Wolves among men (31 page)

“
Ethan, I’m fine.” She
smiled as I planted a kiss on her forehead before letting her
go.

“
I know. I’m just glad to
have you back.”

“
We all are.” Logan smiled
as he and the others took a seat around us. A slight blush colored
her cheeks and she looked down as Grant pulled a chair around,
dropping himself into it with a loud sigh.

“
What’s wrong?” He shook
his head.

“
I hate to be the storm
cloud on your happy day but I just can’t shake the feeling that
something isn’t right.”

“
What do you mean?” I
turned to him, confused and more than just a little
worried.

“
I’m very glad to have
solved one of our problems and reunited you with your sister but I
think we have an even bigger problem to deal with.” He leaned
forward on his knees and took a few deep breaths.

“
What do you
mean?”

“
Did it occur to you that
he might have let her go too easily?” I thought for a moment and
shook my head. The thought hadn’t occurred to me, hell I was just
happy to have her back but now that it was mentioned the thought
began to loom over me like a shadow.

“
I guess you’re right but
we should be fine,” even I didn’t believe what I had just
said.

“
Jonathan’s a pretty
messed up guy, Ethan.” Cordillia looked down at the table top as
she slid her fingernails gently and nervously across its
surface.

“
How so?” I turned to
her.

“
Well, he’s sadistic for
one. Malik told me that he liked Jonathan because he was willing to
do things that others wouldn’t do.”

“
Whoa!” I put my hands up
to silence her. “You met Malik?”

She stammered quickly, “Not exactly, I
spoke to him.”

“
Well where is he?” She
shrugged and shook her head.

“
I don’t know. It was just
a phone call.”

“
Okay well what did he
say?”

“
Jesus you’re excitable
aren’t you?” She chuckled lightly. “Jonathan called him, while I
was tied up, told him I wasn’t one of them. That I was just human
and wanted to know what Malik wanted done with me. I don’t know
what he said but I do know that he asked to speak to me. He offered
me the same thing Jonathan offered you, said if I became one of
them he would make sure I was safe, have eternal life and all that
crap.”

“
What did you say?” I
recoiled slightly. She rolled her eyes at me and smiled.

“
Ethan, come on who do you
think I am? I told him I’d think about it. I figured if I said no
there was a good chance he would kill me.” I nodded. “But anyway I
started asking some questions about him and what he believes and
somehow his relationship with Jonathan came up. He didn’t say much
but he did tell me that he doesn’t like getting his hands dirty
unless he has to and that training pups was beneath him or
something like that. He said he needed someone who would do
anything he was asked without question and I guess Jonathan is that
guy.”

“
Did you learn anything
else?”

“
Yes, Jonathan and Malik
met during world war two in Germany at one of the internment camps.
Jonathan was particularly good at a few things. One was keeping
hidden and keeping their experiments under the radar even from
other soldiers who weren’t so quick to agree with everything Malik
did.”

“
And the other?” my
eyebrow rose with increasing interest as she spoke.

“
The other was planning
every possible outcome ahead of time. He called himself a
strategist, there was no plan of attack that he hadn’t already seen
coming before the other side even thought of it, at least that’s
how he tells it.”

“
It’s not uncommon for
people to embellish their strengths,” Grant added
quietly.

“
True but it was Jonathan
that got the two of them out of Germany well before it was invaded
so there kind of has to be some truth to the story.”

“
So do you think he knew
that this would happen?” I sighed heavily and leaned back in my
chair. Cordillia nodded her head.

“
I’m sure he planned for
it.”

“
Why would he want you
back? He said there’s no use for you?”

“
He doesn’t want me,
Ethan, Malik does. He knows that if he has me he can get to you
without a fight.”

“
Your sister’s a smart
girl,” Grant finally broke from his silence. “We have to be
prepared for attack.”

“
Okay but still, why does
he want me?” Cordillia rolled her eyes and sighed
loudly.

“
Don’t you pay attention
Ethan? You broke a treaty and now he sees you as amassing an army
to go to war against him, he either wants you dead or on his side
and like it or not you’re in this pretty deep,” she laughed
uncomfortably as she spoke. “Do you remember when we were kids and
we would watch movies together late at night?” I smiled as I nodded
my head.

“
Yeah but what does that
have to do with anything?”

“
So you remember the movie
marathons but you don’t remember getting lost in the middle of
every one of them and making me explain it to you?”

“
It’s not like I’m
stupid,” I laughed. “I just suck at paying attention sometimes.”
Cordillia chuckled and nodded her head.

“
Yeah you do and this is
like those marathons all over again except that this isn’t a movie
and you don’t really have the freedom to not pay
attention.”

“
She’s right.” Sam sighed.
I looked up at her sheepishly.

“
I guess I’m kind of
failing here aren’t I?”

“
Not at all.” Grant
smiled. “But regardless of whether or not you have been paying
attention in the past there is the threat of war coming and now
would be a good time to start listening.” I nodded.

“
Where do we go from
here?” I sat up as he sighed softly.

“
Well we could start with
fortifying this place, keeping someone on watch at all
times.”

“
Maybe start training for
war?” Matt added. “Hand to hand combat that kind of
thing.”

“
That sounds like a good
start, can I trust you to do it?”

“
Eight years in the
service, I think basic training is something I can handle.” Grant
smirked and offered Matt a quick salute. “We can start this
afternoon?” It was more of a question than a statement. “That’s if
Ethan is up for it.”

“
Me?”

“
Yeah,” He looked to me
quickly and smiled. “I’ve never seen you fight but judging from the
fact that you were mostly dead when we found you it’s probably safe
to say you could use some training yourself.” The table burst into
soft laughter and a slight blush warmed my face.

“
You’re probably right.” I
nodded.

“
Have Colt help you, he
has some military training as well.” Matt nodded as he leaned back
in his chair.

“
James and I can make some
calls,” Mack piped in from one of the dark corners of the room.
“Maybe see if we can get some more warm bodies to help out.” A
light came on in my head as he stepped toward us, I reached into my
pocket and pulled out the piece of paper Robert had given
me.

“
Hey, Mack, can you do a
check on this guy?” He walked over to me and took the paper from my
hands.

“
Never heard of him. Do
you think he can help?” He asked shoving it into his own
pocket.

“
I don’t know,” I
shrugged. “But a friend told me to get in touch with him. It’s
worth checking into right?” I looked up to him as he
nodded.

“
Sure, man, I’ll see what
I can do.” I looked back toward Grant whose expression was
beginning to lighten as more and more of us began to step up to the
plate and do what needed to be done without question or
complaint.

“
Sam,” Grant called behind
him. “How about you and some of the girls see if you can come up
with a way to hide the kids.” She laughed lightly.

“
Why me old man?” He
looked up at her and smiled.

“
Because there’s a series
of tunnels underneath the factory and I thought you might like to
go down there and take a look.” Her face lit up as she considered
his offer.

“
That sounds like fun, I
can also check to make sure there’s no way that they can get in
from under there as well.”

“
Exactly.” Grant beamed.
He turned his face back to me and smiled.

“
What about me?” Cordillia
chimed in. His smiled warmly as she waited for him to give her a
chore to do.

“
What do you
mean?”

“
Isn’t there anything I
can do?” Grant considered her question for a moment before he
reached over to pat her leg gently.

“
Of course, if you want to
help you’re more than welcome to. What do you want to
do?”

“
I want to fight,” She
answered quickly.

“
No!” I nearly shouted.
Grant lifted his hand to silence me as he watched her
thoughtfully.

“
Why?” he asked
simply.

“
Because I can’t have
Ethan watching my back all the time.”

“
Cordillia, I can protect
you and you’re just a-”

“
A what?” she barked. “A
kid? Ethan, I know I’m a kid in some ways. I also know that I’m the
only human in the room but I can do this.” She glared at
me.

“
I can’t let you put
yourself in danger like that.”

“
And if you spend your
whole life watching out for me you’re going to miss the monster
coming for you and get yourself killed.” I stood quickly and shook
my head.

“
No, Cordillia, and that’s
the end of it.” She jumped up just as quickly and pressed herself
against me, anger and defiance poured out from her eyes as she
stood tall.

“
You don’t have a choice,
Ethan. I’m not stupid, I won’t go running into the heat of battle
but I want to help”

“
It’s suicide!” I
barked.

“
Then teach me to fire a
gun!” she screamed back. “Anything that can kill a wolf can kill a
human right?”

“
You’re not using a gun
either it’s too dangerous!” I shouted.

“
And it isn’t for you?”
she screamed. “You’ve never gotten into a fight in your life that
didn’t almost get you killed what makes you think you can do this
better than I can?” My thoughts stopped and I couldn’t help the
slight smile that curved my lips as her words echoed through my
head. She was clever, quick and there was nothing I could say after
a truth like that.

“
You made the decision not
to tell me you were attacked. You made the decision to leave
California and you made the decision to let me come with you. Now
it’s my turn to decide.” She turned to Grant who held the look of a
man in shock as she peered down at him. “Are there any weapons
here?” she asked quietly. He nodded his head and cracked a soft
smile.

“
We don’t use them often
but we do have a few guns on hand.”

“
Who’s your best
shot?”

“
Honestly that would be
me,” he spoke proudly.

“
It’s true.” Sam nodded in
agreement.

“
Then it’s settled.” She
turned back to me and smiled.

“
You get to help Matt
train the others and I get to learn to protect myself.”

“
I still don’t like this,”
I grumbled.

“
Well I’m not happy
sitting on my ass and being useless so deal with it.” She smiled as
she backed me down. There was no sense in arguing with her, when
she wanted to do something she did it and there wasn’t any telling
her different when she made up her mind.

“
Alright,” Grant smiled as
he stood from his chair. “Since we all know what we’re doing, let’s
get started.”

“
Are you sure this is what
you want?” I asked Cordillia as we stood one by one.