Mate Claimed (19 page)

Iona’s fork stopped halfway to her mouth. “Orders?”

Cassidy moved her hand to her abdomen, caressing it, as though she’d felt the baby move. “I agree with him,” she said. “Graham is dangerous. By Shifter law, you should be untouchable before the Challenge, but I wouldn’t put it past Graham to try to abduct you and use you to hurt Eric somehow. Graham is determined to be leader, and he’ll do it any way he can.”

“But I can’t stay here. I have a business to run—my sister’s on her honeymoon, and my mother can’t do it all by herself.”

“It’s Sunday,” Diego said. “You’re closed anyway, right?”

“We catch up on Sundays. I can’t just disappear, no matter what Eric thinks. My mother will get frantic and call the police.”

“No harm in telling her where you are,” Diego said. “Eric’s not trying to keep you prisoner, he’s trying to protect you. So am I. Eric’s right—you’re safest here.”

Iona seethed, but even her frustration couldn’t keep her from resuming her breakfast. “What is this Challenge anyway? Why are you letting Eric and Graham
fight
over me?”

“It’s Shifter tradition,” Cassidy said calmly. “The Challenge was created to keep Shifters from arbitrarily stealing one another’s mates. Shifters used to be pretty bloodthirsty, and with females scarce, males went all out to fight for them. The Challenge keeps it civilized.”

“That explains almost nothing,” Iona said.

Diego gave her a nod. “I’m right there with you. But go with it. I’ll put it this way—it’s better than Graham trying to rip Eric’s head off and run away with you slung over his shoulder. Eric knows what he’s doing. As far as I understand it, whatever the outcome of the fight, you can still choose whether to accept the mate-claim. Right, Cass?”

“Right. Doesn’t mean Eric won’t keep trying. He can be persistent.”

Iona laid down her fork, but only because her plate was empty. “You two are very sanguine about Eric bringing me home and fighting this guy because of me. You don’t know anything about me. Why are you being so accepting?”

Both of them fixed her with stares, Cassidy’s green one over her plate, Diego’s dark one from the stove. They each seemed to know what the other wanted to say, and Diego got to go first.

“I did some research on you after you called me the other day,” he said. “I didn’t know about you being part Shifter, but the info about your business and family is there for everyone to see. You work hard, make decent money, and pay your taxes.” He gave her a small smile. “Nothing underhanded about you.”

“Scent tells me a lot,” Cassidy said, still tackling her flavorful eggs and cheese. “You’re half-Shifter, unmated, and fairly open and honest. You don’t hide anything. And to tell the truth, Eric’s lonely. Crazy lonely. He doesn’t admit it, but I see it. I think you’d be good for him.”

Iona stared at her empty plate. “But will Eric be good for me?”

Cassidy nodded, her expression matter-of-fact. “He’s the leader of Shiftertown, which means you’ll be the alpha’s mate. That’s a good place to be.”

“I might think that if I’d grown up Shifter,” Iona said. “But I grew up human. I have a human life, a house, a career, things I worked very hard for. You and Eric expect me to give it all up without a fight.”

“You’re also young, for a Shifter.” Cassidy’s voice gentled, and she laid down her fork. “I’m not. Iona, all those things—the house, the business, whatever place you carved in human society—they don’t last. A hundred years go by, the world changes, and Shifters watch it all.” She glanced at the sunny backyard, and her hand returned to her abdomen. “This Shiftertown, the restrictive laws humans put on us—they won’t last either. Life in Shiftertown has been only a small part of my existence, and it will disappear in time. Humans will get used to Shifters, or figure out they can benefit by using us, or we’ll force the situation to change when we’re ready. Nothing is fixed and forever. In another hundred years, all this will be gone.”

Diego finished at the stove, brought over the rest of the mixture in the frying pan, scraped more onto Iona’s plate, then finally filled a plate for himself. He returned the pan to the counter and sat down to start eating.

“It weirds me out to hear her talk like that,” Diego said. “I grew up human, like you did. But Cass is right. Everything is mutable, even when it seems like it will last forever. What does last though—and I had to figure this out the hard way—is family. The people who love you and what you feel for them—that never goes away.”

“Yes, it does,” Iona said, a little less hungry now. “You lose people. I loved my stepfather, and he’s gone.” She felt a pang, as she always did when she remembered sitting those last days with her stepdad in the hospital.

“I know,” Diego said. “I lost my dad when I was a kid. But you still love him, don’t you? You still think about him—I bet part of why you work so hard is to keep up the business he built and not let him down. And that’s what I meant. They’re never really gone. You miss them like hell, but they’re still a part of you, part of your life. That’s what lasts—not houses, not businesses, not money. All that can change on the spin of a coin.”

Iona forked up the last of her eggs and lifted a piece of the sweet toast, trying to push her emotions aside. Emotions made her jumpy, and hungry, moving her again toward frenzy. “You two should be philosophers or something,” she said lightly. “‘How to live life, the happy way.’”

Diego laughed, his stern expression softening. “My mom wouldn’t think so. I’m mouthing things she said to me growing up, when she needed to get me and Xavier through some tough times. I guess growing up rough makes you philosophical.”

“So does growing up Shifter,” Cassidy said. “Not to mention fighting Nazis.” She winked. “We’re not always this serious. You should stay with us, Iona, because we’re great at parties. And anyway, there’s plenty to do around here, and I could use your help. You like kids?”

“E
ric, do not blame this on me. Jace does what he wants.” Shane leaned his bulk against a post on his back porch and folded his massive arms. The post, built to withstand bear Shifters, didn’t budge.

“Which means you didn’t try hard enough to talk him out of it,” Eric said severely. “Why did he want to go back out there?”

Jace, according to Shane, had departed Iona’s house at four that morning to take his motorcycle out to the desert to again check out the buildings out there. Shane’s gaze kept flicking from Eric’s, Shane unable to meet Eric’s anger.

“He said he wanted to watch them change shifts to see what happens,” Shane finished.

“If he left Iona’s at four, he’s been gone five hours now. You didn’t stop him, you didn’t call me, and you didn’t go with him.”

“Because I think he’s right.” Shane met Eric’s glare for a fleeting instant. “He can sneak around out there better than a huge grizzly can. Jace isn’t stupid, and I wasn’t going to wake you and Cass at four in the morning for no reason. Especially Cass. She needs her sleep these days, and she can be really snarly when she doesn’t get it.”

“That’s my son out there, Shane,” Eric said. Shane looked nervous, despite the fact that he was six inches taller than Eric. Height didn’t make any difference in dominance. “My only son, and those guys were ready to shoot any stray noise they heard.”

“Jace can take care of himself. I know it. I’ve seen him in action.”

Yes, Jace was good at handling himself. But Eric was on edge, the mating need making him squirrelly, the problem of Graham and the Challenge not helping. Eric couldn’t call Jace to make sure he was all right without risking that a ringing or even vibrating cell phone wouldn’t be heard by one of the guards in the stillness of the desert.

“Where’s Reid?” Eric asked, naming the Fae they’d captured earlier this year. The man was now living in Shane’s house.

“I don’t know. Sleeping? Eating breakfast? Chasing Peigi? I just got home myself.”

“Never mind.” Eric pushed past Shane and walked into the bear’s house by himself.

Nell was in her kitchen making coffee, wearing a big pink bathrobe embroidered with darker pink hearts twined with roses. She gave Eric a black look as he strode into her kitchen.

“Knocking would be good, Eric. Reid went for a walk.” Being Shifter, Nell would have heard every word of the conversation on her porch. “I get why you’re scared about Jace, but Shane wouldn’t have been able to stop him. Jace definitely is your son.”

“Jace is my cub,” Eric corrected. “When Shane has cubs, he’ll understand.”

“Granted,” Nell said. “You can guess which direction Reid went.”

Eric could, and he walked down the common space between backyards toward the house where the female Shifters and
cubs they’d rescued last spring had been housed. The bone-thin Reid was there all right, leaning on a low stone wall that marked off the porch, talking to a tall bear Shifter female called Peigi.

Stuart Reid was a dark Fae—
dokk alfar
, he called himself, which was a different species from the high Fae, the
hoch alfar
, who’d created Shifters.
Dokk alfar
hated the high Fae as much as Shifters did.

Reid had redeemed himself a long time ago, and Eric would have let him return to the apartment he rented in the city, but Reid had chosen to stay in Shiftertown. He’d also quit his job as a police detective to do security work for Diego and Xavier. The reason Reid stayed was Peigi—one of the Shifter women Reid had helped Diego and Cassidy rescue.

Peigi had suffered some very bad shit and was nowhere near interested in mating yet, but Reid was smitten. He was gently helping Peigi readjust, and Eric knew that sooner or later, the two would be standing before Eric for their sun and their full moon mating ceremonies.

Eric had made Reid one of his trackers, and Reid had been among those who’d found the mysterious compound in the desert. Reid couldn’t shift, but he had one talent that no one else did. He could teleport.

“Reid,” Eric said, acknowledging Peigi by putting his hand on her shoulder. “I need to borrow you.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

E
ric had only teleported with Reid a couple of times, and both instances had made him sick. This time was no different. When they arrived at their destination, Eric spent a moment with hands on knees, trying not to retch.

Reid had landed them about a half mile from the compound, probably to give Eric time to recover. Nice of him.

They hiked along the ridgeline Eric and Iona had run down in the dark. Reid and Eric kept themselves below the lip of the hill so they wouldn’t be silhouetted against the bright morning sky.

The compound didn’t look that much different in daylight. Prefab buildings lined up within the rectangle of the fence, and two guards strolled around. No sound, no activity, and again, no distinctive smell.

Reid had brought binoculars, but Eric relied on his own vision. He scanned the quiet grounds and the desert beyond, again wondering what the hell was inside those buildings.

Reid tapped Eric and pointed. “Got him,” he whispered.

Eric looked and saw the faintest second shadow under a tall creosote bush on the other side of the compound. A snow leopard. Jace.

“Good. Now I kill him.”

Jace must have seen them, because he ever so carefully slunk out from under the bush and slid into a nearby dry wash.

“Want me to teleport us down there?”

Eric suppressed a shudder. “I’ll use my feet. Will you carry my clothes?”

Reid agreed though he looked a little annoyed to be designated clothes caretaker.

Eric didn’t take long to shift, then he ran down the ridge and around a sweep of rocks to the edge of the deep wash Jace had used. Jace was climbing out of the wash, about a mile from the compound, when Eric caught up to him.

Eric growled and swatted Jace with a big paw. Jace shifted, rising to his six foot seven height, scowling, hands on hips. Eric shifted and rose to meet him.

“You checking up on me now, Dad?”

Eric barely contained his rage. “What the hell are you doing coming out here alone? You decided danger doesn’t apply to you?”

“What the fuck?” Jace looked at him in amazement. “I do solo jobs for you all the time. I thought you trusted my judgment.”

“Not with something this weird.” Eric’s words ended with a growl. “Not with Graham threatening us. Your orders were to watch Iona’s house last night, then come back and help me protect her.”

“So I took initiative. I didn’t have the chance to ask your permission. You’ve been hard to track down lately, if you hadn’t noticed, and distracted when you are. I’m glad you’ve met someone, Dad, but your brain is warping.”

Fathers were supposed to be proud when cubs struck back. That meant the father had raised the cub to be strong.

Eric’s hand sprouted claws, and he snarled. Jace looked surprised, then he snarled too, his eyes going flat.

Reid popped in right next to them, displacing air. “You might want to keep it down,” he said. “Sound carries.”

Eric forced his claws to recede, but his anger didn’t diminish. Jace took a step back, but the move was in no way submissive.

“Don’t you want to know what I saw?” Jace asked, his voice quieter.