“Why do you always think your clothes will magically reappear?”
“I don’t know. The Hulk was never naked, or Bruce Banner for that matter.”
“The Hulk doesn’t exist. Plus, he wasn’t a werewolf.”
“Until a few weeks ago, werewolves didn’t exist,” Reagan said, trying to distract herself.
How many times had Rowan seen her naked? She shuddered at the thought, a blush creeping onto her face. Rowan handed her some stretch pants, a sports bra, and a top. “Thanks.” Desperately holding the clothing against her body, she continued, “I’ll be right back. I’m not going to stand here and talk to you naked.”
Rowan had a towel wrapped around his hips. His body was chiseled in ways that shouldn’t be allowed. Before she started drooling and further embarrassed herself, she moved toward the cave. Then a thought struck her.
“Wait, what do we do when we’re in the forest? You don’t have a crew who follows us around with clothes do you?” Please say yes, please say yes.
“No. We’re a friendly bunch. There’s nothing to be ashamed of.” There was a glint in his eye she wanted to punch away. Instead of responding, she headed to change. She’d have to make sure she formed some kind of clothes crew, or see if she could flirt with some young werewolf and get him to carry clothes around for her. My life is in danger, and I’m worried about being naked. She told herself to grow up.
As she was dressing, she considered her new way of communicating. Fear registered deep in her gut. Clothed, she headed back out to find Rowan. If her thought had any bearing, she could be a dangerous liability to the whole group.
He’d changed into shorts, but nothing else. She forced herself to concentrate despite his perfect pecs. “I think I’ve gotten the hang of talking to people. Or at least some people. I’ve been meaning to ask you something.” She was worried about the answer, but she was also sidetracked by the sexy smirk on his face. Did he already know what her question was?
“I know I can communicate, but can I read others’ thoughts? Can they read mine?”
“That takes longer. To communicate, you need a bond. It doesn’t have to be intimate, but you need to have met. To read someone’s mind, there has to be a closer bond, a more intimate relationship.”
His sexy grin was now smoldering, and she was sure he knew her response to it. She refocused. “So, could I learn to read Sam’s mind? Or, someone in my family?” Or a boyfriend? She shook off the thought. But another one, one that terrified her, replaced it. “Does that mean Rafe can read my thoughts?”
Rowan’s expression turned on a dime, the playful sexiness gone. She sensed anger. Or was it jealousy? Was she just hoping it was jealousy, that he saw her that way?
“Did you screw him?”
Definitely anger. And not just his. “That’s none of your business.” How dare he ask her that!
“It’s all of our business. It’s dangerous if you made that kind of connection with Rafe.” Madeleine came out of nowhere.
Reagan still wondered if Rowan was jealous earlier, but she was sure Madeleine reeked of it now. “No. We did not have sex.” Reagan paused, struggling with her inner thoughts. Or at least I don’t think so. She hated how little she knew about her time with Rafe. One thing she knew for sure, however. “But, he did try to rape me. There, are you both happy?”
Reagan couldn’t read Madeleine’s face as she turned to Rowan. “She’s not good for us.”
Whether the us referred to the whole pack or just Madeleine and Rowan, Reagan wasn’t sure. She didn’t care, there were more important things to discuss. “Now that we’ve ruled out Rafe reading my thoughts, what about Sam?” Then, another thought occurred to her. “What about you? He’s your brother. Can’t he read your thoughts?”
“I had to work with someone to make sure that wasn’t a possibility. Now, you’ll need to work on a blocking spell just in case. I’m sure your grandmother can help you when we can get her here.”
“This whole werewolf practicing witchcraft thing takes a lot of getting used to. I just never imagined—” Intense pain shot through Reagan’s body, taking her breath away. She fell to her knees.
Rowan bent down to be on eye level with her and lifted her head so he could look her in the eyes. He went to take her hand and gasped. She looked down and saw that her necklace was glowing and felt extremely hot. He lifted it away from her skin. A mark was singed just above her bra-line on her left side. It was the Algiz symbol. She remembered Nana said it was for protection when she gave Reagan the first necklace.
After a few cleansing breaths, the excruciating fire subsided to a dull ache. With every development, her questions were mounting. As much as she wanted to beg and plead for the answers, she sensed Rowan wouldn’t tell her anything without Papa present. If Rowan even knew how to explain this one. Papa seemed to be some kind of leader, which was weird since Rowan had been around longer. Plus there had to be even older members of the pack. Who turned Rafe and Rowan? Why? Why did Papa seem to be the alpha?
Maybe the best person to ask was the very person who wanted her gone and this whole prophecy thing settled. Someone who would love to hurt her with knowledge.
Madeleine.
In addition to a weapons room and a cafeteria, the caves had sleeping quarters and a number of rooms filled with tables, chairs, and electronic equipment. They resembled conference rooms and included big screens that descended from the ceiling with the push of a button. Reagan still had no clue how such an intricate setup came to be, and her life was too overwhelming for her to care. The sleeping quarters were crude. Very few people had private rooms. Most were set up like army barracks, or at least that was how they looked from what she’d seen in movies. Each one had several bunk beds and shared bathroom facilities.
Papa was one of the few who had a private room, although it was pretty sparse. He had a single bed, a couple of trunks, and a desk with a computer. When she arrived, he had another single bed brought in so they could be together. She was glad, because she slept better at night knowing he was nearby; although she was fully aware Rowan was just a few rooms away. This knowledge had kept her up a few nights, tossing and turning with intense dreams.
Right now, she was trying to find Madeleine’s room. It was time they had a chat. Funny, every time Reagan didn’t want her nemesis to show up, the raven-haired beauty appeared. But now that Reagan wanted to find the woman—nothing. After an hour, and knowing most of the residents were heading to bed, Reagan gave up and headed back to her room. Papa was already there and working on the computer.
She walked up behind him, but he didn’t seem to notice. On the screen was a map of the Colorado Springs area, one similar to the big one they were looking at earlier. “What are you looking for?” Reagan asked.
“Jackie and I got to catch up the other night. There’s a place we can meet that nobody but us knows about. A place from back in the day.”
“Oooohhh.” Reagan hoped her grandparents had a chance to catch up on lost times, although she certainly didn’t want any kind of details. Plus, she wondered if werewolf sex was dangerous, if they could control their strength, especially if the other partner wasn’t a werewolf. She shuddered, grossed out for a moment that her grandfather made her wonder about him and Nana making out. “How’s your jaw, by the way?” Reagan couldn’t help but mention it.
“I deserved that and more,” he said, never looking up from the map. “Anyway, we’ve narrowed down where Cheveyo might be. Or at least who might know where he is. I need to figure this out and have a little chat with him.”
“Don’t think you’re going without me. I deserve to know the answers as much as, or more than, anyone. This all affects me. And Sam.” Sam. A chill ran up Reagan’s spine. “Do you think Rafe is looking for Cheveyo, too?”
“Oh, I suspect he is. He always seems to know things he shouldn’t. After all, he got to you before we could. That’s why I think we need to move fast, probably tomorrow. Early. And, no, I hadn’t planned
to go without you. You have too much skin in the game.”
“Dog with a bone, skin in the game; you really know how to throw out the puns, don’t you?”
He spun around in his chair. “This is all very serious. I hope you understand that. Some of the people we’re dealing with are pure evil, and they’ll stop at nothing to get what they want. There are so many forces at play here, beyond even the witches and werewolves you already know about.”
Her brain went into overdrive. She’d read almost every young adult paranormal book on the market. What was real? What wasn’t? Then it hit her, rarely was there a werewolf book without mention of their one true enemy—the vampire. “Oh my God, do vampires exist?”
“Yes, but we kind of stay away from each other. Most vampires have learned, as most of us have, how to coexist with humans. We don’t want people to know about us. At least most of us don’t. There are a few vampires I trust, and I’ve gone to them for information from time to time.”
She was torn between feelings of awe and pure terror. “I have so many questions. I’m actually sick of hearing myself ask them, but I don’t even really know about our species. Plus, I want to ask about other creatures.”
“What do you want to know? Obviously you know we change, that we don’t all need the moon to do so, and that we don’t change back fully clothed.” He snickered.
“Oh, God, you talked to Rowan.”
His smile grew larger. “Yes. I know I told you to be serious, but your Hulk reference allowed me a much needed laugh. I haven’t had a whole lot of laughing since that night.” His lips turned back to a scowl and the tension was evident in his forehead again. For a moment, he’d looked younger, almost like the picture Nana had shown Reagan not long ago. Then reality returned, the weight of everything, and the wrinkles spread.
“There are others. Those who can never turn back and are endlessly stuck in wolf form. They’re vicious; angry about losing their ability to walk among humans. Rafe has quite a following of them. They’re easy to spot, since their eyes glow an intense red, but hard to escape.”
She felt like a starved lion standing over a freshly killed zebra, ravenous for the next morsel. She craved information, but every new answer only led her to several more questions. “What kills us? Are these red-eyed wolves harder to kill than others?”
“Silver bullets will kill us, that much of urban legend is true. But silver has to get into our bloodstream—silver bullets, silver-tipped arrows, explosives with silver. You can imagine the possibilities. But we can hold silver. Chopping off a werewolf’s head will be the end of him, as well as a vampire draining him, or—”
With each death option, she winced and cringed. She was starting to get the gist of the various ways to murder a werewolf, so she interrupted his dissertation. “Okay, I think I have the idea. Or, at least all I care to hear today.”
He laid a hand on her shoulder. “There’s so much more training you should have, but time isn’t our friend. Rafe will stop at nothing to have you, and he’s already left a trail of dead bodies in his path. I just got my family back. I’m not going to lose them again.”
“Why is Rafe so evil? Aren’t there older werewolves, like a group of elders or something, a group that oversees all of your kind? Well, our kind.”
“You really have read too many books. Sure, there are werewolves older than us, but we age and we die. We don’t age as fast as humans, but we’re obviously not immortal. Actually, I consider immortality a curse afforded to the likes of vampires. Life is meant to have a cycle, and that includes death. Although that’s one of the reasons Rafe is fighting so hard. Being immortal is something he wants.”
She processed for a minute. She never thought she’d been made immortal, not that she knew what it would feel like, but she’d read enough books to know werewolves weren’t. Then again, those were fiction books, so she couldn’t trust anything she thought she knew. “Can a werewolf become immortal if a vampire bites him?”
A curious look spread across Papa’s face. He tilted his head and looked right through her. “You amaze me. You aren’t freaking out, and you’re asking questions most people would think were ludicrous. Funny, your mother made sure you had nothing to do with witchcraft or your grandmother, but she let you read about every creature possible.”
She’d never thought about it like that. He was right; it didn’t make sense. Questions piled on questions, enough to form Pike’s Peak. Very close to where she was now. “I agree. It’s weird. Wait, I’m confused. How can Rafe gain this immortality he wants?”
“Through the prophecy.”
A loud boom rocked the cave before she had a chance to push for him to finally share the prophecy. He grabbed her hand and led her out of the room. Chaos erupted in the hallways. People were pushing and shoving and a red light was flashing, cutting through the darkness. Just as her eyes adjusted, she and Papa arrived at the weapons room. Rowan and the usual cohorts, including a barely dressed Madeleine, were already there.
“What is it?” Papa demanded.
“A breach. South entrance,” Rowan said. “Sasha was monitoring the video cameras when she saw a dark figure brutally attack our two armed guards. She locked it down and sent the closest outdoor guards over to investigate, but the intruder was already gone.”
For the first time, Reagan realized how young Sasha looked. She was the epitome of a California girl, tanned skin and white blonde hair, and appeared to be no more than twenty. Her bright blue eyes and ripped body would’ve been the envy of Reagan’s high school class, and Superior had had plenty of enviable blondes running around.
Papa motioned toward Sasha. “Come with me. I want to see the security footage.” On his way out of the room, he stopped beside Rowan. “Get Reagan ready for tomorrow, and pack a couple of bags. It may not be safe to come back here.”
Reagan’s head was spinning. There was never a dull moment. With rare exception, every person she’d seen in the caves was in their late teens or early twenties. At least, they appeared to be. And they were on constant alert. Would life ever be normal again?
“Earth to Reagan,” Rowan said, snapping her out of her head. “I have a few things to do, but Jed wants you to get more training. Madeleine, how about you partner up with her?”
“As you wish,” Madeleine said with a hand on her hip and an obnoxious gleam in her eye. “Anything for you.”
Reagan wanted to scream out against Rowan’s suggestion, but she suspected Madeleine was a skilled fighter; after all, she’d earned her way into Papa’s tight circle. Plus, Reagan needed some answers, and she had a feeling Madeleine was more than willing to spill.
“Follow me,” Madeleine said. “If you can keep up, that is.”
Reagan pushed her shoulders back, straightened to her full height, and followed Madeleine into the hallway. Walking just a few feet, they turned into an entryway. Inside was an exercise haven that would be envied by elite health clubs everywhere. Reagan panned her eyes around the room. Free weights, every exercise machine imaginable, gymnastics equipment, and hanging punching bags filled the enormous space. To the right was an area with wrestling mats aligned neatly on the floor. Mirrors ran the length of the shorter wall on that side, and there was a rock climbing wall to the left. It went up at least three stories to another level.
Dark fabric entered her side vision, coming toward her face. Startled, Reagan swatted it down.
“Great reflexes. You might just have some skills for me to work with,” Madeleine said. “But don’t worry, it’s only some better clothes for training. Throw them on, and let’s get to work.”
Reagan never broke eye contact with Madeleine, except for the few seconds it took to switch tops. “I’ll do what it takes, you know, to save my family. I’m not here to be the damsel in distress, but I also didn’t ask for this.”
“Nobody asked for this. We’re all doing the best we can with what life has handed us.” Madeleine walked over to the hanging boxing bags and braced herself again
st one. “Okay, you stand on the other side. I want you to punch it with all you’ve got. Get some gloves from over there.” She pointed to a bench nearby.
Reagan walked over and picked the gloves up, pushed her hands into them, and wrapped the straps tightly around her wrists. She’d taken Taekwondo in her early teen years. Pumped and ready to go, she hit the bag a couple of times. Madeleine let out a yawn. “Come on! I know you have more in you than that. Imagine it’s Rafe. Two of his cronies have your brother held down, and all that stands in your way is the jerk who tried to rape you.”
Images from their late night rendezvous in the gazebo came flooding back along with the horror of Yellowstone, every terror-filled moment Rafe had caused. A rage like Reagan had never known flowed through her. She started punching the bag, seeing Rafe’s face rearing back with each blow.
“Whoa, look at the señorita go.” Reagan jerked her head around to find Ricardo clapping his hands. “Impressive.”
“Guess we have to get this one mad to see her full potential,” Madeleine purred.
Sweat poured off Reagan as she was taken from one activity to another: boxing, weightlifting, jumping jacks, burpees, mountain climbers, and many other tortuous routines ending in more sparring. She needed a break but refused to ask for one, which made it sweeter when Rowan’s voice broke through the pain.
“I knew she’d be a natural. After all, there’s quite a bloodline flowing through her.”
Reagan wasn’t sure if he was talking about her family or the werewolf who attacked her. That’s when she realized she’d never asked that question. “Who was the one who scratched me?”
Rowan’s eyes were intent on her, but she noticed Ricardo and Madeleine were studying Rowan. Silence followed.
“All the training in the world isn’t going to help me if you guys don’t start being honest with me. I still don’t know the details about that night. I remember Rowan leaning over me, but I also know Rafe and his wolves were there. Please tell me it wasn’t Rafe.” Please don’t let it be Rafe’s blood flowing through my veins.
Tala Prophecy: The Complete Series Page 21