The Legacy of Kilkenny (14 page)

“Maybe it’s a spider bite.
 
Maybe you’ll be spider woman,” I say, but I think it might be something worse.

“You’re a dork.”
 
We both fall back on the bed and giggled.
 
I miss laughing with my sister.
 
She has changed over the last two years, I like her, despite her temper tantrums.

We sit up talking the rest of the night, falling asleep on my full sized bed.
 
We have slept in the same bed every Christmas Eve giggling and waiting for our parents to go to bed since we were little, we couldn’t wait to see what Santa brought us… I guess two months ago on Christmas would have been our last time.
 
Man, this part sucks.

I send Pru a message when I get up to let her know I am up and about.
 
One thing about wolves, they sleep late.
 
I guess they ran so much at night they collapsed in exhaustion from what Pru has told me.
 
I send her another message asking if it will be okay if Allie came over there with me.
 

After a few texts back and forth, she finally agrees.
 

On our way over to Pru’s house, Allie starts asking me why their family would buy me such an extravagant gift.
 
I knew it was going to cause some eyebrow raising but we all agreed that it was going to be believed my parents gave me the car so people wouldn’t talk about it.
 
With Allie living in the same family as me, she knew where it came from.

“I have no idea Al.
 
I tried to turn it down but they insisted.
 
You can drive it if you want.
 
I don’t mind at all.
 
You
wanna
drive it?”
 

“No, I just want to make sure they aren’t holding it over your head or something.
 
I didn’t know if you’re sworn to marry their daughter or something.
 
None of my friends’ parents have ever given me anything more than a birthday card so it’s a little freaky.”
 
She pulls out some lip stuff smearing it on.

“Trust me; Pru isn’t interested in me as anything other than a friend, much less wanting to be married to me.
 
You’ll like her family, just know they’re a little rough and tumble, they horse around a lot.
 
So don’t get all weird on me when we start working out, I can take it, I might not look it but I’m in fantastic shape.”
 
We pull in the driveway and park behind Oakley’s truck.

“I was going to tell you that you look like you are getting
kinda
buff. Not in a creepy way, I just noticed you didn’t look like my little brother anymore.
 
More like my big brother.”
 
We stop laughing long enough to ring the bell.

PRU

It was hard to admit, but I was a little jealous of Allie the first time she came over to my house.
 
When I saw Abel and her together it reminded me of how normal siblings are.
 
I could tell they had history together and there weren’t any big secrets they had to guard.
 
Or at least there wasn’t any big secrets they had to guard prior to coming over.

All of my training up to that point was directed at preparing Abel for his shift, understanding my dreams, protecting our name and family but it hit me like a ton of bricks that he was going to miss his family.
 
I couldn’t live the rest of my life without talking to my mom or dad and now I expected him to do it and to trust me to be the one to take his life.
 
It was up to me to be the go between for him and the communication with his family.
 
It was bad enough with the threat of the O’Connell’s and now I had to go and like his sister.

It wasn’t too bad having Allie around, she didn’t seem to mind the ass kicking of her brother and was pretty good herself at blocking and kicking.
 
We had a good time up until Abel kicked Oakley so hard it threw him into one of the walls.
 
It
sorta
blew up, between me feeling Oak’s invisible shackles going up and Jason turning around to round kick Abel. Allie jumped on Jason’s back, Abel side stepped Jason’s kick causing him to be off balance. Jason flipped Allie over to the mat, she bench pressed him off of her, and got to a standing position in one fluid movement.
 
Everyone in the house had piled into the doorway and basically everyone stopped and stared at the skinny girl that just took down a werewolf single handedly.
 
That is when crowd control in the form of a Pack Alpha came in handy.

Silently my dad was giving hand signals to everyone to step down.
 
Josie ran over to Allie to see if she was okay and about that point is when we all realized we had to act normal and not let her know something was up with us.
 
One thing we couldn’t get our minds around was
how did she do that
.
 
How in the hell did she do that?
 
A very good question, and one that was going to be interesting trying to answer.
 
As usual it was my job to get to the bottom of it and figure things out.

Abel was the one that gathered composure and he checked on his sister and then he came over to see if I had any idea what was going on.
 
Everyone was laughing and having a good chuckle but I was a little worried.
 
Cat didn’t seem
phased
by any of it, she didn’t question our strength and she didn’t want to quit with the training.
 
We spent the rest of the time fighting and testing reflexes.
 
Abel’s reflexes were off the charts, you would have thought he had been a trained gymnast with all of the tumbling he did and how fast he was to miss a punch.
 
The other incredible thing about him was he instinctively followed my dad’s symbols and could send signals out just as fast.
 
Most bitten
weres
don’t fit into a Pack without a mentor to train them, and it usually took a year or two before they start recognizing the signals. They for sure couldn’t send out signals another Pack member would pay any attention too.
 
Abel was a natural, and everyone paid attention, except
you know who
.
 
Parker, mister contrary himself.
 
It amazed me he was still in the Pack with his attitude but he managed to sweet talk my mom and my dad into keeping him.
 
It was going to be interesting to see how he would do with Abe being the Great Wolf since his insubordination was enough to get him killed via Pack law. With the O’Connell’s coming, they would see it as rogue actions and kill him themselves

It didn’t seem like things were going to get any easier until the next morning when we woke up and there was a note from Parker saying he was going to be gone for a while.

Dear Pack Master Phelan,

In light of the current situation I have decided to take on a hunting expedition that some friends on
Facebook
have invited me to.
 
I hope when I get back we can talk.

Parker

Sadly, I felt relieved.
 
After talking with Abel he confirmed Parker didn’t say anything to him, it looked like things may be looking up.
 
Me being a child of not looking a gift horse in the mouth, I accepted it rather quickly.

My dad called an emergency Pack meeting to discuss all of the events in the last few days.
 
The one issue that was on everyone’s mind was Allie.
 
How did she react the way she did and not get hurt.
 
How did she predict the movements and how did she flip him over?
 
Everyone agreed we didn’t think she was were as we couldn’t smell it on her at all.
 
So it was decided Abel would have to be made aware of our suspicions of Allie and let him find out himself.

ABEL

The impending arrival of the O’Connell’s is starting to wear on my nerves.
 
We have trained, I’ve had my butt kicked about a hundred times a day and I kicked some
were
butt about 100 times a day.
 
All of the fighting only makes me hungry; I can’t get enough to eat.
 
My mom keeps saying I am having a growth spurt but I want to tell her I’m burning about 10,000 calories a day between running and fighting.
 
We do drills of flash cards with every Pack member from the Phelan Pack to the Luthuli Pack of South Africa.
 
I have memorized every smell both enjoyable and disgusting within a fifty mile radius of both Phelan properties.
 
I’m exhausted, yet exhilarated, maybe being an over achiever helps when you’re The Great Wolf.
 
It still made me laugh on the inside any time they spoke of TGW, because I’m just a kid from an average home with an average life and now I’m expected to be extraordinary in a short amount of time.

Allie isn’t sleeping at night. She just wants to sleep all day and will get up at dinner time.
 
Mom is always telling her if she would stop sleeping all day maybe she would be able to fall asleep at night.
 
Mom offered Allie an over-the-counter sleep aid, she gave her chamomile tea, and she made us listen to mood music piped through the sound system in the house.
 
Allie is still wired at night.
 
She likes that I don’t do much sleeping at night but for crying out loud, I do sleep and no matter what, I have to go to school. I have to get up in the mornings while sleeping beauty catches some
z’s
.
 

Pru had come to me about Allie and wanted to know if I noticed anything different about her.
 
Well, minus the sleeping I didn’t really see any difference.
 
Her appetite is about the same if not better (she at least
ate
some meat now.
 
I don’t trust salad eaters).
 
It is getting obvious the Pack thought something more was going on with Allie but they aren’t discussing it with me.
 
They want my energy focused on training.
 

The final bell rings, I grab my backpack and practically run out to my car. I click the remote, I’m meeting up with Oakley for a run in a few minutes.
 
Next to me is a black SUV I’ve never seen here before. A man gets out and walks over to me putting his hand on my shoulder. I muffled a scream (I scare easy, I can’t help it), I turn around and I’m face to face with the Pack Alpha from Ireland.
 
Great, just what I need, more drama, he is a day early.

I hold my right hand to the Alpha and say “Hello sir, you must be Mr. O’Connell, I’m Abel, and it’s nice to make your acquaintance” a little formal I know, but I didn’t expect to meet him when no one else was around
and
in the school parking lot.
 
I know that schools are off limits from fighting, too risky with kids around.
 
Where is Pru when I really need her?

Emotionless he stood, all six feet of him, shoulders back and face stern, and then he busted out laughing, his blue eyes full of life.
 
He took my hand and said, “Nice to meet you chap, I’ve waited a long time… the pleasure is all mine.”

It isn’t going so bad, except I have nothing else to say.
 
What do you discuss with the biggest
baddest
wolf in the world?
 
Hey, I hear you can take down a
were
with your mind, is it true?
 
No, I didn’t feel that to be worthy of talking about either, where oh where are my little wolf friends,
dammit
leaving me alone with the big bad wolf.
 
They suck.

Pony tail bouncing I see Pru bopping down the stairs of the school, she looks my way and she turns so pale her freckles all disappeared.
 
She gave a quick excuse to her friends and runs over to me.
 

“Hi Mr. O’Connell, it’s been a long time.”
 
Pru reached out shaking his hand.
 
“Speaking of time, we need to get home.” She looked at me and said, “You ready?
 
I’ve got a paper to get done, you know me, the study queen.”

He put his hand on her shoulder and pulled her in for a big bear hug, “Pru, you’re so lovely, just like your mother.
 
How are your parents?
 
I’m sure they’ve heard about my travels to the States.
 
I can’t wait to see them again.”

“Yes sir.
 
Abel is about to give me a ride home if you’d like to follow us.”