Shadows of the Ancients (14 page)

“Here,” I said handing him the glass I had brought out for myself. “I didn’t know if you had gone home or what earlier. Where were you?”

“I was going to follow them, to be with Ashley, but Asriel growled at me.” Jack was pouting, and it looked adorable on him.

“I’m sure the last thing she will need if she accidentally shifts back is for her brother to be there to see her naked.”

“Uggh, not that I’d want to,” Jack complained. “But, Asi’s there, and I really don’t want him seeing her naked either.”

“She’s a big girl, Jack.” I reminded him.

“I know.” He took a huge gulp of the sweet tea after I filled his glass. “She’s my sister though,” he said finally.

“We were having a private conversation here, you know.” Mikael tossed out snottily.

“So, what’s your point?” I questioned him, as Evan sat down on the ground beside the chair, and pulled me to sit between his legs. I almost lost my train of thought.

“He should leave.” Mikael tipped his head toward Jack.

“Jack is family, and he’s not going anywhere unless he wants to.”

“Brother, you need to get your bi…”

“I warned you once, let that word come out of your mouth in reference to Jess just once, and see what happens.” There was absolutely nothing sexier than Evan when he was standing up for me. I leaned into him further, to show my appreciation. It was a hug from behind.

“FINE! You need to get your girl under control. I don’t know who she thinks she is challenging every damn thing I say, but I am not you. She can’t just spread her legs, and have me melt to her whims.”

“ENOUGH!” My dad was on his feet yelling, and he wasn’t alone. Evan was behind me one moment, and standing in front of his brother, holding him by the collar of his Navy Blue button down shirt.

“You’re going to learn to hold your vulgar tongue when you speak of Jess. If you do not, Brother, we are going to hav a serious problem. It’s going to be one daddy can’t get you out of. Do you understand me?”

Mikael looked up at Evan from where he continued to sit calmly, but the venom that spilled out with his words was hard to miss. “I’m not sure why you suddenly feel you can challenge me either, but we’re about to find out who the better brother is if you don’t calm down and get the fuck off of me!”

“Boys, there will be no more displays of violence in my house.” My mom jumped in. My heart was screaming for her to shut up and sit down. She seriously had no clue who she was confronting, and I was starting to realize I was going to have to learn to shut my own damn mouth too. Just when I was about to jump up and grab my mother, a wave of calm energy washed over me, and made me too complacent to care. “We will have a peaceful talk while you are here. What you choose to do when you leave my home is entirely up to you.”

“Oh, you are a fine specimen, aren’t you Eileen?” Mikael was smiling at my mother, and I’d be damned if he wasn’t a bit awed by her too. “I haven’t seen someone with your gift in a long time. I’m told my own mother was a calmer. Too bad it only worked on others and she couldn’t use it on herself.” Mikael stared off wistfully into his tea.

Evan came back to sit behind me without another word. I knew what my mother’s talent was, but I had never seen her blatantly use it on others. I could always tell when she tried to use it on me, so she stopped even attempting it years ago. “Well, thank you for the appreciation. Now, if you could extend some courtesy to my daughter when you’re in my house as well, we will all get along just fine.”

“My apologies, she antagonizes me, and I haven’t met many people who will do so openly.” Mikael actually looked somewhat embarrassed. My mom’s magic mojo must have been stronger than I ever imagined. Even my father was gaping at her open mouthed. Mikael took notice of our reactions. “You can’t tell me you two weren’t aware of her abilities, or the extent of them.”

“Oh no, we were aware, but…”

“My wife has little need to use them in our house. She only uses them in times of great strife, because she doesn’t feel the need to intrude on another’s emotions.” My father had purposely cut me off, and I wasn’t sure why. He didn’t want Mikael to know that my mother’s charm didn’t work on me anymore. I was beginning to think my parents were still keeping secrets from me about myself. I was done with secrets, but I would at least wait until Mikael left to address them.

“I see.” Mikael stood and placed his now empty sweet tea glass on the coffee table. “Well, now that I know how Marcus came to fall from power, I think I have enough to report back to my father. Just to clarify though, you stated that Evan never stood beside you on the stage as you declared your leadership?”

“Correct.” My father added.

“I think I missed something in the story earlier, you mentioned him being there for something.”

“I was there, brother. I was introduced to the pack as Jessica’s new match.”

“And is this how non-pack matches are made known to the others?”

“It is.” My father chimed in. “It is rare that we have a match outside of the pack, thanks to Marcus enforcing a pack only mating decree. There were several loopholes to that decree that Jess easily fit into to allow her to mate outside the pack. Marcus would have fought it though, since the match he had chosen for my daughter was with his nephew.”

“Nepotism is alive and well in most packs, I’m afraid.” Mikael added.

“Yes, well, it would have ended up destroying ours. I wish we had been thinking with a clearer head when it came to our daughter. There is no way that she could have made a viable match in our pack. There’s no one here to match her abilities.”

“I see.” Again, with the short cryptic answers. I was beginning to worry that everyone was saying too much in front of Mikael.

“Listen, Evan was introduced to the pack as my intended mate, and then he and I left the stage before further business was conducted. He was not up there. He wasn’t influencing anyone in any way. He was there with me.”

“Yes, well, what you have to say on the matter doesn’t really count, now does it?”

“And why not?”

“Jess, no.” Evan grabbed a hold of me, pulling me nearer to him as he whispered in my ear. “Don’t let him goad you into another fight.”

“You’re sleeping with my brother. That means you have every reason to lie for him.”

“I’m not sleeping with anyone, jerk!” His eyebrows quirked up, and I suddenly wished I hadn’t said that out loud. I’d almost rather him think me the whore than deal with the virgin jokes I could see brewing beneath the surface.

“What a rarity these days. Brother, wherever did you find this one?” He laughed, as he walked to the front door. As it is, I am tired, and I would like to get back to the city to get some sleep. Brother, if you please, I’ll be taking your car. I’m sure you and Asriel can find your own way back later.”

Evan threw him the car keys. “There better not be a single scratch on it when I retrieve it tomorrow.”

“I’m a wonderful driver, brother. No need to worry.” He took his hand off the door knob and turned back one last time. “Oh, I almost forgot, I assume there will be a bonding ceremony?”

“Yes, at the next full moon celebration,” my father stated.

“Ah, good. I will inform the family. You might want to be prepared for guests.”

“Son of a…” Evan started to say under his breath.

“What’s the matter, Evan? Did you think you could get away with a bonding ceremony, and not have your family invited? I’m sure your mother would have been hurt to think you left her out.” He smiled, “to be sure you didn’t think they’d opt not to come.”

“I had hoped for it.”

“Hope’s a nasty little bitch, isn’t she?” I didn’t like the way Mikael eyed me as he said that.

With that, Mikael left, and I helped my mom clean up the glasses that were laying around now. As we were leaving the kitchen my mom called back over her shoulder to Jack. “You’re more than welcome to stay and wait for her, Jack. I know you’re worried, but your sister will be fine.”

“I know she’s strong. I just don’t know how she’ll cope with the transition, and all that comes with it, you know?”

“She has Asi with her, she will be fine. He will get her through anything that overwhelms her, I promise. It is his gift, and he has chosen to help her. Rest assured that Asi is like me, and not my brother. He will not take advantage of the situation. Ashley is in good hands.”

Jack narrowed his eyes at Evan. Nothing was going to convince him that Asi was a good guy when he was the only one out with his sister the day she turned into a werewolf. “I think I will stay here on the couch, if you don’t mind, Eileen.”

“I’ll go and get you a pillow and some sheets.” My mom took off again, to the linen closet, leaving me with the rest of the tea-time cleanup. I rinsed all the glasses and put them in our dishwasher, and sat down for a minute at the kitchen table.

“I know Asi’s with her, but I’m still worried about Ash. How long do you think they’ll be out there?”

“Well, how long was your first run, after the changing?”

“Um, like two minutes, if that. I didn’t even get to run. Remember, we told you about Jack almost shooting me, Ashley distracting him, and he missed and hit Sierra instead.”

“Oh, yeah, I forgot about that for a minute. You definitely have the most unique experiences possible, don’t you?”

“I guess so. I couldn’t do my first run right, couldn’t be paired to my mate correctly. I’m just a big mess.” I laughed. “I’m a walking disaster.” I got up from the table and grabbed Evan’s hand, “come on. I want to go wait outside for Ash to come back. It’s a nice night. We aren’t going to get too many more like it. Before long it’s going to be too cold to enjoy sitting on the porch swing without a blanket, even for werewolves.”

Evan smiled at me, and agreed as he followed along behind me. We sat down, and I slowly kicked the swing out with my foot, sending us in a back and forth motion. “I often wonder what my life would have been like if I hadn’t met Ashley. She’s the reason I got to go to college, you know.” I stared off at the stars dotting the sky beyond the porch. They were exceptionally bright out, now that most of the house lights had been turned out. Werewolves could see well at night, so we kept the light pollution to a minimum throughout the night. “She convinced my parents that I needed to tag along with her at first, to do the nursing thing. Ashley explained to them that I could help as a healer if I had knowledge of human physiology, and worked on combining that with what the elder healers knew of the werewolf side. Not that we get injured beyond our ability to heal a lot, but it does happen. Just like what happened with Sierra. If she had been able to go to human doctors, they probably could have kept her from being barren. The people we had here at the time just didn’t know enough.”

“Is that what you started studying in school, nursing?”

“Yes and no. I started out wanting to join Ashley, but I soon realized that I preferred healing the mind to the body. I think most people, and especially werewolves, hide their emotions away and never really acknowledge the mind body connection. I want to one day show why that is important.”

“Sounds reasonable. Had someone like you been around when my brother’s mom was still alive, you may have been able to help her out.”

“But then you wouldn’t be here.”

“True. Life is funny like that. Maybe you were just meant to save someone else from the same fate.”

“Maybe,” I agreed as I watched the stars twinkling above us. “What about you? When we talked about you buying the bar, you said you owned businesses around the world. Are they all bars?”

“No, they’re not. I have lots of different interests. Each of them tells a little something about my passions though, I guess. The last business I opened was actually a book store. I have a thing for comic books, but an aversion to comic book shops. I prefer the quiet library feel of a book store.”

“I can understand that. I went in a comic book shop with my friend, Tyler once. The guys in the shop were being so loud. Apparently, they were having a gaming night during the time he took me in there. There was a Magic the Gathering tournament going on, and some guy was yelling about how his Black Devotion Deck would slaughter everyone in there. I didn’t even know there was more than one deck in that game. Actually, I didn’t even know it was a game. I always thought they were trading cards. It was like an alternate universe in there though.”

Evan was laughing at me. “Yes, well, that would be why I prefer book stores for the most part.” I leaned into him further, his arm immediately wrapped around my shoulder. “I think your schooling is already working.”

“Oh? How so?”

“When you’re in my arms, I’m at peace.” He leaned down enough to kiss the top of my head, and I knew I felt the same way when I was with him.

“Thank you,” I whispered to him.

“For what?”

“Everything. All the small things. For this. Just sitting out here under the stars with you is wonderful. For calming me without controlling me. You could over power me any time and just take what you want, but you treat me the way my dad treats my mom, like an equal. Thank you.”

“I think you are entirely unaware of your power over me, Jess. You don’t have to thank me for any of it. I do it gladly, because I enjoy being close to you, and I want to make you happy.” I stayed there, head against his chest, for a few minutes enjoying the quiet sounds of the night as he squeezed me a little tighter. I was falling for Evan, but I was still a little confused about how everything was playing out. I never imagined being with a person could be so easy and effortless. I thought if it wasn’t difficult, then it wasn’t real. Here I sat in Evan’s arms, wanting nothing more than to make it permanent. My wolf was in full agreement. She didn’t know what we were waiting for. She was ready to run with his wolf, and be free together. That started me thinking about Ashley again. It had been a while since they bounded out of the house as wolves. “Do you think we should go after them yet? I’m worried, Evan.”

“How about we give her two more hours, and then I promise if they aren’t back yet, we’ll follow their trail. Let’s just sit out here and enjoy the night together until then.”