Kellee had the oddest look on her face while I talked with the family of werewolves. Glen's eyebrows were raised a little as well. Leigh asked me what happened to my salad after I ate it and I told her. I'd only ordered the salad and a glass of wine. Somehow, the wine made it easier to get rid of everything later. Go figure. "Of course you only should do something like that if you're what I am," I said. I didn't want to give anybody else ideas on what to do with their dinner and I certainly wasn't promoting eating disorders. Leigh laughed as I explained that.
Kellee, for some reason, rubbed against Winkler throughout the entire meal, feeding him bits of her dinner and that sort of thing. If she was jealous, she needn't be. I was getting over it. I'd even told Gavin the last time he'd called that Winkler had found himself a lady wolf and I'd used the term lady loosely. Gavin seemed quite happy about it. If he knew I'd talked to Tony, he'd probably go back to cursing in multiple languages.
Leigh asked about my ring, too. She'd been admiring it. "Is that an engagement ring?" she asked.
"Yes," I nodded.
"What's his name?"
"Gavin. And if you added up the ages of everybody at this table, you still wouldn't come close to hitting his numbers," I said. Winkler almost choked on that.
"What's that like?" Leigh was smiling.
"Uncomfortable at times," I admitted. "He speaks quite a few languages and I can't understand him half the time."
I thought Kellee was going to have a fit when Leigh invited me to go out with her after dinner, "to have a drink or two," she'd said. Kellee wasn't invited to go along. I went after Weldon said he didn't need me; Glen was enough protection. Honestly, Winkler would have been better off with Leigh than the airhead he was towing around but that wasn't my choice to make. Another werewolf joined us at the bar and I could tell Leigh liked him a lot. His name was Brady and he watched over Leigh while she had a couple of beers. Now that was love. Leigh wanted to sing Karaoke when they got that started. That's how I was dragged up on stage, and Leigh and I did Dancing Queen. I hadn't sung anything since I'd been turned but it came back and I was able to hold my breaths better, for some reason. Yeah, I used to sing once in a while. I sang at my mother's church growing up. I turned down a music scholarship when I graduated from high school so I could stay home and commute to school at OU. I took the art scholarship instead. Leigh and I got some applause when we finished.
"Do something else," Leigh begged, so I looked through the options and chose Take a Bow.
Leigh's brothers, Weldon, Glen, Winkler and Kellee all came in shortly after the song started. I ignored them and went on. Leigh was back when that one was done, asking me to do one for her father. I did To Where You Are for Thomas Williams Sr. If I'd had a piano there, I would have provided the music as well but the bar didn't have one. There was a standing ovation when I finished that song. I left the stage afterward.
"I wish I'd known you could do that," Winkler muttered in my ear.
"We don't always get to know everything, do we?" I said and walked out of the bar with Leigh and Brady.
They dropped me off at the hotel as I asked and I went walking after that. I even called Gavin. "Lissa?" he sounded so surprised. I suppose he should be.
"Hi, honey," I said. "I just wanted to see how you were."
"I am well," he replied. Yeah. I was homesick. I didn't think that was possible, but it was. And Winkler's defection for bubblehead hurt a little, too. I knew I should make the call short and sweet before I embarrassed myself. "I am home for the moment," he went on, "but they will most likely send me out again."
"Always a problem, huh?" I asked. "Honey, do they ever let you take a vacation?"
"I could request time," he said. "Would you like that cara?"
"Yeah. I think I would," I replied. "All this traveling is wearing me down, I think."
"When you return, we will plan something."
"That sounds good, honey. I should go. I love you."
"And I you, cara mia." I snapped the phone shut before I started blubbering like a fool.
Thomas' confirmation went very well and Weldon handed over a framed certificate afterward, along with a photograph of his father's gravesite on his North Dakota property. The certificate was similar to mine only it denoted the service that Thomas Williams Sr. had rendered to the Grand Master and the werewolf race as a whole.
Thomas and his entire family hugged me before we left, including his mother, who apologized for crying. I told her that her tears were an honor and worthy of her husband. She hugged me again. Kellee and Winkler had their first fight that night; I could hear it even though Weldon and I were two rooms away. Glen must have been going crazy since he was right next to them. The sex afterward was almost as noisy. I just shook my head. Weldon covered his head with a pillow and turned over in an agitated manner.
We stopped in Fresno briefly so Weldon could pass a second certificate off to Martin Walters. It was nice to see him again and he smiled and took my hand. His wife was there so a hug was probably out of the question. Too bad he couldn't receive mindspeech; I'd have told him he looked nice and asked about his two children. Another stop in the Los Angeles area followed and it went without a hitch. We went on to Arizona after that and it was fine. Kellee and Winkler were still at it hot and heavy, either sex or fights. I wondered why they didn't just head on to Dallas. Weldon did his best to ignore them, most of the time. Glen rolled his eyes every chance he got when Winkler wasn't looking. I just kept my mouth shut. New Mexico was next and that was the one I was worried over.
Chapter 12
There were three confirmations in New Mexico: Albuquerque, Taos and Santa Fe. Lester's Pack was in Santa Fe and I had no idea who had taken it over. Weldon wasn't sharing that information, either. Albuquerque was our first stop; we landed there and would take cars or SUVs to the other locations. At least my skin wasn't itching; that was a good sign as far as I was concerned. We arrived late enough that Weldon wouldn't be doing anything until the following evening. I knew the trip was wearing on me so it had to be wearing on him. I walked up beside him as we headed toward the two SUVs and slipped my arm through his.
"Are you holding up, Grand Master?"
Weldon stopped, pulled his arm away and placed it around my shoulders instead. "I've been better," he said. I knew then that he wasn't looking forward to dealing with New Mexico any more than I was.
"We'll get through this," I said and leaned my cheek against his shoulder.
"We will," he nodded and we walked on.
Kellee was already whining when we arrived at the hotel. Thankfully, she and Winkler drove their own SUV so Weldon, Glen and I were spared at least that much. The werewolves were all hungry too, so we dropped off our bags and trooped out to a restaurant to find something to eat. It turned out to be a twenty-four hour diner that the truckers liked, just off I-40. Winkler growled at a trucker who leered at Kellee on the way in. Kellee was a werewolf; she could have put that poor man through one of the plate glass windows lining the restaurant. Kellee—all six feet of her—simpered for Winkler's benefit I'm sure. Yes, she was pretty and she knew it, with long, straight, almost black hair. She had dark eyes, too, but she wore colored contacts, not because she needed them but to change the color of her eyes. I'd never seen a werewolf that needed glasses. Her eyes were a gray-blue with the contacts. She could have been a model if she wanted but she'd gone into her father's business. He was an attorney in Boise and the Packmaster on top of that. Kellee hadn't gone to law school; she was a paralegal and happily told anybody and everybody. I'm sure daddy paid her well or still supported her; a pair of her least expensive shoes would feed a family of six for two weeks. I think Glen hated her already.
Winkler ordered two stacks of pancakes with extra bacon and sausage. Kellee only ordered two pancakes and two strips of bacon and then proceeded to eat off Winkler's plate. Weldon noticed and just shook his head. I'm sure he was with Glen all the way on this one. Everybody always said love was blind. They
just didn't say anything about it being deaf and dumb, too.
* * *
Merrill inspected the Enforcers and Assassins that lined the wall of the warehouse. Wlodek had even considered coming for this but he'd been convinced to stay behind. "No sense losing both of us if that's what comes to pass," Merrill said and Wlodek eventually nodded his head in agreement. The information was kept from most of the Council. Flavio knew and he was there now, the only Council member that had come. Radomir had also come, as had Russell and Will. Robert and Albert, the mindspeakers were there, along with Gervais, one of the misters. Gavin would have come if Wlodek asked but this involved Lissa and he didn't want Gavin anywhere close since Lissa might guess at his nearness. They didn't want her to know; they wanted her out of the way while they attempted to take care of the situation. All they needed was for Saxom's brood to get their hands on her. Saxom was very old when he'd been killed. Adam Chessman, the former Chief of Enforcers had taken Saxom down before his own swift and subsequent disappearance. Saxom never registered any turns with the Council so these vampires could be many and quite old as well.
Dalroy and Rhett walked in while Merrill was turning these thoughts over in his mind. Merrill hadn't met them before so they introduced themselves. Merrill had never had a problem with American vampires; in fact, all his living children were American. He smiled slightly at these two. Dalroy's records indicated he was a Texas Ranger when he'd been turned; he'd been severely wounded in a battle on the Texas-Mexican border. Rhett was slightly younger, turned by Dalroy fifty years later after being shot outside a bar in New Mexico. Originally, Rhett was from Philadelphia and a medical student at the time. His father, a physician, had given permission for his son to explore the Wild West before returning to school. His exploration had cost him his human life.
"Some of you know a little about why we're here," Merrill said after they'd gathered together. "This is what you don't know."
* * *
We had dinner with the new Packmaster and his wife the evening of February eleventh. It was a Thursday night and we weren't fighting weekend crowds but the restaurant was busy anyway. Kellee made sure she gushed and complimented the Packmaster's wife when we were introduced. Didn't matter to me; I didn't have history with this woman. She was a little embarrassed over it I could tell, and when Kellee asked if she wanted to do something after dinner, the woman was too polite to say no. That meant that Kellee, Lewis and Marian Gilliam (Packmaster and wife) and Winkler all went to see a movie after they finished eating. I hoped they liked Kellee's kind of movies because that's what they were surely going to get.
Glen was growling as he watched Kellee and Winkler climb into the Packmaster's car. Lewis said he'd drop them off at the hotel afterward. Glen turned to me, then, and said something that I will always remember. "Lissa," he said. "I had my doubts when Winkler brought a vampire into the house. I'm old school and remember when the vamps and the wolves used to tear each other apart. I have to tell you, though, that I would pay money to work alongside you any day rather than spend one day at extra pay with what Winkler's out with right now."
Glen always operated in Phil's shadow. When I'd been hired by Winkler, Phil was Winkler's Second and had turned on him the moment Winkler completed his security software. Someone had offered Phil a lot of money and the Dallas Pack. After Phil's death, Glen slid farther into the background and Davis had taken over the Second's spot. I blinked up into Glen's dark blue eyes for a moment after he made his announcement. "The feeling is mutual," I said, offering him my hand. He took it and shook firmly. Weldon witnessed the entire thing; he was smiling slightly as we walked toward our SUV.
Lewis was a good pick for the Albuquerque Pack; the Packmembers seemed to respect him and the confirmation on Friday night went without any problems. We spent Saturday night in Albuquerque, so I located a laundry near the hotel and did laundry for everybody except Winkler and Kellee. When she found that out on Sunday, she stewed about it all day until I woke Sunday evening on our way to Taos. I was riding in the SUV with Weldon and Glen. Glen unzips my bag but he doesn't take me out of it like Winkler does. I think he was afraid of offending me. I was discovering that Glen was a gentleman. Kellee borrowed Winkler's cell phone and called me from the other car.
"Well, it was certainly nice of you to ask if we had any laundry that needed doing," she spat, right after I said hello. Yeah, I should have asked—that would have been polite—but miss lily-white could do her own laundry as far as I was concerned. I wasn't getting paid for this trip. Not that I knew of, anyway. I was Pack and had been requested by the Grand Master. The Council had agreed so here I was.
"Hello, Kellee, how are you?" I asked tiredly, instead of responding to her accusation. Glen was driving and he and Weldon were listening in on the conversation.
"All you had to do was ask. I have a bunch of things that need to be washed," Kellee was still spilling acid over the phone.
"Kellee, I didn't want to interrupt you and Winkler," I said, being as tactfully sarcastic as I could. Glen snickered.
"You could have phoned us, I'd have been glad to leave our things outside the door for you."
All right, that pissed me off. Really. Even Weldon drew in a breath at the insult. I was nothing more than hired help to Kellee and I'm sorry to say I let my temper run away with me. "You know what, Kellee, if you'd get off your back once in a while, you could actually do some of these things for yourself. And if Winkler would stop thinking with his smaller brain for a few minutes, he could help. When are you going to tell him, Kellee? When are you going to tell him you're pregnant?"
As soon as it left my mouth, I slapped a hand over it, but it was already too late; I'd spilled what I'd known for two days. My sensitive nose had told me and now Winkler was going to pay through his own nose, whether he married her or not. At least he'd get a child out of it. I hoped Kellee wouldn't teach it to hold his father and the rest of the world in contempt like she did.
Glen had swerved the car and Weldon had his eyes glued on me over the back of his seat at the news. No doubt Winkler had been listening in on the whole conversation, his hearing was still fine as far as I could tell. "You don't know that!" Kellee started shouting over the phone. "How can you possibly know that? You're lying!"
"Nope, not lying," I said and terminated the call. Someday, maybe I'd learn to control myself—develop that stone face that every other vampire wore. Someday. Weldon's phone rang in seconds—it was Winkler calling. He wanted to pull over at the next available spot. We were coming up on a truck stop so both vehicles whipped into the parking lot. Kellee was crying when she got out of the car, Winkler was cursing and there I was, the cause of it all. No, I didn't get Kellee pregnant but I'd certainly spilled the beans.
Weldon took charge of the situation, thank goodness. We all trooped inside the truck stop after Weldon told Winkler to calm down and stop yelling and we all sat at a table off in a corner and ordered coffee.
"Now, Kellee, were you aware you were pregnant?" Weldon looked at her.
"I was only a few days late," she sniffed. She might get sympathy from Winkler and the others but I wasn't going to offer any. Winkler had probably done the deed when he laid her the first time. He wasn't even looking at me, which was fine, I guess. I hadn't been the one to tell him to screw her. I'd just driven her rental car to our hotel like an obedient little servant so he could take her with him in the SUV.
"Let's go buy a pregnancy test," Glen suggested. Weldon nodded. I had no idea what this meant in the werewolf world. Glen asked our waitress where the nearest pharmacy would be that stayed open late and she told us there was something in Española, only a few miles down the road. We paid for our coffee and left. Winkler was fidgeting and growling a little whenever Weldon wasn't looking as we waited outside the pharmacy restroom. Kellee came out with the little plastic thing in her hand and she was crying again. Winkler looked at it and said, "Fuck." I kept my mouth shut this time and didn't point out that the word he'd just said
was why he was in this fix to begin with.
"I'll contact her father tomorrow and make arrangements," Weldon said.
"Does this mean a shotgun wedding?" I asked Glen quietly a little later. Kellee was going up and down the brightly lit aisles of the pharmacy, buying an armload of tissues and other things. Winkler was frowning the entire time he followed her around and then paid for everything, of course.
"In a manner of speaking, yes," Glen whispered back. "If her father had anyone picked out for her, there's compensation to be made. And now, because of the law, we'll have to put up with her until she has the second one." Glen wasn't looking forward to that, I could tell. I just patted his back in sympathy and headed toward the car. I didn't get any more phone calls during the rest of the trip into Taos, which was fine with me. I felt bad enough as it was.
"How did you know?" Weldon asked me later while he was preparing for bed.
"The smell," I said. "I knew Kathy Jo was pregnant, too, when she got married."
"You knew that," Weldon was turning it over in his mind. "We can smell it after a while, but it takes a little longer than this." He raked fingers through his hair.
I didn't tell him about the other things my nose told me. That I could tell who somebody's parent or parents were, whether they were human, vampire or werewolf. That I could sniff out their age, too. I had Weldon pegged around eighty or ninety. No wonder he liked that forty year-old woman. She was more than likely half his age. More power to her, in my opinion. Where do people get off telling others that love is only for the young and pretty? Everybody needs it. Everybody.
Kellee had a conversation with her father, as had Weldon. Kellee's dad was probably hopping with glee when he found out who'd gotten his little girl pregnant. Her dad was an important man in Boise, but Winkler was important everywhere. Kellee was in a better mood when we went to dinner with the new Packmaster and his Second that night. Winkler, on the other hand, hardly spoke at all. He came to find me later after Kellee was asleep.
Blood Passage (Blood Destiny #2) Page 22