Authors: Eileen Rendahl

Dead Letter Day (38 page)

BOOK: Dead Letter Day

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I turned to run up the stairs and get help, but Chuck was already running down them. “What?” he demanded.

I pointed to the boys’ cell. He turned and his shoulders dropped. “Oh, that’s where we are. You might want to leave, Melina.”

“Excuse me?” I asked, staring at him. “You’re saying this is an expected phase?”

“Well, it’s what happened with Hollinger,” he said, leaning back against the wall.

“Do something,” Inge yelled at him. “They’re in agony.”

“Sure are,” Chuck observed, not moving and not raising his voice.

I stared at him, too. “You’re really not going to do anything?”

“What would you have me do?” he asked, his tone calm and conversational as Sven now exploded out of fetal position, flipped onto his back and arched up as if he was having a seizure.

“I don’t know. Drug them. Tie them down. Something.” I was actually totally voting for drugging them.

He shook his head. “The toxins have to work their way out of their systems. I don’t know what would happen if we drugged them, and frankly I have no idea what we could drug them with. Have you ever seen a drug have much effect on a werewolf?”

“Is this what Michael Hollinger went through?” I asked, wincing away from the cell again.

“Yep.”

“Help them,” Inge demanded. “Make this stop.”

“Sorry, Inge. I can’t do that.”

“Can’t you see they’re in agony? What are you doing to them?”

“I didn’t do anything to them,” Chuck said, his tone still even, but I could hear the anger beneath it. “You did it. You kidnapped one of my pack, held him hostage, tortured him and injected his blood into your sons. You’re not going to get a lot of sympathy from me.”

Inge backed away into her cell. “I never meant for this to happen. I just wanted them to be safe. I couldn’t bear to see them hurt.”

Erik let out another terrible howl and then collapsed to the floor shaking and sweating.

“Good job with that,” I said.

“You don’t know!” She whirled toward me and screamed. “You don’t know what it’s like. You don’t know what kind of pain it causes to see one of your babies hurt.”

I stared at her. Through all this, I’d felt so much compassion for Inge. I knew how protective I already felt of this little being I had inside me and could only imagine how much fiercer that feeling would be once it was a baby I could see and hold. It wasn’t until this moment that I realized that
the only thing that Inge cared about was her pain. It was all about how bad she felt when one of her children was hurt. “You are a terrible mother,” I said.

“What?” she shrieked. “Look at how far I went to protect them. How dare you say that!”

I shook my head. “This wasn’t about protecting them. You made them take terrible risks.” I pointed to the cell where her sons writhed on the floor and, oh ick, frothed at the mouth. “You didn’t do it for them either. You did it for yourself. How selfish can you be?”

She gasped and clutched her hand to her heart. “Everything I’ve done has always been for them.”

I shook my head. “I don’t think so. A good mother would never have even contemplated killing herself rather than raising her children. You would have orphaned both those boys if Frigga hadn’t stopped you.”

Her hands went to her mouth. There wasn’t much she could say to that. We all knew it was true.

“You turned them into monsters with no self-control just to keep yourself from feeling any more pain,” I continued. “A real mother would endure anything to keep her children safe.”

“Shut up!” she screamed. “You don’t know anything about it. You’re not even a mother yet.”

There it was. That little flutter kick right below my belly button. Bitch was lucky my little peanut didn’t want to zap her. “You’re right. I’m not a mother yet, but I have a mother and a damn good one at that.” The truth of that resonated through me. I’d been so worried about whether or not I could handle motherhood. Of course, I could. I had the best role model on the planet.

Well, maybe not the planet. Still, she was a damn fine mother and I knew she would never ever have injected me with werewolf blood to spare herself pain.

I PUT ON ONE OF THE SMOCK TOPS WITH THE GIANT BUTT bows that my mother had bought me and looked at myself in the mirror. I didn’t need to switch to maternity clothes yet, but I knew it would please her to see me in the shirt she’d bought for me.

Ted came up behind me and slipped his arms around me. “That’s so…cute.”

“I know. It’s awful, isn’t it?”

“Not at all. It’s just not your usual style.”

That was true. For one thing, it wasn’t black. For another, it had a giant butt bow. I am not a giant-butt-bow kind of girl.

“Let’s go,” I said. “We might as well get it over with.”

He glanced at his watch. “We have a few minutes since we’re not picking up your grandmother.”

I had mixed feelings about that. I liked picking up Grandma Rosie. On the other hand, I liked that Patrick was
having to do a few things now. Apparently being the vessel that contains your parents’ future grandchild gets you out of tons of stuff. I wondered if I was even going to have to help set the table tonight.

“Is Norah ready?” I asked.

“And waiting.”

“Let’s be early. It’ll freak my mother out.”

“Now that’s my girl,” Ted said, smiling.

I was glad we were able to smile again. It had taken a few days. Paul was healing well, although the silver burns looked like they might leave permanent scars. Chuck was closing down his contracting business and moving the Pack. Paul was not going with him. I can’t imagine how wrenching a decision that must have been for him. I also can’t imagine how it must have felt to realize that if it had been left to the Pack that I had pledged myself to, I’d still be in a cell being used like a soft-drink dispenser to turn two ordinary boys into something very nasty. I don’t think Chuck felt very good about that either.

The other wolf not planning on moving with the Pack was Kevin. He’d been the werewolf equivalent of excommunicated. He’d also claimed Inge as his mate so that she and her boys would be under his protection. Otherwise I’m pretty sure that Chuck would have killed all three of them.

Which brings us to Sam. Long-legged, earnest, sweet-appearing Sam. If there was one thing that broke my heart about this whole situation it was Sam. I don’t know how I could have been so wrong about him. Chuck wouldn’t talk to me about what had happened to Sam. He said it was Pack business and not for me to concern myself with. Paul said the same thing.

We were pulling up at my parents’ house no more than
twenty minutes later. “This feels weird without your grandmother,” Norah complained from the backseat.

“I know. Maybe we can take that back from Patrick, but let’s make sure he has to take out the garbage or something else we don’t want to do instead,” I said.

I barely got my car door open and my father was there helping me out of the car. He kissed both my cheeks. “You look beautiful, Melina. You’re glowing.”

I wasn’t sure about the glowing thing, although I apparently did it in the womb. I did feel a lot better than I had for the last few weeks. Maybe it was having Paul back where he belonged or getting past the first rough few weeks or Mom’s raspberry tea. I wasn’t sure. I was just glad to feel better. “Thanks, Dad. You’re looking good, too.”

He hugged me and laughed. “Come in. Your mother made flank steak.”

I knew. I’d chosen. I decided not to flaunt it. I got to pick two times in a row. Getting my way was reward enough. We were also having cheesy potatoes and buttered carrots. It wasn’t a meal that was good for the cholesterol, but it was good for my heart in a whole different way.

An hour later, I sat and watched my family as they argued and laughed too loud and got into each other’s business. I watched as my grandmother totally set my mother’s teeth on edge. I also watched as my mother made sure my grandmother had everything she needed in reach without ever asking for any of it.

I reached for the glass of sparkling cider that my mother had purchased just for me and the diamond in my engagement ring winked in the candlelight. Ted was deep in a discussion with my father about Peyton Manning’s move to the Broncos. My father threw his head back and laughed at
something Ted had said and I felt that weird melty feeling in my chest I got nearly every time I looked at Ted.

He’d been right, though. He had disappointed me. I suppose it was my own fault. My expectations were awfully high. But it also opened my eyes. I was so glad to have him here by my side. I had never known anyone like him. The fact that he loved me still seemed like some kind of miracle.

If he hadn’t proved himself to be the man I thought he was, though, I still would have been okay. I looked around at my mother and my grandmother and my aunt. They would have been here for me. My mother knew more about me now than she had since I was three, and her support was unwavering. Grandma Rosie hadn’t batted an eye about my pregnancy before I’d even known what I was going to do. And Aunt Kitty? She’d already purchased two receiving blankets and a set of footed pajamas, and I wasn’t even out of my first trimester yet.

I’d been spending a lot of time wondering about what kind of mother I was going to be. I still didn’t know. I did know, however, that no matter what, I’d know what good mothering looked like.

My mother hadn’t been able to protect me. Despite her best efforts, I’d died for a few minutes and come back irrevocably changed. Inge hadn’t been able to protect her child either. There were probably going to be times I wouldn’t be able to protect my baby. I was going to do my damnedest, though. That was for sure.