Bloodlines (62 page)

Anthony was alone in the room when Randall came in. Wordless, Randall sank onto his bed, drawing his knees up to his chest, wishing that, for once, Anthony wouldn’t be kind to him. He couldn’t bear the thought of anyone asking how he was, being concerned, much less Anthony. He was holding himself together now. Any show of kindness would break him, he was sure.

That wish must have been written all over his face, because Anthony only observed, “You look like you’re about to seriously hurt the next person that says anything stupid.”

Nodding, throat too tight to speak, Randall just curled up further on himself and stared blankly at the floor. He heard Anthony’s mattress creak, footsteps, then his own bed dipped as Anthony sat next to him. “Everything okay?”

And just like that, the dam burst.

He listed over into Anthony, head buried in his shoulder. He didn’t cry, because Randall was quite certain if he started, he wouldn’t stop. But he pushed himself into Anthony’s arms as if he was a child again, clinging to his brother after a bad dream. “No,” he whispered, voice shattering.

With a quietly sympathetic sigh, Anthony wrapped his arms around Randall’s shoulders. “Let me guess. Victor?”

He nodded, clenching his jaw as tight as he could to hold back sobs. He couldn’t break. Anthony had enough on his plate, enough
real
things to worry about. Randall couldn’t let himself go in front of him. “It’s okay,” he managed. “It’s not a big deal.”

“Randall, come on,” Anthony admonished. “It’s you. You’re one of the two biggest deals in my life. What did he do? Should I go kick the shit out of him? Did he change his mind about being with you?”

Anthony, gods love him, had a tendency to be a complete mother hen when he saw that Randall or Edwin were hurt, physically or mentally. Randall dreaded the inevitable day that Anthony really felt he
would
need to go kick the shit out of a problem, because he had no doubt Anthony would give it a good attempt.

“It’s nothing, Anthony.” And the very
last
thing Anthony needed to be doing was expending energy on Randall’s problems. “I’m sorry. It really doesn’t matter.” He sat up, taking off his glasses to clean them, trying to carefully control his expression.

“You can say that all you like, but we both know that’s going to end up with me just asking the same question all night.” Anthony curled the arm he had around Randall’s shoulders, tugging him in closer. “Do I need to keep asking?”

“It’s nothing,” Randall repeated. But one look over at Anthony confirmed he had that stubborn set to his jaw. There was literally no way to get Anthony off a topic once he’d sunk his teeth in like that. Randall might as well save himself several hours of nagging and give in. “He’s going home. Like he should. I packed his things and told him to go home. That’s it.”

Anthony peered at him. “Something tells me that he wasn’t the one to make that decision. You’d be reacting a lot differently if he had.”

Randall shrugged, trying to appear disinterested. “He’ll be happier this way.”

Anthony looked just about as confused as Victor had been. “Do we need to talk about this? Or….” He frowned in even deeper bafflement. “I don’t understand. He was perfect for you!”

Jaw tightening, Randall shrugged Anthony’s arm away, then pushed himself off the bed. Desperate for something to do with his hands, he grabbed one of their bags and started to pack what few belongings they’d brought with them. He took a moment to mourn his books, back at their home. There was no time to go back and get them. Maybe someday. “He is an adrenaline junkie, looking for something dangerous. Which I am most definitely not.”

“
Victor
? An adrenaline junkie?” Anthony stared at him. “That guy probably just drinks an extra cup of tea to get a thrill.”

“Or dates a vampire,” Randall said, words coming short and brittle as he jammed clothes into the duffel bag. “Or chases after a pack of wolves. Or looks into an immortal’s eyes. Or sleeps with a goddamn
wolf
.”

Anthony didn’t look surprised at the mention of Randall and Victor sleeping together. He did, however, sigh very faintly. “I still think you’re perfect for each other. But it’s your decision. I just wish you had an opportunity to work things out.” He paused, a gleam in his eye. “What if we didn’t—”

“No,” Randall said bluntly. Even if there’d been hope, Randall wasn’t about to stay simply for himself.

Anthony frowned. “Is there any way I could talk you into letting Victor come along?”

Teeth gritted, Randall finished fishing Edwin’s socks out from all the random corners where he seemed to toss them. “Victor is a grown man. He can certainly do whatever he wishes. But I doubt he will have any reason to come with us. He has a job, Anthony. A life.” One-night stands to continue. “It’s not like he’s my mate. I’ll get over it.”

“Okay.” Anthony didn’t sound thrilled to let the point go, but he did it nonetheless. “I’m so sorry, Randall. I wish things had worked out better.” He sounded about as miserable as if
he’d
been the one in Randall’s situation. Anthony had always been too empathetic for his own good, especially when it came to his brothers. “You need anything, you know you can just talk to me?”

“I am perfectly fine, Anthony.” Randall zipped up the bag and tossed it toward the door. “And we’re packed. So how about we go round up Edwin and find some dinner?”

“Perfectly fine my ass,” Anthony grumbled under his breath. He leaned over the mattress and slid something off the nightstand. “Just one thing more to pack. I think there’s room in my bag.”

It was the book. The one Victor had given him. A tight ache settled into Randall’s chest as he reached out to take it, lightly running his fingers along the cover. “No, it’s all right,” he whispered, voice wavering. “I, uh. I’ll take care of it.”

Gently, carefully, he slid it into his own messenger bag. He tucked it away next to all those possibilities he’d extinguished, all those hopes he’d let grow only to watch them wither away. For a little while at least, his Beatrice had been a very nice dream.

It was time to wake up now.

Jed

T
HREE
WEEKS
later, and they’d finally finished setting up the new camp. There were tents for shelter, outhouses far enough away to not make the wolves gag, and a tarp-covered space for the kitchens. It wasn’t pretty, but it kept the rain off while cooking, and that had turned out to be goddamn crucial. All in all, everyone had a place to eat, sleep, and shit, so that had to count for something.

Whatever the fuck Jed had thought about how hard planning a goddamn vacation was, getting a couple hundred furry-assed wolves packed up and moved cross-country? Yeah, that was some serious shit. Fuck knew how Jed had managed to get enough trucks there with a day’s notice, but once the hunters had found the camp, they’d had days, not weeks, to get their asses in gear.

And the travel had been the fun part. Actually setting up camp had been a fucking nightmare.

It’d rained for a week straight, turning their carefully picked clearing into mud soup. Setting up any kind of semipermanent structures had turned into a dirty, dangerous job. More than one person had gotten injured by shit sliding where it wasn’t supposed to, falling when no one could catch it, and plain bad luck. When the sun had finally broken through, Jed had thought he’d never seen anything better.

Redford had helped him set up a training program for any of the wolves who wanted to learn how to fight. They had regular patrols and what was shaping up to be a pretty decent militia, even if half of them didn’t want anything to do with guns. The Gray Lady had named Jed an honorary pack member, which as far as Jed could tell meant he had a lifetime membership at the gym, and nobody tried to sniff his ass anymore when he went out walking the perimeter of the camp.

The new camp was set in a valley between two steep mountains, trees crawling over every surface except for the one decently large clearing Jed had found on the map. It had everything they needed: a water source from a nearby lake instead of the river they were used to, and thickly wooded areas at the north and south of them with more than enough territory for hunting.

It hadn’t been easy. They were low on food, the hunting parties were still learning the lay of the land, and it’d be weeks before any of the newly planted crops were able to be harvested. Instead of nice cabins, there were tents and plywood buildings. The kids had school around one of the campfires, and the adults got their meals at the communal space, a tarp thrown over several tall posts to make some kind of half-assed shelter. But everyone had survived the trip, and, in three weeks, they’d seen no sign of the hunters.

In short, Jed was putting this one in the win column.

Shotgun slung over one shoulder, Jed tramped back from the woods. He’d been doing an inspection of the sentry points and was pretty pleased with the design Redford had instituted. They’d taken their cue from deer hunting blinds, set high up in trees and camouflaged, practically invisible to anyone below. They were watching all possible entry points, and Jed was determined that when he and Redford went back home, the wolves wouldn’t have one damn excuse for being taken by surprise. Effective, and also hilarious to hear wolves bitch about how they didn’t belong in trees. Jed had taken to calling them Fur Pigeons.

Knievel was trotting next to him, tail in the air, chirping happily at the wolves they passed. When they spotted Redford across the way, the cat took off like a streak of fur, only to stop short and begin aggressively grooming herself just shy of Redford, like she didn’t even notice him. Jed had no such illusions of aloofness. With a grin, he covered the distance between them in a few long strides and grabbed Redford for a long kiss. “Hey, babe,” he murmured, wrapping one arm around Redford. “I missed you.”

“Jed, you’ve been gone two hours,” Redford pointed out practically. But he was smiling, and that was what counted.

“A very long two hours,” Jed insisted, eyes wide with pretend earnestness. “The longest. I practically wasted away.”

“Of missing me, or of hunger?” At Redford’s question, Jed braced himself. In the past few weeks, Redford had gotten it into his head that Jed didn’t eat enough, and three times a day Redford now appeared, seemingly out of nowhere sometimes, just to shove a meal at Jed. “Because you skipped lunch.”

“I was working!” Jed protested. “It was very important.”

“So is food.” Redford frowned at him, taking Jed by the arm and leading him to one of the campfires. There was no big bonfire in this new place, but a series of smaller ones that would be less visible from a distance. Redford leaned down and picked up a tray just in time to save it from Knievel’s paws. “One of the hunting parties had some good luck today, so there’s plenty for everyone.”

Settling down onto a bench, Jed’s first priority was serving a good chunk of the unidentified meat on his plate to Knievel. She immediately dragged it a short distance away, gnawing on it, tail swishing contentedly. Jed then tugged Redford down to sit on his lap, ignoring the rest of the meal for a moment in favor of kissing Redford’s shoulder. “So, how did the training session go? Anything interesting happen while I was chasing Fur Pigeons up trees?”

Redford snorted. “They had a fifteen minute long discussion, trying to come up with a good name for themselves to avoid letting you have the honor. Some of them aren’t happy with the idea of using anything but their teeth, but they’re getting there. I just keep emphasizing that it’s good to be prepared in any form.”

“And they have an excellent teacher,” Jed informed him. Absently, he took a bite of the food, raising his eyebrows. “This isn’t half bad. What’d we catch this time?”

“Mule deer, they said.” Redford leaned back against Jed then, getting comfortable. “They all looked really happy about it. They also said they saw mountain lions, but they wouldn’t eat them.”

“That’s ’cause they know cats are superior. Isn’t that right, ’Nievel?” Knievel, for her part, had rolled over and was now vigorously attempting to catch her own foot, which was kicking hyperactively, seemingly independently of her body. Jed paused. “Okay, maybe not.”

Redford laughed lowly. “Hey, you haven’t seen the hunting party get bored and chase their own tails.”

It was simple out here. Sure, hard to get to, and Jed was desperately missing television and a really good beer, takeout food or going down to the gym for a game of basketball. But there was something kind of nice about eating food that people he knew had gone out to hunt hours ago. That his whole day was Redford and training and watching the stars at night. Jed would be happy to go home, but he’d admit, part of him wouldn’t mind staying.

There was a thump next to him, and Jed didn’t even need to look over to know it was Edwin. The kid was ridiculously easy to spot when he wasn’t trying to be stealthy. He approached everything like it was some game he was thrilled to be playing. Edwin was also pretty decent at the whole sentry thing that Jed had been working on with the wolves. He had a good nose and wasn’t afraid to follow it.