Lord. Like a dog with a bone.
“There’s nothing else you want? Nothing else that would make you happy?” And, Lord willing, content.
“I’ve tried the career thing. You know, moving up the Department’s ladder but…eh. Money can only do so much, although it’s always nice having it.”
“What about a man?”
“The answer to all women’s questions?”
He grinned. “For some.”
“Tried marriage and that was extremely unfulfilling.”
Tully felt his body go tight. “You were married?”
“You didn’t know?”
“No.”
“Yeah. Seven years of my life I’ll never get back.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“It must have been something. Unless you’re still married.”
“Oh, no, no, no,” she said quickly. “So not still married.”
“Then what was it.”
“Like I said. Nothing. That was the problem. When we’d argue, I felt nothing. When he yelled at me over something ridiculous, I felt nothing. When he threatened to out me to the Department as a witch and a kook, still nothing. And when I found him fucking a pseudo-friend of mine in my bed…more than nothing. In fact, I felt bad for him, because God knew he was doing it all for me. And I felt nothing.”
“You never loved him.”
“No,” she said with a shake of her head. “I really never did.”
“So why—”
“I went through this really weird phase where I wanted to be normal. Marriage is considered normal. My parents were happy. The people I pretended were my friends were happy. I was happy. Everyone was happy…but my coven. They were not happy.”
“They knew it was wrong for you.”
“Yeah. They did. And tried to tell me. Guess I should have listened.”
Although curious why anyone would be with someone they didn’t care about for seven long years, Tully decided to stick with their current topic of conversation.
“So, you get all that power,” he said. “You scoop it up like my momma’s key lime pie at the church social. Then what? What are you going to do with all that power once you have it?”
“Use it.”
“To do what? Destroy the world? Become the almighty empress of the universe?”
“No,” she said with an easy roll of her shoulders that told him she wasn’t lying. “Don’t want any of that.”
“Well, that’s the thing about power, beautiful. Once you have it, you’ve gotta do something with it.”
She smiled, showing all those perfectly aligned, “my daddy is an orthodontist” teeth. “And I’m sure I will.”
Jamie had no idea when she fell asleep, but she knew when Tully took her to bed. He easily lifted her off the couch and walked through the dark house to the back bedroom. He pulled off the quilt before covering her up with the sheet and comforter.
“You’re leaving?” she heard herself ask.
“In a bit.”
“Okay.” She rolled over to her other side and tucked her hands under her cheek. Lips brushed against her forehead and then he was gone. He didn’t make a sound, but she still knew he’d left the room and then the house from the amazing energy that went with him.
And with his energy gone, theirs returned. She could hear them scratching at the walls, the doors, the windows, trying to get in. Always trying to get in. It had been getting worse every night. At first, a simple spell could send them away, but now she had to use more than that. Even worse, it was getting to the point where she had to manage it constantly. One simple spell no longer covered her from moon to moon, or even day to day. Of course, they did have help, didn’t they? They had the one who’d sent them.
She grabbed another pillow and put it over her head in the hopes of blocking out the sounds while Rico settled on her headboard, watching over her for the night.
Yet there was only so much her familiar could do. Once they broke through the barriers she’d created, Jamie doubted anyone would be able to protect her.
Chapter Five
Jamie was mid-yawn when she heard the knock on her office door. Once Tully had left, she’d gotten no sleep and had spent the rest of the night watching bad television until dawn when she had to get to work and whip out some pastries for a Daughters of the Confederate Bears meeting. Even worse, her cousin had been an annoying heifer since she’d rolled into work later that morning. If Jamie didn’t know better, she’d swear Mac was trying to pick a fight with her. Or maybe she was just being her usual nosey self. Whatever her damage was, Jamie had avoided her cousin by hiding in her office.
Hoping her cousin wasn’t back to push her, Jamie wiped her tired eyes and said, “Come in.”
Emma stuck her head in. “Hey.”
“Hey. What’s up?” When Emma hesitated Jamie motioned her in. “What’s going on?”
Emma closed the door and sat down in the leather office chair across from her. “I was going to ask you that.”
“Nothing.”
“Jamie.” Emma gave an exasperated laugh. “Look at you.”
“Hey. I was spitting up fire last night. I deserve to look this tired.”
“You don’t think we feel it? Every night? Them coming for you? And I’m not talking about what you’re doing to become Morrighan’s champion.”
Jamie relaxed back in her chair. Of course her coven felt it. Soon they might be able to hear it too. The demands for entry getting louder, more angry, more desperate. “Let it go, Em.”
“Let us help you.”
“There’s nothing to help.”
“You’re lying!”
Emma winced at the voice coming through the door. “Would you let me handle this?”
Mac pushed the door open. “You’re not handling it right.”
Exhausted, worn down, and just plain raw, Jamie warned her cousin, “You need to back off this, Mac, and you need to back off this now.”
Her cousin snorted. “No.”
Around early afternoon, Tully ambled on over to the Smithville Arms to check on Jamie. True, she wasn’t his responsibility but he’d felt a kinship to her after talking for so long the night before. She was a sweet thing, if a bit misguided. Misguided because he couldn’t understand how she didn’t see the beauty of this place. Smithville wasn’t just some town to him. He knew there was no place else in the world where he could go and be as happy and, more importantly, content as he was here. If she only bothered to open up her eyes and see what had been bestowed upon her, he knew she could find her place here. She could find something better than the hoarding of power.
And, as always, his mother had been right. Trying to force anything down Jamie’s throat or even trying to smooth talk her would never work. She was way too smart for her to buy that move from him. So being her friend would have to be the way to go and he couldn’t say that he minded. He liked her.
Hated her bird, though.
Tully ambled on up the great porch stairs of the hotel and opened the screen door, stopping right in the doorway. He watched Emma and Seneca, their arms wrapped around Jamie’s waist, trying to pull her back. Across from them was poor Kenny, her arms around Mac’s waist, trying to hold Mac back. The cousins had a healthy hold on each other’s hair and didn’t seem in the mood to let the other go while they yelled obscenities he was glad his momma wasn’t around to hear because she’d have dealt with that right quick.
Deciding Jamie seemed basically fine and figuring he could talk to her later while she was cleaning up those bruises her cousin would give her, Tully turned back around, headed down the stairs, and got back onto the road. He needed to make peace between one of the Prides and one of the Clans again anyway.
He’d walked about a half-mile when he stopped and lifted his head, his nostrils flaring as he cast for a scent. When he finally latched on to it, when he finally remembered it, he spun around, and stared down at the wolf watching him.
&nbs
p; Bracing himself, Tully said the first thing that came to mind. “And all this time I was really hoping you were dead.”
Jamie finally had Mac on her back and was about to start spitting in her face when a strong hand grabbed hold of her arm and pulled her off.
She looked up expecting to see Kyle or Bear—they really hated when the witches fought—but instead she saw Tully.
“I need to talk to you,” he growled out as he yanked her to her feet.
“Hey,” Emma said, jumping forward and then scrambling right back again with the rest of the coven when Tully barked and snapped at them all. Besides being kind of disgusted at her easily startled coven, Jamie was also shocked at Tully. He never yelled at Emma. Or, as in this case, barked at her. He treated her like she was spun glass. “Sweet little Emma,” he always called her which, until this moment, never bothered Jamie before.
Although why that was going through her mind now as he manhandled her right through the dining room, through the kitchen, and out the back porch, she had no idea.
“Why is Buck Smith here?” he demanded once they were on the lawn behind the hotel.
Jamie stared up at him. “Who?”
It was fascinating to watch the way his expression completely changed. She’d never seen him look like that. So angry. She didn’t think she’d ever seen him miffed, much less homicidal. Even when she’d set the forest on fire and poisoned the lake, he’d never appeared this angry.
And, boy, did he look angry.
“You’re supposed to protect this town,” he bit out.
“Right. And I do…when I’m aware of a problem.”
“How could you not be aware? He’s staying at your goddamn hotel!”
Whoa. He was yelling at her. Normally, she’d bind his lips together with a Hoodoo spell she kept for just this type of situation, but this was Tully and this was not normal behavior for him. Something more than simply being a twat was in play here and, after last night, she felt she kind of owed it to him to find out what…before she bound his lips together.
“Tully, I don’t know who Buck Smith is. I mean, I’m assuming he’s family…”
For a split second, he looked like he might hit her. Or, in more canine terms, maul her. But instead he released her and began to pace.
“Momma’s gonna lose her mind when she finds out he’s actually here. We all thought he was just on his way, not here.”
“I don’t—”
“And Daddy…Lord.”
“Tully?”
“I need to let the Pack know. I need to let everybody know. He’s here.”
Getting frustrated but not wanting to show it, Jamie gently placed her hand on Tully’s shoulder, but he turned to face her so fast, she stumbled away from him, her feet catching, and she fell right on her ass.
Tully stared down at her with such horror that if she didn’t know better, she’d have thought he’d slammed her to the ground himself. In fact, she knew that he believed he had.
“Oh, my God. Jamie.” He reached for her. “I’m so sorry.” She caught hold of his hand and instead of letting him pull her up, she tugged until he’d knelt in front of her. “Jamie, I’m so sorry.” She went up on her knees and placed her hand against his cheek. Tully’s eyes closed, his brows pulling down in a phenomenal frown of pain. Whoever Buck Smith was, he could get under Tully’s skin as no one else could.
Jamie put her arms around Tully’s big shoulders and pulled him in close until his head rested against her neck. She looked up to see her cousin standing on the porch watching her, her face filled with concern. Jamie tilted her head and, after a brief nod, Mac went back inside.
“Why don’t we go for a walk?” Jamie softly suggested. “We’ll figure it out from there.”
Only his father could make him like this. Full of rage and uncontrollable fits of violence…like father, like son.
No. No. He was not like Buck Smith. He would never be like Buck Smith. Not if he could help it. And he would help it even if it took every ounce of willpower he possessed. Yet there was no denying that the one thing that could set him off, that could and would bring out the worst in Tully Smith was his father. Not his daddy. Jack Treharne with all his snarling and snapping and feline ways had earned that particular title, but he’d earned it and kept it with pride. Buck Smith hadn’t earned anything from his son but Tully’s distrust and paranoia.
“Buck Smith is my father,” he explained to the woman walking beside him.
“I thought your real father was dead.”
“No. I said I’d hoped he was dead.”
“I see.”
“He said he was staying at your hotel.”
“I guess he is, but the reason it never occurred to me to say anything was that he didn’t check in himself. If I’m thinking of the right Pack, a woman checked them in. Wanda something.”
“Pykes. I’d heard he’d hooked up with a full-human a few months back. Can’t believe he brought her here, though.”
“Why?”
“He hasn’t marked her as his own from what I’ve heard. We’re more likely to trust a full-human bonded to one of us than one who has no ties. One good argument and she’s running around, telling the world about shifters.”
“I can handle that if she becomes a problem. Tell me about Buck.”
Tully winced. He’d rather not, but after yelling at Jamie and knocking her on her ass for no other reason than him being a dang idiot, the least he could do was tell her everything.
“My direct kin come from Alabama. The MacClancys are my momma’s people and they’re part of the Alabama Smiths. My father had been forced out of town when he was sixteen but he came back four years later when his granddaddy died. My momma was barely fifteen then and he latched on to her like a tic on a dog. Things got bad, again, between my father and his, and Buck was forced out…again. Only this time he took my momma with him because she was well pregnant with me. By the time she was about to pop, they’d made it to Smithville. I was born here about a week after they arrived. Then it started again. My father crossing his uncle and cousins, trying to take control of the Pack and, eventually, the town. They ran him off again but this time Momma didn’t go with him.”
“Why?”
“There were lots of reasons she’ll give you. She had me. She wanted to give me something stable. She was tired of traveling all over the place. And there were lots of reasons everyone else in town had: That Buck fucked anything that moved even while she was pregnant with me; that after nearly two years of being together he had yet to mark her as his own; that he was cold to her, rude. And I’m sure all of that was true. Actually, I know it was. But what I figured out, what I know is the reason my momma stayed is that she never thought he’d leave. Not without us. She thought he loved her enough to simmer down and wait until he was really ready to take over. At the time, I don’t think it ever crossed her mind that he would leave her. And then I don’t think it crossed her mind that he wouldn’t come back.”
“I don’t know which is worse,” Jamie mused softly. “Being so confident in the power of love that you’re willing to risk your heart, or knowing that love is just a cruel joke from the gods and never risking anything.”
“I’d have to say that last one.”
“Even after what your mom went through?”
“Yeah. I won’t say it was easy on her. It wasn’t. For six long years she waited for him. Waited while I grew into the most terrifying devil child this side of the Mason-Dixon.”
Jamie laughed. “That bad, huh?”
“Yeah. That bad. So bad Miss Addie and her coven politely suggested that Buck was using astral projection to visit me at night in an attempt to turn me.”
“It must have gotten better.”
“I wouldn’t say it got better but nothing lasts forever. And it was a cold, dark day when my momma had to come down to the school to meet with my second grade teacher because there was the suggestion I tried to drown another student in the boys’ bathroom.”
“A suggestion?”
“I didn’t see any hard proof other than the little bastard’s word and the fact that he was drenched from his head to his shoulders.”
Jamie laughed, and Tully laughed with her. A shocking feeling since any mention of his father usually sent him into one of his rare funks for days at a time. But she was calming him down, easing him just by being herself, by being his friend. “I still say they misread the situation,” he went on. “Anyway, my momma was called and she had to leave her job to come down to the school. And while she was waiting, she met Daddy.”
“Love at first sight?”
“So they say. I still say the old bastard took advantage of her pure innocence.”
Jamie snorted but she choked on it when Tully teasingly glared at her.
“Anyway,” he went on, “Momma and Daddy met and, ignoring the grave indignities they were causing both me and Kyle, decided to get married. They didn’t have to, this is a town of shifters, after all, and if there is one thing very few of us care about one way or the other is marriage. But I kind of understand why they did it, being different species and all. They wanted to show everybody how serious they were about each other, plus they wanted to make sure their children grew up feeling like they were family.
“But it got back to Buck what was going on and if there’s one thing that man hates it’s felines. So ignoring the fact he hadn’t been back in more than six years, he sneaked into town with a Pack he’d created of forced-out Smiths and stray wolves he’d found along the way. The plan was simple: grab me, grab my momma. It might have worked, too, but Buck must have forgotten how loyal the Smiths are to their pups and the females who breed them. Although none of them were crazy about the idea of any wolf mating with, much less marrying, a cat, they still knew how much Momma loved Daddy and, more importantly, how badly Buck had treated her. They also knew what a bastard he was. Most of the Smiths were already here for the wedding when my father came into the territory. He found me first. Told me I was his son and that he’d come to take me home with him.” They stopped by a large boulder and Jamie leaned back against it, watching him closely.
Belong To The Night Page 5