Chapter Two
“I didn’t tell you about the fight because it had barely started before I stopped it,” Rook McQueen said, repeating the same thing to his father that he’d told Bishop not twenty minutes ago. If he’d known he’d get his ears chewed off for not reporting that morning’s minor non-scuffle, he’d have done so right after the incident occurred.
So much for big brother Bishop telling him to use his head, his common sense, and to start making his own decisions. Most of the time, Rook’s decisions were picked apart and declared wrong, anyway. Or foolish—that was his favorite. He really shouldn’t have expected this one to be any different.
Thomas McQueen, Rook’s father and run Alpha, turned away from the broad window that looked out over the auction floor. Thick arms crossed over his chest, dark eyes narrowed and hidden behind bushy eyebrows, Father made an imposing figure even when he wasn’t trying to intimidate. Of all the other loup in town, Father was hardest on his sons because—as he said over and over—they were his legacy. And he was hardest of all, as always, on Rook.
***
The first six chords of “Black Sheep Son” played through his mind. He’d written the song in high school, and it was the first original tune performed by his college band once they started making a name for themselves doing covers. Remembering his music kept him calm and focused.
“What was the fight about?” Father asked.
“The usual. Two teenage boys posturing over a girl, even though she’s made it clear her interest is elsewhere.”
In a town as small as Cornerstone, dating was often more difficult than a novice guitarist learning barre chords. Its two-room school educated fewer than fifty children at any given time, and you were lucky to have a handful of friends in your grade. Luckier still if one of them was of the opposite sex and interested in you—but that luck could be shattered by the color of your Wolf and the expectations that your color carried. As a Black Wolf, Rook had spent his teenage years in a firm, frustrated state of “look, don’t touch.” College had been another kind of nightmare. But this fight wasn’t about him.
“Who hit first?” Father asked.
“They moved at the same time. I saw it coming before they could actually strike each other, and I got in between. Technically, there wasn’t a fight, so I didn’t see a reason to bother you, especially on an auction day.”
“Run business doesn’t stop for auction day, son.”
“I know that, but I made the call.” Rook’s ability to stand up for himself had improved dramatically in the three months since he graduated college, but his father still intimidated him. As did the role of Alpha and everything it entailed—a role that Rook, as a Black Wolf, had a right to claim one day. Becoming Alpha was looking less and less likely with each decision his father and brother questioned.
Rook moved to the other side of the desk to stand opposite his father. The bustle of auction day continued below them, the noise a muffled rumble on the other side of the glass. A flash of black hair caught his attention as it bobbed through the crowd. The angle gave him only a cursory view of a slim female body, pale arms, and the back of a green t-shirt. Her hair was so black it actually glinted with blue highlights. His skin prickled with impossible interest, and he watched her, hoping she’d turn around—
“Rook?”
He snapped his head around. “I’m sorry, what?”
Father glanced out the window, then shook his head. “It sounds as though you handled the situation well, and you may have been right that it wasn’t something I needed to hear about.”
“But?” There was always a but.
“Bishop brought it up so that I could make that judgment call.”
“Bishop brought it up because he doesn’t trust
my
judgment and never has. He didn’t trust that I handled the fight or my assessment that it wasn’t worth bringing to you.”
“It isn’t about trust, son.”
“Then what is it about? You both keep telling me to take initiative. So I make a call, he questions it, and then he comes to you so that I have to explain myself.”
“It’s how we learn.” Father unfolded his arms and tucked his hands into his trouser pockets—in all his life, Rook had never seen his father wear jeans. “It’s how Bishop and I discover what you know and what you can do. There’s no written exam for this kind of work, Rook. You learn it on the job, just as I did.”
Rook frowned, not wanting to concede the argument, but his father had a good point. As the oldest son, Bishop was traditionally first in line to inherit the role of Alpha, despite being born a common Gray Wolf. As the third son, Rook had surprised everyone by being a Black Wolf—stronger, faster, fiercer, and typically the firstborn of a Black Wolf like their father. And as the Black son of the Alpha, he could one day claim the role of Alpha without physically challenging his elder brother for it.
Therein lay the friction.
Bishop had been training to take over as Alpha his entire life, working hard to overcome the handicap of being Gray. He’d been ten years old when Rook was born, and fourteen the first time Rook shifted and revealed his Black Wolf. His kid brother had innocently changed Bishop’s future, and he’d been punishing Rook for it ever since. Nothing Rook did was ever good enough—not even his music.
“I know you’re frustrated,” Father said, and the sympathy in his voice surprised Rook. “Right now it feels like we don’t trust you, but that’s only because you’re still learning. One day no one will go behind your back to bring matters to me, because everyone will know that your word is mine. Just like they know this with Bishop.”
Rook nodded. He understood all of that; it had been drilled into his head for years. And Rook knew he still had a long way to go to prove himself worthy of voicing the Alpha’s word. He also knew he didn’t possess an overabundance of patience, which fueled his daily frustration.
Footsteps creaked up the stairs, alerting them both to the interruption before a fist ever landed on wood. After two sharp knocks, the office door swung open. Knight came inside, his favorite Stetson in his hands instead of on his head. “Minor problem,” he said.
“What sort of problem?” Father asked.
Knight stepped further into the room, boot heels snapping on the wood. Rook resisted rolling his eyes at his middle brother’s choice of footwear. Knight only wore them on auction day, as a running joke about wearing a disguise for their human customers. Women liked it, though, and even if they didn’t come to buy at the auction, they spent their money at the concession stand while hanging around and hoping to flirt with him.
“There’s a young lady downstairs who’s giving off the strangest scent. It’s human, but there’s also an undercurrent of something else, almost loup. And she’s extremely agitated. Her pulse is all over the place.”
Having a human woman running around the auction house on sale day wasn’t uncommon, but a human scent mixed with loup was. “Half-breed?” Rook asked.
While run loup were forbidden from marrying humans without special dispensation from their run Alpha, some rogue loup lived with and married humans anyway, producing run-less half-breed children. Despite being born sterile and often without the ability to shift into beast form, half-breeds were the biggest threat to loup garou secrecy because of their mixed biology. They weren’t welcome in sanctuary towns like Cornerstone, and most were smart enough to stay away.
“I don’t think so,” Knight replied. “I’ve smelled half-breeds, and I was able to get close to her. Speak with her. Her scent was different. That and the agitation . . . Bishop is escorting her upstairs.”
Rook glanced out at the auction floor in time to see Bishop and the black-haired woman disappear beneath them, heading for the stairs. He moved around to the other side of the desk and stood next to Knight, while Father arranged himself behind the desk. Knight elbowed him in the ribs, then nodded at their father. He knew why Rook had been summoned. Rook rolled his eyes; he’d tell his brother all about it later. Only three years younger than Knight, Rook and he had always been close, often putting them both at odds with the much older Bishop.
Until it came to run matters. Then all three McQueen brothers came together as a solid, immoveable force.
Two sets of footsteps ascended the stairs at a steady clip. The scuff of the first was lighter than the clump of the second, and a waft of something sweet, floral, and decidedly female trickled into the office. The scent put all of Rook’s senses on high alert. Once again, awareness prickled across his skin.
And then the onyx-haired woman stepped into the room. She met Rook’s eyes immediately and froze in place, and he stared right back, his heart beating a bit faster. She was beautiful, with long lashes, eyebrows the same black as her hair, and flawless pale skin with no trace of makeup. And younger than he’d originally thought, guessing her to be around his age. She came up to Bishop’s shoulder, which would put her at about Rook’s chin. She was exquisite—a china doll come to life, cursed with a blank stare instead of a smile.
He wanted to touch her, needed to touch her, and his right hand lifted a few inches before he snatched it back, alarmed. Bishop had brought her up here for a reason, damn it. She could be a threat, and he was checking her out like a love-struck idiot.
She stared back at him with an expression that waffled between alarm and suspicion, and her eyes carried a lingering accusation. He didn’t know her (was positive he’d remember having met her at any point in his life) but she seemed pissed off at him for something. Maybe she didn’t like tattoos? Or the 00-gauge steel studs in both of his earlobes offended her beyond reason. They had certainly offended Bishop when he showed up two years ago with both lobes pierced. Whatever it was, her stormy expression squashed most of the interest rising from points south.
She blinked hard and the animosity disappeared behind a curious smile that she turned and directed at Father. “I was told there was an accident involving my car,” she said. Her voice was carefully controlled, devoid of accent, and sensual enough to drive a spike of heat right into Rook’s guts. Even his beast, usually silent unless threatened, stirred at the sound of her voice.
Father didn’t even blink at whatever lie Bishop had used to lure her upstairs. Bishop was smart enough to not close the office door yet, but he stood in it, his height and size blocking her only escape route. “Please, have a seat, Miss . . . ?” Father indicated one of the two wicker chairs across from his desk.
“Jones,” she said. “Brynn Jones. And I’ll stand, thank you. Mr. McQueen, I assume?”
“Thomas McQueen. Pleasure.”
“Likewise.” A slight trickle of sarcasm hinted at an unspoken “not.”
Rook inhaled hard, trying to her figure out. She did have a vague, indistinguishable human scent on the surface, but Knight was right—beneath it, threaded through, was something
other
. Almost definitely loup. Only she was doing everything a run loup (and most half-breeds, for that matter) wouldn’t dare do. She was looking an Alpha in the eye, for one thing. And she’d walked right into their town without permission, and without immediately introducing herself to the Alpha.
Even deeper below the other two things lingered that sweet female scent that drew Rook to her. Made him want to get closer, to breath that scent in deeper. Instead, he caught hold of his common sense and held still.
Father made a gesture, and Bishop closed the office door. Brynn took a few steps toward the center of the room, putting herself at equal distance from all of them, even though she kept her gaze trained on the Alpha. She fiddled with a ring on her right hand, its blue gem glinting in the office light.
“Ms. Jones, your car is fine,” Father said. “But we have a private matter to discuss with you.”
“Which is?”
“Why are you here?”
“You’re having a public auction. Do you interrogate everyone who attends for the first time?”
“Only when they give me a reason to do so.”
“What exactly have I done, Mr. McQueen?”
“According to all human laws, not a thing. But a few of our laws take exception to your presence here.”
“Your laws?”
“You seem too intelligent for word games, Ms. Jones, so allow me to be blunt. Your people should have told you it’s bad form to enter a sanctuary town without permission.”
Her jaw twitched, but she made no move to deny the fact that she wasn’t entirely human. Brave girl. “My apologies, then. I know my auction attendance is unusual, but I wasn’t aware of any laws requiring a Magus to ask permission to enter a sanctuary town.”
Magus? Rook inhaled deeply, catching Brynn’s scent again. He clearly identified human and loup, but not the bitter orange scent he associated with the arrogant magic users who called themselves Magi. What was she playing at?
Even Father frowned, his thick eyebrows furrowing in a deep vee. “You don’t smell like a Magus,” he said.
She reached beneath the collar of her shirt. Next to him, Knight stiffened, and Rook took a step forward. Brynn pulled a gold necklace out of her shirt and slipped the chain over her head. Her shoulder-length black hair fell back down in an obsidian wave and another blast of that floral scent wafted around the room. She put the necklace on the back of the nearest chair.
“It has a reflective spell,” she said. “The medallion was supposed to mimic the identifying scents of the humans around me and hide the fact that I’m Magi. I’m impressed you could smell through it.”
All four loup noses in the room flared at the same time as they reassessed the woman in front of them. The soft, earthy human scent was gone, and Rook caught a strong whiff of bitter orange.
Knight made a quiet, strangled sound. He gaped at Brynn with something like horror on his face. Bishop came closer, attention firmly on Knight. Bishop stopped within an arm’s reach of Brynn, and that’s when Rook scented it, too. Beneath the strong fragrance that marked Brynn as Magus remained the distinct smell of loup.
Brynn turned to face them, right hand clutched to her chest, tense. “What?”
“It’s a trick,” Bishop said. “It has to be.”