Wolf and Prejudice (The Alaska Princesses Trilogy, Book 2) (22 page)

After they were dressed, Rafesson gave more commands. They went over to the duffle bag Alisha brought back with them, the one Rafe discarded without thought in a corner of the room. Rafesson rifled through the bag, before coming up with two child-sized iron swords, one of which he hand to Knud, and a small axe, which he handed to Nago.

Then they turned to him with weapons raised.

“Now wait a minute,” Rafe said. The last thing he needed to put the cap on this hellish week was having to fight off his three weapon-wielding sons.

But Rafesson dropped to his knee and lay his head against the sword’s hilt. “Father,” he said, in heavily accented English. “I do honor you.”

His other two brothers quickly dropped to their knees behind Rafesson and said in stereo, “Father, I do honor you.”

And then all three boys dropped their weapons and swarmed him, each wrapping their arms around as much of his waist as they could.

“We are happy to know you.” Rafesson said. His voice cracked and he buried his head in his father’s stomach, so perhaps he wouldn’t be able to see the tears that were obviously in his eyes.

“We are very happy to know you,” Nago and Knud said, their own glistening eyes speaking to how much they had missed him in their lives, even if they had never known him.

And suddenly the tears that sprang to his eyes weren’t due to the mate on the other side of town. “I’m happy to know you, too,” he told his sons. “I’m happy to know you, too.”

21

L
ess than a half hour after she forced herself to stop crying, a wave of profound happiness passed over Alisha, so intense she nearly started crying again, but this time with joy. It was so completely the opposite of the constant anger she’d been feeling over the past week that she knew in an instant Rafe must have finally met the boys, because that’s how she felt whenever they came home after any time away.

And despite the fact that she was in here and they were out there, she felt happy for the boys. It hadn’t been easy growing up in a village where fathers were considered the most important figures in a boy’s life. And though they’d never rebuked her for taking them away from Rafe, toward the end of their stay in Old Norway, they’d begun asking about their father more and more and not necessarily accepting the extremely vague answers she’d offered in reply.

But how to explain to the boys that their father was both living and yet to be born; that he would love them, but would ruthlessly use them to make alliances and serve his ongoing legacy? How could she explain to them that a prince’s life was not his own?

They might not have had a father, but they’d made friends who liked them for themselves and not for their titles. They had childhoods that didn’t consist of adults telling them to stay quiet at state dinners, to act at least three years above their current ages, to perpetually be on their best behavior—even at school because they represented the state crown and we’re always being watched.

In the village, Rafesson, Knud, and Nago had been untitled boys, free to grow into whatever they wanted. Here that would be decided for them. She wondered if they’d ever understand her reasons for keeping them from their father, or understand why she’d done what she’d done.

“The boys are great.”

The words we’re so close to what she’d been thinking about, it took her a moment to realize they weren’t her own thoughts, but a voice being pushed into her head. Rafe’s voice.

She sat up in bed, as if he were actually in the room with her.

“I know,”
she said, pushing words into his mind for the first time since she’d left him in Alaska. Re-establishing the connection on her end felt both intimate and relieving, like finally getting to pee after holding it for too long. An almost heady rush overtook Alisha as she said, “
I know they’re great
.
Really great.
”

“Strong and disciplined and smart—they speak two languages.”

“Old Norse way better than me.”

“They asked me to show them the books. They said you promised them more books than they could read in one day when they came to this land.”

She smiled.
“I did. The village only had one book, handwritten by Fenris’s Aunt Bera, and no one but her and her daughter were allowed to touch it. And I didn’t want to unduly influence history, so I had to make up stories for them off the top of my head. But historians are better recounters than authors, so my stories weren’t that great. I told them when we got back here, there would be more books than they’d know what to do with.”

“I’ll take them to the bookstore tomorrow.”

“Thank you,”
she said, but then the old anger she’d come to recognize as Rafe’s flared up.

“You’re angry again.”

“Fatherhood. I didn’t know it would feel like this.”

“Same for me and motherhood or I never would have…”
She stopped.

“What?”
he said.
“Say it.”

“I never would have left with the boys. If I had known what it was to be a parent, to love somebody else more than you love anything: your work, your pride, even your own life, I
…” She took a deep breath and admitted
. “I never would have denied you that opportunity. You lied to me and you hurt me, and after five days in this cage, I still can’t say I’m one hundred percent sure you’re not a sociopath. But I shouldn’t have done what I did. And I’m sorry.”

There was silence then, in both her cell and in her head. And though she’d braced herself for another wave of anger, it never came. Instead there was an absence of strong emotion, one so blank, it felt like a metaphysical reserve, like he was purposefully not feeling anything at that moment.

His lack of words or emotion made her strangely despondent, and she reached out to him with her mind before she could stop herself.
“Rafe? Are you still there?”

But there was no answer, and though she waited for one, she eventually drifted off to sleep, in the same clothes she’d worn all day, her head full of silence.

Only to be woken up a few hours later by Grady, rattling the cage. She lifted her tired head to see him opening up the cage door.

“What’s going on?” she asked. She looked over at the digital clock on top of the microwave. Its red numbers blared 2:36 AM into the darkness.

Grady didn’t answer, just swung the cage door open wide and headed back up the stairs.

That action alone woke Alisha all the way up. She got out of bed and followed his trail, taking tentative steps, and wondering if this was some kind of cruel trick. Would he reappear and throw her right back into the cage?

But no, she found the sheriff beta in the kitchen unpacking a bag of groceries into Chloe’s refrigerator and cabinets.

“He’s letting me go?” she asked when Grady didn’t immediately grab her by the arm and escort her back down to the basement.

He tapped out words onto his smart phone and turned it to face her. “King says you can have the run of the house now, sleep in either of the bedrooms. But you’re not allowed to leave the premises.”

Alisha’s heart sank a little. So she wasn’t free, she’d just been upgraded to a bigger cage. Still, it was better than nothing, and the thought of bathing herself in a way that didn’t consist of a couple of hand towels and a bucket of water sheepishly delivered by Rafe’s mother, made her skin prickle with joy as she followed Grady up the stairs.

“How about my boys?” she asked him. “Did he say anything about letting me see them?”

Grady shook his head and made a beeline for the front door. The mute equivalent of “conversation over.”

Alisha didn’t try to follow him. Grady seemed less than enthused to let her out at this time of night, and she doubted he’d be willing to speculate with her about Rafe’s mindset in expanding her prison to all of Chloe’s house. His hand was already on the front door knob.

But then he surprised her by turning around and typing a new note out on his phone: “Your sister… Tu. How long is she planning to stay in town?”

Alisha’s forehead scrunched up. “Since this is the first I’m hearing of Tu even being in town, I’ll have to go with I have no idea. Why?”

A look rife with disgust and frustration passed over his face. But then he merely pointed toward a leopard-print suitcase, sitting upright in the middle of the living room. Then he pushed his hand palm-forward toward her as if to say, “yours.”

Hers? Alisha frowned at the suitcase. From the leopard print alone, she was able to put together the situation. Her mother had arrived this morning with exercise clothes from her own wardrobe for Alisha to wear. She’d harassed Alisha into passing all the sweats Rafe had left for her in the chest of drawers through the bars, and claimed she was going to burn them for crimes against femininity. Then she’d promised to return with a “get out of jail free” wardrobe that would “bring that stubborn king of yours to his knees.”

“Thanks, I guess,” she said to Grady, eyeing the suitcase with a mix of curiosity and trepidation.

Grady just left without even a signed goodbye.

In the wake of his departure, Alisha carefully opened the suitcase like someone opening a cage with a rattlesnake inside. She’d been right to be afraid. There were a couple of lightweight cardigans and a pair of fashionable hidden wedge sneakers in the bag, but the rest of the suitcase consisted of clothing more suited to going out for a night on the town than being kept prisoner. Saucy little numbers with low necklines and high skirt lines that would cling to every curve she had, and heels that wouldn’t be out of place at a strip club. Plus, a bag full of makeup and enough high-end lingerie to clad an army of escorts.

“Oh, Mama,” Alisha said out loud with a tired laugh.

She took a shower, and put on the least revealing piece of lingerie in the bag—a lace one-piece that at least covered up her nipples and crotch unlike many of the other nearly see-through options in the suitcase—and crawled into the bed in the guest room.

This time she got to sleep for a little bit longer, but was nonetheless jerked from her slumber yet again by a familiar smell. Like freshly fallen snow on pine needles.

She opened her eyes. The morning sun was shining bright through the window now. And Rafe was standing at the end of her bed.

22

A
lisha
sat up in bed
.
How long had Rafe been standing there? Why hadn’t he woken her? And why hadn’t he said anything yet?

She gave him a tired and confused shake of her head. “What’s going on?” she asked.

He didn’t respond, just continued to stand there, staring down at her with that strange absence of emotion. A deeply unsettled feeling started to creep over her. “Rafe?”

“The boys are here,” he said abruptly, like he was biting out the words while under a considerable amount of strain. “I brought them to see you.”

She gasped. “The boys are here?” she said, scrambling out of bed. “Oh my Fenrir, thank you! Where are they?”

She started to head for the door, but he stopped her with an arm held up across her chest, blocking her exit. “Might want to change first.”

She looked down at the lacy one-piece and cringed. “Oh God, I can’t believe I almost went out there looking like this.” She ran to put on one of the dresses her mother had sent. Again, this was the best of the lot in that it had a cowl neck and at least came halfway to her knees.

She’d have to ask Rafe to ask his mother to get her something decent to wear, since apparently, her own mother couldn’t be trusted to pick out a decent outfit for a mother of three. But right now, all that mattered was the dress covered up enough of her body. As soon as she donned it, she ran past Rafe into the living room.

“Mama! Mama!” her three boys cried.

They were all dressed in jeans and t-shirts with Marvel superheroes on them and despite having been born over a thousand years ago, they looked exactly like modern day little boys.

She bent down with her arms wide and they fell into her, yelling about everything they’d seen and done that morning at the top of their lungs. Something about tablets and a market of books and Nago being okay.

“Ssh! Ssh! One at a time,” she said. It wasn’t an unfamiliar phrase. Triplets came with their share of challenges, and the all-three-talking-at-once thing was a constant battle.

As usual, Knud and Nago deferred to their oldest brother. “Our most honored father did take us to many markets, larger than any we ever seen. He did buy for us wondrous machines called tablets!”

“But they don’t look like tablets from our land,” Knud interjected.

“It only took them ten minutes to figure out how to use them,” Rafe informed her, shaking his head with both confused awe and pride.

“We went to a book market, too,” Rafesson said. “And there were many books, like the ones you did tell us about!”

“They have pictures!” Knud told her excitedly.

“We got very many books, and father paid for them with a
credit card
,” Rafesson told her.

“And the musicians in the ceiling played ‘Nago, Are You Okay!’” Nago told her, jumping up and down.

“No way!” Alisha said, fighting hard to keep from laughing.

“Except in this land, the musician sings ‘
Annie
are you okay,’” Nago said with a disappointed frown. “Father says the song name is ‘Smooth Criminal.’”

“A criminal is the same as a thief,” Rafesson informed her.

“Yes, I know,” Alisha told him, hoping to God they wouldn’t be too disappointed when they found out “I’m Knud” was actually “Bad” and “Dirty Rafesson” was actually “Dirty Diana.”

Rafe folded his arms.

“Our most honored father was surprised when we began to dance.”

“Many people did smack their hands together when we danced,” Knud told her. “Father calls it ‘clapping’ and this means they liked our dance.”

Alisha lost the battle with laughter at that point. “I’m sorry, Rafe. That was probably a little embarrassing, right?”