White Knight (20 page)

“It’s huge for all of you. It’s time for this family to begin healing.”

“It’s time for the whole town to start healing, now that our White Wolf is coming back to us.”

Bishop came inside. If sending his wife off to buy a goat and barter peace with the vampires bothered him at all, he was hiding it well. “You two have anything else?”

Shay shook her head no.

“I’d like a few minutes, if you aren’t busy,” Rook said.

“I’m always busy but I’ve got time.” Bishop glanced around the sparse room. “I don’t know how Dad balanced all of this with running the auctions, too.”

“He learned. You’ll get the hang of it.”

***

Shay excused herself and left the brothers to talk. She suspected Rook wanted to tell Bishop about his chat with Knight. She was curious herself with whom he’d had his breakthrough, since it wasn’t her or Rook. He hadn’t been around Bishop since breakfast. She passed Smythe’s, then rounded the building to their street.

Devlin nearly ran into her on the sidewalk, his head down and attention elsewhere. “Hey, sorry.”

“It’s okay.” She took in his grass stained pants, bloodshot eyes, and swollen lip. “What happened to you?”

“Knight knocked some sense into me.”

“Literally?”

“Pretty much.” He glanced around them, but they were very alone. “Did you know?” The spark of anger in his eyes supplied the rest of his question.

Did you know about Knight?

“He’s never told me outright, but yes, I knew. I was told by Rook when Knight force-shifted. Understanding his pain helped me coax him back.”

“I can’t even be mad he didn’t tell me until now, because who wants to talk about something like that?”

“Talking about your pain is the first step toward healing from it.”

“Yeah, I got that now.” Devlin exhaled a long, harsh breath. “I can’t bring my cousin back but I can live a life he’d be proud of.”

“Yes, you can.” She hugged him on impulse—the first time she’d done so since her attack. Her stomach flipped when she realized what she’d done, and she pulled back quickly.

Devlin grinned and bussed her cheek. “Go see your boyfriend. I think he’s at the Alpha’s house.”

“Thanks, Devlin.”

He waved off the thanks. “Just keep our boy safe.”

“Always.”

Shay’s search for Knight took her through the downstairs of the McQueen house. Muffled voices in the library gave her pause outside of the nearly shut door.

“—are peaceful. We don’t need to be enemies.” Brynn’s voice, very likely talking with her father.

“Forging peace with the loup garou is not my call, daughter.” Atwood’s voice scraped down her spine like icy fingernails.

“But you can present the idea to the Congress.”

“For what purpose? Once the hybrids are dealt with and the Magi are safe from threat, I’ll have no use for the loup garou.”

“I’m not suggesting everyone gets together for tea. Only that we can reach an arrangement of mutual disinterest. Ignore each other, if you like, with a promise to stop trying to destroy the loup.”

“You ask a lot.”

“You set this in motion when you created me. I’m of two worlds, Father, and I want to protect them both.”

Brynn was persistent, Shay had to give her that. She backed away from the door, uncomfortable with eavesdropping any further. This wasn’t her conversation.

She found Knight on the back patio, stretched out on a lounge chair. He scooted over as soon as he spotted her. Shay cuddled up next to him, her beast sighing in perfect contentment now that they were together.

“I hear you had a productive morning,” she said.

He kissed her forehead, then her nose. “I did.”

“Want to tell me about it?”

“Yes. Yes, I do.”

“Well, they heard me out,” Jillian said. Her frustration was plain to hear even over the speakerphone on Bishop’s desk.

Shay had filled Knight in on the vampire visit over lunch, and then they’d spent a good chunk of their afternoon walking around town. Knight introduced her to little Thomas Barnes, and he did his best to settle nerves frazzled by the rumors of a Magus among them. For the first time in a long time, he took great pride in his role as the White Wolf of Cornerstone.

After dinner, Bishop had called them, plus Rook and Devlin, into his office for Jillian’s update.

“And?” Bishop asked when she didn’t expand on her statement.

“The vampire I spoke with, Gola, told me that they needed time to consider it. He was upset about the news, as you can imagine. However, it seems vampires don’t make hasty decisions.”

Knight didn’t need his empathy to sense Bishop’s irritation. “How long did they ask for?”

“He only said time. I have no idea if vampires have telephones, but I gave him your information again. He said they would be in contact.”

“Great. We could get a call tonight or a month from now.”

“Nothing about this was a guarantee, you know that.”

Bishop glanced at Shay. “It was worth a shot.”

“Anything from Mason?”

“Nothing remarkable, no,” Rook replied. “He checked in about thirty minutes ago. They have the Jones property pretty well staked out, but there’s been no scent or sign of the girls. Dell either.”

“Okay.” Jillian said something muffled, probably to one of the guys with her. “Listen, unless you think I should hang around outside the creepy old factory for an answer, we’re heading home.”

Bishop snickered. “No, come on back. I’ll see you in a few hours.”

“Yeah.”

A split second after Bishop ended the call, the phone rang. He snatched up the receiver. “McQueen.” His entire body snapped to attention, raising the tension level in the room. “Good evening, Alpha Behr.”

Knight stopped breathing, the world going briefly hazy. No one had to ask what this call was about. Shay’s hand curled around his and squeezed. He sucked in a startled breath and held on, sharing her strength and support in what was about to become an unpleasant conversation.

Bishop stared at the far wall as he listened, his expression impressively neutral. “I’m very sorry for your losses. We’ve had several of our own in this struggle, and I offer my deepest sympathies.”

Rook tapped out a beat of some kind on his thigh, a testament to his growing impatience. Knight wished Bishop had put the call on speaker, and he nearly demanded that Bishop do so. But Bishop was doing a good job of hiding his growing annoyance with the call.

“I understand the position that you’re in, Alpha, and it’s a difficult one. I will do my duty and pass along your request to the parties involved.” A pause. “Yes, sir, tonight. I’ll give you an answer as soon as I have one.” He clenched and unclenched his jaw. “Good night, sir.”

“Let me guess,” Knight said once the phone was down and in no danger of being thrown. “Behr wants me.”

“He has made a formal request to the other Alphas, who gave a majority vote to allow him to make the request to me. Alpha Behr wants one of our two White Wolves to go to Skydale, and he hinted very heavily that he didn’t want Agnes.”

“A White her age would never acclimate to a completely new run. Even here, she can only really help the Springwell loup.”

“I know, and so does Behr.”

“So he wants me.”

Bishop nodded. “Yes.”

“Tough shit.”

Rook snorted laughter, then clamped a hand down over his mouth.

“You want me to call back Alpha Behr and tell him that my White Wolf said tough shit?” Bishop said.

Knight leaned forward, shoulders back, every confidence in what he wanted to say. He’d made this decision already. “Phrase it however you’d like, Alpha, but I’m not going to Skydale. I don’t care what the other Alphas voted for. Behr can’t force me to leave here. This is my home. I’ll leave in a body bag before I leave willingly. Request denied.”

“And that’s your final decision?”

“Yes.” He was making this decision for himself, damn it. No more allowing other people to dictate to or control him.

“Good.” Bishop smiled proudly. “I wouldn’t let you leave even if I thought you would. Our father would have wanted us to stay together.”

“How come no one ever calls up and requests me?” Devlin asked.

Rook knuckled his shoulder. “Because you’re an annoying pain in the ass.”

“So?”

The banter broke the tension in the small trailer. Knight relaxed back into his chair, still holding Shay’s hand. He didn’t envy Bishop’s difficult phone call back to Behr. Hell, Knight would get on the line and personally tell Behr no way in hell, if it helped. He had every sympathy for the run and their losses, but his priority was to Cornerstone. Period.

“Are you going to break the news tonight?” Rook asked.

Bishop pushed the phone away. “No. It will keep until tomorrow. Let’s go home.”

They walked in an odd cluster, no one really leading, all simply heading in the same direction. Devlin broke apart from the group just past Smythe’s, turning right instead of left, on his way back to his family’s home. Knight glanced over his shoulder once, incredibly grateful to see Devlin acting more like his usual self.

“Do I want to know how Dev got a fat lip?” Bishop asked.

Knight cleared his throat, while Rook coughed to cover a laugh. “He had to get something off his chest,” Knight replied. “The important thing is he’s healing.”

Shay squeezed his hand. She let go on the front porch and followed Rook inside the house, leaving Knight outside with Bishop by some unspoken agreement. Knight leaned against the porch railing, arms crossed, while Bishop sat in one of the wicker chairs. Late-season crickets chirped in the hedges and a cool breeze picked up, carrying with it the scent of dried leaves.

“Our father would have been incredibly proud of you tonight,” Bishop said. “Standing up and deciding your own fate.”

“Are you sure?” Knight kicked his heel against the wood floorboard. “I’m going against the wishes of the other Alphas.”

“A majority of the Alphas. I have a few allies who would have voted against it.”

“Alpha Weatherly?”

“And Parks and Montgomery.”

The two Alphas who had come to Cornerstone to witness Bishop’s fight for Alpha last month. “I guess you made an impression on them.”

“I suppose.” Bishop picked at a worn spot on the knee of his jeans. “When I talk to Behr tomorrow, I’d like your permission to tell him about your forced shift.”

“Why?”

“To reinforce you staying here. Moving a White Wolf over the age of twenty is risky under any circumstances, but Weatherly is the only other Alpha who knows about the shift. If Behr understands how fragile your emotional state is, maybe he’ll drop the idea of you going to Skydale.”

Knight snickered. “Make him think I’m crazy so he doesn’t want me, in other words.”

“Something like that.”

“Tell him whatever you want.”

Bishop’s eyebrows lifted. “Really?”

“If it makes the conversation easier and our position more clear, then yes. Tell him everything.”

“I don’t think I need to tell him
everything.
”

Knight held his big brother’s gaze, disliking the hesitation he saw there. He didn’t want Bishop to tiptoe around him anymore, not for anything. “You’re right, we don’t need to tell him about the rape.”

Bishop blinked hard, the uncertainty melting into surprise. His expression finally softened, settling on something very much like respect. “No. I have to be honest, Knight, I never thought I’d hear you say it.”

“For a long time I didn’t want to say it. But I have, a couple of times now, and I’m still here.”

A flash of anguish in Bishop’s eyes matched the emotion that drifted over to Knight. “I’m so sorry.”

Knight shrugged one shoulder. “It’s not your fault.”

“I couldn’t do anything to stop it. I was stuck in that damned quarterly cage.”

“That wasn’t your fault. It was bad timing.” He studied Bishop, alerted by the regret he now sensed from his brother. “You don’t blame yourself, do you? Because no one else does.”

Bishop was silent for a moment, lost in his thoughts, while Knight waited. “Intellectually I know it wasn’t my fault, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. It’s my heart that’s having a harder time catching on.”

“I know the feeling, believe me.”

“About what?”

They didn’t do this. They didn’t have heart-to-heart conversations. He and Bishop didn’t have that kind of relationship. Maybe it was time to change that. “Our mother,” Knight said.

Bishop blinked hard, several times. “Her death wasn’t your fault.”

“Sure it was. She was killed because I’m a White Wolf.”

“She was killed because you were kidnapped by loup from another run, and I didn’t do anything to stop them.” Bishop practically snarled the words, and so many things suddenly made sense. Bishop’s overprotective streak. The distance he’d kept from Knight and Rook while they were growing up, acting more like another parent than a big brother.

“You blame yourself for me getting kidnapped,” Knight said. It wasn’t a question.

“I should have done more. Sounded the alarm, called for help, anything except let them take you.”

“You didn’t let them take me. You were nearly killed protecting me. You were only ten for crying out loud.” He took in Bishop’s twisted frown. “You’ve been carrying this around for twenty-two years?”

“You’ve been carrying your guilt around just as long.”

Bishop was right. They had both blamed themselves for the same crime, and when it came down to the details, neither one of them was the culprit. Knight was finally starting to see that about his life. He was a White Wolf, but he was also Knight McQueen. He was a brother, a son, a friend, and a lover, and none of those things had anything to do with the color of his beast. If others chose to value or devalue him based on that, then it wasn’t his fault.

And it certainly wasn’t Bishop’s.

“Mom died because of the greed of others,” Knight said. “Others who saw me as a commodity, and who underestimated our parents. Her death wasn’t my fault, and it wasn’t your fault either. It wasn’t your job to protect her or me.”

Bishop’s flecked eyes glimmered in the dim porch light. “Maybe not, but you’re still my little brother. I’ll always want to protect you.”

“Family protects each other. We always will.”

“Damn straight.”

“So no more shared guilt over what wasn’t our fault?” He stepped forward, his hand out for Bishop to take or dismiss. “Only looking forward?”

Bishop stood and clasped his hand. “Looking forward.” He tugged Knight into a hug, and Knight didn’t protest it. He returned the embrace, one of only a handful of times they’d done it in their lives.

It wouldn’t be as easy as saying the words and forgetting, but Knight was certain they were both going to be able to put the past behind them.

Finally.