Into the Light (29 page)

Rick looked doubtful, but he pulled out a cell phone and his fingers danced across the screen. “Kids these days,” he mused as he typed. “The only way they communicate is through text messages.” He placed the phone onto the desk. “I’ve just contacted my two oldest children. They will not lie to me. Not about something like this.”

Tanner expressed his appreciation for the gesture. And then the two men settled in to wait.

* * * *

“It’s been two weeks,” Duane complained as he paced back and forth through the small apartment that Chuck called home.

The apartment was located above Chuck’s parents’ garage. Convenient, for washing clothes and eating meals that didn’t come from a fast-food restaurant. It was also a hell of a lot cheaper than making his own way, especially because he didn’t really like to work. His father teased him mercilessly and his mother strongly disapproved of him bringing girls home, though, which would have been more of a bummer if he was better than he was at picking them up in the first place.

Duane showed up shortly after the massacre at the hotel, where that shifter and lightbearer had managed to kill the group of shifters his pack had sent after them.

“Hide me,” he’d pleaded, looking frightened and a little crazy. “I can’t go back to my pack and tell the pack master what just happened.”

Duane, so Chuck eventually figured out, had held back, hadn’t gone in with the rest of them. He said it was because he thought the lightbearer would run, and he intended to catch her.

Chuck figured it was because he was a pussy, although that Tanner guy
was
damn scary. And no one knew the extent of the magical abilities of the lightbearer, but Chuck figured they had to be significant for that pack master from out west to want to kill her for them.

He let Duane camp out in his apartment. That first night, they’d split a case of beer, with Duane downing most of it and as a result, developing loose lips. Turned out, that guy he and Andy and the others met at the grocery store was the pack master’s son, and he’d stolen the lightbearer from the pack master himself. Pretty damn ballsy.

The pack master was furious, of course, and he’d sent half the pack out, scouting, tracking, searching for Tanner and the stolen lightbearer. Chuck’s call had been Duane’s chance, his opportunity to impress the pack master. Duane was a punk, but he had high aspirations.

“After this, the pack master will disown Tanner, you watch,” he had slurred drunkenly. “And he’ll need to declare someone else as his heir.”

“You think it’ll be you?” Chuck had snorted in disbelief. If Duane was the pack master’s best hope for an heir, that pack needed help. Maybe Chuck should go out there and introduce himself. He’d hung out with Andy plenty enough to know how a pack master’s heir ought to act.

Plus, it would finally get him away from Leah.

She’d shown up that first night, because she heard through the grapevine that something had gone down at a hotel in town, and she wondered if he knew anything about it. He pretended he didn’t, but he and Duane were already loaded by that point, and Duane started looking at her with a spark of interest in his glazed, dark eyes. So Chuck herded her into his bedroom and much to her delight, he screwed the daylights out of her, making a hell of a lot of noise in the process, so that Duane didn’t get any ideas. As soon as they were done, he herded her back out again, past Duane, who was passed out on the couch, and all but shoved her out the door.

He’d been stupid to screw her again, because she’d gotten even worse about hanging all over him. Every day after work, she showed up at his apartment, all smiles and cheerful hopefulness. The couple of times he hadn’t been there, he’d gotten home to find her and Duane, cozied up on his couch, Duane hitting on her and Leah giggling like a stupid schoolgirl. It pissed Chuck off because he didn’t want Leah, but he sure as hell didn’t want this punk kid to have her either. Duane didn’t deserve her.

Leah was cute and smart and she was a pack master’s daughter. Duane was an idiot with overzealous aspirations in life, and he would do anything to reach his lofty goals, even kill, which he’d already proven when he’d killed those humans and then claimed he thought they were lightbearers.

“I knew they weren’t,” he had drunkenly admitted to Chuck that first night. “But I also know my pack master, and I knew he would be impressed that I tried. No one else in that pack seems to give a shit about his goal to find the lightbearers. At least, they didn’t until now. Now everybody’s scrambling like fucking ants, trying to track Tanner and that lightbearer. Now that they have proof. Me, I believed even when there was no proof.”

Chuck believed now too. For his entire life, he’d been taught that lightbearers were an extinct species and that the concept of killing them to inherit their magic was just an old urban legend. His pack master had been wrong. Duane had been right.

There was a knock on the door, and Chuck groaned as Duane rushed to answer it. Neither shifter was surprised when Leah stepped into the apartment, although Chuck was taken aback at the way she looked when she did it.

Her dark hair was down around her shoulders, softly curled and incredibly feminine. She wore makeup, Chuck noticed, and was wearing a dress, too, a cute little pink number that made her look way hotter than she normally looked in her khaki shorts and T-shirts. Duane was practically panting as he fawned all over her, so Chuck hurried up and strode across the room to divert Leah’s attention.

“What are you doing here?” he asked gruffly.

She didn’t even look offended by his tone, like she usually did when he was being an ass to her. She just smiled and batted her eyelashes and sashayed into the room. Yes, she actually sashayed, and Chuck and Duane were both mesmerized by the way her hips swung to and fro underneath that dress.

Chuck gave Duane’s shoulder a shove and then hurried up to claim the seat on the couch next to Leah, before Duane got any ideas.

“I don’t have to work today,” she said as she crossed one knee over the other and her skirt rode up to reveal a hell of a lot of thigh. Chuck’s cock gave a hopeful little jump, and he knew damn well Duane was having the same reaction. When Duane perched on the arm of the couch on Leah’s other side, Chuck issued a growl of warning. Duane ignored him.

“I thought I’d come hang out with you guys,” Leah said in a strange, purring voice that made Chuck want to roll her to the side, flip up her skirt, and pound into her from behind. Make her his, so that Duane wouldn’t be able to touch her, ever. He shifted closer, so that his thigh pressed against hers, and he draped his arm across the back of the couch.

Duane one-upped him and placed his hand on the back of her shoulder, as he leaned in and said, “What do you want to do today?”

To Chuck, it sounded like he said, “Want to fuck me today?” He had to fist his hands and take a couple of deep breaths to keep himself from lunging across her lap and attacking the bastard upstart.

Duane, he decided, was gone tonight. He could sleep on the street for all Chuck cared.

Leah shrugged one shoulder and the strap of her dress dropped off that shoulder and fell to her elbow, revealing more of the top swell of her breast than Duane had a right to see. Before Chuck could do anything, Duane snagged the strap and pushed it back onto her shoulder. Leah blinked at him and murmured thank you, and Chuck decided he was going to call the goddamned pack master himself and let him know that Duane had been hiding out for the past two weeks.

That would show the punk.

“Leah,” he blurted, “I need to see you in the bedroom for a minute. In private,” he snarled at Duane, who leaped to his feet as if he intended to join them.

Leah’s phone chimed, and she pulled it out of her purse. She read a text message and then frowned. “My dad wants to see me.”

Chuck was both relieved and disappointed. He desperately wanted to fuck her right now, but at least if she left to go see her father, he knew Duane wouldn’t have a chance to get to her. He’d give her time to get to her dad’s house and then Chuck would kick Duane out, send him back to Wyoming—or to hell, he didn’t care either way.

Then when Leah returned—because he knew damn well she would—he would be alone in the apartment, and they could do whatever the hell they wanted. Even mate, if that’s what she wanted. As hot as she was at the moment, and the way Duane was drooling into her cleavage—Chuck determined he’d do anything she asked him to.

A minute later, her phone rang, and she answered the call. She talked briefly and then disconnected the call. “That was Andy,” she said as she stood up and faced Chuck and Duane. “He says that guy we met at the grocery store is back, and he’s at my dad’s house.”

Duane looked at Chuck. “Tanner?”

Chuck shrugged. He wasn’t giving this asshole a damn thing, not anymore.

Duane turned to Leah and grabbed her arm, squeezing until she protested. “Is it Tanner?”

“Ow,” she complained as she tried to pull her arm out of his grip. “I don’t know. He didn’t introduce himself. Let me go.”

“It’s him,” Duane said. There was a wild look in his eye. “I know it is. Why else would you be getting a call? Take me to him,” he demanded.

Leah tried to push him away. “No. Let go.” She struggled, but Duane was stronger, and Leah obviously hadn’t been expecting such rough treatment. Chuck had seen her kick enough shifters’ asses to know she could hold her own, normally. But within seconds, Duane had her arm twisted behind her back until she cried out again and stopped struggling, lest he break her arm.

“You’re taking me with you,” he said in a deadly calm voice. “I want to see for myself if it’s Tanner. I’m going to be the one to bring that lightbearer back to my pack. You hear me?”

Chuck watched as Leah blinked back tears and gave him a look that made him feel guilty as hell. He knew he could take Duane, especially since Duane seemed confident that he wasn’t going to do anything. But the thing was…Chuck believed now too. He had seen the lightbearer with his own eyes.

And if anyone was going to take the lightbearer to the pack master out west, it sure as hell wasn’t Duane. Chuck knew he’d done the right thing that first night, when he’d copied a bunch of phone numbers out of Duane’s phone, while the punk had been passed out cold.

Chuck scrambled to his feet. “I’ll drive,” he said, and he refused to look at Leah, who he knew was giving him a murderous look, because he could practically
feel
it.

* * * *

Rick Pantera introduced Tanner to his son. “That’s not the name you gave me at the grocery store,” Andy commented as he shook Tanner’s hand.

“For obvious reasons, I was trying to keep my identity secret.”

“I heard you left your pack ten years ago, because you and the pack master didn’t see eye to eye.”

Tanner determined that Andy really was just as sharp as he’d suspected two weeks ago.

“I did. The pack master is my father. I am his only legitimate heir, but I don’t hold to his beliefs about the lightbearers, and I refused to accept that my legacy was to carry on his obsession.”

“But the lightbearers exist,” Andy said. “And you’re glowing.”

Tanner nodded. “I’ve spent time in their coterie,” he said, watching Andy’s reaction. The young man looked surprised and impressed, but not…greedy or eager, Tanner decided. He hadn’t really believed Andy was the one who gave him up, but Tanner never went into any situation blindly, if he could help it.

“My father believes you can inherit their magic by killing them, but I believe killing them kills their magic too.”

“So how
do
you inherit their magic?”

The kid was definitely sharp.

“You don’t,” Tanner replied. He lifted his hand, and all three shifters watched as his skin glittered in the sunlight shining through the window. “This is residual, from being in the coterie. It’ll wear off in a few days.”

In truth, the glow had become more and more long lasting, with each time he bedded Olivia. And since they’d mated—at least, by shifter law—the glow had yet to recede at all. But that was none of these shifters’ business.

“Where is your sister?” Rick asked his son.

Andy scowled. “She was with Chuck, but she’s on her way here.”

Rick’s scowl matched his son’s. Clearly, neither male approved of Leah’s crush.

They made small talk while they waited. Andy and Rick asked questions about life within the coterie, and Tanner answered carefully, being sure to give away nothing that might give either man any ideas. Through it all, neither Andy nor Rick gave any indication that they might change their stance on lightbearers.

By the time Leah made her appearance, Tanner was reasonably confident he could trust both men. Which was a good thing, considering what happened when she walked into the room.

* * * *

Tanner recognized Duane at almost the same instant that Duane recognized him.

“Fuck me, I found you,” Duane blurted, and he gave Leah a shove, sending her staggering into the room, as he pulled a phone out of his pocket and urgently began tapping on the screen.

Tanner caught Leah and passed her off to her brother, and then he and Rick both lunged for Duane. The kid hit the floor hard and lost his grip on his phone, which went skidding across the wood floor until it smashed into the wall in the hallway.

Tanner caught sight of Chuck out of the corner of his eye. When he looked up, Chuck had a phone in his hand and was tapping the screen just as urgently as Duane had been a moment earlier.

“It was him,” Tanner called out.

Rick looked up sharply and Duane punched him. Andy pushed Leah into a chair and then hurled himself across the room, shifting into a panther as he did so. Chuck screamed when Andy attacked him. His phone hit the floor a scant second before he did. The screen cracked and went blank, and Chuck lifted his arms and cried mercy, while the pack master’s son put him in his place.

Leah, for the first time since she’d developed her crush seven years prior, did not defend Chuck.

Quentin Lyons was not a happy shifter. Precious little was right in his world, and his anger and frustration were so great at the moment that the energetic and creative human female who had been warming his bed for several weeks now could not even manage to excite him. He stood, staring out the window in the great room of his manor home, while the human woman knelt on the floor in front of him and tried to get his limp cock to harden under her ministrations.