“I wouldn’t have,” Gabriel snarled.
I twisted around to look at him. The expression he meant to be threatening and strong was laced with fear and frustration.
“That’s exactly why you’re missing a hand now,” Gareth retorted. He glanced in the rearview mirror again, shaking his head at Gabriel. “Dude. If you’re trying to flip me the bird, use the hand that still exists, genius. Oh. That’s right. That’s one of the fingers you’re missing, isn’t it? Funny a brutal fight would manage to force better manners on you.”
Gabriel kicked my seat in anger and Gareth pulled the car over. “Don’t make me kick you out here.”
Snow slithered down the windshield before being whisked away by the squealing wipers.
“You wouldn’t—”
“Dare?” Gareth asked. “You have no idea what I’d dare given the proper motivation.” He looked at me, and I turned to look out the window, knowing he was talking about leaping down the cliff face. Talking about saving me.
No one else would’ve bothered.
We both knew that.
My stomach was burbling, and I forced myself to look past his reflection in the glass and tried instead to pick out something in the woods beyond to focus on.
“How much money do we still have?”
I shrugged.
“You need to think, ’laena,” Gareth urged. “That money determines what options we have. If any.”
“I—I’m not sure exactly,” I admitted.
“Well, think hard. Because, if you didn’t notice, you failed to come through for Dmitri. He may have it bad for Pietr Rusakova, but I have the feeling he’ll take anyone who’s able to do what he wants without question. Above everything else, he wants a werewolf.”
“Give him Gabe,” I said through a sneer.
“He wants a whole werewolf. One who follows directions,” Gareth added. “Have you noticed how much attention he’s been paying Noah?”
I swallowed.
“Let’s take the money and run as far and as fast as we can and hope our trail goes cold before Dmitri realizes he’s lost us.”
I shook my head. “It won’t be enough.”
Gabe sank into the backseat with a groan.
“Dmitri will be at the motel in the morning—I guarantee you that,” Gareth said.
“Not if I kill him tonight.”
* * *
“Why did you finally agree to come along with me?” I asked Gareth, my fingers wrapped around the steering wheel.
He was quiet for a long time, working out the words to say somewhere between his head, his heart, and his tongue. That was the weakness of Gareth: He always let his heart get caught up in the mix. That was also his strength. “You can’t do this alone,” he muttered. “You shouldn’t have to, either.”
“Huh. So when the moment comes, when it’s time to actually do the deed—kill the mobster—will you help?”
Again he was silent. “He is a threat to my family. I will do whatever has to be done when the moment comes.”
I nodded solemnly and slowed the car down. “That’s what I thought,” I confirmed a heartbeat before I snapped a hand out, undid his seat belt, and kicked him out of the car and onto the roadside.
He rolled a short distance, shouting my name in surprise.
He was the best of us. The kindest, the most compassionate. If I let him come along—help commit murder—I’d be killing more than some mafia man who had his hooks in my pups. I’d be killing the heart and soul of Gareth.
My Gareth.
My head spun, and I tightened my grip on the steering wheel and nailed the brakes a dozen yards away.
I couldn’t let Gareth be destroyed. No matter that I thought without backup Dmitri would get the drop on me.
And end me.
“… end your sorry existence,” Margie had threatened the time I’d forgotten to change the cat litter. I’d hated that cat as much as it had hated me. I’d never realized it knew what I was long before I did—that must’ve been why it shredded my curtains and peed on my walls. But I’d had my revenge. People say, “Revenge is a dish best eaten cold,” but cat, I knew, was best eaten fresh.
And hot. The memory stirred something in my blood. Reminded me of who I was.
I was the alpha.
In the side-view mirror I saw Gareth stop rolling and clamber to his feet.
All the things that came with being the pack’s leader—the respect as well as the burdens—were mine to shoulder, to bear. Alone.
Gunning the engine I sped away to find Dmitri and free us of his influence.
Jessie
I was hardly still, tight in the truck waiting for Pietr’s return.
“Stop doing that,” Max complained, jabbing my knee with his finger.
“Huh—wha-?” I blinked at him.
“You’re twitchy.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
“He’ll be back any minute,” Cat reassured us, but she was also obsessively looking out the truck’s window back the way we’d come. “He knows better than we do what time it is.”
I nodded.
Cat began picking at her fingernails.
“Something’s going on,” I muttered.
“Have you tried calling your father to let him know you are all right?” Alexi asked, adjusting the rearview mirror and trying to find me in the sparse light reflected inside from the snow.
“Oh. No.” That was dumb of me.
Alexi passed me his phone.
I switched it on and took a good look. “No good,” I countered, handing it back. “No signal.” Realizing I really needed to talk to my dad and Annabelle Lee only made me fidget more.
“It won’t be long now,” Cat said.
I screamed when he popped the door open and I nearly fell out. “Pietr!”
“Were you expecting someone else?” he asked, sliding in beside me.
“Dmitri?” Cat muttered. She rapped the roof of the truck with a fist. “Drive on,” she told Alexi.
He snorted and pulled out.
After buckling up, Pietr wrapped an arm around my shoulders, pulling me tight to the inferno that was his torso. He rested his lips on top of my head. “I missed you.”
“I’ve been here the whole time,” I said, pressed so close snuggling up to him was easy. I ached all over, but having a somewhat human hot water bottle next to me eased every pain in my body.
He lowered his head so his nose touched mine and with a blink he kissed me, all the power of the wolf burning through his lips to scorch and possess my own.
Max coughed. Then coughed again. I pulled away from Pietr’s lips reluctantly. Just long enough to reach out and cuff Max in the back of his head. He laughed and I fell back into Pietr’s arms, covering his face with kisses a moment before I confessed, “I missed you.”
Marlaena
A few blocks from the place where Dmitri was supposedly staying, I parked the car. Unease bubbled in the pit of my stomach. Something was wrong. I slid out of the car, my fingers twitching by my hip.
Hugging the walls, steeped in the shadows of the surrounding buildings, I kept an eye, and a nose, out for any sign of Dmitri. His scent—cigarettes, vodka, and enough cheap cologne to make any werewolf want to claw its nose off—was everywhere, hanging as a thin and sour reminder of his existence.
But his car?
It was nowhere in sight.
By the time I slunk beneath his windows and finally reached his door I was cursing. And not under my breath as good girls did. The reek of Dmitri was only a bit fresher here—only a little more recent.
I pulled out Gabe’s lock-picking set and went to work. I wasn’t nearly as quick at picking as Gabe was—even with werewolf ears there was a quality of hearing and of subtlety to touch I hadn’t mastered yet.
And if this didn’t work, maybe I’d never get a chance to master the skill.
After three minutes (with no noise from inside) I’d opened the door and was in.
I needed no i
nside light with my werewolf vision, the trace of a streetlight’s glow seeping between the heavy curtains of the room’s main window was enough. The smell of Dmitri was so thick I gagged. The air was dank and heavy, all sweat, vodka, desperately cheap cologne, and cigarettes.
Nothing decorated the room. No pictures or mirrors hung, no certificates or awards marked his achievements. It was very unlike anyone’s home should be.
Rattling open every drawer and closet, I realized the place had been stripped. Totally empty.
Even if he’d been a minimalist or a man without worldly possessions, still, this room would have held something.
Unless he’d cleared.
Because he’d been warned.
“No!” I shouted, reaching for my cell phone. I pulled up Gareth’s number and hit send. “Where are you?”
“Walking home.”
“What street?” I slammed the door behind me and raced back to the car.
“Couldn’t do it, could you?”
“What street?!”
“Same one I’ve got road rash from.”
“I’m coming to get you. Call the pups. Tell them we’re coming home and to keep the doors locked.”
I jumped into the car and flew as fast as I could all the way back to Gareth.
Flinging the door open, I nearly knocked him to the ground. “Get in, get in!”
He leaped inside, buckled up, and held on to the handle bolted to the car’s ceiling just above the passenger’s side door.
He didn’t say a word for two merciful blocks, but as we fishtailed to a stop at a sudden red light, he cleared his throat. “You couldn’t kill him, could you?”
I snorted. “You’re right. You’re absolutely right. I couldn’t effin’ kill him.”
He set a hand on my knee. A simple gesture meant to say, “See, I knew you weren’t that horrible of a person.”
I picked up his hand and set it back on his own leg.
“So why couldn’t you do it, ’laena? Why couldn’t you kill him?”
I turned his direction just long enough to lock eyes with him so he’d know how truly serious I was.
He swallowed, seeing my expression, and I answered the question I knew he’d regret asking. “Because I couldn’t find him.”
Alexi
She flung open the door and leaped at us so suddenly I jumped back, falling into a defensive position.
Pietr snorted, Cat laughed, and Max just caught her and swung her around so her bright red hair caught every bit of light from the porch’s single bulb.
“You’re back, you’re back, you’re back!” Amy sang, giving Max a kiss she surely expected to be quicker than it was.
He pulled her tight against him and worked his mouth across hers like he was trying to suction up a lung. It was far from pretty.
Jessie concluded her call and thrust my phone into my hand. Her father had surely been as thrilled to hear her voice as Amy was to see Max.
I squeezed the phone and slipped it into my pocket, banishing my impulse to report my own safety to someone overseas. Perhaps I would have viewed their display of affection differently if I still had someone of my own.
Perhaps that was the key to seeing the beauty of another couple’s kiss—knowing you had even better yourself.
Amy tugged away from Max, the tension again filling the space between them like a wall, but a wall they were both working to take down in equal increments.
With a grin, Amy pounced on Jessie, dancing around the porch with her before she pulled back away to examine her BFF’s face. “Where is the bitch?” she asked, her tone suddenly cold.
“Gabe was the one who took me. He’s the one to blame,” Jessie explained.
“Yeah,” Max said, giving Jessie an odd look. “Marlaena only threw her down a mountainside.” He shrugged. “Gabe was definitely the bigger problem.”
Jessie rolled her eyes. “I didn’t mean it that way. I meant…”
Max leaned in, widening his eyes dramatically. “Go ahead. I can’t wait to hear what you really meant to say about your willing murderer’s innocence.”
“Marlaena wasn’t going to kill her,” Pietr said, stepping forward.
Jessie frowned.
“I think she tried to save me at the last minute—right as Dmitri fired his second shot.”
“That did not seem to be your sentiment on the way to rescuing Jessie,” I reminded Pietr.
“This is not the sort of conversation to hold on someone’s porch,” Cat said tersely, shooing us all toward the door. “We can discuss this all inside. Over cups of tea.”
I groaned, knowing precisely what my darling sister intended.
Marlaena
We vaulted up the stairs side by side and raced each other to the rooms the pups usually gathered in, slamming our fists on each of the doors and announcing ourselves in our most authoritative voices.
Doors swung wide for us, and Gareth corralled everyone into a single room.
His.
I tried not to stare at his bed in disappointment and focused on the pups, exchanging one frustration for another. “Stop milling around!” I demanded. “I can’t count when you’re pacing that way!” Worry was clear in their eyes. “Sit!” I barked.
They dropped to the sofa, the bed, and the floor, all cross-legged and wide-eyed, their hands folded in their laps.
And then I called their names out one by one: Jordyn, Londyn, Kyanne, Darby, Beth, Tembe, Debra, Justin, Terra…?” No answer. I scanned their faces again—all so familiar now, even though most of us had hardly been together an entire year. My lips pursed. “Terra?” The pups looked away, each suddenly fascinated by something about the room we’d all gathered in. “Noah.” He was also absent. “Oh. Oh, God.” I closed my eyes and asked the question my gut had already answered. “Where’re Terra and Noah?” But my heart dropped into my stomach the moment the words left my lips. I knew the answer.
“They went with Gabe,” Darby volunteered.
Jordyn raised her hand but asked her question before I’d given her permission to speak. “What happened to Gabe’s hand—”
Londyn echoed her twin’s concern. “Yeah. How’d he get hurt?”
The questions began to fly.
“No, no, no!” I shouted, covering my ears with my hands to try to stop from pulling my own hair out. “Where did Gabe take Noah and Terra?”
They shrugged, frowning.
Londyn said the thing I’d known was inevitable. “They got into Dmitri’s car. He said they’d be back as soon as they could.”
I fell into a heap on Gareth’s bed, cradling my face in my hands.
Gareth slipped an arm beneath me, curling me into his arms. “Shhhh,” he soothed. “We’ll get them back, Princess. Don’t you worry your pretty little head.”
The pups fell silent, staring at us both.
I’d finally done it. I’d failed them. By not delivering Pietr—my heart raced at his name—I’d doomed both Noah and Terra.
And destroyed the family I’d been awkwardly building.
“Did they say or do anything else?” I whispered, my voice hoarse.
There were whispers that rose slowly as they conferred with one another. They knew I wasn’t holding up well. I sucked a breath through my nose, snot rattling and almost as wet as the tears leaking treacherously from my eyes. Not holding up well? Who was I kidding? I was falling apart.
And no one wanted to be the one to deliver bad news to an alpha on the brink of snapping.
I wiped my face with the backs of my hands and coughed to clear my thickening throat. I was an absolute mess. As my eyes cleared, I noticed Darby had crept over to whisper into Gareth’s ear.
His eyebrows rose sharply. “’laena. Your key.”
“What?” But I fumbled it out of my pocket and followed as he peeled away from me and strode out the door, muttering to himself. “Gareth?”
He swiped the key through my room’s lock and shoved open the door.
In three q
uick strides he was in front of my dresser, slinging open the bottom drawer. Yanking it free, he flipped it upside down, scattering my socks and underwear across the floor for everyone to see as they crowded behind me, curious.
I knew what he was doing. And I knew why. “Damn him,” I said, springing across the room and snatching up the envelope I’d taped to the bottom of the drawer.
The envelope hiding the last of our cash.
I slipped my finger inside it, but it was as empty a gesture as it was an empty envelope.
It was, after all, Gabriel we were dealing with. And if Hell had no fury like a woman scorned … well, Gabriel made angry women look like absolute innocents.
And I knew firsthand we never were.
I determined then and there to prove to him that same lesson.
Alexi
Jessie’s request for sugar and milk in her tea only elicited a sharp look and a tsk from Cat. In the Rusakova household tea was not truly for drinking—though that was a part of the process—it was a tool for prediction.
Our brief time in Europe not long before we settled in Junction and upturned Jessie’s life had brought us into contact with a wide assortment of intriguing characters. While Pietr sulked his way through libraries, museums, and art galleries surrounded by a broad selection of beautiful young women but focused more on the dead than anything as alive as a date, Max used his wiles to get invited to the wildest parties and into the arms of equally wild girls. I visited all of the tourist attractions, imagining how different the trip would have been if Nadezhda had accompanied me, and I sent Nadezhda a postcard daily unless there was more to say and then I used my finest penmanship (which was ragged at best) and wrote her letters spiked with poetry (never of my own invention, as my desire was to impress her, not worry her at my inability to compose a non-rhyming couplet). We all coped with our parents disappearing in different ways, all clinging to different things.
Ekaterina clung to the soothsayers, panhandlers, and gypsy readers who lived on the outskirts of major cities and only came in to tell fortunes, pick pockets, or beg. She was a princess among paupers, and they were as fascinated by her interest in them as she was enamored of their rootless, wandering lifestyle. I joked with her once that, given her behavior, I could only assume she had taken a gypsy lover. She thrust me up against a wall, snarling and spitting, and told me to never say such a thing again.