Chapter Eleven
ELEVEN
We do sleep, eventually, and we wake to breakfast being delivered before we could request it. Bishop retrieves the trays and brings them to our bed with a sigh.
“Someone is trying to impress my new bride,” he says as he pours me a cup of coffee.
“Or someone is acknowledging that his cousin is in need of a little thoughtfulness himself right now.”
Another sigh as he hands me the cup and pours tea for himself. “If I grumble, it’s because I would rather maintain the facade that I am doing fine, and everything is under control.”
“That’s for the Pack,” I say. “Not for Julius and, I hope, not for me.”
He leans down to kiss my forehead. “I appreciate that, more than I thought possible. I couldn’t imagine needing to be that around you. Most times, I carry it off lightly, but it suddenly feels very heavy.”
I squeeze his hand. “I know. But you did what you set out to do—became Alpha and freed me from my father—and so you have nothing left to prove. Now, what time are we meeting Julius and Kenric?”
“At ten.”
“Excellent. Time to eat, and time—if I might be so bold—to ask more about this werewolf we’re about to meet.”
The werewolf’s name is Rufus Cain. Yes, Cain. He was Henry’s first cousin, which makes him Harry’s cousin once removed. Rufus is forty and a former member of the Albion Pack who left as a young man.
Rufus had left the Pack just before my father became Alpha.
He hadn’t suffered any particular outrage at my family’s hands—he’d just had enough, and I think maybe that’s a harder obstacle to overcome.
If you hate the leader, you can be convinced to help overthrow him, but if you hate the system he represents, it takes more than a promise of reform to lure you back.
Rufus just doesn’t see enough in the Pack worth saving.
Bishop’s father had invited Rufus to work for them, which he’d done for years, but Bishop and Julius had been unable to convince him to come along when they rejoined the Pack.
Julius meets us at the hotel, and I thank him sincerely for the gifts. Bishop does the same. He might have grumbled and balked in private, but he doesn’t hesitate to express his gratitude to Julius himself.
“Is Kenric not joining us?” I ask as we leave the hotel.
“He’s feeling under the weather,” Julius says.
I grin. “You treated him to quite the night, I presume?”
I expect a return grin, but Julius looks troubled.
“I did,” he says slowly. “And while he partook of the offerings, I didn’t get to know him any better for it. He isn’t too badly off this morning. Mostly, I decided Rufus might prefer we paid this visit alone.”
“Should I stay behind as well?” I ask. “I don’t wish to intrude.”
“No,” Bishop interjects, his tone brooking no argument.
“You’re different,” Julius says as we walk along the road.
“It’s bringing another wolf that could be a problem.
Rufus and Kenric grew up in the Pack together, and before we visited Rufus I hoped to get an idea how well they did—or did not—get along, but that is one more in a long list of things I didn’t get from Kenric last night. ”
“Have we made a mistake bringing him?” Bishop asks.
When Julius glances my way, Bishop says, “Yes, I’m questioning a decision in front of Cordelia. She doesn’t need me to pretend otherwise.”
“Good,” Julius says. “I honestly don’t know, Bishop.
Strategically, it works. Kenric was part of the Pack before we joined.
He’s older than us. Strong enough to help if we run into trouble.
Quiet enough that he won’t talk when we need him to stay silent.
And it gives us time to better gauge his thoughts and loyalties, which I completely failed to do last night. ”
“But you did get him drunk?” Bishop says.
Julius throws up his hands. “He was inebriated, and he still barely said a word. I gave him money to bet on a fight and when he won, he offered the winnings and I said to keep them. When he expressed interest in visiting the back rooms, we did that and he enjoyed…” He clears his throat.
“The companionship of companionable ladies?” I say.
“Yes. He should have thoroughly enjoyed himself, but I can’t even be sure he did.”
“Was it too much?” I ask.
“Too obvious that he was being plied with liquor and enticements, possibly as a bribe to win his loyalties? I tried to be careful there. I didn’t push alcohol on him.
After he won the bet, while I didn’t accept his winnings, I didn’t offer more money either.
He even paid for his companion, and going into that part of the club was his idea. ”
“Did he say anything?” Bishop asks.
“You saw what he was like on the train. Barely a full sentence in two hours. It was the same. He drank. He gambled. He…” Another cough, this one with a rueful smile for me. “While he seemed to want all of that, I can’t even say he enjoyed it.”
“Perhaps it was the company,” Bishop says.
Julius glares at him. “I know you’re teasing, but I wondered that myself. He seemed content with me, and when he did speak, it was to encourage me to keep talking.”
I ask, “Could he have been hoping you’d say something while in your cups?”
“Who knows? I drank less than I seemed to, and my conversation was all meaningless chatter.”
“I really hope we have not made a mistake in bringing him,” Bishop says somberly.
“I hope so, too.”
Rufus Cain’s flat is in a decent part of Leeds, neither fancy nor impoverished.
Julius knocks, with Bishop at his shoulder, leaving me tucked slightly to the side in the narrow, shadowy hall.
When Rufus answers the door, I immediately know why he’d worked for Bishop’s father.
The man is as big as his cousin—Silas’s now-deceased enforcer, Henry.
Rufus fills the doorway as he leans against the frame, braced on one arm, dressed casually with his shirtsleeves rolled up.
Although, possibly, given the size of those forearms, the sleeves might just not roll down.
Bishop says he’s forty, but he looks in his early thirties, with a shock of uncombed dark auburn hair.
“You know you could have stayed the night here,” Rufus says in a deep rumble of a voice.
“We would never impose like that,” Julius replies.
“Could be considered rude, coming to my city and staying somewhere else.”
“We respect your territory.”
A snort. “You’re Pack wolves already. Fuck that. The only problem I have is if you kill humans on my territory, which you are not going to do. Next time…” He trails off and inhales and then leans out the door. “Oh, fuck me,” he says when he sees me.
“Language,” Bishop murmurs.
“You stole Silas’s girl? And don’t tell me she’s not his. She has his eyes and his hair.”
“I didn’t steal her. May we please come—?”
Rufus inhales louder. “Why does she smell like wolf?”
Bishop sighs. “Perhaps we could not have this conversation in the hallway?”
Rufus throws open the door and backs up. We step into a small flat smelling of a fresh-cooked breakfast. Rufus grabs his full plate from the table, and drops into a chair and resumes eating.
“May I introduce my wife,” Bishop says. “Cordelia…”
When Bishop trails off, Rufus’s brows shoot up. “You don’t know your mate’s name? Off to a fine start, I see.”
“Daniels is fine,” I say. “Bishop hesitates because I may have a few. Daniels. Carter. Levine.”
Rufus chokes on a strip of bacon. “Levine?” He groans.
“Really, Bishop? I know you don’t do anything by halves, but you’ve only been in the Pack a few years and you’re already breaking the rules, taking a mate …
who is Silas’s daughter and a Levine witch, meaning you have stolen from two very powerful—”
“Not stolen,” Bishop says firmly.
“Oh, I’m sorry.” Rufus bows his head to me. “Forgive my rough manners, my lady. You are a modern woman, I am sure, who cannot be stolen but gives herself freely. A pretty fiction that is not going to matter to either side of your family.”
“Silas gave me to Bishop,” I say.
Rufus stops chewing. “What?”
Julius sighs and waves us to the only empty seating—a small sofa. “Please sit, Cordelia. Our host skipped that part.”
“She can’t sit without permission?” Rufus says.
Julius continues, “Let me do this as quickly as possible. Silas tricked Cordelia into coming to Trevelyan, under the guise of protecting her from a threat. He then made Bishop his Alpha-elect and gave him Cordelia as his bride.”
“You really did make an impression, boy.”
“He wanted grandsons,” Bishop says. “Cordelia and I were breeding stock.”
Rufus jabs his fork our way. “Congratulations to you both on being deemed Alpha-worthy breeders. So, how’s that coming along?”
“Moving on,” Julius says. “Bishop had no intention of marrying Cordelia against her will, but before they could resolve that, Silas became suspicious and forced the marriage, after which he immediately accused me of murdering your cousin Henry.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
“Huh. That’s too bad. I have more breakfast in the kitchen, and I’d have given you some if you killed that sadistic bastard.” He pauses. “Is he dead at least?”
“Yes.”
“All right then. You can have breakfast.”
“Moving on again,” Julius says. “Silas wanted to execute me for killing your cousin, which forced Bishop’s hand, and he had to issue his Alpha challenge immediately. Silas accepted, for an immediate fight to the death.”
Rufus nods. “So that’s why you’re on my doorstep. Bishop grabbed you and his new bride and made for the hills. Or, at least, Leeds.”
“No,” Bishop says. “I was successful.”
Rufus chokes on a mouthful. “You killed Silas?”
“Yes.”
“Then who exiled you? Reginald?”
“Reginald is also dead. Killed by Silas for betraying him. And no one exiled me. We…” Bishop takes a moment to regroup. “I lost Trevelyan.”
“Trevelyan was taken from us,” Julius corrects. “Right after the challenge fight. While we were exhausted from the infighting that followed, we were attacked by a cabal.”
“A…” Rufus blinks and finally sets down his plate. “Fuck me. Which one?”
“Mine,” I say. “Or my grandmother’s, that is, which I knew nothing about.”