"Yeah?"
"You up for doing some catering for the--"
"N.O. No."
"But you're an amazing cook."
"I'm a genius in charge of DarkRiver's financial assets, not your personal chef slave."
She grinned, because grumpy as he sounded, her brother had taken time out of his genuinely busy day--because he was a financial genius--to come hang out with her. The food was just an excuse; this was about family. "Is Kirby okay with you being here today?" Bastien and Kirby hadn't been mated long, were understandably possessive of one another.
"Are you kidding? She loves the pupcubs." He poked his head out of the kitchen again. "I think she still occasionally worries about the fact that she's a lynx and I'm a leopard. The pupcubs reassure her that's not and never will be an issue."
Mercy knew her sister-in-law well enough to guess what lay at the root of her fears. "Just love her." Kirby had been alone for a long time--she was pack now and understood that she belonged, but a little extra affection would help cement that realization.
"I love her until my heart hurts." Bastien's expression softened. "She's smart, sexy, funny, perfect."
"I just threw up a little in my mouth." Mercy pretended to gag, wasn't fast enough to dodge or catch the cushion Bastien grabbed from the closest sofa to throw at her. It hit her in the chest with so little momentum she knew he'd been purposefully gentle. All three of her hooligan brothers had reverted to type now she was pregnant: protective DarkRiver dominants.
You'd think they'd never pushed her into a mud pool or five, or tripped her up, or played hard-out football with her complete with bruising tackles. Of course, she hadn't been innocent of hooliganism herself. In fact, she might've pushed Bas and Sage into a mud pool first.
Grinning at the thought of her own children playing rough and tumble games with each other, she said, "Is your lynx coming over after work?"
"I've messaged to let her know you need another kitchen slave so she'll be roped into cherry pie prep." A deep smile. "She said she'll pick up the supplies on the way."
"Did I tell you I adore your mate?"
"She is highly adorable."
Laughing at the smug cat look on his face, Mercy went back to her plans while Bastien busied himself in the kitchen.
The first problem was location.
Usually when DarkRiver held such gatherings, it was in the Pack Circle. SnowDancer had a comparative space up in their territory. DarkRiver was a much smaller pack and as such had a smaller central gathering space. However, SnowDancer's celebration area was in the Sierra Nevada and at a higher elevation. If the event was to be held soon after the birth, then Mercy and the pupcubs would have to travel to that elevation.
The babies might feel like linebackers inside her, but they'd be very small at that stage and she didn't want to shock their little bodies. It would've been different were they to be born in the Sierra Nevada, but they'd be born in DarkRiver's Yosemite territory. She wanted them stronger before taking them up.
Any wolves who wanted to visit would be welcome in DarkRiver lands.
"Hmm." Tapping a finger on the dining table, she picked up her phone to contact Riley. Her mate was worried she'd go into labor while he wasn't with her, had only reluctantly left to run an errand for SnowDancer. Mercy couldn't argue with his concern--most changeling multiples were already born by this stage of the pregnancy.
He'd given the pupcubs strict instructions to stay put while their daddy was away. Mercy could almost feel them listening as he spoke, had full faith they'd behave--because she was not having them without Riley next to her. The end.
Location for party? she messaged him. DR circle is too small and I don't want to switch elevations on the pupcubs so soon after birth.
Pupcubs are half wolf, Riley responded. They won't mind.
That was a good point. Regardless of what their babies chose to shift into, they had Riley's genes as well as her own. And Riley was built for the higher elevations, barely felt the cold. He was also tough, gorgeously sexy with those big shoulders and that wall of a body that could take anything she could dish out.
Mercy pressed her thighs together. I wanna pounce on you.
Your pregnancy hormones are going to kill us both . . . and we'll die happy.
She giggled, slapped a hand over her mouth before Bas heard and grew curious.
What about the area around our place? Riley sent.
She knew he wasn't talking about this cabin; he was referring to their permanent home, a home that was part Swiss chalet, part rugged mountain cabin. It'll also mean an elevation change, she replied, but not such a big one. And it's where the older teens and early-twenties group had their new year's party. A successful effort to get that age group talking to one another across pack lines.
Only problem is I'm not sure there's enough open space.
Mercy considered Riley's point. Cutting down trees wasn't an option. No changeling would ever damage the environment for such a fleeting reason. We could use our house and the land around it as the focus and people could spread out into the trees.
Close to the house, those trees weren't packed so tightly together that it would make mingling difficult. We have enough open space for dancing and for the kids to play.
Riley agreed before messaging: I'll be home in a couple of hours. You good?
Getting fatter by the minute but otherwise happy. So are the pupcubs.
He sent her back a whole bunch of hearts. She melted. Senior SnowDancer Lieutenant Riley Kincaid did not message little pink hearts. Saving the message, she hugged the phone to her chest for a moment before messaging back some hearts of her own. She added puppies. Because she could be goofy and mushy with her mate. He wouldn't see her as any less strong.
Positively buoyant afterward, she sketched out several more ideas. A temporary dance floor--maybe backlit?--was a definite, as were pretty lights in the trees. Beside each point, she jotted down names of packmates and SnowDancers who'd be good at actioning it. Riley could help with the latter when he got back.
Food, of course, lots of it. Everyone could pitch in there--despite her teasing of Bastien, bringing food to share at a pack event was pretty standard in both DarkRiver and SnowDancer. "Bas?"
"Yup?"
"Should we get a special cake?"
"What? Half wolf, half cat, all danger?"
She knew he was messing with her, but she liked the idea. "That'd be fun. The pups and cubs would love it."
Mercy stroked her belly when she paused in her work. Space was at a premium in there. The recent scans Tamsyn had taken showed the pupcubs wrapped around each other like living pretzels, a foot in someone's face, an arm under a chin, other creative ways of making the most of limited space.
"It's almost time," she whispered to them. "Your daddy and I can't wait to hold you in our arms."
Even as her lips curved in joy and wonder, part of her mind continued to think of the darkness licking at the edges of the world, of the growing threat to a small panther cub, and of a woman trapped far from home. When the Trinity Accord was first proposed, she'd hoped her pupcubs would be born into a world at peace.
Today, she accepted that it was going to be a far more complicated, and far longer, process.
Chapter 16
FORMER PSY COUNCILOR and once leader of the Arrow Squad, Ming LeBon needed to be part of the Trinity Accord, not just for informational purposes but because he might otherwise miss out on lucrative business opportunities. Unlike with Nikita Duncan, business didn't occupy the central role in Ming's personal hierarchy of importance, but he'd long ago learned that money was power.
Since the wolves and the squad would certainly block his application to sign the accord, he'd have to get in via a majority. So he'd play politics. He would far rather use fear to achieve his aims, but that could backfire in this situation. No, it was better if he began making contact with smaller groups and flattering them with his interest.
He'd also sound out a nu
mber of large Psy corporations who couldn't be as "happy" about the accord as they appeared to be in public. Together they'd ensure Ming's application to sign Trinity was a success. Of course, he'd then figure out how to take control of the cooperation agreement and use it to his advantage.
The Trinity Accord was too potentially influential to be left in hands that had no experience with wielding that kind of power.
Chapter 17
I THINK LUCAS and Hawke should do the tango to open the party. Yes? p.s. Update on pupcubs: I am still fourteen months pregnant.
Sascha stifled a laugh as she replied to Mercy's message from her curled-up position in an armchair in a corner of Lucas's private office at DarkRiver's Chinatown HQ. He had a much sleeker public office on another floor, but this was the hub of the HQ.
"What's the smile for?" Lucas glanced over from where he stood in front of a comm screen, having just finalized the details of a new business project DarkRiver was entering into with a large Psy family group.
Sascha read out the message. "I'm voting yes to the tango," she added. "I want to see you and Hawke cheek to cheek."
Lucas's scowl was very alpha. "She needs to give birth so she can stop being bored and making trouble."
"I think she'd agree with you." In her last update, Mercy had written: Think belly button has popped off. May have to fashion new one out of a doughnut hole.
Lucas turned back to the comm as it chimed an incoming call. "BlackSea," he murmured to her before touching the screen to answer.
The woman who'd made the call had sharp cheekbones, her flawless skin a shade that, Sascha suddenly thought, wouldn't have looked out of place in any Psy family. Psy in Silence had a clinical way of mixing and mingling genes to the family's psychic advantage, until skin shades on either end of the spectrum were less common than those in between. According to Riaz, one of the SnowDancer lieutenants who most often dealt with BlackSea, Miane was the product of a devoted mating between an Egyptian father and an Algerian mother.
The result was a striking, powerful woman.
Her straight black hair was cut in a blunt fringe over slightly uptilted eyes that were currently a translucent hazel. However, Sascha had seen those irises turn obsidian. It shouldn't have disconcerted her, not when Psy eyes could go fully black. But the blackness in Miane's eyes . . . it was as dark as the deepest part of the ocean, a whispering echo of a more primal time.
"Lucas." The BlackSea alpha's tone was cool but Sascha sensed boiling tension beneath the skin. As an empath, she couldn't technically feel a person's emotional resonance from this far a distance, but technicalities weren't everything. It was her belief that empaths learned fine emotional cues without knowing it.
Sascha had discussed that with Ivy Jane and with young Toby. Both agreed, though Toby had put it a different way: "Since we know about emotions all the time, I guess we get used to separating out all the types. Like changelings can with scent."
An astute comment from an astute boy.
"Miane," Lucas responded while Sascha stayed out of the shot. "Tanique's info give you any leads?"
A shake of Miane's head. "We've focused on Canada because we have to start somewhere, but so far, nothing's panned out."
"We're here to assist if you need it."
BlackSea's alpha nodded before moving on to the reason for her call. "I just spoke to Aden Kai. He suggested I attend a Trinity summit in two hours with the head of a Psy family plus a couple of Human Alliance CEOs. All three have interests in coastal areas that touch our waters."
"You wondering why the short notice?"
"Kai says it's to stop the chance of a violent disruption and that I'm getting an hour's extra notice because it'll take me longer to reach the location of the meeting. But while I'm predisposed to like the Arrows, I'm well aware they have motives and aims of their own, not all of which align with BlackSea's."
DarkRiver, meanwhile, Sascha realized, was an official ally. Changelings didn't make such pronouncements lightly.
"It's legit." Lucas braced his hands on his hips, the fine cotton of his white shirt stretching over his biceps. "I'd take the usual precautions regardless--we don't know the motives of all parties who've signed the accord."
Miane logged off with a curt nod and no good-bye.
Watching her mate use the comm screen to deal with a quick contract update, Sascha wondered if Lucas knew he was becoming a powerful figure worldwide. Likely not. Such thoughts would go against his pack-minded nature. He'd never pursued power for power's sake and never would--but as Miane had just demonstrated, Lucas had come to be considered worthy of trust by an influential network of changelings.
Another call came in just as he finished up what he'd been doing and went to turn toward Sascha. She caught his raised eyebrow. "Jen Liu and I don't have a scheduled call today."
It turned out the matriarch of the Liu family group wanted his feedback on a changeling pack that was pitching for business with Liu. "Our contacts in that area are regrettably thin," said the silver-haired woman with a sharp, pointed face. "I'm not requesting private data; I simply wish to know if they're reputable in a business sense."
"Very," Lucas replied. "They're small but if they take on a project and you don't get in their way once the plans are finalized, they'll finish it on time and within budget."
"Thank you. Should you require similar feedback on a Psy company, feel free to contact me."
That was when Sascha realized Lucas wasn't only trusted by changelings across the world, but that he was gaining a reputation among Psy as well. "Naya," she whispered, understanding settling on her shoulders like a warm blanket.
Her mate sent her a questioning look.
"Changeling and Psy," she said, "they both know that of all involved parties, you alone would never jeopardize Trinity. You--we--have a child who needs to grow up in a united world."
Her mate's eyes were suddenly more panther than human. "A fair evaluation, isn't it, kitten?"
"Yes." She uncurled her legs from the armchair and got up to walk to him, wrapping her arms around his waist as they stood face-to-face. "You don't mind that they know?"
Head inclined to meet her gaze, Lucas shook his head. "Not if this is the consequence--if people trust me, they trust in Trinity by default."
An inquisitive mental touch across Sascha's mind. "Naya's having fun with Clay."
The quietest of the sentinels was one of Naya's favorite people. She would snuggle up against his shoulder and watch wide-eyed while he moved around, no matter what he was doing--and unusually for Naya, she didn't demand to be put down so she could explore on her own. Clay said it was because he had experience with little girls, thanks to his adopted daughter Noor.
His mate, Talin, had a different take on it. "He's always had a marshmallow heart," the tawny-haired woman had teased one day while he was cuddling Noor in one arm and holding Naya in the other. "He used to attend tea parties with me when we were kids. He even drank the pretend tea and told me it was delicious."
Clay had glowered at the woman he called Tally. "Wait till I have my hands free."
His glower should've been terrifying--Clay was a seriously dangerous leopard. But Noor had growled and pretended to maul Clay, setting off Naya, who'd burst into hysterical baby laughter that had in turn set off both Sascha and Talin. Clay's grin had creased his cheeks, the once angrily silent sentinel now a man deeply at peace and delighted with his life.
Smiling at the memory, Sascha responded to Naya's telepathic touch with a psychic kiss. Here I am, sweetheart.
"I've been thinking that Naya should meet Nikita," Lucas said at almost the same time.
Sascha's mouth fell open. "You don't even like her."
Nikita had been part of a machine that had crushed countless changelings under its boot, had in fact been a member of the organization that had consciously hidden the worst serial killers on the planet. That action had led to the deaths of hundreds, including that of Dorian's younger sister, a loss that
had devastated the sentinel and enraged Lucas.
SnowDancer had almost lost Brenna to the same murderous psychopath.
"I might not like her," Lucas said, "but she kept you alive in difficult circumstances and she's Naya's grandmother." He ran his thumb over her cheekbone, tactile as always.
Sascha never had to wonder about Lucas's love for her, either on the emotional or on the physical plane. Neither did she have to worry about being touch hungry ever again, as she'd been for so many years of her life. "Still," she said, trying to make sense of his suggestion and failing, "to trust her with access to Naya?"
Her mate's expression grew dark. "I'd rather Naya know her from childhood than that she grow up curious about her--curious cubs have a way of getting into trouble."
Sascha couldn't argue with that. She'd seen exactly how much trouble DarkRiver teens could get into; a teenager curious about her powerful, lethal grandmother had the potential to get into more dangerous trouble than most. "I don't think Nikita would ever hurt her," she said, placing her hand on the taut muscle of Lucas's arm.
"I agree," he said. "Otherwise, feline curiosity or not, I wouldn't let her within a hundred feet of our child." Sliding one of his hands up to curve it around her neck, he locked his gaze with her own. "If we do it, it has to be soon. Nikita's still weak from the assassination attempt, her defenses down. Naya might actually get to meet the woman beneath the mask."
Unlike the panther who was her mate, Sascha's empathic heart wasn't used to thinking with such pitiless pragmatism, but she knew Lucas was right. They had to bring Naya and Nikita into contact while there was a chance Nikita would bond with their baby--because once Sascha's mother bonded with a child, she'd fight to the death to protect that vulnerable life.
Sascha had understood that only after she was out of the PsyNet.
"I'll work out a time with Sophie," she said. "We'll make sure Nikita doesn't know, so she can't prepare." Nikita's most senior and trusted aide, Sophia Russo, was very much her own woman and she would defy Nikita if she thought it good for her boss.
"Sophia still worried about how hard Nikita is driving herself?"
Nodding, Sascha said, "At least Anthony's keeping an eye on her. If anyone can make my mother rest, I'd say it's him." Quite aside from whatever it was that was going on with Nikita and the head of PsyClan NightStar, Sascha knew Nikita respected Anthony.