The Accords Triptych (Book 3): Heartlines

by Ian Thomas

  The memory flashed into James’ mind. He’d been a wolf less than a year when Will – in one of his blinding rages – sliced him open from neck to navel, pulled his insides out, and left him there. In order to heal properly James’d had to put himself back together. He’d blacked out twice from the pain.

  “You signed up to Grey’s cause back then,” Ben challenged. “Wolf dominance and all that. Well, that’s what I was doing here. Matteo’d lost sight of us. I wanted to remind him of that. How does that make me a traitor?”

  “He’s the bleedin’ Pack Lord,” Will replied.

  “And doesn’t that leave a sour taste in your mouth?” Ben asked.

  “Coulda been worse.”

  “Who? Dominic? He would’ve never accepted the role, nor gotten the support. ‘Sides he died. You were part of that, weren’t you?”

  To James, the Pack War had been a blur. He’d been a wolf only a few months when it broke out. Struggling with the wolf nature overriding his own, he was still disentangling himself from his old life and setting up shop in London. The full moon became irrelevant given what Blackthorne had let the vampire and the mage do to him. For almost a full month he’d been locked in his wolf form, thrown into conflict after conflict.

  Only afterwards had he understood the extent of the war. To himself and to their kind.

  Seeing the accords as both a brilliant tactical move and an act of common sense, James marveled at the mind behind them. Which led him to McLachlan. However, Blackthorne had other ideas for him. Follow McLachlan’s brother. Cosy up. Keep tabs. Little did James know that in finding Dylan he’d found a new pack. A new family. One that brought out the best in him.

  “Dom’nic was weak. He was too human to be a wolf. Too soft.”

  “Not you though,” Ben continued. “You were a wolf before you got sired, that right?”

  “Fuck, you talk a lot,” Will said, a nerve being touched. One James had long suspected pulsed too close to the surface for Will. If Ben wasn’t lucky Will would kill him, regardless of Blackthorne’s orders. Hierarchy was a tenuous concept in their pack, enforced but not respected.

  “So how’s this gonna work now that Colton’s alive?”

  “What you like? Sitting there, talking shit. Do you fink this is gonna work? Fink we’re gonna go any easier on you spoutin’ shit like this? You are right mental.”

  “You didn’t know? That’s where I was going when you took me. To warn Matteo. Colton’s alive and he’s coming for all of us.”

  Despite his brave front, there was actual fear in Ben’s voice.

  “He’s gonna wipe the slate clean and start over. You think he’s gonna go easy on the wolves who switched teams in the war? You, Blackthorne, your whole pack – probably first on his list.”

  “Feck off,” Will spat, faltering.

  “But you’re not so sure now, are you?”

  “Why Dylan?” James asked. Will was too stupid to see what Ben was doing. The man was smart. An asshole who tried to kill his best friend, but smart nonetheless.

  “Because I’m a fuck up.” Horrified, James saw that Ben was accepting the physical torture. Hell, he wanted it. In some twisted way the suffering paled in comparison to the shame he heaped on himself for betraying Matteo. Then what was the point of continuing, James thought, eager to stop. Nothing they could do would hurt worse than what Ben had already done to himself. His own life, his pack, his friends.

  Unsure what harm he could do but aware Will was watching, James reached for the corkscrew.

  VI

  Rowan had nothing left to give. Not tears. Not words. Not…no, the tank was empty.

  She was numb.

  But just when she thought she’d leveled out she saw Michael’s face unbidden, and the grief rose again. Smothering. Choking. Not that anything in the British hospital should have sparked her memory. Amid the institutional green walls, sterility, and numerous cups of tea she’d hoped she was safe. Protected from uninvited memories. But Dylan’s shape in the bed reminded her of their last morning. She half-expected him to roll over and it would be Michael.

  First Daniel, now Michael.

  Who else would she lose? How much more heartache could she take? They were selfish questions. Of course they were. But wasn’t this a time she could finally be selfish? Just this one damn time? She served, she suffered, she sacrificed, and yet despite all that, in the end, she was always alone. And broken.

  So very broken.

  Or she had been. Five years of emptiness, five years of brave-facing life, five years of putting everyone else before herself. And though eventually she'd put herself back together after Daniel's death, she hadn't expected to do the same again. And not so soon. At the cost of another five years.

  Perhaps she was too exhausted.

  But Michael wasn’t Daniel. He’d been a distraction. A reward for rebuilding herself over five years. Catching herself she felt horrible being dismissive of Michael. True, he hadn’t been Daniel. No one ever would. But Michael…he’d been different. And in that difference, something had blossomed between them. Was it love? Maybe, she thought. Maybe? But she didn’t know. Couldn’t know. Well, not now.

  Besides she had so many obligations, so many people relied on her, so much pain to ease. Who had the time to fixate on the complexities of friends with benefits and lovelorn amateur dramatics with the world so out of balance? With so many wrongs to right! Amid all of that he had been good for her. A shelter from the storm, a distraction from the madness. But he could never be her focus, not while there was so much still to set to rights.

  Had she just thought of Michael as a distraction? An amusement? He was dead and she had trivialized her feelings and his. Who was the monster now?

  Colton.

  The first and worst monster. He’d taken Daniel. And he’d taken Michael. He’d take more if he wasn’t stopped. McLachlan? Matteo?

  It shouldn’t have been Michael, she raged. It should have been the…

  Rowan sat back in the hospital chair, startled by the thought.

  No.

  Losing them would end her. They were her constants. Her familiars. Her family. If they were gone, she’d be ended as well.

  But they didn’t come more innocent or bystander than Michael. He was the gentlest of all the wolves. A Zen-like calm that had quelled the savage beast. He’d never defined himself as wolf or outsider the way Matteo or McLachlan did.

  Wearing the title of Pack Lord easier than he wore the term werewolf, Matteo belonged to the supernatural realm. Far more than Michael ever did. Where Matteo needed them as much as they needed him providing balance, Michael had balance within himself. His Zen rarely affected others. God knows they needed it, but that balance was his own.

  As for McLachlan. Of all the supernaturals she’d known, he was the one most out of place and yet most at home. An affinity he shared with Michael. Thrust into a world through pain and violence, McLachlan brought a light that had pushed against the dark when most reveled in it. He offered balance. Mostly sarcasm, but balance too.

  Michael had been the same. Maybe not the pushing part, but he’d been so bright, so good.

  With him gone the night seemed colder and more threatening.

  Colton would come after them. Matteo. McLachlan. Her. Bodies would litter their failure as it had before.

  Well not anymore.

  They would stop Colton. They had to. She had to.

  “I’m sorry,” Dylan said, sitting in the chair next to her. He had almost fully recovered but was moving stiffly.

  “Don’t.”

  “I meant for you being stuck with me. I’m hardly the consoling type.”

  Rowan half-smiled.

  “Maybe, but you’re the best thing next to having Mac here.”

  “If you want, my folks can adopt you. They do that you know. Kind of a habit. I may not even be theirs.”

  Now she laughed. Without so much as a word, Frank and Connie had become her parents after the phone call with Hayley.
A well-intentioned, knowing-the-best-for-her fussing that she needed but could never have asked for as a grown woman. Through them she better understood McLachlan’s light. And even Dylan’s.

  “Not true.”

  “I’ve subpoenaed birth records but they’re such hold-outs.”

  “I’m gonna head home,” she said abruptly. “I’m…this place – I need to go.”

  “No fight from me.”

  “Thanks but I’m taking your mom with me.”

  “They travel better as a matching set.”

  “Think you need someone on your side here.”

  “Freddie’s on my side.”

  “And all things considered, I wish I had someone like him in my corner. Like them. Annie’s lovely. But they don’t know the full picture. Frank does. You need him here to push back.”

  “You gonna be okay?”

  “No but I’ll deal.”

  “All we can ask.”

  Colton wouldn’t take anyone else from her. Good, bad. Light, dark. Alive, dead. Rowan needed to restore balance or…

  Well, that was a scale too dreadful to comprehend.

  VII

  He was losing himself.

  Standing at the vanity and looking at his reflection, Somerset grieved. This wasn’t him. He’d never been so full of piss and vinegar even when this had been his true visage.

  Clear-headed for the first time in hours, he needed to act.

  Charging back into the room he searched for a phone. There had to be one here somewhere. To her generation, they’d achieved limb status. Not the point. Think. Find. What was the chapter house’s number? Area code 5-1-8. What else? What came next? 5-1-8 8-9. 8-9. 8-9 what?

  He needed to remember. He needed to tell them.

  Henry was Colton. That much he was certain of, no proof just pure supposition. Hardly a coincidence his ring goes missing then Colton finds him in the morning. Oh god. Mills! Had he killed him? The night was a void. Occasionally he had snatches of fetid memory, the taste of blood, the feel of tearing flesh in his mouth, body strong and powerful. But nothing of the young investigator.

  Then he remembered the cold. Searing, blinding, frozen. Had to be a siren he thought, unable to find a memory in his head.

  He needed to find his ring. Colton wouldn’t make it easy for him. Obviously, he wanted something in return. Would he stay lucid long enough to get the ring back, he worried. Already he felt his mind degrading. The musky smell of his own body. The blonde honey naked in the bed. The potency of his youth and hunger.

  Somerset wanted to change.

  Succumb.

  Be reborn, remade, unleashed.

  He’d been old too long. Alone too long.

  But this girl wasn’t his wife. Irene had died a while back now. This girl was his granddaughter’s age. Or close to it. She was nothing he ever wanted, yet seeing the curve of her body in the sheets, he grew hard.

  Even the coldness of her skin didn’t dissuade him.

  Nor had he been put off when his claws erupted during sex and he cut her. Feeling the wolf rise had been incredible. Such power. Good thing she was a vampire, he thought with a smirk, his hand sliding between her legs. A regular woman couldn’t take that level of punishment or pleasure.

  He wasn’t the old man any longer. He was this now. Young, hungry, powerful.

  When she didn’t respond to his touch, he looked for some clothing. A scent caught his nostrils. Coppery, wet, fresh. Realizing he didn’t have any clothes, he exited the room. Catching sight of himself in the hallway mirror, Somerset knew he was all but lost.

  Did he mind? He’d been old, staid, tied to the Clan look their dog. But he was a wolf again. Strong and free. His own man.

  Or was he? The last vestiges of Somerset the Scholar desperately clung to him. What about the fracture? Startled, Somerset the Younger realized there was a massive crack in the mirror from floor to ceiling. Hadn’t been there earlier. Cleaving the glass, it corrupted his reflection. Two men. Halves a whole. And he remembered…why he’d rejected the wolf. This other side of him craved the beast, the violence, the blood. His ring had suppressed both. Locked them away, given him a normal life.

  “I’m in charge now,” the younger spat at the fracture. “You’re done old man.”

  Taking a step, his reflection was whole, the corruption gone, and his mind clear.

  Another scent hit him, layered under the fresh meat. Fury. The pheromone stung his nose, toxic and rancorous, hiding beneath the raw fare. Enmity had cracked the mirror; the world should be so lucky for it stop there.

  Feeling whole, he took a deep breath. Meat. Fresh. Raw. But layered under the fresh meat was another scent. Fury. Rage. The pheromone stung his nose, toxic and rancorous, hidden beneath the raw fare. This enmity had cracked the mirror, the world should be so lucky for it stop there.

  “Feel better?”

  “Some,” he said, entering the kitchen. Colton sat on the other side of an island block, between them was a platter piled with raw meat.

  “Hungry?”

  “Always.” Together, they started to eat. Colton seemed to prefer the smaller cubed pieces while Somerset went straight for the bone, his canines extending as he gnawed the flesh. “Colton, right?”

  “The one and only.”

  “You died.”

  “Not very well apparently.”

  “And you did this?” Somerset gestured to himself. “Stole the ring, freed the beast?”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “For what purpose? How you think this is gonna play out? I’m the head of Clan Delphae for the East Coast after all.”

  “Not looking like that you’re not.”

  “I’d wear clothes,” Somerset replied with a hungry smile. “But really what’s your endgame here?”

  “Chaos. Mayhem. Bloodshed. And just the whiff of patricide.”

  “You wanna break the accords.”

  “Oh, I’ll do more than that.” Barely containing his rage, Somerset felt power emanating from the man. Did this have to do with what the young woman said earlier? A bomb not going off? A wolf? Not him, Somerset realized.

  “Where do I fit in?”

  “So many questions.”

  “Do you blame me?” Somerset demanded, as a shadow of the wolf changed his features. “Yesterday I was some learned eighty-year old all quiet and repressed, then you draw this out of me on the full moon. The Colton I knew of never did anything by accident. Calculated, that was the word that came up most often.”

  “Why thank you, I have missed hearing about myself. Anonymity is quite dull you know. Well actually you would know, wouldn’t you?” He stepped back and leaned against the rear counter, anger quelled as his ego took over. “In time. Give you a chance to get a little more feral. Then we’ll play.”

  “Then they’ll bleed?”

  “Very much so,” Colton smiled, folding his arms.

  _ _ _

  Holly lay in the dark, thinking.

  Did she really need Henry when she had Somerset? He was younger, hotter, and he could gold medal if fucking were an Olympic sport.

  If she’d known wolves were so good in bed she’d have straightened that Jason kid out a while back. The few times her and Henry had screwed were good. Better than the fumbling frat boys and cross-fitters she’d had in the past but…restrained. He didn’t connect with her, not emotionally. Not that she expected love or flowers or platitudes ala Taylor Swift. Henry wasn’t that guy. But maybe…something.

  Somerset was different. Still no connection but there was an energy, a rawness, an…anger she liked. Henry didn’t have that. Sex was functional. Like eating or killing. Any pleasure he drew from it was guarded and his alone.

  With Somerset, sex had a pleasurable violence. Which made the decision a no-brainer. Somerset was her pick. Sure, she had to get past the fact that yesterday he’d been an eighty-year-old wrinkle. But she could make him forget that easily enough. And Holly did like the taste of wolf-blood.

  B
ut did he have any money? Would he be able to collect his social security when he looked like a jacked up gangsta she worried. And really, she was accustomed to living better than they would on social security.

  Henry had money. That much was obvious. She just didn’t have access to it. He bought her things, lavished her with gifts, jewels and clothes, but never let her have any money herself.

  But then this was very human thinking. The same kind of thinking she’d done six months ago when she was mortal. Find a hot, rich guy who could fuck. As life goals went it suited her perfectly. Holly didn’t need love. Would love get her past VIP ropes with Kanye? A million followers on Instagram? Jimmy Choos? No, it wouldn’t.

  While she’d been feeding off hot, rich, bangable guys for the past few months, what had they done for her? Very little. The hot was nice. She did like the cut abs and arms. A broad, rippled back was a joy to behold. Raiding their wallets had proven worthwhile but they didn’t exactly carry houses in the Hamptons around with them, now did they. As for the sex…well, sad to say but her current rankings were Somerset and then the coffee guy. Malik? Melvin? No, wait, Malcolm.

  Her coercion was the only thing she needed really. Malik – Malcolm, had proven that.

  Wow, she thought, could she be some sugar mama? Coerce her way into Park Avenue, Eleven Madison, Fendi, and just surround herself with beautiful young men to service her every whim. Now that was a plan, she mused. Then she wouldn’t need Henry or Somerset.

  Well, not Henry. She had a choice after all.

  VIII

  Too wired to sleep, Mouth looked around the chaos of his dorm room for something to do.

  Which wasn’t hard given the previous night and the chaos that had taken place.

  As procrastination went, he was spoiled for choice.

  Did he start with Jason’s bed? Stripped and piled high with bloody bedding. That would make for some interesting conversation in the laundry room. That would wait. Until much later. Like after midnight.

  So what else? By the radiator were the remnants of Jason’s sweat pants and the belts Mouth had used to restrain him. There was a certain grimness to that part of the room. Very rape dungeony. But easier to tidy. Mental note, time to buy new belts.