The Power Of The Bite (9 page)

“You didn’t fight for your alleged mate?” Now Lance was almost sneering at Dax, which put Zane’s hackles right up. But Dax still had the situation handled.

“My mate didn’t need any help. For fucks sake, he’s far stronger than Cole will ever be. I trusted that and believe me, so should you.” Zane heard Broz snort at the comment and figured that probably had something to do with the fact that Dax would have taken out Cole himself, and probably killed him if Zane hadn’t moved faster.

“Well we appear to have a bit of a stalemate then,” Lance said taking in the size and demeanor of the vampires at the door and making, what Zane considered, the sensible decision not to engage them. “You know if I don’t take the detective back, your father is going to be severely displeased.”

Dax nodded and pulled his phone out of his pocket, hitting a single digit on the screen.

Chapter Ten

“Father, we appear to have a problem. Your men are here to collect Cole’s worthless hide and apparently have orders to take in my mate as well. You have to know that is not acceptable to me.” Dax’s voice kept his voice firm but respectful at the same time.

“Your mate is a vampire. He struck and incapacitated a member of my pack. I can’t allow for that to go unpunished.”

“Your pack member attacked my mate without provocation and Zane did nothing but defend himself. And for some reason it seems you have exposed your motives more than you should have. Lance told me Zane was to be taken in for questioning. You have already passed sentence and decided to go straight for punishment. It’s not going to happen, Father, so back down on this before you lose face.”

“Are you challenging me?” Dax thought he could hear a hint of excitement in his father’s voice. What was the old man up too? And then it hit him.

“You’d think that would be my only option, wouldn’t you Father, because that’s what you are trying to corner me into. But you’d be wrong. I don’t want to challenge the man who raised me, not because I don’t think I wouldn’t win, but because I have more respect for you, than you have ever granted me. You spent years teaching me pack law and I know that all I have to do is advise you that I am leaving your territory within the next seven days, and there is nothing you can do to me or my mate. So consider yourself advised, and one last thing, if you don’t want to lose four really good enforcers, then I suggest you call them off as well. I’m not without friends of my own and your men are currently outnumbered in a human populated club.”

“Dax. This wasn’t…” Dax clicked off the phone and caught Lance’s eye, waving his hand at Cole, who was starting to stir. “Please remove your pack member from my club. He is trespassing, unless you would prefer that I call the human authorities and have them deal with it?”

“You know we don’t want that,” Lance said, indicating for Joe and Tom, both men Dax remembered from childhood to pick up Cole who wisely stopped wriggling when he saw how crowded the room was becoming. When Tom and Joe left with Cole, Lance and his friend Bruce remained.

“Was there something else?” Dax asked, his mind already racing with things that he needed to get done. “Only as you can imagine I have a lot of things to get done if I am going to be out of the territory within seven days.”

“Dax, can I speak honestly here? Man to man.”

“Of course, if you don’t mind speaking in front of my friends. We don’t have any secrets between us.” Dax waved his hands to indicate Broz and the others who were all standing around the room like the bodyguards they were so well trained to be.  He moved around to his chair, and gently pushed Zane into it, preferring to stand, with his hand resting on his mate’s shoulder. Vampires did the whole silent thing really well, although Dax was aware any one of them could be in killer mode within seconds, and apparently Lance and Bruce knew it too.

“You know your Dad has trained you from birth to take over the pack,” Lance began.

“I am well aware of that, and up until I met Zane, I was quite prepared to accept my responsibilities. However, the pack won’t handle a vampire as Alpha Mate and Zane
is
my fated mate, not someone I picked at random to piss my father off.”

“He wasn’t?” Lance looked shocked and Dax wondered just what malicious rubbish Cole had been spreading about him. But then his father knew that Zane was fated as well, because Dax had told him.

“Babe, do you mind?” Dax’s hand strayed to the collar of Zane’s shirt and Zane picked up what was going on, undoing the top three buttons and pulling aside his collar. Lance and Bruce would both be able to see Zane’s scar, despite his pale skin because Dax had bitten into it again just a matter of hours before. Dax couldn’t resist running his finger over it, and watched Zane trying to control a full body shudder. Then he opened the top of his shirt, showing a similar scar evident below Zane’s new fang marks.

“Double claimed, one dies we both die, you know the story. I’d never be so cruel as to mess with someone other than another wolf in matters like trying to form a bonded mating. We all know that could get someone killed. Zane is my Fated Mate. I have no intention of living without him and if that means leaving the pack, then that is what I’ll do.”

“Cole told everyone that this was just a ruse from you so that you could evade your responsibilities for a few more years because you liked being a playboy. Your Father believed him, even though you had told him about you and your mate being fated. He planned to expose Zane at the challenge tomorrow night, forcing you to not only take over the Alpha position, but also claim a proper mate – a wolf this time. He has a number of candidates lined up, including Cole.”

“Cole would have had to believe that nonsense himself, or he wouldn’t be able to sell it to my father,” Dax said thoughtfully, thinking hard. A wolf’s ability to sniff out a lie was damn handy sometimes and close to infallible.

“Your friend Cole has been living it up as a prospective Alpha Mate for quite some time,” Zane said quietly. “Anyone not blinded by friendship or pack protocol would have seen it.”

“That still doesn’t explain why Cole challenged my father for the Alpha position. Cole didn’t have a chance of winning.” Was Dax upset at the thought of his best friend calling him a liar to his father? Too damn right he was. But he knew better than to show that kind of weakness in front of Lance and Bruce.

“There never was a true challenge,” Lance said, looking at Bruce as though unsure if he should continue. Bruce seemed agreeable to a spot of honesty, which was good, at least from Dax’s perspective. He kept thinking there was something he was missing. Something crucial. “Cole told your father about Zane, and that you were prepared to proclaim to the whole pack that a vampire was your mate, rather than become Alpha. Your father wanted Zane exposed for the fraud he’d been told that he was, sure that if the truth was revealed to you, you would turn on Zane, claim another and take your place the way your father intended. Cole had said you wouldn’t dare show your face, and was planning to leave town, hence the idea of a challenge to get you to the pack house with your mate before that happened.”

“And why didn’t Cole just tell me all this tonight? Why go through all the lies about wanting to be Alpha himself, and then settling for pack second when he knew that wouldn’t work. If he was my friend wouldn’t that have been his best option?” Dax hated not knowing the full picture. Why was his Dad being so adamant about him taking up the Alpha position? Why couldn’t he tell that Cole was lying through his eye teeth?

“Cole was still hoping to become Alpha Mate,” Zane said calmly. “You heard him. He was prepared to go through the farce, beat your father and still become your second to apparently protect me, when it’s crystal clear that both Cole and your Father intended on having me killed. If we weren’t double mated then his plan would have succeeded. The shirt you’re wearing tonight hid your marks, as well as mine, so Cole still thought he was in with a chance until this meeting.”

Dax didn’t know what to think. He knew his father would be annoyed with him for claiming his true mate, but tough shit. No paranormal should ever think they knew more than the Fates in the grand scheme of things. Another Alpha could have been brought in and trained up on the pack, and the pack would have still been okay. His father definitely intended for Zane to die, probably as a way of saving face, or maybe just so he could show the pack that he could still control his son. God only knows.

“Was there anything else you think I should know?” He said, suddenly feeling really tired. Intrigue and politics had never been his thing.

“I’ll inform the Alpha that I have seen proof that you are double mated, and that any violence against Zane will result in your death. I will also let him know that you have advised the Council that you will be staying within the territory for seven days, but will leave within that time.”

“Good point, thank you Lance. I will see it done.” Informing the Council would mean his father’s hands were tied. Nathaniel had to conform to pack law or risk punishment himself.

Lance bowed his head and he and Bruce made to leave. Stopping just by the door, he said over his shoulder, “For what it’s worth we would have followed you, with or without a vampire as a mate. I’ve never had any problems with vampires before, and I think you’d find most of the pack feel the same way. Most of them are quite simple in their needs – they want jobs, security and a strong Alpha. You could have given them that.”

Dax simply nodded in reply. The lump in his throat made it impossible to swallow, let alone speak. Broz and the others also made their exit, letting him know they were ready to head home whenever he and Zane were ready.

“Come here, babe,” Zane said pulling Dax down into the chair with him. “You’ve had a bit of a rough evening.”

“That’s an understatement,” Dax agreed, going with the motion and curling himself around his mate. Zane might be smaller physically, but he was a strong man and Dax didn’t have a problem appearing weak in front of him. Zane had already shown in so many ways that he would always protect Dax in all things. To the point of death.

“I’m so glad I got my head out of my ass before it was too late for you,” he said into Zane’s neck.

“So am I sweetheart. Believe me. So long as we’re still breathing, this life of ours can be fixed.”

“Then we’d better make sure we both keep breathing.” Then Dax had another thought. Shit, sometimes he wished his brain would shut down, even if just for a few hours. “What was the story with the wolfsbane in the beer? How did you pick that up? I didn’t smell it when the bottle was handed to me. Was that Cole’s doing too?”

“I was surprised to see that the bottle had been sent to your table opened,” Zane explained. “Normally it comes complete with the cap which you, rather suavely I might add, remove with your teeth. Your little hangers on seem to love it.”

“Shit, you really have been keeping an eye on me.”

“For months,” Zane agreed. “I knew you were mine from the moment I laid eyes on you. That tends to happen with vampires.”

“I think I’m flattered. But how did you know about the Wolfsbane? Not being rude, but I know your sense of smell isn’t as good as mine.”

“I may not be able to smell things as well as you, but my taste buds are far more enhanced. No matter what I put in my mouth I can tell you every ingredient, every element used and sometimes even what the ingredient was stored in, especially if it’s plastics. Wolfsbane was simple to detect because it has such a terrible taste.”

“You swallowed some. Won’t it upset your system?”

“No, there wasn’t enough there to upset me, or kill you and I didn’t actually swallow more than a drop. I think you were meant to feel a bit sick, but that doesn’t mean I was going to let you drink it. Wolfsbane has been used to break spells before, maybe it was an attempt to do something like that.”

“That doesn’t sound like something Cole would do,” Dax said thoughtfully. “Although, to be honest I’m starting to wonder if I ever knew the man at all.”

“I’m not one hundred percent sure that Cole was involved, purely because he did want to talk to you and he clearly didn’t expect to see either one of us in the club tonight. He hoped to, but he didn’t expect to. Nico knew there was something going on though.”

“Maybe Nico fancied his chances at you. I seem to recall he blushed every time he served you a drink, and when I sent him to get you that night I claimed you, he actually went and got Cole first instead.”

“So sweet, but you know I never took him up on anything offered. I never went with any wolves from your pack, not even Cole when he asked.”

“Then I owe you an apology because I did have…”

“I know that too, but I also knew from the moment you claimed me, that those roving days of yours were over.”

“I’m not sorry about that.” Dax regretted a lot of things, his friendship with Cole was just one of them. Having Zane in his life might be causing that life to spin in a direction he’d never intended, but he was never going to be sorry about it. “Any chance I can convince you to head upstairs with me for a bit of a snuggle?”

“How about we all head off home, my place, and then we don’t have to get up early, or run the risk of being interrupted. We’ll grab a change of clothes for you though, so you don’t have to keep trying to squeeze yourself into mine.”

“Best idea I’ve heard all night.” Dax dropped a kiss on Zane’s lips and then stood up. His heart was hurting, his brain was racing, but Zane was the one definite he could count on, and hopefully in the man’s arms, he would find some peace.