Dark Refuge (28 page)

Em head-butted her mother’s side.
Do whatever you need to do. I just want my parents back. I’ve missed you. Where’s Dad? It’s getting late and we need to get him home.

He’s at Adam’s tree. Just sitting there, staring at the clouds and the mountains.

Em stopped in her tracks, tilted her head to one side.
He doesn’t have a rope, does he?

No. No rope. He’s hardheaded, but he’s not stupid. I love you, Em. I’ve always been so proud of you, but never more than I am today.
Before Em could answer, Mei turned and trotted back along the way they’d come.

Em led the way up the narrow trail that led to the huge oak leaning out over a small, snow-covered meadow that was always covered in pretty blue flowers in the spring. Gabe’s parents called it Eve’s meadow, but the tree had a dark history. They all knew it was the tree where, burdened by overwhelming grief when his mate died, Adam Wolf had hanged himself.

Jace had talked about it one time, about his father’s horrible agony when Eve died. How he’d attempted suicide, only to be rescued by the Goddess Liana and the mate he’d loved who had died before her time. Eve and Liana had saved his life and then Eve had taken over as goddess and Liana had been unceremoniously booted out of the only life she’d known for eons. Adam had hated the ex-goddess at first, but then he’d slowly fallen in love with her and she’d become his mate and mother to their daughters, Eve and Phoenix, and Gabe’s best friend, Jace.

So odd how that had worked out, but Gabe hadn’t been up here for years. It always made him feel as if he were trespassing on a private place. Jace disagreed. He said it felt like a church, as if he could come here with his problems and find peace.

Maybe that’s what drew Oliver. The same peace that Jace felt. They followed the trail through the woods until they broke out onto a rocky outcropping. The tree was at the western edge, leaning out over the small meadow below. A snow leopard sat beside the tree, staring off into the distance.

Will you wait here for me?

Of course.
He watched as she walked along the rocky crest to sit beside her father. The air was still and the clouds heavy with snow and growing darker by the minute, but Em sat beside Oliver and stared off into the same distance as her father.

Gabe found a slab of granite that was bare of snow and lay down on it. It was cold and uncomfortable, but he’d wait as long as he had to. This was his mate’s journey, not his, but he fully intended to make sure she didn’t travel it alone.

• • •

Em sat beside her dad for what felt like a very long time before she spoke to him. And then it wasn’t what she’d planned to say.
Eve came, right after you left.

Eve?

Yes. She wanted to apologize for her part in hiding the truth.

The snow leopard hung his head and refused to look her way.
I was wrong, but I fear that if it happened again, I would beg for the same thing. I didn’t want you to suffer. You were just a little girl, and he was such an evil, horrible man. You didn’t deserve what he did to you.

She thought about that. Tried to see it from his point of view, with his past experience, but she still couldn’t agree.
Bad things happen to good people, Dad. You didn’t deserve what happened to you, either. But you survived and you were stronger because of it. Taking away the memories of the horrible things that happened to me also took away my memory of beating the sonofabitch who kidnapped me. I killed him. Fourteen years old and I tore a killer to shreds. I wish I’d known that for all these years. Wish I’d known I was strong enough to save myself.

It took what felt like a very long time before he raised his head, slowly turned and looked at her, eyes dark amber to her green. Still, Em knew she was very much her father’s daughter when she saw the moment that he’d finally heard and understood what she’d been trying to tell him.

Why couldn’t I see that? When you couldn’t recall what had happened over the days you’d been missing, I thought it a blessing of the Mother that allowed you to forget, to go on and have your own life. That’s when I begged Eve to erase the memories of everyone who knew. I was beside myself with grief, with anger that I hadn’t been there to protect you, that we hadn’t been able to find you. That was the worst of it, knowing you were out there with a madman, a killer, and we couldn’t find you.

It was all due to his alarm system. Gabe told me that Igmutaka, Star, Sunny and Fen had the same problem when they were captured a few months ago. A cheesy little alarm system that put out some kind of current that stops our mindspeech from going anywhere. That’s why you couldn’t hear me. I’m sorry you were afraid, Dad. I was terrified, but I was more angry than afraid, if that makes sense, only I didn’t realize that. I’ve had twelve years of feeling like a victim. It’s time I get to celebrate being a survivor, one who not only lived but managed to take out the bastard who hurt me. I did it by myself. It was wrong to take that away from me.

I didn’t take it away. You said you buried those memories.

You’re right, but because you buried everyone else’s, there was no one there to ask me how I was, what it was like to kill a killer, how I’d managed to survive. Answering those questions would have forced me to remember, and yes, it might have been painful, but I wouldn’t have spent the next half of my life afraid of living.

Oliver snarled and bared his teeth at Em. She didn’t even flinch.

Why did you come here?
he asked.
To remind me what a failure I’ve been as a father? How I destroyed your life by loving you too much?

Em stood and gazed at Gabe.
Is this what Alex meant when he said you made things all about you?

Yep. Pretty much..
Gabe walked across the windswept rock and stood beside Em. He hadn’t realized what a big leopard he made, but he was almost a foot taller than Em at the shoulder and a good eight inches taller than her father. Oliver glared at him, his muscles bunched as if to spring, his fangs bared.

Bad idea, Oliver. Especially when you’re doing what I’m often guilty of. You’re taking an issue important to your daughter and making it all about you. Yes, we know you suffered as a child and we know your life wasn’t easy. Your only failure as a father is in not trusting your daughter to be intelligent enough and strong enough to deal with what happened to her. Treat her like the strong, intelligent and powerful alpha bitch she is, not like an incompetent child. And what’s really sad is that Emeline is here because she loves you and she’s worried about you, and she wants her father back. The one who used to love her and think she could do anything she set her mind to.

Em leaned against Gabe, but her gaze stayed on her father.
There was another reason I chased him down, Gabe. I wanted to ask my father if he’d walk me down the aisle when we marry at the winter solstice. Guess that’s not gonna happen.

With that she turned away, shifted and became the wolf. But she was in Gabe’s thoughts when he stared at Oliver, at the shocked and very human expression in her father’s eyes, and then he shifted as well and joined his mate. It was growing dark by the time they headed back along the trail to Anton’s house. Neither of them looked back, though Em couldn’t help but hope the snow leopard would follow them.

• • •

At the point where the forest ended and the meadow began, where the lights of the small community twinkled brighter than any stars, Gabe scented another wolf. He nudged Em and they paused, just two more shadows among many in the early winter night. A large black wolf trotted slowly toward them. He stopped about ten feet away and lowered his head. His tail was down, tucked tightly between his legs, and he wouldn’t meet their eyes.

Gabe walked toward him, sniffed and growled. He wasn’t going to allow this man to hurt Em any more than he already had. Emeline joined them. She stopped beside her mate, showing both men where her loyalties lay, but she stared at the black wolf for a moment and whined softly.

The wolf raised his head but he looked at Emeline, not at Gabe.
Will you forgive me? I promise to do my best to be the father I should have been. I love you, Emeline, and I am so sorry for the hurt I’ve caused you.

I love you, too, Dad. It’s over. We need to put it behind us and move forward. Let’s go back. It’s been a long day and it’s cold out here.

It’s been a long twelve years, and that was my fault. And there is nothing I would love more than walking my daughter down the aisle at her wedding.
He paused and glanced at Gabe, then back at Em, and he sighed.
Giving you to another man is not going to be easy.

He looked directly at Gabe then, and some of the old humor was back in his eyes. Gabe couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like if he and Em had daughters. How far would he go to protect them?

Probably every bit as far as Oliver.

Nothing good is ever easy,
Gabe said. Then he turned toward his father’s house and led them out of the forest.

Chapter 18

One week later . . .

Gabe stood beside the large wood-burning stove in Jace Wolf and Romy Sarika’s cottage near the edge of the forest. It had been much smaller when Jace had been single. Finding a mate tended to change a man’s priorities, and when he’d told the pack he needed more room, they’d come through.

Gabe had been one of those working on the addition to the cottage. Romy now lived in a home worthy of the strong, brave woman she was, a woman who wanted space to raise the family she and Jace hoped to have one day.

Tonight, Jace and Romy had invited all the newly mated couples to join them for a chance to discuss their upcoming wedding. The winter solstice was three days away. “Wouldn’t you know it,” Jace said, “there’s a blizzard predicted to hit on Tuesday and last through Friday.”

“Then we hold the celebration indoors.” Romy was always the voice of calm. “The airplane hangar is huge. I’m sure we could make it look nice.”

Igmutaka, once an immortal spirit guide who had only recently—as time among immortals is measured—taken corporeal form and was now fully Chanku, sat on one of the couches in front of the fire with Mikaela Star Fuentes in his lap. Beside them were Sunny Daye and Fenris Ahlberg. All of them were bonded mates in the only four-way mating among the entire pack. The fact both Ig and Fen were Berserkers, that warrior branch of the Chanku family tree, meant that their upcoming induction into the pack would be breaking new ground.

So many changes in such a brief span of months.

Gabe glanced at Ig and the two exchanged brief smiles. Then his gaze swept everyone in the room, all of them preparing to take the legal step beyond their Chanku mating and do the very human wedding ceremony. Even Lily had admitted that, while mating was an indescribable joy and the one thing that would bind them together forever, there was something almost mystical about pledging their love in front of their packmates with the pack’s alpha leading their vows.

Lily and Sebastian weren’t here tonight. They’d wed shortly after meeting, not long after mating, and even the most cynical among them would have to admit that Lily was a changed woman after her marriage to Sebastian Xenakis.

There was a light knock on the door. Alex stepped in, holding it open for Annie. She shook snow out of her hair in the entryway, laughing at something Alex must have said. “Sorry we’re late. No excuse.”

Alex laughed and kissed her. “Yes, there is. She wanted to make Tinker sweat. He knew we were all supposed to meet here tonight. We were there for dinner, and he kept checking his wristwatch and suggesting it was time for us to go. Annie kept shrugging him off. I swear, if the man has a stroke, it’s her fault.”

“He’s driving me crazy.” Annie rolled her eyes as she took off her coat. “All he can talk about is the wedding and what he should wear and what are Alex and I going to say.”

Alex leaned close and kissed her. “He used to drive me nuts, and then your mom said something that made me think.”

“Something made you think?” Annie slammed her hand over her heart. “What was it?”

“Something I’m sure bridegrooms have heard for centuries. She said, ‘How do you think you’re going to act when you have a daughter and some man comes along and wants to take her away from you?’” He shook his head. “I realized that Tinker wasn’t crazy at all, because it will be a cold day in hell before some horny jerk comes along and marries our daughter.”

“You don’t have a daughter, sweetie.” Annie kissed his chin.

“We could. Someday. And I’m already sympathetic to your father.”

Gabe handed Alex a cold beer while Annie took the glass of wine Romy had poured for her. “Are any of the girls coming? They’re going to be part of the celebration too.”

“They backed out.” Alex took a swallow of his beer. “Not of the celebration, the planning part. Said they’d show up and do what they’re told.”

Gabe glanced at Em. “How come you never say that?”

She frowned at him. “What?”

“That you’ll show up and do what you’re told.”

“You are in so much trouble . . .”

He ducked and covered his head with his arms. “I don’t know what made me say that. Honest. I really don’t.”

“Wishful thinking,” Ig said, and ducked when Star took a mock swing at his head.

Romy moved to the center of the room and clapped her hands. “Okay. Now that the boys have that out of their collective testosterone-driven systems, where are we going to hold this celebration? The meadow is out unless we want to risk freezing to death. I suggested the hangar. Any other ideas?”

Em glanced at Gabe and showed him an image. He nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “That would work. Probably needs to be cleaned out.”

“We can do that.”

He grinned at everyone here, all longtime friends except for Romy, but their few weeks together had cemented their friendship for all time, and Fen, who had slipped into the pack as if he’d been born here. Em’s idea was perfect.