by Lauren Dane
Tosh stood. “I’m afraid that’s not going to work for me, Joe. You know why.”
Porter sighed. “It’s Marlon Hayes. The damn fool has just done a public statement. She’s got to put out some major fires. Tens of thousands of calls have just crashed the phone lines and the servers are overwhelmed. She’s got to deal with all that.”
“What on earth did he say?” Tosh had turned his phone off when he’d come into the room as was polite. He had no idea what had happened.
Joe blew out a breath. “He’s taking the Domestic Safety Act to the floor this week. He urged people to call in to get their senators to support it. Off the record?”
Tosh nodded.
“There were some very thinly veiled calls to execute Others. The president is concerned about violence and retaliation.”
Tosh scrubbed his hands over his face. “Is she going to take a position at least?”
“She’s going to call for calm and nonviolence. She wants the people to be heard on this. If she takes a position, she’s cutting that off.”
“Oh bull. Come on, Joe! The time for that has passed. She’s the president and this is her job. This is insanity. A United States senator calls for extermination of American citizens? And she’s not going to get on television right away and condemn that as un-American? He’s whipping up violence. She needs to be a leader right now.”
Porter’s mouth flattened into a line and Tosh knew he’d overstepped, but he didn’t care.
“I want a meeting with her. Please call my office when time opens up. And pray it’s not too late.”
“Senator Sato, you can tell me your concerns and I’ll forward them to the president.”
“No offense intended, Joe, but I don’t want to meet with you. I want her to look me in the eye when she tells me she’s got no intention of protecting the citizens of this country she was duly elected to represent. This has gone on long enough. Time is running out. I’ve got to go and deal with my constituents. Please do let me know when she’ll be available.”
He turned and left before Joe could argue, anger coursing through him as he did.
The hallways were far busier than usual. There was an undercurrent of not just gossipy Did you hear what Hayes said, but anger and, he was sad to hear, not all of it directed at Hayes and PURITY.
His assistant started to speak when he got back to his offices. “I know. I want to see the footage right now.”
“It’s queued up in your office. Go on in and I’ll get you some coffee. You’ll need the caffeine.”
He thought what he’d heard would have prepared him for what he’d see. But nothing could have. Nothing in the world could have prepared him for seeing a United States senator not so subtly call for the extermination of a sizable minority of the American population. It was more than sickening, it was outrageous.
Worse, that the president wasn’t on television immediately afterward was even more outrageous.
“Get me some time on the shows.” He didn’t look up from his screen as he spoke to his assistant. “We’ll need to get a statement up on the website within the hour, condemning any calls to violence and encouraging a real dialogue that includes listening instead of threatening. Get me Meriel or Molly from Clan Owen.”
“On it. Oh, and Senator Sperry is here.”
Well that was one nice thing at least. “Send her back. Get me immediately with the rest of this.”
He stood as Delilah swept in and sat in a chair across from him. “I suppose you’ve heard.”
“I was waiting to meet with the president when it happened. Porter came out to tell me she had to cancel and why.”
Delilah only barely managed to stop from rolling her eyes. Tosh could see the effort it cost her to do so. “What’s her story then? Did I miss her speaking on the issue?”
“The president believes that taking a position cuts the process of input from Americans short.”
“Did Joe say that to you with a straight face? Because he should be ashamed if he could.”
“He’s got a job to do. I understand that.”
“I don’t. Come on, Toshio, they called for our extermination! How is the fact that anyone can stand there with a straight face and say the president won’t condemn such a thing an acceptable job? Huh? That’s not a job. That’s something to be ashamed of.”
“I refused to meet with him instead of the president. I want her to look me in the eye when she says she’s not going to stand up for all Americans.”
“Well, good luck to you. I can’t even get my calls returned.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“Do I sound like I’m joking? This is how it is now, Tosh. From a lot of people. That a colleague would stand up and call for my extermination in front of cameras without any sense of shame is telling. I’m here to let you know I will be on the floor tomorrow. I may get ejected.” Her smile made him a little sweaty, in good and bad ways.
“Should I set aside bail money?”
She laughed and took the teacup his assistant handed her with thanks. “No, I don’t think I’ll be marking that off Marlon’s Christmas list. He wants us to be that. But what I will be doing is calling this what it is. I will not wear a yellow star. I will not let them send me to a camp or exterminate me if I’m difficult, and I will say out loud to the American people that if they support this bill that’s what they’re doing. This is not going down the way it did in the thirties in Germany. I am a motherfucking werewolf and if I’m going down, I will take as many as I can down with me. “
He nodded. “I agree. I’ll be saying the same. Well, not the werewolf part.”
“Yeah? You stepped out of the middle then?”
“I was never in the middle, Delilah. I have always been on your side. But I will not be silent about this. This is unconscionable.”
His assistant popped a head in. “Senator Sato, I just sent the text for the press release to your email if you want to look it over. I’m also going to place a call to Molly Ryan in five minutes. She’s on another call right now.”
“Great. Thank you. Tell everyone we’ve got a long night ahead of us. Order in some dinner and let’s get this show on the road.” He looked to Delilah. “Want to combine efforts?”
“Yes. Let’s get some others in on this too.”
Chapter 20
THREE hours after the press conference, Helena found herself in front of the Defense arm of the COO, who’d called an emergency meeting after the speech. Familiar faces showed up on the screen, but she found herself shocked by what Lex Warden had just said.
“Can you repeat that?”
Lex Warden smirked but it was gone in moments. Damn he was pretty.
“I said we’ve elected you. You’re now in charge of this body. You know, you make the decisions as to all the military and defense coordination between Others.”
“Why?”
“I’ve watched you do your job. I’ve watched you do a job in what have been extraordinarily difficult times. You consistently make good decisions. Your judgment is sound. You are vicious, but not without reason and logic. You are well trained and fully capable of training others. You understand what it means to delegate and yet you do not hesitate to take responsibility when you need to. Now, more than any other time in our history, we need to work united. And to do that, we have to make use of our best. You are one of those. As Meriel will run the main body of the COO along with Cade, you will run this body.”
She kept her sigh inside her head. There were no other choices to be made. She would accept, of course. But fear trickled through her veins. The stakes were so high she just decided to pretend not to think about it.
“All right. I accept.”
Lex tipped his chin. “Good. Now, what do you need?”
Thank heavens she’d already thought in detail on this. “This is how it’s going to be. Our current teams of three will go to teams of five. These teams will be mixed with at least two witches. I believe the mix of different skills and gifts will be bes
t used in that combination. The magickal backup is imperative, especially on any type of sweep or investigative work. Each enclave will have constant security. At least one team at the gates and another to sweep through the neighborhoods. That’s twenty-four hours a day. All leadership, wolves, witches, cats, Vampires, whatever, needs to have added protection. I can help with that should you want my assistance.”
She knew how tricky that part was. Others had been on their own for so long, they really hated to take direction from anyone outside their group. Plus, there were so many alpha males that it was difficult to tell them they needed to be protected.
Still, before Lex became the Alpha of Cascadia, he’d been his brother’s Enforcer for years before Cade went on to lead National, so she hoped that gave him perspective from her side of the table.
“Within three minutes of the end of that speech Hayes made, the first official death threat came in. Senate, House and White House servers went offline due to the overwhelming traffic. The phone lines were choked. Not all that was negative, I want to underline that. It is not our belief that a majority of humans feel the way Powers does. But there will be movement after this latest stuff. Our leaders need to be kept safe. Every public appearance should include a team that goes to the venue first and does a sweep and then locks it down until arrival. If they don’t like it, too damned bad. We can’t trust anyone else to keep us safe.”
“You’re right. I’m happy to start out and set that example. Tegan has been on me to up my guard anyway. I’ll get the news out to the rest of the Packs.”
Gibson agreed to do the same for the other shifters. She was meeting with The Gennessee right after this so she’d tell Rebecca then.
“The Vampires will do as you ask.”
Okay then.
“I’m working with Owen and the other Clans to make our people available to send to Others who need them for their security teams. The new enclaves have begun to consolidate our populations, which is helpful on many levels. But for areas that may not have a lot of Others of different types, we want to be sure they’re being protected. My assistant, Sasha, is keeping the list so please have your people contact her directly and we’ll get on that. Lark will continue to work on cross-training programs. The wolves and cats are particularly good at tracking and we have a great deal to learn from them. Faine and Simon Leviathan have graciously volunteered to continue to help train on all things battle and combat.”
She went over a few more things before everyone signed out and went their own way.
Lark stayed on the line. “Excellent job.”
“Yeah, maybe. Let me know if you need anything. I’m sending some people up to Oregon later today. They’re going to hook up with folks from Pacific. Are we covered in Idaho now?”
“Yes. We’re good. Cascadia land includes Idaho and they’re pretty organized. Most of their people already lived in close quarters and we were able to connect them with contractors and security people to get the place walled and hooked up to cameras and all that. We don’t have many witches out that way, but about seventy percent of them have opted to move into the enclave with the wolves. The rest will stay where they are, but have acknowledged the dangers and volunteered to call to check in twice daily. It’s the best we can do with Others in far-flung places who decide to remain out of the enclaves.”
“Don’t you dare feel guilty for that. People are making their own choices for all sorts of reasons. We cannot make everyone safe. We gave them options, they will take them or not, but in the end it’s up to them.”
Lark laughed. “Seems to me, missy, I’ve had this exact conversation with you.”
“Yes. Well.”
“I’ll talk to you tomorrow to fill you in on what I learn tonight. Molly is doing a bunch of interviews. We installed some nifty new tech here so she can do sat feeds and doesn’t have go to the studio every time.”
“Good. I feel better knowing that. We’re having dinner with Mom and Dad tonight. Faine insisted so he can announce his intentions or whatever.”
“Mom’s gonna love that. When are you going to Lycia?”
“He wants to go as soon as possible. But right now things are sort of crazy and I’m not ready to do the binding thing yet.”
“Binding thing? You didn’t even tell me!”
“I didn’t? I just figured. Well, you said you knew he’d set his sights on me. How can you not know?”
“Well, the Ne’est thing is a whole different level! Jeez. You can take your time. He’ll wait. If he’s declared you’re his Ne’est, he’d wait forever for you. It’s not something more than ten percent of them do. It’s rare and it’s forever and it makes me so happy!”
“It’s sort of weird. Two sisters. Two brothers.”
“It makes sense I guess for them both to have that connection to us. Partly it’s at the DNA level, or so Simon tells me. We’re related.”
Helena closed the door and came back to sit in front of the video conference set. “So what’s it like? The binding I mean.”
“I was worried. That it would be too much, or that I’d feel trapped. But really? Do you sort of feel like when you enter a room he’s in, there’s like a cord of energy between you?”
“It draws me to him. If he’s around it’s like I know it on some level. But I can’t read his thoughts. He’s cagey.”
Lark laughed. “They all are. But the binding, it sets that connection. It amplifies it. I can think about it and know where Simon is right now. It doesn’t hurt that since all this got worse he makes an effort to be near me all the time. But still. I don’t need to be near him. But I know where he is. I can sense great shifts of emotion. If he’s angry or happy or hurt. They’re rebuilding Heart of Darkness right now and he was putting up shelves in his office and suddenly I just know he’s been hurt. And he’s pissed off. Given our current circumstances I flipped out and rushed over there because he’s not answering his phone. He had driven a nail through his hand and he’d done it stupidly and that’s why he was pissed. But I don’t know his thoughts. And he’s a man, so. It’s not like chances are it won’t be about food or sex at least eighty percent of the time.”
Helena laughed.
“It ties your life force to his. That’s a clumsy way of explaining something that is . . . well, it changed my life. It didn’t take anything away from me. I’m still quite able to be annoyed with him. I can still look at Gage’s butt and recognize it for the masterpiece it totally is. I’d love Simon just as much without the binding. But Leviathan now sees me as one of their own. I made a commitment to him and his family both here and in Lycia. That meant a lot to Simon. Family and pack means a lot, you know?”
“Do you think I should do it? It seems so fast!”
“It’s been months since you’ve known him. You have been through some hard-core stuff with him at your side. You know how he’ll act in a crisis. You know he’ll have your back. Do you love him?”
She thought about it carefully. This wasn’t a question she should take lightly. But the answer was inescapable and she was totally, utterly sure. “Yes.”
“And he loves you. More than that, by undertaking the binding he’s declaring you’re it. Forever. He wants to cleave himself to you. Which sounds old-fashioned, but gods, it makes me so happy. It calms me and sustains me that I have someone who commits so wholly. That’s what he wants for you. You are, as long as I have known you, the kind of person who commits to something with everything she has. You are his match. He is yours. So yes, I think you should do it. I think you deserve that kind of connection to someone. You deserve that commitment and happiness.”
“I’m so afraid of failing. Of failing him. Of failing everyone.” She grabbed a tissue from a nearby box and tried to dab her eyes without messing up her makeup. “See, this is why I hate to cry. It’s too hard to keep my liner and mascara from running.”
“Shut up. You look like a freaking model even after you barf. And look, everyone is afraid of failing. What is the poin
t of having important things in your life if you don’t care enough about them to worry you could mess them up? I know we were raised to believe failure is unacceptable. But that’s bullshit. Failure happens because no one is perfect. And because very few things in life are totally in your control. So all you can do is your best.”
“When did you get so wise?”
“I think it might be some of Simon’s wisdom I get through the binding.”
Helena snorted. “That is a plus.” She took a deep breath. “I guess I need to just suck it up and jump, huh?”
“Yeah. I will say up front that the first few hours after the ceremony you’re sort of swimming in all sorts of Lycian pack stuff. Simon said it was like me settling into the collective space the Pack exists in. Like the heart of the Pack or something. Sort of like the Font, I guess. Will you tell me when you go? I want to be there with Simon.”
“Yeah? I’d really like you to be there.”
“Good, that’s settled. I’ll talk to you soon. And Hellie? I’m so happy for you. Faine is a lucky dude.”
She was still smiling when she came out of the conference room.
Faine was across the way, leaning against a desk and speaking earnestly with her father.
“Uh oh.” She gave them both a look when she got to them. “Should I be concerned?”
“I was just telling your father that you’d been named head of the Defense and Security arm of the COO and what some of your orders were. He and I agreed they were quite good orders.”
“And I was telling him your mother won’t break out anything with tempeh in it until he’s been around a while longer. We’re having chicken for dinner so don’t be late.”
“In all fairness, she’s a really good cook. I do not agree with her stance on vegan baked goods, but her tempeh stuff is actually quite tasty. I’ll bring something sweet.”
“Okay.” Her dad squeezed her hand and stepped back. “See you two in a bit.”
“I have an other hour’s worth of work and then we can head out. That work for you?”
Faine nodded. “You all right? You’ve been crying.”