by Ellie Pond
The zeros at the end of both numbers sent her stomach soaring. Maybe he did have her price. But with shiny top-notch equipment to help shifters get better, it might be worth it.
“And you’ll let me work on both projects?”
“Well, two of the research assistants are for the dragon issue, one is for the shifter mortality problem you’re working on. Or whatever you want to do with them. But I want the smartest two to be working on the dragon issue.” He put his drink down on the table in front of him.
Smartest two. What the hell did he think this was—a popularity contest? Fudge, he probably did.
Her head was spinning with the gin and the prospects, but she remembered her introduction. “I have one more question and I want you to answer it honestly. No, I want a puma in the room.”
“I can assure you that I can answer a question honestly.”
Elizabeth drummed her fingers on the table. If ever she would be in the power seat with the dragon, it was now. She flashed a smile.
“Fine.” He hit a button on his desk and, after a few minutes, the bridge door opened. She spent the time in between studying the blueprints. By the time Anna’s son sauntered in, her question almost didn’t matter anymore.
The captain addressed the puma. “Thanks for coming in, Smithfield.” Romie nodded at the captain. “You have a question for me, Doctor?”
Elizabeth smiled at Romie. He was movie-star handsome. “Yes. You mentioned that there were a lot of labs and universities after my services. Have you been keeping those offers from me?”
“Well, that’s easy. Hell yes.” The captain stood with his fist on his hips.
She didn’t need to look at Romie, but he nodded that it was the truth.
“Thanks, Smithfield.” He dismissed the puma with a nod. Romie waved goodbye to Elizabeth.
“Why?” she asked.
“Because you’re the best and dragons don’t let go of their hoard. I thought you—out of anyone—would understand that, my dear doctor.”
“Oh.” Elizabeth perched on the edge of the gold chair. She wasn’t a prisoner, but she might as well have been one. But then she looked at the blueprints. She felt like Belle from Beauty and the Beast—who would want to leave when you had all those books, or in her case, all that lab equipment?
“May I take this with me?”
The captain smirked. “But of course. Let’s discuss your needs. Tomorrow, shall we? We have two dry port days after the next cruise. I think I can have all of this done in that time. Draft a job post for the candidates you want. Let’s see if we can get them on board even before the renovations.”
“Hold up, Captain. I haven’t said ‘yes’ yet,” she said as she rolled up the plans and slid them into the tube he handed her.
“But you will.”
Lug nuts, she knew he was right. The excited flutter of a new lab was tempered by the careless words she’d flung at Tad back in her cabin. And her disappointment in herself for not keeping track of her research specimens. She wanted to tell Tad about the new lab.
24
A Shift
Once he heard Sam’s voice and Aurora’s, it became difficult to move out of the hallway. He wasn’t eavesdropping, he told himself. He had been trying to keep track of his cousins to make sure they didn’t do anything stupid, but exhaustion kicked in. He was searching for Spencer because his family pack was going to explode. Spencer wallowed in a vat of guilt that he almost mated his brother’s mate. Yes, his mate was a witch—Spencer would have to deal with it. Some things he’d come to realize were important. And if he happened to run into Elizabeth, that wouldn’t be bad.
He had been walking around for the last few hours trying to find either of them with no luck. The dining rooms, the spa—everywhere. When he poked his head in at the clinic, Anna grunted at him. But he couldn’t scent either Elizabeth or Spencer. The others in the infirmary only shrugged at him.
He got by the security doors on the second floor and even to the first floor with a lot of patience. After the infirmary, he checked the officers’ mess—not that his cousin would be there. Although he did get yelled at and had to run away from a mechanic by the engine room.
He didn’t find Spencer at the theater or the cage match arena, either behind the scenes or watching the match. Tad didn’t expect him in the lounge or the night club but tried anyway. He never was a fan of shifter lounges in the city, but searching for Elizabeth in this one made him ill. The pheromones of others laid rocks in his stomach. On his way out, he learned that it was the one place on the ship humans weren’t allowed, and he felt an odd sense of relief.
He tried all four quick-service restaurants and the pizza parlor. Of course, Spencer might be circling behind him. He rounded the corner on the balcony to the empty coffee bar lounge and froze. If he hadn’t been searching the ship so long, he might not have listened in.
But having your world perception change with a blast of magical power will change a guy’s perspective on what was right. He leaned up against the wall of the hall and slowed his heartbeat down from its marathon speed.
When he had talked to Aurora only a few hours ago, she’d stormed off. He should have led with the ‘did you ever notice your mother’s a witch?’
Aurora spoke in a low voice to Sam. “. . . I don’t know any magic. I’ve never felt a pulse of it.”
Sam took Aurora’s hand. “Trust me. It’s there. The vibrations already are radiating from you. You will harness your gift and when you do, your power will soar. You broke your own binding. That’s a tough thing to do.” Sam held her hand an inch away from Aurora’s.
“Do you feel it now? That’s your magic pulsing towards mine. All yours.”
It took a lot of willpower for Tad to not rush out into the lobby. Because that was the problem. Violet was controlling all of this. But why? He didn’t know. What did she get out of it? Here on the ship in international waters, it wasn’t like a wolf-witch battle would play out.
“Protection spell . . .” And then he could feel it. Shit. He headed the other way. Aurora might not know how to use her magic, but he was confident she could tell that he had powers now. At least, that’s what Violet had indirectly said. That woman was anything but open.
The visions were gone, but the reality of Aurora’s power hit him. His wolf growled, and he felt the urge to shift again. He ran down the hallway, away from Aurora and Sam, before his wolf got the best of him.
Finding himself in front of his cabin door, he tumbled in. The drawn curtains revealed the three beds turned down for the night. He bolted the door shut. His cousins would have to find a place to spend the night; he wasn’t opening this door.
Sweat poured off him as he stripped. Bones popped, and fur took hold of his skin. Paws jumped from the bed to the desk to the bed again. A loud pop bounced off the glass balcony door. He crawled under the bed, pulling a blanket with him.
Enthusiastic love-making sounds pulsed from the adjoining cabin. He rubbed his paws over his sensitive ears.
* * *
The pounding wasn’t only coming from his head. Tad rolled over, cold. His skin rubbed the carpet, and he opened his eyes to see the underside of the sofa bed. He was under the bed, naked.
“He’s in here. I can smell him.” Gunnar’s feet lay next to Tad’s head. Gunnar landed on the bed, and a spring sank into Tad’s hip.
“Shit.”
Gunnar’s head appeared over the edge of the bed, hanging upside down. “Hey.” Gunnar looked him in the eye.
Tad tried to move, but the sagging bed didn’t give him enough room. “Can you get off?”
“No thanks, I already did.”
“Get your ass of the bed.”
“Sure.” Gunnar not only got off the bed but yanked the sofa bed up, snagging Tad’s hip with a long scratch. Tad looked down at the minor wound.
“You should get a doctor to look at that.” Gunnar pointed to the wound, laughed, and threw the cushions on the sofa before flinging himself onto
it. “You had a cabin to yourself and you slept under the bed? And locked the door? Spencer’s asleep on the pool deck. I was in bed, but I didn’t sleep much.”
“You and Duncan. I didn’t need to hear it.” His wolf wasn’t giving up his fur and he had to deal with the noises from next door all night. He wanted his mate. There was an inkling that he possibly might have been wrong. His wolf growled at him, and he ignored it as always.
“I know Duncan’s fine, you dip shit. He let me in through the adjoining door. You were under the sofa because of their love thumping? Is that why you went all wolf under there?” Gunnar raised an eyebrow as if to ask if Tad had an issue with Aurora and Duncan’s mating.
“Fuck, no. That’s difficult to explain and has nothing to do with Dunc.”
“Yeah, well, then don’t explain it.” He dropped the sofa bed on Tad’s head.
And that was the problem with Gunnar. He was the life of the party. Gunnar always had control of his wolf. They worked together.
Tad caged his wolf, mastered it. Took pride in the inner control. But it hadn’t been inner control at all, only a messed-up spell put on him by his mother. The pack. And him, a voice said inside. And him. His wolf craved the emotions he couldn’t access. Love, belonging. There was no way for them to join as one. Tad’s focus away from his wolf didn’t elevate him to a more cerebral plane, it hollowed him away from his true nature. And there was nothing to be done about it. His pack, siblings, and mother required protection.
“I don’t care if you get dressed, but you might want to. Aurora and Duncan are going out for breakfast, and I’m going with them. And then I’m going to go get Spencer from the pool deck where he slept and throw him in the pool. Wanna come watch?”
Tad pulled on some clothes after deciding that he wasn’t up for a shower. He ran his fingers through his hair and pulled on his running shoes, now that he had lost his sandals to Elizabeth’s cabin. At least she would have work today.
“You look like bat shit. You should shower.”
“I’m good.”
“You’re far from good . . . like drank-a-gallon-of-Troll-ale away from good.” Gunnar knocked on the door to Aurora’s room. It was early still. “You ready?” Gunnar pushed open the door before an answer could come.
Aurora sat in a chair near the balcony while Duncan stood nude, his clothes in his hand.
“Are you ready?” Gunnar repeated.
“Do I look ready?” Duncan motioned to Aurora. “You’re lucky that I was the one still getting dressed. If you had seen my mate, I would have had to beat on you.”
Gunnar held his fingers up, counting on them, and Tad knew where this was going.
“Don’t. He’s not going to think it’s funny.”
That only made Gunnar smile more. “How many times have we all been down to skinny dip in North River Lake, Aurora?” Gunnar asked and ducked behind Tad laughing.
Duncan swung his fist, hitting Tad in the gut—not a real punch and he’d been expecting it, but the worst part was Duncan’s junk smacked Tad in the leg. He held out his arms, keeping the brother’s apart, but they weren’t putting any effort into it.
Aurora looked up from her book, shaking her head. “Duncan, you know it’s always dark at the lake. No one can see anything.”
At that, the three of them stopped and stared at her. No one said anything until she processed what she had said.
“Oh, shit. I never thought that through, did I? You can see in the dark.”
Gunnar and Tad laughed in unison.
Duncan pushed Tad into Gunnar and into the connecting room, then locked the door behind them, but he heard Aurora repeat, “Honestly, I never thought that through,” on the other side of the door.
“Forget breakfast. The Bjørn Bar opens early on sea days.” Gunnar opened the door to the hallway.
That sounded like the perfect thing. Tad grabbed a book from the dresser because at least part of him was intact.
25
Not Going to End Well
Kellen, Tad’s new best friend, slid two plates of food across the bar to him and Gunnar. Half a keg gone. It took a lot for a shifter to get drunk and that would describe exactly the amount they had had—drunk.
“There’s something different about you, cuz, and I don’t mean the you-have-a-mate-you-haven’t-claimed thing. No. Something else.”
Once every hour Gunnar brought the same thing up. And Tad steered him away from it again. They weren’t alone with Kellen anymore. Spencer had been there for an hour before he lumbered off. Around noon, others began filing into the bar. And Gunnar would walk, or rather wander away, to tell a story or a joke to a new group.
Right after Tad finished the burger on his plate, no matter how much ketchup spilled on his jogging shorts, he would camp out in the infirmary waiting room.
He grabbed his book and left Gunnar telling another couple how Aurora had figured out about the skinny dipping. With each telling, the story got bigger and further from the truth. But that was the thing with bar stories. By the time they got good, there was no truth left in them.
* * *
The heavy door swung back at him as he left, and he turned to look at it. He stumbled a bit but righted himself on the way to the clinic. He took the steps two at a time to deck three and the infirmary. The waiting room was empty, unlike earlier. The child with an upset stomach was no longer there. Good. Nurse Anna hadn’t liked it when he tried to talk to the child and its mother. Something about him smelling like the gutter.
“Oh, you’re back. And you didn’t take me up on my suggestion. You need to go shower, Theodore Larsen.”
Two names. Not good. Lucky she didn’t know to add the Andrew in there.
“I should wait.” He sat down in the seat closest to the desk where Nurse Anna sat. She closed the glass. “I’ll wait, then.”
“You do that,” Anna said behind the glass.
Yesterday, she had been so much nicer to him. Three chapters into his book, he looked up. Anna was no longer there at her desk, so he opened the door to the clinic hallway as quietly as possible.
No one else had come in, and there was no one in the hallway. The effects of the drinks earlier were fading and, as he moved, he caught a reflection of himself. That included the large ketchup stain on his shorts and the greasy hair. He lifted his arm and breathed in. He pivoted in the hallway and dashed out of the infirmary to his cabin on the upper decks.
The shower complete and his head clearer, if not all the way there, he headed back to the clinic. But instead of Anna to greet him, the petite physician’s assistant, Katie, glared at him, her ebony hair pulled back into a tight, short ponytail.
“Hello, I’m looking for Dr. Cottage,” he said, spying his book still on the seat he had vacated less than half an hour before. He tucked it under his arm.
“Anna and Dr. Cottage are off for the rest of the night.”
Tad looked at his watch in reflex. 5:00 p.m.—how had that happened?
“Oh.”
“Elizabeth came out looking for you, but you’d left. We had to perform a surgery today. Appendicitis. It took us all by surprise. We couldn’t wait until we docked tomorrow, and a rescue helicopter would have been too much for the patient. Anna said you’d been in and out all day. I’m sure Elizabeth will come find you. And I don’t know what Anna was talking about—you don’t smell.”
“Right. Thanks.” He resisted the urge to take a whiff of himself. And Anna had told him earlier about the surgery. He could kick Gunnar for getting him drunk before noon. Gunnar made Tad’s stupid come out.
Tad tried Elizabeth’s cabin first, but there wasn’t any answer. He sighed. At least he was learning the ship. He needed to get her phone number. It shocked him that he hadn’t yet. He tried all the places he had the night before but stopped when he got to the Bjørn Bar. Gunnar was still there, and his audience was larger now. He had a handful of darts, but he was performing more than throwing.
“Tad. Where did you go?”
<
br /> “I would say why are you still here?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” Typical Gunnar.
Tad sat on a stool behind where his brother held the attention of a semi-circle of people with his grand storytelling. Another beer appeared in Tad’s hand. Tad looked over his shoulder to see Michele smiling.
“This is the third time since I got here that he’s told this story.”
Tad nodded his thanks for the beer. “His fans don’t seem to mind.”
“He’s charismatic.”
“He’s always the center of attention, that’s for sure.”
“I can see that.”
“You two?” Tad motioned to Gunnar. He might not have been awake when Gunnar came into the room this morning, but he remembered that Gunnar thanked him for locking him out.
“Having some fun, that’s all.”
Tad cocked an eyebrow at her.
“What? I’m a little bored. Lauren convinced me to come on this cruise. I understood that she’d be at the tournament part of the time. I didn’t know a mopey alpha wolf would take up the rest of it. Gunnar’s decent company.”
“He’s crazy. You must be really bored.”
“He has his talents.”
Tad looked from Michele to Gunnar and back again. There were things about his cousin he didn’t want to know.
“Hey.” Gunnar turned and winked at Michele. He understood they were talking about him even as his hands flailed telling his story. She smirked back. He finished, and the group erupted in laughter. Gunnar hit his stride, and Tad laughed with the crowd. It didn’t matter that he’d heard it before. Gunnar worked construction, but stand-up comedy was his passion.
Michele pointed over his shoulder. Tad didn’t need to turn. The scent of cherry with the comfort of meatloaf that filled the air told him his mate was there. He glanced at the door. Elizabeth’s hands were thrust into the pockets of her lab coat, Oliver Sutton, the famous retired Kunyon ball player, at her side. He’d been the announcer at Duncan’s cage match. All of the males in the bar turned and stared. Not at his mate, but at Sutton. He still didn’t like it, not one bit.