Tiger Born (20 page)

“We need to talk,” she began.

He shook his head and laid a finger over her mouth. “I’ll tell you everything that happened when I’m out of here and we’re back home.”

That wasn’t what she referred to, but she accepted his delay. They’d have plenty of time to talk about the baby later.

Chapter Fourteen

Deja grunted in annoyance when the phone rang. She waved a hand without opening her eyes and cuddled closer to Heath, her head on his chest. The ringing ceased, and she sighed, but then it started up again.

“Why?” she growled, sitting up. Nausea hit her, and she fell back down. Heath let out an
oof
and shifted from under her.

“It would be simpler to get it.” He leaned out, but she smacked his hand.

“Not you. It’s only been two days since you’ve been back. No one should be calling you, and I’m going to tell that and a few more choice words to whoever has the gall to disturb us.”

She squinted at the caller ID on her cell but didn’t recognize the number. After stabbing the connect button, she shouted, “This had better be good or—”

“They’re going to kill the humans.”

“What?” She didn’t get a chance to fully form the question before the person hung up. Deja tossed her phone aside and turned to Heath, who had fallen back asleep. She shook him. “Heath, wake up. I think some shifters are killing the humans. I don’t know where Ward is. We have to go see what’s going on.”

Heath sprung up and checked his phone. “I must have put it on silence last night. I have a text. Ward says we’re to meet at city hall, and looks like we’re an hour late.”

“Damn.” She scrambled into her clothes and ran to the bathroom to brush her teeth. Heath did the same, and within five minutes they were outside running toward his truck in the driveway. “I’ll drive.”

“I’m done with the babying, Deja. Get in the other side.”

She opened her mouth to protest, but he gave her a shove, and she had no choice but to give in. All the way over to city hall, her stomach knotted, and she had to keep swallowing between taking deep breaths to keep from throwing up. Apparently, morning sickness refused to give her a break in this emergency.

Outside the building where Heath and his dad worked, a crowd had formed. In fact, it looked like almost all of Siberia was in attendance. Guards around the parameter moved forward when they spotted Heath and Deja to force the crowd to part and let them through. All around her, people shouted, and some cried. Deja had a really bad feeling about this. Heath grabbed Deja’s hand and weaved through the crowd until they reached the front door. He opened it and escorted her through. The long hall between offices was surprisingly empty. Toward the back, she picked up voices of people arguing.

“Heath, there you are,” Ward snapped. “I was just about to send someone to drag your ass here. Sorry, Deja.”

She raised an eyebrow at him and folded her arms over her chest. “What’s going on, Ward?”

Joe sat leaning back in a chair as if this were a typical day, and Carter stood with hands clenched into fists, his face red. She guessed he’d been the one arguing with Ward. When their leader glared at the man before taking his seat behind his desk, she assumed she’d been right.

“I have passed a new law,” Ward announced.

Heath’s eyes narrowed. “Without talking to me?”

“Last time I checked, Son,
I
am the alpha.”

Deja stepped up to his desk. “Yeah, and last time
I
checked, you acted like you and Heath were joined at the hip and you couldn’t make any decisions without him. What’s the new law?”

“Watch your tone,” he warned.

Heath pulled her to his side. “Don’t threaten Deja, or you’ll have me to deal with. What’s the new law?”

Rather than be angry at Heath’s words, Ward seemed pleased, and Deja rolled her eyes. A man couldn’t love his son more than Ward loved Heath. She realized Abel and Aaron would have to go through a lot of growing up before they looked at Heath without resenting him. Ward was not the subtle type.

“All humans who haven’t been mated to a shifter at least five years are to be killed. No new—”

“What?” Deja shouted. “Are you out of your damn mind?”

Heath stared at his dad. “That’s the wrong decision, Ward, and you know it.”

Ward winced at Heath calling him by his name rather than calling him dad, but he didn’t comment on it. “I’ve already made the announcement. You two would have heard if you’d bothered to come to the meeting on time.”

Deja cut in on the conversation. “Sure, that leaves your wife safe, doesn’t it, but what about everyone else? What about Carter and Melanie? What about Jake? He risked his life to save your son, or doesn’t that matter to you?”

Ward slammed his fist on the desk and stood up. “You think I came to this decision easily?”

“I don’t care how you came to the decision. It’s wrong and dumb. Not all humans are bad, and it’s obvious not all shifters are good. You seem to forget you were once human and not tiger born.”

Ward’s eyes narrowed. She knew she’d pushed his temper too far, but she didn’t fear him. Someone needed to speak up, and if she didn’t, they’d kill Jake. Just the thought of losing her friend, the one who had stood by her even after Heath hurt him, didn’t sit right with her.

“Watch your mouth, Deja,” Ward growled. “You show me respect.”

“Watch yours,” she snapped back, and Heath grasped her arm.

“Deja, don’t goad him.”

She rounded on Heath. “You can’t agree with this just because you hate Jake.”

He frowned. “I don’t hate him. In fact I’m grateful for his help since you told me he went with you to rescue me.” He eyed his father. “While my father and his men were led on a wild goose chase.”

Ward gritted his teeth. “I told you we were pinned down with more Spiderweb bastards. You know I would always come for you. We’d finally extricated ourselves and were doubling back when I heard Deja’s roar for help.”

Deja wasn’t aware it had been a call for help, but she let it go. “You’d rescue me and Heath but not Jake, you who claimed to love all the citizens of Siberia. You said this town was a haven, and you offered it to Jake when Spiderweb tried to turn him but failed.”

“You seem pretty interested in that man when your mate is right here.” Ward walked around the desk toward her, but Heath stepped between them. He put a hand up to his father’s chest to push him off a step. Ward didn’t budge.

“Deja and I are fine, Ward. You don’t need to question her relationship with her friend. She doesn’t want anything to happen to him, and neither do I.”

Deja stared up at Heath, her heart swelling with love. He trusted her, and more, he backed her up in standing against Ward. She glanced over at Carter and met the hope in his eyes. The man loved Melanie, but she wondered if Melanie really felt the same. Still, she wasn’t a bad person either, and she didn’t deserve this kind of treatment just because she wasn’t a shifter. At shouts outside, she moved over to the window and peered out. A van pulled away from the curb, and she narrowed her eyes. Something occurred to her, which she hadn’t noticed coming into the building.

She turned back to the others. “Where are the humans, Ward?”

“They’re safe. Look, I’m only doing this because I have to do what’s in the best interest of the shifters. I have to think of their safety first and about keeping Spiderweb out of Siberia. The truth is I’d be a fool to believe we’re not already compromised, and you know what that means? It means uprooting everybody from their homes, their jobs, and their schools. You’re right. This is a haven, one that I have lived in for more than thirty years. I let myself get soft. I’ve let in humans—ones that haven’t even been screened to determine if they’re a threat.”

She walked over to him and put her hands up to cup his face, then kissed his cheek. Several men in the room gasped. They probably thought she was crazy—one minute yelling at Ward and disrespecting him and the next kissing him like he was her beloved father-in-law. He fit the role, she decided, despite how crazy he drove her.

“I get it,” she said. “I know it’s hard, and you want to do the right thing. We bullied you, said you were too lenient letting everyone bring in whoever they wanted and not putting up a fuss.”

Ward’s eyebrow rose at her insinuating the alpha could be bullied.

“I understand it’s hard,” she went on, and took one of his hands in hers. “But I beg you not to do this, Ward. My landlord, he’s human, and he’s a decent guy. I have no idea how long he’s been here or if he’s mated to a shifter. All I know is shifters have treated him like crap, and now he seems to live in fear. They’ve vandalized his office, and his secretary, who was a shifter, has quit. No one should have to live like that, or, for that matter, die because of some evil person who just wants to make a buck. I know there’s a problem, but killing all of them is not the answer. Please find another way.
Please
.”

Guilt and sadness glimmered for a second in Ward’s eyes, and then he moved away out of her reach. He turned his back on everyone and ran a hand over his face. “Just give me time to think. Everyone out.”

* * * *

“We’re going,” Heath announced, and Deja ran a scathing look over him from head to toe. The look didn’t seem to faze him. “I’m not impressed by the attitude, baby. We need to be at that dinner tonight at Ward’s.”

She sucked her teeth. “Why? So I can sit around his table with the rest of you, pretending there aren’t people somewhere suffering, who might not even be getting food to eat?”

He leaned over the bed and grasped her wrist to drag her up. She swatted at him, but he hauled her to his chest. No matter how angry she got, he didn’t seem to get riled, and it pissed her off because she couldn’t really get mad at him either, despite the high-handedness.

“You know Ward better than to ill treat the humans.”

“He’s commanded that they be killed.”

“Well, they aren’t yet.”

“How do we know that?”

He frowned. “You can make an additional case tonight over dinner.”

She settled her hands on his shoulders. They were having a serious conversation, but for some reason, Heath had gone hard. His cock twitched between them. “But you said I should let him stew and think about changing his mind.”

“And now I’m worried because he can be stubborn, so I want to be there to offer some other ideas.”

Deja’s eyes widened. “Are you serious?”

“Yes.” He smacked her ass. “So you can get dressed and go with me, or you can stay here, and I’ll tell you about it when I get back. Your choice.”

“Fine, I’m going, but I won’t like it.”

“Yes, ma’am!” He swatted her ass again and this time held on to give it a squeeze.

Deja wriggled free and put the bed between them. “You’re getting frisky. I told you the doctor said no sex for a week.”

“I will have you tonight when we get back.” His eyes turned golden, sending a delicious shiver down her back. “Or maybe I should have you now.”

“Heath, think about your health.” Her pussy clenched with desire, and she just knew he could smell her wetness, damn the man.

He leaned across the bed reaching for her. “I
am
thinking about my health, and right now I need a dose of my woman.”

She wavered, wanting it as bad as he did. Sleeping in the same bed with him, lying in his arms and not doing anything, had been outright torture. Up until now, Heath hadn’t challenged the doctor’s order, although a thousand times he’d rubbed her down with his hands and kissed her lips numb until she came close to an orgasm. From the look of him at that moment, he was done with waiting.

“Think of the humans who might die any minute,” she squeaked when his fingers closed around her wrist. He froze.

“Good way to throw icy water on a man’s libido. Thanks.”

She offered him a broad smile. “You’re welcome. I guess I’ll go take a shower and be ready in twenty minutes.”

He sighed and stomped from the room grumbling.

Half an hour later, they were on their way to Ward’s place. Deja was glad to feel better since the morning sickness had passed. Refreshed from her shower and rested since she’d taken a nap that afternoon, she felt ready to tackle Ward again. The fact that Heath would suggest alternatives to Ward’s decision gave her increased hope, so she couldn’t wait to get to his house.

Ward and Coreen’s home, as usual, carried a friendly, inviting air. The boys were nowhere in sight. From the looks of it, only Joe and Carter would be joining her and Heath with Ward and Coreen. The surly expression on Carter’s face said he was there strictly to push his case that Melanie be allowed to live. The predinner chat seemed stilted as they stood around holding drinks. No one wanted to be the first to bring up what was on everyone’s mind, and no one could fully participate in shooting the breeze about nothing when the important topic was left out of the discussion. At last, Coreen announced they should all move into the dining room, and Deja breathed a sigh of relief.

Sitting across from Carter and two seats down from Ward, Deja tried catching Carter’s eye. He seemed reluctant to be the first to question Ward. Why did they all have to be so afraid of him? He was only a man after all. So what he could put them on the floor without a touch? He wasn’t likely to kill any of
them
. No, it was the humans who were in danger, and if she and Carter and Heath didn’t speak up for them, who would?

She glanced at Heath, sitting at her side. He was the most relaxed of all of them, eating his food and taking swigs of his beer. He chatted without reservation with his father. She knew he wasn’t afraid of Ward, and he would stand with her no matter what, but he also knew she liked to have her say, so he waited. Resisting the urge to jump into his arms and hug him, she settled for squeezing his thigh under the table. Heath broke off his conversation and looked at her. The warmth and encouragement in his gaze choked her up.
Please, I’m not scared of your father either!

Amusement lit his blue eyes, and she knew he’d seen her defiance.