Tarnished (6 page)

Andrew turned to stare at Silver. She’d never said that to him before, but she smelled of absolute sincerity and belief in him.

Michelle put her hand out to her beer bottle, but didn’t drink. “But someone who has killed before might find it easier next time.” Her inflection trailed almost into a question at the end.

“Someone’s who’s killed before knows the cost,” Andrew said, and hesitated, choosing his words. “The madman who injected Silver and killed her whole pack, including the children, should I have let him walk away? Locked him up to escape again someday?”

“He deserved to die for his crimes.” John thumped his bottle on the table for emphasis.

“And who do you want to judge that? Someone who knows the cost, or someone like Rory, who was such a pussy that he demanded I run back to Virginia to protect him instead of tracking the killer down?”

Michelle turned her head away to hide her expression and her scent muddied. She seemed less sure than she had been at the beginning of the conversation. Less sure in what direction, Andrew didn’t know. He hoped she hadn’t revised her opinion downward.

“At the end of the hunt, what does it matter to me who controls Roanoke? The Mississippi’s a long way from my eastern border,” Michelle said.

“Because we help keep you safer,” Andrew said. He was on firm ground here. He’d thought this about the Western packs for years, and now he had the perfect example to back him up. “If a threat comes in through the East, we take care of it. We track lones, watch out for people,
communicate.
We caught a lot of problems and dealt with them before they ever got to the West because there was no way for people to slip between the cracks when they passed from one territory to another. Especially when two alphas happened to be in a snit and not talking that week.”

Andrew eyed Seattle and Portland, and they both looked guilty. “You’ll notice it wasn’t one of the Roanoke sub-packs that madman managed to get to. Better if all the packs had more cooperation, but at least Roanoke catches threats within a reasonably large area. And without an enforcer shoring him up, Rory’s too weak to hold what his father built, so the continent will lose that safety.”

“You’re such a philanthropist,” John said, ostensibly a joke, but Andrew could hear the edge buried in the words.

“What, you think I want power for power’s sake?” Andrew changed position in his chair, trying to ease muscles in his back that were aching from all the tension in the air. Did he need to show them the scars there? Would that make them understand that everything he did, he did to keep Were safe? To prevent what had happened to Silver, to Silver’s pack, to him, from happening to someone else?

“You’re the one talking about how great being together in one big pack is. Maybe you do want to take over all of North America for everyone’s own good.” Michelle raised her eyebrows. “You took over Seattle days after arriving.”

“And then gave it back.”

“When you were too hurt to hold it.”

Andrew slammed a fist on the table. “Because it wasn’t really mine! I needed to be able to track the madman without having to stop and persuade John into every step. But I didn’t really deserve it. John takes care of his people. I’m only going after Roanoke because someone needs to take care of
them.
” He looked at Silver, one of the stories she’d told once drifting into his mind.

“Sometimes someone has to be the one to get something done, even if people hate him for it at the time,” Silver said, obviously thinking in the same direction.

“And there’s a difference between holding something together and being the first to unite it,” Andrew said. “One prevents upset, the other creates it. I’m trying to preserve the safety that already exists in Roanoke. Since I don’t want the power for power’s sake, there’s no way in the Lady’s name I’d want
more
of it.” Andrew let tense silence settle to see if Michelle would come up with any arguments he needed to counter, but she seemed content to consider his words, lips thin.

“He’s telling the truth about when he challenged me.” John didn’t sound happy about it, but he was saying it. “I think he would have handed control back even if he hadn’t been injured. Nothing was easy or straightforward about dealing with that situation.”

Andrew gave him a slow nod of thanks. A little less grudging would have been nice, but he’d take what he could get. Silence fell. Andrew finished his beer and started to peel off the label. Michelle’s scent was still too conflicted for him to pick out any one emotion.

“I’ll think about it,” she said finally. “But it comes down to this, Dare. Sacramento’s on my border. If I support you, he’s going to make my life absolute hell. My people have jobs to go to, even if I could lock them in the house to keep them from being harassed by Sacramento’s bullies while going about their daily lives. If you can get him to give up his grudge about his son, in front of everyone, fine. I’m with you. But otherwise I can’t afford to.”

“I understand,” Andrew said, his voice as neutral as he could make it. He did understand, after all. Borders in this day and age were always more a product of common agreement than something fought for and enforced. No patrol could keep someone from driving past on the freeway, smell contained by the car. You could only try to cover enough territory to notice when anyone left a vehicle. He didn’t blame Michelle but frustration still twisted his muscles. His problems kept circling around to Sacramento. It was clear he had to deal with the man somehow, but how?

“Maybe you should think about taking over Sacramento’s territory,” Silver told Michelle. Michelle eyed her and Silver laughed. A moment later the other woman joined in. The joke broke the tension, though Andrew wasn’t entirely sure it had been a joke.

Michelle lounged back in her chair and let the conversation lull long enough to make an obvious break between business and small talk. “Well, I’d ask if there were any exciting new additions to the pack lately, but it smells like you’re still with that same human woman?”

John stopped with his bottle halfway to his lips, and Andrew stepped in to fill the silence. “Less work than a bunch of different ones.” If John wasn’t careful, he’d give Susan away with his jumpiness alone.

“If it gives me a rest from the attention of one of the male alphas surrounding me, I’m not going to argue.” Michelle toasted the idea. “Hey, baby, wanna join territories?”

John sputtered. “I was never that bad.”

“You were.” Michelle shared a look of feminine communication with Silver and both grinned.

The topics stayed lighter after that, and Andrew mostly remained silent, drinking his second beer, since he wasn’t familiar with a lot of the people they gossiped about. He listened, though. You never knew when something might be useful to know later.

After about an hour, Michelle pushed to her feet. John followed. “We’re going hunting tonight, if you don’t want to drive back so soon?” he offered.

Michelle shook out her thick black curls and tried to finger-comb them into some kind of order. She pointedly drew in a breath of the charged atmosphere of the dining room. “Four dominants, one hunt?” She smiled and shook her head. “I’ll take permission to run in a park down nearer your border and head out, I think, before any wrestling matches break out.”

Andrew said his good-byes still sitting, and let John be the one to show her to the door. When the front door shut, Seattle and Portland’s voices continuing toward the driveway, he looked at Silver, who looked as frustrated as he felt. “If she’s an ally, I hate to think what the others are going to say,” he said, and she nodded.

6

Susan stalled in the coffee shop for a whole ten minutes after John called her with the all clear, staring at the same page in her book. She’d grabbed one of her favorite paperback spy thrillers for a reread, but she hadn’t made it past the first chapter. She read whole paragraphs several times without remembering what they said, as a campy movie delivery of “If I told you, I’d have to kill you” looped in her mind. Now that it was real for her, she couldn’t imagine why she’d once thought it would be exciting, in the days when she and her brother would chase each other around the house with water pistols when their parents weren’t home. Susan finally gave up and shut her book with a snap.

The stubborn feeling that flooded her at the thought of giving in and letting her brother declare himself winner hadn’t changed, though. She wasn’t going to leave her son, but she also wasn’t going to abandon what she had with John so easily. So they were dangerous people. So what. She couldn’t let them bully her and John both. Susan left the coffee shop feeling slightly more settled.

She arrived back at the house to a scene of chaos in the foyer. A hunt, she realized, pausing to watch with her hand on the shoe cubby. Predators, out to kill something. She didn’t remove her shoes yet. Better to wait until the pack was out of the way. Even without considering their true natures, they were an intimidating bunch. Around fifteen adults lived in the house, though of course not all of them were gathered here tonight. Teens made up the difference in numbers from anyone still at work. It sometimes seemed a physics anomaly to Susan that they all fit, especially with memories at the surface of her mind of rattling around with her brother in their parents’ big, showy home.

Watching the werewolves get ready to go out was like watching any other set of people in reverse. Rather than collecting possessions and coats, they shed them, getting rid of everything they could and still be decent. Men emptied their pockets, women who were built small enough wriggled out of their bras. Several were still in business clothes from the workday, and seeing the maneuvers done with slacks and crisp shirts and blouses made them seem even more surreal. They also looked likely to get awfully cold. It must have been in the fifties outside, but Susan supposed that didn’t matter with fur.

Tracy waved at her from the foot of the stairs, clearly bursting with something she wanted to tell her friend. Susan hesitated a beat, then started nudging through the crowd. She’d decided she wasn’t going to let them get to her, after all. Most people were polite enough to edge out of her way, but the beta stayed a stubborn obstacle and eyed her, arms crossed, as she detoured past. Susan was used to that from him by now. The feeling was mutual.

Dare came down the staircase as Tracy chattered in Susan’s ear about the dress that had won in the program after Susan left. He looked regal, standing above the throng with the white streaks in his hair. “Silver,” he called back over his shoulder. “Coming along?” Heads in the foyer turned to her as she came to the top of the stairs. Several of the people’s expressions surprised Susan. They looked annoyed, like Dare had invited his bimbo of a girlfriend along on an important mob hit. But Silver was a werewolf like the rest of them.

Silver’s back stiffened. “I’ll stay and help with the cubs.”

Dare shot everyone a look, but by then they all looked innocent. “Are you sure? I could stay, and we could drive out later to catch the end of it.” Even Susan could tell he wasn’t wild about missing most of the hunt.

“I was going out too.” Susan wanted to wince under the pressure of all the eyes that switched to her. Predators. She pushed back through the crowd toward the door without looking at anyone. “Just shopping. But if you wanted to get out for a while, Silver?”

John frowned, and drew Susan aside into the doorway to the kitchen. “That’s probably not a great idea,” he said, leaning in and lowering his voice. Susan frowned at him, trying to formulate her question. Whatever disqualified Silver from a hunt shouldn’t have anything to do with a simple shopping trip.

“Thank you.” Silver said it loud enough to cut John off even from the stairs. “I’d love to.” She followed the remains of Susan’s path through the crowd, Dare on her heels.

When John reached out to stop Silver, Dare got there first, blocking the man with his body. He pulled out his wallet, and extended a folded twenty to Silver. “If you find something you want.” Silver eyed him as if she had expected him to try to stop her too. When he just nodded to her, she smiled at him in a quick flash and took the bill. She turned it over in her fingers and examined it with concentration for a moment like it was some cryptic puzzle that had to be unlocked before use.

Did she even understand what it was? Susan had bristled at Dare’s attitude, but she lost the feeling to confusion now. Silver grimaced at the money a final time in incomprehension and shoved it into her pocket. She tugged on Susan’s arm.

Since she still had her coat on, Susan let Silver propel them both outside without protest. “I don’t actually need anything. I thought I’d wander around the store when I can do it without calibrating the timing between feedings and naps.” Back when she was single and grocery shopping alone, she’d actually rather enjoyed it. She wondered what John would think of her old comparison of it to the thrill of the hunt, discovering what new items the store held that day.

“I might pick up some ice cream to eat before we get back. Food enters this house and it’s gone before I blink, never mind eat any. I don’t know how interesting it will be for you.” Susan gave Silver an apologetic shrug.

Silver nodded but didn’t answer as they got into the car. Susan let silence reign for as long as she could stand as they drove through darkness. Light slipped and slid off the dampness on every surface from drizzle earlier in the day.

The trouble was, she saw no good way to work what she wanted to ask Silver into a casual conversation. Every time she thought of an opening, the question filled her mind again, choking out the innocuous comment.

Silver turned away from staring out the window, a smile banishing her residual frown. “Please don’t explode,” she said.

Susan blinked. “What?”

“There’s something you’re pent up about. I can smell it a mile away. Was there something you wanted to ask me?” Silver smoothed some flyaway strands of her fine hair down to her head, then gave Susan her full attention.