In the Beginning... (57 page)

“We are not far from transportation. Maybe a
fifteen minute walk. Gather what things you can carry, and we shall
begin. Please keep your pups as silent as possible to avoid drawing
any more attention our way.”

Aodhan gave them ten minutes, then he
started off into the woods. Matthuin took up the rear position,
carrying a small boy of about three in his own arms.

She made it ten minutes away before she had
cell signal on the disposable phone her brother had insisted she
always carry in her car console. His number was preprogrammed into
the phone. She called him and told him what was happening and to
bring help.

He’d ordered her
not
to turn around and
return to help Rebecca and Aodhan. Had it not been for the
unconscious girl in the seat beside her, Mallory would have ignored
his edict. Instead, she pulled the vehicle to the side of the road
to wait for him.

And to study the girl.

She had hair the same blonde
as Josey’s, but it curled more like Jade’s or Cassandra’s. She
certainly
looked
like Jade and Josey
and most of the
female Tanisses. She wasn’t as old as Mallory had first thought.
She was probably younger than Becca, though it was hard to tell
under the dirt. She was built like Mickey, slender and delicate.
There was dried blood under her ragged nails.

Mallory ruthlessly pushed
down the nausea when the fear that the girl had been raped hit her.
The clothes were intact, jeans were dirty but not torn. Mallory
forced herself to raise the girl’s filthy sweatshirt slightly. No
finger-shaped bruises marred the girl’s stomach. And she wore a
bra. A
clean
one,
at least one not stained with
dirt or blood.

Some of Mallory’s fears subsided. But she
sat behind the wheel, with one hand gripping the gun she’d taken
from the console and the other gripping the cell.

The sky darkened around her, and that made
it even worse as she waited.

Finally,
and it was probably less than twenty
minutes
—
she saw the
headlights of half a dozen SUVs she recognized as belonging to the
Dardanos Resort. She opened the door and slammed it shut to keep
the damned cat from escaping. He was as upset as she, and had taken
to curling around the injured girl’s stomach. Mallory figured if
she was in shock, the cat’s warmth would only help.

Cormac reached Mallory’s side first. She
handed the gun to him without a second thought when he reached for
it. She knew how to use it, but she didn’t have to like it. “You
have to hurry. I’m not sure what’s happening. Aodhan sent me ahead
and took my little sister with him.’’

“We got it, female. Tell me what happened.”
Mallory followed him back to his vehicle. He wasn’t going without
her.

“We were driving back when I
was flagged down by two women. One was my sister, the other
was...well...I’m not sure who. But she’s been injured. Aodhan put
her in the car and told me to get her to Dardanos. He and
Becca
went into the woods to help his
cousin Matthuin. Becca had been kidnapped or something by a pack of
Lupoiux.” She hopped into the passenger seat of Cormac’s vehicle,
after ordering Tajic to the back. “Hurry! You’ll see the van
fifteen minutes that way!”

She didn’t even look back at her car.
Barlaam had accompanied Cormac and she knew he would take care of
the girl.

She said nothing as Cormac pushed the SUV
over a hundred miles an hour, just yards behind the vehicle Rand
drove. If anything, Mallory wished they’d go faster.

Her sister was out there. Her lover.

If something happened to
them,
him...

“Hurry. Please, hurry.”

“Rest assured, Aodhan and Matthuin can take
care of themselves. They have done so for centuries. You do not
need to worry.”

“If I don’t need to worry why are you going
twice the legal speed limit?”

Cormac laughed. “Just eager to catch some
wolves. I need a new rug for your cousin’s office. And since your
brother and uncle aren’t obliging...”

Mallory caught the humor and
a laugh escaped. She was finally starting to understand her
cousin’s
Rajni
a
bit better. But that didn’t lessen her own sense of
worry.

It took them half as much time to get back
to the van as it had taken her to get away from it.

“There! There’s my sister!” Mallory pointed
to Becca as Becca rounded the hood of the huge van.

Cormac slowed the SUV to a stop. Mallory
jumped out and rushed to her sister’s side, meeting her just as
Rand scooped Becca into a hug. “Becca! Where’s Aodhan?”

“He was getting Matt. They’re bringing back
all the women and kids that were being kept hostage by those
Lupoiux.” Becca clung to Rand for a moment then pulled away. “Your
friend told me to start the van and get it warm. Where’s that
girl?”

“She’s on her way back to the resort. She’s
ok, safe.”

Cormac and Rand and two other Dardaptoans
Mallory knew were part of

Aodhan’s security team
started into the woods. A third,
Naeron—also one of Aodhan’s men—
stayed with Mallory, taking up a guarding position in front of
her. Tajic remained at her side, as well.

“
Equa
Adrastos?” Naeron addressed her
with a reverence Mallory was still not used to.

“Yes, Naeron?” Mallory kept her arms around
her sister as she watched the night around them, waiting for one
single sign of Aodhan.

“Maybe you and your sister
should get inside the van? The temperature is dropping, and
Equan
Adrastos will have
my head if I let you get the least bit chilled.”

Mallory understood what he wasn’t saying. It
would be easier to defend the van, in case something happened. But
she wasn’t sure she could sit patiently waiting knowing Aodhan was
out there somewhere. “We’re ok, Naeron...”

“Still, if your sister is a
target of these wolves, they will be relentless in getting her
back. Especially if she’s
newly
mated.
”

It hadn’t occurred to
Mallory that her sister might have
been
with this Matthuin. But if he was
Aodhan’s cousin, wouldn’t he be Dardaptoan? “Becca, just what
exactly is this Matthuin?”

It was Naeron who answered
the question. “The
Equan
of the Lycurgus House is quarter-Lupoiux,
Dardaptoan, Druid, and Witch,
Equa
. He can shift into a wolf and can
use quite a bit of the magical arts.”

“So if my sister’s been with
him, is she his
Rajni
or a Lupoiux mate? Becca
did you sleep
with this guy?”

“Mal! That’s private!”

“You did.”

Naeron shifted, obviously
uncomfortable with the question. “That is a question best answered
by
Equan
Lycurgus,
as I would only be guessing.”

The van was close, and Aodhan hoped the girl
had gotten it warm enough. The temperature was dropping fast, and
many of these wolf pups had little more than rags covering their
undernourished bodies. Many were girls, but a few were male. The
sons of the Redd Gothan pack, fathered on unwilling mothers? Poor
little creatures, to have such a rough start in the world. Aodhan
suppressed his rage when he thought of what many of these females
had suffered.

When he remembered how his own female had
suffered.

“How much farther?” the spokeswoman for the
Lupoiux women asked, her words almost inaudible. She walked at
Aodhan’s side, strong and courageous. She too reminded him of his
female. “These women have been through a lot. I want to get them
safe.”

“You all have. The van is a mile that way,
at most.”

“I haven’t been through shit. I’ve just had
to watch it. My brother is the current leader of this damned pack.
I’ve not found my mate yet, thank the deities. If I had they would
have just killed him and given me to one of them.” Her disgust was
clear for him to hear. “They are animals, in the truest sense of
the word. I need your vow that you are not.”

“We are
Dardaptoan.
We value our females and
our children. I can promise you that these souls will find safety
and kindness amongst my people. I give you my word as the
Equa
of the House of
Adrastos.”

“Why were you in these woods if you are a
blood-sucker?”

“My female’s sister. She led me to you, and
to her own mate Matthuin.”

“The Taniss female?”

“Yes.”

“She survives, then.”

“Both do, yes. How did the one come to be
with your brother’s pack? The blonde?”

“My brother has been offered
a price of a quarter million dollars per Taniss
female
that he captures or kills. One
hundred thousand per male.”

Aodhan couldn’t suppress the hiss that
escaped. “Offered by whom?”

“I don’t know. Only my brother and a few of
his top curs know. Rumor has it the Taniss family are the prime
targets of half the Kinds because of the bounty.”

A howl split the night, and a few of the
women and children gasped.

Aodhan shushed them quickly. He and Matthuin
could handle fourteen male Lupoiux of the same caliber they’d found
at the camp, but the dark and the women and children would hamper
their fight. It was best not to risk it. But he had half an idea
who the wolf howling actually was.

The girl wolf beside him had tensed, as
well. “That was my brother. He’s made it back to camp. Gunarr will
find me; he always does.”

“Not this time.” A male voice came behind
the group.

The girl beside him tensed, ready to flee.
Aodhan wrapped a hand around her elbow. “Relax. This is my
brother-in-law, Rand, Alpha of the Taniss pack. He will harm you
not.”

“Well, blood-sucker, you were supposed to
take my sister on a harmless drive today. This is what you call
harmless?”

“This is a walk in the park, dog. Where is
your sister and how is it you come to be here?”

“Jareth and I heard you needed a bit of
assistance. Rescuing, as it were. From a bunch of women and
puppies? I thought better of the man who has vowed to keep my
sister safe.”

“Not assistance, but if you were to take
these children and females, that would free me and my cousin
Matthuin up for a bit of dog-catching.”

“Your man, Lanze, can take them to the van
where my sisters await. I have something to say to these
puppies.”

Aodhan agreed. “So Lanze and Cormac are in
the woods, as well? There are fourteen Redd Gothan wolves in the
woods somewhere. I’m not sure what they are doing.”

Cormac appeared at Aodhan’s
side, dark and terrifying to the unsuspecting women who did not
realize he was there. Aodhan hoped their surprised cries would not
give their positions away. “Aodhan, I’ve dispatched two wolves.
Naeron waits with your
Rajni
. And she is getting impatient.
Reminds me much of her cousin.”

Phelan was a few steps behind Cormac. “I got
one for my collection.” He held up something in the dark that
Aodhan assumed to be a pelt. If a piece of skin was cut from a
dying Lupoiux, it would turn into a pelt to match the wolf’s fur in
life. Some wolf-hunters liked to collect the pelts. Phelan was one
of them.

“That leaves eleven, then.
Come. We need to get back to Mallory and her sister. Seems there is
a
bounty
on every
Taniss head. Quarter of a million for the females. One hundred
thousand for males.”

His brother-in-law’s curses were low, but
Aodhan had no difficulty hearing them and appreciating the
sentiment. Who would put such a blatant death threat out against
the entire Taniss family? It had to be someone with a serious
reason to hate all things Taniss.

There were plenty of Kinds with reason to
hate the Taniss, but which one were they dealing with?

Mallory took Naeron’s
advice
and climbed into
the warm van. Becca slipped into the passenger seat. Naeron
patrolled around the vehicle, the wolf moving in tandem with him.
The moon was bright enough that Mallory could see Naeron’s shadow
each time he passed by her window.

“So he kidnapped you?” Becca asked the
question five minutes after Cormac and the others had taken off
into the woods. “Why?”

“Because of Grandfather.
He’s a real bastard, Bec. He’s hurt a lot of people. Aodhan and the
others were bent on revenge, but then he realized we were
Rajnis
.”

“So he kidnapped you and just kept you? And
you let him?” Skepticism was loud and clear in Becca’s tone. “That
doesn’t sound like you.”

“It was more complicated than that.”

“I’ll bet.”

“So why were you with this guy in the woods
to begin with? Claudette told me you were with Dad.”

“Nope. I was on my way to the vacation house
when my car broke down. I was walking to the house when two wolves
came out of the woods and grabbed me.”

“What?”

“The wolves were scouting out the vacation
house. I walked right into them. They bit me, then Matthuin was
there. We stayed in the woods for days, trying to avoid them. We
went back in the hills for several days, then headed toward
Dardanos. He said we’d get help there. We didn’t make it.”