Winter’s Wolf (16 page)

W
INTER
BUTTONED
the new long-sleeved shirt and tucked it in his Levis. Three shirts. How freaking civilized could he get? And for what? He could end up writing off this whole experience, shifting, and running back to Canada in furry form. Still, a lot of guns and hunters between here and there. Easier to travel looking like a human—and for that he needed money.

He stepped out of his bedroom and ran straight into Damon coming through the front door. “Where have you—”

“Where are you—?”

They both stopped and stared at each other. Winter shrugged. “I’m going out.”

“I can see that. Where to?”

“To my accounting job.”

“Oh, good.”

“The sooner I earn enough money to get out of this hellhole, the better.”

Damon frowned. “I thought you were settling in. I heard you went to see Lindsey Vanessen.”

“You heard—?” He nodded. “Oh right, from her. You heard from Lindsey’s mother.” Okay, he sneered it, and weirdest of all, Damon let him get away with it. Worst of all, Winter didn’t mean it since he really liked the lady.

“Yes, she told me you were a gracious and charming young man.”

Way to make him feel like crap. “I thought she was nice too.” He looked up and saw Damon’s sappy smile. “All the more reason not to get the human killed!”

Damon looked annoyed but his voice stayed even. “I’d never do that. I have great respect for the cardinal rule.”

Winter shook his head. “What’s your plan, Damon? You can’t stay here. So what, you’ll whisk her off to the wild? Live as a human for the rest of your life? Come on. Even Lindsey Vanessen has the pack to take the edge off living in their society, and he’s half human. You’re an alpha-class were. Yes, that gives you lots of control, but it also gives you lots of power. The pack may not even let you leave with her.”

“It doesn’t matter. She’d never go.”

Powers, Damon looks like somebody killed his puppy.
“Yeah, I know. I only had to take one look to know her whole world revolves around her son. No chance she’d leave him.”

Damon spread his hands. “So you see my dilemma.”

Shit.
He did not want to stand here and feel sorry for his father, the fucking liar. “Maybe you should have thought of this crap before you came back?”

“I didn’t know who she was.”

Winter frowned. “You knew she was human.”

He walked to the small couch and dropped in it. “I fucked up. I’m sorry.”

Well, double shit.
“Look, man, I truly am sorry, and I wish you could have what you really want.”

Damon looked up. “Are you gay?”

“What the fuck?”

“Are you?”

“Yes. Yes, I am.”

“Ironic, isn’t it, that I should have been such an asshole on this subject, only to learn that I have two sons who are both gay?”

Winter crossed his arms. “You think it’s your fault? Defective werewolf genes or something?”

“I considered it.” He smiled tightly and shook his head. “But I finally came to the fact that I don’t care if you’re gay. I think you’re pretty great, Winter. You’re bright, capable, and you’ve grown into a fine male. If I want to be proud of that, I have to be proud of you being gay too, since it’s a part of you.”

“Well, shit.” He swiped an arm across his eyes.

“I want you to have whatever makes you happy.”

Matt Partridge’s green eyes flashed in his mind. “I’m afraid that’s going to be as hard for me as it is for you.”

Damon gazed at him levelly. “Sorry to hear that.”

“Maybe we should just pack up and go back home.”

“I can’t. She’s willing to see me and spend time with me now. Who knows how long that can last? She’s so much more incredible than I even imagined, and that’s saying a lot.”

Winter looked at the sunlight out the window. “Did you two—?”

“Oh no. She’d never fall into bed with the likes of me.”

“Uhhh—”

“That was her one night of craziness—maybe in her whole life. No, I slept outside her house. I just thought I might catch a glimpse of her in the morning.”

He shook his head. “Oh man, you’ve got it bad.”

“Yeah.” He sighed. “But if you want to go back to Canada, I’ll give you whatever money I can to get you there. Merced might lend me a grubstake to start you in a business. I can work it off to pay him back.”

Winter slid a hand through his hair. “Man, you should fall in love every day.”

Damon’s face crumpled, and Winter covered the space between them and sat beside him, putting an arm around his shoulders. “I’m sorry. That was callous. I don’t want to leave you. Hell, in almost twenty-one years, I’ve gotten used to you, old man.”

Damon rested a head on Winter’s shoulder. That was pretty much a first.

Winter petted Damon’s thick, pale hair, so much like his own. “Let’s see what happens. Maybe no Canada. Maybe we’ll move to New York and become sewer wolves. Hell, what have I got without you? You gave up everything for me. I can hang around and make sure you don’t become dog food.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah.” He took a deep breath and sat back so he could look Damon in the face. “But if we’re staying, there’s stuff going on you need to be aware of.”

“What?”

“Merced and Landon have opposition from what I gather is a conservative faction that hates the alliance made by marrying two males.”

“Yeah, I heard Merced allude to that at the party in a conversation with one of his betas.”

“I think these dudes are gathering power. Maybe training a lot of young males who are easy to sway. I think they’re trying to recruit me.”

“No shit?”

“Yeah. They tested my firearms capability and asked me to shift at will. I think they like my blood connection to Marketo. Have they approached you?”

“No. But they may sense I’m too close to Merced.”

“Whereas I’ve made it pretty clear I don’t much like established authority at all.”

“Do you plan to talk to Merced? Warn him?”

“I mentioned something to Lindsey about it, and he said Marketo knows who the opposition is.” He shook his head. “Plus I’m not so sure we want to talk to anybody yet.”

Damon raised an eyebrow. “Why? You hankering to be an alphanta?”

“Hell no. But you’ve got a lot to lose. I think we need to wait and see who’s most, shall we say, sympathetic to our cause.”

“
Our
cause?”

Winter shrugged. “I meant it when I said I wanted you to have what would make you happy. Shit, I want us both to. Maybe this faction would let you have your human.” And let Winter have his.
As if that would happen.

“No werewolf is going to go back on the cardinal rule for a lone wolf and his pup.”

Winter grinned. “Ya think? I guess it depends on what they want and how badly they want it.”

“Hell, when did you become this political?”

Winter laughed. “When in Rome.”

W
INTER
TURNED
in his hours to Freedman’s assistant, took the cash she gave him, and walked out into the afternoon sunshine. Three hours of accounting.
Cross-eyed.
But he’d done worse in his checkered career. So where else could he get a job? Best to have some money under the mattress when whatever shit was coming down went splat. At least he’d reconciled with his father, and that felt good. Right. They’d been a team since Winter was born. Besides, who the fuck was Winter to tell Damon not to want a human?

He crossed the front parking strip and headed for the side lot.

“Hey, Thane.”

He’d know that snarky voice anywhere. Winter turned. “Hey, Junior.” The young wolf hung out the passenger window of an SUV driven by Mario.

“You busy?”

“Just finished some accounting work for the marshal.”

“Want to make some scrilla?”

“Sure. What you got?”

“Simple delivery job.”

“Sure. Thanks to the marshal, I’ve got wheels. Just tell me where to go.”

“No, you come with us.”

“Why? You delivering a refrigerator?”

Junior glanced over his shoulder. “No, three deliveries, three guys. We split the fee three ways.” He reeked of dishonesty.

“I appreciate it and all, but why can’t you two do it?”

Mario leaned around Junior. “Get over yourself, Thane. All you need to know is there’s a hundred bucks in it for you.”

Curiosity and a hundred bucks. Huge incentives. He shrugged, opened the back passenger door, and slid in. “Lead on.”

Mario turned up the rock music to the point of pain and drove to the outskirts of the town. Winter’s nose went crazy the whole time. Why couldn’t he remember the scent? He usually remembered anything his nose told him.

On a backstreet, leaves and some rusted lawn furniture decorated the front yard of a beaten-up two-story shingle-covered house. Mario pulled up and left the motor running, slid out, walked around, and opened the hatch. After fiddling in the back for a while, he moved toward the house, carrying a parcel wrapped in brown paper and tied with string. Interesting. Drugs?

A tall, thin, male human answered the door, looked toward the car with a frown, accepted the parcel, and handed Mario an envelope. Mario ran back to the car and drove off fast. Fifteen minutes later, deeper in the woods, they repeated a similar process with Junior, except he went inside the recipient’s house, stayed about five minutes, and ran out with his envelope, looking freaked. He climbed in the car, slammed the door, and Mario accelerated. “Everything okay?”

“Shit, some people just live like pigs.”

“Yeah, well, they’ve got other priorities.” He laughed at his own nonjoke. Mario looked at Winter in the rearview. “So all you have to do is what we did. Take in a package and collect an envelope.”

“What’s in the package?”

“None of your business. None of any of our business, right, Junior?”

“Right.” Junior leaned around the seat. “It’s an easy hundred. Don’t complain.”

“I still don’t see why you need me if it’s so easy.”

Junior glanced at Mario. “Let’s just say the next homeowner is a big guy, and we needed a similarly big guy to make sure he wants to pay for his purchase.”

Mario reached over and smacked Junior’s head. “Shut up, man.”

Winter nodded. “Okay, that makes sense to me.” Yeah, it sure did.

Junior smacked Mario back. “See, it makes sense.” He turned back to Winter. “So just go in, look large, and get the envelope.”

“Should I count it?”

“No. Somebody else does that. If it’s the wrong amount, they take care of it.”

Mario snorted. “Yeah.”

They pulled onto a side road and stopped in front of a very ordinary-appearing suburban middle-class house. At the end of a street on a cul-de-sac, the ranch house looked like a bunch of kiddies would run out with their bikes any minute. Winter peered through the car window. “You sure this is the right place?”

Junior nodded. “Yeah. Just get the last package from the back and take it in.”

Winter opened the door and slid out on the street side, keeping the car between him and the house. Even a gun had trouble killing a werewolf unless the shooter used special bullets, but getting shot wasn’t fun. He flipped open the rear compartment and saw a metal container in the shape of an ice chest. “Is it in this chest?”

“Yeah. Open it.”

He cracked it slowly. He’d assumed there must be drugs in the packages, and the odor inside the container instantly confirmed it. Pot and heroin, it smelled like. “You guys delivering this for the marshal?”

Mario snarled. “No. Now shut up and do it.”

Should he turn over the car with the two doofus brothers inside it? Or try to find out what was really going on?
Gotta know how all this weird shit fits together.
He grabbed the smelly package, walked across the manicured lawn to the front door, and knocked.

The door opened. Talk about not what he expected. The pleasant-looking suburban housewife smiled. “May I help you?” Everything about her spoke of soccer games and car pool harmlessness, if you didn’t count her scent. That screamed cobra-lethal.

Winter smiled back. “Yes, ma’am. I’m delivering a package.”

She gave Winter a fast but thorough appraisal, and a slight shift of odor indicated she didn’t like what she saw. “Oh? Where’s Junior?”

“In the car, ma’am.” He pointed over his shoulder.

Her lips tightened. “Sent you to do his dirty work, did he?”

“No, ma’am. Just to deliver the package.”

“So you’re unaware that he shorted me on his last delivery?”

“Yes, I am unaware of that and very sorry to hear it. Has he indicated how he’ll make it up to you?”

“I was planning on taking it out of his ass. I’m thinking I should take it out of yours just as a warning to people who try to cheat me.”

He grinned and stretched to his full height. “Forgive me, ma’am, but that could be hard.”

“Not necessarily.” She tapped her hand against the door she leaned on, and it moved farther open, slowly revealing a man who must have weighed three hundred pounds of muscle and mean.

The guy scowled. “How about you hand over that package, sonny?” His voice sounded like a motorcycle minus a muffler.