Fragile Brilliance (Shifters & Seers) (24 page)

“Well, if you’re sure,” he said, pulling himself up off the ground, “it seems I’m needed elsewhere tonight.” He pointed a finger at Charlie. “You will do whatever you can to protect her, understand?” The coyote growled, and Joshua swung his finger to the Thaumaturgic. “And you will not over-extend yourself again.”

“We’re not children.”

“I’ve got t-shirts older than the two of you.”

“That’s only because you’re older than dirt.”

He smiled at her gumption and leaned down to give her a kiss on the forehead just to piss off the coyote. “Take care of each other,” he said, knowing they would.

Maggie hadn’t meant to fall asleep. Honestly, she didn’t think it was possible. But once Joshua was gone, the night became quiet, and the fatigue she’d felt from draining herself earlier came back with a vengeance. She’d only meant to close her eyes and rest for a few minutes, but the next thing she knew someone was calling her name softly as warm hands caressed her shoulder. Early morning light stung her eyes as she tried to shake off sleep.

“Hey, beautiful.” Charlie’s face, his very
human
face, smiled down at her.

Maggie scrambled up. “Oh, God. I’m so sorry, Charlie. I didn’t mean to fall asleep.” Her hands brushed down his strong arms as if she might find a patch of fur or some other part that had gone wonky during the Change. “Are you okay?”

One hand came up to cup her cheek. His eyes were locked on hers, and in them was something she couldn’t name, but it took her breath all the same. “I… I am…” He smiled, a bright, amazing, true smile, and then those gorgeous lips were on hers.

They’d only kissed two times before, and both times she’d kissed him. Not so this time. This was Charlie’s kiss, and she was lost under the power of it. He nibbled at her lips, teasing her mouth open before taking it deeper. The heat of his mouth warmed her so much she forgot the frosty November chill that had numbed her fingers and nose. His hands roamed over her as if memorizing the curve of her shoulder and line of her back. Her own hands found their way to his bare chest, worshipping the silky warmth they found there.

“Maggie,” Charlie moaned, his breath coming in hard bursts.

Feeling even more powerful than she had commanding the earth the night before, she trailed kisses down his neck and settled in at the place where it connected to his shoulder.

“Jesus,” he muttered. “We’ve got to stop.”

“Why?” she asked, moving to the other side.

His fingers dug into her hair, gently holding her in place. It took several kisses for him to answer. “Because we’re in a public park?” It came out like a question, and at the word “public”, Maggie knew the answer. She pulled back, not at all surprised her breathing was even more erratic than his.

“This probably isn’t the best place for this, huh?”

He gave her another smile, and she marveled at how it transformed his face. She’d thought she’d seen glimpses of the real Charlie before, but now she knew better. “I can hear people waking up and moving around,” he said as if it was perfectly normal to be able to hear inside people’s houses. “Someone will be walking a dog or taking a morning jog soon, and if it’s all the same to you, I’d rather not give them something to share with all their friends and enemies on the internet.”

Maggie spent the rest of the day waiting for the robot to slowly start taking over, but it never happened. She’d been disappointed the night before when Coyote Charlie insisted on sitting obediently by her side instead of going off and showing her some of the wild emotion she’d been so eager to see, but it turned out seeing it in Human Charlie was even better. His smiles were dazzling, and his laughter was so rich and earnest she could feel it lifting her own mood somewhere beyond the stratosphere. When they’d gone to the pawnshop she discovered his anger to be a quiet and terrifying thing. Luckily, the guy working the counter felt the same and let them take her china for the originally quoted three hundred instead of the forty percent mark-up they tried to charge.

The transformation seemed magical, which made Maggie worry the spell might eventually break and leave her with the robot. It made her want to stay in Monarch forever, but she knew it wasn’t an option.

“We need to go,” Charlie announced, walking into her bedroom where she was looking for the copy of
Kabuki
she wanted to lend him. “How soon can you be ready?”

“My stuff is packed and ready to go.” She didn’t bother telling him it’d stayed that way since they arrived. Maggie didn’t trust her mother to not do something stupid that would end with them storming out at a moment’s notice.

Charlie crossed her tiny, crammed-pack room in two long strides. “I’m sorry,” he said, his palm once again cradling her cheek. In the hours since sunrise, she’d discovered it was his preferred way to have a conversation with her. It was quickly becoming hers, too. “Something has come up, and they need us back at the farm.”

“Is anyone…” She cleared her throat, unable to ask the question she’d been forming. “Is everyone okay?”

“As far as I know. Someone tried to run the Alphas off the road, and Joshua says they have some information they’d rather not share over the phone.”

Maggie could tell he was worried about the same things she was. It might have been selfish, but she sent a plea out into the universe that everyone was alive and well, not for their sake, but for Charlie’s.

The drive back to Kentucky was mostly quiet and done at speeds which should have gotten them carted off to jail for reckless endangerment, but they pulled into the long drive leading up to the house without seeing any flashing blue lights. Charlie sprinted around the truck, pulling open her door before she could get her seatbelt undone. Once she was out of the vehicle, he gathered her hand in his. It wasn’t a particularly sexy touch, just two hands clasped onto each other, but it felt more intimate than any of the kisses they’d shared.

If she hadn’t already seen their vehicles in the six-car garage, Maggie would’ve known the rest of the Alpha Pack was already back the moment they opened the door. For a group of people with super-hearing and animal-like grace, they were a noisy bunch.

They were making their way towards the living room when a small blond person stepped out of the kitchen and directly into their path. She looked to be around nine or ten. She stood just a few inches shorter than Maggie, although she seemed to be trying to make up for it with the mass of curls piled high on top of her head. Her blue eyes widened in alarm for about a half-second before she launched herself at Charlie’s waist.

Once she released her hold she looked up at him with prepubescent ire. “You weren’t at Thanksgiving.”

“Sorry about that, munchkin,” Charlie said, rubbing his hands over her tower of hair and causing her to shriek. “Maggie needed a ride home to see her family, and I figured no one would notice if I went missing.”

The girl rolled her eyes, and instantly Maggie knew who she was. “Yeah, no one would notice. Especially not your gramma, who had to say, ‘I wish my Charlie was here,’ every five minutes.” One hand went to her hip as she poked Charlie in the chest. “You should be ashamed of yourself, Charlie Hagan. Your gramma is old, and we’re supposed to be nice to old people.” Apparently finished with the scolding, she turned and brought her full attention to Maggie.

It is stupid to be scared of a child.

Still, Maggie had to force herself to hold her ground.

“Who are you?” the mini-Scout asked as if she already knew she wouldn’t like the response.

“My apologies,” Charlie said, affecting a British-like accent of sorts. “I shall give the proper introductions. Miss Angel, this is Maggie Mae McCray. Maggie, this is Angel Donovan, the third of the overly sarcastic Donovan siblings.”

Angel cut Charlie a look, but her focus remained on Maggie.

“Maggie Mae McCray? That sounds like a nursery rhyme name.”

“And Angel sounds like the sort of name belonging to a kind, loving child instead of the complete opposite, yet here we are,” Joshua said, stepping into the hallway. The past twenty-four hours had been noticeably hard on him. His eyes were bloodshot and sporting dark circles, and his face looked even more gaunt than normal. He almost looked as old as he actually was.

“Ignore him. He’s an idiot,” Angel said, stomping on Joshua’s toe. He let out a string of nonsensical words, letting the world know she’d hit her mark. “So… Maggie Mae…”

“Maggie works just fine.”

“Are you are werewolf, Maggie Mae?”

Joshua and Charlie were just as shocked by the question as Maggie. “Werewolf? What kind of crazy talk is that?” Charlie asked in such an overly exaggerated fashion even the absolute last person on earth who might believe in supernatural creatures would take pause.

Joshua was a bit more helpful.

“Somebody has been watching Netflix without parental supervision again, hasn’t she?” he asked, giving her head a condescending pat.

Angel ignored them both. “You don’t look like you would be a werewolf,” she said, cocking her head to the side as she studied Maggie. “You must be whatever Talley is.”

Maggie couldn’t think of a single thing to say. Fortunately, she didn’t have to since Angel had grown tired of that topic and moved immediately onto something else.

“That dress. Vintage or retro?”

“Vintage?” Maggie hadn’t meant for it to be a question, but this little girl was confusing. “It was my grandmother’s.”

Angel nodded her head as if Maggie had passed some sort of test. “I like it.”

“Thanks.”

“No problem,” Angel replied before turning to Charlie. “Your girlfriend is nice and she dresses well. I like her.”

Maggie started to correct her, but was cut off by Charlie’s “Me too.”

As far as declarations of love and conversations on defining the relationship went, it wasn’t exactly what most people would define as romantic, but Maggie decided the words “me” and “too” would forever be the most swoon-worthy she’d ever heard. She was feeling all sorts of happy, warm feelings when Liam stepped into the hallway. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days, and Maggie thought it may have been an accurate reflection as he looked at the odd gathering happening as if he was hallucinating.

“Charlie,” he finally said, after rubbing a hand over the back of his head. “You guys are here. Good. We have a problem.”

Charlie’s coyote was still incredibly close to the surface when he walked into the never-before-used meeting room where he’d once caught Makya talking to Maggie. He could feel the tension of everyone around him, and it kicked his own anxiety up to the point of becoming a distraction.

He wasn’t used to feeling so much. For nearly two years he’d cut himself off from his coyote. It hadn’t been a conscious effort in the beginning. After he’d been injured, his coyote knew he didn’t have the strength to pull through the transformation, so he’d receded, leaving Human Charlie to heal in peace. But there was never any peace in Charlie’s life. He began to purposefully keep his coyote at bay. He’d grown used to Human Charlie’s muted emotions, and he couldn’t handle the way his coyote cried out in grief and anger over the loss of his brother. So he pushed it back down into the closed-off part of his soul where it had hidden during his recovery. And he kept it there so long he didn’t know how to let it out when he found himself in Monarch City Park, desperate to break free and be the coyote again.

Thank God for Maggie.

She was poised on the edge of one of the big, heavy leather chairs. He’d always known she was beautiful, but he hadn’t realized how her beauty was the kind that would punch you in the gut, leaving you breathless. He’d admired her smile and laughter before, but he didn’t know how it could make him feel all warm and snuggly on the inside. She was kind and talented, and after seeing the way she’d grown up, he knew her spirit was made of the strongest stuff on earth to have accomplished everything she had without turning bitter. She was amazing, and for God knew what reason, she wanted to be with him.

He would happily take the burdens of the coyote if it meant getting to feel all the feels Maggie gave him.

“Where is Scout?” Jase asked, plopping himself into the seat across from Charlie and throwing his feet up on the table. Other than the Alpha Female, he was the last one to make an appearance. The rest of the Alpha Pack was all sitting and waiting, most of them studying the patterns on the textured ceiling. No one had said a single word up until that point, the gravity of whatever this situation was weighing on all of them.

Jase had little time or patience for weighing situations.

“She’s trying to force Angel to sit down and watch television instead of joining us.” Liam got that far-away look in his eyes that said he was trying to connect to her through their mate bond. “It’s not going well.”

“Why exactly is the munchkin here?” Charlie asked. “I mean, I love the kid and all, but if we’ve got something going on, maybe this isn’t the best place for her.”

Jase tilted the chair back as far as it would go. “For the love of God, do not let Scout hear you say that.”

“Gus… Do you remember Gus?” Liam asked.

“Seer who talks to dead people? Hated Makya on sight?”

Liam nodded. “Gus’s sister had a vision of the Donovan’s house burning to the ground.”

The rage was like a literal punch to his stomach. Threatening the Alpha Pack was one thing, but going after innocent humans like Uncle Dustin, Aunt Rebecca, and Angel? That crossed a line. A line with a pissed off Shifter looking for revenge on the other side.

Once Charlie could catch his breath again he asked, “Was it a this-is-going-to-happen vision, or a maybe-possibly-or-perhaps-just-a-metaphorical-vision vision?”

“Does it matter?” Jase asked, the muscles in his jaw jumping as he ground his teeth together.

Of course it didn’t matter. Any threat to the Donovans was unacceptable.

If the homicidal look in Liam’s eyes was anything to go by, the Alpha Male agreed. “Scout convinced her family to come back with us as a precautionary measure.”

“And she already regrets it.” Scout walked through the room and to her rightful spot next to Liam with all the regality of a queen. It almost made Charlie overlook her unbrushed hair and the giant mustard stain on her shirt. “I swear, whoever decided cute teenage boys should be allowed to have their voice auto-tuned and recorded should be shot. Repeatedly. In the ears.” Even though the arms on the chairs made it difficult, her hand intertwined itself with Liam’s. “So…,” she said, looking around the table. “This is everybody?”

“Everybody over eighteen and under eighty,” Marie said, and Charlie wondered at what could have caused them to fly in the Minnesota contingent of the Alpha Pack on such a short notice.

Scout glanced at Charlie’s side of the table and met his eyes. She held the stare a few seconds longer than was comfortable and then a slow smile curled up the corners of her mouth. “Hey there, Chuck. Glad to have you back.”

He dipped his head, acknowledging she was referring to more than his physical presence in the room.

Robby Hagan leaned forward onto his elbows. “While I’m enjoying this hi-how-are-y’all-doing business, I really wish we’d just get on to whatever it is you made us all haul ass here for. I had to cancel a weekend getaway with my girlfriend at the last minute, and it’s left me kinda cranky.”

Charlie didn’t miss the “pity that” Marie’s sister Michelle muttered under her breath or the way Robby’s body tensed up when she said it. If he wasn’t as eager to find out what was going on as Robby was, he might have asked them what that was all about.

“Mandel is dead,” Liam said, cutting straight to the point.

Jase sat up, the legs of his chair thudding down onto the carpet. “Which is a good thing, yes?”

“Not so much,” Scout said. “It appears he committed suicide… more than three months ago.”

And it had been around three months since Charlie’s Humvee was violated. “I’m still not seeing the bad part,” he said. “Guy does some bad shit, feels guilty, and offs himself. Personally, I feel like justice is served. Day over. Let’s go get some pie.”

This time, Joshua answered. And since it was Joshua, the lights dimmed and an image flashed up on a screen Charlie hadn’t noticed before. The picture was of a corpse mostly covered in leaves. From the way most of the flesh was missing, it had been there a while. “In the Mandel Pack, the wife of the Pack Leader is expected to lay flowers on the grave of the first Pack Leader to hold that territory on holidays. Lucinda Mandel went to the small cemetery yesterday and discovered her husband’s body at the base of the former Pack Leader’s gravestone. She immediately called the Alphas.” Joshua punched something into his phone and the image on the screen changed. Now there was the picture of the corpse on the left side of the screen, and on the right side was a picture of Abram Mandel at the hustings where he’d asked Scout to force Imogen into marrying another Shifter. “I’ve done some preliminary tests, and I think it’s safe to say Mandel hasn’t been seen since he left the hustings because he immediately drove back to Mississippi, found himself a nice, quiet spot, and shot himself in the head.”

“But you can’t be sure?”

“No,” Liam said, “we can’t. And we might be inclined to believe he’d arranged for the murder of Barros and the attempt on you and Maggie back in September with the contacts he had, but then we came home.”

The screen changed again. This time the picture was of the wall in the gym where the Painting of Death resided. Since Charlie had last seen it there had been an update. The word “soon” was painted across the canvas.

“Is that blood?” Maggie asked in a strangled voice. Taking a cue from his Alphas, Charlie reached over and placed her hand in his.

“Horse, not human,” Scout answered. “We found the body of one of our thoroughbreds behind the gym. He’d been…” She swallowed so hard even Maggie, whose hearing was at a normal human’s level, had to have heard it. “He was posed.” Her eyes flicked up to the screen. “There are no pictures. It seemed disrespectful, and I’m pretty sure I would vomit if I had to see it again.”

One disadvantage to letting the coyote have so much control was at times like this it was hard to focus enough to think things through logically. Rage, disgust, and fear created a red haze he had trouble fighting through long enough to ask, “How? How in the hell did someone get to our horses? We have the best security system in the world, a vet who freaking lives twenty feet from the barns, and the house is inhabited by Shifters. This place is more protected than Fort Knox, and yet someone has slipped by us
again
? Long enough to kill a four hundred thousand dollar horse, drain his blood, have a little arts and crafts time, and then get all freaky with the dead body? Are you serious?”

Liam scrubbed a hand over his face. “I know. It shouldn’t have happened. We had two Shifters on the property, plus the vet last night. The vet woke up this morning with no idea what had happened over the past twelve hours. I caught the scent of a drug in his coffee cup. And the Shifters Changed back over halfway to Lexington. They called as soon as they could grab clothes and a phone. Turns out, someone started shooting at them last night, and their animal completely took eover and ran.”

“And the security system we spent half a fortune on?”

“We’re looking into it,” Joshua said. “It looks like it was turned off for a few hours last night.”

“That’s not all.” Scout nodded at Joshua, and the image on the screen changed to a blurry picture of a black sedan. “Early this morning this car started following us somewhere near the Versailles exit on the Bluegrass Parkway. Once we got off the parkway, it tried to run us off the road.”

Jase leaned forward, eyes squinting. “License plate number?”

“Didn’t have one.”

“Did you get a look at the driver?”

“Wearing a mask.”

Jase turned to his sister. “Like a ski mask?”

“Like a Pennywise the Clown mask.”

All the color drained from Jase’s face. “That’s not funny.”

“No,” Scout agreed, “for once, it was not funny.”

Charlie slowly became aware of a gentle caress against the base of his thumb and a softly whispered “it’s okay.” That was when he realized he was growling. It shouldn’t have been surprising to anyone. They were just one night past the full moon, and everyone’s animal was riding them hard. But a quick glance around the table assured Charlie everyone had noticed his reaction and was definitely surprised. Michelle’s jaw was literally hanging open, Jase was staring with raised eyebrows, and Talley was smiling at him like he just announced there would be an extra Christmas this year.

Liam’s expression didn’t change much, but Charlie knew him well enough to realize he was on the Talley end of the reaction spectrum. “Maggie, Joshua told me what you did.” Her eyes fell to the table as a blush spread across her cheeks. “The Alpha Pack is forever in your debt. Anything you should ever need, all you have to do is ask.”

“I didn’t do it for you,” Maggie said, not looking up, “so you don’t owe me anything. But I appreciate the offer all the same.”

If he didn’t think it would embarrass her, Charlie would have pulled her out of her seat and kissed her until neither of them could breathe. Instead, he said, “We can start by finding a way to eliminate this threat to her.”

“What I don’t get,” Talley said, “is why they did nothing for so long and then came out with guns blazing now. Do you think they knew the body would get discovered this weekend?”

“Maybe they have day jobs and needed a four-day weekend to do their extracurricular creepy murdering stuff,” Jase guessed.

“A day job… or a busy school schedule.” Maggie worried her bottom lip as she thought it over. “Barros’s murder and the stuff with Charlie’s car happened early in the semester. No one had too much going on then, but when all the exams and stuff started, everything went quiet. But now it’s Thanksgiving Break, and I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m not doing anything school related.”

“So… another art student,” Charlie said. “Either an independent study or grad student. Someone with access to Rosa Hall.” He swallowed down another growl. How many times had Maggie been in danger just by being in that building? How many times might he have walked right past the killer and not known?

“Maybe, but who? You’re the only drawing student. Everyone else is into 3D stuff. And I have a painting class with most of those guys. None of them are capable of what is hanging in the gym.”

“Students aren’t the only people on campus.” Joshua leaned up onto his elbows. “Sanders boasts some of the nation’s best artists on its staff. I’m assuming they all have access to Rosa Hall?”

Maggie nodded, seemingly too shocked by the thought of one her professors being behind all this to speak.

Charlie started a suspect list in his head, but stopped on one name. “Stroud.”

It made sense. A recluse with a reputation for a volatile temper. Charlie’s interactions with him had been minimal. He didn’t have him as a regular teacher, and Stroud had asked for everything to be sent back and forth digitally instead of face-to-face. They were only a month into the school year when Charlie started relying exclusively on Maggie for feedback. Charlie hadn’t thought much about it before, but what if there was a reason Stroud didn’t want someone with super-senses around? And why had he even offered the independent study position to Charlie in the first place? Charlie had been proud enough to believe it was because he was talented, but what if it was to keep an eye on him? What if he’d had Charlie and the rest of the Alpha Pack in his sights way before Charlie walked into his office?