Wolfsbane (Howl #3) (22 page)

Son, I’ve got you the plane tickets to Alaska.
You have to be at JFK Airport at 7. Don’t be late or you’ll miss your flight.
I’ve convinced them that there are no flights out of Alaska so it should buy you some time.
I’d love to see you kill them
. . .
all of them. I’ll get there as soon as I can. Linda thinks I’m going on a business trip to Colorado, so no problems there
.

Samara scrolled down, to find the text message that Jason
had written back in response:

OK, Dad. See u soon. I’ll try my best to kill them, but this could be tr
icky. They’re getting smart. I’ll be glad once u are there to help me.

Unable to say the words out loud,
Samara passed the phone to Chris, who was sitting next to her, and he and Kyana both read the text messages before hesitantly passing the phone to
Kyle, who passed it to Steve.

“Why does everybody look like they’ve seen a ghost?
My cooking can’t smell
that bad,”
Linda said,
strolling back into the room with a smile on her face.

“Do we tell her?” Steve whispered, glancing d
own at the phone in his hands.

Colby nodded without hesitation. “Yes, we’re not kee
ping this a secret from her.”

When Steve passed the phone to Linda, Samara studied her face closely for her reaction. It turned from curious at first to a shade paler than Colby’s before she dropped the cell phone onto the
floor and fled from the room.

Kyle ran after her to comfort her, since Colby
was still on the floor shaking.

“So, Jason is Colby’s half-brother then,” Luke was th
e first to state the obvious.

“Which would mean Josh is, too,” Samara added. “If your dad’s an Ima, why is Jason a
Vyka? It doesn’t make sense.”

“It happens that way sometimes,” Colby shrugged, his voice still shaky. “You should
know that better than anyone.”

“I guess you’re right,” Samara agreed, trying to ignore the edge to his tone. “But how did he keep this a secret from you—and apparently your mom—for all th
ese years?”

Colby shrugged. “Lots of hiding and sneaking around, I guess. And I never read his text messages bef
ore. I
probably should have, though.”

“He must be a dam
n good liar,” Steve chimed in.

“He had me fooled.” Colby sighed.

Samara cleared her throat. “It’s not your fault, you know, Colby. No one should have to check their dad’s cell phone to find out that their
father has a secret family.”

“Yeah,” Chris agreed. “This is the type of thing you only see in Lifeti
me movies, not in real life.”

Everyone was quiet for a moment, allowing what they had just learned sink in. Finally, Steve spoke up. “If Jason
knows, I wonder if Josh knows.
Why would one of
them know, but not the other?”

“Well, you can ask him right now,” Colby said,
motioning to
the window. “I see him coming up the driveway.
”

When the front door opened and was closed loudly behind him, Josh paused at the doorway. He was about to scamper off into another direction, when Samara said, “Josh?
Can you come in here, please?”

“Why?” Josh’s voice squeaked at a high pitch as he peered into the room. “So that I can see the love of my life with . . .
him
?” He pointed his chin at Chris, who had his arm wrapped around Kyana
’s shoulders
. It looked like she had fallen asleep; Samara couldn’t blame her. She wished that she could be asleep right now,
too, with all of the craziness that was
unf
olding right before her eyes.

“No, so that we can tell you something,” Samara rep
lied
quietly
. “It’s pretty important.”

“What is it?” Josh asked. By the tone of his voice, she could tell that he didn’t believe it was all that im
portant.

“Let’s try to not to let things come between us right now because there’s harder news you need to accept. We just found out you’re Colby’s half-brother, dude,” Chris said.

“What?”
Josh asked, a surprised tone in his voice.

“It’s true,” Colby said, gulping. “And here’s the worst part. My dad’s the one who tipped Jason off that we were in Alaska. He’s been
working with them
. . .
against us.”

The idea that Darren Jackson had done such a thing made Samara feel sick to
her stomach, but . . . it
wasn’t all that surprising to her, either. It made sense now why Colby’s father gave her the creeps.
Her natural instincts about him had been right; he wasn’t just a guy who acted creepy but was really innocent—he actually had ulterior motives in mind.

Samara realized that the reason he probably stared at her so much was because she was at the top of Jason’s hit list. Colby’s dad was probably trying to determine what her weaknesses were so that he could use them against her
,
and that scared
her a little.

When she’d first been turned into a werewolf,
she was weak and vulnerable. Darren Jackson had to have noticed that quality in her. In fact, anyone who had been around her over the past few months would
have recognized it within her
.

Well, not anymore. It was time for Samara to start being strong; she needed to start acting like the
Alpha she was destined to be.

Chapter
26

They all spent that night at Colby’s house, agreeing to pay Troy a visit
early
the next morning. Emma had woken up briefly—just long enough to grab a ham sandwich and go back to sleep. She said
that although she felt okay, she was unusually tired and just needed to sleep it off.

When they all sat around the breakfast table the next morning, Samara noticed right away that Colby still seemed out of sorts. He was quieter than he normally was, and she knew it was because he was still upset about his dad.
Not that she could blame him. His father was working with the enemy. 

When Josh came downstairs from his bedroom and sat down at the kitchen table, he shoved a piece of bacon in his mouth like a hungry animal. “It makes sense. I look like our mother, but Jason doesn’t look anything like our father
. . .
you know, our non-biological father. But he does look a lot like Darren.”

“It’s those eyes,” Steve said, crunching on his own bacon. “They have the same exact
dark
eyes.”

“You know, you’re right,” Samara agreed with him. “Both of them have always creeped me out, and I think that’s what it was about both of them. Those eyes.”

“We don’t have time to sit around and talk about this all day,” Colby said, standing up from the table. “We need to get ready to go see Troy.”

Samara gulped down the last of her sausage. She only felt a little bit nervous about confronting Troy. He didn’t scare her. Even Rocco, his cousin who had threatened to kill her if she didn’t agree to become a Shomecossee, didn’t freak her out that much. Not the way Jason
or Colby’s dad
did.

If it came down to fighting with
either Troy or Rocco, she believed she w
ould
be able to
win. Because unlike Jason, neither of them used black fighting—not that she was aware of, at least.

“I had an idea,” Luke said, carrying his dishes to the sink. “I’m not sure if everyone else will
be willing to
go for it, but I think it could help us get the talisman back.”

Samara glanced up at him, curious about whatever it was that he
was about to propose.
“What’s your idea?”

“What if we offered Troy something in exchange for the talisman?” Luke asked. When she didn’t respond, he explained further. “I mean, we could see if there
’s something that he might want already,
but
if he doesn’t come up with anything on his own
. . . what if we agree to tell him about wolfsbane in exchange for the talisman?”

“
No, absolutely not.” Samara shook her head firmly. “
Grandpa Joe wouldn’t have wanted me to tell anyone about that information. That’s why he left it for me—and me,
alone
. If it starts getting well-known in the werewolf world that wolfsbane can do what it does . . .
It’s bad enough that the Vyka might already know. I just think le
t
ting Troy in on it, too,
would be a bad idea.”

“Actually,” Kyle said, pouring himself another glass of orange juice, “I don’t think Grandpa would have cared that much.”

“How do you figure?” Samara asked, pulling her chocolate brown hair into a ponytail. “You think he didn’t care about wolfsbane?”

Kyle shook his head.
“No, that’s not what I’m saying at all. What I’m saying is . . . I think he cared more about his talisman
than he did about wolfsbane
.
I think if he had to choose between the two, he would have rather you traded
your knowledge if you knew, for sure, that you were going to get the talisman back.”

“Hmm, I guess you’re right,” Samara agreed.
“I didn’t really think of it that way, but the talisman does seem much more important. Anyone could stumble on the wolfsbane secret if they really wanted to—I’m almost surprised that no one
’s made the information more widely known
. But only one person in the whole world can have the talisman at one time, and I believe it has more to do with his power than wolfsbane did.”

“So, we’re going to go with my idea, then?” Luke asked,
grinning proudly at the fact that he had come up with it.

Samara nodded.
“Yeah, I think it’s a good idea. Well, it could be. Unless we find that it’s easier to get the talisman from Troy than I’m thinking it will be. We’ll have to test the waters first to see.”

Luke nodded.
“Sounds like a plan.”

At that moment, Linda Jackson strolled into the kitchen. She looked awful. Her hair was disheveled, and there were bags under her eyes, which gave Samara that impression that she hadn’t slept an ounce the night before. Her eyes were also bloodshot, a sign that she’d been crying.

Samara couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. She couldn’t imagine what it would be like if she were to wake up in thirty or forty years from now and find out that Luke had betrayed her by having a secret family she had never known about—a secret
son who he was plotting with to kill the son that the two of them had together.

That will never happen to you and me
, Luke insisted.
You have to know that by now.

I do
, Samara smiled at him from across the room.
I know you would never betray me.

“Good morning, everyone,” Linda said groggily, grabbing a carton of milk from the fridge and then slumping down into one of the chairs at the dining table.

“Morning, Mom,” Colby said, as he stroll
ed back into the kitchen with
fresh clothes on. He hesitated before saying, “I have a question, but I’m not sure if it’s too soon for me to ask about this.”

“Ask whatever you want, Colby,” his mom replied. “I’m so thankful that I have a son who is decent enough to be honest with me after finding text messages like that last night.”

Colby glanced down at his hands. “Are you going to kick him out? I mean, this is our home. We should be able to stay here. He’s the one who screwed up, so shouldn’t he be the one who has to leave?”

Linda sighed. “I don’t know yet, Colby. We’ll figure out what we’re going to do. I haven’t had the chance to even think about what I’ll say to your father when he does get home. I’m not sure if I want to confront him over this and kick him out, or if I should just leave him without saying a word. Either way, it’s going to be a painful experience since it means that we’ll de-mark.”

“
De-mark?” Samara asked. “What does that mean?” She had only just learned about marking; it was possible to de-mark?

“When a person gets divorced, they lose their mark,” Steve explained. “Remember how you feel when you initiated, and you got your tattoo?”

Samara nodded. The experience had been a painful one; it had felt like a cat was tearing its claws through her back.

“When you de-mark, it feels like that but ten times worse because you’re literally removing a tattoo. With it, you’re also removing years’ worth of emotions. Not only is your own mark removed, but the other person’s mark is also removed.
It’s thought to be traumatic,” Steve explained.

Linda sighed. “They
say
it’s traumatic, but nobody really knows. The truth is, very few werewolves ever get divorced because most mates stay together for the duration of their lives. There aren’t a lot of case studies on this sort of thing.”

“And I thought divorcing was hard enough as a human,” Samara replied half-jokingly. She couldn’t even imagine what it must be like to de-mark from someone.

Don’t worry
, Luke told her.
You and I will never need to worry about it.

She smiled at him and nodded. De-marking didn’t seem like it was something that would be in their future. She knew that, even if they weren’t that happy in the future, there was no way things could be as bad for them as they had been for Linda and Darren Jackson.

“Were you surprised?” Colby asked. When his mom didn’t respond right away, he explained, “I’m only asking because you seem to be taking it pretty well. Well, not that you’re taking it well, but . . . you accepted it for what it was. You didn’t accuse me of maki
ng up those texts or something.”

Linda’s eyes widened. “I would never accuse you of such a thing. You’re the most honest man I know.”
She poured Cheerios into her bowl before topping it off with bacon bits (which was the strangest concoction Samara had ever seen, but seemed somewhat fitting for a wolf who liked cereal). “I always suspected that your father had been hiding something from me, I just never knew what it was.”

“How did you know?” Samara asked, hoping that she didn’t sound too nosy. Mostly, she was just concerned for Colby’s mom. She hated to see the woman so depressed.

“He always went on these business trips that never
quite
added up,” Linda explained.
“For example, one time, he told me he was staying at a Holiday Inn in Seattle. So, I called every Holiday Inn in the surrounding areas trying to get ahold of him because Colby was sick with pneumonia. When he got home, he told me that he meant to say that he was staying at a
Comfort
Inn, not a
Holiday
Inn. Lots of little things like that
have happened over the years.”

“Did you think he was cheating on you?” Colby asked. “Or that he had a secret family?”

Linda shook her head, one of her blonde curly locks falling in front of her face. “No, I never suspected that. To be honest, I always thought he might have been involved in something I wouldn’t approve of.”

“Like what?” Luke asked, coming to stand behind Samara. He rubbed her shoulders and even through the sweater that she wore, his hands felt good against her skin.

“Black magic,” Colby’s mom replied in between a spoonful of cereal. “Darren was always fascinated with black magic.”

“Interesting,” Samara murmured, glancing over her shoulder at Luke.
Are you thinking what I’m thinking?

That Colby’s dad is working even closer with Jason than we originally realized?
Luke asked.

Samara nodded and when she met Colby’s eyes, she knew that he was thinking the same thing. Darren Jackson
was probably who
Jason Masterson was learning black magic from—which also meant that they were one step closer to learning more about it. She was convinced that somewhere, inside this house, there would be a clue that was bound to lead them to everything they needed to know to win a battle with someone who used black fighting.