Beneath the Skin (20 page)

Champagne and orange juice, my pre-flight beverage of choice, sloshed around in my

stomach. I smelled jet fuel and the heavy floral scent of the perfume the woman behind us wore.

I heard Murphy’s heartbeat, steady and slow, and my own, faster, lighter.

Then we were airborne and leveling off, and when I opened my eyes again, there were puffy white clouds everywhere and I couldn’t see through them. We were very high and the sun was bright above us, making the clouds so white and defined I thought I could reach out my hand and come away with pieces of them clutched in my fingers.

The flight attendant walked by and wanted to know if I wanted something to drink.

I had another champagne and orange juice. What the hell.

It was about ten hours from Paris to Houston. We did it non-stop. The food was better than that of some of the cafés and brasseries in Paris. Served on china plates. The coffee was the only thing that didn’t quite measure up. I put some brandy in mine and fixed the problem.

It was still early afternoon in Houston when we arrived. It was nearly Thanksgiving, but the moment I stepped outside and followed Murphy to the rental car desk, I was uncomfortably hot. It had to be at least eighty degrees. Maybe more.

The first thing I did was take off my leather jacket. The sweater I wore underneath went next. The thin cotton shirt I wore beneath the sweater was about right for the temperature, but it was much the worse for wear after ten plus hours.

The trees all had leaves still, most of them green, and there were swimming pools

everywhere.

Murphy drove us to a small boutique hotel downtown. Hearing American accents again

threw me off. I’d only been in France for three weeks, but America seemed like Mars now. I didn’t like the feeling.

I’d never been to Houston, so this wasn’t my territory. The American accents were not the New England ones I was used to. They were slower. The desk clerk called Murphy
darlin’

when she checked us in. She had very big hair, white teeth and a tailored blue dress.

Murphy flirted with her while I stood there sweating with my hair in my eyes and the taste of too many glasses of champagne on my tongue. I didn’t much like Houston.

Our room was soulless compared to the hotel rooms in Paris. It was a suite, but with only one bedroom.

I found the bed almost as soon as I put down my suitcase. I hadn’t slept on the plane. I never could sleep on planes.

The pillow smelled like lavender. Murphy pulled the heavy draperies across the window and I heard him prowl around the suite, then I was asleep.

Bayou, the Houston-based pack was a thin, tall man between the ages of thirty and forty. He had unruly brown hair, steely blue eyes and wore a pair of jeans with a Houston Astros t-shirt. His name was Bobby Jenkins.

We stood in the living room of his house, which was not in Houston but in a town called Katy, and it seemed composed mostly of strip malls and parking lots.

The house had an open foyer and a staircase leading to a second story, which was also open. Two skylights streamed sunshine down upon us. I saw Murphy’s eye lashes and the stubbly specks of his beard. He looked tired but sexy. He wore a black button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows along with a pair of jeans and Red Wing boots. An expensive silver wrist watch gleamed from his wrist. His pendant was tucked down the neck of his shirt.

In France he hadn’t seemed so Irish, but here, where he did not fit in, he appeared very foreign.

Bobby Jenkins seemed suspicious of him. Murphy picked up on this, and if anything, the Irish lilt in his words became more pronounced.

Air-conditioning blew through vents near the ceiling, making me wish I’d worn a sweater instead of the thin, light purple t-shirt I had on. Air-conditioning in November seemed wrong somehow and it contributed to my own growing sense of unease. The whole place reeked of grief and confusion, and I wanted to leave in the worst way.

Murphy seemed unaffected. He stared around the house as if it impressed him when I was sure it did not.

Bobby Jenkins’s bond mate, the Alpha female, was in the kitchen making food. There

was already a lot of it on the huge dining table. The living room and dining room were combined into one big room with an L-shape where the table was.

Funeral foods were on display--casseroles and cheese and crackers, olives, pickles, and something that smelled a lot like seafood.

“Crawfish etouffee.” Bobby Jenkins followed my gaze to the covered dish on the table.

“My bond mate’s from Louisiana. Help yourselves.” His invitation lacked real warmth, and he kept casting looks at a small woman in a green skirt and black t-shirt that really didn’t match.

She had long, brown hair that fell into her face, because her head was bowed. Her shoulders shook with suppressed tears.

“Kevin went and drowned himself in the goddamn hot tub two nights ago and this is a real shit mess, so I’m sorry if I’m not exactly thrilled to see y’all.” He pushed a hand through his hair and I understood why it looked so unruly. “Molly won’t stop crying and Jolene won’t stop cooking. And I’ve got some goddamn Advisor from the Regional Council asking all these goddamn questions and...hell.” He pushed his hand through his hair again and gave us a small half-defensive, half-apologetic smile.

“How’d y’all end up here in Houston wanting to know about this pack?” His eyes

became shrewd all of a sudden, because it was weird that an Irish man and a New England woman would show up on his Houston doorstep, wondering if the pack were interested in two more members.

Murphy smiled. It was a diplomatic, friendly smile. One he probably practiced in front of mirrors, because it looked sincere and the man was about to blatantly lie.

“We met at the Great Gathering, Constance and I, and we knew at first sight we had to be together.” Murphy put his arm around me and pulled me close, and I pretended to melt into him.

To be malicious, I drew a finger down the side of his face. He never let me touch his face, he always turned away. But he couldn’t let Bobby Jenkins of Dark Bayou see him reject me. Not if we kept to the script.

He didn’t turn away, he reached out and took my hand with his and gave the palm a

distracted kiss, never taking his gaze off Bobby Jenkins.

I took my hand back and managed a bright smile.

“She wants to stay in America and I’m looking for a change, so we thought we’d wander around the States for a while and check out prospective packs. We’re on our way to New Orleans next.”

Bobby Jenkins nodded but suspicion lingered in his eyes.

“Do you mean Kevin drowned himself on purpose in the hot tub?” I blurted, because I was increasingly aware of the way Murphy’s fingers were gently stroking my hip. He was such a bastard.

Acute irritation washed over Jenkins’s face.

“What the hell?” he drawled. “You’re like that Advisor, you know that? He asked the same damn thing. Why would he do that? He and Molly were happy, and he’d just bought a house--next door to this one, y’all ought to see the game room. He’s got a seventy-inch flat screen television and a Wii and...aw, hell. No, ma’am. He did not drown himself in the hot tub.

We’d been drinking and I guess he fell asleep. Mindy found him next morning.”

He looked out the sliding glass doors to a small terrace where a little girl of about ten was having a tea party with a group of dolls and stuffed animals. She was not smiling.

“Mindy’s his daughter. His and Molly’s. He was Alpha before me.”

His bond mate, Jolene, a buxom brunette with snapping dark eyes and jangly earrings blew into the room then, laden down with a plate full of fried chicken.

Her energy was enormous and she reeked of grief and cooking oil.

“Y’all want some chicken?” She thrust out the plate, and I think if we’d declined, she would have burst into tears.

We each took a piece. I nibbled on a leg and my eyes went wide with appreciation. From the sizzle on my tongue, I think she put hot sauce in the batter. It was the most astoundingly delicious fried chicken I’d ever put in my mouth.

Murphy had a breast and he too looked surprised at how good it was. I think he had been prepared to be repulsed by Southern cooking. Elitist bastard.

Bobby gnawed on a thigh.

The atmosphere in the house was choking and I wanted to enjoy my chicken, not strangle on it, so I took another leg and some napkins and escaped out the sliding glass doors. The little girl poured pretend tea from a bright pink teapot decorated with Disney princesses into a bright purple tea cup, also decorated with princesses. The doll behind the tea cup was a lady doll--curly blond hair, an expressive china face and realistic sapphire eyes that open and closed. The eyelashes were stiff and bristly. She wore an old-fashioned silk dress that had once been canary yellow and now was more cream with age. She had to be at least a century old.

“She’s very pretty,” I remarked.

The little girl had dark hair and even darker eyes. She had the most solemn expression I’d ever seen on a ten-year-old’s face.

“What’s her name? Does she want some chicken?”

The dark eyes studied me.

“Delilah,” she said after a long pause. “I didn’t name her. She was Grandmother Pam’s doll in the olden days. I don’t think she likes chicken much.”

“Do you? I’ve got this extra piece I can’t eat.” I held it out and she took it politely, but I wasn’t sure if she’d really eat it.

“My name is Constance,” I said, aware that Murphy stood in the doorway watching us.

Bobby and his bond mate were having some sort of heated conversation in whispers in a far corner. “But everyone calls me Stanzie for short.”

“I’m Melinda,” she said. “But everyone calls me Mindy.”

“It’s a nice day for a tea party, Mindy. It always seemed to rain whenever I wanted to have one outside when I was your age.”

“You had tea parties?” Her eyebrows lifted a little bit as she considered this information.

She took a bite of the chicken and chewed thoughtfully.

“Lots of them. I had a real china tea set. From Grandmother Elaine. My mother always thought I would break it but I never did. I was careful.”

Understanding resentment flashed across Mindy’s face. “That’s why I have this plastic set. I wanted a real one but Molly said no. Kevin said I could have one for Christmas but now he’s dead so I guess I don’t know if I’ll get one.”

I did not react, because she watched me intently waiting for me to say something to destroy the fragile rapport we’d built together. Although it was all right for her, she did not want me talking about her daddy.

“This plastic set is nice, though.” I gave it an admiring smile. “I like Cinderella best.

What about you?”

“Belle,” she said. Her face turned shy. “You want some tea, Stanzie?”

“I would love some. I need to wash this chicken down with something and tea would be perfect.”

She moved Delilah to a lounge chair, telling me she had finished her tea, anyway. Then she ceremoniously filled my purple cup with pretend tea.

From the doorway Murphy smiled then moved away. I saw him sit next to Molly and I

wondered if she’d talk to him. She probably would. Murphy had a way with women.

Mindy and I drank our tea and she introduced me to her three dolls and two stuffed

animals--a panda bear and an elephant. She finished the chicken and her face was so solemn and sad I wanted to pull her into my arms to rock her and tell her it would be all right. But I didn’t. I admired the dolls and petted the panda bear.

“Mindy?” The voice was thin and upset. Mindy and I both turned our heads to see Molly holding onto the edge of the sliding glass door, her face wan and pinched. “Go wash your hands, lovebug, and ask Miss Jolene to pour you some milk. It’s time for dinner.”

“I ate some chicken.” Mindy pointed to the evidence reposing on the napkin by her tea cup.

“Not enough. Now you mind me, do as I say.” Molly’s eyes were red rimmed from

constant crying and she looked ready to collapse.

Murphy hovered in the background and I could tell by his worried expression that he was ready to catch her if she dropped.

Eyes downcast, as if she were being punished, Mindy slid back her lawn chair and

escaped inside, throwing her mother one look as she went by. They were both careful not to touch.

When she was gone, Molly staggered out onto the terrace and I smelled the alcohol on her breath from seven feet away.

She blearily pulled out a chair and sat on one of Mindy’s dolls. She didn’t appear to notice.

“I don’t know you,” she said with a drunk’s belligerence. She saw me holding the stuffed panda and reached across the table to snatch it from me. “Don’t you touch my child’s toys. I don’t know you.”

“My name is Constance,” I said in a low voice. I sat very still.

“I don’t give a rat’s ass what your name is. You can’t come in here and start talking to my child without me telling you it’s okay. Where the hell’d you come from, anyway?” Molly worked herself up into a fine frenzy. Murphy and Bobby Jenkins stood talking near the dining room table. Bobby’s face flushed but he did not come outside.

I gave her the ridiculous story about how Murphy and I were newly bonded and looking for a pack. I wondered if she’d buy it any better than Bobby Jenkins had.

“Y’all don’t want to join this pack. We let people drown in this pack. And y’all better not have been talking shit to my daughter about being Pack. We aren’t telling her about being Pack until she hits sixteen or so. That’s the way Kevin wanted it, and that’s the way it’s gonna be!”

Molly glared defiantly at me. She also directed a black, scorching look into the house, straight at Bobby Jenkins. Which of us she was really talking to?

“I said nothing to her about being Pack. We talked about her tea set and her dolls.” I looked across the table at her. Her whole body drooped with grief and misery, but her eyes were angry.

We stared at each other woman to woman, Pack to Pack.