Frozen Alaska

by Katherine Rhodes

  “She never said yes.”

  “Raise her ire, or lose her forever.”

  I stared at my dying friend. I didn’t have a chance to tell them how much she wanted to live because Addi did that. “Don’t let her die!”

  Garrett looked up a second later, and there was a decision in his eyes.

  God almighty. He was going to mate her to save her life.

  “Go with Patrick. Go. Leave us alone.”

  Jason nudged my leg and nipped at my shirt to get me going. Zanna and Addi were screaming at each other, but I took Brandy by the arm, and led her back from the porch, down the stairs.

  Jason looked back for a second and I glanced to where his sight fell. There were wolves locked in battle with coyotes, near the front of the house. Half the pack was there, fighting the exiles.

  With a yip, he herded us down the path I knew cut straight down the mountain to the back gate of the compound. Brandy was shuffling along, and I was sure she didn’t know what the hell to think.

  I shifted the rifle to the side away from her. “You okay?”

  “No.” She looked at me. “What the hell just happened?”

  I looked down at the gorgeous wolf with my boyfriend’s eyes looking back at me. He yipped, and nodded, assenting to what had to happen.

  “There’s a lot more in these woods than we thought when we first got here, Bran. A lot more. And I’m not just talking about coyotes.”

  She shook her head. “That’s why you and Addi and Jess have been acting weird, isn’t it?”

  “To some degree, yes.”

  She walked quietly for a moment. “Did I really, honestly just see a giant gray and brown wolf catch Jess off the roof and turn into Garrett?”

  “Yes.”

  “Fuck.”

  “I’m sorry. I couldn’t tell you. None of us could.”

  “Did Zanna know?”

  “Before tonight, no.”

  She looked over to my right to the wolf trotting along with me. Jason was not a big wolf, not compared to the Pauler men, but no wolf was truly small. He easily reached my waist, and his dark gray and brown fur made it hard to see him in the night. He trotted along quietly with us, and returned Brandy’s glance.

  “That’s…”

  “Jason.”

  “Jesus Christ, you aren’t kidding are you.”

  The sound of paws on dropped needles reached us, and I grabbed Brandy and pulled her out of the way. But this wasn’t a coyote. It was Patrick’s big brown and red wolf, who came to halt next to Jason.

  There were chuffs and whines, as well as a yip and a bark. Jason licked my hand and pressed his muzzle against my palm, and I nodded. “Go. I know the way.”

  He yipped and took off a run with Patrick.

  Brandy let out a breath. “I don’t even know where to start asking questions about this.”

  “Let me see if I can just cover some ground with this,” I said. “Jason, and Garrett and his family, and most of the people at St. Terese, are shifters. They are mostly wolves. They can change from wolf to human and back at will. They are faster, stronger, and live longer than humans. That goes for all the shifters: wolves, bears, ravens, eagles, elk, coyote, mountain lions. The packs around Juneau include wolves and coyotes, bears and elk. There used to be ravens, but something happened, I don’t know what, and they don’t exist anymore.”

  “So why did Garrett just shoo us away?”

  “Jess is dying, and he can save her.”

  She stopped dead. “Wait. Are you telling me that the insane books you read are actually true?”

  “Somewhat?”

  “Garrett can save her because she’s his mate. And if he creates the bond, she gets his powers of healing.”

  “Yes.”

  Brandy looked ahead, and we just walked in silence for a few minutes. “Does she become a shifter?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know how that all works. Jason doesn’t want to talk to me about it.”

  “Are you Jason’s mate?”

  I blinked as a wave of sadness crested over me. “Yes. I am. But he’s…in denial. I think. It’s a sore subject for him. He was pretty messed up in the truck yesterday when he tried to talk about money and it’s getting in the way of everything he’s thinking about.”

  “Is Jess going to be okay?”

  I nodded. She will. As long the bond is real, she’ll be fine.”

  Brandy smirked. “From what I’ve seen of those two, it’s real.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You too?”

  “In the fucking woodshed. Twice. This week.”

  I laughed, some of the tension of the past few hours draining away. “Yeah. Me too. But the bathroom. Randomly.”

  “Every surface. I don’t know how Zanna stayed in that house with them. It must have been a construction zone.”

  I looked at her. “What?”

  “With all that drilling.”

  We crumbled into laughter.

  11

  The dinner was too quiet.

  Jess sat munching on her hamburger while I poked at the potato salad, Zanna took another hot dog. Brandy grabbed a beer and Addi pushed her coleslaw around the plate.

  “What does it feel like?”

  We all brought our gazes up to Brandy.

  Jess cleared her throat. “Which part?”

  Brandy took a swig of the beer, and slammed it down. “Shit, all of it.”

  Addi broke down in laughter. “Thank you! One of us had to ask!”

  “Well? You read shifter romances all the time! Of course, I want to know! I mean, is he really that good in bed?”

  Zanna chuckled and the next moment saw all of us breaking down into laughter.

  Jess pointed her hot dog at Brandy. “He’s so good in bed, Zanna woke up needing a cigarette.”

  Brandy was indignant. “Don’t wave your wiener at me.”

  That was the end of the awkward tension. We all started laughing, and finally started to just talk.

  “I wanna see the shoulder,” Zanna said, walking around the table.

  Jess put the hot dog on the plate and pulled the sleeve of her shirt over. Her skin was pink, and seemed to have a starburst pattern on it, but there was otherwise no sign of a lethal shotgun blast having hit her only a week before.

  “Damn that is so cool,” Zanna said, prodding the soft skin. “And it doesn’t hurt?”

  “Only when you poke it!”

  “And you’re really going to be able to shift?” I asked.

  “Someday, according to Tomasina. In a few years. It’s in there, but it’s…she’s not ready yet.”

  “What about the other stuff?” Zanna asked.

  “Like?”

  “Smell? Taste? Hearing?”

  “Oh, the smell! Christ! I know why they make fragrance free everything! Damn,” Jess said, rolling her eyes. “I can smell numbers sometimes.” She pointed at me. “You and Jason were going at this morning.”

  “Before my shower!”

  “Exactly.”

  I laughed. “Wow. That’s some nose power!”

  “Hearing? Nuts. I had to learn to turn it down really fast. It was getting so loud sometimes, and it was just crickets at night. Garrett gave me some tricks, but even sitting here, I can hear things that are under the dirt about a fifty yards away. And that’s just casual. If I focus, it gets more powerful.”

  She smiled and looked at each of us. “The best part is my sight. I can see in damn near total darkness. You want to know why all the lights in St. Terese are low, that’s why. Very few people need them to see, and sometimes they are even annoying now. But I can pick out amazing details in things, and it’s crazy. I’m thinking about picking up my oil paints again, and trying to captures some of what I can see now.”

  “That good?” I hadn’t seen Jess touch her paints in three years.

  She stuck her finger out at me. “Don’t even think about buying them for me. My husband…” She stared at the tablecloths for a
moment. “My husband. That sounds so…strange.”

  “You’re married?” Addi asked.

  “In the eyes of the pack, yes. Very much.” She darted her gaze around the table, and pulled back the other side of her shirt. There was an oblong, broken scar there, made of pale white dots. “That’s a mating mark. That makes us married in the shifter world.”

  Addi drew a really deep breath. “Do you hate him?”

  Her head snapped around. “No. No I don’t. I’m sitting here because of this. I’m still alive because he did it. I can’t be mad at him.”

  Addi slumped in the chair. “Martin and I told him to do it. He didn’t want to because you hadn’t said yes. And I thought that you might…”

  Jess stood and walked around to Addi. She wrapped her arms around our friend and hugged her tight. “I do not hate you. I do not hate Garrett and I don’t hate Martin. This is where I belong, and I’m glad that I can be here to enjoy it. And enjoy these terrible burgers that Brandy cooked.”

  Brandy threw the burger back on her plate. “They are really bad. I’m better than these burgers. And you all know that.”

  I sat in the woods, listening to their laughter. The menfolk had been invited to show up later, but the women wanted to have a chance to clear the air, and just have time to chat with each other.

  Garrett and Patrick trotted up next to me, and sat down to listen as well. They both had their heads cocked, and I could see the smile on Garrett’s face.

  Happily mated, even if they circumstances had sucked.

  Patrick yipped quietly, but not quiet enough for Garrett’s wife. Her eyes drifted through the trees around us, and finally went back to her friends.

  His command though, was clearly understood in the one yip. He trotted off with Garrett at his side and I fell in behind them. We loped through the forest toward the back of the Yéil property where there was a secluded waterfall and pond.

  Garrett hopped up on the diving rock that was on the edge of the water. A lot of us spent a hours of our life jumping in and out of the pond.

  The whole property had been an extension of pack land. The ruins of dozens of houses sat beyond the view of the main drive. I wondered if Brandy even knew how big her property was.

  Garrett shifted to human and laid down on the rock to catch some of the summer sun. Patrick and I followed suit, and could just imagine what would happen if our respective women wandered in to this scene.

  “Doing good, man?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Much better than I thought I would. She’s not mad at all. I’m giving her as much freedom as I can, all things considered. She’d made it clear she’s going to get her master’s, so I’m trying to back off the possessiveness.”

  “Hard?”

  “Constantly. Oh, you mean the possessive thing…”

  I snorted.

  “Yes. I’m really having a hard time with it. I want to lock her in the house and throw away the key, despite her being everything I wanted in a mate: intelligent, sweet, powerful, and curious. It’s a total internal battle.”

  “Are you going to put any limits.”

  “Noooo, no. Not if I want to keep her. I’m going to have to let her go down to Vancouver for classes in the Fall. Maybe when she’s pregnant I’ll lock her away. Just to shut up the wolf.”

  “Pregnant?” Patrick picked his head up.

  “No, again. Noooo. No we’re not having any babies yet. I’m not ready—which is funny when you consider I’m a hundred eighteen—and Jess is especially not ready. She needs more time between a baby and her miscarriage.”

  I had head that before but… “Miscarriage?”

  “Her ex-fiancé tricked her into getting pregnant.”

  “Wow, how do you do that?”

  “Poke holes in the condoms. Grade A asshole.” Garrett shook his head. “The alpha in me wants to go choke the fucker. The human in me also wants to go choke the fucker.”

  “At least both sides agree.” Patrick laughed. “Hey speaking of alpha…could you warn the people around you when you’re going to go into alpha? I basically ripped Addi’s clothes off.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, I was barely able to get down the road the other day and duck off in the truck.”

  Both Patrick and Garrett turned and looked at me lying on the rock. They traded looks, and then looked back at me.

  Twisting my lip, I sighed. “Yes. It hit me when we boxed in Heath. I had Delia pulling her pants off before I could pull the truck off the road.”

  Garrett nodded and put his head back down. “Well. That’s that, I guess. I meant to ask you about the other night, what your standing was in the pack. I see you’re one of the higher ups.”

  “I’m not. You both know that. I’m just a regular shifter in the pack,” I said. “I actually kinda freaked out about it when it happened.”

  “Well, apparently, my alpha group is forming.”

  “Yeah, I’m not really…”

  “Oh, stop. I’m not taking the lead from my father for a long time.”

  I put my head back down. I wasn’t going to be an enforcer for a long time, if at all. I also knew that this wasn’t the time to argue with him. We had a while to relax before we went back to the cabin.

  “We’re going to have talk to Brandy. Soon,” Patrick said.

  “It’s a relief she knows, anyway,” I said.

  Garrett grunted, “Yeah, but it sucks that it falls to us to talk to her.”

  “Why don’t you have Grandmother talk to her?” Patrick asked.

  “You’re too young to remember, but Grandmother lost her husband in that mess. Bringing Brandy to talk to her could open a can of worms or hurt that I don’t want want to.” Garrett rolled over and lay bottom up on the rock. “I’m going to have Dad help me with it. I can’t just walk up to her, spit out the facts and walk away. That’s…not right.”

  I nodded, banging my head on the rock accidently.

  Patrick and Garrett looked over at me, and started laughing as I rubbed the sore spot. I shook my head. “You really want that kind of grace and awareness as an enforcer?”

  They laughed harder.

  12

  “Why are we sneaking around?” Addi asked.

  I parked the car on the side of the bank where I knew no one would go looking for it, and motioned Addi to get out.

  “Zanna’s creditors are back, claiming she owes them another thirty grand.”

  “Horseshit! Are you serious? That felonious bullshit treatment she went for?”

  I waved her down. “Her parents were desperate. I don’t blame anyone but the scam artist who runs that clinic. And in fact, that’s part of why we’re here.”

  I pushed open the door, and ushered her into the bank. Quentin nodded at me from across the room and pointed to the stairs on our right. I waved my thanks and Addi and I walked up.

  “So, why are we here?”

  I waggled my eyebrows. “I found a lawyer. He’s been working with four other people who are being defrauded by the clinic. I am thinking about hiring him for Zanna so this can go forward and we can close this clinic.”

  “Zanna doesn’t have—”

  I held my finger up. “Would I ever, ever hire someone for her if I wasn’t willing to front the cash for this?”

  Addi’s jaw dropped. “You flew him here, didn’t you?”

  “Of course. I want to talk in person. I trust lawyers as far as I can throw them.”

  “I’m very light, Miss LaPlage, so you can toss me pretty far.”

  I looked to the left and found a man standing there in pressed slacks, a long-sleeved shirt and a sweater vest. He had a briefcase open on the table as well as a computer next to it.

  I grinned. “Mister Bellator, I presume.”

  “Indeed, Miss LaPlage. But call me Jim. After all, it’s not every day a small-time lawyer like me gets an offer to meet a client, expenses paid.”

  Motioning to the chairs around the table, we all sat. Addi looked confused, but I hoped she cou
ld see the ‘just hang on’ look in my eyes.

  “So, Mist—Jim. Tell me about this case, and if we can put Zanna on your lawsuit.”

  “Well, as you know I’m sure, Vitaz Clinic purport to have cures for all kinds of rare disorders that get no real attention from the CDC or research. They claim that just about any blood borne illness, pathogen, or cancer is able to be cured in their clinic.

  “We all know this is bullshit, but they prey on the desperate. Four of the clients on this lawsuit were very young when they fell into the trap. They seem to prey on young adults. That is, the teenagers who are eighteen, nineteen years old, or just in college. People who have not responded to traditional medical techniques.

  “Three of the people on the lawsuit were misdiagnosed, which was why they didn’t respond. Two more were victims of over-zealous parents who just wanted them cured from whatever it was they had. Four more are the families of the deceased.

  “At Vitez, they treat with exercise, apple cider vinegar, and beets. Meditation and Tylenol. Sweat houses. It’s a holistic nightmare there. And I don’t know who they know, but even after they had four people die on property—more than, but the rest went unreported—the place was still open.

  “We’re trying to sue for closure and damages. This is a huge medical malpractice suit that deserves it’s day in court, especially now that we’re going through a second round of fraud. It’s difficult though, because all of these clients are in desperate straits and I can’t dedicate the time I need to really, really dig into this.

  “Mind you, I don’t mean to sound like I’m brushing them off for money. But the fact is that I’m pretty much a one man show, and I have to feed my kids.”

  Addi wrinkled her brow. “That’s kind of forward.”

  “No, it’s not. I had asked him to explain, a few a days ago, what was holding the case up.” I scratched my chin. “So you think that you could win this, if you had the resources.”

  “Absolutely. This is a clear-cut case.”

  Addi stared at me. She knew what I was about to do, though she didn’t know how.