Haunted Sanctuary (Green Pines Sanctuary) (10 page)

Eden met the implied question with a bland smile. “Not
everyone
, but it’s not just my farm, you know. And I still have a job in town, so I can’t be here to manage things.” Odd, that those words already made her feel vaguely hollow. There would be a time when she couldn’t be here every day to help, and it felt…wrong.

“Oh.” Mrs. Wilson toyed with the lemon wedge on the rim of her glass. “I thought the farm
was
just yours. I assumed, you know, when Albus died and Zachary didn’t come home for the funeral.”

On paper, it
did
belong to her. Albus’s last defiant gesture, leaving everything he owned to Eden. As much as she’d wanted her father to reconcile with his brother for his own peace of mind, Eden was fervently glad Zack hadn’t returned for his father’s final, bitter days. Albus’s body might have failed, but his mind and his vicious hatred had stayed as sharp as ever.

“We’re family,” she told Mrs. Wilson, just like she’d told her father. Just like she’d tell Zack. “I may own the farm, but it belongs to all of the Greens. That’s how it should be, don’t you think?”

“But will Zachary ever come back to it?”

The old biddy hadn’t seen him yet. Eden considered lying, but Zack’s presence would come out eventually, and everything she’d ever said on the topic would be scrutinized by Mrs. Wilson and everyone she knew. “He’s already here. Working hard on the barn right now, I think.”

The woman straightened, obviously taken aback. “I didn’t know that.”

Lorelei hadn’t returned. Eden was starting to envy her. “Yes, he’s been here for a few days. He came with Lorelei and the others.”

“I see.”

Silence stretched out, expanding and growing until it was a tangible presence every bit as real as Mrs. Wilson, who stared at her in awkward discomfort, clearly at a loss for words.

Well, words she’d say to Zack’s cousin, in any case.

Eden cleared her throat and gestured to the barely touched glass. “Can I get you some more sweet tea?”

A good deal of the older woman’s indulgent courtesy had chilled. “Actually, I should be going. You will keep the construction noise down, won’t you, Eden?”

You hadn’t even heard it until you found out Zack was here.
This was how it would be from now on. Zack didn’t have to do anything to be guilty. If the town couldn’t find a crime he’d committed, they’d make one up.

They always had.

It was hard to smile when she wanted to bare her teeth in a snarl, but Eden managed. She smiled until her jaw ached. “Of course, Mrs. Wilson. Thanks so much for the basket.”

“You’re welcome, honey.” The woman rose and returned Eden’s smile. “And tell your daddy I asked after him, all right?”

“Absolutely. Let me walk you out.”

She kept her smile fixed in place like it’d been stapled there until the door was shut with her adversary on the other side. The wolf stirring inside her wouldn’t view the old woman as anything else, not when Mrs. Wilson invaded their territory and stank up the room with disapproval and chilly disdain.

Too bad for Mrs. Wilson, and too bad for every nosy gossip in Clover. Eden wasn’t a helpless kid this time around, and no one was going to drive Zack away from his home.

Lorelei peeked around the open archway into the living room. “I hid. I’m not proud of that fact, but there it is.”

Eden laughed hoarsely and closed her eyes. “That just makes you smart.”

“I heard bits and pieces. She thinks we’re starting a filthy hippie commune and that Zack’s the Antichrist.”

“They’ve always thought that, ever since he was a teenager.” Eden pushed away from the door and headed back for the kitchen island. “It’s not going to get better once they see him. The tattoos are a bit much for Clover.”

Lorelei lingered, staring at the front door with a troubled expression. “We’ll have to be careful, won’t we?”

It had always been the truth, but maybe the wolves who were used to the city hadn’t understood. “People around here think they have a right to know everything about everyone. And when we start selling soap and lotion and handspun fabric…”

Hippie commune, indeed.

Chapter Six

Jay felt Zack’s approach in the jagged, discordant power that flowed ahead of him, but Eden’s cousin didn’t say a word until he’d dropped a cardboard package of beer down hard enough to rattle the glass bottles within. “Thought you might be thirsty.”

Jay finished hammering in the nail he’d placed to secure the barn window casement. “Thanks. I could use one.”

Zack claimed one bottle and sat in one of the folding chairs situated among the building supplies. “Fair warning. It’s a bribe.”

Interesting. Jay eyed him as he dropped to the other chair. “What do you need?”

“That wolf who’s following me around.”

Fletcher couldn’t have already made an ass of himself, but maybe Zack was looking for confirmation more than anything else. “I asked him to keep an eye on you,” Jay confessed.

Zack stared at empty air and took a slow sip of his beer. “So he doesn’t want to be my new best friend.”

“You sound relieved.”

“Don’t really want a new best friend.” Another sip. “Mine hasn’t been dead all that long.”

Lorelei had explained—in hushed, sad tones—about Zack’s roommate, Noah, and his attempts to hold the pack together after Zack’s abduction and supposed death. “I’m sorry.”

Zack shrugged, his gaze still fixed on that empty bit of space, but not like he was staring forward, unseeing. He could have been looking at something—or someone. “I lost a lot more than just Noah. I’d be watching me like a hawk too.”

Chilling words, nearly the last ones Jay wanted to hear. “You seem to be doing okay, all things considered.”

“All things considered. Maybe I’m still trying to wrap my head around it. Never thought I’d end up back here.”

“Can’t say as I blame you.” The farm was beautiful, but it wasn’t peaceful. It wasn’t settled. “You’ll get past it. You’ve got a lot of good things going.”

“I do, do I?”

“Sure. Everyone’s relatively safe here, and you’ve got Eden and Austin looking out for you.”

Zack’s mouth twitched toward a smile. “Eden looking out for me. God, that makes me feel
old
.”

“Not the kid you remember, huh?” Jay sobered. “I would have talked to you about Fletcher first, but I wasn’t sure how you’d take it. Alpha to alpha, I mean.”

The smile fell away, leaving Zack’s gaunt face blankly exhausted. “If there’s anything alpha left in me, it’s needing to keep them safe. Lorelei, Mae, Quinn…Kaley. They’re the important ones.”

And yet he’d been the glue holding them all together. Jay shook his head. “You don’t really think it’s that simple, do you?”

“It has to be, for now. I haven’t got a damn thing left to give.”

Oh, but there was plenty his pack still wanted from him—one young alpha in particular. “You think Kaley’s going to want to accept that? Or understand it, even if she does?”

That snared the full force of Zack’s attention. Dark eyebrows pulled together over narrowed eyes, and Zack’s power bubbled up. “Kaley’s young, and still fairly new. She’ll learn, and she’ll move on.”

The words carried a thread of desperation, but Jay only nodded. “Maybe.”

“She
will
.”

“I heard you.”

“Aren’t exactly acting like you believe me.”

“Because I don’t,” Jay answered. “I’m not real well acquainted with Kaley, not yet, but she doesn’t seem like the type to let stuff go. Not if it’s important to her.”

Zack ground his teeth together audibly. “I’m the only wolf she’s ever known who’s stronger than her. That’d confuse anyone who’s new.”

There was hope for the man yet, if he could come to his alpha with his tail tucked between his legs and still manage to get in a dig about Eden. “I’m not railroading your cousin, Zack.”

“Better not be.” Zack’s smile returned, and this time it held a vicious edge. “Can’t say I wasn’t wondering if that was part of the reason you sent Fletcher after me. Get him out of the way and all.”

“I’m not that manipulative.” Jay sipped his beer. “
Or
insecure.”

“Good for you.” After a moment, Zack shrugged. “I don’t care if he babysits me. As long as he’ll help with the repairs.”

“Fletch isn’t afraid to get his hands dirty.”

“And if I snap? He’ll do the dirty work there too?”

An almost hopeful question—completely out of place, considering what he was asking. “You want to know if Fletcher would kill you?”

Zack finished his beer and reached for a second one. “Someone better be willing to, if the worst happens. You wouldn’t have him watching me if you didn’t know that.”

“Information,” Jay countered. “Got to know if someone’s headed off the rails.”

“And when they’re already there?” Scowling, Zack twisted the cap off his beer and flung it aside. “I don’t need a fucking pep talk. I need to know you’ve got the balls to do what it takes to keep my people safe.”

Eden would hate him, not to mention the rest of Zack’s pack. “I’ll do what I have to do.” It was the closest Jay could come to a promise, and it was true. If there was no other way, no hope left… “But
I
will do it. I won’t have anyone else handle my shit work. And if you think me saying this is a free pass to give up, think again, pal.”

Zack bared his teeth in a grin that stopped a hairsbreadth short of outright challenge. “Can’t give up, can I? It’s not over yet.”

“Not even close.” Jay snagged another beer. “But it won’t be over when we beat Memphis back, either. That’s just the start.”

“Not really looking that far ahead right now. One foot in front of the other…unless I fall off the path.” Zack stared at Jay. “Don’t let me hurt them. Swear to me.”

“I swear.”

But the whole conversation left him on edge, disquieted. Not because of what Zack was saying, but because of the unspoken implications. The feeling Jay couldn’t shake that, no matter what he said, the other wolf just needed to know he could slip away, guilt-free.

Jay’s couch was starting to feel more like home than any place in her own house ever had.

It was the smell, Eden decided as he settled next to her. His scent had become the one thing she associated with safety. The tense muscles of her neck began to relax as she inhaled deeply and let her wolf rise to the surface. Not enough to spill free, but enough to loosen her limbs as she twisted to rub her cheek against his shoulder. “This is what gets me through the day. This moment right here.”

“Good.” He slipped his arm around her shoulders. “Did you and Fletch buy out the grocery store?”

“Just about. And the fabric store, and the hardware store.” She smiled. “Is he secretly a prince?”

“More like very well-managed, very
old
money.”

“Well, he was very generous in spending it.” Closing her eyes, Eden traced her fingers over Jay’s chest. “Mae smiled for the first time when she saw the sewing machine we brought home. Did you know she’s an artist? She does a lot of different things, but one of her specialties is textiles. I guess that was part of her and Kaley’s plan. The reason they were coming to the farm to begin with.”

He hummed softly. “I thought it was Zack’s idea to come to the farm.”

“It was Zack’s idea to come to
this
farm. Kaley told me that she and Mae had been making plans for a while. Mae has a pretty decent business selling soaps and lotions, but she also makes hand-spun, hand-dyed yarn, and they thought they could expand by raising and shearing their own animals.”

Jay sat up a little straighter and squinted down at her. “What, you mean like sheep?”

She bit back a grin. “Alpacas, actually. Apparently there can be good money there, if you know how to raise animals and how to sell the fiber.”

“Who knows how to raise them?”

“Kaley. She’s familiar with the requirements.” Jay had a furrow between his eyebrows, and she couldn’t resist the urge to smooth it away, stroking her finger down the bridge of his nose with a smile. “I know it sounds pretty out there, but they’ve given it a lot of thought. They have money set aside, and supplies squirreled away in a storage unit outside of Memphis. That’s one of the things they wanted me to ask—if you and the men could clear it out and bring everything back. They didn’t have time after Zack escaped.”

Jay nodded his agreement. “If we can, we’ll get it.”

“I understand.” A shiver of foreboding swept over her, and she pressed her forehead to his cheek and tried to banish the sudden chill with the warmth of his body. “I hate that you have to go at all.”

He held her closer and spoke low against her ear. “The only other option is to let them come here.”

Yes,
the wolf whispered deep inside her. Let the enemies come to them. Let her fight as an alpha should. Let her defend her pack.

Only her pack had enough scars already, and she had no experience with fighting. She swallowed the urge and nodded. “I know. I still hate it, but I understand.”

He stroked her hair. “I asked Shane about your early change. He said he’s never heard of anything like that happening without magical interference, but he’s going to do some research.”