Big Bad Bite (21 page)

Kent parked in the driveway in front of
Adam’s house, with the tigers parking their black Chevrolet
Suburban behind them. As they all exited their respective vehicles
the door to the house opened and Clay walked out with Amy, who
looked down right excited about something. She thought it might be
the hooker-esque outfit since Clay got an appreciative look on his
face and an amused tilt to his mouth. Even Amy seemed to check out
the tank top and mini skirt paired with her motorcycle boots in an
envious manner. However, the level of enthusiasm Amy was emitting
seemed to be pointed in her direction, not her clothes, which made
Jenna nervous. The gorgeous red head was all but bouncing on the
balls of her feet in glee, so something was certainly up. That
realization made her sigh in resignation. Jenna didn’t need
anything else to be up. In fact, she very much needed everything
around her to start going in the opposite direction of up and be
more down. Relaxed. Less hectic. One’s life could get turned upside
down only so many times in one month before you flipped your
internal crazy switch and went totally gun-totin’, put me in a
strait jacket, homicidal bitch on the rampage on people.

As they crossed the yard towards the pair
waiting at the front door, a breeze blew past Jenna and towards the
house’s direction. Almost immediately Amy’s eyes widened, she paled
a bit, and Clay’s eyebrows snapped down in a semi-murderous look.
By the time she was standing in front of them, Amy was nibbling on
her bottom lip nervously, and Jenna was darn confused by their
reactions.

“Hey. Where’s Uncle Owen?”

Clay motioned towards the house with his
head, still scowling, “Follow me.”

They went into the house and through the
living room that she had stood half naked in just earlier that day,
past the living room and up the stairs to the second floor that
she’d yet to see. When they cleared the top stair, Jenna caught the
scent of her Uncle nearby. She could have found him now on her own
if she’d chosen to, but opted to stay behind Clay instead. Making
their way through a hallway with cream colored walls and wooden
trim to match the hard wood floors, she glanced at the family
pictures hanging on the walls as they passed by them. There were
numerous shots of a much younger Adam and Amy posing with two
people she was guessing to be their parents, and tons of other
individuals who were all probably distant family or pack members.
All of the pictures were happy and quaint, and made this seem more
like a home instead some of the sterile houses she’d been in while
on the job. Looking at all of these images, the way everything
seemed lovingly decorated, you knew this was more than a roof and
walls to the owners. It was their haven.

At the second door to the end of the hallway,
they stepped into a room with a long rectangular conference table,
at which her Uncle sat at the head of, with her brother sitting to
his right hand side. He motioned for Jenna to sit in the empty
chair at his left. Jenna and Clay had been the first two through
the entrance to the room, and as she made her way to the seat
indicated by her Uncle, she watched his head snapped back towards
the door so severely that it was a miracle he hadn’t given himself
whiplash. Curious as to what caused him to react that way; she
glanced back to the doorway just as Vera sauntered through it.

In less than the blink of an eye, her Uncle
was on his feet, across the room, and standing in front of Vera,
bringing the back of her hand to his lips for a kiss. He moved so
quickly that he had disturbed papers sitting on a desk just a few
feet away from the table he’d been sitting at, and now they were
floating towards the floor as if they were settling back down after
a mini tornado.

His voice was raspy after he kissed her skin,
lingering longer than necessary, then he murmured, “My sweet, it
has been too long since you’ve graced me with your presence.”

Vera blushed. From the looks of shock on her
grandson’s faces, this was not something she did often, if ever.
She purred back to Owen, “Have you missed me, moy strong wolf?”

Uncle Owen never let go of her hand. Instead,
he used it to pull her closer to him so that they stood touching
from toes to chests, his hand holding hers over his heart, their
noses and mouths practically brushing each other’s. The scent of
their lust permeated the room in such a cloying manner that Logan
snorted in disgust and actually walked over to one of the windows,
opening it to let in fresh air.

“I have missed you for far too long, my
striped temptation. Tell me; is your husband here with you in
America?”

Her head dipped, a tear slid down her cheek,
and her breath hitched. Owen placed his finger underneath her chin,
pulling her face up so that they made eye contact once more. The
act was so intimate that Jenna had the urge to look away. She felt
as if she were watching something much more private than a
conversation between a woman and a man. The way they looked at each
other, held each other, you knew Vera trusted Uncle Owen
unequivocally, just as you knew that he considered her something
far more precious than any fine china or glass sculpture. He held
her as if she was his salvation, and he was a man tired of living
without it.

“Tell me my sweet, what has he done this time
that makes you cry? If he’s hurt you, I’ll end him. This time you
will not stop me.”

She shook her head faintly, “It’s not that,
moy Owen. Egor is dead. Here in America, I am to live.”

“Finally free”, he growled.

“Svoboda,” she nodded her head in
agreement.

A gagging sound filled the room. Jenna looked
towards the sound to see Alec bent over at the waist, his body
jerking with dry heaves. He looked up when he realized the room was
too quiet to see us all staring at him. Holding up a hand as if to
assure everyone he’d be ok, he croaked, “Sorry. Just give me a
minute. I just started to puke a little in my mouth when the old
people started eye fucking each other. There are just certain
things a man should never see his grandmother do; this is one of
them. If they’re done, then I’ll be ok in a minute. Although, I
might feel better faster if Jenna would come pet me a little."

Jenna chucked the first thing her hand could
find on the conference table at him. It happened to be a half full
cup of coffee, but she wasn’t fast enough, so she missed hitting
him by about a centimeter. What she did do, however, was make one
hell of a mess all over the floor. One she stared grumpily at, like
it was all the puddle of coffee’s fault she hadn’t been able to hit
the big headed bastard, instead of the fact that he was who knew
how old, with more speed, strength, and agility than she would ever
have. That alone made her want to try and hit him with another
coffee cup. She might never make contact, but the act of throwing
shit at him, causing him to jump around the room like a scaredy
cat, would surely brighten her day.

Moving her glare from the puddle of coffee to
the arrogant feline across the room, she almost lost her temper
again when she saw the man smiling at her. Just like a sneaky
feline to play games when it was inappropriate to do so.

Uncle Owen’s irritated growl silenced the
snickering of every other person around her. “Let’s get this
started with already. Clay, go track down Adam. I’ll want to touch
base with him after I speak to Mr. Ivanov. Amy, please get
something for Jenna to clean this mess up with. Then make sure no
one else comes up to the second floor until I say otherwise.”

Amy ran at wolf speed, zipping out of the
room and back within seconds, a towel in hand for Jenna. She handed
it over before zipping out of the room again, shutting the door on
her way out. Jenna squatted down to mop up the puddle of coffee
while Uncle Owen waved at everyone else to have a seat at the
table. When she was done cleaning up the mess she’d made, she sat
down too.

Her Uncle once again sat at the head of the
table, except this time when she looked at him; he was stroking his
chin in interest and looking at Alec.

“Tell me, Mr. Ivanov, what do you know that
it was so important that you could only tell me in person?”

“You sent Kent and Jenna to find out if
anyone had heard anything around Wilmington about rogue shifters,
or ones who were out to cause trouble. The thing is, what I heard
wasn’t something that I heard in Wilmington. It’s what I overheard
in Germany that I thought you should know about.”

Jenna’s interest was caught like a fish bite
on the breakfast buffet of worm-ala-hook. Germany. That’s where the
Corvus Pack was based.

Alec continued, “You see, I fight in the
Black Rings. It had me on a circuit country hopping not too long
ago from Brazil to South Africa, then on to the European countries
before hitting China and Australia. One of those stops was Germany,
where I fought just outside of Frankfurt, near one of their pack
properties. So just after I’ve beaten this big ugly German wolf to
smithereens, the place goes nuts. The beer is flowing, and let me
just say, those Germans know how to have a helluva good time. The
party is in full swing when I make my way to the bathroom and pass
some interesting whispering going on in a corner.” Alec taps his
ear. “Everyone always underestimates how good feline hearing is
since it’s supposedly not up to par with you mutts.” Logan growled,
but Alec ignored him and continued, “So anyways, this whispering
catches my attention because its two hot chicks and one of them
sounds scared shitless. The blond, well she’s practically crying
while arguing with her little brunette friend about how what
they’ve done is going to catch up with them and get them
killed.

“Normally I wouldn’t bother eavesdropping on
the rest of it, cause frankly, if they’re dumb broads who have done
something to go and get themselves killed, that’s not my problem,
but what the blond said next is what kept me nosey. She goes on to
mention that they’ve kept him down for too long. She’s not sure if
what they’re doing could be slowly killing him or not, and she’s
terrified of what will happen to her if someone walks in there one
day and finds him dead. The brunette tells her that she’s being
ridiculous. There’s no way what they’re giving him could kill him,
and even if it did, it would just mean that Lars took over the
pack.”

Uncle Owen’s face became inscrutable. None of
it made any sense to Jenna, but she knew from the blank expression
on his face that he was starting to add shit up. More than likely
what he was adding up spelled to trouble.

Uncle Owen asked Alec, “Was that all that was
said?”

Alec shook his head ‘no’. “The last bit
didn’t make much sense to me until now. The brunette told the blond
that she needed to keep her shit together for a little while
longer. Scolded blondie that the plans were already in place, the
teams would be leaving soon to start their tasks, and that they had
to stay strong because soon the New Age would be coming.”

He shrugged his shoulders at our baffled
faces, “Whatever that means. I have to admit though that it sounds
a bit disturbing. So like I said, none of it made any sense to me
before, so I kept my trap shut about it.” He picked his hand off
the table and waved it in Jenna’s direction. “Then your sweet
little niece here comes to ask questions, tells us about your eight
dead wolves and where they came from, and let’s just say things
start clicking into place for me. How about you, Pack Master
Davies? Anything clicking into place for you?”

Uncle Owen’s face was still a blank mask as
he stared at no one in particular, deep in thought. His fingers,
however, were drumming away at the tabletop. Creating a steady beat
in the otherwise silent room. Several minutes passed, and Jenna was
starting to wonder if she was going to have to snap her fingers in
front of her Uncle’s face to bring him out of his self-imposed
catatonic state. If it hadn’t been for the fingers still thrumming
away, she would have thought he was pretending to be a human
mannequin or something.

Suddenly his fingers stopped, turning his
head from looking at nothing, to Alec, he quietly asked, “You
obviously want some compensation for this information. What exactly
are you hoping to collect?”

“Right now? Nothing specific. However, one
day I’m sure I’ll want or need something, and if I come to you and
ask for help with it, I want your reassurance that you’ll aid
me.”

“You can’t ask for an open ended favor. I
need to make sure that nothing hurts my family or my pack.

Alec shook his head, “I’ll never ask you
anything that would put your loved ones, or those who are your
responsibility, in jeopardy. That’s a promise. With that
stipulation, do we have a deal?”

Uncle Owen tipped his head to the left and
regarded him cautiously. Looking at him in a deep probing manner,
Jenna wondered if he was trying to read Alec’s intentions. Or maybe
read the story of his soul, as if it could be written there on the
skin for those who knew how to read it correctly to see. It was an
extremely unnerving phenomenon, and Jenna would bet it was one of
the skills he used often to keep his status as Pack Master.
Finally, Owen came to some internal conclusion and nodded his head
in Alec’s direction.

“We have a deal. Thank you for the
information, as well as keeping it to yourself from now on. I
imagine I’ll hear from you when you’re ready to cash in that favor.
Till then, I would ask that if you happen to come across anything
else that you might think of use to us, that you let me know
immediately.”

Alec crossed his arms over his barrel chest,
“You wouldn’t happen to feel like sharing what your thoughts about
all of this is, would you? I normally wouldn’t bother with anything
that doesn’t involve something important, like me, but from what
I’ve heard between those two German wolves and what Jenna told me
today, I’ve got a crap feeling about all of this. I don’t like shit
sneaking up on me in my own backyard.”