Pack and Coven

by Jody Wallace

  What they planned to do about her being resistant, she had no idea.

  “What do you do with hags like her?” Gavin jerked his thumb at June, who quit twisting her wrists and ankles.

  “We all find our wolf eventually.” Bianca blinked at the fire, her profile limned by the blaze. “Except for challenges, this pack does not include violence in its ceremonies.”

  Gavin laughed. “Then you’re in for a treat. This is my pack, baby, and a lot of things around here are going to change.”

  Bianca exchanged a look with the wolf lurking near the grills, or at least that’s what it seemed she was doing. The four-leg let out a gruff and sank to the ground, nose on paws. Its eyes gleamed red in the firelight.

  “Nothing to say to that, B? That’s what I thought,” he gloated. “A pack won’t hold without a man in charge. This is how it’s supposed to be. You’ll thank me some day.”

  June doubted Bianca would thank Gavin for anything. Ever. Considering what Bianca had revealed earlier, June wouldn’t be surprised if she were hatching an evil plan to rid herself of Gavin, just as she might have done with Bert.

  Or was it evil, when it achieved a beneficial goal? Did it mean the pack would be after Harry again soon?

  Next time, June would be better prepared. If there was a next time. She might be singing an entirely different song after tonight.

  And she might be dead.

  Gavin began stretching his calves. Did the ceremony involve running? If it did, Bianca required no warm-up. She just stood there, glancing between the flames and the bridge.

  Watching. Waiting. Expecting.

  Expecting what? Had someone tried to interrupt tonight’s ceremony? Another challenger. The police. She had to assume Harry hadn’t been captured or they’d have dragged him here to duke it out with Gavin.

  Nothing like a little blood sport to make a commitment ceremony binding.

  Or, apparently, a rape.

  June’s stomach roiled, its emptiness no guard against nausea. She sawed at the tape on her hands, knowing her movements were obvious but risking it anyway. If she couldn’t get her hands free, she had zero chances for surviving this unscathed.

  Her efforts were rewarded when a section of tape parted, the rip loud enough that surely Bianca or Gavin would hear. If not them, the shifters preparing the ceremonial beverages. Or the wolf near the grills, glaring at Gavin with lupine eyes. But nobody noticed.

  Encouraged, she sawed more. Pushed harder. Wriggled her fingers and ankles. Started bumping her chair out of the circle again, easier now that she could grasp the slats and lift.

  Every inch was closer to freedom. To escaping the circle of pine around the clearing. To that laurel bush growing beside the shed. It would have to do.

  Gavin had obviously grown impatient. Bianca was obviously stalling. The sequence of events would be Gavin’s confirmation followed by the pack bond portion of the night. Whether the two halves would be punctuated by her rape, June didn’t want to find out. She, Harry, the coven, Bianca and her pack—all of them were adlibbing now.

  How she hated adlibbing!

  At least she had a secret weapon. Something inside her nobody would be expecting.

  A few more inches of tape, a few more feet in the chair. June pulled her hands as hard as she could, and the tape yanked the hair on her forearms. She grabbed the rungs, lifted the chair and toed herself backward.

  The legs of her chair brushed the pine. If she could scoot out of the circle and somehow, miraculously, be forgotten, the bonding magic wouldn’t affect her.

  A naked man June didn’t recognize jogged to the log pile, added an armful of wood and began rounding the ring, shutting down kerosene lanterns. All remaining wolves disappeared from the circle or shifted up. Soon the only light was that of the bonfire.

  In the darkness, June wrestled with the tape. Soon the only bit left was around her wrists. She rubbed her arms up and down, trying to squeeze out of the binding.

  Bianca glanced at her watch and frowned. She clapped her hands.

  “Let us gather.” She motioned to her herbalists. One of them struck an iron triangle hanging near the table.

  The clang shattered the silence. Wolves barked. People shouted. Excited voices converged on the courtyard. The herbalists ladled the crock pots’ contents into the paper cups they’d set out across the table surface.

  June bumped her chair, pushing pine aside. Another foot. She was almost there.

  Gavin bounced up and down. “I can’t believe it. This is it.”

  His men entered the clearing, stepping over the pine ring. Maurice hung back like a censorious shadow. He focused on June a moment before taking a spot inside the branches.

  Although it was obvious she was struggling to free herself, he did nothing—including help.

  Adult shifters in varying states of undress entered the circle, each treading carefully over the pine. June had never seen so many bare bottoms in her life. Some walked past her. All ignored her. Many regarded Gavin with open hostility, lots of crossed arms and angry expressions.

  Two rangy, black wolves darted into the clearing from the bridge. They halted outside the pine and barked.

  “No wolves in the circle,” Gavin yelled.

  Both shimmered into nude bipedal forms. Neither appeared to be cowed by his outrage.

  “That’s better.” He thrust out his chest. June recognized one of the men—Lionel. He crossed the ring and whispered to Bianca, who glanced at Gavin.

  “What’s going on?” Gavin demanded.

  “Lionel was the last adult on the bridge. The juveniles are at their posts.” Bianca tossed another baggie into the fire, this one sending up sparks and pops. “We can begin.”

  What happened to stalling? June had to get loose. Now.

  The herbalist rang the triangle again. Shifters filtered around the circumference, linking by touch. They began to jockey for positions in a pecking order June couldn’t decipher, but one that would eventually snake its way to her.

  She made another desperate effort to pitch free and get her hands on the mountain laurel. The pine. Dirt. Anything. Her heart thudded so hard it felt unhealthy. She half rose and pushed with her toes, throwing herself back at the same time.

  The chair legs caught on something, and the seat lurched. Tilted. June found herself falling until she came to an abrupt halt before her face had an unpleasant encounter with the ground.

  She’d been caught by someone—someone strong and quick who didn’t want her to hurt herself.

  Her heart leaped. Was it…

  No. The hands were smaller, the arms delicate, the scent flowery.

  “Careful.” Susan righted June. The woman was dressed like Bianca, in exercise apparel. Her exposed skin was pale, tinged orange by the light of the enormous bonfire. Her short curls matched the pale coat of the wolf June had been seeing all night. “You don’t want to cut that pretty face.”

  The other woman didn’t seem to be mocking her. She regarded June with kind eyes, her face unhappy. June couldn’t blame her—the new alpha had assaulted her with a log.

  “Get me out of here,” she begged, one unhappy woman to another. “I’m a juvenile. I don’t want to take this risk.”

  “I’m not the alpha.” Susan’s jaw firmed. “I don’t get to make those decisions.”

  While they did monitor the wolves, covens interacted with local pack members as little as possible to cut down on the chance of recognition. Packs weren’t attracted to covens like indie wolves, which made avoidance easier. June couldn’t remember ever conversing with Susan, but her voice sounded familiar. So did the disappointment in it.

  “Bianca doesn’t want to include me,” she told Susan. “She wouldn’t be mad if you sort of nudged me out of the circle.”

  “Bianca is only half the equation. Too bad Harry won’t be the other half. He was perfect.”

  Harry was perfect. Where had she heard that phrase recently?

  This morning—when Donna
Manns telephoned her house looking for a mechanic.

  That hadn’t been Donna Manns. It had been Susan. How that knowledge could help June, she had no idea, so she asked, “How is Harry perfect?”

  Susan gazed toward the bonfire. “Perfect for what we needed.”

  Susan too? There were hundreds of candidates all over. They weren’t all Bert. Some were progressive, intelligent. Why did Millington’s pack want Harry when he didn’t want them?

  “Don’t you have any recessives in the pack?” June asked. Gavin wouldn’t have been able to eliminate them like he had the candidates.

  “No male recessives,” Susan said, her voice dry. She pulled June’s nightshirt down her thighs, covering her. “Not that it matters.”

  Before June could reflect on that, somebody grabbed her upper arm, linking her into the circle. Violet, irritation pouring from her like a heater. She didn’t seem to care that her fingers bit into the flesh of June’s arm.

  On her other side, Susan placed a warm hand on her neck. There had to be some reason Bianca’s lieutenants had picked spots on either side of her. She felt nothing magical—yet.

  What would happen to her? Would they sense she was different? Would she wind up bonded to the pack as a witch? Or would she wind up an inconvenient dead body?

  The herbalists began to pass Dixie cups around the circle. June struggled, but the shifters kept her in place. A few pine needles stuck to her clothes, nothing touching her skin, nothing she could use.

  The only ones who looked happy were Gavin, some of his men and…Bianca.

  Bianca?

  “Welcome, my kith and kin,” the female alpha said with a smirk. She waved away the cup offered to her. “Tonight we renew our commitment and connection. We cleanse the old. We welcome the new. Circle of life, blah blah blah. You know why we’re here.”

  “I like the new speech,” Violet whispered. “Pithy.”

  “Who wants to commemorate this?” Susan answered over June’s head. “I’m sure next year will be as tedious as ever.”

  Violet’s grip on June eased. “Don’t give up yet, Sue. He’s around here somewhere.”

  “Who?” June asked, but they ignored her.

  While Gavin paced, Bianca strolled around the ring, making eye contact with each person. The cups progressed faster than she did until Susan held two of them, the green smell of peppermint reaching June’s nose.

  She twisted her arms, and one of her hands slid out of the restraint. Finally. She kept it hidden. Bianca reached Susan, June and Violet, touching Susan’s hand where it rested against June’s neck, before continuing onward.

  “Enough,” Gavin ordered. “The one-on-one crap comes later. Instate me.”

  Bianca returned to his side. Some might view her as obedient. Those people hadn’t seen her face. Or her hands, curled into claws. “I suppose we have to do this. Is there anyone here who challenges Gavin Householder for the position of Millington pack alpha?”

  Amid a sudden murmur of voices, a large gray wolf padded out of the shadows and into the firelight. He shimmered, stretching upward, until he solidified into a man. A lean, familiar man with a head of dark, shaggy hair and a smile that dared anyone to question his presence at the ceremony.

  “I do.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Gavin rammed into Harry before he had a chance to aim the gun. The pistol flew out of his hand, skidding across the dirt into the pine boughs. Harry landed on his back, the other shifter’s hands around his throat.

  The bridge had been guarded by heavily armed young men when he’d reached it, and they hadn’t so much as blinked when he trotted past. He’d crossed the swaying suspension bridge and approached the circle unchallenged.

  Was it the spell or was his timing exquisite?

  When he got to the ring, the two-legs parted to let him pass. Even though he was a wolf, even though he was breaking pack law, no one stopped him. Several had stroked his fur. Many had smiled. One woman had whispered, “Thank God.”

  But none could help him, and he’d just lost his primary advantage. His only advantage. He’d planned to force Gavin to stand down and take his place in the ceremony. Vern had been right about one thing. What did Harry care about the pack’s opinion of him using a gun if it meant June was safe?

  Being pack alpha would have been tricky enough, but now it seemed he’d be lucky to survive the encounter.

  Harry yanked at Gavin’s wrists, and the other man squeezed harder. The packer’s strength cut off his wind.

  “Stop him,” a woman screamed. “He’ll kill Harry.”

  June. Was she all right? Harry had scented her but hadn’t seen her. He dug his nails into Gavin’s fingers, craning his head in her direction.

  Not enough range of vision. All he accomplished was letting Gavin get a better grip.

  “You dumbass.” Gavin shook Harry, banging his head against the dirt. “I’m pack. I’m alpha. You’re nobody. Your mother couldn’t take me and neither can you.”

  Harry whipped up his knees, pounding Gavin in the back. The other man lurched forward. Harry slammed his skull into Gavin’s face.

  Bone crunched. Blood splattered.

  “First blood to Smith,” someone cheered.

  Gavin let go of Harry long enough to punch him. Pain splintered through his head and he struck back, scrambling. He couldn’t gain purchase in the blood streaking Gavin’s arms.

  Gavin, blood drizzling from his nose, got his hands back around Harry’s neck and tightened. Spots appeared in Harry’s vision, sparks of firelight. Was this going to be over before it started?

  No time to be squeamish. Or sportsmanlike.

  Harry was taller than Gavin. He went for the eyes.

  Gavin howled and released his hold, protecting his face. Harry’s instincts told him to shift to a wolf, fight with tooth and claw, but he wasn’t the feral here.

  Despite the shifters’ worship of the wolf, the contest to rule a pack was between men. A gun Harry would risk. A shift would mark him for death—as if Gavin hadn’t already done so.

  Harry heaved the other man up and over, rolling toward the bonfire. The ring of mesmerized two-legs broke when Gavin tumbled near, none allowed to interfere once the challenge had begun.

  Gavin grabbed a large branch from the circle, his muscles bulging as he ripped off limbs. Blood oozed from his nose and his eye was beginning to swell shut. Harry’s throat and face ached with bruises. No doubt he looked as rough as Gavin.

  No doubt he’d look a lot rougher after two more minutes of this.

  They circled each other, Gavin thrusting with the wood. Harry spotted June, tossing a chair into the circle as if she hoped he could use it as a weapon, and ducked under a swing. Another. And another.

  Barely.

  He was not going to win a contest of strength. He had no idea where the gun was. Nor could he reach the chair June had thrown. He had to come up with something to stall so the coven could move into position. They’d told him they didn’t have the power to put the pack to sleep, yet they promised they’d extract June if he played his part. It was all he had.

  So he played.

  “What the hell are you wearing, a rabbit?” he asked Gavin. His voice was gravelly. If he could make the other man angry, perhaps he’d become careless.

  Gavin growled and advanced. Harry skidded to one side, nearly colliding with Bianca.

  She didn’t budge from her spot near the bonfire, a delighted smile stretching across her face.

  “Chicken shit.” Gavin bared his teeth. “You’re going to die tonight, Lapin. Finally.”

  How could anyone say Harry was chicken when he’d challenged a shifter who was the odds-on favorite? Indie versus packer? He was surprised he’d lasted as long as he had.

  Harry danced away from the branch, letting it smack his hands. He tried to yank it free, but Gavin had momentum. The flesh on Harry’s palms ripped on the sharp wood.

  “I love it when men fight over me,” Bianca taunted.
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  Harry wasn’t sure if she intended to rile him or Gavin. The other man knew Harry was the pack’s choice—knew he wasn’t wanted. Why was Bianca so pleased by this unbalanced fight? What did she know that Harry didn’t?

  Gavin threw the log at Harry and used the distraction to close on him. His fist caught Harry in the gut.

  Air whooshed out of his lungs. Harry threw himself sideways to avoid an uppercut to the jaw. The blow glanced off his shoulder. Gavin swung again, missed and caught Harry’s arm when he attempted to reciprocate.

  He wrenched it upward, trying to twist it behind Harry’s back. Harry dropped instead and pitched Gavin over his shoulder.

  When Gavin landed, it was Harry’s turn to pin him to the ground, hands around the other man’s throat. Gavin gagged and clawed. Harry felt a burst of triumph, a primal urge to squeeze the life out of his opponent. The flesh, the bones of the throat, compressed beneath his fingers.

  But Gavin was pack, and Harry was not. The other man threw Harry off. Blows rained on his head and shoulders, savage blows. The fists stopped, Harry caught his breath, and suddenly Gavin was flying through the air feet first like a ninja.

  Harry didn’t duck in time. The unexpected attack snapped his head back. Felled him like a tree. Nausea rose in his gorge and he remembered Vern’s advice to shift. But shifting would mean failure, maybe death, if he couldn’t outrun Gavin and the pack.

  He wouldn’t run. He couldn’t see June anywhere and hoped she’d escaped to the coven, who should be here. Yet there was no sign of them.

  He struggled to rise. Gavin’s body slammed him to the dirt. The move was showy but effective.

  Harry’s head thwacked the ground. Gavin squashed his stomach all the way to his spine. He doubled up like a pretzel, and Gavin punched him back.

  Harry hit the ground. Again. Blackness tunneled his vision. Gavin’s leering face and crimson scar loomed over him as hands closed around his head. Lifted.