by Lori Drake
“I wasn’t there.” She lifted herself up to sit on the edge of the counter.
“What happened in the woods, then? You were there for that.”
“I was.”
“Come on, Jess, talk to me. I just want to help.”
She hesitated, glancing toward the door. “There’s nothing you can do.”
Chris followed the direction of her glance with a frown, then broke off and walked back to the door. He flipped the other switch on the wall, turning on the fan. It rattled noisily as he walked back to her.
“Talk to me,” he said, keeping his voice low. Even a wolf-eared eavesdropper would have difficulty making out their words over the interference of the fan. “What do I need to do to prove you can trust me?”
Jessica still hesitated, but then said, “A favor. To be named later.”
Chris frowned. “I’m not having sex with you.”
She smirked. “A non-sexual favor.”
Still, Chris hesitated. “Non-sexual favor” covered a lot of territory. A lot of territory. “You’re asking for a pretty big leap of faith here.”
“You’re asking me to trust you. Trust me in return.”
“Okay, a favor. One favor. But I draw the line at anything illegal or immoral.”
“What kind of girl do you think I am?”
“I have no idea what kind of girl you are, other than the ‘pot brownie baking, crawl into bed with strangers’ kind. That’s the whole point.”
She laughed, eyes twinkling. “Okay, fair enough.”
He did not laugh, or even smile. “Spill.”
Her expression sobered quickly. “I don’t know who attacked Jenny for certain, but my money’s on the man in the woods. We’ve encountered him before.”
“Encountered how?”
“He killed two wolves in this area last year.”
Chris rocked back on his heels and whistled through his teeth. “A hunter?”
She nodded. “We thought he was gone, but he’s clearly back.”
“But you had him outnumbered in the woods, with all of you in wolf form… why not press the advantage?”
Jessica shrugged and looked away. “He caught us by surprise. After what happened to Jenny, I guess we just panicked.”
Chris gently turned her face back toward his, meeting her eyes when she lifted them. “What do you know about him?”
“Um, his name’s Ted and he lives out in Redwood.” She smirked.
“Be serious.”
“They call him the Butcher. He’s been stomping around the Pacific Northwest for the last five years, leaving a trail of dead, dismembered wolves in his wake.”
Chris felt the color drain from his face. “That’s… serious.”
“Yeah. Eric called a hunt after we lost Micah last year, but the Butcher gave us the slip. We didn’t know he knew where we lived, but…”
“He knows, obviously. So now what?”
“Eric wants to go after him, but the others are too afraid.”
“I’d go. Joey’d go. Hell, probably Ben too. All he has to do is ask.”
Jessica snorted. “This is Eric we’re talking about.”
She had a point. “He won’t ask, and taking matters into our own hands would just piss him off.”
“Exactly.”
Chris stepped back and rubbed his face. “We can’t let his ego get in the way. Lives are at stake. Hell, our lives are at stake just as much as yours are.”
“They don’t have to be.”
“What?”
Jessica hopped down from her perch on the counter. “Go home. Take Joey and Ben with you. This isn’t your fight.”
Chris shook his head. “What do you mean, ‘not my fight’? The man’s a hunter. It doesn’t matter which pack we belong to. He’ll take out whoever he can get his… silver bullets on.”
“I had a feeling you’d say something like that.” She sighed and leaned down to snag the plunger from where it stood by the toilet. He watched her in confusion as she turned back toward him, moving so swiftly that her arm—not to mention the plunger—blurred. The wooden handle cracked him upside the head.
Pain exploded behind his eyes. The world went gray and fuzzy around the edges. Jessica stood with the plunger still gripped in one hand, an air of sadness clinging to her like cheap perfume. Her eyes lowered. It took him a moment to realize why. She was looking down at him. Or, rather, at his body where it lay on the tiled bathroom floor.
Joey stepped out of the hall into the living room and found Ben leaning against the back of the couch.
“Now what?” he asked.
A quick glance around revealed no one else in the room. “Where’s Chris? And Jess?”
Ben shrugged. “Dunno. They were already gone when I got into the hall.”
The memory of interrupting them upstairs flashed through Joey’s mind. She shoved it aside and swallowed the knot in her throat. If they wanted to run off and canoodle, far be it from her to stop them. No matter how inappropriate the timing.
“Something wrong?” Ben tilted his head, a thoughtful expression on his face.
“Yes. This whole fucked-up situation is what is wrong.” She turned toward Itsuo and caught his eyes. “What the hell is going on?”
Itsuo spread his hands. “I do not know, Josephine-san. I just got here myself. But I intend to find out, if you’ll excuse me. I will come find you shortly.” He bowed and waited for her nod before turning to go.
Joey sighed and flopped into a chair. “This is ridiculous. Maybe we should just go. They clearly don’t want our help. Remind me why we’re still here?”
“Because there’s a man in the woods taking potshots at us?”
Joey held up her index finger. “Correction. There’s a man in the woods that took a potshot at them. A pack of wolves. What man with a gun wouldn’t defend himself against that?”
“What man goes wandering in the woods at night with a gun?” Ben countered.
“It’s an open carry state,” Joey grumbled, but he did have a point. She sighed and rubbed her temples. It was late, and she was beyond tired. She’d been up since first light, anxious about Chris’s homecoming. What a homecoming it’d turned out to be. “What about Brandon? He must know something. Maybe he’d open up to you.”
“I was working on that when you came to get me.”
Joey glanced toward the hallway. “I can try Lucy again. Maybe she’d be more forthcoming without Jess in the room.” Mentioning her was a stark reminder of what Joey was trying not to think about. She sighed and rubbed her temples some more.
Ben straightened and walked over to her. “Why don’t you find an out-of-the-way spot to grab a little nap? You look beat.”
“If I close my eyes now, I might not be able to wake up again until morning.”
“So?” He leaned down and put a hand on her shoulder, giving it a squeeze. “I promise I’ll wake you up for any new developments.”
Joey shrugged off his hand and straightened in her chair. “Just go talk to Brandon, okay? I’m going to wait here for Itsuo.” She yawned, jaw popping in the process. “Or morning. Whichever comes first.”
Ben nodded, but grabbed the blanket from the back of the couch and tossed it at her on his way past. Joey smirked, but murmured a thank you and shook the blanket open, drawing it around her as she listened to Ben’s footsteps retreat up the stairs. She was surprised she couldn’t see her breath, as cold as it was in the house. Eric was such a cheapskate. Now that she knew the house belonged to Chris, she was more than a little bit annoyed at how Eric had let it go over the years. Everywhere but his own room, apparently. She amended her internal assessment to selfish cheapskate.
What kind of Alpha hoarded all the good things for himself, relegating his pack to the aging cast-offs? A shitty Alpha, that was what. Was it fear of Eric or loyalty to Eric that kept the others guarding his secrets so closely?
She closed her eyes for a moment while the thoughts chased each other around inside her tired
head like wolves chasing their tails. Was that what she’d been doing for the last two months? Chasing her own tail?
It’s not too late. You can still walk away.
The thought floated through her mind as she drifted on the edge of consciousness.
But what kind of alpha would that make me?
12
Chris found Ben with Jenny and Itsuo downstairs, in Kate’s room. Stepping inside, surrounded by the evidence of a life cut short, he couldn’t help the twinge of guilt that tugged at his heartstrings. He could only imagine what it must be like for Colt. If he’d known their quest would bring them here, he would’ve suggested Colt stay upstairs with the others.
As they entered, Itsuo stood from the chair beside the bed. “Christopher-san.”
“Um, hey… what’s the occasion?” Ben asked, looking up from Jenny’s stomach. “And what the hell happened to his neck?”
Chris grimaced, glancing at Colt. “Long story, but you should probably take a look at him when you’re done. How’s she doing?”
“She’s healing. Otherwise, no change.”
Chris moved forward for a closer look. Jenny’s bandage was pulled back, long row of stitches on display. To Chris’s inexpert eye, it looked better than the last time he’d seen it. “Can she be moved yet?”
“I wouldn’t recommend it, but maybe. Probably,” Ben said. “Why?”
“We figured out what’s going on and we need to get everyone together to talk about it.”
“She’s unconscious. She’s not going to have much to contribute.”
“I realize that, but we don’t want to leave anyone alone.”
“So, have everyone come down here?” Ben suggested, then went back to smearing ointment on Jenny’s wound.
Chris glanced at Colt again. The injured wolf stood beside him with eyes downcast, a distinctly uncomfortable look about him. Chris walked over to Ben, leaning in to speak quietly to him. “This is Kate’s room.”
“Oh,” Ben said. Then, after a pause, “Ohhhhh. Well, we can use the blanket as a stretcher, but she can’t sit up. Will the couch work?”
“Yeah, actually, that’d be better than just about anywhere else. No doors, you know?”
“You know who attacked Jenny?” Itsuo asked. He hadn’t resumed his seat.
“It’s more than just Jenny now,” Chris said. “Kate was also attacked, and she… didn’t make it.”
Itsuo frowned. He lowered his eyes and bowed his head. “Benjamin told me of this.”
“Ahh, okay. Well, yes, I’m pretty sure I know who is responsible for both attacks. We’ll talk about it when we get everyone together, okay? In the meantime, I don’t want anyone left alone—or in pairs. Groups of three, at a minimum.”
Itsuo looked up. His dark eyes studied Chris for a long, uncomfortable moment before he nodded, lips quirked in the barest hint of a smile. There was approval in his eyes as he said, “Yes, Christopher-san.”
They seemed to have some time to kill, so Chris leaned against the wall and asked, “Were you responsible for Eric’s impressive shiner?”
“Eric is responsible for the consequences of his actions,” Itsuo replied.
Chris rubbed his eyes. That fifteen-minute nap he’d gotten earlier hadn’t gotten him very far. “There seem to be a lot of chickens coming home to roost tonight.”
“Indeed,” Itsuo said. “Christopher-san, may I tell you a story?”
Chris glanced at the bed. Ben was still at work. “Sure, we seem to have some time.”
Itsuo nodded and began, speaking quietly, as was his way. “There once was a wise, generous man. He led his people with compassion and care, and they followed him out of love and respect. One day, a young man joined his company. He was an unruly fellow, coarse and violent-tempered. But the man saw something in him and took him in. He sought to teach him where others had failed and made him like a son, for he had no children of his own.
“Time passed, and eventually the man and his wife were blessed with a child. The brash young man they had taken in grew jealous. He saw the child as a threat, to both his standing as the good man’s right hand as well as the favored son. Fate stepped in, and the man and his wife died tragically, leaving their child an orphan and their people without leadership. The young man stepped into the void, but he was not the man his predecessor was. His shortsightedness and brutality tore the group apart, leaving it a mere fragment of what it once was. But the legend of the good man lived on, passed down in whispers, for they dare not speak his name aloud.”
Chris studied the bedspread in silence while Itsuo told his story. He was pretty sure he knew who it was about. “That’s a sad story.” He lifted his eyes to look at Itsuo.
“I did not say it was a happy story. But the ending is not yet written. The good man’s child, he escaped the usurper’s wrath and was raised in a far-off land, in a loving home. Now that he is grown, he may seek to claim his birthright, but the child—the man—should be wary. The usurper has killed others who rose to challenge him.”
Chris frowned and glanced around the room. Brandon and Colt’s eyes were studiously on the floor. Ben caught Chris’s gaze and lifted a brow.
“Are you telling me that Eric has killed alphas that issued a challenge?” Chris asked. Such a thing was unheard of. Completely out of line. Just thinking about it made his blood boil. Lycanthropes were rare. Challenges between alphas were not. To kill another alpha in a challenge… it was beyond inappropriate.
Itsuo spread his hands. “It would be dishonorable to say such a thing about one’s Alpha.”
Chris had seen enough since arriving to know that Itsuo considered Eric his Alpha in name only. He snorted softly and folded his arms. “Thanks for the warning.”
Itsuo nodded.
“You sure know a lot, for someone only recently come to the area,” Chris said.
Itsuo shrugged. “I did not say I had never been in the area before. I was a member of your father’s pack long before you were born.”
“Really?” Chris tilted his head. Everything that he knew about his birth parents had come from Adelaide and Reginald. He’d never had another perspective, not before tonight. “How long?”
Itsuo was quiet for a moment. “About fifty years.”
“How’d you meet him?” The question came from Brandon, who tried to make it sound casual, but there was an unmistakable spark of interest in his eyes.
“That is another story for another time.” Itsuo punctuated the statement by tucking his hands up his sleeves, withdrawing once more into his enigmatic shell.
“No time like the present,” Chris said, curious himself. “Please, Itsuo? I’d like to hear it.”
The older wolf’s expression softened. “Very well, Christopher-san. Eric was far from the first lone wolf your father took in. He had a soft spot for hard cases, and I was one of them.” His eyes grew distant with remembrance. “We met in Portland during the Second World War. I had been evading the authorities for some time, avoiding forced relocation. My wolf spirit feared being caged more than anything, and those camps… there would be nowhere to run free. Do you know what becomes of a man who denies his wolf too long?”
Chris swallowed, nodding. “He goes mad.” He knew the history. Dozens of Japanese, German, and Italian American wolves had cracked in the internment camps. They’d gone in whole, but emerged broken. Some never made it out at all.
“Indeed,” Itsuo said. “No one knew, at the time, that the situation would drag on for years. But madness was a risk I was not willing to take. Henry-san, he not only helped me evade capture, he moved his entire pack east, outside of the exclusion zone. We rode out the rest of the war in a remote part of the state, and I remained by your father’s side until he passed.” A shadow crossed Itsuo’s features as a fond memory turned stale.
“That’s amazing,” Brandon said, more than a little starry-eyed. The legend of Henry Martin had just gotten bigger.
Chris mulled over what Itsuo had said in silence. H
e’d heard plenty of stories about his birth parents over the years, but this one was new. Part of him wanted to press for more, but this was hardly the time. Instead, he turned his thoughts to Eric. He already knew Eric was a killer, but a hunter was one thing—a wolf was another matter entirely. What kind of man had his birth father taken under his wing? How hadn’t Henry seen what Eric was, or could eventually become?
When Ben gave the signal, they gathered up the corners of the blanket Jenny lay on and carried her with the utmost care out of Kate’s room. Once she was settled on the couch in the living room, Brandon fetched a few logs from the crate by the fireplace and knelt to start a fire. Itsuo settled on the floor at the foot of the couch, legs folded lotus style and head bowed, while Ben ushered Colt into a chair to take a look at the wound on his neck.
“I’ll go let everyone know where we are,” Chris said, and headed for the stairs. “Be right back.”
“Shouldn’t you take someone with you?” Ben called after him.
Before Chris could answer, a loud creak and thump sounded from upstairs, followed by voices raised in alarm. He took the stairs two at a time. Upstairs, he found Jessica and Lucy alone at the end of the hall. Lucy stared up at the attic door while Jessica pulled on the cord, but the door remained shut.
“What’s going on?” Chris asked. “Where’s Joey?”
Wide-eyed, Lucy pointed at the attic door.
“She needed to make a phone call,” Jessica said.
“In the attic?!”
“Adam said that’s where the best reception is,” Lucy said.
Chris looked up at the door. “Adam’s up there with her?”
“Yes, but they’re not alone. If you catch my drift,” Jessica said.
“Shit. Please tell me there’s another way in.”
Jessica’s grim expression didn’t give him much hope. “Are you much of a climber?”
Joey’s heart stopped. Or, at least, that was what it felt like. It took a few agonizing seconds for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. What ambient light from outside crept in through the broken window was largely negated by the tall stack of boxes between her and it.