Silver (15 page)

“
And by us you meant
me?”

A sigh, then, “Yes. You were the only one
who had a chance to get close to him.”

“
He almost killed me for
it!” Nikki’s voice rose again. “You didn’t think to warn me? You
know, ‘Carry some silver bullets, darling, just in case your
boyfriend goes psycho?'”

“
We didn’t think it would
get this far,” her father put in. “We thought we’d find the other
Alphas long before now.”

“
Yeah, well, he would have
killed me. His whole pack came to tear me apart.” I heard Nikki’s
hand touch the door. “I’d be dead right now if it wasn’t for
Jaze.”

“
Another werewolf,” her
mother said with contempt in her voice.

“
Another Alpha,” Nikki
corrected her softly.

Silence followed.

The door creaked in protest as Nikki leaned
more firmly against it. Her elbow brushed the doorknob.

“
Why is he still in there?”
her mom asked, quieter now. “If he’s an Alpha, he should have
healed already.”

I heard the slide of Nikki’s hair across the
wood as she shook her head. “They used silver blades, and parts of
them broke off. I can’t get it all cleaned out.” Her calm facade
broke and her voice cracked. “He’s bleeding to death before he can
heal.”

There was a moment of silence and I could
feel the depth of it through my fevered haze. It felt as if the
entire world waited for someone to make a decision. Her mom finally
cleared her throat. “Well, what are we standing around for? Heaven
knows your father and I have extracted silver fragments
before.”

Their footsteps came to the door. “How do I
know you’re not going to kill him?” Nikki protested without
moving.

Her father spoke gently. “You’re going to
have to trust us. We owe you one. We promise to take care of
him.”

My heart tightened at the potential
implications and I hoped Nikki would stay in front of the door. I
would rather bleed to death than face Hunters like the ones who had
killed Dad.

But Nikki stepped back and the door opened
slowly. “You owe me more than one,” she whispered.

Their footsteps drew near the bed and I
closed my eyes. I focused on breathing steadily to calm my
thundering heartbeat.

Nikki’s mother gave a quick intake of
breath. “Other werewolves did this to him?” she asked quietly. “Why
would they do such a thing?”

“
He stood in their way to
protect me,” Nikki replied, her tone bitter.

A hand touched my sweat-soaked forehead.
“He’s got a high fever, probably from the silver. It kicks in
fast.” She turned away. “We’ve got to hurry, Roger, or we’ll lose
him.”

Fingers touched my palm and my hand flinched
before I could control it. Nikki touched my shoulder reassuringly.
“It’s okay, they’ll help you,” she whispered.

I opened my eyes and fought to focus them on
her face. “You’re not safe here,” I whispered. The words burned
through my aching throat. I took a shallow breath against the sharp
pain in my side.

“
They’ll keep me safe. Both
of us safe,” she replied. Her eyes shone through tears. “You just
hang in there, okay? Don’t you leave me.”

Pain from the gash across my stomach made me
gasp. I shut my eyes and clenched my teeth in an effort to stay
silent.

“
Jaze?” she asked, her
voice tight with worry.

“
It hurts,” I forced
out.

“
Stay with me,” she
commanded, her voice rising.

I tried to nod, but flashes of light sparked
behind my closed eyelids.

“
Jaze?” She turned away and
shouted, “Mom, Dad, hurry!”

A hum rose, shutting out all other sound. I
opened my leaden eyes and saw her face floating above me, her lips
tight and tears tracing trails down her cheeks. Black spots danced
in my vision. She mouthed my name. I tried to reply, but my limbs
felt heavy and weak. I shut my eyes and gave in to the
darkness.

Fever dreams brought back memories with
stark clarity of Mom, Dad, and I together. I saw them from
somewhere behind my shoulder, as if I was the observer of this
happy family, a stranger drawn by the hauntingly familiar. Dad
carried me as a toddler on his shoulders, my dark blond hair long
and wild the way he liked it, a tangled mess like a lion’s mane, as
my mom would say. Dad tossed me up into the air, and I lost sight
of my young self in the light of the sun.

The next dream showed the first time I
phased. I saw the proud look on Dad’s face when he realized I would
be an Alpha like him despite the fact that Mom didn’t have any
werewolf blood. We tore around the kitchen and living room, me with
big gangly puppy paws and silky, shaggy fur that would eventually
turn into the coarse outer coat and soft inner coat I had now. We
crashed around a corner, breaking Mom’s blue vase, but she only
smiled and shook her head like a proud mother hen.

The dreams flashed forward to my
introduction to the pack. Usually pack members waited until the
next full moon to bring any children that had phased, but Dad
couldn’t wait. He called his pack together and they truly seemed
happy that one of his offspring would eventually inherit. I
glimpsed Uncle Mason near a tree, his dark gray coat blending in
with the forest’s shadows. He didn’t look angry or pleased, just
calculating. I wondered if he had already begun his takeover of the
North American werewolves.

I fought to break free of the next dream
before the memory even solidified. It was too real, the house, the
stars, the smell of wood smoke from cozy home fires. The front door
glared brilliant red in the night, though it had been softer and
more of a Tuscan color in real life. Mom reached the door first and
touched it. It opened slowly and the iron scent of blood filled my
nose. I ran through the door, ready to protect her, then froze in
horror at the scene before me.

I knew who had been killed even before I saw
the body. Dad had fought, and fought hard. The scent of his sweat
and determination permeated everything. I could also smell the
Hunters, at least four of them, and the scent of Uncle Mason, faint
as if he had stayed at the door.

I fell to my knees, tears streaming down my
face. Mom fainted behind me, her body crumpling gracefully to the
floor like a tired dancer. I rose, picked her up, and carried her
to the lawn near the sidewalk. The leftovers of the dinner Mom and
I had eaten together sat forgotten in their Styrofoam box where Mom
had dropped it when she fell. I walked past it into the living
room. A pink heart card from Valentine’s Day the day before lay
among the shattered remains of the lamp and a picture of our family
on the floor. I picked up the card in a daze and opened it as if
searching for the familiar in a world that had turned upside down.
Mom had written on one side and me on the other.

Dear Jason,

I could never have imagined where life would
take us when I said yes to you so many Valentine’s Days ago. You
had your little pink box, afraid to bring it out when we were
around your friends because it wasn’t manly. Ha ha. But if I could
have seen the life we would lead together, I’d again have said yes,
yes, yes, a million times yes, because you have made me happier
than I ever thought a person could be. Thank you, my dear
sweetheart. I look forward to a hundred more Valentine’s Days
together.

Love,

Vicki

Dad,

Thanks for everything, for loving Mom and
me, for working so hard for us, for being there all the time.
You’re the best Dad ever.

Love,

Jaze

I stared at the card for another minute,
then tore it up and made a small pile in the middle of the floor
with the shredded paper. I broke the wooden picture frame into
splinters and added it, then used a table leg to tear off a part of
the banister and added the chunks to the pile. I did it all in a
numb daze, avoiding any thought of what was truly going on. I only
knew what I had to do to protect Mom and me, to protect Dad.

Last, I carefully gathered the parts of
Dad’s dismembered body and laid them gently beside the pile. His
blood streaked my shirt and hands. His torso had been thrown in the
fireplace. I wiped off what I could of the dark ashes, then added
it to the pile. It didn’t look like him anymore; I could almost
imagine that it was a mannequin, a bleeding, too-real mannequin.
His head was nowhere to be found, but Hunters usually took the
heads because they wrongly believed that a werewolf could bring
itself back together and live if it had the head. I found Dad's
arms and legs. When the pile was complete, I sat down and stared at
it. I sat that way for several minutes, my thoughts too jumbled and
dazed with shock to make any sense.

When I realized what I was doing, I forced
myself to my feet, stumbled to the garage, and brought back the gas
can we used for the lawn mower. I dumped it on the pile of
kindling, on Dad’s body, and around the living room. The smell of
blood and gasoline tangled harshly in the air and I ran outside and
threw up in the bushes. I then grabbed a cigarette lighter from the
cupboard by the fridge where Mom kept the birthday candles, lit it,
and tossed it on the pile. The roar of flames leaping to life
followed me out the door.

I watched the house burn long enough to
ensure that the flames had a good hold and wouldn’t die before our
home was a pile of ash, then carried Mom to the car and laid her
across the back seat. I looked back once as I drove away. The
flaming house burned with the glow of a sunset in my rear view
mirror. A fire engine raced past and I turned my attention to the
road.

It had happened merely weeks ago. The pain
of watching our house burn with my dad’s body inside haunted my
thoughts like dark shadows clinging to every simple moment. Each
breath I took filled me with pain more powerful than the silver
that was loath to leave my veins.

Chapter 15

My throat tightened and a sob wrenched from
my battered heart, waking me from the haunted fever dreams. I tried
to roll over, to curl in on myself in an effort to disappear
completely, but realized my hands were tied. My heart raced with
fear at the thought that perhaps Nikki’s parents had gone back on
their word. The chance to study an Alpha was too great to pass
up.

“
Jaze?”

Nikki's voice chased away the pain, the
fear, and even the memories for the tiniest moment. For that
instant, her nearness was my world. I clung to the familiar way she
said my name as though we had been friends for years instead of
weeks. I inhaled and fought to let her scent chase away the
memories of blood, gasoline, and tainted smoke. Fingers touched my
hair softly, afraid of hurting me. I ground my teeth to prevent the
wry smile from reaching my lips. I had been so damaged both inside
and out that even love at this point hurt.

“
Jaze?”

I opened my eyes slowly, squinting in the
light above the bed. A shadow blocked half of it from view. My eyes
focused and the light faded to the background as the face took on
detail. Nikki gazed down at me, her beautiful blue eyes bright with
worry. A few strands of long black hair fell near her face and
whispered across my chest. She looked so perfect, so absolutely
perfect and pure and innocent and untouched by the cruelties of the
world that I could only stare. I wondered why she dared touch me,
and was afraid that the taint of the shadows I carried with me
would cross over to her. My breath caught in my chest.

“
Jaze, are you okay?” she
asked softly, concern rising in her voice. “Are you
here?”

“
What do you mean?” I
managed to croak out past my dry throat.

She smiled then so sweetly that it took my
breath away. “You’ve been talking in your dreams, calling out to
people I don’t know, to your dad.” Her voice dropped off as though
she was afraid she had said too much.

I closed my eyes, then opened them again.
“Hunters killed my dad just over a month ago.”

Nikki’s eyes widened and I saw my reflection
in the tears that filled them. “Oh, Jaze. I’m so sorry. I’m so very
sorry.” She shook her head and wiped at the tears.

I wanted to touch her face, to tell her she
didn’t need to cry, but my hands were still tied to the table.
“It’s not your fault. You don’t have to cry for me,” I said,
willing myself not to break down.

She cupped a palm to my
face, her touch so soft I barely felt it. She leaned closer so that
her eyes stared right into mine. She whispered, her lips an inch
above mine, “You took all this pain for me. You saved my life. I
owe you the world and I
will
cry for you.”

“
Because I'm so charming?”
I forced out past the knot in my throat.

She gave a soft laugh. Her tears fell onto
my cheeks and she leaned down and kissed me so softly yet so full
of love that I couldn’t hold in my emotions anymore.

I closed my eyes as my tears coursed down
the sides of my face to linger in my hair. Nikki rested her cheek
against mine and just held me while I cried, my heart and my soul
so exposed and vulnerable she could have crushed me with a single
word or look. I tried not to care, and hoped she would take what
was left of me and destroy it. But deep down I wanted to live, I
wanted to fight and stop Mason from hurting anyone else. I didn’t
want Dad’s death to have been for nothing.

My sobs slowed and Nikki rose back up. She
loosened the bands on my wrists and slipped them off. “My parents
were afraid you’d hurt yourself further if you moved,” she
explained gently. I lifted up an arm and my body shook with the
effort. My wrists were red and raw from the thrashing I had done
during the silver fever. I definitely would have done more damage
to myself if I hadn’t been secured.