“Thank God,” said Kaleb, relieved.
But Troy wasn’t nearly so satisfied. “Lucy,” he said, waving her out into the living room. “I don’t want to embarrass you, but I’m going to have to ask you to kiss my brother.” When her eyes widened, Troy added, “I know, it’s a real chore. Just do me this one favor.”
She looked spooked and embarrassed, but Kaleb saw his brother’s logic. Before she could agree or decline, he pulled her in and pressed his lips to hers. She let out a little squeak of a moan and melted into him—God, he had the hots for her when she made noises like that—but as soon as he deepened the kiss, her skin flared bright and light burst out of her all over again.
“Alright!” Troy yelled as he squinted through the blinding light that was pouring out of Lucy all over again.
Kaleb stuffed her apologetically back into the bedroom and closed the door.
“Is God punishing me?” he asked Troy.
“I don’t know how God factors into all of this, but you’re going to have to keep your hands off that girl until we get this thing figured out.”
“So He does hate me,” Kaleb surmised with a frown.
“Maybe she is your one true mate,” Troy offered. “But PDAs will be out of the question if that’s the case.”
“I’m going to need a pair of Ray Bans just to get to second base.”
“Forget second base, and forget about kissing her,” Troy barked. “Why the hell are you making out with your client, anyway?”
“Gee, I don’t know, Troy. Why did you bed Reece when you were protecting her?”
Troy grinned, not that he liked that Kaleb’s point had knocked him down a peg.
“I’ll tell you one thing, Kaleb. That girl isn’t human.” He let that hang in the air between them before adding, “But neither are we.”
“What is she, though? I’ve never even heard of her kind.”
“I have no idea,” he admitted. “Let’s hope Sasha does tomorrow morning. I’ll meet you guys there at first light. Until then,” he warned, “keep your hands, and your lips, to yourself.”
Given Kaleb’s growing affection for the otherworldly girl on the other side of the door, Troy’s instructions were much easier said than done.
***
It seemed far-fetched to PO Rachel Clancy, though she did a soldierly job of keeping her mouth shut and listening as the sheriff gave her the rundown on a man named Peter Swanson who, in Rachel’s estimation, sounded like a real moron.
Peter had been a glue-huffing, cat-strangling, sticky-fingered, fire-starting, illiterate waste of human life…
…who had managed to more or less assassinate Roxanne and Harold Cooper, wielding a rusty meat hook that had torn through their flesh like wolf fangs?
And he’d returned to the Fist, as Rick postulated, to quote-unquote finish the job by taking Lucy’s life.
But he was a moron.
And had mistaken Leeanne Whitaker, a curvy brunette, for the tow-headed blonde girl with bright blue eyes that he hadn’t had the opportunity to kill some twelve years back.
This was the mastermind?
Rick seemed to think so.
Rachel wasn’t buying it.
But she also wasn’t about to jeopardize her already tenuous chance at making detective. Not now. Not when the sheriff had actually sought her out to garner her impressions and overall take on his sudden theory.
He’d invited her to ride along with him out to Jackson Hole, and she was determined to do the best damn job she could. On Rick’s terms. Which meant she was going to build off of his hair-brained ideas, convince him that she believed he was some kind of genius for having resurrected the old closed case, and yes, sir! him until he was hanging her silver badge around her deserving neck.
“Fascinating, Sheriff,” she said when he’d finally run out of gas on his longwinded ruminations. “Have you considered putting a protective detail on Cooper?”
“It crossed my mind, Clancy,” he told her as they pulled up to the halfway house where Peter Swanson was supposed to be staying in Jackson Hole. “But that slutty Quinn boy seems to be handling it at the moment.”
He was referring to Kaleb, who had quite the reputation around town.
It made her wonder though, if Rick had seen his own daughter around town recently—talk about slutty. Rachel couldn’t be sure if Whitney acted like how she dressed, but it was no secret that she liked to dress on the revealing side. In a lot of ways, Rachel had to wonder why Kaleb and Whitney had never gotten together, but she had to figure that Rick being her father and all probably had a great deal to do with it.
“A motive was never established?” she questioned.
“That’s what’s eating me,” Rick confirmed. “We had fingerprints and a confession. No trial for anyone to doubt anything. And the guy got thrown in the slammer.”
“A scapegoat,” she supplied.
“But for who? Who was he covering for? And why?” asked Rick as he pulled the key from the ignition and they climbed out into the stifling heat of Jackson Hole.
The city was tucked out in the plains where the sun could beat down, heating asphalt and concrete like a damn oven. Rachel was glad she never thought to move out here. She could’ve. If she had, she probably would’ve seen a lot more police action. She might’ve even made detective by now. But she loved Devil’s Fist. Born and raised in the rural town, she had absolutely no plans of ever leaving it. The Fist was her home. There were no other people on God’s green earth that she wanted to keep more safe and sound.
The halfway house looked like an old, moldy colonial house that didn’t quite belong in this part of town. The street was suburban by nature, with only a few delis and dry cleaners peppered in. Not quite middle class, but not quite a full-on slum. Rachel had to assume the residents in this neighborhood were far from pleased that a halfway house was located on their block.
Rachel followed Rick up the saggy, wooden stoop where unkempt-looking middle-aged men were sucking on cigarettes and not talking to one another.
Inside the foyer, they came to a front desk of sorts where a tough-looking black man seemed to be handling things.
“Hidy-ho,” said Rick in his folksy, Fist manner.
The man behind the desk, who Rachel assumed was the coordinator, barely blinked at the sheriff, much less cracked a smile or greeted him back in any kind of formal way. “I’m Sheriff Abernathy and this is PO Clancy,” he announced, taking a gander around the common space that to Rachel’s eye resembled a grimy living room. “I spoke to a one Ricardo Martinez this morning, that’s Peter Swanson’s parole officer. Said Swanson was here. I’d like a word with him, if I could.”
“Swanson, Swanson,” grumbled the coordinator as he rummaged through a nest of loose papers on his desk. When he found a relevant sheet, he told Rick, “Swanson’s at work.”
“He found employment already?” Rick questioned.
“Says so right here,” said the coordinator.
“We’ll swing on by,” said the Sheriff. “Where’s he at, now?”
“Some forgotten town,” said the coordinator. “It’s a real bitch to get to. Devil’s Fist. Have you heard of it?”
Rick and Rachel exchanged a highly interested look then Rick asked the coordinator, “Where’s Swanson working at on over in the Fist?”
“Mechanic shop called Damned Repair.”
“Son of a bitch,” grumbled Rachel as she cut her eyes to Rick again.
The look on the sheriff’s face told her that he was thinking the exact same thing.
Peter Swanson had gone back to the beginning. Back to where it all started. Back to Curt Wilson, who might have been lying through his teeth about the delinquent kid all those years ago.
***
Just around the same time that the Sheriff and PO Clancy were climbing back into Rick’s SUV to make the long drive back into Devil’s Fist, Kaleb and Lucy were pulling up in Kaleb’s pickup into the dusty parking area on the northeast side of Yellow
stone next to Troy’s parked truck.
Kaleb had explained to Lucy that his grandmother lived in a little stone house on the wilderness side of the trail that this parking lot connected to. He hadn’t fully explained Sasha’s powers, nor his mother, Nikita’s. The two lived together and thanks to a phone call Troy had placed to them last night, both were prepared to not breathe a word about the fact that they were all werewolves.
Lucy Cooper might be an otherworldly being, not quite human and not quite alien, but unless and until Kaleb learned for sure that she was destined to become his one true mate, his family secret would have to remain just that—a secret. Lucy mustn’t learn that Kaleb, or any of them, were werewolves.
Following Troy, who had greeted them with an air of seriousness that had caused Lucy to clam up, Kaleb walked beside Lucy along the grassy trail that led up to the stone house.
As soon as it came into view, nearly swallowed by the foothills of the mountain behind it with vines and vegetation, Lucy let out a breathless gasp of intrigue.
“I can’t believe anyone lives here,” she commented, marveling the mountain landscape behind the house, the magnificent Tetons in the far west.
Kaleb was tempted to mention that the little stone house his mother shared with his paternal grandmother was practically as old as Yellowstone itself, in terms of Wyoming having claimed it as a National Park. He held his tongue, though, and escorted her to the front door where Troy used the iron knocker—a wolf clamping a metal ring in its snarling mouth—striking the surface of the door three times.
Quietly and nervously, Lucy asked him, “You think your grandmother will know what’s wrong with me?”
“She’s very old and very, very knowledgeable,” he assured her, as they waited.
Kaleb was nervous as well, but for an entirely different set of reasons. His nerves were shot. It was one thing to hold himself back from crossing any kind of romantic line with Lucy. He’d done a fairly remarkable job of it up until last night and it hadn’t frayed his every last nerve. Quite the opposite, in fact. He’d been mostly proud of himself, and would probably rank the short-lived abstinence among his most impressive accomplishments. Having to keep his hands to himself, however, because touching and kissing Lucy was forbidden, on the other hand, was another matter. He didn’t like to throw the term torture around loosely, but in certain respects that’s what it had felt like. All night, he’d stayed out on the couch, while Lucy slept behind her closed bedroom door. He probably could’ve done it easily if he hadn’t kissed her. The night she’d spent with him at his cabin hadn’t been so bad at all. But now that they’d kissed, now that he’d experienced the tremendous arousal of having held her in his arms and kissed her without holding back, he felt like an addict trying to white-knuckle his way to sobriety while the best hit of his life was there for the taking in the next room. It hadn’t been easy.
The entrance door of the stone house that had always reminded Kaleb and his brothers of a little castle nestled in the wilderness eased open with a whining creak, their mother, Nikita, on the other side.
Her long, white hair was combed straight and shining, and as she smiled at Troy and widened the door, Kaleb saw that she was wearing a long, lavender linen dress, her signature style.
“I’d expected you all much earlier,” she commented as Troy stepped inside the dim hovel.
“There was an issue with Reece,” he told her. “I got held up.”
Reece had been struggling to control her shifts, which was no secret, and their mother didn’t push it further.
Kaleb followed in after his brother, ushering Lucy inside with his hand at the small of her lower back, and his mother’s dark eyes widened with intrigue when she observed the tender care her son was using.
“You must be Lucy,” said Nikita, stopping them in the foyer. Nikita looked her up and down, and Lucy shrank a little with shyness.
“Mom,” said Kaleb in a complaining tone. “Stop staring at her. You’re making her uncomfortable.”
“Oh, please,” she said, rolling her eyes a touch, as she closed the door behind them.
Kaleb shepherded Lucy into the living room where Troy was standing and Nikita brought up the rear.
Grandmother Sasha was seated in her rocking chair as always, in front of the fireplace where light flames licked a little cluster of kindling. The temperature had been rising with the shift from spring to summer, but the stone house held the chill of winter still. A throw blanket was draped over Sasha’s lap and her knotty, aged hands were clasped together over it.
“Mother,” Nikita said softly as she neared her mother-in-law. She knelt down and took the older woman’s hands in hers, but Sasha’s translucent eyes continued to stare into the crackling fire. “Kaleb has brought a young woman here. He and Troy need your advice.”
As Sasha angled her sharp eyes up to Lucy, she told them, “That’s no woman,” then returned her gaze to the fire.
Kaleb and Troy exchanged a puzzled look between them, then Troy, taking charge, ordered, “Do it.”
“Do it?” Kaleb questioned.
When Troy confirmed with a nod, Kaleb felt a jolt of excitement swell in his chest. All he’d wanted to do all night long was it—kiss Lucy.
But Lucy was transfixed on the elderly woman and her mysterious comment. “What do you mean I’m not a woman?”
“You’re just like your parents,” said Sasha, dismissively. There was an edge of accusation in her tone as well. But she didn’t elaborate.
“You knew my parents?”
When Sasha didn’t respond, Troy pressed, “Did you?”
Nikita spoke on her mother-in-law’s behalf, saying, “She must have.”
Kaleb could see the frustration rising in his brother’s expression. It seemed to be their new dynamic—Troy and Sasha’s. Ever since Troy had inherited the werewolf throne and Dante had started playing tricks around town, his every attack a threat against their kind, Troy had demanded answers from Sasha that the old woman had refused to give. He still regarded her with massive skepticism because of it. She hadn’t been forthright about the fact that Dante was of her own flesh and blood, a son she’d bore having gotten pregnant by an unknown man who wasn’t her one true mate. They still had no idea who that man was—Dante’s father. If he was alive or dead, no one knew because Sasha hadn’t told them. If he was right here in the Fist, the Quinns had yet to find out.
Like his brother, Kaleb also wasn’t in the mood for riddles, so without further ado he took Lucy by the hips, jerked her in with all the intensity and passion he’d had to bottle up throughout the night, and crushed a kiss over her mouth that caused his mother’s eyes to pop as round and wide as saucers.
At first Lucy felt stiff as a board in his arms. Mortified, no doubt. He hadn’t exactly explained to her that this was the precise reason they’d come—to trigger her blindingly bright glow so that their grandmother could see for herself.
But soon Lucy relaxed into his arms, draping her own around his muscular shoulders. Feeling the length of her slender body pressing warm against his was enough to make him stiffen in his jeans and he had to take firm mental control over his body to cool his excitement. Making out with a girl that drove him crazy, in front of his mother and grandmother, was embarrassing enough. He didn’t want to exacerbate the ordeal by tenting his friggin’ pants.
Then it happened. He felt it first, the energy of her inner light cracking through every pore in her body. In an instant, her brightness exploded and soon the entire living room was filled with blinding white light.
Everyone shielded their eyes and squinted, as Kaleb eased back from Lucy.
Sasha hadn’t shielded her eyes or squinted. She stared into the light as if it were energetic gold she felt compelled to bask in. She rose from her rocking chair, the throw blanket over her lap falling to the stone floor, and began nearing Lucy.
“See?” she breathed without tearing her wide, marveling eyes from the glowing girl. “Not a woman. Not human.
”
“Then what is she?” asked Kaleb, who really wanted to know if Lucy was his one true mate. One thing at a time, he told himself, as he demanded, “Grandmother, if she’s not human, then what is she?”
“She is what her parents were,” Sasha told them mysteriously as she brought her knotty fingers to Lucy’s face.
As she grazed her old fingertips down Lucy’s glowing cheeks, Troy complained hotly to his mother, “If she’s going to waste our time with riddles—”
“She’s a goddess,” said Sasha, the conviction in her tone cutting through Troy’s frustration. “They’re called Astral Gods and Goddesses, and there are very few left in the world.”
“Astral?” Troy questioned. No longer irritated by the woman. He was only intrigued now. “Like from another planet?”
“From another dimension,” she corrected. “One that our kind, and humans, are too dense to visit.”
“Your kind?” Lucy asked Kaleb. When he didn’t respond, she cut her radiating eyes to Nikita and questioned, “You guys aren’t human either?”
“Can you dim yourself, girl?” Sasha asked. “Your burning my retinas.”
Lucy screwed her face up and, in an emotional tone, said, “You think I can control this?”
“Don’t tell me your parents taught you nothing before their demise,” Sasha responded, which only offended Lucy worse than the accusation that she could dim herself but was for some reason refusing to.
“My parents were good, hardworking people, who did an excellent job—”
“But they never told you what you really are,” Sasha surmised as she turned and made her slow, joint-cracking way back to her rocking chair where she landed with a tired plop. “Dim yourself!”
Lucy startled at the surprising volume of Sasha’s tone and there must have been something about the command in the old woman’s voice that compelled Lucy, without her realizing or trying, to snuff out her inner light until she was as dim and seemingly human as the rest of them.
She stared down at her hands and arms in disbelief, and breathed, “It worked.”
Kaleb felt as blown away as Lucy looked.
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