About Face (Wolf Within) (6 page)

“The job is in Dublin. I want you to help Liam either find Mick Shaughnessy or give up the search gracefully. It’s become an obsession with him and he’ll put himself and his pack at risk if he’s not careful.

Now do you believe in me?
Paddy’s face swam before my eyes. Could he need my help with Murphy? Is that what Faith’s dream meant?

“He’s not thinking clearly lately. You, my dear, I suspect are the cause of that.”

Mick Shaughnessy. The name sent a shiver down my spine. Four years ago Murphy placed him in a janitorial job at the lab where Murphy’s bond mate, Sorcha, worked nights. Grandfather Mick repaid the generosity by arranging her death in the name of the conspiracy. Once his cover had been blown and his role in the conspiracy revealed, Mick Shaughnessy disappeared. Murphy was chasing him down? That was so dangerous I wanted to scream.

“Murphy’s not running around Dublin spouting off about the conspiracy, is he?” I was scared. I knew Murphy when he had his mind set on something. He was single-minded and relentless. He threw his personal safety to the wayside.

“Not quite yet, thankfully.” Jason gave my arm a squeeze and sat back. He cast a hungry look at his omelet, and I pushed the salt and pepper shakers toward him.

“Eat. Do you want ketchup?” At his horrified look, I let go of the bottle and then decided my eggs needed more and dumped a red blob of it onto my scrambled eggs. They were cold but still delicious.

Jason tore into his omelet with the appetite of someone who had spent the previous evening occupied with strenuous exercise. I didn’t really want to think about him and my mother thrashing around passionately between the sheets, so I forced my attention back to my plate.

We ate in silence for a moment, and the less I thought about Jason and Wren, the more Murphy crowded into my thoughts. What if the asshole did something stupid? Fatally stupid? The conspiracy already tried to take him out with an overdose of narcotics. Would they hesitate to act again if Murphy threatened them? I didn’t think so.

“Someone told Grandfather Mick the Council knew he’d been involved in Sorcha’s death,” I said when my plate was empty. Jason’s was, too, except for a few lone breakfast potatoes. “Someone in Mac Tire?”

“Presumably.” Jason set down his fork and gave me his full attention. “The problem with Mac Tire is that it’s a very large pack and is not confined to simply Ireland and Northern Ireland. England, Scotland and Wales have to be considered as well. Mick’s obviously taken refuge somewhere, and he’s nowhere to be found in Dublin. At least not yet. Liam doesn’t believe he’s there.”

“So you two are in contact? You authorized his search efforts?” My coffee mug was lukewarm between the palms of my hands. Outside the diner, the rain had intensified, the sun blocked by a raft of ominous dark clouds. Heavy droplets spattered against the window and combined to smear the glass so I could barely make out the wavering shapes of the cars in the parking lot. Maybe the hunt would be a wet one tonight, but it seemed more and more likely with every passing moment I wouldn’t be there to find out.

“We’re in contact,” Jason confirmed, but frowned. “But the colder the trail, the hotter his pursuit. Maybe you could distract him.”

Murphy had been focused on finding Sorcha’s killer for nearly four months. Would I be a distraction he would brush off easily? I’d never been able to compete with Sorcha, even four years into her grave, why in the world would I be able to start now?

But I had to do something.

Chapter 4

“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” A bulky shadow detached from the brickwork near the green door of the pub and resolved itself into the shape of a very tall, extremely muscular man.

The glow of the streetlights illuminated his green eyes and bright red hair. His expression was not exactly welcoming.

The sign above the pub doors read
An Puca,
and I was pretty sure I was in the right place. Although, after a hellish twelve-hour delay in Philadelphia due to some damn mechanical malfunction in one of the plane’s engines, I wasn’t even sure what frigging day it was anymore.

Instead of arriving in Dublin at just before eight in the morning with time to find a hotel and get my bearings before setting out to find Mac Tire’s pub, the plane landed just after eight PM, and I’d taken a cab straight from the airport to the pub.

My eyes were scratchy and dry, my throat ached and my stomach rumbled. I was sleep and food-deprived and pretty damn close to a meltdown. Whether it would be a temper tantrum or tears I wasn’t exactly sure, but I’d had enough.

Now this goddamn red-haired giant couldn’t even be civil?

“This is a pub, right? Don’t pubs want people to drink in them?” I curled my lip sarcastically which only made the red- haired giant angry. Good one, Stanzie.

“Can you not read the wee sign in the window that says
Private
party
tonight
, maybe? Or do they not teach reading in American schools these days?”

“Your big, goddamn hulking shoulders blocked the wee sign in the window,” I muttered rebelliously.

The red-haired giant cracked his knuckles.

“Excuse me?” I tilted my head to the side and regarded him with growing incredulity. He was not going to threaten to beat me up, was he? I wished I’d worn my six-inch spiked heels with the steel-tipped toes, but all I had were a comfortable pair of leather boots. “Look, I don’t know your name but I do know you’re Pack. And so am I. And if the private party tonight is for members of Mac Tire, well, then, here’s a funny thing—I’m a member of Mac Tire. So can I go in now? I’m fucking tired and I want a drink.”

Meltdown verged in the direction of temper tantrum. That was interesting. Most times it was tears.

“Well, I can smell too, can’t I now?” The giant sneered. “But, if you knew the first thing about Mac Tire, which I’m almost positive you don’t, you’d know we have pack jewelry, which, incidentally, I’m not seeing on you. And I’ll betcha my left nut you don’t have the jewelry because you’re not Mac Tire. Because if you were, you’d never take it off. Brilliant, isn’t it?”

Yeah. Brilliant. Of course I didn’t wear the damn ring. It was a lie. Paddy had put it on my finger and told me I was family and it was a fucking lie.

“I’m going to lose my temper,” I announced. The giant might be bigger than me, but I knew I could scream louder.

“I don’t give a fuck.” The giant crossed his beefy arms over his chest and smirked.

I cursed the fact I hadn’t let Jason alert Paddy or Murphy I was coming to Dublin. In my irrational fear of everything, I’d thought maybe they wouldn’t have let me come, but they could hardly object once I was already there.

I’d come armed with the name and address of the pack’s pub. That was all I’d let Jason give me.

Damn the man, why hadn’t he gone behind my back and called anyway? Of all the times to let me have my way, why now? Bastard.

“Look, I have the damn ring. It’s in my luggage. I am Mac Tire, I swear.” It galled to say that because I did not feel remotely as if I belonged to the pack, but I needed to get into the pub. I was tired, hungry, miserable and about to collapse.

“Doubtful.” The giant made no move to move aside and let me in.

“Do you want me to tear apart my suitcase? Jesus, I don’t believe this. I think you get off on hassling people.” I began to unzip my suitcase.

He guffawed, but did not uncross his arms. “What’s your name, woman? But I have to tell you, we don’t have Americans in Mac Tire.”

“Ha,” I crowed. “That’s just a goddamn lie. Because you do have one. Me. My name is Constance Newcastle.”

I don’t know what I expected. Maybe not that he’d break down into abject apologies, sweep open the door and personally escort me in, but at least some glimmer of recognition.

“Doesn’t ring a bell. Why don’t you fuck off? Right now I’m bored, but I’m edging toward irritated and there’s a thing you don’t want to see, I promise you.”

“How about Liam Murphy? You know him?” I spat out his name and hated myself for sinking so goddamn low.

One bushy red eyebrow elevated. Paddy could do that trick too. Was everyone in Mac Tire a direct descendent of Mister Spock or something?

“Him I know.” That figured. Murphy was an ex-Alpha after all.

“Then do you know he’s bonded with an American?” I prompted, my lip still curled.

“I know he showed up here four months ago without her and never talks about it. Rumor has it you two are on the rocks only he won’t face up to it.” The giant gave a huge shrug and his green eyes gleamed with protective ire. “Tell you what. You give me the real story of it and I’ll think about asking if you can go in. Fair’s fair. Liam Murphy’s a favorite in this pack and you’re some flighty American twat nobody knows or gives a damn about.”

Won’t face up to it? What the fuck?
He
walked out on
me
. I don’t know what showed on my face, but the red-haired giant’s expression altered and for the first time he looked unsure.

“Look, let me call Paddy and…” he began, but I couldn’t stand the sudden pity in his eyes. I guess he’d figured out I wasn’t the one who walked out. Fuck.

“Oh, screw this.” I wheeled around and stomped off. I ruined my exit though because I forgot my goddamn suitcase and had to scurry back to retrieve it and the backpack full of shoes.

The giant attempted to help me, and I slapped his meaty hands away, my cheeks on fire with mortification.

“Did you come to try to work it out with him then?” He didn’t seem to feel the stinging slaps on his hands, and pulled the strap of the backpack over my shoulder even as I fought against his help.

Where was my goddamn anger now? Mortification rapidly turned into blinding tears. My eyes burned.

“None of your fucking business.” I stomped away.

“Hang on,” he called after me. “Just let me call Paddy and maybe I can…”

“Fuck you,” I screamed over my shoulder and turned my head away before he could see the tears on my cheeks. But I think he saw them anyway. Goddamn streetlights.

* * * *

Two blocks later when I was about to shove my damn heavy suitcase into the middle of the street and watch it get demolished by the terrifying traffic that traveled on the wrong goddamn side of the road, my cell phone rang.

“This blows,” I announced as the backpack of shoes fell off my shoulder and dragged me by the elbow half into the gutter. I gave my suitcase a kick and it tottered a moment before it fell over—straight into a puddle.

Pedestrians gave me a wide berth, and once again I wished I had my steel-toed, spiked heels.

Instead, I dug into my purse, fatalistically convinced I would miss the damn call, and pulled out my phone. I pressed Talk.

“What?” I barked, and there was a strange silence on the other end, as if the person debated whether or not to gently hang up and say to hell with it.

“Where the hell are you?” The person on the other end obviously had no fear of death, but I wondered how he felt about death by disembowelment. Slow disembowelment.

I looked around at the unfamiliar street. A pharmacy. A men’s tailor. A shoe store. I knew I was not in a good mental space when not even the slightest desire to drift closer to the shoe store window passed through my head. In fact, I felt like throwing my backpack through the damn thing. Bad place. Stanzie was in a bad, bad place.

“I have no fucking clue,” I replied because I didn’t. Some street in Dublin. I smelled food—something thick and meaty like stew—and nearly wept, I was so damn hungry.

“Turn your ass around and come back to the pub.”

“Is that a direct order, Alpha?” I snarled. Paddy, who was on the other end of the phone, damn him, made a strangled noise halfway between laughter and a roar of outrage.

“You know what? Just shut up and frigging stand there. I’ll find you. You can’t be far, Colm said you didn’t have a car.”

“You have got to be kidding. A car? Everyone drives on the wrong side of the road, Paddy. I almost had a fucking coronary in the cab from the airport and had to put my head between my knees and close my eyes for most of the ride. The cab driver thought I was freaking insane, and there’s a distinct possibility he may be onto something. A fucking car. Please.”

“Are you gonna go ballistic if I start laughing now?” Paddy definitely struggled against hysterics, I could hear it in his damn voice. Fury, dull and hot, pounded through my veins and made my head hurt.

I heard traffic noises from his end and suspected he was outside. “Where are you?”

“Grouchy,” he commented. “I’m walking down the damn street, Stanzie, where the hell else would I be? I told you I was coming to find you. Do you suppose you could describe your surroundings? Give me a bit more than the cars are driving on the wrong side of the road?”

“Pharmacy, men’s tailor, shoe store,” I recited obediently, although I really wanted to reach through the phone and strangle him.

“Let me guess. You’re standing outside the shoe store and drooling over the Jimmy Flus or whatever the bloody hell they call them.”

“Choos,” I snapped. “Jimmy Choos. You’re fucking with me on purpose, aren’t you?”

“Maybe a little,” he agreed, and I growled.

“Did you just growl at me?”

I did it again and gave my suitcase another kick. It was still on its side in the puddle, and I bet all my damn clothes were now soaked in dirty Dublin rainwater. Fuck. Me.

“Just for my own edification, what might be the name of the pharmacy? Or the men’s tailor? Or the bloody shoe store?” Paddy was the one who sounded grouchy, and a grim smile flickered across my face.

“Boots, John O’Toole’s Menswear and Shamrock Shoes. That’s the dumbest name I ever heard for a shoe store, by the way. What’s next? Emerald Isle Organic Market? Blarney Stone Cosmetics? Jesus. H. Christ.”

“Hey,” groaned my Alpha. “Don’t be making fun of my culture, woman. It’s not nice.” Then he snickered. “Blarney Stone Cosmetics. You horrible bitch.”

I almost laughed myself. It was kind of a good one.