A Pack of Blood and Lies

by Olivia Wildenstein

  My nostrils pulsed. The coppery scent of blood mixed with the smell of his skin was making my head spin. Or maybe it was the intensity with which he was studying me.

  “I wish I could erase my actions, Ness. I wish I could go back in time and let you go without acting like a…a”—even though his voice wavered, his gaze didn’t—“a savage. I am so deeply ashamed of what I did to you.” His voice was soft like the patter of the raindrops tapping against the window.

  “Is that why you took a bullet for me tonight? So I would forgive and forget?”

  “No.” His lids slid shut for a long second. When they lifted, his eyes were even brighter than before. Wolf eyes. “I’d understand if you never forgave me.”

  My chest tightened like a fist.

  “Please say something,” he croaked.

  Pressing my arms against my abdomen, I said, “I’m glad you’re okay.”

  “Are you?”

  “Yes.”

  He hitched up an eyebrow, as though not truly believing me. But it was true, and he must’ve seen this on my face because his eyebrow slowly fell back, aligning with the other.

  “Why did you do it?” I asked.

  “Because I was hurt and”—he looked at the painting of the feather over his fireplace—“jealous.”

  My arms loosened. “Jealous? Of Aidan?”

  His gaze jolted back to me. “What?” A flush creeped over his jaw.

  I swallowed. “I asked why you took a bullet for me.”

  “Oh.” Clearly, his answer hadn’t been intended for this question. He looked away again and a deep groove appeared between his eyebrows. “I reacted. That’s all.” His lips barely shifted, yet his words stirred the air that had gone very still.

  I barely heard his answer over the loud echo of his previous answer. Jealous. “What did you think I was asking you about?”

  The tendons in his neck shifted as he sat a little taller, as his shoulders pressed a little harder into the pillows. “Why I lost my mind when you came to my house.” He closed his eyes, then leaned his head back against the wooden headboard. “This conversation is more painful than being shot.”

  A breath snagged in my chest. “You like me?”

  His eyes remained closed. He was so still I checked his chest was rising with breaths.

  Liam had feelings for me?

  “Are you trying to torture me some more?” His voice broke the spell of his confession.

  “No. I— Why?”

  His eyes flew open and set on me. “Why do I like you?”

  “No one else does.”

  “First off, that’s not true. Second off, I have no clue. I just do. But apparently the feeling isn’t mutual.” His tone was rough. “So if you can forget I said anything, that would be great.” He turned his face so that he was facing his bathroom door.

  “I was scared tonight. Scared that you’d die.” My blood simmered in my veins, heated my skin.

  I toed the tufted rug that stretched over almost every inch of the wooden floor and examined the long fibers, trying to decide if they were purple or maroon. In the obscurity, it was hard to tell.

  “I don’t hate you, Liam.”

  Purple. They were purple. A deep, almost electric purple.

  Bare feet flattened the looped filaments and stopped inches from mine. My heartbeats quickened like skittish trout.

  The heat from his bare skin permeated the slim divide between us. Warmth meant he was better, unless he was coming down with a fever. Was his wound infected? I didn’t dare move. Didn’t dare look up. But Liam crooked a finger underneath my chin and tipped my face up.

  “I almost died tonight, Ness, and that reminded me that I’m not immortal. That none of us are. We might be stronger than humans, but we don’t get to live forever.”

  My throat tightened.

  “Do you know what I thought about when the bullet hit me?” His pupils throbbed, burned a path straight into me.

  “What?” I breathed.

  “That I’d hate to die with you thinking I was a bastard.”

  I removed my head from its perch. “Liam—”

  “Let me finish.” His tone was gentle but tremulous, as though severing the connection between his finger and my chin had shaken his confidence.

  I’d been about to say that I didn’t think he was a bastard. At least, not anymore. Not since he’d taken a bullet for me.

  “And the second thing that entered my mind”—he combed an unruly lock of hair behind my ear, and I shivered—“was that I didn’t want to die before getting to kiss you.”

  I blinked. “You want to kiss me?” If I’d heard him wrong, and he’d said kill me, then…well, that would be so many shades of embarrassing.

  “Yes, Ness Clark. I’d like to kiss you.”

  It struck me then that Liam didn’t think I murdered his father. I closed my eyes. “Don’t, Liam. Don’t like me. I’m no good. For you…I’m no good.”

  My eyelashes dampened. No, no, no…I couldn’t cry. Not in front of Liam. Oh, God, I was such a mess.

  “Why shouldn’t I like you?”

  “Because…you shouldn’t.” The tears snaked out.

  Perfidious tears.

  I felt his thumbs swipe over my cheeks, felt his fingers close around the sides of my face, tilt it back toward his.

  “You’re going to have to give me a better reason.”

  I looked at him then, and my heart beat so wildly it almost tripped right out of my chest. A better reason was the truth.

  “Tamara.” I blurted out the redhead’s name, not knowing what else to say.

  “Tamara?”

  “She likes you, Liam. I couldn’t do that to her.” My excuse was pathetic, eye-roll-worthy pathetic.

  “Let me make something very clear, I don’t give a crap about Tamara.”

  “But—”

  “Go out on a date with me.”

  “Liam—”

  “One date. And I promise to wear clothes.” One side of Liam’s mouth quirked up.

  Of course, that made me acutely aware that he was naked. “Lucas said there was no dating within the pack.”

  “Lucas is a dumbass, and it’s a bogus rule. I know for a fact that two of the wolves in our pack are together.”

  For the briefest of moments, I wondered who, but then I focused back on the matter at hand. “We’re opponents. Opponents can’t date.”

  A nerve jumped in his jaw. “Says who?”

  “It wouldn’t be ethical.”

  “Really?” His face loomed over mine.

  I licked my lips that felt as dry as my throat. “Yes. Really.”

  “Drop out then.”

  That snapped something in me. I ducked away from him. “Is that what this is about?”

  “What?” His forehead grooved.

  “You’re trying to make me drop out?”

  His eyes darkened, and he gave his head a little shake.

  “Why don’t you drop out?”

  His jaw clenched. “I’ve been working my entire life toward this, Ness. You only want this to piss me off.”

  “That’s not true,” I blurted out. But it was true.

  So. Damn. True.

  He crossed his arms in front of his blood-flecked torso. “You didn’t go against me because you hated the idea of having a Kolane in charge?”

  Instead of answering him, I used the momentum of our quarrel to drive in my previous point. “See? We can’t date, Liam.”

  He snorted but didn’t disagree with me. Then again, his bedroom door flew open.

  As he took us in, Matt’s eyebrows shot up. “Everything all right in here?”

  Liam glared at me. For someone whose dying wish had been to kiss me, he seemed over it.

  “Yeah,” I mumbled, planting my gaze on the large oaf of a man standing in the doorway instead of on the infuriating one standing inches from me.

  Matt flicked his attention to Liam, who remained as still as glass.

  “Can you tak
e me home?” I asked Matt.

  “Of course.”

  I started walking away when Liam’s voice made me halt. “Why do you want to lead this pack, Ness?”

  My cheeks burned from being put on the spot. “I don’t have to explain my reasons to you.”

  “I just hope your reasons are noble, because these are good men. Men who deserve someone honest, with the pack’s interest at heart.”

  I stared at Matt’s dirty boots.

  I swallowed over and over, but my saliva kept getting jammed up. Finally, I managed to wheeze out, “And they’ll have someone deserving of them.”

  For the first time in a long time, I was speaking the truth.

  Because it wouldn’t be me.

  I would make sure to lose the next test. I wasn’t sure how yet, but I was sure it would come to me. If I lost, Julian couldn’t hold that against me. Could he?

  He probably could. He’d probably rescind his offer to speak to the PI. Or if he’d already spoken to him, he’d call him back. But it wouldn’t matter because Liam would already have heard it from me.

  After the next test, I’d confess.

  I’d confess it all and free myself of the debilitating guilt. And if that meant groveling for my life, then I would drop to my knees and grovel. My only hope was that Liam would show me the mercy his father had been incapable of showing my mother.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  I spent every minute of the next three days with Evelyn. If these were to be my last hours on this earth, there was no one I wanted to spend them with more than Evelyn. Several times, she asked me what was wrong. Nothing. That was my answer. Nothing plus a cheerful smile.

  But she knew me better than that. She also knew there was no point in pushing me. That when I walled myself off, there was no breaching my brick-and-mortar shell.

  Next week, my fate would be sealed.

  I thought about the wedding with a heavy heart. Remembered I still needed a dress. I tried to call Everest for help, but Lucy told me he’d gotten dire news about Becca and that he’d hit the road to clear his mind.

  I didn’t want to hold his sorrow against him, but I was sad he’d left me behind. I didn’t wallow too long in my loneliness, though. After days of avoiding August’s calls and messages, I’d answered him that morning. Like a dying person, I was putting my life in order, and part of that order was thanking August for caring, even though I didn’t really understand why he cared about me in the first place. I was no longer the innocent little girl whose hair he’d ruffled and whom he’d taught to whittle wood into animal statues.

  As I wiped down wine glasses in the pantry, my heart squeezed so tight a sharp pain spread through my chest. I was wallowing again. God, I didn’t want to wallow. I drove my focus outward, on the chirpy conversation of the two servers who worked nights and weekends at the inn. They were discussing going clubbing at The Den.

  One of them, the one with a pixie cut and a gazillion silver hoops in her right ear—Emmy—must’ve noticed I was listening, because she asked, “Want to come with us, Ness?”

  I almost dropped the glass I was drying. Emmy and the other server—Skylar—were at least a decade older than I was and had never spoken to me before. I’d assumed it was because I was so much younger than them and related to their boss.

  “I’m only seventeen.”

  “You don’t look seventeen,” Emmy said. “Besides you’re too pretty to be turned away from the door. Plus, DJ Wolverine’s spinning. She’s awesome.”

  DJ Wolverine… It took my mind a second to connect the dots. DJ Wolverine was Julian’s niece, Sarah. She could help me get in touch with Julian.

  “Okay. I’m in.”

  I’d never gone clubbing, so I didn’t know how people dressed. Although sporting the black dress I’d worn when I’d visited Heath made my skin itch, it was the only nice thing I owned. Well, that and the red dress, but there was a small tear in the side seam—probably from when I’d ripped it off my shifting body.

  The black sequins sewn over the material caught every flick of light, casting tinsels over the dashboard of Emmy’s little car that rumbled with club beats.

  “You okay, hun?” Skylar asked. She’d swept her bleached hair into a high bun that sat atop her head like frosting on a cupcake. “You seem real down.”

  I bit the inside of my cheek. “I’m okay.”

  Emmy turned down the music. “Is it your momma?”

  “My mom?”

  Just two mornings ago, in that slim moment between sleep and wakefulness, I’d reached for my phone to call her for advice. Only when I couldn’t find her contact did I remember she was gone. I’d lain in my bed a long while, watching the dove-gray light of dawn turn pale gold.

  Emmy glanced toward Skylar. “We heard you lost her a couple months before coming out here.”

  Skylar spun around in her seat, her manga-sized blue eyes roving over my face. “I lost mine last year, and although I ain’t gonna say our pains are the same”—she didn’t sound like she was from around here—“if you ever need to talk, well, you can talk to me, hun. We can bitch and lament together. I’m real good at bitchin’ about life.”

  “It’s one of her many talents.”

  Emmy grinned, while Skylar chortled.

  Intent on shifting the spotlight off the woman I missed so much, I asked, “How long have you two known each other?”

  “We met two years ago.” Skylar placed her hand over Emmy’s and brushed her knuckles. “We started working at the inn at the same time.”

  Emmy loosed a light sigh. “It was love at first sight.”

  My lids fluttered. “Oh…you two…you’re together?”

  “For a year and a half already! Time flies,” Emmy said. “What about you, Ness? Are you seeing anybody?”

  I stared out my window at the moon that was growing fatter and fuller every day. “No.”

  “No one’s caught your eye?”

  “Not really.”

  “Maybe you’ll meet someone tonight,” Skylar said. “The Den’s full of hotness.”

  “Maybe.”

  Soon, we were parking across from a brick building illuminated by a huge blue flickering neon sign. A beefy bouncer stood by the closed metal doors, turning away three gangly boys, before letting in a gaggle of chattering girls who wore too much makeup and too little clothes. I’d never felt overdressed before, but in this moment, as I trailed Emmy and Skylar, I felt extraordinarily self-conscious. It didn’t help that people from the long line awaiting to get into the club were staring.

  I started walking toward the end of the line when Skylar looped her arm through mine and tugged me to the front. Grumbling erupted behind us, but neither Emmy nor Skylar seemed to care.

  “Hey, Bobby!” Skylar chirped.

  The bouncer turned toward us. “Skysky.” He tipped his head down toward me, hiking up an eyebrow. “Who’s your little friend?”

  Little friend. Skylar had a couple inches on me, but I was far from little. Unless he meant age-wise. That was probably what he’d meant. My palms slickened. Don’t ask to see my ID. Don’t ask to see my ID.

  “Ness’s my little sister. She’s visiting from LA.” The lie rolled off Skylar’s tongue so naturally that Bobby pulled the heavy metal door open.

  Music whooshed out and battered against the dark street.

  “Be good,” he said.

  “Aren’t we always?”

  “Em is.” He smirked at Skylar. “You, not so much.” He winked at us as we passed by him and then closed the door.

  Swirling neon lights illuminated the cavernous building, which must’ve housed an old power plant once upon a time. Exposed metal tubing and air vents crisscrossed the high ceiling like a rat maze, reflecting the swinging strobes. In the middle of the dancefloor stood a wide square bar manned by several bartenders. Partygoers spilled around the bar, moving their bodies to the deafening beat. On a metal mezzanine, people sat at tables, pouring long drinks from liquor and juice bottles.
Some were leaning against the railing, gazing down at the crowd below.

  “Where’s the DJ booth?” I yelled into Emmy’s ear, my mouth coming in contact with some of her silver hoops.

  My lips instantly blistered, and I jerked away. I licked the tiny sores, then squashed my mouth shut when I caught her staring at it.

  Nostrils working, she pointed to the top of the stairs that led to the mezzanine floor. There, in an open booth, pink headphones nestled in a mane of wild curls, stood Sarah aka DJ Wolverine.

  Emmy tapped my shoulder. “Is it me, or is your mouth smoking?”

  I licked my lips. “Must be you.”

  She frowned.

  “I’m going to go say hi to someone,” I said.

  “Okay. We’ll be right here.”

  I nodded, then strode across the room, slaloming between the bodies.

  Another burly bouncer stood at the bottom of the stairs. He stuck out his hand when I approached.

  “The DJ’s my friend,” I said.

  He gave me a grumpy, meaningful look. He wasn’t buying it.

  “Ask her,” I pleaded.

  “I can’t interrupt her set.”

  “Please. Her name is Sarah. Her uncle is Julian Matz. Her brother—”

  The bouncer grumbled. “Fine. But I’m keeping an eye on you.”

  I slid by him before he could change his mind. When I reached Sarah, she was fiddling with some dials on her turntables.

  “Hey!” I yelled.

  Since my voice didn’t carry through her headphones, I gesticulated my hands. That caught her attention. She looked up from her laptop. A frown gusted over her face, but then she recognized me, and a sizeable smile curved her lips. She held up a finger, tapped on her laptop—probably cuing up the next song—and then she lowered her headphones.

  “Welcome to my den. Did you just get here?”

  I leaned over the tall booth. “I need Julian’s phone number.”

  “Why?”

  “I need to ask him something.”

  “Ask me instead.”

  I supposed I could ask her. “I’ve been invited to your brother’s wedding, and I need a dress.”

  She frowned, her thin eyebrows slanting over her wide brown eyes. “Not sure what you heard, but my uncle doesn’t wear dresses.”