Iron Kissed (16 page)

He sighed. “I don't know. Does it matter whose fault it is once you're sitting in the middle of the frying pan?” He gave me a despairing look. “And as my father used to point out, you find your way into that frying pan way too often for it to be purely accidental.”

I put aside the urge to defend myself. For over a decade I'd managed to keep to myself, living as a human on the fringe of werewolf society (and that only because, at the Marrok's request, Adam decided to interfere with my life even before he built a house behind mine). It was
Adam's
trouble that had started everything. Then I'd owed the vampires for helping me with Adam's problems. Clearing
that
up had left me indebted to the fae.

But I was tired, I had to get up and work tomorrow—and if I started explaining myself, it would be hours before we got back to a useful discussion.

“So, finding myself in the frying pan once again, I came to you for advice,” I prodded him. “Like maybe you can tell me why neither Uncle Mike nor Zee wanted to talk about the sea man or how there happened to be a forest and an ocean—a whole ocean—tucked neatly into a backyard and a bathroom. And if any of that could have something to do with O'Donnell's death.”

He looked at me.

“Oh, come on,” I said. “I saw your face when I told you about the funny things that happened in the rez. You're Welsh, for heaven's sake. You know about the fae.”

“You're Indian,” he said in a falsetto that I think was supposed to be an imitation of me. “You know how to track animals and build fires with nothing but sticks and twigs.”

I gave him a haughty stare. “Actually, I do. Charles—another Indian—taught me.”

He waved his hand at me; I recognized the gesture as one of mine. Then he laughed. “All right. All right. But I'm not an expert on the fae just because I'm Welsh.”

“So explain that ‘ah-ha' expression on your face when I told you about the forest.”

“If you went Underhill, you just confirmed one of Da's theories about what the fae are doing with their reservations.”

“What do you mean?”

“When the fae first proposed that the government put them on reservations, my father told me he thought that they might be trying to set up territories like they once had in Great Britain and parts of Europe, before the Christians came and started ruining their places of power by building chapels and cathedrals. The fae didn't value their anchors in this world because their magic works so much better Underhill. They didn't defend their places until it was too late. Da believes the last gate to Underhill disappeared in the middle of the sixteenth century, cutting them off from a great deal of their power.”

“So they've made new anchors,” I said.

“And found Underhill again.” He shrugged. “As for not talking about the sea fae…well, if he were dangerous and powerful…you're not supposed to speak about things like that, or name them—it may attract their attention.”

I thought about it a moment. “I can see why they'd want to keep it quiet if they've found some way to regain some of their power. So does it have anything to do with figuring out who killed O'Donnell? Did he find out about it? Or was he stealing? And if so, what did he steal?”

He gave me a considering look. “You're still trying to find the killer, even though Zee is being a bastard?”

“What would you do if, in order to defend you from some trumped-up charge, I told a lawyer that you were the Marrok's son?”

He raised his eyebrows. “Surely telling her that there were killings in the reservation doesn't compare?”

I shrugged unhappily. “I don't know. I should have checked with him, or with Uncle Mike, before I told anyone anything.”

He frowned at me, but didn't argue anymore.

“Hey,” I said with a sigh, “since we're friends and pack now, instead of potential mates, do you suppose you could loan me enough to pay Zee what I owe him for the garage?” Zee didn't make threats. If he told his lawyer to tell me that he expected repayment, he was serious. “I can pay you back on the same schedule I was paying him. That will get you paid off, with interest, in about ten years.”

“I'm sure we can arrange something,” Samuel said kindly, as if he understood that my change of subject was because I couldn't stand to talk about Zee and my stupidity anymore. “You've got a pretty solid line of credit with me—and Da, for that matter, whose pockets are a lot deeper. You look beat. Why don't you go to sleep?”

“All right,” I said. Sleep sounded good. I stood up and groaned as the thigh muscle I'd abused at karate practice yesterday made its protest.

“I'm going out for a minute or two,” he said a little too casually—and I stopped walking toward my bedroom.

“Oh, no, you're not.”

His eyebrows met his hairline. “What?”

“You are
not
going to tell Adam that I'm his for the taking.”

“Mercy.” He stood up, strode over to me, and kissed me on the forehead. “You can't do a damned thing about what I do or don't do. It's between me and Adam.”

He left, closing the door gently behind him. Leaving me with the sudden, frightening knowledge that I'd just lost my best defense against Adam.

My bedroom was dark, but I didn't bother to turn on the light. I had worse things to worry about than the dark.

I headed for the bathroom and took a hot shower. By the time the water had cooled and I got out, I knew a couple of things. First, I was going to have just a little time before I had to face Adam. Otherwise he'd already have been waiting for me and my bedroom was empty. Second, I couldn't do anything about Adam or Zee until tomorrow, so I might as well go to sleep.

I combed out my hair and blow-dried it until it was only damp. Then I braided it so I could comb it out in the morning.

I pulled back my covers, knocking the stick that had been resting on top of them to the ground. Before Samuel moved in, I used to sleep without covers in the summer. But he kept the air-conditioning turned down until there was a real chill in the air, especially at night.

I climbed into bed, pulled the covers up under my chin, and closed my eyes.

Why was there a stick on my bed?

I sat up and looked at the walking stick lying on the floor. Even in the dark I knew it was the same stick I'd found at O'Donnell's. Careful not to step on it, I got out of bed and turned on the light.

The gray twisty wood lay innocuously on the floor on top of a gray sock and a dirty T-shirt. I crouched down and touched it gingerly. The wood lay hard and cool under my fingertips, without the wash of magic it had held in O'Donnell's house. For a moment it felt like any other stick, then a faint trace of magic pulsed and disappeared.

I searched out my cell phone and called the number Uncle Mike had been calling me from. It rang a long time before someone picked it up.

“Uncle Mike's,” a not so cheerful stranger's voice answered, barely understandable amid a cacophony of heavy metal music, voices, and a sudden loud crash, as if someone had dropped a stack of dishes. “
Merde.
Clean that up. What do you want?”

I assumed that only the last sentence was directed at me.

“Is Uncle Mike there?” I asked. “Tell him it's Mercy and that I have something he might be interested in.”

“Hold on.”

Someone barked out a few sharp words in French and then yelled, “Uncle Mike, phone!”

Someone shouted, “Get the troll out of here.”

Followed by someone with a very deep voice muttering, “I'd like to see you try to get this troll out of here. I'll eat your face and spit out your teeth.”

Then Uncle Mike's cheerful Irish voice said, “This is Uncle Mike. May I help you?”

“I don't know,” I answered. “I've got a certain walking stick that someone left on my bed tonight.”

“Do you now?” he said very quietly. “Do you?”

“What should I do with it?” I asked.

“Whatever it will allow you to do,” he said in an odd tone. Then he cleared his voice and sounded his usual amused self again. “No, I know what you are asking. I think I'll give someone a call and see what they'd like. Probably they'll come and get it this time, too. It's too late for you to be awaiting for them to come callin'. Why don't you put it outside? Just lean it against your house. It'll come to no harm if no one collects it. And if they do, well, then they'll not be disturbing you or the wolf, eh?”

“You're sure?”

“Aye, lass. Now I've got a troll to deal with. Put it outside.” He hung up.

I put my clothes back on and took the stick outside. Samuel wasn't back yet, and the lights were still on at Adam's house. I stared at the walking stick for a few minutes, wondering who had put it on my bed and what they wanted. Finally I leaned it against the mobile home's new siding and went back to bed.

 

The stick was gone and Samuel was asleep when I got up the next morning. I almost woke him up to see what he'd told Adam, or if he'd noticed who'd gotten the stick, but as an emergency room doctor, his hours could be pretty brutal. If my staring at him hadn't woken him up, then he needed his sleep. I'd find out what had happened soon enough.

Adam's SUV was waiting next to the front door of my office when I drove up. I parked as far from it as I could, on the far side of the parking lot—which was where I usually parked.

He got out when I drove up, and was leaning against his door when I came up to him.

I've never seen a werewolf that was out of shape or fat; the wolf is too restless for that. Even so, Adam was a step harder, though not bulky. His coloring was a bit lighter than mine—which still left him with a deep tan and dark brown hair that he kept trimmed just a little longer than military standards. His wide cheekbones made his mouth look a little narrow, but that didn't detract from his beauty. He didn't look like a Greek god…but if there were Slavic gods, he'd be in strong contention. Right now that narrow mouth was flattened into a grim line.

I approached a little warily, and wished I knew what Samuel had told him. I started to say something when I noticed that there was something different about the door. My deadbolt was still there, but next to it was a new black keypad. He waited in silence as I checked out the shiny silver buttons.

I crossed my arms and turned back to him.

After a few minutes Adam gave me a half smile of appreciation though his eyes were too intent to carry off real amusement. “You complained about the guards,” he explained.

“So why did you set up an alarm without asking me?” I asked stiffly.

“It's not just an alarm,” he told me, the smile gone as if it had never been there. “Security is my bread and butter. There are cameras in the lot and inside your garage, too.”

I didn't ask him how he'd gotten in. As he said, security was his business. “Don't you usually work on government contracts and things a little more important than a VW shop? I suppose someone might break in and steal all the money in the safe. Maybe five hundred bucks if they're lucky. Or maybe they'll steal a transmission for their '72 Beetle? What do you think?”

He didn't bother to answer my sarcastic question.

“If you open the door without using the key code, a physical alarm will sound and one of my people will be tagged that the alarm has gone off.” He spoke in a rapid, no-nonsense voice as if I hadn't said anything. “You have two minutes to reset it. If you do, my people will call your shop number to confirm it was you or Gabriel who reset it. If you don't reset it, they'll notify both the police and me.”

He paused as if waiting for a response. So I raised an eyebrow. Werewolves are pushy. I've had a long time to get used to it, but I didn't have to like it.

“The key code is four numbers,” he said. “If you punch in Jesse's birthday, month-month-day-day, it deactivates the alarm.” He didn't ask if I knew her birthday, which I did. “If you punch in your birthday, it will alert my people and they'll call me—and I'll assume you're in the kind of trouble you don't want the police to attend.”

I gritted my teeth. “I don't need a security system.”

“There are cameras,” he said, ignoring my words. “Five in the lot, four in your shop, and two in the office. From six at night until six in the morning, the cameras are on motion sensors and will only record when there's something moving. From six in the morning to six at night the cameras are off—though I can change that for you if you'd like. The cameras record onto DVDs. You should change them out every week. I'll send someone over this afternoon to show you and Gabriel how that all works.”

“You can send them over to take it out,” I told him.

“Mercedes,” he said. “I'm not happy with you right now—don't push me.”

What did he have to be unhappy with me about?

“Well, isn't that just convenient?” I snapped. “I'm not happy with you either. I don't need this.” I waved my hand to take in the cameras and keypad.

He pushed himself off his SUV and stalked over to me. I knew he wasn't angry enough to hurt me, but I still backed up until I hit the outer wall of the garage. He put one hand on either side of me and leaned in until I could feel his breath on my face.

No one could ever say that Adam didn't know how to intimidate people.

“Maybe I'm mistaken,” he began coolly. “Perhaps Samuel was misinformed and you aren't engaged in investigating the fae without their cooperation or the approval of either Zee or Uncle Mike, who might otherwise be reasonably expected to keep an eye out for you.”

The warmth of his body shouldn't have felt good. He was angry and every muscle was tense. It was like being leaned on by a very heavy, warm brick. A sexy brick.

“Perhaps, Mercedes,” he bit out in a voice like ice, “you didn't set out last night to join up with Bright Future, a group that has been tied into enough violent incidents that the fae, who
are
watching you, are going to be somewhat concerned—especially since you have ferreted out a number of things they'd rather be kept secret. I'm sure they'll be extremely happy when they find out you've told the son of the Marrok everything you know about the reservation—that you were supposed to keep secret.” The coolness was gone from his voice by the time he'd finished, and he was all but snarling in my face.

“Uhm,” I said.

“The fae aren't exactly cooperative at the best of times, but even they just might hesitate to do something to you if Samuel or I show up. I trust you to be able to survive until one of us gets here.” He leaned down and kissed me forcefully once, a quick kiss that was over almost before it began. Possessive and almost punitive. Nothing that should have sent my pulse racing. “And don't think I've forgotten that the vampires have a good reason not to be happy with you, too.” Then he kissed me again.

As soon as his lips touched mine the second time, I knew that Samuel, in addition to telling Adam everything I'd told him last night, had also informed Adam that he was no longer interested in being my mate.

I hadn't realized how much restraint Adam had been using until it was gone.

When he pulled back, his face was flushed and he was breathing as hard as I was. He reached over and punched in four numbers with his left hand.

“There's an instruction booklet, if you'd like to read it, next to your cash register. Otherwise my man will answer any questions you have when he comes.” His voice was too deep and I knew he was a hairsbreadth away from losing control. When he pushed away and climbed back into his SUV, I should have been relieved.

I stayed where I was, leaning against the building until I could no longer hear his engine.

If he'd wanted to take me right then and there, I would have let him. I'd have done anything for his touch, anything to please him.

Adam scared me more than the vampires, more than the fae. Because Adam could steal more from me than my life. Adam was the only Alpha I'd ever been around, including the Marrok himself, who could make me do his bidding against my will.

It took me three tries before I was able to slide the key into the deadbolt.

 

Monday was my busiest day, and this was no exception. It might be Labor Day, but my clients knew I was usually unofficially open on most Saturdays and holidays. Adam's security man, who was not one of the wolves, came in shortly after lunch. He showed Gabriel and me how to change out the DVDs.

“These are better than the tapes,” he told me with more childlike enthusiasm than I expected out of a fifty-year-old man with Marine tattoos on his arms. “People don't usually change tapes often enough, so the saved footage is too grainy to be much help, or else they record over an important incident without realizing it. DVDs are better. These can't be written over. When they fill up, they'll automatically switch to a secondary disc. Since you're only activating them when you are not here, they probably won't fill the first disc in a week. So you just change them once a week—most people do it on Monday or Friday. Then you store them for a few months before you throw them out. If something happens to your system here, the boss is recording remotely as well.” He obviously loved his job.

After some additional instructions and a little bit of a sales pitch to make sure we were happy with what we had, Adam's man left with a cheery wave.

“Don't worry,” Gabriel told me. “I'll change them for you.”

He'd been as happy to play with the new toys as the tech had been.

“Thanks,” I told him sourly, unhappy about
the boss is recording remotely
part. “You do that. I'll go take my temper out on that Passat's shift linkage problem.”

When there was a lull in customers about two, Gabriel came back to the garage. I was teaching him a little here and there. He was going on to college rather than becoming a mechanic, but he wanted to learn.

“So, for a person who just shelled out a lot of money for a security system, you don't seem too happy,” he said. “Is there some trouble I should know about?”

I pushed a strand of hair out of my eyes, doubtlessly leaving a trail of the sludge that covered every inch of the thirty-year-old engine I was working on and had gotten a good start on covering every inch of me, too.

“Not much trouble that you need to worry about,” I told him after a moment. “If I thought there'd be a problem, I'd have warned you. Mostly it's just Adam overreacting.”

And it was overreacting, I'd decided after thinking things over all morning. Only a moron would believe that I was joining Bright Future in order to protest the fae—and somehow I was pretty sure that stupid fae didn't last long. If they talked to Uncle Mike—or Zee (even if he was still angry)—they'd know that I was still trying to clear Zee.

I might know a few things that made the fae uncomfortable, but if they wanted me dead for it, I'd already be dead.

Gabriel whistled. “Jesse's father installed the whole security system without asking you? I guess that's pretty aggressive.” He gave me a concerned look. “I like him, Mercy. But if he's stalking you—”