Winter Wolf (A New Dawn Novel Book 1) (16 page)

This is what Katalina loved most about Bass. No matter the situation, no matter the danger they were in, it took only one touch for them to be in their own world, for nothing to matter but their hushed secret whispers, heated stares, and consuming love.

“Kat!”

Katalina sighed, breaking away from Bass. She took hold of his hand and walked him toward Jackson. “Time to face the music,” she muttered.

“Play nice,” Bass whispered into her ear, “and I’ll reward you later.”

Chapter 24

They walked toward Jackson, hands linked together. Katalina could see the tension in every fiber of Jackson’s body—from the rigid set of his jaw, to his knuckles strained against white skin. She pressed herself closer to Bass, trying to gain control of the anxiety churning inside of her.

As if sensing her feelings, Bass squeezed her hand. “I’m right here,” he whispered.

Katalina took her eyes off Jackson for just the barest of seconds. She lifted the corner of her mouth slightly, squeezing his hand back. Her eyes met his, the tension dropping from her face, but then Katalina was wrenched away from Bass. The space between them like a tear within her soul.

The wolf within her stood up, raising hackles, and drove Katalina to react. She pulled back from Jackson’s grip, her free hand swung up, palm open, slapping him across the face. The noise from the impact vibrated through the air. Jackson stood speechless, his hand slowly pressing against the red patch that had formed on the side of his face.

“Never touch me again!” Any anxiety she’d felt before had vanished. Now Katalina was the one who stood rigid with tension, her blood hot with anger. “I don’t care who you are, no one has the right to touch me in that way.”

Bass’s armed reached out and pulled her gently backward. She went willingly into his warm embrace.

Their actions seemed to snap Jackson from his shock, his angry mask slipping once more into place.

“This cannot happen,” he ground out through clenched teeth, his finger pointing between them. “He is Dark Shadow, Katalina. I forbid this!”

“Forbid it! Forbid it!” Katalina growled in frustration, stepping forward; her angry gaze fixed on Jackson. “Have you heard yourself? You can’t forbid me to do anything. I will love who I wish. I will do exactly what I WISH!” Her voice rose the more she talked. Her blood was on fire, any minute she was going to combust.

“Katalina, will you just stop and think about this for a minute. He’s Dark Shadow, you are River Run. Whether you want to be or not, that is who you are. My blood runs through your veins.”

Katalina sucked in an angry breath and blew it out as she looked at the floor. “I honestly can’t see why that is a problem? It shouldn’t matter who I’m with as long as they love me. You say you’re my father, but you act nothing like one. All that should matter to you is that I’m happy and I’m loved. I know that’s what my dad would want for me.” She looked up from the ground seeing indecision cloud Jackson’s eyes.

His hands came up, angrily running through his long, messy red hair. With hands pressed tightly over his eyes, his voice was low and defeated. “It was never supposed to be this way.”

“Maybe you're right, Jackson. Maybe I was supposed to be with Cage. Maybe I was supposed to grow up with my pack, my family. Cage and I would have been best friends and teenage sweethearts. Maybe we would have married, and had those precious, pure blood babies you so desperately want. Maybe that is how my life should have been, but it never turned out that way, did it?”

Katalina let out a long breath before continuing. “You gave me away before I was even one. Dumped me on a doorstep. I didn’t grow up with a pack. I grew up with normal parents, in a normal home. I wasn’t a shifter. I was just an ordinary human girl. But then you changed your mind, and that decision cost me my parents, the life I knew. You’ve dragged me into this brutal world, a world that makes no sense to me, one full of blood and death, where it’s perfectly okay to attack one another.” Glancing away, she stared at the horizon, focusing on nothing. “I feel lost here, Jackson. Every decision you’ve made for me since I turned eighteen has cut me. My heart bleeds because of you and decisions you have made. I have lost everything I’ve ever known and you don’t seem to give a shit. And now you want to take away the only person I have left away, the one thing that makes sense in this life, yet I can’t have him? Well, guess what, Jackson? I honestly couldn’t give a damn what you want. I hate you for everything you’ve done to me. Do you understand that?”

She stood breathing heavily. Feeling too angry to cry, too angry to move, she stared at the man with whom she shared DNA and wondered what parts of him she’d inherited. The angry, bitter and twisted man before her held no resemblance.

The silence between them was a palpable thing. Thick and heavy it seemed to choke the air from their lungs until finally Jackson spoke. His green eyes looked up but connected with Bass, not Katalina.

“She says she loves you, but do you love her?”

“She’s my mate,” Bass replied, matter of fact.

Jackson nodded. “I’m trying to work out what you’re planning. Do you want River Run or do you simply wish to destroy me by taking the last link I have to my Winter?”

Bass frowned as he thought over Jackson’s words. He didn’t seem offended by what he’d said but Katalina sure was.

“How dare you! Can’t he just love me for me! Not everything is about your freaking pack!”

“Katalina, its fine.” Bass ran his hand gently across her face. “Jackson has every right to know my intentions. After all, I did go into that shed to kill you.”

Jackson’s growl cut Bass short.

Katalina saw the slightest smile cross Bass’s lips before his neutral expression returned. She finally understood what Nico meant by him talking himself out of arguments. Jackson looked physically in pain trying to control his anger. He looked as if he’d love nothing more than to punch Bass, but while Bass was so calm, he could do nothing but try to restrain himself.

“What? Isn’t that what you wanted to hear? Did you think I sought her out with the intentions to steal her away? That I wanted to take your pack? Well, I’m sorry to inform you, I never had any intention of taking River Run, and I had every intention of fulfilling my father’s wishes. You see, he thought it would be quite poetic, if his son killed your daughter. He’s trained me from the moment I could walk so that I would be ready, but then I saw her. Beautiful and broken, dressed in white, with the moonlight in her hair, she looked like an angel, an angel stained red with blood. I knew who she was to me the moment I saw her. I didn’t think about the consequences. She’s mine and that is all that matters. You should understand what I mean when I say she’s my mate. Those lucky enough to find the one person on this planet who is made for them, will stop at nothing to keep them safe, and if they fail… Well, this war is proof of the pain the one left behind feels. She is my mate, Jackson. That is all the explanation you should need.”

Jackson stared. Bass stared back, neither seemed like they were going to back down.

Katalina threw her hands up. She’d had enough; she was too tired to fight, too heartbroken to care anymore. All she wanted to do was get as far away from Jackson as possible and forget he had ever existed. “I’m leaving. Tell Toby I’m sorry. I couldn’t stay.”

She turned on the spot, her hair fanning around her. The late evening sun caught each fine thread, glistening as she strode away. She didn’t wait to see if Bass followed, she wasn’t sure she wanted him to follow.

I had every intention of fulfilling my father’s wishes…

“Urgh, stupid asshole,” she muttered. Sometimes she forgot he was a shifter. He’d been so different in her world, relaxed and funny, but in this world, in his world—
her new world—
he was an alpha’s son: controlled, practical, talking with logic and not emotion.

How could he talk so flippantly about going against his father?

“Katalina, where are you going?” Bass ran past her. He walked backward in front of her as she stomped. “Kat?”

“I’m leaving. I don’t care where. Anywhere that isn’t here.” She’d reached the truck. Opening the door, she let Arne out.

“What’s the matter? Didn’t you hear what he said? He’s accepting us, Kat.”

Katalina stopped. “I don’t need his acceptance, Bass,” she sighed. “I didn’t come here for approval.”

“Why did you come here then?” he asked gently.

“I’m not even sure I know. I’m not sure of anything anymore. It’s all messed up. Everything is a mess. I’m a mess.”

“No, you’re not.”

“Yes I am. How can you not see that?”

He tried to take her hand but she pulled away. “Don’t, just leave me, Bass.”

“I can’t do that, Kat.”

She looked at him, at the boy who could be two people, who could change from
her
Bass to Sebastian Evernight in the blink of an eye. When she looked at him now, there was no doubt of his love, but she just couldn’t shake his words, the way he spoke so unemotionally to Jackson.

“I can feel you’re mad at me but I don’t understand why?” he said.

“Argh!” she screamed. She shoved him, her hands possessed taking on a life of their own.

“Do you know what I don’t understand? I don’t understand how you can talk about wanting to kill me in such an offhand tone. It is not nothing, Sebastian!”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Why? It’s who you are being.”

“Kat, you are being irrational.”

“Irrational! I’m fucking livid!” It infuriated her that he could stay so calm when she felt ready to rip him apart. She knew she wasn’t really that mad at him. She was just angry in general; angry at the world, at Jackson, at herself.

They stood there; Bass calm, the frown mark between his eyes the only outward sign of emotion, and Katalina, trembling in fury, her hands in fists, each knuckle pulled tightly against white skin.

“I don’t know what you want me to do,” he said quietly.

Katalina looked at him as he sighed. She breathed deeply, and released her breath, uncurling each finger as she did. Her anger dissolved in a puff of breath. “Get mad, Bass. Shout, scream, do something, other than act as if nothing affects you.”

“Is that what you think? That none of this affects me? That the thought of laying a single finger on my father doesn’t tear me up inside? Do you think I don’t hate myself every minute of every day for ever thinking of hurting you? Because I do, Kat. I feel as lost and as angry at what we’ve been dealt as you. The difference is I’ve had years to perfect my mask, to play the game, to be Sebastian Evernight.”

“I’m not sure I like this mask.”

She went into his arms as he reached for her this time. “Sometimes, the mask comes in handy.” His hands cradled her face, so gently it nearly broke her. “Only three people know the real me and one of them is dead.”

“Nico and your grandmother?” she asked.

He nodded. “And you.”

“I don’t want to be responsible for you having to do such horrible things.”

“Kat, whatever happens next will not be on you. What happens between me and my father will be on him. You must stop thinking of him as my dad. He isn’t. He’s been nothing more than my alpha, and not a nice one at that. He has never shown me any love. He stole my childhood by forcing me to fight. He’s pushed me and pushed me, and nothing I have ever done has been good enough. I stopped trying to please him a very long time ago, and I stopped seeing him as my father way before that.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“Don’t be,” he kissed her cheek. “Are you ready to go back?” He turned her around in his arms. “It looks like a few more people have arrived.”

“Oh goody!”

Bass smiled against her neck, nipping at her skin. “I do love you, my snarky girl.”

They walked back toward the house and the hive of activity.

“I’m still not sure I fit in this world.”

“It doesn’t matter. We’ll make the world fit you.”

Chapter 25

The house was in chaos as they walked in. Katalina stopped in the doorway, stunned. There was a trail of bloodstained rags leading off to the kitchen; Jackson could be heard from the front room, his voice raised.

“Come on.” Katalina pulled on Bass’s hand, leading him toward the kitchen. She wasn’t in the mood to face Jackson. One step into the kitchen and she wasn’t sure she was ready for this either. Toby lay on the kitchen table. He was deathly pale and unmoving. Karen worked over him, her hands, quick and sure in their task. A woman stood nearby, hovering but looking as if she didn’t dare approach. Tears of black mascara streamed down her face.             

“Is sh-she g-going to be okay?” Katalina stammered.

Karen didn’t look up, but she answered, “He’d have been dead if not for you, Kat. Toby is a strong boy. He’ll fight.”

Karen’s answer caused Toby’s mother to choke out a sob. She buried her face in her hands. “Terry, why don’t you go find, Cage? I’ll come get you when Toby wakes up.”

Katalina watched in silence as Toby’s mother, Terry, nodded and left the kitchen.

“Kat, come here and help me.”

“What? No, I’d be no use.” She suddenly wished she’d chosen Jackson. Jackson shouting was far easier to handle than Toby bleeding to death.

“Hold this!” Karen ordered.

Katalina walked forward on numb legs. She took the torch off Karen. “I need you to shine the light in here. There’s a bleed I need to find.”

She wasn’t sure how long she’d stood there, holding a torch over Toby’s open body. She focused on forcing her breaths in and out, deep and steady, over and over. She didn’t know how Karen did it, how she had her hands inside someone, surrounded by organs and blood.

“Gotcha,” she muttered. “Pass me that clamp, Kat.”

“Clamp?” Katalina whispered, looking at the tray of instruments next to her. Her hand hovered over what she thought looked like a clamp.

“That’s the one.” With an unsteady hand, Katalina handed it over, and Karen carried on.

Once Toby was stitched up, a dressing over the wound, Katalina turned around to look for Bass, but he’d gone.

“Kat, tell Terry she can come back, please,” Karen called as Katalina left to find Bass.

She found him near the front door, gazing out the window. He turned with a smile at her approach. Katalina paused at open the door to the front room. Terry sat in the corner chair staring into space but no longer crying.

“You can go see him now, Terry,” Katalina said.

Terry’s faraway eyes fixed on her. She stared for a second before her brain registered Katalina’s words. “Thank you,” she murmured, jumping to her feet.

Walking toward Bass, Katalina heard Jackson was having a heated discussion with a woman who looked to be in her late thirties. She held the hands of twin boys. They didn’t seem the least bit affected by the madness of the last few hours, but their mother clearly was.

Katalina had almost made it to Bass when her name fell from Jackson’s lips. She froze, a deer in headlights, wondering whether it would be rude if she just turned, and ran.

“Kat, have you met Amelia and her two boys, Thomas and George?”

“N-no,” Katalina stammered, still in the hallway. She shifted from one foot to the other, contemplating escape.

“Come say hello. Amelia, this is my daughter, Katalina. You see, I have my child here where it’s safe.”

Great, I’m being used to put across his point!

Katalina sighed, having no choice but to say hello to Amelia. “Hi, it’s nice to meet you.”

Amelia gazed at Katalina, her mouth in a hard line. “Hello, Katalina, I’m pleased you are back home, but your father is trying to distract me.”

Katalina smiled. “I gathered that, and it’s just Jackson. My father died a few weeks ago.”

“Oh, erm, I-I’m sorry,” Amelia stammered.

Katalina smiled sadly but said nothing. Jackson eyes darted between them looking agitated, his plan clearly not going to plan.

“Hey, Thomas, George, do you want to come with me and see my dog, while your mommy and Jackson talk?” Katalina crouched down as she asked them.

“Sure!” they both chimed in unison, ripping their hands from their mother’s grip.

Amelia look startled. She clearly didn’t want to let them go, but didn’t have a valid excuse to say so. “Boys, we’re leaving, so you can’t today.”

“Aww!” they moaned.

“Amelia, please, you’re safest here. At least wait until I can have someone go with you,” Jackson pleaded.

              “This place was attacked just a short while ago. I’m taking my chances at home. I’m sure they wouldn’t attack a mother and her children anyway. It’s you they want. As far as I’m concerned, the further aw—”

Bass’s voice cut through the room, halting her conversation. “They would.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Dark Shadow would attack a mother and child.”

Amelia gasped, clutching her chest. “A-and who are you?”

“Sebastian Evernight.”

“Evernight? Is-isn’t that a Dark Shadow name?” he asked in a small voice.

“Yes.”

“Oh, my God!” Amelia gasped, reaching for her boys’ hands again. She turned her angry gaze on Jackson. “You want me to stay here with him? Nowhere is safe anymore.”

“He’s not going to hurt anyone,” Katalina said firmly, cutting Amelia’s ranting short.

“And how would you know that?” Amelia had gone from concerned to outraged. She stood, glaring at Katalina.

“Hey now, don’t you talk to her like that.” Jackson cut in.

“That’s all right, Jackson. I can take care of myself.” She took a step forward. “Because I know him. I know he’d never hurt anyone unless provoked, and because he’s just defended all of you, against his own pack. He’s killed to protect River Run. And because he’s my mate.” Katalina glared, her eyes unblinking. “Now listen to Jackson and stop acting irrationally. It doesn’t make sense for you to take off with two children unprotected when it’s clear some of Dark Shadow would like us all dead.”

Amelia stared dumbstruck. Her boys snickered.

Katalina turned and strode out of the room. She took Bass’s hand as she left, dragging him with her out into the hallway. When Katalina left, Amelia started her ranting again.

Katalina dropped with a huff onto the stairs, using the steps as a seat. “Is it too late to change my mind and hide at my grandmother’s forever?” she asked the floor.

Bass just laughed. Arne stuck his head on her lap. She scratched behind his ears, trying to block out Jackson’s voice becoming more irritated by the second.

“I just made that worse, right?” she asked Bass, looking up to find him standing by the front door, his fingers playing with the net curtain hung hanging over the small window.

“You were doing okay until you mentioned your mate’s a Dark Shadow.”

“But my mate is a Dark Shadow and they are just going to have to deal with it.”

He glanced at her with a smile just as Amelia pulled open the front room door. Her twin boys followed, seemingly enjoying the drama. “We are leaving!” she shouted, grabbing the boys’ coats and throwing them at them.

“No, you are not!” Jackson boomed back.

“What’s going on?” Karen asked as she rushed in from the kitchen. It was utter chaos, shouting, staring. The back door banged open as Cage ran in. He froze for a second as he took in the scene, and then decided what he had to say was more important.

“Bodies are all collected and covered in the back of the truck.” His voiced carried over the ranting and raving.

Katalina buried her head in her hands, wanting to disappear.

“Someone’s here,” Bass said into the noise.

Jackson spun around turning his back on Amelia just as the door opened. More people crowded into the already packed hallway. Amelia pushed past Jackson, racing for the door, her knuckles strained white as she gripped her little boys’ hands.

“No, you don’t!” Jackson moved with such speed, Katalina couldn’t follow the movement. One minute Amelia was making a run for it, the next Jackson was lifting her from the floor, his thick muscular arm wrapped around her middle.

The three men who walked in looked on in surprise. Katalina decided this was the craziest family reunion ever.

“I didn’t want to do this but you leave me no choice.” Jackson sighed before he spoke his next words. His tone changed, taking on a whole new level. The power and strength in his words was palpable in the air, the command an unbreakable thing. “As your alpha, I forbid you to leave this house unless given permission by me.”

Jackson put her down, dismissing her. “What do you know?” he asked the men standing with their backs against the closed door.

The eldest of the three was about to answer, but Bass interrupted, “Jackson.” Everyone went silent, staring at him as if they couldn’t believe he’d spoke.

“Yes?” Jackson half-growled.

“We’ve got company, cops.”

“Shit!” Jackson ran his hands through his hair with a groan. “Everyone in the back, now! Not a word out of any of you.”

Katalina jumped to her feet. “Come on, boy,” she murmured, patting her leg as she instructed Arne to follow.

People scrambled into action, bodies pushing their way through the door into the kitchen.

Katalina heard Karen speak in a firm tone. “Everyone over there. I don’t want Toby disturbed.”

“Look at this place! It’s like a war zone!” Jackson shouted, looking at the bloodied rags across the floor.

Katalina picked them up, as she walked.

“William, what the fuck are you doing sitting bleeding on my floor? I told you to go see Karen.”

Katalina came back into the hall to see what was taking Bass so long.

“Well, someone had to keep an eye on him. Dark Shadow scum!” William spat.

Bass froze in his path. Katalina saw the hurt cross his face for the briefest of moments before his mask slipped back into place.

“And how exactly did you plan to stop him with a broken leg? Cage, come get this idiot off my floor!”

Cage appeared through the doorway, took one look at William and laughed, “Come on, buddy.”

There was a knock at the door.

Jackson’s eyes looked at the pool of blood William had left behind.

The knock came again, louder.

Katalina pulled a towel from off the banister and rushed forward to mop the blood up. “Get the door,” she hissed.

“Just a second,” Jackson called toward the door. “Both of you stay out of sight. I don’t want either one of you caught up in this.

They slipped through into the kitchen in silence. William lay on the floor with Cage at his shoulders holding him down. Karen’s fingers prodded at his leg, causing William to moan in pain.

“Shush, Jackson’s talking to the cops,” Katalina hissed.

Karen looked up at her. “Kat, come help.”

Katalina tossed the towel aside and dropped on her knees beside Karen.

“What do you need?”

“Well, the stupid idiot didn’t come to me straight away, so his leg’s healing crooked. I’m going to have to re-break it. I want you to hold his thigh down. Cage, hold his shoulders. Here, William, bite on this. No noise, remember.”

Katalina watched as Karen knelt at his feet. She took his foot in her hands and pulled. The crack echoed through the silence. William’s muffled cry sent a shiver down Katalina’s spine.

Jackson popped in briefly to inform them of the cops’ departure and then disappeared to do something else. Hoping to escape now the cops had left and William’s leg had been straightened, Katalina went to stand but Karen gave her more instructions and before she knew it, she was lost in the task at hand. Katalina followed Karen’s instructions not thinking of anything else.

So it was a shock a little while later when she felt the first trickle of anxiety form in her gut. She focused on the feeling, wondering where it had come from, because although, treating injured people wasn’t the nicest task she’d ever done, it was nice to feel needed, to help. It took her a minute to realize it wasn’t her feelings, but Bass’s. She glanced up from her task of holding the splint while Karen strapped William’s leg in place. Bass stood alone in the corner, his eyes glazed, staring at nothing. To anyone else in the room, he look as indifferent as he always did, but to Katalina, he looked lost, and Bass never looked lost. He was the type of person who owned a room. As if he sensed her looking, his glazed eyes focused on her. He flashed her a forced smile.

“Hey, Karen, can I leave you to it? There’s something I have to do.”

Karen glanced up at Katalina and then to Bass. “Sure, Kat, thanks for your help.”

Walking silently toward him, Katalina took his hand, leading him out the back door. Arne stood from his position by the twins, but Katalina told him to stay. Once outside, she turned to face Bass and squeezed his hand as she asked, “Are you all right?”

“Of course, why wouldn’t I be?”

“Bass, I’m not stupid. I can read you better than you think. What’s wrong?”