Scratch the Surface (Wolf Within) (8 page)

How bad it could be? I was pretty sure it couldn’t compare to my situation, but I was supposed to feel bad for Murphy and jolly him along even while I silently went to pieces.

“It’s complicated,” he said. He glanced at me and sighed. He looked so desperately unhappy I felt a little bit like a selfish asshole.

He was always there for me. He’d stuck up for me and protected me at the Great Gathering. He’d bonded with me to keep me out of Councilor Celine Ducharme’s clutches. He guided me and my wolf, he’d brought me on a two-month road trip to allow me to sort myself and various issues and nobody was more sympathetic to those various issues than he.

Now here he was, beside himself, angry and desperate, with nowhere to turn. I had him to turn to, but he didn’t have anyone. He was trying to turn to me and I was being a baby.

“You don’t have to tell me,” I said softly. “It’s okay, Murphy. It’ll be all right. And you don’t have to stay tonight if you don’t want. I’ll be fine. I know you only came back because you were worried about me.”

He gave me a small, relieved smile. The skin stretched tight around his eyes and mouth relaxed slightly.

“That and the fact that Allerton must have a reason for this bullshit.”

I snorted laughter despite myself.

“You are always so curious about what that man is thinking and what he’s up to.”

“I have to be because lately what’s he been thinking about and what he’s up to somehow ends up deeply impacting my life. You’re a prime example.” His smile was sardonic, but his voice softened when he got to me.

“He asked me if I liked you,” I confessed in a guilty rush.

His dark eyes searched my face.

“What did you tell him?”

“The truth,” I said.

“That bad.” He mock groaned.

“I do like you. A lot,” I said and he became serious in an instant. “I told him we were having so much fun on our road trip and all the cities we’d seen and then he asked me why I wasn’t in a rush to see Dublin and meet my new pack members and I didn’t know what to say.”

“Because now you’re thinking I’m deliberately keeping you away from Dublin and the rest of the pack. Aren’t you?”

It killed me, but I nodded. Every time I’d brought up Dublin, he’d adroitly changed the subject. I’d thought he’d wanted me to relax and not rush through every experience as though I were eating ice cream in ninety-degree weather, but this afternoon after Allerton asked me, I’d begun to wonder.

His reaction to the fact that this man from the English branch of Mac Tire was going to be here tonight made me wonder if there was some sort of secret being kept that he didn’t want me to know. I didn’t like thinking that way. It made me nervous and guilty, as if I were the one keeping the secret and not him.

“We’ll go to Dublin soon. Especially now that Colin’s in the picture.” The way he spat out the man’s name, as if it burned and disgusted him, made me shiver. I wouldn’t want to be Colin Hunter.

I waited for him to say more, but he didn’t. He turned back to the window and I put down my brush and went to my suitcase.

Forty minutes later we were both ready. My dress was a metallic burgundy sheath with a matching bolero jacket edged in dark red sequins. I wore my new Jimmy Choo black platform pumps—a Christmas present from Murphy.

I stood before the mirror fixing my bond pendant to the short silver chain I wore for evening events while Murphy stood just behind me making last-minute adjustments to his tie.

He had on a pair of black wool trousers and the white button-down shirt with blue pinstripes I’d gotten him at the Armani store in Houston. A black Giorgio tie with a tiny silver triangular pattern completed his look. He had a gray jacket tossed across the bottom of the bed. Thankfully he’d put aside his Timberland boots for a pair of black wing tips.

When I went to fasten the chain around my throat, he was there to do it for me and I gazed at us both in the mirror. He was so attentive and the way his eyelashes brushed his cheeks as he concentrated on his task, produced a strange longing inside me.

I’d rolled my hair into a sleek French knot held in place with a rhinestone clip. I looked far more sophisticated and at ease than I actually was.

“You are so beautiful.” Murphy sounded wistful as he stared at both of us in the mirror. “I look at you sometimes and I can’t even breathe, Stanzie. That’s how beautiful you are. I remember the first time I saw you coming to the table that night at the Great Gathering and I thought, Jaysus God, she’s gorgeous.”

I flushed. Every time he complimented me I had no idea how to take it. None at all.

“I thought you were so handsome,” I said. “And bored,” I added with a laugh. “And I seemed to bore you even more than you already were.”

“I wasn’t bored with you, I was intimidated,” he said with a grin.

“Oh, hell, Murphy, you and your Irish blarney. That’s such bullshit.” I clasped a silver chain link bracelet around my left wrist. Now I doubted the fact he’d thought I was gorgeous that first night. I hadn’t intimidated him the first night. He’d left the table the minute it had been revealed my bond mates were dead because everyone believed I was drunk behind the wheel. I’d made no effort to defend myself and I knew he’d been disgusted. He’d as much as told me later during the Gathering.

His dead bond mate, Sorcha, had been a fiery-haired red head and I’m sure she had been really, truly beautiful and people didn’t just tell her she was beautiful to compliment her, they actually meant it. I wished I could see a picture of her, but then again I didn’t. She was already stiff enough competition without me feeling absolutely hopeless in the face of her beauty.

“There’s not enough Irish blarney in the world to convince you I’m not using any when I compliment you.” He gave me a rueful smile then moved to switch off the gas fireplace.

I slid a few rings on my fingers and waited for him to put on his jacket.

It was five minutes to six and time to run the gauntlet.

Chapter 6

We found Kathy Manning and Councilor Allerton seated together on a light brown sectional sofa beneath a large framed picture of the Hartford skyline at night. The photo had been artificially enhanced and tiny electrified lights had been inserted around the buildings with a
 
realistic and modernist result.

The long, low coffee table in front of the sectional sofa was spread with plates of cheese and crackers, bowls of mixed nuts, an olive-and-pickle tray and a plate of three different kinds of handmade canapes—slices of cucumber topped with smoked salmon and cream cheese, cheese and olives topped with maraschino cherries speared to small round pieces of homemade sourdough bread with toothpicks, and ham, cheese and stuffed olives on cracked wheat crackers.

A drinks cart had been wheeled in and left in a strategic corner. It held iced buckets of champagne and white and red wine, gin, whiskey, rye and mixers.

Allerton had a plate heaped with all three kinds of canapes in one hand, a glass of chilled Riesling in the other.

Kathy had swapped her conservative wool trousers and vest for a severe, high-necked black halter dress with velvet bands around throat and waist, sheer black stockings and patent leather pumps. Silver bracelets were laddered up one arm, a diamond tennis bracelet on the other. Her bond pendant, a duo of a diamond and an emerald, dangled on a long silver chain below her small breasts. She nibbled on a piece of Gruyere and a tumbler with rye and soda on a cocktail napkin rested on the end table beside her.

Classical music, one of Mozart’s sonatas for flute and harp, played softly from a CD player housed within a discreet cabinet with glass doors.

In a small alcove at the back of the room was a beautiful thirty-six string Celtic harp. My heart did a little queer thud against my ribcage. Surely, they wouldn’t.

Kathy noticed my stare and smiled.

“We were hoping, Stanzie, that you might play for us tonight. Possibly after dinner.”

Murphy gave me a look of surprise. I had never mentioned I could play the harp.

“I haven’t played in over two years, Councilor. I’m sorely out of practice.” Remarkably, my voice remained calm but really I wanted to shriek in outrage.

“I’m sure you’d play beautifully. Isn’t this harp almost like the one you had?” she wondered.

“The one I found hacked into a million pieces along with the rest of my stuff after the funerals?” I snapped before I belatedly tried to get a grip on myself

Murphy’s face took on a thundercloud expression of outrage, while Kathy winced delicately and reached for her rye and soda.

Allerton said nothing. He continued to munch on his damned canapes.

“Your stuff was hacked to pieces?” Murphy demanded. “By who? That bloody bastard of an Alpha?”

“I don’t know,” I returned in as calm a tone as I could muster. “Whoever did it, did it during the funerals. Jonathan was there the whole time so I don’t see how it could have been him.”

“But I bet he ordered it done,” said Murphy balefully.

I wasn’t so sure. Vaughn was the one who had truly known how much my harp meant to me. I’d always had the sneaking suspicion that most of the wreckage was camouflage for the destruction of my harp.

Vaughn had been my duet partner, and, he’d been in love with Elena. He’d confessed as much to me one Sunday night when we’d gotten drunk together after practicing most of the afternoon.

She’d never returned his affection, save as fondness for him as a pack mate. Her love was unreservedly for me and Grey.

I’d felt sorry for Vaughn until I saw my harp in shattered pieces. He’d been late to the funeral, arriving agitated with his tie crooked and the appearance of having thrown on his clothes in a terrible rush. He hadn’t even combed his hair.

He’d given me one malevolent, resentful smile that had chilled my blood and made me glad he was on the opposite side of the caskets. Everyone was, except Councilor Allerton who had made it a point to stand close beside me.

Murphy stalked to the drinks cart while muttering imprecations in Irish under his breath, and made a gin and tonic. He poured me a flute of champagne and handed it to me, still cursing.

“It was a long time ago,” I said gently. I could smell his anger. His face was flushed and I thought he might crush the glass containing his gin and tonic if he didn’t fling it at the wall first.

“It’s the goddamn principle of the thing, Stanzie,” he argued with me in a low, growling tone. “I can’t believe these people. Are they animals? Because that’s what they act like in every story I hear about them. I saw it myself at the Gathering. Those two arseholes went out of their way to knock into you and spill red wine all over your dress that night. I saw the whole damn thing. I only wish I’d kicked the shit out of that bastard when I’d had the chance.”

“I hope you’ll restrain yourself tonight, Liam,” said Allerton mildly, but his blue eyes held a distinct warning.

Murphy made a snarly noise I guessed meant he would try not to lose control.

Allerton continued to gaze at him for a moment then picked up his wine glass.

“And you’ll not be forcing her to play that damned harp if she doesn’t want to,” Murphy snapped at Kathy Manning, gesturing at her with his glass. It was really rather rude, but Kathy simply smiled at him the way one would smile soothingly at a snarling dog and kept her prudent distance.

I gulped at my drink and wondered if getting drunk would be good or disastrous.

The doorbell chimed and I nearly doused myself with champagne.

Kathy Manning leaped gracefully to her feet and when she walked away, I saw her dress was just as severe in the back as it was in the front. That woman gave nothing away but smiles and baked goods.

I heard familiar voices in the foyer. A gust of cold air blew into the room, making me shiver. Murphy moved closer to me.

A moment later Kathy returned to the room. Behind her were Callie, Vaughn and Peter.

Vaughn and Peter wore dark blue suits. Vaughn had a white shirt and blue tie, Peter, always more flamboyant, had on a pink shirt and blue tie. He had his blond hair slicked back in 1940s gangster style and a pink handkerchief peeped out of the breast pocket of his suit jacket.

Vaughn had grown a goatee since I’d last seen him and let his hair grow out. It was nearly as long as Grey’s had been and the same dark brown. His eyes were brown too and he was clearly nervous, scanning the room as if looking for hidden assassins, his narrow mouth clamped tightly shut.