by CJ Cooke
I couldn’t help myself as I picked up the chip and eyed it cautiously.
“You’re looking at that like you’ve never seen one before,” Calli observed, and when I looked up at her face, I could see her amusement, but there was an underlying amount of concern there too.
“I’ve never had one before,” I admitted, and her eyebrows rose in shock.
I could see my brother wanting to say something, but he seemed to think better of it and kept his mouth shut. Perhaps this dog could be taught some tricks after all.
I shoved a chip in my mouth to try and break the weird silence while they stared at me like some kind of circus freak. Trying to school my expression as the salty flavour burst in my mouth wasn’t an easy task. They were greasy and crunchy, and I could see why the humans let themselves grow fat by gorging on food like this.
We ate in relative silence, but it didn’t feel strained. I’d never really shared a meal with anyone like this before. The only people I spent any time with were the house servants who knew to make themselves scarce when their task was completed, and my father when he deigned to grace me with his presence.
“Is your room comfortable enough?” Tanner asked, and it actually seemed like he genuinely wanted to know. “If there’s anything else you need, just say.”
“It’s not what I’m used to, but it’s adequate.” I inwardly cringed as the words slipped past my lips. I was supposed to be ingratiating myself with these people. Why was it so hard just to say something nice? Even I knew that was rude, and ordinarily, that sort of stuff didn’t even register with me.
“We just had to do a massive shopping spree to get the kids’ rooms set up, so if you need anything, I feel like we’ve become experts at it by now,” Calli smiled. She had a beautiful smile. It didn’t just light up her face, it was like her whole being glowed with happiness.
“So, what do you do for a living?” Tanner tried again to get the conversation going.
“What do you mean?” I asked in confusion.
“He means do you have a job?” Calli clarified, looking confused herself.
“I’m a high ranking wolf. I don’t work outside of the pack. I suppose now that Calli is my mate and she is also mated to your alpha, I will assume some kind of beta role in this pack.” I sat back in thought as a plan started to form in my head.
That could work. The position would be debasing, but it would allow me closer access to the alpha. Once I had a better knowledge of the position of this pack in terms of its assets, I could start to steer the structure to how it was supposed to be. Then when the alpha was least expecting it, I’d have the ideal position to be able to take him out.
I didn’t realise Tanner was laughing, and at me no less, until I reached the end of my strategy planning.
“Dude, I’m afraid it doesn’t work like that in this pack. Everyone contributes, and the position of beta is earned, not a right.”
“So, who is your current beta?” I asked, already dreading what I was certain to be the answer.
“I am,” he grinned. “And before you get any ideas, we don’t allow dominance challenges in the pack. Every wolf contributes on an equal footing. We have an alpha and beta position because they are necessary, but apart from that, there are no rankings in this pack.”
“Hmmm, I had assumed you had some structure such as that when I noticed your lack of an omega,” I observed. “But without dominance challenges, how do you manage pack aggression.” I was actually interested in his response. Dominance challenges were the only way to keep a pack of hundreds of aggressive males from tearing the whole pack apart.
“We’re a smaller pack, so we don’t have the number issue, and everyone chooses their role. With pack members actually doing what they want to do, we don’t have any jealousy issues. With everyone contributing equally, there’s no issue with thinking someone is getting more than anyone else. Is it always going to work? Probably not. But it’s working for us for now, and when we get to the point where we have any issues, we’ll deal with it accordingly,” he explained.
“Like casting out the wolf that doesn’t fit,” I snarked. He preached of their better way of life, but I knew they’d just shunned a wolf from their pack, leaving him with no option but life as a rogue until his eventual madness took his life.
“I’m assuming you’re talking about Wallace,” he snarled.
I could understand why he would hate that name if it had come to a point where they had seen fit to discard him, but the fearful look that flashed across Calli’s face at the mention of his name pulled at something inside of me I wasn’t willing to look at yet.
“Wallace beat Calli to the point where she could have died and kidnapped her brother. He abused his own son. He’s not a wolf that is worthy of any pack,” Tanner spat.
A growl rumbled within my chest, and for the first time in my life, I didn’t lash out at my wolf as he tried to push to the surface.
Calli quickly stood from the table, taking her dishes into the kitchen and cleaning the sides down. I could see Tanner watching her sadly and the regret that flashed through his eyes.
“I’m going to put some laundry on,” she muttered, walking out of the room.
Tanner’s fists clenched on the top of the table, and I could see how much he wanted to go with her, but for some reason, he was holding himself back. For some reason, it just sparked the anger inside of me.
“How could you allow him to lay his hands on her?” I growled, unsure why I felt so strongly about this.
“It was a strange time. We didn’t realise Calli was our mate. There were feelings there, but none of us understood what was happening. We had a witch incursion into the pack, and one of the pups was taken—Wallace’s son. We found Calli and Grey unconscious out in the woods, and we didn’t know what had happened. River and I were trying to figure out what was wrong with Grey when Wallace…”
He hung his head in shame, and the roiling emotions inside were confusing me nearly as much as when I watched my hand reach out and lay on his arm.
“We will kill him together, brother,” I assured him. The words and the sentiment were so foreign to me, but they felt right. My mind was awash with confusion, and my wolf actually reached out to reassure me. For once in my life, I embraced it. I didn’t push him away. His warmth filled me, and I knew I didn’t deserve it. I didn’t deserve his loyalty and kindness after the way I’d treated him all these years.
“You should go to her,” I said, clearing my throat and quickly pulling my hand away. This level of emotion was disorientating, and I couldn’t afford to let these wolves sway me from my mission.
Tanner nodded and got up from the table, leaving without a word. I had things I needed to do anyway. To start with, I wanted to explore these pack lands and see what secrets there were to uncover.
22
Grey
Tanner found me in what would be the new library and started pacing the room. He could’ve helped me by holding the other side of this shelf I was trying to get into place, but I could see he needed to get something out first. Part of me was really enjoying putting this together for Calli and knowing it would be something I’d made for her, though.
“I don’t know what to do about Maverick,” he finally said, and realising how important this was, I placed the shelf down and pointed him over to the couple of armchairs we’d already moved from Calli’s place.
Tanner slumped down and propped his feet up on one of the cardboard boxes as he sat there and brooded for a moment. It was probably a box filled with priceless books, but I had a feeling he wasn’t thinking about anything else right now.
“He says weird shit like he’s never had a potato chip before, and I just want to wrap him a hug and tell him he’s safe now, and then he spouts some shitty, confusing shit, and I just want to punch him in the face instead,” Tanner sighed and sullenly crossed his arms over his chest.
If I was honest, I hadn’t seen us getting to this place so soon. I thought Tanne
r would push back against Maverick’s presence more than he was. But his beta nature was shining through with his need to care for this wolf we were bringing into the pack, not to mention the fact that this was his brother.
“We have to bring him into the pack bond tonight,” I said, taking the reins of the situation for now. “I have a plan for Jacob, and we can talk about that in a bit, but for now, I want him in the bond, then I want someone from the pack with him for the next couple of weeks. We need to crack his shell and find out what he’s been through in your father’s packhouse and ultimately if we can trust him.”
Tanner cringed as I spoke, and I knew he was probably dreading finding out what Maverick had endured during his childhood. He was going to have to come to terms with the fact that whatever it was, it wasn’t his fault. Tanner had no way of knowing he even had a brother, nevermind any way of saving him.
“My wolf is telling me that he is pack, but in my head, I just don’t see how we can ever trust him, Grey,” Tanner sighed.
This was going to be hard work. But not just for Tanner. He was right that it was going to be hard for us to trust Maverick. I had a feeling this was going to be a leap of faith type situation. I also had a feeling it was going to be a bit of a bite you in the ass type situation.
“Okay, let’s just get through the bonding ceremony and then go from there. I don’t want Calli alone with him until we know if we can trust him,” Tanner said, not surprising me in the least.
“I agree with you, but Calli can take care of herself, and I don’t think she would be too impressed if you tried to tell her she wasn’t allowed to do something,” I warned him, just imagining the look on her face if he tried to pull that with her.
Tanner huffed, his arms pulling tighter over his chest. He was about to go in full-on sulk mode soon.
“Fine, but he isn’t around the pups without supervision.”
“We need to talk with Calli about the Abby situation today as well,” I reminded him. “After everything with Jean last night, it’s obvious her magic is very much present. Maverick cannot, under any circumstances, find out about that.”
Tanner nodded as a rush of anxiety filled me at the thought of Abby being in danger from someone here in our pack. This was a shitty situation. The only way we could have Maverick out of the picture was if Calli rejected him as a mate and we could send him back to his father’s pack. But I didn’t want to encourage Calli to reject him, and I wasn’t sure I could even stomach the thought of sending him back there. I had no idea what Councillor Stone was up to, but I knew it wasn’t good, and I wouldn’t wish him on my worst enemy. Besides that, we needed all the allies we could get, and there had to be a reason why Calli had been fated to have so many mates.
“How is Blake?” Tanner asked, shifting off the subject of Maverick. I’d let him have it for now, but we were going to have to sit down tonight and come up with a plan.
“How do you think? He and Jean moved back to their cabin last night, I expect they’ll keep to themselves for the next couple of days, and I can’t say I blame them.”
Tanner grinned at the thought. Getting Jean back and healthy into the pack was a win the pack desperately needed. Especially Blake. I didn’t know how he’d coped as well as he did while she was asleep. Not only did he have to deal with his grief over his wife and child, but his wolf would have been grieving his pup. At least I wouldn’t have to worry about that if I ever lost Calli. I’d be driven to madness so fast I’d probably die.
“Okay, we should probably let them just be for a while. Apart from tonight, when we need Blake at the bonding ceremony, he can take a couple of days. We won’t need him at the garage. We’ve only got a couple of jobs in for this week because we weren’t sure if we’d open up again so soon. The bulk of the work isn’t coming in until next week,” Tanner strategised.
“How many of the jobs for this week can be pushed back?” I asked, cringing as I did. We had a good reputation in this town as a reliable garage. I didn’t want any blowback from this.
“Probably all of them,” Tanner shrugged. “They’re only small things from regulars. They’ll understand, especially because Holly put the word out that Jean wasn’t well and Coby’s parents had run off on him.”
“Fucking hell,” I muttered, shaking my head. “We really need to get some whiskey in here.”
Tanner chuckled in amusement, but I was deadly serious. This place really needed some booze in it. It was coming together nicely, though. Since I’d shown the room to Calli yesterday, Aidan and I had managed to get the wood cut to the right size last night, and I’d started building the bookshelves. We had a load of wood leftover from the renovations. We’d just need to sort the hardware for the cabinets we were fitting.
“We need to get the rest of Calli’s stuff moved this afternoon,” Tanner said, looking around the shelves that were half completed. “There shouldn’t be too much, just what was left in the library and her clothes and stuff.”
I nodded in thought. This was something else that had been on my mind. We were running out of space in the packhouse. It was a bit easier now Cassia and Hunter had moved into the cabin, but something didn’t feel right about Calli moving into a bedroom on the other side of the house. It wasn’t like she could bed hop for the rest of her life, though. That wouldn’t be fair on her, and she deserved more than that.
“She needs a room,” Tanner said, reading my mind.
I nodded in thought. This was ridiculous. She’d move in here from her place because we didn’t have enough room there, and now we were in exactly the same position here.
“We could move a couple of people into the empty rooms down here,” Tanner suggested, but I didn’t want to do that.
I had an idea of setting up a family room for the kids to hang out in. I suppose they had their bedrooms to do that, but I didn’t want them to feel like they were shut away up there all the time. Anyway, I liked the sound of the pups running around the packhouse.
“Or there’s the top floor. We could move up the plans to renovate the attic space, put in a suite up there for Calli with separate rooms for the rest of us. That would open up another three rooms on the second floor for when the pack expands. We’re going to need to look into getting another cabin up soon as well. We should have done it when Jean and Blake moved into theirs. We always said we’d make sure there was a spare on packlands, and we’re paying for not doing it now,” Tanner pointed out.
He was right. We’d got to the point where we’d become complacent. I think we’d hit a funk thinking the pack was never going to expand, and yet, look at us now. We might have lost Wallace, but once Hunter and Maverick went through the bonding ceremony tonight, we’d have added four wolves and a cub to our ranks. Not to mention whatever had happened with Coby. I had a feeling he was going to be coming into his wolf far earlier than we were expecting.
Rubbing my hands down my face, I sighed. “Okay, let’s go through where we stand with everything because shit is starting to build up.”
“Maverick, we have a sort of idea about,” Tanner pointed out. “What was your solution with Jacob for the bonding ceremony?”
“Right! He’s little,” I said, suddenly feeling like this was a terrible plan.
“Okay, for some reason, I’m dreading where you’re about to go with this,” he laughed.
I barked out a laugh, not even wanting to know what was going through his head. “I just mean, he should be easy enough to hide. I’ll help him shift before Maverick comes out. He just needs to be behind me with the pack. We’ll stash him somewhere and then get Maverick out of there so we can get him back in the house without him noticing.”
“Oh,” Tanner said, looking a bit disappointed and I was almost tempted to throw something at him. “It sounds stupid, but I actually think it could work.”
Shaking my head, because he was right, it did sound stupid, but I’d always appreciated the way Tanner could tell me straight how it was.
“I’ll scout it o
ut when we’re done here,” he offered, and I nodded in thanks. “Shadow demons coming to suck out your soul and our deal with the vampires?” Tanner pointed out next.
“Subtle, Tan, thanks for that. Well, we need information before we can do anything, so that means getting the library up and running as quickly as we can.”
“Okay, Aidan and I will make sure everything is moved here by tonight. You want a hand with the bookcases?” he asked, looking around the room again.
“Nah, I’ve got this covered, but you can pick me up some hardware for the cabinets at the hardware store if you don’t mind.”
“I’ll text Aidan to grab it. He’s at the garage at the minute so he can nip in on his way back,” Tanner nodded.
“Okay, while he’s there, get him to push the jobs for the next few days. Anything desperate, we’ll make a house call to sort it as long it doesn’t need to be done at the garage. That should hopefully build a bit of favour back with the customers we keep pushing back.”
“The Council,” Tanner pointed out next with a wince.
“I’m going to speak with Sean tonight about the situation and see if I can find out about this inside person they have.” Tanner sat up straighter in interest. “Don’t you remember, Calli mentioned it last week? She said if Jacob was taken, she knew someone who could get them out. I’m assuming that means the underground has someone on the inside. Presumably, snatching a prisoner like Jacob would have blown their cover, but I’m hoping they can maybe feed us some information.”
“I’d completely forgotten about that,” Tanner nodded, his brow creased in thought. “They might not have access to that kind of information, though,” he pointed out.
“Only one way to find out.”
“Okay, that leaves the witches.”
“For now, they fall to the bottom of the pile. They’ll be licking their wounds and regrouping. Cassia said they couldn’t perform the spell for the drain until they increase their numbers, so that should buy us some time. Hopefully, we can clear this vampire situation before that rears its ugly head again.”