by RJ Blain
“I would have made better arrangements had I known.”
I had to give the old woman credit. She was really good at the dual good guy and bad guy act. I hadn’t lived as long as I had without being able to play the same game. A werewolf like me played well, or died. That was how things had been and would always be. I matched her smile with one of my own. “Mark couldn’t have known.”
“You’re right. He couldn’t have known. Why, he’s probably tearing apart the hotel looking for clues right now.” There was an unfriendly edge to Mrs. Livingston’s smile. “You’re beneath him. If you weren’t, he’d be here with you instead of trying to win on his own. He’s playing you, girl. You’ll never be fit to become his bride.”
I met her eyes without changing my expression a bit. She recoiled as though I’d struck her. I wondered how I would’ve reacted if I had really been Mark’s girlfriend, having learned of his betrothed. Unhappy, I decided, was at the top of the list. I had plenty of reasons to frown, but rich women hid their displeasure behind venomous grins.
“Mrs. Living—”
“What are you filling my girlfriend’s ears with, Mother?” Mark called out from across the lobby.
I kept smiling, but like Mrs. Livingston, I let it turn sour.
Mark froze in midstride.
“Allison?”
Two could play hardball, and I wasn’t about to lose everything to the Wicked Witch of the West. It was like I’d been thrust into some real-life romance novel, complete with every cliché I could think of. In our little game of cats, mice, fake fiancées, and evil step mothers, the existence of Mark’s betrothed wasn’t a secret, not anymore. It was, however, a part of the game women played in high society. To fulfill my favor to Mark, I had to play by the rules of a game started hundreds of years ago in royal courts across the world. “Your charming mother was just about to tell me about your fiancée.”
Horror paled Mark’s face. He stared at his mother before turning to me, mouth partially open.
I’d seen deer trapped in the glow of headlights look more responsive. Instead of rising from the chair, I sat straighter, hands clasped on my lap. I wasn’t going to burn bridges.
Pulverization was more up my alley. It’d hurt both of us less that way, in the long term. “Weren’t you, Mrs. Livingston?”
The Wicked Witch of the West stared at me with her lips pressed together in a thin line. “Indeed.”
Smiling was starting to make my jaw ache, but I didn’t relent. “What’s her name?”
“Victoria,” Mark choked out, as though her name was forced from his throat. He coughed and ducked his head until the plumes of his costume hid his face. “Her name is Victoria.”
That caught me by surprise. Well, well, well. It seemed Mark’s fiancée and I had something in common, although Mark didn’t know my real name was Victoria. I let my smile falter. “When were you planning on telling me?” I snapped.
Mrs. Livingston’s eyes focused on me before she turned to Mark. “That is something I want to know too, Son.”
“I didn’t want you to find out this way, Allison. I… I had planned to… I mean…” He fell silent, staring down at me with wide eyes.
“Is that all I am to you?” I let my words serve as both hammer and nails to the coffin of a relationship doomed to failure from the start. If Mark hadn’t anticipated such a dispute, it was his fault for being blind. I did feel a little guilt as I pressed on. “Am I just some toy you can discard when your fiancée comes calling?”
“She is not my fiancée!” Mark snapped, shaking his head so hard several of his feathers came out. “I never agreed to marry her.” He sank down at my feet, resting his hands on my knees. “You have to believe me, Allison. I’d never betray you. Not for all of the money in this world. Not for any reason. You’re the one I want to marry, not her. I’ve never even met her.”
The Wicked Witch of the West sucked in a breath. “Marcus Alexander—”
Mark interrupted his mother with a jerk of his hand. Then he turned back to, taking hold of my left hand. “Allison Malinda Ferdinan, please marry me.”
I don’t know where he had pulled the ring out from, but he held it up to me with a trembling hand. A single diamond caught the candlelight.
It twinkled.
My eyes burned, but I didn’t cry. One day, he’d stare at the true love of his life with wet eyes, and the girl in front of him wouldn’t be me. But, I had promised to play his game. There was nothing but the truth in his gaze.
Had he been serious about proposing all along? It’d be like him, creating an illusion so the truth of his sincerity could become something truly powerful.
Any other girl would’ve been flattered. Too bad I wasn’t her.
I wondered how much it would hurt him when, as had happened tens of times before, I vanished to become someone new, someone he’d never see again. Would it hurt him as much as it would me?
Time wasn’t kind to werewolves. It didn’t let us forget.
Not trusting my voice, I sat perfectly still. The dip of my chin was as close to a nod as he’d get, although it wasn’t the yes he hoped for. Mark smiled as he slipped the band over my gloved finger.
The cold, tiring touch of silver seeped through the thin material. I stared at the ring and shivered. It wasn’t just a piece of jewelry, but it was old. Old silver, forged and reforged again, carrying with it an age almost as great as mine.
It hurt, but the white material didn’t blacken. It was pain I embraced, because I deserved it for the betrayal I would soon commit.
A clock counted the midnight hour.
I really was Cinderella, but I didn’t have glass slippers, and there’d be no happy ending for us.
~*~
No one said a word, and the silence was suffocating. I alternated between holding my breath and pretending I wasn’t trying to gasp for air. Sneezing and sniffling weren’t options, not when I was pretty certain any sudden noise or motion would set the mother or son off.
I was trapped in a Mexican standoff, and my so-called fiancée and his mother were about to start firing bullets at each other. I was glad looks couldn’t kill, because I’d be a charred corpse otherwise. I understood why Mrs. Livingston wanted to burn me alive. As for Mark, I could make a few guesses, all of which involved my attempt to circumvent his grand plan to escape his mother’s plan for his married life.
A zombie shuffled to Mark, leaning over to whisper something in his ear. Mark rose to his feet with a deep frown. “I’ll deal with it.” He tried to smile at me, but it didn’t last long. “Allison, I’m sorry. I’m needed.” Mark kissed the Wicked Witch of the West on the cheek before leaving me alone with her.
I focused my gaze on Mark’s extravagant, feathered costume in the effort to forget about the ring on my finger. It didn’t exactly burn me, but it hurt all the same. Little jolting stabs ran from my fingers to my neck. It wouldn’t leave a mark—the silver wasn’t old enough for that— but I was more than ready to call the engagement off to get the damned thing as far from me as possible.
Over time, it’d probably poison me. I shivered.
“He loves you, doesn’t he?”
I was really, really tempted to chase after Mark and kill him. His one little favor was blowing up in my face. How was I supposed to answer her question? Worse, she was right, and it had happened without me knowing it.
I wasn’t allowed to love anyone. In the best-case situation, I’d kill him when I failed to resist the change. In the worst case, I’d make him become just like me.
Cursed. Violent. Bestial.
Love didn’t survive that sort of change. It was the golden rule of werewolves. Picking a human mate ended in tragedy.
But that was the reason for the jewel-encrusted mask I wore, to prevent the black werewolf from being able to take me for a mate and convert me into a werewolf. But Mrs. Livingston didn’t know I knew that. She also didn’t know I had reasons to want the wolf for myself, if only to set him free. To play m
y part, I had to pretend I wanted the wolf. Mrs. Livingston could understand greed as a motive. It was my last defense, and I wielded it like a sword. “You’re the Keeper of Secrets, aren’t you?”
Mrs. Livingston stared at me. One of her eyebrows hiked up to her hairline. “Why would you say that?”
Distraction successful. I twisted the ring on my finger. It didn’t help ease my reaction to the metal. Once again, the diamond winked at me, taunting me with its fiery beauty.
“That ring belonged to his birth mother,” Mrs. Livingston said, sinking down onto a nearby armchair. “It’s all he has left of her.”
Why the hell would Mark give me his dead mother’s ring? I don’t know how I managed not to flinch. This should have been an arranged trick to help him escape a marriage he didn’t want. A marriage he hadn’t quite confirmed existed, for that matter. It had been a lucky guess on my part, and painfully correct.
I was at least a hundred and fifty years too old for him. In the best-case scenario, I’d get him killed before he realized he’d fallen in love with something right out of a horror movie.
“It’s beautiful,” I said. It was the truth, too. The stone glittered with a purity I’d never match, and the silver shone with the luster of the moon on a clear night.
“Why do you think I’m the Keeper of Secrets?”
The corners of my mouth twitched upwards. “Why ask me to win the wolf if you could earn it yourself? You said you’d helped organize it. Who else?” Shrugging my shoulders was a bit much, but I didn’t really care if she thought of me as flippant or arrogant. I didn’t have to be nice to the woman. I was expected to be polite. I could handle polite, although I would’ve rather been anywhere else on Earth other than in her company, but I wasn’t brave enough to say it. The woman was an Inquisitor, and I didn’t need to give her any more reasons to look closer at me. They had ways of exposing wolves.
I’d gotten more than a little lucky avoiding exposure with the ring on my finger. If I had been any other wolf, any younger of a wolf, I would’ve already joined my brother in his cage.
“Clever. What proof do you have?”
Smiling made my jaw ache. “Absolutely none. Isn’t leaving proof around bad form?” I let my smile fade into a faint frown, averting my eyes to scan the lobby. “Where do you think Mark went?”
“My son’s a busy man.”
I sniffled before faking a yawn. “Oh, I’m sorry. I was at the airport at five this morning. I’m afraid Mark hadn’t told me this was an all-night affair.”
Mrs. Livingston stared at me, her eyes narrowed, but she nodded in acknowledgment of my comment. The explosion I expected from her didn’t come. It was easy waiting with the patience of someone too tired to really care, ideal for the role of a weary newly-engaged.
I blamed the silver ring.
“I’ll never accept you,” the old witch whispered. There was a hard edge to her tone, but there was a quiver to her words that cracked her stern visage.
I might not have liked her, or the Inquisitors she had allied herself with, but I could respect a woman’s love for a child. It was a little like a pack, though there was no way I was ever going to admit that to the overly-wealthy woman.
This time, my smile was the real thing. “And I always preferred honesty. Mrs. Livingston, before you try to, you can’t buy me off. I told you once, and I’ll tell you again. I don’t need Mark’s money.”
Anger flickered in the old woman’s eyes, but the Wicked Witch of the West said nothing.
“I’ve enough money of my own, and I earned it all.” I held up my throbbing left hand. “Do you know what this is?”
Mrs. Livingston’s eyes focused on the diamond. Once again, she waited in silence. When I didn’t speak, she pointed a crooked finger at the ring. “What is it, then?”
“A message to you. Mark isn’t someone you can just pawn off as you see fit. Let him choose, or he will choose someone you can’t stand—like me.” I twisted the ring on my finger. “If you don’t want me to marry your son, I’ll consider it. Maybe.”
With the speed of a striking snake, she gripped my wrist. “What do you want?”
“Some things don’t deserve to be caged, Mrs. Livingston. Others should, but aren’t. If you’re a woman of honor, you’ll release the wolf back to the wild where it belongs. Swear on it. Swear on everything you hold dear. Swear on all of your power as a woman. If your arrangement for Mark is so important to you, you will take that black wolf and set him free into the wild tonight before the sun rises. Swear on it! You will provide proof, sent through Mark, that you have done as I demand. Then, and only then, will I consider breaking off the engagement.”
Mrs. Livingston flinched, but she didn’t reply. Leaning towards her, I forced our eyes to meet again.
“Swear on your power, your wealth, and your son that you will free the wolf into the wild.”
“I swear,” she whispered.
“Swear properly,” I snapped. While forcing the oath revealed I knew at least something of the nature of witches, I wasn’t about to leave without her sworn word. It was the only way I could ensure she would do as promised.
The Wicked Witch of the West trembled, although I couldn’t tell if it was from fear or anger. “I swear on my power, my wealth, and my son that I will set the wolf free, unhurt, before dawn, providing proof to my son to deliver to you that I have done so.”
A normal human wouldn’t have been able to feel the pulse of power as the witch committed to the oath. If she broke her word, the Wicked Witch of the West would no longer be a witch. With a little luck, she would never suspect I had purposefully goaded her into an unbreakable geas. Ignoring the momentary sensation, I rose, grabbed my purse, turned, and headed for the hotel’s main doors. One of the doormen moved to intercept me.
Our eyes met.
I don’t know what he saw in my expression, but he backpedaled and opened the door for me in a hurry. I stepped out into the cold night, pulling out my cell as I crossed the street to the fountain.
Samantha answered on the second ring.
“Samantha, pick me up at Central Park near the Plaza.” I hung up without giving my friend and partner-in-crime a chance to respond. Ignoring the surge of guilt at using Mark for my own means, I stowed the silver engagement ring in my purse.
I hid among the revelers on the street. It took Samantha an hour to find me on the paths leading to the pond.
I was almost disappointed that no one bothered me. I guess even the things that went bump in the night on All Hallow’s Eve feared an angry Cinderella.
Chapter Five
“Allison, talk. What in hell is going on?”
For a little after one in the morning, traffic was heavy. We were traveling at an impressive pace of three blocks an hour. I kicked off my heels and stretched my legs. “Cinderella doesn’t like the evil stepmother.”
“Well, that’s a given. You look like hell.”
“Thanks. They had a dog at the party.”
Samantha glanced at me out of the corner of her eye, arching a brow in an eloquent fashion I didn’t have a prayer of matching. “A dog? You look like someone jabbed hot pokers in your eyes. What’s with the mask, anyway?”
Shit. I had forgotten to give the damned thing back before I had stormed out of the Plaza. “I might be in trouble, Sammy.” However much I didn’t want to admit it, I needed to give my friend a chance to back out. Being with me was about to go to a whole new level of dangerous.
The SUV made it a quarter of a block before traffic ground back to a halt. I busied myself with untying the mask.
Samantha made a displeased noise in her throat. “Well? What sort of trouble?”
If I lost control without the bejeweled mask, Samantha could subdue me. At least, I hoped she could. I didn’t want to think about what would happen if she couldn’t. The headlines, at least, would be spectacular.
“Inquisitor trouble. They executed a witch and disguised it as a murder mystery.” I peeled t
he mask off my face. Even in the darkness, it was a pretty thing, glittering in the faintest of light. I suspected it was worth at least as much as my necklace. I fished the business card out of my purse. “Put your hazards on.”
Samantha obeyed, laughing a little at my request. “Seriously? This is New York, Allison. No one is going to care. You folks are just too polite in Atlanta.”
Before I could regret my decision, I got out of the SUV and tossed the mask and card into the nearest trash can. I jumped back into the vehicle and slammed the door. I settled down, buckled up, and let my breath out in an explosive sigh. “Hell of a night.”
“How do you know the witch was executed?” There was the faintest quiver in Samantha’s voice. If we hadn’t been together for fifty-odd years, I probably wouldn’t have noticed it. I didn’t blame her.
The Inquisition scared us both, and Samantha had as much to lose as I did.
Lying wouldn’t work. It never did with her, so I gave it to her straight. “I used my nose. Death’s got a scent, Sammy. If it weren’t for whatever witchery was on that mask, they would’ve had two werewolves in their clutches instead of one.”
“They had a werewolf? I think you better tell me everything from the top.”
I did.
It took us another hour to go four blocks. At the rate we were going, Mark would’ve been able to catch up to the SUV on foot. Samantha refused to look at me the entire time. Maybe I deserved the punishment of her silence, but it didn’t stop me from squirming.
“You’re right. You’re in a lot of trouble,” she said. Then she sighed, letting out a strained laugh. “Can’t you go to one little party without getting into trouble? Mark must be furious. And you kept the ring?”
I flinched. “It’s made of old silver, Sammy, and it was his mother’s. I wasn’t going to spite him like that. I’ll find some way to give it back to him.”
“Oh. Sorry. So, what’s the plan?”