Spell Bond: More Tales From the Old World Read online

  My breath stopped. That one little sentence was like getting shoved through a trash compactor. After our years together, all the arguing and adjusting and conversations about family, Ryan was just…done with me?

  When I could breathe again, my chest seemed to refill with hurt and rage instead of air. “You’re kicking me out of the pack?” I sputtered, struggling to get the words out. “What the fuck, Ryan?”

  That little smile again, like something had amused him. This pissed me off even more, but before I could open my mouth to yell at him, he turned his body sideways to face me and said, “Of course not. But in another year or two, you’re going to outgrow us.”

  For a few long seconds, I could only stare at him with my mouth open. Outgrow the pack? What did that even mean?

  Ryan searched my eyes, as though he could literally read through my mind. “Do you really not know?” He sounded a little surprised.

  “Know what?”

  “Mary…you’re going to be an alpha.”

  A short, choked laugh escaped before I could swallow it. “Don’t be stupid. I’m not alpha material.”

  The smile got bigger, but it was full of kindness now. “God, the fact that you can even say that to me—or that you can show up here and demand to know what I want…you really don’t see it?”

  I could only stare at him dumbly.

  “Have you seen any other pack members fight me over their clothes, or where we’re going for the full moon, or why they need to show up to pack meetings?” he asked, and even in the low light I could see his eyes twinkling. “Do you know anyone else who’d get away with that?”

  “I guess I never really thought about it.”

  “Exactly. You’re so strong, and just…” He gestured in the air for a moment, searching for a word. “Fiercely independent. And as angry and passionate and stubborn as you are, you’re…well, not at peace, but settled. With yourself, with being exactly who you are. That’s rare for werewolves. That makes you alpha material.”

  “No,” I blurted. “I won’t leave you.” I cringed at the words, turning my head away so I wouldn’t have to see his pitying expression. “Your pack. I won’t leave your pack.”

  “Mary.” He sighed, and there was a note in his voice I wasn’t expecting. Sadness? Longing?

  I turned to face him again. His forearms rested on the knees of his jeans, and his eyes were on his hands, folded in front of him. With a tiny thrill of shock, I realized that he’d slumped forward a bit. On any human it would have been a normal, relaxed position. For an ex-Marine werewolf, the combination of that lowered gaze and his posture was downright unnerving.

  I edged closer, forgetting myself. “Ryan? Are you okay?”

  He put his hand on the ridge cap between us so he could turn his whole body sideways to face me. “I…don’t know what to say here, to be completely honest.”

  This was even more perplexing. When had Ryan Dunn ever not known what to say? He wasn’t a talkative man, but he always had this mentor/veteran vibe, like he’d seen everything the world had to offer, and would patiently advise while you discovered it, too. The thought that Ryan could be unsure of himself was deeply unsettling…and kind of fascinating. I’d always known there was more to him than he showed the pack, but I’d never expected him to willingly show me any kind of weakness.

  Then I felt a stab of panic. Was he at a loss because he was trying to figure out how to get rid of me? “What did I do wrong?” I blurted.

  He looked up sharply then. “You didn’t do anything wrong. Look—” He leaned toward me so he could dig something out of his pocket, and I caught a fresh wave of his smell—deodorant and sweat and sawdust—and something underneath it. My brain was still parsing through all the available information when he reached out to give me the little object.

  I automatically held out my hand, and he dropped a small piece of metal into my palm. I didn’t even look to see what it was, though, because as he began to withdraw his fingers brushed against mine, and a jolt of electricity, like a static shock, went all the way up my arm.

  I choked on a gasp of surprise, dropping my eyes again. What the hell was that? I thought that kind of thing only happened in romance novels with women in frilly dresses and guys in billowy shirts. Now my fingers tingled with the urge to touch him again, and I had to force myself to look down and see what was in my hand. It was a key.

  “—all the pack wolves,” Ryan was saying. “At least, eventually. But I thought you were ready. And I…well, I put in a little extra work for you.”

  I looked from the key to his face, uncomprehending. He saw my confusion and smiled, tapping his fingers on the roof between us. “This house, Mary. It’s for you.”

  For a long time, I could only stare at him as he waited patiently, giving me the time. “You got me a house? A house,” I sputtered, half-certain that I must have misunderstood. Surely he meant I was supposed to help with the repairs or be the landlord for new tenants or something. I knew Ryan bought houses and flipped them as a side thing, a hobby, but it couldn’t possibly be—

  “It’s yours,” he repeated. “I have to fix that soft spot in the roof, of course, and the house still needs some cosmetic work—new carpet in the living room and paint in both bedrooms—but I figured you’d want to pick all that out yourself.” He broke off, looking closely at my face. “Mary? Are you okay?”

  I realized with absolute horror that my lower lip was trembling. “It’s just…I’ve never owned anything.” I shook my head, trying to find words that wouldn’t make me sound like an idiot. “I never thought I could…I didn’t hope…” I clamped my mouth shut and turned my body at a right angle away from him, because if I didn’t I was going to cry, and I absolutely could not allow that. Not in front of him.

  “Mary.” I thought I couldn’t be surprised any more that night, but then Ryan slid his body down the roof, lower and lower so he could circle down to be in front of me. I waited for the old crash of wrongness to hit me, but there was nothing this time. Instead, Ryan rested his palms lightly on the sides of my boots to get my attention.

  When I was able to look down at him again, his face was full of gentleness. It suddenly felt like all my senses were overloading. Ryan was so close to me—he was right there. “Before you even came to Cheyenne,” he said, “you were already stronger than any person should ever have to be. I’ve watched you grow, and I’ve felt…” he trailed off, clearing his throat.

  “What?” I said softly. “What have you felt?”

  He paused, long enough that I could actually see him choosing the careful word over the incendiary one. “Proud,” he said finally.

  I never made a decision, really. It was more that I watched my hand lift from my lap and gently come to rest on Ryan’s cheek, right where I’d always wanted to touch him.

  My fingers seemed to tingle again, or maybe the motion was coming from him, because he actually shuddered. He didn’t move, but his scent changed in a way that was both familiar and unexpected.

  Ryan Dunn wanted me back. That was the scent under his natural scent. How long had it been there?

  He must have seen my understanding, because something shifted on his face, and he slowly pulled away from my touch. “Mary…I can’t cross that line with you.”

  “Why not?” I heard my voice say.

  “It’s my job to protect you,” he said soberly. “And you’ve already been hurt by men who were supposed to protect you. I can’t be another name on that list.”

  His words, and the simple sincerity behind them, moved me more than I would have thought possible.

  I thought of how often I had pushed Ryan Dunn, all the arguments and battles I’d insisted on fighting, usually for reasons that had nothing to do with him. All the times I had planted my high-heeled boots and stood my ground over nothing more than the pull to fight someone. So many times when he’d been willing to be that person for me.

  And suddenly I didn’t feel the pull to fight.

  “You wer
e right,” I told him. “I have changed. I’m stronger and more whole than I was, and a lot of that is down to you.”

  His face softened, and I couldn’t help it—my hands rose again, and I let myself touch his face, gently stroking the coarse hair that started his beard. With werewolf hearing I couldn’t miss his pulse speeding up, his intake of breath. “I don’t need or want your protection anymore, Ryan, not like that. I just want you.”

  I lowered my head until we were level with each other, and then I kissed him.

  It started soft and exploratory, both of us giving the other space to back out, to pull away. Then the need hit, like a flame flashing across a pool of gasoline and igniting. I remember surging forward so I could straddle his lap, and then my memory goes white.

  In my years as a werewolf, I’d only ever been with human men. They were easy to control, which meant they were never really a threat. This was the first time I’d so much as kissed someone who could feel everything as hard as I could. It was almost blinding, except somehow my overloaded senses short-circuited me to a place of wonderful calm.

  Somewhere in the dazzle of it, we lost our balance, and Ryan toppled backward, landing us exactly on the one spot on the roof that wouldn’t hold. There was a loud crack, followed by a whole series of snaps and creaks, and then we were falling.

  I don’t think we let go even as we plummeted through the roof. We didn’t break apart for real until Ryan’s back hit the floor of the second story bedroom.

  I was fine—he’d cushioned the fall for me—but Ryan groaned, and it was like a cold shower splashing directly over my brain. Horrified, I disentangled the upper half of my body so I could sit up. “Are you hurt? Ryan?” My nose was full of the sawdust and insulation fibers that had risen up in a cloud around us, so I couldn’t tell if there was blood. Being impaled could potentially kill even a werewolf, and he wasn’t moving or answering me fast enough. I grabbed his shirt and yanked him into a sitting position, looking down his back over his shoulder for splintered boards or signs of injury.

  Then his whole body began to shake. I leaned back to check his face, but there was too much dust and no light at all inside the house. Could he be having a seizure? “Ryan!”

  A low rumbling sound followed, but it was still probably fifteen seconds before I understood that I was hearing laughter. The alpha werewolf of Cheyenne had thrown his head back to laugh with a wild, uncontrolled joy that sang in my ears.

  “You scared me!” I practically yelled at him. “I thought you were hurt!”

  “I’m sorry, it’s just…”

  “What?!”

  He threw his arms out to indicate the house around us. “It’s too perfect! I built something just the way I thought it should be, and you come and blow a hole right through the roof.”

  I looked around the wreckage of what had probably been a nice, if rather boring, bedroom, and then back at Ryan. “I guess I wanted a skylight?”

  He roared with laughter, and I felt myself smiling, settling my body down so I was comfortably in his lap. After a moment he reached up to brush dust and hair from my face. “Do you mind?” I asked shyly.

  By then enough dust had settled, and I could see his grin. “God, Mary. I’ve waited so long for someone to blow a hole through my roof.”

  It was too much. My body went limp with relief and joy, and I buried my face into the warmth of his neck. He wrapped his arms around me in return, whispering my name with a voice still full of mirth.

  Eventually, when the shock of all of it had worn off, his lips found other things to do.

  Afterward, I fell into a deep and contented sleep, right there in the pile of rubble.

  The room was freezing around us, but werewolves aren’t much bothered by cold, and besides, it felt a lot warmer with my limbs all tangled up with Ryan’s.

  I would have happily slept through the night, and maybe the following day, just like that. But I woke to Ryan stirring, then sitting up, beside me. I opened my eyes. It was just as dark outside as it had been, and I wasn’t yet starving, which meant we hadn’t slept very long.

  “What time is it?” I asked hoarsely. Whoops. I must have swallowed some of that dust. Beside me, Ryan was bent over something I couldn’t see.

  “Almost ten. Is your phone still working? Mine is a pancake.” His voice was tight with worry, and I sat up, suddenly feeling wide awake. Ryan was the alpha. He couldn’t just go offline.

  I rolled over and found my pile of clothes. The shorts were ripped nearly in half, but when I found the right pocket, my phone screen blinked on.

  I hissed at the sudden light, squinting to read the screen. “No missed calls or texts.”

  He swore. “They should have called by now.”

  My brain finally caught up, and a sharp lance of panic pierced my chest. “Matt and Cammie.”

  Quickly, I dialed Cammie’s number, but the call went right to voicemail. Matt’s phone was the same. I hung up and looked at Ryan. “Maybe they tried someone else in the pack?”

  Ryan shook his head. “Matt knew I was showing you the house tonight; if he couldn’t reach me, he would have called you.” He was already standing, pulling on his jeans. The button had been ripped off, and he paused just long enough to arch an eyebrow at me. I shrugged, unapologetic.

  “Can I use your phone to check for messages?”

  I unlocked the phone and handed it to him. While Ryan called his voicemail, I rummaged around for the remains of my own clothes, which I would supplement with the spare clothes in my car. Werewolves are used to destroying clothes, though not usually for this reason.

  A moment later Ryan handed the phone back. “No messages. I don’t like this.”

  “Should we call the vampire lady? Or her security guy?” I brushed dusty hair back from my eyes, watching Ryan think. He was as filthy as I was, but with a contained calm that I found soothing.

  After a second, he shook his head. “Let’s both go home and shower. I’ll try again in an hour, and then at midnight. If they still don’t answer…”

  He hesitated, and I knew the expression well enough to tell he was debating whether or not to share something. “What?” Oops. My old impatience was back.

  “If they still don’t answer, I’m driving down there myself. I’m owed a favor in Colorado.”

  It took me a second to remember, but when I did, I wasn’t impressed. “The death magic girl? You can’t trust her; she works for the vampire.”

  “I can’t explain it, but I know she’ll keep her word.” He gave me a crooked smile. “It’s a soldier thing.”

  “Then I’m coming with you.”

  His face began to harden. “The hell you are. None of us are really supposed to be over the state line without advance permission. It’s bad enough for me to take the risk. I won’t risk you too.”

  “You said I was alpha material,” I reminded him, crossing my arms over my chest. “I need to learn what an alpha would do. And you need someone watching your back, in case you’re wrong about the soldier.”

  He frowned at me. “Just because you can stand up to me doesn’t mean you always have to, you know.”

  I gave him my most obnoxiously sweet smile. “I know. But I’m still coming with you. After all, if something happens to you, who’s going to fix that?” I pointed a finger at the starry night sky, perfectly visible above our heads.

  Ryan’s face clouded over, then broke out in a grin. “Right through my fucking roof.” He shook his head ruefully. “All right then. Consider yourself a substitute beta until we find Matt.” He started toward the bedroom door, and I fell into step beside him. For the first time in ages, it felt like I was right where I belonged.

  Author's note

  Perhaps the biggest surprises for me as an author has been the Will-Sashi-Grace story that sprouted up alongside my main novels.

  As I explained in the introduction to “Powerless,” I wrote Bloodsick back in 2014 as an impromptu entry for an urban fantasy boxed set called Shifters Af
ter Dark. It was supposed to be a quick side project, something to explain Will’s backstory and keep readers interested in the series while they waited for the next book from my publisher. I thought I’d release it quickly and then return to my “real” writing.

  Instead, though, Bloodsick has truly taken on a life of its own. The saga of Will and Sashi, and eventually their daughter, has become my favorite thing to write outside of Lex and Scarlett. Will and Sashi’s story has become so meaningful in the series that I think of it as a sort of parallel novel, one that I get to allude to instead of actually writing. That’s where these next two short stories come in. The Old World novels feature first person protagonists (plus Jesse chapters), so I can only show the events and ideas that Scarlett, Jesse, and Lex are aware of. “Blowback” and “Birthright” are a chance to fill in some of those gaps that naturally happen for side characters.

  By the time I sat down to write “Blowback,” then, I had a whole laundry list of events and ideas I wanted to include—and, as usual when I write these characters, they showed me even more. Most of all, I wanted to finally write a story from the perspective of everyone’s favorite no-longer-a-werewolf, Will. Like Quinn, Will has always been an iceberg kind of guy: there’s a lot going on between the surface, but we only see the part he presents to the world. In Will’s case, that’s sort of affable calm, the natural leadership qualities that make him such a good alpha. This story gives us a chance to go deeper. How aware is Will of his charm and the effect he has on people? What happens to those qualities when he’s no longer a werewolf? Who is he without his primary identity?

  There are a lot of themes packed into this story: actions have consequences, even the best intentions can sometimes hurt people. Perhaps most importantly, as a parent we may make the best choices available, but they can still come back to hurt your kid.