Heir To The Pack (The Cursed Pack Book 1) (5 page)

“I’m Marjie,” she said. “Elaine
is waiting in the kitchen.”

They walked through, and
Annie set Jack down. He seemed brighter than he had in weeks, running off to
explore the large family room that the kitchen overlooked.

At one end towered a
massive stone fireplace that rose to the cathedral ceiling, which was lined
with wood. The place had the feel of a hunting lodge, and she half-expected to
see taxidermy hanging from the walls. Instead, huge framed photographs of the
wilderness decorated the room.

Another older woman—presumably
Elaine—stood behind the kitchen counter, putting cookies onto a plate. She
was the shortest member of the family Annie had seen to date, although she
stood about as tall as Daisy. Elaine was as soft and round as Marjie was tall
and rangy. Her hair, shiny pewter grey, hung in a long, smooth bob below her
ears, behind one of which perched a pink flower. Where Marjie wore a plaid
shirt and jeans, Elaine had a floral blouse and pale pink pants.

Despite all that, Annie
sensed steel in both these women. Dash treated them with deference and so would
she. She plastered on her best diplomatic smile, usually saved for responding
to questions about why she wasn’t married or explaining to graduate students
that their research wasn’t particularly innovative.

Elaine brought the cookies
over to a low table in the living area, and sat down, patting the couch next to
her. “Come on, dear,” she said. “I don’t bite.”

Marjie snorted and flung
herself down in a battered leather armchair. “That’s what she always says. Don’t
believe her for a second.”

Annie caught her mother’s
eye. Daisy gave her the beady-eyed look with a capital L she knew meant trouble
later. She hadn’t been Daisy’s daughter for thirty-two years without
recognizing that look when she saw it.

Regardless, she took the
invitation and carefully seated herself on the edge of the cushion. Dash folded
himself into the couch next to her. Daisy made herself at home in an armchair,
while Jack continued exploring the big room.

A very odd tea party,
indeed.

Dash began, “This is
Annie, Jack, and Annie’s mother, Daisy.”

“We’d guessed who you were
as soon as we saw you yesterday,” Marjie remarked, bouncing the foot she hung
over one of the chair arms. “Dash still talks about you.”

Annie couldn’t control her
eyebrows from shooting to what felt like her hairline. “Really,” she said.

“Of course, it’s not as
often as when he first returned from his vacation. But it has been three years.
Cookie?” Elaine said, proffering the tray.

“Thank you.” Annie took a
chocolate chip cookie and turned to Dash, who was now staring out the window. Her
self-control, trained from birth and legendary even in their stiff-upper-lipped
family, slipped even further. “Is that really true, Dash?” Emboldened, she
added, “After only three days?”

He made a sound somewhere
between a grunt and, “Mmm.”

Well. That was
interesting. Perhaps she had more chance of salvaging this situation than she’d
first thought.

When Annie had the cookie
half way into her mouth, Marjie said, “So you think Jack is Dash’s son?” Annie
took the cookie from between her lips and looked for somewhere to set it down. Elaine
handed her a napkin, smiling sweetly.

“Don’t worry, dear,”
Elaine said. “We want to understand what’s going on.”

Dash, still staring out
the window, said, “The timing fits, but I don’t know how.”

Elaine pursed her lips a
tiny bit, the downward curve in her mouth provoking dimples under her apple
cheeks. Annie had never seen a more textbook grandmother figure. She could be
in Hallmark commercials.

“Mama, look! A bone! A
dog’s bone!” Jack trotted over from the corner where he’d been playing, hefting
a large, slightly grimy cow’s femur.

Annie’s inner
overprotective mother freaked out. She twitched toward him, ready to snatch it
from his hands.

“Dash always loved bones
when he was young,” Elaine said. “So good for the jaw muscles.”

Annie froze, her
outstretched hand inches from the bone.

“Would you like me to get
him a fresh one?” Marjie asked.

Annie couldn’t tell if she
was serious. Her horror must have showed, because Elaine gently exchanged
Jack’s bone for a cookie. He trotted back over to the windows.

Clearly she needed more
sleep, because this discussion was getting increasingly surreal.

“My dear,” Elaine said, “Dash
told us your boy isn’t well.”

Tears welled up in Annie’s
eyes, and she bit down on her lip to stifle a sob. This was all too much. It
had been an incredibly long day. Week. Month. Her child was sick, people were
trying to kidnap him, and no one could tell her why any of these things were
happening. Her resolve collapsed, and she had to swipe at her eyes to see the
room.

“We need to go over a few
things with you,” Elaine continued, handing her a tissue as if nothing unusual
had occurred. Clearing her throat, delicately, Elaine said, “It may well be
that Jack’s illness is a side effect of his breeding.”

“What are you implying?”
Annie was suddenly uncomfortable. “There’s nothing wrong with me. Or my genes.”

“It could be the
combination of the two. I hear you’re a biologist. Surely you know about
recessive genes.”

Annie gave a tight nod. Now
she was on firmer ground. She began to breathe again. “I’d like Dash to get
tested.”

The older woman gave a
half-sigh. “I’m afraid that won’t be possible.”

The beginnings of calm
fled and she had to fight not to snarl. “Why not?”

Dash groaned and covered
his face with a hand. His voice came out muffled. “We don’t use modern
medicine. I’m sorry.”

The hackles stood up on
the back of Annie’s neck. “How ridiculous. You realize we’re talking about the
life of your son?”

Elaine pressed her lips
together. “We have agreed to tell you the truth. Dash?”

Dash dropped his hand,
turned his gaze from the windows, and looked Annie in the face. That steady pale
blue gaze pinned her in her seat, and she shifted her weight.

They didn't use modern
medicine. Dash had enemies, enemies who had tried to abduct Jack. They gave
their children bones to play with. There was something very, very wrong here.

“Yes, Dash,” she said. “Why
don't you tell me the truth?”

He paused, then said,
quietly, “We’re not human. We're werewolves.
I’m
a werewolf.”

The words could have been
in ancient Greek. She struggled to form the sounds into something that made
sense. Shaking her head, she said, “What did you just say?”

Dash leaned toward her. “Annie.
I'm a werewolf. I have two souls, and only one of them is human.”

“No. No, no, no.” She
stood up, her knees trembling. Daisy cleared her throat and Annie shot her a
look. Her mother's face was pale, and she looked far too excited by this
ridiculous development. She turned her back on her, turned to face Dash. He
watched her. Her body went cold, hot, numb, tingling. She didn't know what she
felt, what to say, or what to do. All she knew was that it couldn't be true. “No.
This can't be happening. Why would you even say such a thing? Couldn't you come
up with some better excuse to avoid being a father?”

Dash's face hardened. “It's
not an excuse. I'm telling you the truth. I wouldn't lie to you.” His hands
went to the hem of his shirt and he pulled it over his head.

She froze. “What are you
doing?”

“I'm going to prove it.”

“Oh for God’s sake,” Annie
said. Anger unlocked her words. “This is all such absolute, absolute bullshit.”
The word tripped off her tongue rather unnaturally, and she glanced in Jack’s
direction. He was absorbed in eating his cookie and appeared not to have heard.
“We’ve been embarrassed, chased by badly-behaved dogs—sorry,
werewolves
, for God’s sake—and
nearly abducted by strangers. No one can give me an explanation for any of
this. I don’t know what is wrong with you, but I have had enough. You are
either lying or deluded, and either way, you think that’s more important than my
child’s life. We are leaving now.” She tried to stiffen her spine but she
ruined the effect by stumbling as she swept Jack up into her arms.

Daisy sat still, looking
up at her big-eyed. “Oh dear,” she said. “It's a lot to absorb, isn't it? And you
so rarely lose your temper.”

“Mother. Get. Up.”

Marjie stood, and met
Annie’s eyes square on. “Calm down,” she said. “We’re gonna help you. I believe
the boy is Dash’s son. You need to stay.”

“I have had quite enough,”
Annie repeated. “Please move out of my way.” She would not be scared by a couple
of elderly aunts, even if they were claiming to be werewolves.

“Guess I’m going to have
to show you,” the older woman said, stepping toward her.

Annie took a step back,
her arms tightening on Jack. “Are you threatening me?”

The big craggy woman’s face
lit up with a lightning smile. “Nope. I want to show you something.” She moved
so fast her hand blurred across Annie’s vision, and landed on Annie’s shoulder.
Annie felt a curious
push
inside her
head.

She saw stars. There was
no other way to describe it. The world darkened before her, lit by a thousand
glowing points of light around them.

Her gaze cleared, and she
blinked, trying to understand what she saw in front of her. Her eyes showed her
two Marjies, a sort of 3-D double vision. Superimposed over the tall woman in
front of her, there was a second image, smaller, darker, and covered in fur.
Dash had mentioned two souls. This had to be Marjie’s other spirit, inside and
outside and all around the human form it wore like a set of clothes.

A voice in some quiet
corner of Annie’s mind tried to suggest that this couldn’t possibly be real,
but she knew in her heart, as truly as she knew anything, that it was.

The world as she knew it
changed, irrevocably.

From Marjie’s second self
radiated a set of vibrating cloudy lines. Annie followed them with her gaze. The
lines led to Elaine and to Dash.

Each of them also had a
second self. Both wolves. Elaine’s was small and grey, and Dash’s, enormous and
solid black.

Dash’s wolf had pale blue
eyes that met hers. A connection clicked between them, as it had in Cancun
three years ago. His presence filled the room. How had she not felt it before?

His gaze traveled downward
toward where Jack lay in her arms, and Annie, too, looked down.

Tremendous love for her
son rushed through her when she saw his soul. The shape was softly glowing but
unformed, filling Jack’s body with a cloud of light.

His hair flopped over his
forehead, shadowing his face. Annie reached to brush it aside, but her hand
passed into it—not hair, but a shadow. Her fingers moved it slightly but
could not push it out of the way. She caught her breath and tried again, her
hand moving faster as she tried to unveil Jack’s face.

“You can’t remove it,”
Marjie said in her ear. “There is a shadow on his soul.”

CHAPTER
FOUR

Annie clutched her son
close and closed her eyes, swallowing the urge to scream. She couldn’t, not
with Jack in her arms. When she opened her eyes again, the world had shifted
back to normal. Or as normal as it could be with what she now knew to be true.

She let out a muffled
half-sob as she looked at her son’s face, now unveiled, and pressed him close.

“What’s wrong, Mama?” Jack
said, sleepily.

“Nothing, baby,” she said,
huskily, and swept her hand across his forehead where the shadow had lain. Where
she now knew the shadow lay.

She sank down into a
chair, cradling him against her. He snuggled his face into her neck, and let
out that little shuddering sigh that meant he was falling asleep.

Marjie, too, eased herself
down, one hand on the arm of her own chair as she sat.

The shadow was real. She’d
seen it and touched it, and the horror of it would stay with her forever.

And she hadn’t thought she
believed in magic.

“What does it mean?” Annie
kept her voice low, squashing the panic down into her brain. She would think
logically through her emotions later. And find a quiet place to scream into a
pillow. Werewolves were real. There was a shadow on Jack’s soul.
Holy shit.

“What does what mean?” Dash
walked up to her. “What did you see?”

She couldn’t believe what
she'd seen. But she knew she’d been privy to a vision. And something that Dash
himself couldn't see.

“The boy,” the old woman
said, her voice husky. “His future is not known. There is a darkness upon him.”

“That’s what’s making him
ill?” Her voice shook, and Annie despised herself for it. She had to be strong
now, for her son.

“It’s likely. I can’t tell
you any more.”

“Why not?” The words came
out much snappier than she’d intended. “I’m sorry. And I’m...” She took in a
deep breath. “I’m sorry for doubting you. All of you. You have to
understand…I’m so far out of my depth here. I’m sorry I lost my temper.” Her
cheeks heated. But apologizing was the right thing to do. She’d behaved like an
ass. “I'm a scientist, and to me this should all be…simply impossible.”

Dash nodded. “It doesn’t
matter. What matters is that now you understand. And now we can work on helping
Jack, together.”

Annie turned back to
Marjie. “Can you help him?”

Marjie looked up at her,
and Annie noticed shadows under her eyes and a tremor in her hand that hadn’t
been there before. “I don’t have the power to heal.”

“Annie,” Dash said. “My
aunts are the witches—wise women, if you prefer—of our pack. Marjie
sees, and Elaine, well, Elaine does other things. But they are not
all-powerful. Every vision has its limits, and its price.”

If he’d said that to her a
day ago, she would have laughed in his face. Now, though, now, she had no
retort.

“How can we find out? How
can we make him better?”

Dash rubbed his hand over
his hair, pushed himself explosively off the couch, and stood, twitching, his
hands fisting at his sides. With what Annie read as an apologetic glance in
Jack’s direction, he paced over to the window and stared out into the woods. “I
have an idea, but you aren’t going to like it.”

Elaine put down her teacup
with a clink. Annie had quite forgotten she was there, and had to suppress a
start.

“You want to take them to
the Gathering.”

“I think we should speak
with the Oracle.”

Elaine hissed between her
teeth. “I see.”

Daisy got up from her seat
and came over to Annie. She sat down on the arm of her chair, and put an arm
around Annie and Jack. “He’s out like a light,” she said. “Is there somewhere
we could lay him down?”

“Of course,” Elaine said. “I’ll
show you to a guest room.”

“I don’t want to leave him
alone,” Annie said, involuntarily clutching at him.

“I’ll sit with him,” Daisy
said. “All this is very, um, interesting.” Her eyes were as big as serving
plates, and her face white as a bathtub. “Why don’t you finish this
conversation? He’ll sleep better lying down. I could do with a rest, myself.”

“What if something
happens?” Annie couldn’t help but worry. And now she was worried about her
mother, too. “We still don't know why those men tried to take you. They could
come back.”

Dash shook his head. “Nothing
will happen to you here. We’ve cleared out the house and set safeguards.”

Annie made eye contact
with him, measuring whether to trust him again. His gaze was steady and clear, hiding
some emotion she couldn’t quite read.

Her hold on Jack eased,
and she allowed Daisy to lift him from her arms. Elaine led them out of the
room, and Marjie, too, struggled to her feet and followed behind. Annie tracked
him with her gaze until they left the room.

She and Dash were finally
alone. They could speak plainly. He stood by the window, shirtless, watching
her. She forced her gaze upwards from his chest.

“So,” she said. “I need to
understand this better. What kind of gathering? What’s an Oracle in this
context?”

“You’ve decided to believe
in us now? I don’t need to whip the rest of my clothes off and turn furry?”

Perhaps he intended to be
snarky, but he sounded a little too hopeful to pull it off. “You don't need to
show me anything. Marjie showed me. I know it’s true.” She paused. “Besides, if
I'm not mistaken…that was you in the garden yesterday, wasn't it? The
black…wolf.”

“Aren’t you going to write
it off to mass hysteria or something?” He folded his arms, his face neutral
except for the obvious tension in his jaw. Okay, maybe he was grumpy at her.

Logical. He wanted to make
this hard, because of what she’d said earlier. “Are you trying to convince me I
was right the first time? I was wrong. I admit it. That’s the essence of
science. When a hypothesis proves false, you come up with another.” She
convinced herself as she spoke. There was an explanation for what she’d seen. It
just happened to be beyond the bounds of scientific discovery at this time. She
was one hundred percent convinced that what she’d seen was real. “Also, as I
said before, I’m sorry I doubted you. Please understand.” She stood up, took a
step toward him. She didn’t want to be at odds.

He wasn’t done yet. “The
evidence isn’t too anecdotal for you?”

“Perhaps there’s a certain
degree of observer bias going on, but I am left with no choice but to believe
you.” Although she’d been wrong, she’d apologized, and now surely they could
move on. It was time to build bridges. She smiled at him, as sweetly as she
could manage.

*
         
*
         
*

Dash stared at Annie. She
was all wrapped up in a pair of faded jeans, her torso hidden by a loose white
shirt. Despite the layers of clothes, she was still hot. Hotter still when she
put her cool academic face on. He’d like to get her out of that white thing and
back into a sundress. Or out of one, preferably.

Damn it, he had to
concentrate. He had a lot of explaining to do. If there was one thing he hated,
it was explaining awkward things to women. Surrounded by them as he was, this
seemed to be almost a daily occurrence. No matter what he said, they would
think he was wrong. He might as well bite the bullet.

“Are you going to come
over and sit down?”

His jaw ached from
gritting his teeth. He dropped his arms and walked over to her, trying not to
scoot like a naughty kid or saunter with attitude. He lowered himself onto the
couch and patted the leather beside him. “Going to join me?”

She opened her mouth—he
liked that—and nodded and closed it again. Moving her tea, she relocated
herself to the couch. Far enough away that he couldn’t quite feel her body
heat, but close enough to touch her if he reached out an arm. Close enough to
pounce on her, if he wanted. He shifted his weight, crossed his legs, suddenly
uncomfortably warm. And horny as hell.

“What kind of Gathering is
it?” Her voice was gentle. She was trying.

“Once a year, all the
packs get together to talk business.”

“All of them? How many are
there?”

“Seven.”

“That doesn’t seem like a
lot. How many people in a pack?”

“We have just over two
hundred.”

“So there are, what, fourteen
hundred werewolves? In the United States?”

He shrugged. “Some packs
are bigger, some are smaller. They are spread across the globe. The Russians
have a lot of people. They’re the biggest.”

Her eyes narrowed, and he knew
she was working something out. Some people would have been scared by the idea
of wolves living among them. Annie moved straight past that to the logical
implications. He loved that.

 
“So you’re an endangered species. Loss of
habitat? Lack of genetic diversity?”

“Are you saying I’m
inbred? I’m not inbred.” He uncrossed his legs, leaned toward her. “Do I look
inbred?”

“Not at all. I just
wondered.”

He gathered himself
together. “Right. So at the Gathering, we get together for a few days, and take
care of business.”

“Do all of the pack
members attend?”

He shook his head. Back on
safer ground. “No, there’s a delegation from each pack.”

“What kind of business?”

She asked a lot of
questions. Her brain moved like lightning, and he really enjoyed watching it
work. Dash wasn’t stupid. He’d gotten an MBA to help him run the pack’s
business operations. But she blew his socks off. He hadn’t anticipated having
her laser beam blue eyes trained on him like this, though.

“You know, treaties,
trading contracts. Stuff like that.” And arranged marriages, but now didn’t
seem like the right time to bring that up. “There’s a lot of ceremonies,
socializing, and hunting.”

“Deer hunting?”

“Yep, and rabbits and
stuff. “

She smiled for the first
time since he’d seen her again. That was the smile that had gotten him into
this situation in the first place. When she smiled, her face lit up and her
chin pointed, showing off her beautiful bone structure. Everything softened,
especially her lips. Those amazing lips. How he’d love to feel them on his body
right now.

He dragged his gaze away
from her mouth, aware that she was speaking again.

“I guess you aren’t out hunting
with guns or bows.”

The laugh rumbled up out
of him. “Not hardly. Most wolves wouldn’t know what to do with them. There are
exceptions, of course.”

She smiled, more primly
this time. “This Oracle you want me to see, tell me about her.” Her brows
pulled together, and he knew she was worrying about Jack again.

He focused. “Best way I
can explain it is that she’s the head witch. The Oracle is the most powerful
pack witch we have in any generation. The current one–she’s pretty darn
old, too–is from the Mexican wolves. I hear tell that caused a hell of a
ruckus when she was named to the job.”

“Why? Racism?”

“Of a sort. They’re quite
distant from the rest of the packs, don’t associate with us much. She was the
first Oracle from their pack.”

“What will she do?”

He drew in a deep breath. “I’m
hoping she’ll be able to tell us how to make Jack better. I don’t like what
happened here today. I’d much prefer he had some kind of regular illness. This
shadow business gives me the creeps.”

“You’re not the only one.”

Annie shivered, and he had
to fight the urge to put his arms around her. He knew humans weren’t as
tactile. He’d been to school with them, but he’d been back among the pack for
the last three years. Remembering how to behave around human friends would come
back to him slowly, he was sure. Half the problem was she hadn’t been his
friend. She’d been his lover, and the woman of his dreams. He wanted to touch
her, to hold her, to rub his scent all over her. Oh, and to get naked with her,
and stay that way.

“There’s something else
you should know. Well, a ton of things. But the most important one is that the
Oracle might not help us, and if she agrees to help us, there may be a price.”

“What kind of price?”

He paused, ran his hand
over his jaw while he tried to think how to explain. “It varies from person to
person. For a small favor, something you’ll miss, but something small. For
this, I don’t know.”

“Can you give me examples
of the type of thing?”

Looking at her, he fought
the urge to lie or minimize the truth. He wanted to protect her, but facts made
her comfortable.

“I know one wolf who asked
her about his future. He paid with a family heirloom.” He left out what—a
painting, the wolf’s only picture of his mother. “Historically, Oracles have
asked wolves for anything and everything—to give up a lover, kill a man,
go to war. They see the tapestry of Fate and they use their petitioners to
alter the weave to suit their own ends.”