by Camryn Rhys
“Yes, you are, and you’re being about as helpful as a tree stump,” Francis responded. “Aria. Take him to see Carl Rivera, the Vegas alpha. Find out what they know.”
* * *
Francis trusted her to do this. To take Marco. Meet the Vegas alpha. Either that or he realized in his infinite wisdom that she couldn’t let Marco out of her sight.
Probably the latter. Damn alpha bond.
Still, he hadn’t sent Rain with her to babysit, so there was at least that.
Aria stopped the rental car in front of an old singlewide on the outskirts of town and took a deep breath. The Vegas pack kept a low profile, but they were powerful and plentiful in this area. Underestimating them wasn’t on her To Do List.
She didn’t doubt that Marco wasn’t part of their pack, but as separated as these wolves stayed from the city, they knew everything. Just because no one saw them in the city, didn’t mean they weren’t there—watching everything. Vegas was their territory.
All of it.
If anyone knew where he came from, Rivera and his pack would.
“Ready?”
“For what? To get mugged by a bunch of desert thugs?”
Aria snorted out a laugh. “Come on, Marco. We need information and these guys will have it in spades.”
“They don’t look like they even own a computer.”
“They don’t roll in money like other packs, but they do fine. Plus they are one of the largest packs this side of the Great Plains. A rock doesn’t drop in Vegas without Rivera knowing where it fell from.”
“So why wasn’t he at your alpha meeting in town?”
“Rivera isn’t very social,” Aria answered.
“What the hell are we doing here then?”
“You don’t know anything about your mother. Rivera will. If she ever lived here, he’ll know. We need to know where you and Elise came from.”
“Who the fuck is Elise?”
“Another wolf who doesn’t know where she came from.”
“She lives here?”
Aria shook her head. “She was in New Orleans. Coming?” She slammed the door shut and walked to the front of the car and sat on the hood.
“What are you doing?”
She nodded her head toward the front door. A large man wielding a shotgun stepped through the screen door and two other very large men, also holding rifles, came around from the back of the house.
“You’re trespassing,” growled the man at the top of the steps.
“I’m here on behalf of Francis Dubois. I need to speak to Carl Rivera.”
The men’s gazes wandered to Marco, but they didn’t question his presence, which solidified Aria’s assessment that they did indeed know who Marco was and had allowed him to live all this time unbonded.
“Get back in your car and follow us down the road.”
Aria tipped her chin at the guy on the landing before returning to the driver’s seat of the rental. Marco scrambled for the passenger-side door.
The three men jumped into a Jeep parked a few yards away. Gravel pinged the front of the rental car as Aria turned down the bumpy road to follow them.
“They had guns. We are not going to follow these redneck werewolves into the desert. I know I’ve seen that on Criminal Minds.”
“You said you don’t know anything about your parents.” Aria studied Marco from the corner of her eye. His heart rate had increased and his breathing was sporadic. He was lying about something. She just hadn’t figured out what yet. The men with guns weren’t what was bothering him. He’d been this way since she asked about his mom the first time.
Chapter Six
Marco counted the reasons why he should go back to Amare, and they were many. Besides protecting his mother, there was not dying. That was pretty high on the list. Aria not dying was another.
Or losing any of his fingers or toes or other appendages. These dudes represented all the things he hated about the town part of Vegas, and why he never left the strip. They had chips on their shoulders the size of the Eiffel Tower.
Fuckin’ townies. Always out to harsh a buzz.
“Stop that,” Aria growled, jerking the wheel.
Marco looked up at her. All her features were tight, on edge, like she’d just chewed a big roll of tinfoil. “What?” he asked.
“Settle your heart down, for fuck’s sake. I can hear it beating out of your chest.”
He shifted his shoulders. Every part of his skin already felt alive around Aria, but now that feeling was encroaching inside. “I’m not used to all this… I don’t know. Stuff.”
“Well, get used to it fast.” Aria pointed to the string of lights on the horizon. “When we get in there, we’ll probably be surrounded by fifty wolves, or so.”
Marco couldn’t even fathom what that would be like. It had been bad enough meeting the other two wolves back at the strip, and just being in the same building with more.
“Get control,” she said. “Breathe.”
“You keep saying that.” He gripped the oh shit handle on the car door and pushed against the feeling. He knew this feeling all too well.
“That’s because it works.” She put her hand on his stomach, keeping the other on the wheel, and pressed hard. He gulped in air on the uptick.
Her touch alone was enough to skid his heart into a careening pace. But he continued to breathe as she pushed at him.
“If you accept the magick, it’s easier,” she said.
But Marco shook his head. He couldn’t accept something that big, that powerful. The lights were so close, and he could see the big barn they adorned.
“You have to slow your heartbeat, Marco.” She slipped her hand down to rub across the front of his pants. “Do you need me to help you release some tension?”
Her touch set off firecrackers behind his eyes. He shook his head, emphatic. “That won’t help.”
“Turnabout’s fair play.” She squeezed him through the fabric of his jeans and Marco hissed. “There. At least, if you’re not going to let me have any fun, you can breathe and calm down.”
“Nothing you’re doing will help me with either of those.”
“That’s not what you said back at your sex lair.” Aria moved her hand back to the wheel. “What happened to release-your-tension-blah-blah-blah, this-is-what-I-do-blah-blah-blah?”
He tightened his grip on the handle as they drove between two large poles, each with armed guards. “You’re not helping.”
The tension between her eyes increased. “You are freaking out. Have you really not been around other wolves?”
Marco held his breath and nodded, the energy burning inside him. “I really haven’t.”
“Shit.” She halted the car when the Jeep stopped, turning to face him in the seat. “Okay, you have to breathe.”
He nodded. “It feels like—”
“Stop talking.” She touched his face. Such a sentimental gesture from her, and it surprised him. His breath was loud and she breathed with him. “Settle yourself.”
The anchor of her skin on his and her air with his…it helped. He held his eyes closed and breathed.
“Just let the magick wash over you. If you fight it, it will wreck you.”
Marco tried to take in oxygen and think about the energy he was feeling, and keep his attention on her fingertips brushing his cheekbones. But the wolf was so close to the surface.
“I can’t.” His words were so hoarse, he felt like it was the edge of a growl. “I’m going to… I’m gonna…change.”
Aria’s gasp was audible and he tightened his eyes, certain he was going to change. But he could still feel her skin, and her sigh grounded him.
“Is that what you’re worried about?”
“It’s so close.” He stuttered his breath. “It’s right there.”
“Marco, you’re not going to shift unless you want to.” She stroked his cheek. “You’re not gonna shift. Just breathe. It’s just the magick.”
“But…” He couldn�
�t speak. In his mind, all he could see was the girl from all those years ago. He’d been fucking her… He’d felt this, his skin coming apart…and he’d run out of her house, screamed into the night, and shifted.
If he’d been one moment longer. If he’d waited until he came inside her.
Marco opened his eyes to Aria’s icy-blue gaze blinking at him. He washed the memories away and kept breathing. One of the big guys came around the car and Marco grabbed Aria’s hand, pulling it onto the console between them.
“I’ll be fine,” he said. “They’re coming.”
Her eyes continued to blink, as though it took her some time to process the information. He wasn’t sure how the change stuff worked, or the pack stuff or bonds, or any of it. Had she seen the memory? Fuck, he hoped she hadn’t seen that memory.
The way things had been different with Aria, he wasn’t certain of any of it. For all he knew, she could see his thoughts as they happened. It sure had felt, on that table in his room, like he had been able to see hers—knowing what she wanted, deep down, knowing how much she was holding back. He’d always been good at reading body language and facial cues, emotions even, but it was different with Aria. More intense.
Fuck. Even in these stolen moments, he felt like she could take anything from him. Everything. See him. Know him. He couldn’t have that.
The door opened and a dry, earthy smoke smell enveloped him. One of the big dudes stood next to the door as Marco and Aria got out on opposite sides. They exchanged a look over the top—they were basically surrounded.
Six large men with guns walked them through the open doors of the barn, where the smoke smell appeared to have originated. The entire interior was foggy with the stuff, and Marco’s head swam with whatever he was inhaling.
He grabbed for Aria’s hand, all instinct. She didn’t hang on, but she didn’t let go, either.
At the far end of the barn, a group of men sat, encased in the smoke, watching women dance to thumping music. The big guns escorted Marco and Aria all the way to the edge of the group.
A beautiful long-haired, dark-skinned woman whirled in the center of the circle and when she saw the escorts approach, she stopped dancing and spread her arms. The thrumming music stopped immediately. Everyone turned to the man who reclined on a couple of hay bales, his legs wide. The central dancer came to sit beside him and he laid an arm around her waist.
“Who is this?” the woman asked.
One of the guns approached her and whispered between her and the reclining man. She laughed and clapped her hands. Their escorts peeled away and the woman gestured at Marco.
“You, come here.”
Marco exchanged a look with Aria and she released his hand. He walked to the center of the circle where the dancer had been.
“No, your woman, too.” The man’s voice was surprisingly deep, like a big opera singer, and it rang through Marco’s bones.
“She’s not my woman,” Marco argued, but the woman cut him off.
“Yes, she is.” She gestured to Aria. “Come forward, dear.”
“So, you are from Louisiana?” the man asked.
“I am,” Aria said. “He’s not.”
The two of them conferred and the man sank his hand into her hair. She smiled and spoke something in Spanish across the room. The whole group laughed, and it seemed like the smoke thickened.
“Then who are you, my boy?” the woman’s words were long, lazy, like they rolled out of her.
“He’s an unbonded wolf,” Aria said.
The laughter immediately ceased and the man sat forward, his hands suddenly free and his face bright. He nodded at his companion and she stood, clapping her hands and running around the circle. She had cleared all the people from the immediate area in a manner of a minute.
Marco was almost dizzy with the shifting magicks, he didn’t notice the man walking toward them until he was so close, Marco could feel his energy. How did Aria handle this at all times without coming apart? It was disorienting.
“Are you the chef from that rooftop restaurant on the strip?” the man asked. His eyes were dark and they locked on to Marco with quick precision. “With the Italian name?”
Marco almost couldn’t breathe, but Aria took his hand. “He is. My alpha sent me to you when we realized he was unbonded.”
The man looked Marco up and down. “That is good.” He walked around Marco and Aria, and the woman who had been his companion came back into the now-empty circle of hay bales and wooden cartons. “My name is Carl Rivera. This is my pack.”
Marco extended his hand, but Carl did not shake it. He continued to circle and look, like he was deciding whether or not to purchase them at auction.
“And this is Teresa, my mate.” Carl sniffed the air and extended his hand to Teresa. She danced toward him and slid into his side. “So, Miss Louisiana, you have mated an unbonded wolf?”
“I haven’t mated him.” Aria’s reply was quick and insistent.
“But I can smell him on you.” Teresa leaned into Aria from behind her. “And he guards you.” She gestured to Marco.
“He held my hand.” Aria’s shoulders dropped just a hint. “I can protect myself.”
“As a bonded wolf, you should know better than anyone,” Teresa said, silkily. “Guarding your mate isn’t about capacity. We can all protect ourselves.” She slid her hand up Carl’s arm. “He guards you because he does not want to lose you.”
Aria scoffed. “We’re not mated.”
A shiver coursed through Marco’s blood as Teresa and Carl flashed a glance between them. “But you are,” Teresa said. “You just don’t know it yet.”
Carl shook his head. “So this is not why you came here.”
“No,” Aria said. “Francis sent me to ask you what you know about him.”
When she pointed at him, Marco’s veins chilled. He wanted to redirect their attention. The mating conversation had caught him off guard, but the story of his origins would be even worse than trying to pinpoint his feelings for Aria.
“They have some problem with me not having an alpha.” Marco waved at Aria.
Carl nodded. “Yes, they would have a problem with you, and with your mother.”
Aria’s eyebrows rounded sharply. “You know his mother?”
“I do.”
A pain spread across Marco’s chest. “You can’t know about my mother.” He caught himself, trying to recover his wits.
Carl took Teresa by the waist. “It was my wife who first met her, and she told us about you, but as long as you kept to your life and didn’t harm anyone, we didn’t interfere.”
Teresa made a gesture, taking her hand under her chin and flicking it out into the air. “Yes, these packs who think they run the world. They say you cannot be unbonded. We say, you are being safe, so you should be free.”
Aria made an argumentative noise. “How could you just let them run free, unbonded, without telling anyone?”
“They told us,” Carl said. “This is our territory.”
“But you knew we were meeting about an unbonded wolf from New Orleans. Why wouldn’t you tell us?” Aria’s voice trailed off when Teresa sucked in a breath.
“He told you,” she snapped. “This is our territory. We run it how we choose.”
Aria bit her lip and nodded. “I’m not trying to be disrespectful. But unbonded wolves can be a problem.”
“There were circumstances, in this case.” Carl met Marco’s eyes and a touch of sadness flickered there. “She chose to live her life as a human, she married a human, she had human children. She knows the rules about shifting.”
Aria apparently had some trouble digesting this, but Marco couldn’t help the creeping fear. They were skirting dangerously around discussing his mother’s location. He couldn’t allow that.
“You knew about me?” Marco asked, trying to draw Teresa’s attention away from Aria. Once everyone was looking at him, Marco drew out his chest. “Why didn’t you ever try to contact me?”
&nb
sp; “Your mother asked us not to.” Carl shrugged. “We sent our son Tomás to check on you occasionally.”
Marco tried to remember the features of the wolf he’d happened across in the lobby of the Cosmopolitan, years ago. He couldn’t be certain if the wolf had been like Carl and Teresa, but it explained why, every once in a while, in one casino or another, or at some party, Marco would feel someone watching him.
Teresa leaned into Marco. “Your mother said you knew the way of the wolf, that you would never leave our territory, and that you would always be under our protection, if there was a problem.”
Carl pinned him with a hard gaze. “And there’s never been a problem.”
“I am careful,” Marco offered. But Aria jumped in front of him.
“So you know who his mother is and where we can find her?”
Carl nodded, pulling Teresa around him, like a pair of dancers. He curled his body around hers and they walked back to their seats. “It is no matter of ours. Just like your summit. Here, among our pack, we know where to put our noses.”
Aria straightened her back. “Well, we’ve never seen an unbonded wolf before, and now, to find two… We’d just like to ask her some questions.”
Marco held up his hand, about to protest. If he asked Aria not to go see his mother, she would get suspicious and likely insist on going to find her. He typically admired tenacity, but when it threatened to expose his deepest secret, he would rather have her a bit more malleable.
But it was Teresa, and not Aria, who watched Marco’s response, and he could feel her eyes on him. He swiped his tongue across his lips.
Carl had his hand in Teresa’s hair again, running it down her back. “We can tell you the area of town where she lives, but she asked us not to find her. I think she doesn’t want her children knowing us.”
“They are human after all,” Teresa added, but kept her eyes on Marco.
His skin was starting to crawl.
“Fine.” Aria sighed. “I can find her, with or without your help.”
“I will find her,” Marco offered, trying to breathe to keep his heartbeat normalized. “If you tell me where she is, I will find her.”