“Does Tammy know all of this?” Phelan asked.
Hopper nodded before Tarik could reply. “She knows that Celeste has a stalker.”
“I already knew that.” Phelan frowned. “Does she know about the latest text?”
Tarik shook his head. “No. Hodge and I just found out about it.”
“When was this text sent, and what did it say?” Hopper asked.
“The fucker sent it this morning. It was a sick nursery rhyme.”
“You can’t tell your sister.” Phelan pointed at him.
Tarik sighed, scrubbed a hand over his face and then narrowed his eyes at his two friends. “I know. You’re going to have to watch over her.”
“You don’t have to tell us that.” Phelan scowled.
“She can stay with us,” Hopper stated emphatically.
Tarik laughed, humorously. “She’s going to baulk.”
“Doesn’t matter.” Phelan crossed his arms over his chest. “She’ll do as she’s told.”
“We are talking about my sister, Tamara, right? She’s going to argue until she’s blue in the face.” Tarik said.
“She can argue all she wants.” Hopper mimicked Phelan’s stance.
“Tams isn’t the only one you’re going to have to convince. Mom and the dads aren’t going to want to let her out of their sight until this bastard is caught.”
“We’ve already spoken to Royal and Talon.” Phelan dropped his arms his sides and shifted uncomfortably on his feet.
“You’re going to claim her?” Tarik asked.
Hopper and Phelan nodded.
“She’s going to fight you every step of the way. You hurt her.”
“We know.” Hopper sighed.
“Why haven’t you made a move before know?”
“We were giving her time to grow up and experience life before tying her down,” Phelan explained.
“Shit!” Tarik glanced out the window again. “Okay, I understand but did either of you explain this to my sister?”
“Why would we?” Hopper asked.
“Geezus, you two are totally clueless.”
“About what?” Phelan frowned.
“About the female psyche.”
“Why would you say that?”
“I overhead Tams talking to Mom just before she went off to college. The only reason she decided to go was because she didn’t think you two wanted anything to do with her.”
“What?” Hopper snarled. “Not want her? Why the fuck would she think that?”
“You know how women are,” Tarik said. “They have all these dreams and expectations and when they don’t go according to their plans, they do an about-face.”
“What did you hear?” Phelan asked.
“Tammy thought you two would want to claim her when she’d finished high school and turned eighteen. When neither of you made a move, she began applying to colleges and accepted the first offer. She thinks you still see her as a little girl.”
“She is a little girl.” Hopper smirked.
“Compared to us she’s downright tiny.” Phelan frowned.
“Is that why you haven’t claimed her?” Tarik asked. “Because of her size?”
“Yes and no,” Hopper answered.
“Explain,” Tarik ordered.
“We have more than a foot of height on Tammy and we’re nearly a hundred and fifty pounds heavier.”
“So what!” Tarik threw his hand into the air. “My sister may look small and fragile but she’s far from it. You two need to pull your heads out of your asses. Just because she can’t shift doesn’t mean she’s weak.”
“We know she’s not weak,” Phelan snarled, his eyes glowing as his animal pushed to the surface. “We’ve been giving her a chance to find out who she is, a chance to experience life away from the isolation of this place. We wanted her to be sure that we’re what she needs and wants in life. Do you honestly think any of us would be happy if she felt as if she was stuck? She needed to be able to fly free for a while, to experience life as if she was a normal human woman.”
Hopper nodded. “We didn’t want her to end up resenting us. By going to college, she was able to socialize, meet people from all walks of life, make friends, and have new experiences.”
“You guys took a hell of a risk,” Tarik said. “If she hadn’t come back—”
Phelan cut him off. “We knew the risks.”
“Yeah, I guess you did.” Tarik turned toward the door, paused and looked back over his shoulder. “I need to go and inform the others and the dads.”
“Call if you need us,” Hopper said, just before the door closed behind Tarik.
“I will. Thanks.”
Tarik decided to talk to Calloway and Finbar next. As he jogged through the center of town toward the airport he thought over what Phelan and Hopper had said. He was glad that his friends had given his sister the time she needed to find her own feet and spread her wings. If they hadn’t he never would have met his own mate. Tammy was a stubborn little thing and once she got something in her head, it would be hard to sway her way of thinking. He’d heard her and Celeste talking out on the porch at his parents’ place after lunch earlier in the day. When he’d heard his sister crying over Phelan and Hopper, his sabear had come to the fore, butting his head against Tarik’s insides as he tried to push his way out. Luckily for his friends he had good control, because otherwise, he might have ended up ripping Phelan and Hopper each a new asshole. Now that they’d explained their reasons for holding back on claiming Tammy, his beast was a lot calmer toward his stealth members.
However, his inner animal was going to be on alert until the threat to their mate was gone. Tarik just hoped that this stalker made his move soon. He wanted to be able to enjoy his time with Celeste without having to keep vigilant.
“Cal,” Tarik called, as he got close to the hangar.
“Yo,” Cal replied.
Cal and Fin were AMTs or Aircraft Maintenance Technicians. They were also air traffic controllers, or ATC. They took turns in the tower and working on the planes. Tarik admired all of his stealth members, but Cal and Fin more so. They were the only two of his friends who had gone off to college away from the island other than his sister. All the others had gotten their degrees by correspondence. How Fin and Cal had managed to keep their sabears hidden while dealing with so many people, he’d never understand.
Sabears were loners unless with members of their stealth and they loved the well-below freezing temperatures. Being so far south and away from his family and friends would have sent Tarik around the twist. Maybe that was why Cal and Fin had managed to get their diplomas in half the time it usually took.
Tarik changed direction when he saw Cal across the west side of the hangar. He was wiping his hands on a cloth and walking toward him. “Is Fin still in the tower?”
Cal glanced at the clock on the wall behind him before meeting Tarik’s gaze again. “He should be finishing up about now.”
Tarik nodded. “I’ll wait until he gets here so I don’t have to explain twice.”
“Okay. You want a beer?” Cal asked.
“Sure.” Tarik followed Cal into the office. “Have you heard how Jarvis is?”
“He’s fine. He should be back in the air in another two months,” Cal replied, as he handed the beer over.
Tarik muttered. “I invited Jarvis to stay longer to heal up, but he declined and hitched a ride back to the mainland two days later. Thankfully, Celeste recovered a lot faster than he did. It only took a couple of days to get over her concussion and the massage Hodge and I gave her relieved her sore muscles. Poor Jarvis. Sucks to be human.”
Cal barked out a laugh. “I’ll say. We’d be good as new after shifting.”
Tarik quirked his eyebrow as he took a sip of beer.
“Okay, okay. Two to three days.”
Tarik nodded. If one of his kind broke a bone, shifting would help speed up the healing process. The bones would knit back together almost instantly but they�
��d still have to be careful of overusing the limb or whatever was broken. He’d learned that lesson the hard way when he’d been in his early teens. He and Hodge had been wrestling and roughhousing. Somehow, they’d ended up tangling their legs together in an awkward position and when Hodge had jerked away too hard, Tarik’s fibular had snapped. He’d shifted into his sabear and then immediately shifted back and stood up. His bone had been too weak to bear his weight and snapped again. It had been a full week before he was back to normal.
“Tarik, there’s a stranger walking along the shoreline,” Fin said.
“Is there anyone else with him?” Tarik asked.
“No.”
“How did he get to the island? Can you see a boat?”
“No,” Fin answered through their mind link.
“Keep your eyes on him. This could be the fucker who’s after my mate.”
“Shit! Do you have a description of the asshole?” Fin asked.
“He’s got blond hair, blue eyes and is around six-feet tall.”
“It can’t be him then.” Fin sighed.
“How do you figure?” Tarik asked.
“This dude has black hair.”
“He could be working with the prick.” Tarik ran toward town, aware of Cal’s presence behind him. “Where is he?”
“On Main Street, just passing the general store.”
“I see him,” Phelan growled. “Want me to take him out?”
“No, let’s see what he does.”
“He’s coming in,” Phelan said.
“I’m about ten seconds behind.” Tarik slowed his pace as he got to the steps leading into the general store, sniffing the air and imprinting the stranger’s scent into his olfactory senses. The moment he entered the store, he caught another smell on the man’s clothes. Whoever he was, he wasn’t alone. There was the aroma of another man still clinging to the stranger and it was still strong, which meant this man had a friend. So, where was he?
Tarik hadn’t had a chance to speak to the dads or Serge and Ward yet, but they were aware of the stranger since Fin and Phelan had contacted him using the communal stealth link. If explanations were needed he would explain later, but his friends weren’t stupid. All the men knew that his mate had jumped at the chance to visit Tammy because she was being stalked. Now that a stranger had shown up in their midst, everyone would be on alert without having to be told.
“This guy has a friend around somewhere,” Tarik said through the communal link. “The stench is still strong.”
“We’re on it,” Serge said.
“Shit! Where’s Tammy?” Roy shouted.
“What do you mean where’s Tammy?” Talon asked. “She’s in her room.”
“No, she’s not. Her door was open when I walked passed it. Her room’s empty.”
Phelan growled and when he saw the stranger looking at him warily, he drew in a deep breath and forced a smile. “Can I help you?”
“Uh, I was just after a cup of coffee.”
“Whatever you want.” Phelan glanced at Tarik.
Tarik moved toward the counter and leaned nonchalantly against it as he stared at the well-dressed man. He had money. His coat was designer label and so were his boots. “You’re not from around here.”
“No.” The man smiled. “I’m Wayne Preston, originally from New York, but I moved to Washington a few years back.”
“What part of Washington?” Phelan asked, as he set the to-go cup on the counter.
Tarik’s hackles stood on end.
“Everett.”
“Isn’t that close to Seattle?” Tarik asked.
“Sure is. About thirty miles.”
The more Tarik found out, the more his sabear became unsettled. Surely, it wasn’t a coincidence that this man was from where his mate had been living?
“How’d you get to Savoonga?” Phelan asked, as he gave the stranger his change.
“Dirt bike.”
Tarik frowned. He hadn’t heard a dirt bike. Why would this man have ditched the bike and come in on foot? Nothing added up, but he wasn’t letting the stranger out of his sight before he had his answers. He sniffed the air again and frowned trying to get to the source of what the unusual fragrance was. The scent was on the man’s clothes but the aroma wasn’t his.
Tarik’s sabear was being really aggressive, snarling, clawing at his insides, and shoving his head hard against his stomach. He narrowed his eyes as he stared intently at the human man with the earthy smell clinging to his clothes. He needed to work out what that fragrance was because he had a really bad feeling about all of this.
So far, the stranger smelled and scented like nothing but trouble with a capital T.
Chapter Nineteen
Now that Celeste was mated with her brother and Hodge, Tammy’s loneliness was more acute. She didn’t understand why Phelan and Hopper hadn’t tried to claim her once she’d finished high school and turned eighteen, but guessed she never would.
Now that everyone had left the house after one of her mom’s famous stealth meals, the house was too quiet. She could hear her mom and the dads talking in the kitchen, and while she loved her parents more than anything, sometimes she felt like a fourth wheel.
Tarik had moved into his own place with Hodge while she was still in school, and though she could visit him anytime she liked, it wasn’t the same as having her big brother living under the same roof. Tammy knew she was loved, but having her family love her was not the love she wanted most. She sighed and shook her head. That thought hadn’t come out right. In fact, nothing she did lately came out right. She was seriously thinking about moving back to North America. She had people she could reconnect with and go out on the town with, but if she did that, she would be condemning Phelan and Hopper to a slow spiral into ravaging beasts—and finally, death.
Tammy opened her window and gulped in cool, fresh air. She felt as if the walls were closing in around her. She knew that she could talk to her parents about anything and everything, but she didn’t want to spoil their happy alone time. She could hear her mom laughing and there was no way she was putting a damper on their happy mood. She needed to get out and walk off the depression that was threatening to take hold. Normally, she was an optimist but every now and again the pessimistic side of her won. Today was one of those days.
After changing shoes, she climbed out the open window and began to walk. Tammy had no idea where she was going, but it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered anymore.
Her mind wandered back to her eighteenth year.
She’d never forget the dejection and pain that had pierced her heart when she’d mentioned going away to college to get her art degree. Phelan and Hopper hadn’t so much as moved a muscle as she’d talked about leaving the island. They’d been sitting across the big table from her and she’d watched them from beneath her lowered lashes. Neither man had so much as blinked.
Her mom was sensitive to her emotions and began talking excitedly, encouraging her to go after her dreams. Dad Roy had nudged Dad Talon when he’d started to object. That had been the start of a whirlwind of frantic preparations, but the clincher had been the day she’d boarded the plane to head to Washington. Phelan and Hopper hadn’t even come to see her off. That was when she realized they didn’t have any feelings toward her other than the pesky little girl she’d been when she was growing up.
Tammy had been tempted to lose her virginity to one of the guys at college, but the thought of someone other than Phelan and Hopper touching her had turned her stomach. She’d begun to think she was destined to live a long lonely life, watching her mates from afar but never having the chance to be in a relationship with them.
Tears burned her eyes but instead of blinking them back like she usually did, she let them fall. Maybe after a good cry she would feel better. God, she hoped so. She hated feeling so sad.
She wasn’t perfect—far from it in fact—but she wasn’t a bad person. Or at least she didn’t think so. She was never mean to anyone and tried to h
elp out where she could, but she did have a temper when riled and she could be downright vindictive. However, she always apologized afterward if she said something nasty or did something wrong.
Phelan and Hopper weren’t perfect either. If they had halos they would be tripping over them all the time. Phelan was domineering, abrupt, and grouchy. Hopper was more sociable than his friend but he could be just as authoritative. Especially when it came to her.
She stopped walking and wiped the tears from her face and sniffed. The emotional constriction around her heart and in her throat released and making it easier to breathe. Tammy titled her head back and stared at the clear blue sky.
What gave them the right to order her around if they had no interest in claiming her? Anger began to replace the sadness that had gripped her as she’d watched her brother, Hodge, and Celeste interact over lunch. Why she was pining over Hopper and Phelan she’d never know. It was their choice to refuse or ignore their claim on her. She wasn’t the one who would end up going crazy or die.
She could and would head back to the mainland, find a nice human male to settle down with and marry. Tammy snorted.
Like that will ever happen.
Ever since she’d realized why she was drawn to Hopper and Phelan, she’d dreamed about how they would be together. She wanted kids and the only way that dream would come true was to be with her mates. No human male would accept a barren woman and she wouldn’t be able to tell them about her genetics.
Tammy’s shoulders slumped and she sighed again. She was better off remaining alone than having to worry about hiding who she really was. Maybe she should get a cat, or ten.
“That would go over well with all the animals on the island.” Tammy snorted.
When she heard the men talking on the stealth communal link about the stranger in town, her heart flipped in her chest and her palms got sweaty. Was it Celeste’s creepy stalker?