Leader of the Pack (30 page)

* * * *

Ranaild and Elise had managed to get to town. Elise had been chained and beaten so often that she had only barely managed the walk. She wouldn’t have made it if Ranaild hadn’t carried her most of the way. He was debating taking her to a human hospital. But the need to be as far from the Tairneach as possible made him opt for the first public bathroom they came too.

Ranaild carried Elise into the nasty gas station bathroom and sat her on the dirty graffiti covered sink counter. They hadn’t talked since they left the manor. Elise could see and feel the self loathing in him even though he refused to look directly at her. Ranaild wet a bunch of paper towels and made Elise let him look at her wounds. He was wiping dried blood away from a particularly nasty looking one on her side.

Elise’s voice trembled a bit when she asked him, “What did you do to get me out of there Ranaild?”

He stopped cleaning the gash in her flesh and finally met her gaze. He stared into her eyes for a very long time. Tears formed in his own eyes. She reached for him, but he wouldn’t accept the comfort she was offering. “Whatever I had to do,” he finally said.

Elise didn’t ask him anymore. She submitted to his poking and prodding. When he was satisfied that she was able to keep going, he helped her down and they headed out the door. He couldn’t stop thinking about how much he hated himself right then. He wasn’t strong enough to have protected her the way he should have. He wanted to kill Rafe for what he had done to Elise and for what Rafe had made him do. He wanted to kill himself for betraying his pack.

Elise was the one who saw the Tairneach convoy. Her hands dug into Ranaild’s arm and she pulled him back around the corner of the gas station to hide as they drove past. Her heart was racing. They were headed for Arnauk territory. “They must be on their way to the reservation,” she said as tears filled her eyes. “They’re going to attack again. It’s all they’ve been talking about for days. When they were going to take the stones.”

Ranaild looked at Elise. “You know I love you,” he said.

“I don’t like the way you said that Ranaild. What are you going to do?”

“If I call Cullen and warn them they may be able to do something about it. But after what I’ve done…” He couldn’t finish it.

“So we weren’t going home, were we?”

“I’ll take you back to the pack Elise. You’ll be safe there. But if I were Cullen, I wouldn’t let me live.”

“Then we won’t go back. Ranaild, I don’t want to know what you did. I don’t care. I just need to be with you. We don’t need the pack. We can go somewhere else.” The panic in Elise’s voice almost made him think that it could work.

He shook his head. “I’d never be able to live with myself knowing. And there’s the boys, Elise. I’ve got to tell Cullen. I can tell him other things too. I can’t just disappear. I wish I could.”

Elise wanted to stop him, but she knew that if he didn’t follow his heart then he wouldn’t be the man she mated with. She nodded agreement with tears in her eyes.

Ranaild fished his cell phone out of his pocket. The 1 message caption was running across the face of the phone. He knew that it was from Cullen. He wondered if the alpha had figured it out or if it was just a call. It didn’t matter. He dialed Cullen’s number and listened to the phone ring with the morbid feeling of a man going to his own funeral.

* * * *

Cullen was sitting in his office going over the report he had neglected earlier. He was trying to decide if Ranaild was the only traitor, or if he needed to jail all of the people on the list. His phone rang and he picked it up to see who was calling him. When he saw the caller ID his wolf went into overdrive. He flipped open the phone and growled into the receiver, “Tell me why I shouldn’t rip your throat out.”

“I can’t. I’ll lay down at your feet and offer you my throat when this is over. But for now you need to know some things. Rafe has loaded the Tairneach up. They’re all headed for the reservation. I just watched the convoy pass us. I give them two hours to get there.”

Cullen was confused. “Why should I listen to you?”

“I’ve done enough damage. I’m on my way back to the den. You can deal with me when you return. I’ll accept the repercussions of my actions. I’m sorry.”

Cullen’s wolf retreated in confusion. Cullen felt as though his beast was pacing in his mind. He wasn’t sure how to deal with Ranaild now, and that made him angrier. It would have been much easier breaking Ranaild’s neck before this phone call. Ranaild proceeded to give him the names of the other men he knew were being manipulated by Rafe. He left the detailed explanations for a later date, when there was more time.

Cullen stormed out of the office with a new list. He had to further cut his numbers. He pulled several of his best men who weren’t on the list to round up the men that Ranaild had named. The last thing he needed was inner pack conflict when they went into battle, even if he was neutering his numbers.

Finally, he decided that he couldn’t wait any longer. The Tairneach had a two hour lead by the time he straightened everything out. If Ranaild was correct, that would place them on the reservation by now. Brinah had only just finished the alchemical formula she said would counteract the compound Rafe was using. It was a foul smelling liquid that she told people to spray themselves down with. Keith was complaining that it didn’t mesh well with his aftershave. Brinah insisted on going with them. Cullen hadn’t thought it was a good idea but he had enough other things going on that he just didn’t have the energy left to try and stop her. Overall it was a hectic mess.

Chapter 13

Vae Victis!

Woe to the Defeated!

-Brennus of the Senones

Aislinn was sick of passing out. She never knew where she would be waking up. This time she was in a sitting position and her hands and feet were still tied. It occurred to her that Rafe must have thought she was fairly dangerous to think that tying her up unconscious and sick was necessary.

The pain was subsiding, but she still ached all over as if she had the flu. She opened her eyes to find that she was in a car, probably a limo. She was on a black leather seat which was facing Rafe and Jenna. Rafe was leaning back and looking out the window, oblivious to the fact that Aislinn’s eyes had just opened. One hand was on Jenna’s knee. She didn’t appear to care or notice that Rafe was touching her. Jenna was staring at Aislinn with a vicious glare. Aislinn didn’t know what this particular glare was for. Jenna would probably come up with a reason to glare at the pope. Aislinn could only figure that Jenna was still dwelling over Cullen. Rafe’s other hand was stroking a golden tan lioness, who lay at his feet. The lioness appeared to be pleased by the petting, as she was purring her approval.

Jenna reached down and touched Rafe’s hand on her knee. “Your new pet has awakened.”
And how I hate her,
Jenna seethed.

Aislinn was becoming more and more cognizant. She realized, with a great deal of embarrassment, that she was the only one who was naked. Well, unless you count the lioness. She immediately burned a brilliant shade of red, then grew angry at herself when her obvious upset appeared to please both Rafe and Jenna.

Rafe was in a causal suit that looked to be tailored and Jenna was in a loose fitting, expensive looking red silk dress. Between the blond bimbo in the red dress, the greasy looking weasel in a suit, the black leather limo seats, and the lion at their feet, a person would have thought that they were in some bad rock video. Aislinn rolled her eyes at the thought. She leaned into the leather seat, felt her body aching and closed her eyes with the intention of going back to sleep.

“Aren’t you even curious where we’re going,” Rafe asked in a way that might have been friendly if it weren’t for the fact that she was tied up and naked.

“No,” Aislinn answered, without opening her eyes.

“Usually there’s more fight in you lamb. I’m curious what has you so defeated,” Rafe cooed in irritatingly fake sympathy.

Aislinn didn’t answer. She could feel Rafe squirreling around in her brain. She made her mind go blank. She refused to give him ammunition for abusing her. The way she saw it, she couldn’t protect her body from him, but she sure as hell wasn’t giving him her mind again.

Rafe pulled his hands from the two women, braced his elbows on his knees, pressed his hands together, and leaned toward Aislinn. His eyes narrowed dangerously and his voice seethed, filled with threat. “Do you remember what I told you about blocking me lamb? Or were you too out of it to remember out last conversation?”

Self preservation being her number one priority, a thought suddenly occurred to Aislinn. The more she fought him, the more she had found she could do. She didn’t really know her limitations, but she seemed to manage to do things she wanted badly enough. She let a picture float into her mind of what she remembered of their last conversation.

Rafe smiled and sat back. “That’s it lamb.” He continued to work himself into her mind. He figured she was tiring of fighting.

Aislinn was glad it was working. She let him in just far enough to see what he expected to see. Beyond that she stayed safely inside herself and waited for his reaction.

“I’ve always been impressed with your talent Aislinn. I had thought it an unusual thing to find in a human outside of the Circle.”

Rafe was fishing, and Aislinn knew it. She wasn’t sure what he was after finding out, but she wished that he would get to the point. She wasn’t feeling well enough to play this game right now, and she let him in far enough to catch that thought.

He chuckled. “Fine,” he answered her unspoken comment on his behavior. “I was informed by one of my men in the Arnauk clan that your grandmother has paid the Arnauk a visit. Personally escorted to the building by the female alpha.” The fear that Rafe picked up on after his statement wasn’t purposely given to him. “So I did some looking. It seems that you and I are more alike than I had thought,” he said with a jovial tone. Then his voice suddenly dropped and took on his usual deadly monotone. “Why exactly did you keep this from me?”

Aislinn didn’t see a reason to not tell him the truth. As long as he remained focused on her, he might leave her grandmother alone. “I didn’t know. She never told our family.”

Rafe watched her as she spoke. She could feel him in her mind, and she let him reach a place that would let him know she was telling the truth. She figured it would get more difficult if she had to make him believe a lie.

“So then,” he continued, “I suppose you’re going to expect me to continue to believe you were never trained to use your abilities?”

Aislinn didn’t answer him. She knew it wouldn’t matter what she said to that one.

“Fine. I’ll leave this for now. But don’t think that the topic won’t be revisited. Especially if you continue to develop skills miraculously out of nowhere. Let’s just hope it won’t be necessary for me to bring Brinah Senach in, after we’ve destroyed the Arnauk, and question her.” He put an unusual emphasis on the name Senach.

He sounded so definite about destroying the Arnauk. It sent chills down her spine. She moved to find a more comfortable position. But that wasn’t easy, considering the way she was tied.

Rafe watched her breasts bounce as she moved, and he was tempted to play with them. He moved across the space between the two seats and helped her into a sitting position.

Aislinn glared at him. “I would thank you for the help, if I weren’t naked, tied up, and drugged.”

“Naked,” Rafe questioned. “I would have thought that all the time you’ve spent with the Arnauk, on your hands and knees, would have made you accustomed to being naked,” he said, in an innocent sounding voice.

Aislinn was uneasy with the Jeckel and Hyde voice distortions. She was having a difficult time reading his mood, and that played havoc with figuring out how far she could push him. She wondered if he was doing it on purpose, or if he really was that crazy. “I don’t know what you mean,” she said angrily.

One of Rafe’s hands reached up to cup her breast. He kneaded the flesh gently and ran his thumb over her nipple until it hardened in his grasp. Aislinn grimaced and pulled back as far as she could, sitting up in a car seat. His gentle touches tended to turn cruel fairly rapidly. She let him into that thought and pressed her legs together tightly at the agonizing memory.

Rafe smiled at her again. “How insightful you are, lamb,” he said sweetly. Then he grabbed her by the hair and yanked her head back, exposing the bite mark on her neck. He did he dug his nails into her breast, and he leaned in close to her ear. “Did you think I wouldn’t notice? So you let that mongrel lay claim to you? You’re lucky I’m still willing to touch you.” He threw her back against the seat, and then returned to his own. “Don’t worry lamb. The big bad wolf will be dead soon, and if on all fours is the way you like it, very shortly I’ll be more than able to oblige.”

When he said that, Aislinn couldn’t help wanting to know what he meant. She relaxed and reached out with her mind, with the intent of reading his thoughts. Part of her couldn’t believe she was trying this. All she managed to get was an image of a thing that looked rather like a cross between a lion and a bear, with Rafe’s insane eyes staring back at her.