by Ivy Asher
I read the message a second time and then shoot off a reply. I’m not sure what he thinks I’d want to discuss with his pack, but whatever, a job’s a job.
Hi Teo, I’m available whenever. Text when you get to the shop and I’ll meet you.
My phone chimes immediately.
We’ll be there in thirty.
I get to my feet. “I have some work that needs to be done, so I’m just going to hop in the shower. Do you guys need anything? More food? Coffee?”
Ryn, Treno, and Zeph all get to their feet, and I start shaking my head. “No, you guys cannot come in this time. I need to be dry and presentable in twenty minutes,” I warn them.
“I can work with that,” Treno declares salaciously.
“How long is a minute again?” Ryn asks, and I bark out a laugh and hold up an angry this is not happening finger.
“I’m serious,” I tell them, and then I leap over the back of the couch and sprint for the bathroom. If I can get the door locked and myself clean without any orgasms, it will be a miracle. Can I get an amen!
27
“Shit, I’m fucking late,” I growl as I pull the wifebeater over my head and thread my arms through it. I pull on a mustard yellow slouchy sweater over it and fluff my just-dried hair.
I pretty much have an orgasm every time I use conditioner now, which really makes things difficult when I’m trying hard to get in and out of the shower quickly. It also doesn’t help when your mates break down the door and proceed to try and give you more orgasms. What can I say, I’m a weak woman.
Speaking of asshole mates, they all tromp down the stairs behind me in sweats that aren’t nearly long enough for their incredibly tall legs, and shirts that are way too tight. But I figure my new potential client and his pack will prefer that over them being naked, so here we are. I make my way to the front of the shop and look out the window to see eight coat-clad bodies. I look around at my front lobby area, which is currently being dwarfed by my massive gryphon mates, and decide to conduct whatever this meeting is in the two garage bays I have open. I go through the side door, a chill running up my spine at the drop in temperature from the well-insulated lobby to the garage.
“Is this a cahh?” Treno asks, rubbing a hand over the metal hood of the Seaman SUV.
I smile, remembering the first time he said car like he was from Boston on our little picnic back in Kestrel. It’s crazy to think about how much has happened and that they’re even here in my world, touching things I never thought they’d see.
“It is. We call that a Toyota Highlander,” I tell him over my shoulder as I rush to press the button that opens the bay doors.
Treno, Ryn, and Zeph all seem to be distracted for a moment, feeling up Mrs. Seaman’s SUV. A smile sneaks over my face, and I quickly make a list of all the other weird things I’m sure they’d be fascinated by in this world.
Snow spills in as the bay door creaks and groans in protest of being forced to work in these temperatures, and I add it to my list of things I need to look at and possibly oil. The door finally crawls high enough for Teo and his pack to slip in, and as soon as it seems the bodies have stopped slipping into the bay, I reverse its trajectory, blocking out the brittle wind that seems intent on helping us freeze to death.
“Sorry about the cold,” I offer Teo. “My lobby isn’t that big, and I figured a group this size might want a little more space.”
I feel Zeph, Ryn, and Treno walk up behind me, and one by one the eyes widen in Teo’s pack as they take in the giants behind me.
“By the stars, and I thought you were big, Knox,” a male says with wavy brown hair that’s pulled back in a man bun. He’s good looking, and his hazel eyes seem to scan up and up and up behind me.
“Did they bottle feed them Human Growth Hormone since birth?” the hazel-eyed male asks, and the male next to him chuckles.
I realize they’re twins—apparently, you put a beanie on one and it takes my brain a while to see that they look exactly alike. In addition to Teo and the twins, there’s five more people: a guy with medium brown hair and bright blue eyes, a bigger dude who must be the Knox guy one of the twins was talking about. He’s mixed and looking a little tense. A guy with shoulder-length blond hair and sky blue eyes. Another serious looking man with a square jaw and perfectly quaffed hair. I see a hint of a tattoo peeking out between his coat sleeve and his gloves. And last but not least, the only female in the group. She has dark hair, light green eyes, lips that people pay good money for—although you can tell her pout isn’t enhanced—and a solid fuck with me at your own risk kind of vibe.
They’re my age and all incredibly attractive, but I still don’t have the foggiest clue why this wolf shifter thinks I should talk to his pack.
Teo steps forward, his brown eyes darting to the female and then back to me. “Falon, this is Bastien and Valen,” he says, pointing to the twins. “Ryker and Sabin.” The blond and the pretty boy with the tattoos both nod. “Siah and Knox.” Blue eyes and tough guy just stand there. “And this is my mate, Vinna.”
Her name sparks recognition for some reason, and I quickly try to sift through my memories for where I’ve heard it before. Her light green eyes are fixed on my hands like Teo’s were when I first met him, and something about that is prickling through me as important.
They’re all staring at me expectantly, and I abandon my memory search for politeness.
“I’m Falon, for those of you who I haven’t met. This is Ryn, Treno, and Zeph,” I introduce, pointing behind me.
“Are you all from here?” I think Sabin asks, or maybe his name is Ryker.
Crap.
“Uhhh, no. I grew up here, they didn’t,” I answer politely, and he nods once.
I get the distinct impression that I’m missing something. It’s not a feeling I enjoy.
“Soo, what’s up? I mean, your pack seems...great and all, but you could have just told me if you wanted your cars towed in a text, so why are all of you here?” I ask, cutting to the chase.
The female steps forward, her eyes jumping from me to my mates and back, like she’s sizing them up. I take her in warily, tapping into my core on instinct, just in case this meeting somehow goes south.
“Have you ever heard of the term Sentinel before?” she asks me, her nostrils flaring like she’s scenting the air for my answer.
It’s a very wolf thing to do, but when I also take a deep breath, in an effort to figure out what’s going on, I realize she’s not a wolf. She has hints of a floral scent, but it has a citrusy base, the tang of caster magic, an earthy tone like the wolf shifters do, and a cool scent that smells slightly metallic that I can’t quite place. I have no idea what she is. Caution weaves through me at her question.
How does this chick know that term?
Zeph releases a deep growl behind me, and everyone in the room tenses.
I narrow my eyes. “Who are you, and what do you want?” I ask evenly.
Maybe my looking around and asking about Sentinels and the Ouphe flushed out whoever these people are, but I can’t tell if they’re friend or foe.
“I’m getting cold, and honestly I could really go for a taco, so if we can just speed up whatever the fuck this is, that’d be great,” I add, feeling antsy, and an amused smile breaks over the female’s lips.
She carefully starts pulling off her glove and then shoves the sleeve of her coat up to her elbow. She holds her hand up, palm in, and I trace the marks on her fingers with surprised eyes. She rotates her arm to the side, and I see a full line of runes that run up the outside of her forearm.
Well, damn. I didn’t see that coming.
I stare at her marks on her ring finger. They stretch down past her knuckle, and she has different runes on her middle finger. My eyes snap to hers, and they’re filled with intrigue and curiosity while her lips are turned up in a knowing smirk.
I breathe her in again, focusing on the undertones of what I think are jasmine and orange in her scent, and realize what that m
eans in connection with her markings. She is like me. Not in the Gryphon sense, but in the Ouphe sense—or Sentinels, as they go by in this world.
Shock and excitement filter through my dumbfounded thoughts. I was looking for information about Sentinels or the Ouphe so I could figure out how to get back to my mates. But now they’re here, and another Sentinel, one like me, is standing in the bay of my garage. I don’t even know how to begin to process this.
What does this mean?
I pull my sweater off over my head and expose the markings on my arms and chest. Her eyes widen for a fraction of a second before she schools her features.
“She’s about as marked as you, from what I can tell,” one of the twins observes, and we all just sort of stare at each other for a moment as though none of us knows exactly where to go from here.
I hear footsteps clomping down the stairs in the back of the shop, and Wekun waltzes into the garage, fixing the sleeves of his sweater as he announces, “Falon, I’m going to pop over to see—”
“You!” Knox accuses aggressively, and Wekun’s head snaps up in surprise at the snarl.
Wekun throws up his hands in defeat and rolls his eyes. “Always with the mate hate,” he grumbles incredulously.
“Wekun?” the female asks, confused, but it’s clear she knows him.
My eyes snap from Wekun back to...fuck, what was her name again...I blank for a second, and then it comes to me.
Vinna. Right. And with her and Wekun in the same place, I finally make the connection.
Oh shit, so this is Vinna? This is who he was here to check on?
“You’re here!” Wekun chirps in surprise and then shakes his head in frustration. “This whole not seeing things is getting old,” he grumbles and then turns happy eyes back on Vinna. “I was just going to see if you were at your hotel. Did Aydin tell you I was coming?”
Vinna’s brow furrows in question for a moment and then lifts back up in understanding. She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a phone, glances at the screen quickly, and then chuckles. “Yes, he did. Sorry, I never check this thing,” she confesses, and a couple of the guys around her snicker. “What’s going on? Are they from Tierit?” she asks, nodding in my direction.
“No, she just learned about all of that like you did,” he answers, and her eyes once again widen in shock.
Mine do too. Wekun has mentioned Vinna a couple of times in the past. I had no idea who he was talking about though, and I assumed it was a friend back home. So it surprises me a little to hear that she’s as new to this whole Sentinel thing as I am. Did she also wake up in a strange world, with her life fucked up beyond all recognition?
“What’s going on, Wekun?” she demands, confusion and concern etching themselves into her features.
Wekun takes a deep breath, but his eyes light up with excitement. It makes me chuckle a little when Vinna suddenly regards him even more warily, as though Wekun’s excitement is something that people should be cautious about.
“You two are part of the same Sept,” Wekun answers and then pauses dramatically like he’s waiting for her to start jumping up and down while she asks really!
I look from Wekun back to Vinna and decide he’s barking up the wrong tree; she doesn’t look like a bouncy, squealy kind of girl.
“What does that mean?” Teo asks.
“It’s like a coven, only it’s something that only Bond Wielders have.”
“But I have a coven,” Vinna declares, gesturing to the males all around her.
“No, you have Chosen, just like Falon does,” Wekun corrects.
“Chosen?” I interject, confused. I haven’t heard that term before.
“Your mates,” Wekun quickly points out.
Oh. Okay.
“You both have Chosen, which is who you share magic and abilities with, but separate from that, you have a Sept. You all carry the same rune, which will start to work when the Sept is complete. It’ll connect you to each other in a very powerful way.”
“But not in a mate kind of way, right?” I ask as I try to think back about what Wekun said about Septs before. “Because, you’re hot and all,” I tell Vinna, “...but that’s not my thing.”
“Ditto,” Vinna agrees. “No offence,” she offers me.
“None taken,” I reply.
Wekun releases a deep breath. “Why does everything have to be about fucking?” he asks rhetorically, looking from me to Vinna.
“TGV Forevahh,” she answers simply with a shrug, and all the guys with her chuckle.
Their reactions confirm what my nose has me suspecting already, and I turn to Vinna with an impressed smirk on my face. “All these guys are your mates?”
She smiles and gives them a warm look before turning back to me. “They sure are.”
“Fuck, and I thought three was a handful,” I mumble, looking back at my guys.
“That guy’s like easily two and half Chosen’s worth,” she tells me, pointing at Zeph over my shoulder. “Yeah, the grumpy looking one,” Vinna confirms as I look behind me.
I snort out a laugh at her description.
“Sorry, I’m not the best with names,” she confesses with a sheepish shrug.
I smile at Zeph, who just raises an unamused eyebrow at me, and wave her off. “No worries, the grumpy looking one is accurate.”
We both chuckle, and then I feel hands on my face, coaxing me to tilt my head back. Zeph looks down at me and shakes his head. “I’ll show you grumpy,” he whispers in my ear, and it does all kinds of things to my body. I smile, and he plants a quick kiss on my lips before letting go of my head. I drop my chin back down, and Vinna looks perplexed as she rubs at the underside of her chin.
She then tilts her own head back, flashing me a peek of an identical rune under her chin.
“That’s your Sept rune,” Wekun tells her, answering the questions in her gaze.
“Oh,” she chirps, shocked, and then her shoulders relax a little like she’s relieved. “I thought it might be something else,” she confesses, and all at once her guys move closer to her, like they’re all magnets responding to her pull.
I watch as each of them discreetly reaches out to touch her and soothe her in some small way. I realize that they all just responded to whatever intense emotion Vinna was just feeling, and I’m completely captivated by the way they seem to ground her and calm her. She relaxes right before my eyes, simply from their presence and the small intimate things they’re doing to fortify her soul.
I don’t know her, although I think that’s definitely going to change based on our Sept runes, but it’s a beautiful thing to watch her be loved as deeply as she clearly is. Vinna gives her mates a grateful smile and leans into all of them, and I can practically see the soul-deep connections that link all of them.
“Well, now that we’ve gotten introductions out of the way, I’m hoping you both can help me,” Wekun starts, pulling me from my observations.
Vinna stands up a little straighter, confidence pushing the vulnerability out of her light green eyes.
“We’re here on a job already, but what’s going on?” she asks.
“I think the two might actually be related,” Wekun supplies cryptically, and it’s clear Vinna doesn’t know what he’s saying either.
“Aydin said you’re here about missing wolves, right?”
“Right,” Vinna agrees.
“Well, I think the third member of your Sept might be one of them,” Wekun announces, and shock filters through both me and Vinna.
A third member of our Sept?
I’m not even sure how I feel about having a Sept to begin with, let alone surprise, here’s two members of it. Wekun clears his throat, and I can tell just by the sound of it that he’s not done dropping bombs.
“I think she’s in trouble, and we need to find her...fast.”
Called it.
Zeph pulls me back against him. Treno places a comforting hand on my shoulder, and Ryn reaches out and laces his fingers with mine. I
look back at each of them in turn. I know we said we’d help Wekun, but I’m not sure if the development of Vinna and her mates changes anything for the guys.
Treno leans down and kisses me in answer to the question written all over my face. “Whatever you want to do, flower, we’re here.”
Ryn nods once and kisses me sweetly next. “Still not letting you out of our sight though,” he teases as he nips my bottom lip.
I turn to Zeph, and he runs his thumb gently over my cheek as he studies me. “You know I’m always up for a good fight, little sparrow,” he purrs and kisses the end of my nose. I chuckle and nod.
“Don’t I know it,” I snark, and he leans down and bites my shoulder, a smile on his lips.
Adoration and happiness waft through me. Pigeon does a little dance inside of me, and I giggle at her ridiculous antics. She’s clearly up for more shenanigans, although that’s not surprising at all.
Bliss radiates through me as I take a deep breath. It truly is a beautiful thing to be loved so deeply...I’m one lucky Ouphe-Gryphon. Or I guess I should say Sentinel-Gryphon. Ouphon? Gryphinel? I shake my head at myself, I’ll have to work on a cooler sounding name later.
My eyes land on Vinna’s, she nods, and I answer with a smile.
Looks like we’re going Sept hunting.
The End...
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Also by Ivy Asher
The Sentinel World