Chapter 10
ten
Brenn whimpered from the bench seat as Julia held his hand, the wet towel in her free fingers clamped to the side of her twin’s face.
“Oh, Jesus,” Eric whispered, dully. “Did they take her?”
“They couldn’t have.” Zach’s shoulder ground with pain. One of the goddamn upir had bitten him, and its venom burned as his body neutralized it. Focus, goddammit. “I told her to stay down. She was between the beds—”
“I tripped over her,” Julia piped up, calmly enough. “She was by the door.”
His pulse was pounding so hard it threatened to push the top of his head off.
“The door?” She can’t have gotten far on her own.
“We’d’ve smelled it if she was brought down.
She was triggered, it would have called us.
” Any serious blood she shed would have been like a jet taking off—we would have dropped everything and clustered her.
“You’re sure she was triggered?” Eric wasn’t challenging his leader; the question was pure worry, wanting to be told everything would be all right.
“I’m sure.” I damn well should be, I made it happen. And she’d spent enough time in enclosed spaces, breathing their pheromones, to make her a Carcajou shaman. He was sure about that.
Mostly sure, anyway.
Well, not as sure as he wanted to be. But he couldn’t tell them that. It would only worry everyone, and he couldn’t have that. “Maybe she ran.” God, please tell me she’s still alive. She has to be.
The smell of their missing shaman, fading but still present, lingered in the van. Soothing enough, sure, but nothing like the real thing.
Who had vanished into thin air.
He smacked the steering wheel once—but gently.
The very last thing he needed was to make their transportation unusable.
Be logical, Zach. Think it through. “They didn’t leave a guard.
They expected whatever they were looking for to be inside the room.
If there were upir outside we’d’ve smelled them. ”
“So she ran.” Eric nodded, shifting uneasily in the front passenger seat. He turned to gaze unseeing out the window, but at least he wasn’t chewing on his sleeve at the moment. “Smart, very smart. Where would she go?”
Jesus. “We’re this close to losing our shaman. If another Family finds her—” Zach stopped, aware of saying what he shouldn’t.
He’d told them she was theirs. They had to believe it.
Silence crackled through the van, broken only by the low hum of the engine. Brenn made another small, helpless noise, and Julia went back to soothing him. For once, she was in a giving mood—and her twin seemed to be the only person who could spark that gentleness in her anymore.
Let it be. That’s not your problem right now. Your problem is making sure she’s safe. “Where would she go?”
It wasn’t hard to guess, really. He just needed a few minutes to reason it out. And to calm the bubbling, blood-tinted fury burning behind his breastbone.
But he was so very far from anything resembling calm, he doubted he’d arrive there anytime soon.
Eric sighed, fingertips worrying at his cuff. “I don’t know if she has any money. Maybe she has friends around here?”
She said the only person who would pay a ransom is dead. There’s something to do with her husband, and…
A blooming bright-red rose of rage threatened to block his vision; Zach had to concentrate on the fading scent of ice and moonlight. Come on, you dumb bastard. Just fucking buckle down.
“Is it just me,” Julia said, “or are we seeing a lot of bloodsuckers lately?”
“It’s not just you.” Something else is going on here. I knew we were being followed, even though I tried to write it off as just nerves and grief. “I think we’ve stepped into something.”
“With that little bleeder? Who the hell would want her? Other than us,” Julia hastily amended, catching Zach’s gaze in the rearview mirror. “Shush.” Her hair swung forward as she bent over Brenn, suddenly very interested in attending her twin.
Flashing lights boiled behind them. Zach checked the side mirrors and moved over; nobody spoke until the cop car had cruised by, its siren tearing a hole in the night.
Not looking for us, thank God. Eric would have left a fake license-plate number with the clerk at the front desk, would have paid with cash and shown an ID bearing no relation to his real name.
Just another part of life on the run.
“What are we going to do?” Eric finally asked.
Do? That’s right. It’s my job to figure out what to do. That’s why I never wanted to be alpha; even if I’m strong, I’m not smart enough for this. “We go back. I leave you lot in a safe place with the van, I go find our shaman and bring her home.”
“But if there’s upir…” Eric glanced across the hunched, carpeted center console, gauging how far to push. It was what a second should do; it was what Zach had done for years with Kyle.
He wished with a sudden vengeance he was doing it again, and someone else was where the buck stopped in dealing with this clusterfuck.
“Whatever’s going on, we’ll figure it out. First step is finding our shaman again. Won’t be that hard.” I’ll bet you anything she went home. And lucky me, peeking at her purse. I have an address to start with. “And while I do, all of you will stay with the van and behave. Especially you, Julia.”
Her head jerked up. “You think I wanted to get someone killed? You’re going to blame me for this, too?”
Zach winced inwardly. Outwardly he checked the gas gauge and hit the blinker, working his way toward the freeway. Either he stood by what he said and blamed Julia for losing the shaman, or he stepped up like an alpha and took the responsibility he’d been avoiding for a good thirty years.
What a choice. It’d be so damn easy to blame his sister, blame anyone. But a real leader didn’t do that, just stepped up and took responsibility.
“The upir aren’t your fault, Julia.” He kept his eyes on the road, his hands loose on the wheel.
“But Kyle was.” Her voice broke, the vulnerability she tried so hard to hide peeking through. “That’s what you’re saying, isn’t it?”
“Kyle was alpha.” The words were bitter, full of acrid grief.
“He knew the risks, Julia.” And he let you run wild, didn’t bother to teach you control.
Not sure he could have, you might have unzipped his guts and saved a goddamn rabid bloodsucker the trouble.
You wouldn’t have meant to, but still. He was too weak.
“I need you to stay calm, tend to Brenn, and help Eric while I’m bringing our shaman back, and I need you to not have one of your tantrums while I do it. Clear?”
Unmollified, she bent over her twin. “You’re blaming me.
” Quietly, and her whole posture expressed submissiveness, but she was right on the edge.
It was usually how her fits started. He could smell the anger on her, combat rage replacing itself with a low-level growl of irritation, eventually working up to a whipsawing screech of fury.
“If you keep going, Julia, I’m going to pull this car over and put you in the restraints.” He said it quietly, but Zach’s scent-wash boiled with his own leashed rage. “You are not going to be the queen of this little drama. For once, it doesn’t belong to you.”
Amazingly, she subsided.
Eric slumped in the passenger’s seat, making himself smaller, and Zach was suddenly aware of the musky deep crimson leaking out through his pores. A freeway sign loomed to the right, the big green beacon of salvation.
“Don’t worry,” he told them, told Kyle’s ghost, told the smell of his own failure.
“I’ll get our shaman back and we’ll head south.
It’ll be nice and warm. We’ll be a Family again, we’ll be part of our Tribe and go to meets.
Have a nice house out in the country and run whenever the moon’s full—or whenever we feel like it. ”
“That’d be nice.” Surprisingly, it was Brenn who answered, muffled by the damp hotel towel clamped to his face. “Can we get a place with stairs? I always wanted to slide down a stair rail.”
“That’s up to the shaman. I don’t think she’d object.” If we get her back. If I can make her understand. The onramp unreeled under them, Zach laid on the gas, and the trouble swirling through the van receded just a little bit.
Just that little bit was enough. At least for the moment.