anything, he’d never been up against her family.
Then again, neither had she and as the dust settled and the enormity of what she’d done began to hit her, she realized she would be on the receiving end of their ruthlessness for the first time.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Just . . . memories.”
“None of them good, by the looks of it.”
No, there hadn’t been good ones for a long time. Maybe, with Jinx, there would be.
Liam stared at his hands. He’d woken up four times already in the past two hours, convinced he could see the blood on them still. He knew it couldn’t be so—they’d been washed several times already, but the smell . . . the howls . . . rang in his ears.
The spoils of war.
“Ten more surrendered tonight,” Cyd had told him just before he came in here to get some quiet. The rooms they used were at the end of the Dire tunnel, where it was safest for them and yet gave them enough independence to begin functioning as a pack of their own.
In time, Liam would move back to Manhattan with the twins and the majority of his pack.
Max was being held in the room next to Harm and she had everything she could want, except freedom.
Liam felt the yoke around his neck as surely as she did.
It was hard to stay away from her. Cyd offered to find him other comforts but Liam refused.
Didn’t want to ever fall in love again but he didn’t want meaningless shit either.
Cyd took the comfort instead. As an alpha, all his desires were strengthening exponentially. After their kills, they’d never be the same.
As it’s meant to be.
He heard the two weregirls’ cries of pleasure throughout the night. Cyd obviously satisfied them completely and then some, as they’d had come out to breakfast smiling.
Cain was quieter about his needs, as he needed to be as the omega, but he fed his appetites as well. And when they gathered again, the strength of that trio would cement them all a great place in Were history.
Would it be enough? His father had done it for twenty-one years, since Liam’s birth, with not a single companion, no true mate. He said it was much easier without the entanglement and for the first time, Liam understood what he’d meant.
His father could’ve stopped him from mating with Max, but instead let him make his own mistakes. Linus saw nothing wrong, saw mistakes as something to learn from.
Liam saw a hell of a lot wrong with it.
The pup was innocent and a hybrid. It would deserve none of the scrutiny and rejection it would get. But could Liam show the whelp love? Because without that . . .
“Liam? The California alpha’s on the line for you,” Cain said. “He wants to congratulate you on a job well done.”
A job well done most likely meant Liam had his support. The thrill of that helped to erase some of the heaviness in his heart at what good pack law really meant.
Chapter 10
Jinx’s wolf did not like closed spaces, but he offered Gillian the option of the elevator. She seemed to accept his claustrophobia in stride and walked up with him.
“I don’t much like small spaces either,” she told him as they started up the stairs together. Jez took the elevator, mainly so he could make sure all was right in the penthouse.
Jinx was sure they would’ve sensed trouble, but Jez was more careful than most, a trait Jinx appreciated.
“I really like the other house. Why don’t you live there anymore?”
“It was time for me to get out on my own.” They rounded the landing to the halfway point of the upstairs.
They finished the walk in silence. Jez met them at the door with a nod to Jinx as Gillian stepped inside.
“I like this place too,” she told Jinx. There were lots of windows in the main part of the room. Most vampires would hate that, but Jez wasn’t most vampires.
“I’m going to head to the roof,” Jez told them.
“Do you sleep there?” Gillian asked.
“I don’t sleep much at night, no.”
“I’d like to sleep outside, I think.”
“I’m never going to have any privacy again, am I?” Jez grumbled, but he didn’t look all that put out as they went out onto the rooftop terrace under the stars.
It was so calm—too calm for monsters to be roaming the night. Then again, most humans thought wolves were monsters too. He settled with Gillian in one of the double loungers while Jez took one on the other side of the roof for maximum privacy.
She snuggled in against him. “Do you see them now? The ghosts?”
“Yes. They’re everywhere.”
“I could only see the one in my room. I liked her,” she said wistfully.
There’d been a time he’d liked ghosts too—thought maybe they were misunderstood. He’d spent what seemed like a lifetime trying to hold to this theory. Since it was his ability, shouldn’t he be kind to the things?
Rogue never had that issue. He’d wanted the spirits to go back to where they came from, no niceties at all. And by the time Jinx was convinced he was right, Rogue was far ahead of him in the
But Jinx had learned. “You shouldn’t ever get that close to a ghost. Don’t let them talk to you. Ignore them, because most of the time, they lie.”
That was true about half the time, but for the inexperienced, the ignoring thing was generally the best rule of thumb.
“You make them all sound scary.”
“You don’t know what’s underneath what you’re seeing or hearing.”
“It sounds like a hard job. I used to want to work at Carvel when I was younger, but mainly so I could have ice cream all day long,” she admitted. “What about you? Did you always want to hunt ghosts?”
He couldn’t tell her yet that, as a Dire, you didn’t really have a choice as to what you wanted to be. You just were—and he was a warrior alpha wolf born into a great warrior family big on tradition and worried as hell that the twins would ruin the line with their witchy ways. “It’s what I’m good at.”
There was a long, comfortable silence and then Gillian turned her head against his chest and went to sleep. It was a calm, peaceful sleep, with deep, easy breaths and the hint of a smile on her face. He covered her against the coolness of the night, since she hadn’t officially turned yet. Her metabolism was faster, she was warm, but he wouldn’t take any chances.
Shifting—especially the first shifts—on any Dire were very hard. In his day, on average maybe half survived the transition.
Brother Wolf whined in his ear and he didn’t blame him. Jinx didn’t want to think about the possibility of losing Gillian either.
As Gillian slept under the stars, he and Jez moved back over to the small table in the middle, bringing beer and chips and salsa with them. Their talk turned back to the other matter at hand while they had the opportunity. Decided that reopening purgatory was the worst idea ever, but neither had a clue about how to send the purgatory monsters to hell.
