And why would I use just one, when Delight had given me two to play with?
I didn’t register when the sticks I was using ran out of charge. Bone kept cracking, and the wolves kept falling. The team took it in turns to keep me company, until we got outside the complex and were racing down the road towards the hill country just beyond the wolves’ estate. After that, it was Mack who was running beside me, his presence seeping into my head, but leaving me alone.
The man knew what was good for him, after all.
26—Reparation is Required
Wanderer didn’t port us off-world. She sent the shuttles, instead. It was safer, she told us, later, given the teleport interference systems that had been installed on the planet. Delight made a note of it, and added it to her report on Aktrovaran.
“You’ll be getting a copy,” she assured Mack and Abby. “After all, you’re the reasons we’ve got any data at all.”
“Thanks a lot,” Mack said, and there was only a tinge of sarcasm in his reply.
As he spoke, his gaze wandered to where Cascade was pressed tight against Rohan’s legs, the dog’s big head firmly under the boy’s hand, and then to where Tens stood, almost vibrating with rage, and then to me—wary because he could see the stims hadn’t worn off yet.
“I thought I told you never to juice her, again?” he growled at Delight, and I rolled my eyes.
Honestly! The man had no idea.
He scowled at me, a delightfully pissed-off Mack scowl.
“I have every idea, girl,” he said, “and someone owes me three rou—”
I pushed off the wall and stalked over to the door.
“You and whose army?” I asked, and palmed the door open, before stepping through and heading for the gym.
Delight and Pritchard were smirking as I left, but I didn’t give their amusement a second thought. I heard Mack coming after me, but that was only to be expected. Challenging Mack was just one of the things I’d missed
He caught me as my knees gave out, wrapping an arm around my waist and lifting me from the floor.
“Me with one arm tied behind my back,” he said, breath tickling my ear, and I swear he was smiling.
I might have cussed him out…or Delight and Pritchard and whoever had tailor-made their concoction, but I figured their timing had its advantages.
I woke to the sound of Mack shouting.
“Are you telling me you can’t reverse it?”
“No,” Delight told him, and I could tell she was doing her best to keep her own temper in check. “I’m telling you that if this particular concoction doesn’t work she’ll need to sleep it off like she was meant to…and that she isn’t going to thank you for speeding the process in about an hour.”
“An hour?” Mack asked. “Is that going to be enough time?”
Delight was uncharacteristically sober when she answered.
“Let’s hope so. If we didn’t need her on deck for this, I’d be telling you to let her rest.”
Why would she have to tell him that? I thought, opening my eyes so I could see her.
To my surprise, I was still in Mack’s arms, tucked close against his chest as he stood, facing off with Delight. Tens, Rohan, Cascade were looking on. I didn’t want to lift my head, let alone demand to be allowed to stand on my own two feet. Looked like I had to, though.
It had been a while since Mack had been in my head, so I was a little surprised when he set me carefully on my feet. I was also relieved when he kept me tucked tight against his side. Delight tilted her head to one side, watching us, and then she smiled.
“Awww,” she said. “She missed you.”
I arched an eyebrow at her, feeling the dregs of post-enhancement lethargy slide away. Still didn’t feel like I could smear the deck with her. That couldn’t be right.
“What’s up?” I asked, and she waved at the screen.
“Wolves are calling,” she said.
Before she could go on, however, the conference room door opened, and Scarpil and Cossack dragged Costoganzi through the door. Delight greeted the oligarch with a twist of her lip.
“You need to tell the wolves you rescind the contract on my friends and allies,” she said, and the businessman regarded her with a blank stare.
“Do you understand me?” Delight asked, and the man made a show of running his gaze over who she’d assembled in the room: Rohan, Tens, Cascade, Mack, Me, Pritchard, and herself—everyone he’d asked for except Abs and the rest of the Shady’s crew.
The smirk that curved his lips gave me a dull sense of foreboding, and I knew this meeting wasn’t going to go the way any of us wanted. The worst part of it was, I don’t think Costoganzi realized he was no longer in control.
“You ready?” Delight asked, looking around the room, and the rest of us nodded.
Costoganzi’s grin grew wider.
Delight flicked her gaze over him, and then brought the screen at the front of the room to life. The wolf on the other end of the line had turned his head to speak with an underling. When that worthy touched his shoulder and indicated the link was live, he turned back to face us. Seeing us, surprised him, and he wasn’t fast enough to hide it.
Delight smiled.
“Hunt Leader,” she began, and the wolf’s attention shifted from Costoganzi to the woman standing slightly to the front of the room.
I read the frown on his face as confusion.
Clearly, he’d been expecting the businessman to be in charge.
Delight caught the look, and signaled to Scarpil and Cossack. If the Hunt Leader had been in any doubt who was in charge, the sight of Costoganzi being forced to his knees should have made it obvious. From the scowl on the man’s face, this had not been in his plan of how the meeting would go. He raised his
