That had her head up and her eyes on me. She actually looked a little worried. She had been trying to pretend that she wasn’t one of the wolves that Warren bothered.
“Warren is worth ten of you,” I told her. “He’s here when he’s needed, and he doesn’t do his best to undermine Adam whenever his orders are inconvenient.” I waved off her impending argument because I was saving the discussions of her more recent activities until later, when I’d broken her down enough to answer my questions. “Back to business. What else?”
“It’s your fault I died,” she said. “Poor Alec—when he tore my jugular he didn’t know what hit him. None of us did. The vampires targeted us because of you.”
The vampires had set a trap at Uncle Mike’s, the local tavern where the fae and assorted other supernatural people went to relax. They’d laid a spell that drove anything with ties to wolves to bloodshed. Mary Jo’s bad luck that she and two other werewolves—Paul and Alec—had gone there on the wrong night. By the time Adam and I got there, Mary Jo was dead. But apparently if you die when there is a Gray Lord present, at least when one particular Gray Lord is present, dead isn’t as permanent as it might otherwise have been.
“Point to you,” I said, deliberately relaxing against the wall so she could see it didn’t bother me in the slightest. I can’t lie with my mouth, but sometimes body language does it for me. “I’d tell you that accepting the blame for the bad guys is a stupid thing to do—the proper people to blame for your almost death are the vampires. But if I hadn’t been dating Adam, they wouldn’t have targeted the wolves, so I suppose you could be justified in blaming me.”
I waited for her to look up again, so I could read her face. When she looked at me, her control was back in full. There were two things that could explain her sudden dislike of me. The first one was the incident at Uncle Mike’s, but she wasn’t angry enough about it. Which left me with the second—I’d hit her with that when it would do me more good.
“But,” I told her, “if I accept the blame, I’d like to point out that I’m also the reason you are still standing here. The Gray Lord healed you because she thought she owed me a favor.”
She sneered. “I hope to God that someone does you that kind of favor someday. It hurt . . . It still hurts. Some days I can’t feel different body parts.”
I’d known about that, and it worried me though the fae had given her word that Mary Jo would be back to normal. I expect that she’d left out the word “eventually” because Mary Jo’s suffering didn’t really matter to the fae.
“Next time, I’ll tell her not to bother bringing you back,” I promised. I tapped my foot and wondered how far I really wanted to push this. Some of it depended upon what role I wanted to take in the pack. Just then I was channeling my inner Bran, using the techniques I’d grown up watching the Marrok use, techniques that came so easily to me it made me a little uncomfortable—I don’t see myself as a manipulative person. For the moment, though, I set that aside and considered the case at hand.
“Figure out the results you want and do what you can to get them” was one of Bran’s favorite sayings. Well, then, exactly what results did I want?
Part of that really depended upon how much of her recent activities were directed at me and how much at Adam. I found that I could excuse her actions against me, but I was less inclined to be forgiving about Adam.
I remembered that look she’d given me when I was sitting on the floor of the hospital with Adam changing in my lap—Adam, who’d damn near burned to death trying to rescue me because she hadn’t told him I was safe. The look that said she’d have been happier with him dead than with him on my lap.
Had that been a momentary thing, or had her anger that Adam was mine become a force driving her past the point of no return?
“Mary Jo,” I said pleasantly, “you and I know all of that is garbage. It is all true, or mostly, but it isn’t why you are so angry with me.”
Her chin jerked up.
“Adam is mine,” I told her. “And you can’t handle it. Does it bother you that I’m a coyote? That we have sort of an extreme case of an interracial—in our case maybe even cross-species—mating? Darryl is African and Chinese, and Auriele is Hispanic, and they don’t seem to bother you.” It wasn’t that I was a coyote shifter that bothered her. I knew it. I just wondered if she knew it. It did bother some of the pack; maybe Auriele and Darryl bothered some of them, too. If so, those pack members were smart enough to keep it to themselves.
Mary Jo tightened her lips but didn’t say anything.
“How long have you wanted him?” I asked her. “You had all these years since Jesse’s mother left.”
Bran’s methods sucked. I watched her eyes darken with pain and wanted to kick myself. But she’d been at least partially responsible for Adam’s wounds. And I agreed with Warren about fire after watching Samuel scrub dead flesh from live. Mary Jo had been stupid. I was betting she hadn’t hurt Adam on purpose, but I had to know.
I observed the anger that followed pain rise in her face and just watched her.
“You are nothing,” she spit. “I’m nothing, too. That’s how I know. Adam deserves the best. A wolf strong and beautiful, a woman who is—”
“More?” I suggested. “Smart, well-bred?”
“Not a half-breed coyote,” she snapped. Her wolf was in her eyes, and her voice was raw. “Not a stupid mechanic or a freaking fireman. There isn’t even a proper word for what I am. Fireman. He needs someone soft, someone feminine.”
“He deserves so much,” I said slowly. I had her, even though it made me sick. Coyotes aren’t cats; we don’t play with our prey. “I think he deserves a pack who has his back.”
“I have his back,” she said. I couldn’t see her hands. Through all this she’d held to parade rest, and her hands were hidden behind her back. From the flex of her biceps I would bet that they were clenched in fists, and her voice wasn’t as hard and certain as she meant it to be. But her words told me what I’d been watching for, told me that she hadn’t wanted him dead. That made the rest of this both harder and easier. Harder because she was going to be hurting even more before this was over—easier because she would survive it.
“You have his back, do you?” I kept my voice soft, my body relaxed. “Funny, I could have sworn that you just set him up to be killed.”
“I got him out,” she said. “I ran in after him with Darryl and pulled him out.”
“Not soon enough, Mary Jo,” I said. “He could have easily died in there.” I had to take a breath so I could maintain my relaxed posture. He could have died. But I had to keep up the momentum, make her listen to me, make her listen to herself.
“Who was it that was out there with you?” I asked coolly. “Ben says whoever it was, he has to be more dominant than you. It wasn’t Warren or Darryl.” Ben would have noticed if Darryl hadn’t been at the meeting. He’d have said something to me because if it was Darryl who was running the show, it would have been too dangerous to hold his tongue. The same was true of Auriele.
“How does the pack run from there?” I watched her sweat. Ben was right that it was someone higher up. She was expecting me to name him soon, so not too far down the pack hierarchy. “Auriele. It wasn’t her either, was it? She likes Adam. She’d never send him into a burning building to rescue someone who wasn’t there.”
She stiffened at the dig.
“Then there is Paul.” That got her—wasn’t that interesting? But I knew better. “It wasn’t him, though. Adam doesn’t trust Paul at his back. He’d have kept him right here through the whole pack meeting.” Paul had been my pick for the jerk who’d influenced me at the bowling alley before I’d understood how angry Mary Jo was. He’d probably been Adam’s pick, too. Paul was still angry about losing a fight to Warren, and he’d put the blame on Adam for that. Like Ben, Paul was a bitter and difficult person who didn’t like many people. Mary Jo was one he did like, her and her boyfriend, Henry.
I watched her face c
losely. She was worried I’d guess. Not Paul, then who? Further down the ranks things could get murky to an outsider as I had been and really still was. I ran the wolves I knew well through my head, then stopped. Henry? He was a nice guy. Smart and quick. A banker, I thought, but I wasn’t sure, something with finances. He would never—Hmm. “Never” was an awfully strong word.
I wondered how Henry felt about Mary Jo’s crush on Adam.
“Henry,” I said experimentally and watched her face whiten. Maybe she didn’t know how much she was telling me without opening her mouth at all. “Henry was out with you last night. Henry told you to leave the fae alone when they set my house on fire.”
Jesse’s door opened, and Adam came in and shut it gently behind him. He was obviously stiff, and, from the set of his jaw and the tightness of the skin around his eyes, he was in pain as well. If I could see it, he was hurting a lot more than he showed. And the Alpha didn’t show weakness if he could help it.
He was dressed only in a pair of gi bottoms that ended mid-calf, leaving the weepy wounds on his feet clearly visible. Oh, there were other bits in rough shape, but next to his feet, nothing looked all that bad.
“I heard your voice,” he told me, pulling my eyes away from his feet and up to his face. “So I pressed my ear to the door, and even with the noise my daughter calls music blaring, I overheard what you said, Mercy.” He looked at Mary Jo, who had turned around to face him and lost her formal parade- rest stance. She just stood there, looking vulnerable.
Had it been Samuel standing there, I’d have worried that he would be too soft on her. But Adam didn’t really see women as the weaker sex, and he knew how to organize and how to recognize organization when he saw it.
His unreadable face was focused on Mary Jo. “So Henry was there when the fae set Mercy’s house on fire. And here I thought you were out there alone. Because I knew Henry was in the house when I had plainly told him to back you up last night. Doubtless if I asked him, he’d tell me that he thought I only meant for him to be there while the meeting was going on . . . or he’d come up with some other explanation.”
“Henry was the one to tell you my house was on fire, wasn’t he?” I said. Like Adam, I was watching Mary Jo. I couldn’t see her face, but her shoulders tightened. A friend of mine from college, a drama major, told me that the shoulders are the most expressive part of the body. I had to agree with him. She was almost to the point of seeing the big picture, because she expected Adam to say yes.
“I see you’ve followed this to its logical conclusion, Mercy,” he told me, but his eyes were on Mary Jo. “I wonder if she’s seen it yet—or if she’s part of it.”
“Henry ran in and got you out to the trailer before anyone else came out of the house?” Mary Jo’s voice was stark, but she wasn’t arguing.
“That’s right,” Adam agreed. “More or less. He wandered into the kitchen. Before I could ask him why he wasn’t out watching Mercy, he looked out the window, and said, ‘What’s that? Is that a fire? My God, the house is on fire.’ ”
“He knew,” Mary Jo said uncertainly. “He saw them start it. He wouldn’t let me confront them because he was afraid I’d get hurt. He said Mercy and Sam were gone, what was the harm if the upstart coyote’s house went up in flames? She deserved a little hurt because of all the pain she’d caused.”
Mary Jo looked at Adam. “He meant to me. He was really angry about how the vampires had attacked us . . . how I was hurt because they were trying to get to Mercy. He wanted to get back at Mercy.”
“He could care less about me,” I told her. “His girlfriend didn’t like me better than she liked him. Henry was interested in Adam. He saw an opportunity to get back at Adam, and he jumped at it.” I looked at Adam. “The next time you leap into a burning building after me, you’d better make damned sure I’m in there. And wear your shoes, damn it.” I looked at his feet again. “You’re leaking nasty burn ooze on the carpet.”
He smiled. “I love you, too, sweetheart. And thanks to the time you bled all over it, I now know a place that can clean almost anything off the carpet.”
“He wanted Adam hurt,” I told Mary Jo. “Because if he’s hurt, then he’s vulnerable. An Alpha can be challenged at any time. Since Adam is hurt, usually he could put it off without anyone complaining, especially since the Marrok doesn’t allow fights for an Alpha position without his consent. But the pack is—” I looked at Adam. “Sorry, I know it’s my fault. But the pack is broken. Adam can’t put this off—not when the pack is in this much turmoil. If he does, he’s liable to have worse than a formal fight on his hands—he’ll have a rebellion.”
See, I grew up in a werewolf pack. I know the dangers. Not even fear of the Marrok can completely control the nature of the pack. That’s why an Alpha will do anything in his power to hide his weakness in front of the pack.
“Henry challenged you?” Mary Jo’s voice was shocked. “The Marrok will kill him, if you don’t manage it first.”
“Almost right,” said Adam. “Paul is actually the one who challenged me. Climbed in the window of the bedroom about four minutes ago and challenged me in front of Ben, Alec, and Henry. Henry having volunteered to drive Ben to pick up some clothes for Mercy because Ben’s hands are still too sore for him to drive easily and suggested Alec tag along.”
He paused, and said heavily, “Henry is helpful like that.”
Mary Jo nodded. “And Alec is known as a neutral party. Not one of your biggest fans, but not one of the hotheads either.”
Adam continued in a gentler voice. “They must have had some signal so that he and Paul appeared in my bedroom at virtually the same moment when neither Warren nor Darryl was there to interfere. Ben and Henry witnessed the challenge. Henry was appalled that Paul would challenge me when I was hurt.”
“They set you up,” said Mary Jo numbly. “They used me to set you up.”
“That’s what I was trying to tell you,” I said, then added a question casually. “Was it just you and Henry at the bowling alley, or did Paul help, too?”
She nodded, not even noticing all the assumptions I’d made because she was too distracted by the realization that things might not have been as she’d thought they were. “Paul, Henry, and I. Paul suggested it to me. ‘Can’t have a coyote second in rank in a respectable pack.’ ” Mary Jo looked at Adam. “He said she wasn’t good enough for you—and I agreed. Henry was pretty reluctant. I had to talk him into it. He set me up, didn’t he? Both of them set me up.”
I felt sorry for her. But I’d felt more sorry for her before I’d found out that the wolf who’d challenged Adam was Paul. Henry was a good fighter—I’d seen him play fight a time or two—but he wasn’t a tithe on Paul. Paul . . . Normally I wouldn’t worry about Paul taking Adam either, but normally Adam’s feet weren’t oozing goo on the carpet, and his hands weren’t swollen and raw.
That was why I wasn’t sorry enough for Mary Jo that I’d let her escape blame by pointing her finger at the other two.
“The bowling alley was you,” I said. “Oh, Paul wouldn’t cry if Adam and I broke up—but he wants to get rid of Adam more than he wants to get rid of me. Henry . . . Maybe that was the straw that broke the camel’s back for Henry—you’d know better than I. Was that the first time he realized how much you wanted Adam?”
Adam jerked his head toward me. I guess he hadn’t noticed how Mary Jo felt.
“Paul,” began Mary Jo. Then she stopped. Closed her eyes and shook her head. “Not Paul.” She gave Adam a wry smile. “Paul is tough, and he’s not stupid—but he’s not a planner. He’d never have figured out how to force you to accept a challenge before you were ready. She’s right. It’s Henry. What can I do?”
“Not a darn thing,” he said. “Just be smarter next time.”
“When’s the fight?” I asked, trying to be cool, trying to be a good coyote who lets her mate go out and fight a duel to the death when it hurts him to walk. I had to do it, because sobbing and fussing wouldn’t change anyt
hing except make his job harder. If he refused the challenge, Paul would be Alpha—and if I knew Paul, his first act would be to kill Adam. Henry was hoping so, anyway.
And the reason it was Paul who challenged and not Henry was because as soon as the Marrok heard about this—Paul was a dead man. And that would leave Darryl in charge of the pack with Warren as his second. The pack would not tolerate having a gay man in the second position because if something happened to Darryl, Warren would run the pack. So Warren would be killed or be moved by Bran—leaving Henry as the second in the pack.
Of course, Adam would have to lose to Paul for that to happen. I felt sick.
Adam looked at Jesse’s clock, which read 9:15. “Fifteen minutes from now in the dojo,” he said. “Would you go down and let Darryl and Warren know they’ll be wanted for witnesses? I think I’ll go lie down for another ten minutes.” He was in the hallway when he said, “If I survive, Mary Jo, we’ll have to come up with a suitable reparation for the bowling alley. You ruined a very promising evening, and I won’t forget about it.”
“YOUR FOOD IS COLD,” GROWLED DARRYL, AS I ENTERED the kitchen. “I hope your business was important.”
Jesse was still there, drying, while Auriele washed. There was no saving this, not if Paul specified the fight be here—no chance of talking Jesse into waiting this one out somewhere safe; she was too much her father’s daughter.
“Paul’s challenged Adam,” I told them. “Fifteen minutes from now in the dojo in the garage.”
Darryl whirled around with a growl, and Auriele stepped between him and Jesse, though I don’t think Jesse realized it because she was staring at me.
“How did he get to Adam?” said Auriele. “Who was supposed to be watching him?”
“Me,” I said after a stunned moment. “I guess that would be me.”
“No,” said Auriele. “That would have been Samuel. Ben said he left Adam with Samuel and you.”
“Samuel’s not pack,” growled Darryl, eyes light gold in the darkness of his face.