Chapter 38
Austin
The small sitting room at the back of the house felt like a welcome relief after all the traveling and tension from the road. He sank into the couch with a tired sigh.
“There you are, sir.” Mr. Tom came in with a plate holding two sandwiches and a bag of chips.
“This’ll tide you over for now. We’ll have a big roast tonight with all the fixings now that I have a proper kitchen with space and appliances that actually work.
” He eyed the scotch. “Do you need me to bring you the bottle?”
Usually, Austin hated when the gargoyle waited on him, but right now, he welcomed it.
“It’s fine, Mr. Tom, I can manage. Thanks.”
Mr. Tom closed the door behind him with a click.
Silence surrounded him as he took a sip of his drink and breathed out another sigh, this time one of relief.
He’d been slow to adjust to Ivy House, only moving in when it was renovated and more to his tastes.
But now, it felt distinctly like home, especially because he could feel Jess upstairs taking a shower, safe in the confines of the house.
Two fast knocks and the door opened again, admitting Mr. Tom, who was clearly irritated.
“Apparently former alphas don’t know that retiring means people are no longer at their beck and call,” he said, his wings fluttering.
“Aljoe is insisting on seeing you, sir. Shall I tell him you have more important things to do than coddle a grown man old enough to look after himself?”
“No, Mr. Tom, thank you. Let him come in.”
Mr. Tom narrowed his eyes at Austin before sweeping his gaze to the drink and food and then around the area. “You see, sir, what happens when you don’t consume so much sugar? No wild mood swings and unexplained tempers. Now do you see why I limit you?” He sniffed and turned for the door.
Home, sweet home.
John walked in a moment later, glancing back down the hall at a retreating Mr. Tom.
“Before being in your company”—John closed the door behind him—“I would never believe an alpha would allow someone to speak to him like that gargoyle just did. I would never believe I would allow someone to speak to me as he so often does, or that I would ignore a vampire letting himself into my room to wander around, or let the mate of a powerful alpha comfort me by touching my arm.”
He surveyed the room with interest, obviously wanting to look around, but instead walked to the loveseat facing Austin. He noticed the food.
“I apologize,” he said. “I won’t take much of your time.”
“Not at all. You’ll forgive my casualness. This is a room Jess and I wind down in.”
“Of course.” He leaned back, easing himself into relaxing. “I appreciate what you are trying to do for me. There isn’t another alpha in the world who would. They might offer me a place to reside, but they’d ask something from me to get it. Advice on running a territory, maybe, or training.”
He paused. It sounded like he’d decided not to stay. Austin waited for him to go on.
“You haven’t asked,” he said. “Neither has Jessie. I can tell you won’t.”
“Correct. I sought out a rogue, looking to offer help. Nothing has changed.”
John nodded in agreement. “I swore I would never join a pack again, not even one run by my sisters.”
Austin continued to wait, no energy to feel much at all.
“The thing is…” John fell silent as the door opened again, and Mr. Tom entered, carrying another scotch.
“If you insist on hanging around, you might as well try to relax a little,” he said. “We can’t have you making the whole house jumpy. We’ve got that horrible Irishwoman for that.”
He handed John the drink, fluttered his wings, and left again.
John stared at it blankly for a moment and then started chuckling.
“This is actually just the thing.” He took a sip and relaxed a little more.
“Austin, I’m going to be frank. I ran my pack like I did, and stuck with it as long as I did, out of duty.
My life was about protecting my sisters’ futures.
And now I find myself in a world where they are in jeopardy again.
If someone can nearly take down a pack like Kingsley’s, there’s nothing to stop them. ”
“Except us.”
“Right.” John ran his fingers through his shaggy hair. “Except us. I have a duty to my sisters, as I said, and to the magical world at large, as do you. As do we all. I cannot, in good conscience, turn a blind eye when I am able to help.”
Austin felt his confusion show on his face.
John smirked, allowing himself to be just as expressive. “Thought I was about to say thanks, but no thanks, huh?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact.”
“The last test, I guess. I just had to make sure, because I don’t really want to be saying this, but I feel I have no choice.” He took a deep breath. “I can help you sway the shifters. I still have pull.”
“I’d imagine you still have a lot of pull, but won’t that be a sticky situation for your former pack? Don’t they think you are exiled or dead?”
John’s lips tweaked into a smile. “Is there no end to your honor? I could greatly help you and you’re more worried about the people of a pack you have no ties with.”
“I’m an alpha. Taking care of others is my job. It doesn’t matter if they are my people or not, they don’t deserve to have their lives ripped apart by having to choose—allegiance to you and this convocation, or to their pack and your sisters.”
John nodded slowly. His gaze was hyper-focused on Austin, reading him. “True. You’re shaping up to be a very good man, Austin Steele, an alpha worthy of the king of the mountain status. Quite the change from the little Barazza boy who terrorized his pack.”
“In some ways, yes.”
“In many ways. I’ve been watching.” He took another sip of his drink.
“I’ve spoken to my sisters and then chastised them for not telling me how serious this mage problem is.
They didn’t want to worry me, apparently.
They want me to get on with my life. They’ve had mage visits.
Many, it seems, in groups and once in a crowd.
So far, they’ve been able to run those mages away.
This was before the attack on Kingsley. The visits have totally stopped since that battle.
They get the feeling the mages are regrouping. ”
A shock of adrenaline coursed through Austin that made him tense. Niamh would want that information.
John gave a tiny nod, reading Austin’s thought.
“My sisters are highly intelligent and excellent at their jobs. But they are shifters. Rather than reaching out to Kingsley to compare notes or contact you—both strangers—they collected their pack friends. They thought more numbers than Kingsley had would be enough.”
“And they’d be annihilated.”
John took a deep breath. “I’ve realized that. My sisters are going to talk to our pack and explain why I really left. I’m sure most of them suspect. Once that is smoothed over, I will use what pull I still have to help you. On a few conditions.”
Austin kept from widening his eyes. Having Golden Fang as a backer would be huge. Huge. It would push this thing in leaps and bounds. Unlike that cairn leader, Austin was prepared to offer him the absolute world.
“Which are?” he said evenly, not giving anything away.
The other man took a sip. “I will not join your pack. If I tried to fit myself into your hierarchy, inevitably I’d have to pit myself against Sue.”
That was true. John had ten times more experience, and he was raised to be in a leadership role.
He didn’t come to it late, like Sue had.
He’d fall into the role without thinking, and eventually people would turn to him rather than Sue.
Eventually, they’d have to battle for dominance, and John would win.
“Sue is exceptional in his place,” John went on. “He’s a better fit for this convocation. He understands it, and he wants it. I don’t want to get in the way of that, even if I wanted to be in a pack at all.”
It spoke highly of John’s sense of responsibility and overall regard for the people that he recognized that and had acted upon it. It was clear what had made him such a good leader.
“But I do want to be in the convocation,” John went on. “Just like that cairn leader, and everyone in your crew, I believe in it. I can bolster it. I can add power and might and fit within the chaos. The stint in the bar told me that.”
“Except you can’t fly. You’d have to be in the ground crew. Don’t get me wrong, John, I want your help. Only an idiot wouldn’t. But you’d still be able to undermine Broc—Sue.”
“And that’s my next condition. To have a place, I ask that you give me a specialized force.
Find me more rogues. Give me the wild shifters that have a hard time existing in a civilized pack.
Send me the lost causes. You and Sue will be busy managing the bulk of the shifters.
You won’t have time for the troublemakers.
Give them to me. Let me shape them into your overall battle image.
And let me work under Jessie and with her people.
You can call me a special unit, part of the convocation.
I can work with the basajaunak, also a ground crew.
I know you might worry that I’d use that force to—“
Austin held up his hand, knowing where John was going with that.
“I told you before, I’m not worried about you taking over this pack.
My relationship with Jess, and how my life has been shaped, makes me uniquely suited to handle my role here.
You wouldn’t be able to. No one would. Trust me, you wouldn’t want to. ”
John laughed and took another sip. “Fair enough and true. Very true. People who try to challenge you for this pack are mad.”
“As to the special force, that’s a good idea, and I might just claim it.”
John laughed again. “Fair enough,” he repeated.
“Give me a week to check in with efforts here and make sure things are running smoothly—“
“I’d like to shadow you, if I could. No one needs to know who I am, yet.”