Preston laughed. “This is not the norm. We will take two cars.”
Jarret shook his head. “Try three. And she’ll ride with me.”
Anton held up four fingers.
I laughed, throwing my head back. “Well, there goes my fantasy about road trips.”
“You can still have them.” Rainer smirked. “You’ll just have to change cars every four miles.”
We arrived at the sisters’ house half an hour later. It was a small, tan, quaint house with a red door that was laid out over one story. Three small white columns broke up the front porch, and although I couldn’t see the roof entirely, it looked mostly flat to me. There were two cars in the driveway that spoke of, hopefully, someone home. I looked at the clock in the car before Rainer turned it off. It was seven. We might very well be interrupting dinner.
My Alpha held up his hand, indicating he wanted me to wait in the car while he got out first. Preston jumped out after him, but Jarret and Anton remained. Was this something they’d discussed or was it just a natural thing, like they all knew who was going to do what in terms of my safety? I’d guess the latter. Rainer probably hadn’t known how he’d feel until we got here.
He sniffed the air. It was a subtle move and one that anyone who wasn’t a werewolf would probably miss. With a nod at Preston, he stepped away from the car while Pres opened the door to let me out. My second oldest mate crowded me for a second. “Missed you today. Pretty sure we’re all on edge from being in a closed space with you and not able to touch you for hours, Mac.”
I kissed his chin. “Try being overwhelmed with the smell of all four of you. My nipples might be permanently hard.”
Deliberately leaving it at that, as a means of the best kind of torture, I slid past Preston and headed toward the house. I didn’t miss the widening of his eyes or the way for just a second I could see his wolf reflected back at me. I winked at him, and he smirked. Anton put his arm around my shoulders. It was a sweet gesture, but if I had to guess, it was probably more about keeping me close.
I was out in public, and we were arriving unexpectedly at the home of unknown werewolves. Of course, I could shift as easily as any of them, and I didn’t feel weak when I was in my wolf form. I could kick ass as well as they could.
Now was probably not the time to have this conversation. Still, I couldn’t resist. “You know that if it came down to it, I could defend myself pretty well.”
Anton nodded, but he didn’t let go. Apparently, he agreed but that wasn’t going to change a thing. Rainer rang the doorbell, looking once over his shoulder. “Back up just a little bit.”
Anton did as he was told, which moved me with him. I swallowed. “If we’re this worried about these women, should we be doing this at all?”
Jarret shook his head. “We’re going to be really careful with all new werewolf meetings. Frankly, once the Hunter situation is handled, I can’t imagine caring that much about the humans. They can’t really hurt us if we don’t expose ourselves.”
That wasn’t exactly true. We could get shot. Die in a car accident. Get trampled to death. But his point remained. The truth was they couldn’t reach out and strangle me to death. Now that I had my shifting abilities, I was going to be stronger than they were in a one-to-one match. That would be the case as long as I kept shifting.
The door opened slowly. A woman with reddish-blonde hair stared at us. She was a wolf. I could smell it. But she didn’t shift anymore. I could smell the wolf but not its current presence. Her eyes widened.
“Oh.” She opened the door wider. “You’re the Lejeunes. I remember you from when you were all so young.”
I looked at Jarret. “Do you know her?”
“No. But you could count on two hands how many werewolves my parents have had around since the Accords. No more pack. Just families and lots of judgment. We do human behavior ten times worse than the humans do it.”
Rainer smiled at her. “We were the Lejeunes, ma’am.” I loved when they pulled out their fancy southern manners.
“Who’s there, Justice?” Another woman, similarly aged to the one speaking to us, appeared at the door.
Justice opened and closed her mouth. “The boys who used to be the Lejeunes.”
“I see that.” She gaped. “Well, much as this is shocking and very unexpected, what are you doing here? How can we help you? I haven’t seen your parents in a long time. We’ve broken no rules. We’ve kept her locked up. I can assure you.”
I stepped forward. “Kept someone locked up?”
Rainer indicated me. “This is our mate. We have broken some rules. And as it is, maybe she can help all of us so that there aren’t rules or the need to lock anyone up. You see, she’s an Omega.”
The second woman—not the one called Justice—covered her mouth, but I heard a little scream escape the same moment I scented her sadness. It was somehow a mix of elation and terror. In any case, I couldn’t stay back any longer.
I rushed forward, but Jarret grabbed my arm. “Not until we understand that comment she made about locking someone up.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Please let me start again. I’m Raven. This is Justice. Are you really an Omega?”
Rainer held up his hand. “Who do you have locked up in there? My mate doesn’t say another word until I’m certain of her safety.”
“Our sister,” Justice whispered. “I’m afraid she’s not been right since we stopped shifting. Not okay.”
Only men became Loups. Nothing was ever said about women having issues other than the general withdrawal of it all.
“I can help her.” My hands burned, and I stared down at them. Had they activated because I’d said that or was that going to happen anyway? “We’re all… shifting. Can we maybe discuss this inside?” I looked at Rainer, and he nodded. “I’m not comfortable with all of the shifting-not shifting things where someone might overhear us.”
I was good at hiding what we were. I’d spent my life doing this. It was familiar to me. We didn’t shift but that hadn’t meant we didn’t sometimes discuss it. No talking about wolf things in front of humans. It was wolf life 101.
Raven stepped back. “Please come in. You can’t know how glad I am that you exist. Our mother… it was her deepest wish that another Omega would come. And here you are. I’d given up hope.”
“We’d like to talk to you about your mother.” Rainer stepped in first with Preston and Anton right behind him. Jarret still hadn’t let go of my arm. It was awkward to stand there waiting while everyone else was inside.
I shook my head. “Surely we could stand by the front door, inside.”
“Nope. Not yet.” He smiled at me. “Sorry.”
“No you’re not.” I rolled my eyes. “This is how it goes. I get it. I don’t want to be kidnapped. Surely, the two nice women aren’t going to call the Hunters on me.”
His smile could only be called sardonic. There was no mirth to it. “We never do know what people will do. They’ve locked up their sister. Let Rainer decide it’s okay. Then you can go anywhere you want in there.”
Preston came to the door. “We’re good. And, yes, their sister is locked away. But she’s not dangerous. Just lost. Come see.”
Jarret let go of my arm, and I turned to him. “In the future, if you want me to stay somewhere, just tell me that’s what you want. I’m not going to run or bolt, okay? I’m reasonable, I think. I don’t think you need to hold me back like I’m going to run away.”
He sighed. “Sorry, love. That wasn’t well done.”
“We’re figuring this out. I’m not mad. This time.”
“Got it.”
The inside of the house was filled with stuff. Everywhere I turned, a picture covered a wall or a decoration of some kind. Books were piled but in artistic, interesting ways that told me that they’d been placed there purposefully, not strewn down in unthinking piles.
My hands still burned, and I studied Justice when she ushered us into the living room. “I need to see your sist
er.”
She blinked fast and looked at Raven before she answered me. “Don’t you want to eat something first?”
“No, I don’t think I can wait that long. I’m being called to help. That is what I have to do.”
The older woman bit her lip. “This is very new for you, isn’t it? We never knew our mother when she was new to her gifts. She could always hold off doing what she did.”
I smiled, or at least I hoped I did. I didn’t have a lot of patience to spare with the need to heal rushing through me the way it was. “Nice to know that someday that can be the case.”
Raven opened the door past the living room, and I walked through it. Rainer let me go first and followed me inside. The woman I’d been seeking appeared different than her sisters. They both had blondish hair. She was a brunette. Standing, she stared out the window, not turning when I entered the room to indicate she was aware of us at all.
“Why does she have to be locked up?”
Rainer answered me. “Justice says she sometimes bangs her head into things or speaks gibberish. They don’t want to answer a lot of questions, so they keep her in the house. Not in a cage or anything terrible. One of them is always with her.”
I walked toward her. “Why not just let her shift? Surely it would have to be better than this.”
“The Accords are a real problem.” Rainer sighed. “We are likely going to be in a lot of trouble. If you don’t have family influence, they could really hurt you for breaking the rules.”
I looked over my shoulder at him and nodded. That was a conversation we needed to have and soon. What kind of hurt was he talking about? It had never occurred to me to ask. I’d always intended to do just as my family told me to and not shift. Knowing the bad things that could befall me should I decide to break my oath had been something I’d not checked on.
“Shouldn’t they have family influence? These are the daughters of the Omega.”
Rainer walked toward me, placing his hand on my arm. “Sweetheart, the Omega is long dead. They’re older, mateless. Seemingly never married. They don’t run in the social circles my family does. No, they’re not considered particularly important. I’m not saying it’s right. Before we broke, they were our pack. It should be different. It’s not.”
Those weren’t things I could fix now or maybe ever. But I could help this poor woman. “If I do this, she might shift. What will happen to her?”
“Nothing. I won’t let anything happen, MacKenzie,” Rainer spoke in my ear. “Not to you or to her. I promise you that.”
I believed him. Come hell or high water, Rainer Harper would see to our safety. I took the final step toward the person who waited for me. I didn’t know her, but I hugged her like we were old friends. My energy flowed through me until it wasn’t just my hands that burned but my whole body. I wanted to shift, but she wasn’t in wolf form and the same way I knew how to breathe in and out, I knew that I had to stay on two feet this time.
Someone gasped and a low voice spoke. It must have been Justice or Raven. I couldn’t think about them right then. I held onto this third sister—whose name I hadn’t been told—and did what only I could do. I fixed her.
She jerked in my arms and our gazes met, hers suddenly clear.
“Omega,” her voice was low, like sandpaper, before she shifted. I let go, falling backward. I never hit the floor. Rainer caught me, holding me tight against him. We both watched while she shifted into a small, gray wolf. I’d never measured myself as a canine, but I guessed she was even tinier than I was in that form.
“Okay?” Rainer asked me quietly.
“I am.” I didn’t feel like I was going to pass out or as though I had to suddenly become a wolf. If fact, the burning in my body abruptly ceased, leaving me okay.
“We need someone to watch her. To let her shift and make sure she’s okay.” Rainer really did tend to think of things that escaped me. He called over his shoulder. “Jarret, take her outside. Let her run for a while. Shift with her and bring her back.”
Rainer scooted us out of the way while the woman ran past us, heading for the door.
“Is it okay to let her out?” Justice asked. I could smell the mixture of excitement and worry in her voice. “Won’t the neighbors notice?”
“Not if she has Jarret with her. You guys have a canal back that way. I saw it on the way in. Stay low, out of sight, and by the water. No people. Got it?”
Jarret nodded once. “Got it.”
My stomach grumbled. I hated to put them out, but suddenly, the thought of food was really appealing. “Do you think we could order a pizza?”
Chapter 14
We didn’t order pizza because Justice wanted to cook. My stomach grumbled, and Anton squeezed my hand. In an orange chair, Raven watched us while she drank sherry to calm her nerves.
None of us had spoken. Jarret was still gone, but I guessed he’d be back soon. If not, I suspected Rainer would go look for him. I couldn’t worry that something had happened to Jarret. I had to believe everything was fine. I’d feel it if he was hurt. Everything was fine. I’d say that over and over until I talked myself into one hundred percent believing it.
“How did you do that with no food, just getting out of the car?”
I regarded her for a second while her sister cooked in the kitchen. The smell of chicken wafted toward me. Right then my wolf was so close to the surface I might have preferred it rare.
“What is your sister’s name? The one I helped.”
She took another sip of her sherry. “Mercedes. Mercy to most of her friends. Not that she has had too many of those in recent memory. Not since she slipped into the madness. And you brought her back. All she needed was to shift?”
“No.” I shook my head. “Her wolf was lost. I found her. Then she shifted. But you know that. Or at least some of it because your mother was an Omega.”
Raven set down her cup. “My mother never really discussed what she did with us as we weren’t Omegas, and I think that was a huge disappointment to her.”
I sighed. Parents weren’t always reasonable. “It’s not like you decided on your genes, opted to not be an Omega.”
She tilted her head. “But we did. My mother always said Omegas aren’t born, they’re self-chosen. Like something you volunteer for. We had obviously not made that choice. It was disappointing to her. Of course, having seen what being the Omega did to her, I can’t say as I’d do anything different. Nothing is worth the pain you’re about to have.”
My blood ran cold. Anton drew me back to him.
It was Preston who spoke. “What is about to happen to her? What pain? And how can someone choose to be any kind of wolf?”
“I don’t really understand it myself. Only that she always said a person chose to be an Omega and we hadn’t done that.”
That was good and fine, but it sounded like her mother, the previous Omega, had been out of her mind. I’d made no such choice. I was going to leave that alone. I wanted concrete answers, explanations, and anything else that was fantastical could stay just that way.
“Pain?” Preston tried again. “I can assure you whatever pain she has will go away fast. We won’t have it any other way.”
I suspected Raven was feeling her sherry. She waved her hand in the air when she spoke. I suppressed my grin but caught Rainer’s gaze. He smiled in his eyes. Yes, we were on the same page about Raven at that moment. Maybe it would make her chattier.
“Have the nightmares started yet? My mother once said that they took her by surprise in the beginning. She and the other Omegas would talk about it. The inevitable nightmares.”
I hadn’t had any of those. “No, I’m sleeping great. Better than I ever have. I mean… when I first got to these guys, I had memories that hit me in sleep but not for days.”
“Give it some time. You’re going to have nightmares of those who need you, you won’t even necessarily be able to help them. They could be in… Antarctica and there will be nothing you can do. In the last yea
rs when my mother was frail, after one of my fathers had died, she would wake up screaming.”
Anton rubbed my back in gentle circles.
“Well, that sounds like it’ll… suck.”
She laughed. I was glad she could find some amusement in this. “You’re only going to get so strong before you will not get any stronger. That doesn’t make the needs of the pack any less. They always want more, and you’re going to taper out. That’s why my fathers were so protective. I can see that’s already happened with you. And of all things, you got the Lejeunes.”
Anton shook his head, and Preston spoke. “We have her last name now.”
“That so?” She leaned forward. “What are you going to tell the Council? I wouldn’t put it past them to kill the Omega just to keep the status quo. They can’t have anyone bringing the packs back. Not when they went so far out of their way to all but destroy them.”
I needed some of that sherry.
Jarret burst through the door, following the shifted-back Mercy. She was bright eyed, and when she saw me, tears leaked down her cheeks. I rose. I thought I liked it better when I didn’t have to make conversation with the people I helped. There really was nothing to say. I was glad they were better, but I wasn’t some kind of savior. Whatever this was… it wasn’t that.
* * *
I lay in the dark in the hotel room we’d taken in New Orleans. We were in the area, and like it or not, Rainer had to speak to the Council. Better to rip the bandage off. Anton had booked the room online. We might have been hiding, but he’d spared no expense. We were in the French Quarter with a view of Jackson Square. It was dark but still noisy outside.
I hadn’t asked why we didn’t stay with their parents. I wasn’t going to bring up the obvious trouble with the fact that I’d walked through a hotel lobby like I wasn’t a werewolf being hunted. I thought we were all a little turned around by the news we’d received.
Inevitable pain. For me, I had to endure it. For them, they had to watch me do it and try to protect me from what was going to happen whether we liked it or not. Choice? If that was somehow true, I was the stupidest werewolf to ever live. Who would volunteer for this?
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