Wolf and Soul (The Alaska Princesses Trilogy, Book 3) (24 page)

But Grady still couldn’t believe it. “Five million,” he said, feeling the shock roll around in his head.

“Yes, five million.”

“Five million,” he repeated again, his head starting to swim.

Tu shook her head impatiently, like his response was just silly. “Grady, yes, five million.”

And that was the last thing he heard, before his legs gave out from underneath him.

The next thing he felt was a glass of water being splashed into his face. Then Tu and Alisha’s faces came into view overhead as he spluttered liquid out of his mouth and nose.

Tu turned the transmitter back on and said, “See, I told you, Alisha.”

“Yes, I suppose he most likely didn’t know. Sorry,” Alisha responded, her face and voice a study in how to deliver the most begrudging of apologies.

Grady shook the water off like a wet dog and sat up. Tu. She had saved him. Not just his heart, not just his soul, but the future of both his crown and state. He pulled her into his arms.

“Your dad’s an idiot. You know I would have paid him five million to marry you, right? I mean I would have had to ask Rafe for a loan, but I would have.”

The smile she gave him could have lit up their entire kingdom town, it was so luminous.

“Yeah, I know, Wolf,” she said, pressing a sweet kiss to his mouth. “But don’t tell

my dad that when he and my mom come down here tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow? Your parents are coming here tomorrow!?”

“Yeah,” she answered, tugging at his hand. “So get up, Wolf. We have a lot of work to do before they arrive…”

T
HE NEXT DAY, Grady found himself waiting outside his little farm house in the first suit he’d ever bought for his own kingdom’s business. Tu was on his right, Rafe on his left, while Alisha flanked Tu’s other side.

Tu and Alisha were talking with their heads together, probably a last-minute strategy session for how to handle the impending visit. After he fainted, Tu had gone from telling her sister off to acting like her presence was an early Christmas gift. Grady and Rafe had done more signing over the past day than over the past year, because their wives pretty much ignored them as they talked and talked and talked—Grady suspected they hadn’t talked like this in a very long time, even though they’d been living in the same house for the past year.

And when Tu finally returned home after staying up late with Alisha, drinking tea in a nearby hotel bar, it had been all, “Alisha says Daddy might try to block the dowry, so we should… and Alisha says she wants to help us get a wolf program at Oklahoma Northeast University. She says it’s the only way to keep our best wolf talent in state—though she thinks we’ll still lose our best football players to Denver U. We’ll have to show her on that one.”

It was funny because when he’d first observed the two sisters at Mag’s celebration six years ago, they’d been on opposite sides of the same coin. Alisha, an academic who thought she knew everything, Tu, a party girl who thought she knew everything.

Life had beaten them both up since that night, but it hadn’t knocked them out. No, not at all. And now that they were finally both women, it turned out they had a lot more in common than they’d originally thought. No, better than that, now they knew each other’s value and would never let anything come between them again.

Seeing their heads together, their hands joined like they were preparing to do battle with a common enemy, did Grady’s heart good, even if he was too nervous to concentrate on reading their lips.

His anxiety only increased when the Cadillac Escalade appeared in the distance, kicking up dirt as it headed toward them, shiny and black and looking way out of place in their small Oklahoma kingdom town.

“
House too small
,” he signed to Rafe. “
Shouldn’t meet here. Should meet town hall or—
”

“Too late,” Rafe signed and spoke back. “Plus, it’s tradition. The king would respect you less if he sees you’re ashamed of your house.”

Rafe leaned in and signed further, “I know you started out as a beta, but you’re the alpha now. Remember that. When he’s here, he’s on your land. He is owed the respect of a king, but he owes you even more respect because he is in
your
state. He’s going to try to top dog you. Don’t let him. This is a business talk. Treat it like business.”

Good advice that Grady fully planned to take, until Tu’s cousin Vince climbed out of the driver’s seat and opened the door for the small king, who then came around the back of the car to open the door for his queen. Tu was the smallest wolf in her family, but the king looked to be a close second. Along with his stature, he was also plump, with a perennially pleasant expression that put Grady in mind of a laughing Eskimo cartoon, even though he was wearing a business suit with a black overcoat. However, there was no doubting his status.

He carried himself like an alpha, crossing the distance between him and the greeting party with the confidence of a president, before parting from his wife to clasp Rafe around the forearm and pull him in for a fatherly hug.

“Good to see you again, Son,” he said.

Wilma was talking to both Tu and Alisha now, her hands on their shoulders, so it would have been awkward for Tu to take attention away from their conversation to transmit for Grady. Grady might have thought it an unfortunate coincidence a week ago, but after seeing how Tu had handled his pack leaders, he quickly assessed Wilma’s sudden need to talk to her youngest daughter as what it was—a business tactic. The king had effectively disarmed Grady’s most important business weapon in a matter of seconds.

Grady looked over at Rafe who was on the receiving end of some small talk from the king. Tikaani’s face was warm as could be, but his eyes didn’t once go to Grady. It was like having the most important man in the room come up to your friend and then totally ignore you, in a way neither you nor he could get around without coming off as rude.

And Tu’s words came back to him.

“King Tikaani Business Rule: Strategy. Everything you do. It’s all strategy from the moment you step into a business space.”

He could see now if Tu was Luke Skywalker. Tikaani was Yoda, all cute and wrinkly until he pulls out that light saber in Episode II.

Grady would have bet money Rafe was looking for a break in the conversation to make an introduction, but Tikaani didn’t even let them have that. After telling Rafe how his father, Dale, had tried to get in on this trip, but had been shut down by his mother who loved her three grandsons but refused to babysit them alone, he abruptly turned to Grady, and signed, “
Hello, Grady
.”

“
Hello,
” Grady signed back. Then he awkwardly pocketed the phone he had pulled out to talk with Tu’s parents and signed. “
I didn’t know you signed.”

“Only little. Learn fast after I see my daughter in Wolf Springs clinic. Think I might need to know for wedding.”
His eyes went cool then, and it had a very chilling effect, somewhat akin to having Santa Claus glare at you. “
But we never get invitation.”

Beside him, he felt Tu open up her mind, a sign that she was about to start transmitting to him, but Grady pushed into her head, “No, let me talk to him. Just me.”

“But—”

“Tu, this is my duty to you and to my kingdom. Let me do it.”

He didn’t wait for Tu to respond before signing to the Alaska alpha, “
Your signing very good.”

“Thank you,”
her father signed back.

Grady tapped Rafe on the shoulder. “
But I’m asking Rafe translate, make sure you and queen understand what I sign. I want both you to understand what I say. Okay, Rafe?
”

“Sure,” Rafe signed and spoke, although he was probably wondering along with everyone else why Grady didn’t ask Tu who had a direct link to his mind to do his translation work.

Grady didn’t keep them wondering long.

“You hurt Tu. When she need you most, you make her feel like shit,”
he signed slowly to her parents, giving Rafe the time he needed to speak what he said. From the appalled looks that came over Tikaani’s and Wilma’s faces, he guessed Rafe had done him the service of translating his words precisely, and he continued on.

“My wife is amazing, best wife any wolf could have. She don’t see I’m not good enough for her. Because of you, her parents. It will take me years to make her not think she ruined. Because of YOU. No, we don’t invite you our wedding
.”

He stopped, waiting for Tu to make him stop talking to her parents this way. But for once she didn’t say anything, didn’t try to impose her own agenda on the business conversation. And that spoke to the truth of his words more than anything else could have.

“
You her parents. If Tu want, you can stay in our lives. But if you ever say words make her feel she not amazing, I will ban you from my kingdom
.”

Tikaani’s eyes narrowed as he signed. “
You ban after you take my money
!”

“
Yes, after. Tu wants your money for many Oklahoma business deals we make. Tu has vision for our crown. She need your money, but WE don’t need YOU
.”

It was always silent in Grady’s world when Tu wasn’t in his head, but at that moment, it was even more silent than that. The King and Queen of Alaska were looking forward in such a way, there was no doubt a furious conversation was taking place behind their eyes. But other than that, nobody was talking. Nobody was moving. They all waited to see how Tikaani would respond to Grady’s signed words.

The king took a step toward Grady, bringing them nearly wingtip to cowboy boot, and Grady stood up straight, hoping to God this conversation didn’t end up with him having to easily deflect the much smaller wolf’s punch.

But then the king burst out laughing.

“See Wilma, didn’t I tell you? I knew I picked right!” he said out loud. He then explained to Tu, “Your mom didn’t think I made the right call sending you back up to Grady after you showed up at the clinic. Near chewed my ear off about it—you know how prejudiced she can be when it comes to wolves from mange states, even though she’s from one herself, but I said, ‘I’ve been watching that deaf beta over the years, and mark my words, he’s going to make a great king.’ I told her I could see it in him, the way I saw it in Rafe’s dad back when we met in college and he was just some no-name wolf from a Colorado rez pack. And I told your mom you two would be a good match. Your mom called me crazy, told me I was flushing good dowry money down the toilet.”

The Alaska king slapped his knee, looking happier than a fox who’d eaten all the chickens in the hen house as he turned to his wife and said, “But look at these two now, Wilma! He’s all wolfed out over her. Defending her, making sure she gets the money she needs to make her crown thrive. And look at your daughter! Cute little orange dress, none of that black and grey crap. Going all over the state, making business deals.” The king pumped both fists in the air like a boxing champion. “Who called it? Who called it?”

The queen looked absolutely furious. “It’s not polite to rub it in, Husband.”

“Why not?” Tikaani demanded, doing what looked like an Eskimo step dance of triumph. “You would if you were the one who got to choose what we watch on TV for the next whole year.”

“Am I…?” Grady started to push into Tu’s head.

“No, you’re not reading their lips wrong,” Tu answered back, sounding more than a little peeved. She turned the transmitter back on and said out loud to her parents. “You bet
an entire year of television
on whether I would be a good match with Grady?”

“Yep!” her father answered, bopping his head up and down. “And I won! No
Rap Stars Wives
for an entire year. The remote control is mine!”

Now Alisha and Rafe were the ones wearing appalled looks and tears sprang to Tu’s eyes. Grady could understand why. Her parents… well, as insults went, this was pretty much the king of them. And though he hadn’t expected to actually have to ban his in-laws from Oklahoma, he raised his hands to make it official.

But before he could sign his pronouncement, Tu said, “You guys are the worst!” She then stepped forward and threw her arms around her parents, pulling them into a group hug. “I hate you so much,” she said, crying into their shoulders.

The kind responded by saying, “Oh, and since you didn’t invite us to the wedding, we decided to give you the worst gift of all. Vince agreed to be your beta king’s beta!”

“What?” Tu screeched. “No! Nooooo!”

“Too late, cuz,” Vince answered coming out of his bodyguard stance. “You done fucked up, and now you’re stuck with my ass for life!” Her cousin then made a farting sound, before wrapping his big arms around Tu and her parents.

Wait, now he had a new beta? What the… what was happening?!?! Grady looked to Rafe for an explanation. Rafe just signed back, “
Welcome to the truly insane family
.”

“And don’t think you’re going to get remote control privileges when you come up to Alaska this Christmas,” King Tikaani said.

“I didn’t realize we were coming to Alaska for Christmas,” Tu said.