Hyena Moon (18 page)

"What?!" Rafe sounded stunned. "No! Why the hell would I want to talk to them with Lenore there?"

"You were afraid for Lenore?" That spoke well for him. If he was telling the truth.

"Um, yeah." He looked at her like she was a mental patient. "Teresa isn't what you'd call a nice person and I didn't want Lenore anywhere near her." He sounded angry.

Kess met his eyes. They were furious, the amber irises nearly swallowed by the black pupils. She felt like she had disappointed him somehow, like she had crossed a line by treating him with the same suspicion as everyone else. But she couldn't just ignore the coincidences and inconsistencies with him any longer.

"From now on, you check with me before you go anywhere. And you go nowhere alone. Is that understood?"

His eyes flashed. "Fine," he gritted out between clenched teeth. "Is that it?"

"For now." Kess watched him storm out. She followed behind him, watching him carefully. She heard the door to this bedroom slam shut behind him. And she tried to feel like she had done the right thing.

**********

The house was quiet again after their return home. She couldn't hear Lenore and Cormac on this side of the house, but she had a feeling the argument they'd probably had was a good one. Rafe was lurking in his room after her talk with him. Finn was gone so he wouldn't be bothered by the tension. He'd left to visit Laila over in New Orleans and wouldn't be back for several days. Kess was amazed that he'd actually kept his word and gone to see her; in Finn's world, out of sight used to mean out of mind. Not so with Laila. It figured that a teenage werejackal assassin would be the only thing to hold his attention longer than a few weeks. She bet Cormac wished he were here right now so he wasn't alone in dealing with his upset sister. Kess certainly wished Finn was here to help her deal with Rafe.

She looked over the papers on her desk absently. Bomani, the clan counselor, had been by earlier in the day and dropped off some paperwork for her to look over. It didn't interest her right now, but she knew she was going to have to make time for it eventually. She wondered how Cormac was doing with Lenore. She hoped it had gone better than her own talk with Rafe.

As if conjured by her thoughts, Cormac walked into the room, rubbing the back of his neck as if the muscles there were tense. She left her desk, moving behind him, and began to knead the stiff muscles with her slim fingers. He hissed out a breath as she found a particularly tight spot.

"I'd have more luck with a piece of rebar." She bore down a bit harder, trying to work out the knots in his neck.

"Thanks," he said, leaning his head forward so she had more surface area to work with.

"How's Lenore?"

"Less mad than she was in the car." He turned around so they were face to face. "I took your advice. I told her what was going on."

Kess fought against a smile. "How'd that work out for you?"

He smirked. "It's killing you not to say 'I told you so,' isn't it?" He pulled her over to the loveseat and they sat down.

"That would be petty and small and I am far too mature for that." She stuck her tongue out at him.

"Of course you are." He wrapped his arms around her and she leaned back against him. "I think Lenore understands why what happened today can't happen again."

Kess smiled to herself. Amazing what happened when you gave someone some credit. "That's good."

"Mmmm hmmmm." She felt Cormac's breath against her temple. "How'd it go on your end?"

She scowled. "Not well. He didn't like me questioning him. And he definitely didn't like me asking what he'd been doing when he was out of sight of Lenore."

"Really?" His voice was surprised. And a bit smug.

"Now who wants to say 'I told you so'?" She smiled wryly.

"I'm just a little confused. Why the change of heart? You've argued his side in the past." His head was resting against the back of the leather loveseat, but his eyes were open. "And you haven't exactly been willing to entertain anyone's contrary opinion."

"Because I realized you were right. I was letting my own feelings color the way I handled him." It wasn't an easy thing for her to admit.

He closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them and focused on her. "I know you've wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, but every time I think about these close calls--the mall, the glades, today--I just can't help but wonder if he's engineering all of this to get in, to get close. So what made you change your mind?"

Kess let her eyes track the strong lines of his temple, cheek and jaw. She studied the sweep of his lashes, the jut of his brow. He was everything she'd ever wanted. He was the first person since she'd left home with whom she felt safe. She should have listened to him sooner instead of dismissing his concerns.

She traced his jawline with her fingertips. "A verbal kick in the ass by someone who knew how to apply it. And you. You've always had my best interests in mind. So I'm keeping my eyes open now. Rafe will be watched and his phone calls tracked."

His eyes widened, the irises a stormy grey. "Kess?" She knew it was quite the departure from her normal stance on Rafe.

She smiled at him, then leaned forward and kissed him lightly, but with the promise of more. "Yes?

His eyelids dropped to half-mast, all sleepy and sexy. "That must have been some kick in the ass."

Kess slid along him, pushing him so that he was lying beneath her. "In case my body language isn't being clear, Rafe isn't the person at the forefront of my mind right now."

"Is that so?" His voice was teasing. "I can be a little dim sometimes. Maybe you should employ a more emphatic approach."

"I'll give you emphatic." Then there wasn't any breath left for talking.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Rafe wondered what it was about girls and shopping. He and Finn followed along in Lenore's wake as she cruised past the boutiques of South Beach, and he could not understand the appeal of staring at clothes you weren't actually going to even try on, let alone buy. His mother could spend hours trying on clothes and never purchase a thing; she just liked looking at herself in the mirror. She'd love it here.

Lenore had said something about being down here and experiencing the flavor of South Beach before she had to go back to PoDunk Vallarta, but hadn’t understood at the time. Experience what, exactly? Half-dressed, beautiful women parading around the streets on their way to the beach? He could experience that at any hyena gathering if he wanted to, although the hyenas tended to be more biker and less bougie.

Finn stared, enjoying the available flesh, but seemed otherwise resigned to following Lenore around like she was the leader of this particular parade. Rafe let his eyes wander past boutiques and restaurants and hotels to see the people around him. They were in a crowd, so it never hurt to be wary, especially when Teresa and her girls might be around. He doubted they'd try anything in this press of people, but Ter wasn't long on smarts or real big on forethought.

Lenore made an excited noise and pulled up at a window. Rafe saw Finn smile indulgently. All of them seemed to love Lenore to the point of giving way to her in most cases. Finn was less in his face than Cormac was, which made this outing a lot easier on Rafe. Ever since Vizcaya, Rafe knew he was even higher on Cormac's shit list than he was before. And now Kess doubted him, all suspicious of why he was here. It had to happen eventually, but it still disappointed him--way more than he'd thought it would. He had a watcher on him now at all times and he never went anywhere unaccompanied. It was beginning to piss him off.

"It's a dress," Finn muttered as Lenore made strange cooing noises at something in the window. "Not the Taj Mahal." He looked at Rafe who shrugged.

"I don’t get it either."

"Thank God Laila doesn't make me do this. She's more interested in beating stuff up than trying stuff on." Finn grinned and pulled out his phone.

Rafe kept his eyes on Lenore. "You're a lucky man." He caught Finn's nod out of the corner of his eye.

"What do you think of this one?" Lenore called, waving him over.

Rafe slunk to her, not enthused about having to talk fashion. Books, he could talk all day. He tried to muster up some enthusiasm. "Um, it's okay? There are a lot of tassley things on it."

"That would be fringe and you are hopeless." She saw Finn talking on the phone and rolled her eyes. "He's talking to Laila again, isn't he?" Rafe shrugged; he assumed Finn was since they had just been talking about her. "I can't wait to tell Burke about this. He will never let Finn hear the end of it."

Rafe quirked a brow at her, unsure what she meant. For as long as he'd been living with Kess and the others, Finn had been attentive to his mysterious girlfriend. Rafe remembered the short girl with really long hair and a smart mouth. She'd seemed to be a good match for the easy-going werewolf.

Lenore took his hand in hers and led them down the street, not bothering to see if Finn followed. Rafe tried to act natural about the hand holding, like this was no big deal. He hoped his palms weren't sweaty. He looked down at her as she eased him through the pedestrian traffic toward the next shop, wondering what she was thinking. Did the hand holding mean anything to her or was it just a convenient way of making sure he kept up? Rafe had a lifetime of reading signals, but not this kind. He could pick out every nuance of leashed violence, every volatile tone or angry gesture and know what it meant for him, but interpreting the gentler gestures was something he didn't have a roadmap for. He didn't want to embarrass himself.

"Finn's a great guy," Lenore was saying, as she led him through the crowd, "but he was kind of the town heartbreaker. I think every one of my friends had an older sister that dated Finn at some time or other. He jumped from girl to girl a lot."

"So what's so special about Laila?"

Lenore smiled slyly. "She's different. Finn's never acted this way about any other girl. And Burke isn't going to let him off the hook about it. No way."

Rafe didn't pretend he understood. It seemed like Lenore's family enjoyed joking and teasing each other—even the siblings. He'd seen it himself with Cormac and Finn down here. It was so alien to what Rafe was used to; he and his sister had never teased each other without it turning into a fight for dominance, at least not that he remembered. Maybe it had been different before his father left, but he didn’t think so.

He was going to ask her a question about Burke when a familiar face distracted him. Kess? What was she doing here? His eyes followed her as she met a man who looked vaguely familiar at the doorway to a coffee shop. The two went inside.

Lenore was staring into the window of another store and Finn was still well behind them, talking on his cell. Rafe pulled his hand from Lenore's. "Be right back."

"'kay," she responded, her eyes on the clothes in the window. She hadn't seen Kess.

Rafe quickly crossed the street with a group of people, trying to look casual. He was curious what Kess was doing out here and with someone that he could swear he had seen before. He ducked over to the coffee shop and peered in the window. They were seated at a small table in the middle of the shop.

Rafe recognized the man now that he got a good look at him. It was the other werejackal, the one from the nightclub fight. Rafe had gleaned enough from Kess and Finn's comments over the last weeks to know that this was Laila's brother. So what was he doing here meeting with Kess?

He sat down at a table that offered a decent view of where they were sitting. It was sweltering in the late summer heat so he was the only one sitting outside, but he didn't mind. He wanted to see if he could find out anything about Kess and this werejackal. Did it spell trouble for Cormac? Rafe peered at them through the window, hoping to get an idea of what was going on.

They were just sitting and talking. No hand holding, no furtive glances, nothing that would indicate this was a clandestine meeting of the romantic variety. Rafe thought about what they could be meeting about and had no idea. He thought briefly of his mother. She'd want to know about this. If the werejackals were still in Miami, his mother would give a lot for that information. This guy never came to meet with Kess at the house, which made Rafe wonder if Kess wasn't planning something that she didn't want to risk him finding out about.

Rafe chewed the inside of his cheek. Kess had said that he was free to roam the house and city, that she wasn't keeping tabs on him outside of what was meant for his own protection, but then she'd revoked it, like she didn't trust him. If she was up to something that he might get wind of and pass along to his mother, she would be smart to meet away from the house where he was less likely to overhear anything.

He pulled out his phone and set it on the table in front of him. He spun it absently as he continued to look into the coffee shop. He couldn't risk going inside; they'd see him and then whatever leverage he might have would be gone. But staying here meant he couldn't find out what they were talking about.

He looked down at the keypad, suddenly unsure of what to do. Kess had treated him fairly--almost too fairly--and it was probably better than he deserved, and being in Miami was the first time he'd ever felt normal and accepted in years, but it wasn't his home. This wasn't his family. And now Kess was treating him like he was someone to be watched, to be wary of. She was treating him like he was, well, a hyena. He didn't owe her anything.

But then what did he owe his mother? She'd been the one to leave him here; it had been her decision to throw him away. Didn't that negate any family loyalty he might feel for her? But what if he could go back, could prove to her that he was worth her time and trouble—what if he could bring her the information she needed to take Miami? Could he do that to the people here? Could he betray Kess and Finn and even Cormac?

Could he betray Lenore?

He groaned in frustration, dropping his head into his hands and fisting them in his hair. Why did this all have to be so complicated? Why didn't he know what to do? Teresa wouldn't have hesitated. So why was he? They were from the same mother, raised in the same house. Why couldn't he be what Samara wanted?