Asil’s Fourth Date Dating Terrors #2
The big man, more observant than some, stopped, too, while there was still some twenty feet between them. The stranger’s eyes glinted with secret gold before he closed them. His muscles tightened as he fought, in turn, to hold his beast in check while Asil’s wolf’s presence stirred it to violence.
“My Alpha’s apologies,” said the man, keeping his eyes closed.
He bit out those first three words as though every syllable caused his tongue to bleed.
But he regained control of his voice and muted it to more courteous tones.
“He had intended to be here, but one of our pack had a run-in with the police, and he had to go negotiate that wolf’s release. ”
And he, the Moor, had been deemed the lesser threat? Asil’s wolf half lidded his eyes to better disguise his next course of action, deliberately keeping his muscles loose so the other wolf would not know when the attack would come.
“My Alpha said,” continued Not-the-Alpha, “if the Moor wishes us to die, we will die. He does not need me to give him leave to come to my city—it is a courtesy that he comes to us. Tell him that he is at all times a welcomed guest to me and mine, a thing freely given that we acknowledge the Moor could have taken if he chose.”
Oh, those words were sweet, like the words of a bard. They rang with sincerity and truth that allowed Asil to snatch back control and rein in his wolf. It took a few moments, during which the Emerald City wolf waited silently.
Once Asil’s beast resettled itself into the dark corner of his soul, Asil relaxed and considered again the Emerald City Alpha’s words, delivered by his messenger.
The speech had been both humble and clever, he decided, a statement designed to hold the Moor in chains of courtesy.
That “guest” bound not only the Emerald City Pack but also Asil to an ancient and unwritten set of laws that this pup was probably too young to understand, though his Alpha, a cunning and vicious chess player, well knew how Asil would hear them.
The Emerald City Pack had just offered him a key to their territory, and such things could bite back. But he did not intend to do anything this day that should reflect badly upon the pack. If unexpected events changed that, Asil would let Angus decide what he wanted to do about it.
“I accept those terms,” Asil said.
Angus’s messenger looked up, and Asil realized how much effort he’d expended to be so quiet while Asil regained control.
His eyes were wolf tinged and wild. Asil could tell that though this one was strong of will and power, he had not yet seen half a century as moon called.
He was thus vulnerable to the wild turbulence of Asil’s wolf, when his own would have been unsettled by the task of delivering a message of submission to a strange wolf.
Especially a wolf who looked like Asil, who in human form was not large and was much too beautiful to be a threat. Asil had used that combination to his advantage. Countless wolves had fallen to his fangs, betrayed by their underestimation of just how dangerous he was.
It was not Asil’s purpose today to abuse his just-accepted status as guest by forcing this perfectly fine and trusted member of Angus Hopper’s pack to attack him so Asil’s wolf could taste his blood.
That he was still considering doing that very thing meant Asil’s self-assessment of how well he was controlling his wolf was demonstratively wrong.
If not for his understanding that this mission was important, he would have driven back to Montana.
In Seattle, the Marrok was too far away to help him.
The Omega wolf Anna was too far away to help him.
And he was reminded just why he had given up his Alpha status in Spain to travel all the way to the backwoods of Montana.
He had only himself here. He pulled that old wolf back again, tucking him deeper into his mind, trapping him in the steel of his will.
As soon as Asil had battened down his wolf for a second time, the other man turned, putting his back to Asil. “Sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry. Give me a minute.” And quietly he muttered, “I didn’t expect…well.” He shut up.
He had good control for one so young. Asil felt the drop in tension as if it had been a balloon pierced by a nail. When the other turned around, his eyes were human blue and they met his own frankly before dropping in deference to Asil’s dominance.
“I’m Tom Franklin,” he said, “Angus’s second. In the name of my pack, I bid you welcome to Seattle.”
Ruby sat on the front porch of the huge old Victorian mansion that was the subject of their current ghost hunt while winter rain pounded the roof overhead and rushed merrily out of aged but mostly intact gutters.
Normally she’d have been helping place the team’s cameras and various bits and pieces of electronic gadgetry, but not today.
She should have been traveling in a bus headed for some anonymous city where she could lose herself again. Instead, she sat on the railing surrounding the Victorian’s extensive covered porch, her back against one of the square posts facing Alan, who was similarly situated at the opposite post.
They waited for her Internet date to show up so they could use him to kill a monster.
“It’s perfect,” Alan’s wife, Miranda, had said enthusiastically.
Miranda had caught Ruby packing to run. Her very pregnant downstairs neighbor and best friend was a force to be reckoned with.
Ruby found herself making tea and telling Miranda the whole story—something she had sworn never to do again.
Miranda had summoned Alan—who had come up with a solution: a blind date.
“Perfect?” Ruby had said, repeating Miranda’s words incredulously. “Take some poor werewolf who is already being pranked with blind dates from Internet dating sites—and throw him into a battle to the death?”
Miranda shrugged. “You don’t know this kind of werewolf the way I do. Those old ones, the powerful ones, they deserve everything they get.” Miranda had opinions about Alan’s Alpha.
Alan laughed. “This will be fine. I called up an old friend who knows this wolf. Unless this person you are running from is one of the fae’s Gray Lords—” He paused with a little question in his voice, and Ruby shook her head.
He wasn’t that kind of Power, she was sure. She’d seen him bow and scrape before other fae in a way she didn’t think a Gray Lord would. Not that she’d met one of those.
“Then this Asil Moreno can handle him. My contact was pretty sure he wouldn’t even be upset about it. He has something of a hero complex.” Alan frowned a little. “Unusual first name. I feel like I should know something about that name.”
“He’s old,” said Miranda briskly. “You’ve probably run into someone who told you a story about him or something.”
Ruby thought, I bet he won’t be so quick to use a dating site after we get through with him. And felt horridly guilty.
“Moreno comes here,” Miranda pronounced blithely. “You be nice to him long enough that he likes you.”
“Sort of like a hooker,” muttered Ruby. Being nice to people wasn’t her best thing.
Miranda smacked her hand lightly. “And then you use magic. Your tormenter, called by your magic, appears to take you. And this werewolf kills him. Easy.”
Even Alan had given Miranda a thoughtful look at that. “Easy,” he murmured. “Hmm.”
And that was why Ruby was watching the rain pour down instead of being on the run hundreds of miles away from Seattle. She had her headphones on, listening to music, because music calmed her down and Alan had warned her that she didn’t want to be in a full-blown panic when her date appeared.
She didn’t hear Alan’s phone ring, but she saw him put it to his ear.
After a moment, his head tilted just a little away from her as if he was watching the rain fall on the mostly quiet road.
If she hadn’t known him so well, she probably wouldn’t have known he was making sure she couldn’t read his lips.
It was a moot gesture, because half a second later, quiet, sweet Alan said something in Mandarin in tones that made the words a universal curse.
He was loud enough for her to hear him over her music. Out of politeness, she waited until he disconnected to pull her headphones off.
He grimaced. “Stevie Nicks? Really?” Alan liked his music modern and raucous or classical, and nothing in between.
“Stuck in the eighties,” she said without apology. “Do you need to go? Family emergency?” More quietly, “Miranda?”
She didn’t think it would be Miranda. If something had gone wrong there, he wouldn’t be hanging around with that look on his face—he’d have been off the porch and running for his car.
But Alan’s family owned an herbal shop, and Alan should have been there helping out.
He’d taken the day off for Ruby’s sake. Probably it was something at the shop.
“No,” he said. “That was Tom.”
Tom was Alan’s pack mate, second only to Angus Hopper in the pack that ruled Seattle.
“What did Tom have to say?” she asked. “Pack business?”
Alan sighed. “I wish. Sort of. Your date—”
“The werewolf with the hero complex and the kind of friends who set him up on blind dates for their own entertainment?” she inquired.
Alan was upset enough he didn’t snark back. Instead, he said, “You know when werewolves enter another pack’s territory they have to check in with the Alpha.”
She nodded. He’d already told her that was going to happen.
“Angus was tied up and he had Tom do the welcome,” Alan said. “Tom just got through talking with him. We might have to rethink this whole thing.”
“He’s not strong enough?” Ruby asked.
“Tom said Moreno is scary as hell.” Alan’s voice was neutral.
“Which is what I need,” Ruby said slowly, wondering, not for the first time, why she’d let Miranda talk her into this. “Scary as hell” did not sound at all reassuring.