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  It’d been a promise made in the heat of the moment without being thought through—that Tove could come live with us to get her life back in order.

  Yeah. Not thought through: all part of the after-effects of going rogue.

  I’d spent months on the brink, before sliding all the way down that slope out in New Mexico. Wild fits of impulsiveness had been one of the symptoms.

  They’d brought me back from the abyss—Diana, Bian and my House. Now it was time for me to figure out how to make good on the promises I’d made, and fix things. If I could.

  So much for a relaxing Christmas holiday with my House.

  I texted back.

  We have a situation.

  Diazoun House inbound, seeking sanctuary. With complications.

  Talk to Pia.

  I glanced at the clock on the dash. In twelve hours and change Kath would be at my parents’ house in Aurora, everyone ready for Christmas Eve festivities. I was determined to be there, beginning the process of letting Kath know that she could count on me again, that I would show up for her and make her a priority. But this morning had its own urgent problems. Amanda Lloyd had called before entering Colorado. Given the time I’d spent getting Bian’s response, Keith and I might arrive back home just as House Lloyd turned up.

  As I saw it, I had three choices: drag her and her kin out to Haven and turn the decision over to Bian; offer simple sanctuary; or take her oath as a sub-House.

  My fangs throbbed.

  Who am I trying to kid?

  I’d already decided, unless something went very wrong in the next hour: if she was willing to give an oath, I would accept it.

  Which meant I had to start thinking hard about how much metaphorical baggage House Lloyd was bringing with them. Hopefully not a lynch mob of northern Adepts, or something subtle that would poison Athanate politics.

  For example, House Lloyd was diazoun, an outsider, so she wouldn’t have contact numbers for the Athanate territories she’d passed through, and, as diazoun, possibly didn’t think it mattered if she passed through another House’s territory.

  I had to address these potential problems, because if I accepted her as a sub-House, they became my problems.

  I knew highways were open to Athanate, but what if they’d stopped somewhere for food?

  Or Blood?

  I called Pia.

  “If they stayed on the highways and she didn’t feed, there’s no issue,” Pia said.

  “Otherwise?”

  “Well, unofficially, no harm, no foul. A written apology citing urgency would cover it. If she caused a problem anywhere that reflects on the resident House, all bets are off. And none of that covers House Prowser’s claims. What did Skylur say?”

  “That Prowser’s okay with it,” I said. “And we have the go-ahead to accept Lloyd as a sub-House and try out my infusion on her kin, if we think we’re up to it.”

  Pia was quiet. Like me, she was probably adding up everything that could go wrong. She was my zamenik, theoretically in charge of the process around infusing new Athanate in my House and then guiding them through crusis. Pia would be the new Athanate’s Mentor, and her kin would help provide the training on feeding. Once I bit House Lloyd’s kin, he should become mainly Pia’s responsibility.

  And all of which assumed my bite would work. I had accidentally and partially infused David and that worked out okay, but he’d been infused by Pia before me. No one knew what would happen with a completely new infusion, let alone the complicating factor of a kin who hadn’t gone through rigorous preparation, and was about to die anyway.

  “Okay, Boss. Well, it’s your call then.” There was a noise in the background, David’s voice, and Pia spoke again. “David’s talking to House Lloyd now. They say they’ll be here in five.”

  “Make them comfortable in the sunroom and leave them alone.” I glanced out of the car. We were just coming up to the Platte River crossing on 6th, and traffic was quiet. “I’ll be there in ten.”

  The cell was beeping, telling me there was a second call.

  My mother.

  “Hi, Mom.”

  “Hello, Amber,” she said. “This is a pleasant surprise. I was expecting to get that rude foreign woman again.”

  “Yelena?”

  “That’s the one. Always telling me I can’t speak to you. Has she got the day off?”

  No. She’s bringing a drug-addicted prostitute from LA to live with us.

  I decided I wouldn’t share that news with Mom.

  And, yes, Yelena probably was a bit abrupt with everyone calling me whenever she took charge of my cell. She’d told Felix, the Denver alpha werewolf, to ‘fuck off’ once. I hoped she hadn’t said that to my mother.

  “Hello?”

  “Sorry, Mom. Distracted. Is everything okay for tonight?”

  “I was calling to make sure you remembered.”

  She was calling to make sure I turned up. She knew I didn’t forget things, but family life had been difficult recently.

  “Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” I said.

  “Did I mention Taylor will be here with Kathleen?” she said casually.

  It was anything but a casual comment. I’d made my feelings about the pair of them clear. Kath’s fiancé had certainly gone along with her craziness.

  “Good,” I said, tamping it all down. “I’ve been wanting to... rebuild bridges.”

  It sounded lame, and it was. I could barely keep the tremble from my voice.

  In my head, I was back at Jen’s ranch, high up in the Rockies, looking at the videocassettes that Special Agent Ingram had just given me. The cassettes that Forsythe used to record his rapes. There was one cassette that recorded my rape, neatly labeled with my initials. And one more. In the lighting, the letters written on the front were dark, like blood under UV.

  KF.

  Kathleen Farrell.

  I’d run away. I’d left my sister behind in Denver with that monster. Now I had to repair the result.

  “Amber? Are you all right?”

  “Sorry,” I said again. “Mom, I’m going to be busy right up until it’s time to come over.”

  She wanted to talk. Wanted to talk to me alone about Kath, but she was so nervous I’d make up an excuse not to come, she let me go. We’d have to talk sometime. Tonight, I’d be there with Jen and Alex. Kath would be suspicious if Mom and I disappeared off together, so it wasn’t going to be tonight.

  I could guess some of the things Mom might want to talk about: Kath’s alcoholism, her erratic behavior, or the split between us.

  I’d intended the split to be permanent: the last words I’d said to Kath had been designed to hurt.

  I had a little sister once, I’d said. I loved her with all my heart.

  And I’d walked out of her house, not wanting to see her ever again.

  Justified? She’d tried to have me committed to a maximum security mental institution as a violent psychopath.

  But as we’d talked it around, my team and I had finally decided her behavior was driven by the rage at what Forsythe had done to her—driven so deep she’d probably deny it—and a sense that I’d abandoned her.

  I had left. That had been part of my way of dealing with my rage, along with near-suicidal risk-taking and impulsiveness. But not being there didn’t mean what Forsythe did to her was my fault, any more than it was my fault what he did to me.

  And yet, and yet. I ran away. If I’d gone straight to the police...

  Then his family’s lawyers would have made it look as if I were to blame. They’d have claimed I was drunk. That I wanted it. That I encouraged Forsythe and his sick friends.

  But Kath would have believed me, back then. Without question. With the result that she’d never have fallen for whatever line he’d come up with.

  So in a way, it was my fault.

  But I couldn’t have these conversations with Mom. I couldn’t have them with Kath either.

  Not yet.

  My team and I had agreed�
��first rebuild the relationship, then review how to fix the damage.

  How high was this mountain?

  And why couldn’t I think it through without feeling like I was going to burst into tears?

  “Boss, Julie and I...” Keith stuttered, breaking into my thoughts. “We understand how this Athanate thing works. Sort of. I mean...”

  He was floundering even more than I just had with my mom. Not usual for Keith. I raised a brow at him.

  I knew the whole situation was difficult. Keith and I had been an item back in Ops 4-10, before I’d been bitten and infused. By the next time I saw him, he was married to my friend Julie, also Ops 4-10. And not long after, I’d nearly gone rogue and bitten him. Now he was part of my House. Mine. As far as Athanate rules went, I could have his Blood anytime I wanted. And by Athanate customs, his body as well. Same for his wife’s.

  Yeah. Made it a little awkward.

  But the only reason he’d bring it up now would be to distract me from my thoughts spiraling uselessly. Obviously, my ex-boyfriend still knew me well.

  Which wasn’t going to stop me from teasing him.

  “Your body is probably safe from me,” I said, putting on a husky voice as I ran a fingernail down his arm. “I don’t think I can manage much more in the bed at the moment. Your Blood, now. Hmmm.”

  He twitched and I watched the pulse in his throat pick up.

  Joking aside, it made my jaw throb in time.

  Keith stayed silent.

  “Thing is,” I went on, “the Athanate rules say I should bite everyone in my House to ensure they’re bound to me.”

  Keith swallowed.

  “But you and Julie are Yelena’s kin, and she’s bound to me, so I don’t need to check the pair of you out...”

  “Copy that,” he said quickly.

  “Course, I might do it for fun anyway.”

  He knew I was teasing him then, and he laughed. It was good to hear that sound. There hadn’t been much of it back in LA.

  “Yelena has bitten you, hasn’t she?”

  I walked my fingers up to his collar and edged it aside. No scars.

  “Yes, Boss.”

  He was blushing already. That was so cute.

  “Just not on the throat,” I said.

  He coughed. “No.”

  Not on the wrist either. The bite scars generally healed to invisibility in a week, but there had been none on display. I could smell he and Julie had been bitten by Yelena, but I wasn’t going to say that.

  “None of my business, really, where she bites you,” I said, thoughtfully. “Might be your upper arm. She bit me there once, you know.”

  He went a shade darker.

  “But, as I understand it, for a real... intimate bite there are only three places. Throat, wrist and—”

  “Okay! Okay. Yeah. She bit us both on the thigh. Happy now?”

  I smiled. Oh, yes.

  Julie would blush too, probably even more than Keith, when I brought it up. And I was going to bring it up.

  In the meantime, he’d successfully distracted me and we were back at Manassah, Jen’s mansion, where the car Yelena had been using was parked alongside a Volvo with Michigan plates, brick-red under the road dirt of a long trip. House Lloyd’s car.

  Thank you, Keith.

  Now. Back to the present. Mind in gear.

  In the next few minutes I had to decide about House Lloyd and infusing her kin, based, as ever, on my gut instincts, which were being inflamed by Athanate desires I still didn’t completely control.

  And to do that with a clear head, I had to put aside this constant, looking-over-my-shoulder feeling that I was missing important things that had already gone wrong.

  Chapter 5

  They were waiting in the sunroom as I’d asked.

  Yelena went in first. She’d caught a serious case of Californian biker chic from the girls of the Belles werewolf pack in LA. She was dressed head to toe in mean, sprayed-on black leather, with sunglasses pushed up onto the top of her head.

  I was right behind her in my cowboy boots, jeans and an oversized winter jacket I’d ‘borrowed’ from Alex.

  Probably neither of us was exactly what House Lloyd expected to be wandering around in Jen’s upscale mansion with its elegant decor.

  With Yelena in front of me, looking like that, it kept attention focused away from me, and gave me a chance to develop some impressions of them.

  A jumble of sensations hit me with an unexpected shock.

  Their scent. My nose flared, caught the usual Athanate copper base but overlaid with something floral and appealing.

  House Lloyd herself had a sensitive, intelligent face, dominated by gray eyes that were wary and watchful. A hand’s width shorter than me in height, maybe five-five. Blonde hair pulled back severely. Trim. Wearing casual clothes that suited her, and still looked good, despite probably being what she’d lived in for a couple of days.

  She projected a sense that she was all tightly buttoned down.

  The two men standing with her must be the shaman Adepts. I eyed them with interest. Both Native American, tall and dark and breathtakingly good-looking. They were dressed almost identically in jeans and handmade buckskin jackets. One had his hair braided up in a complex knot that ran in a thick rope back over the top of his head. As I studied them, I could feel the power flowing off them, like silk brushing against my skin. Not threatening, just watchful.

  An older kin, another handsome man in a dramatic Old World way, lay on the sofa. He was unconscious. That had to be Scott.

  He didn’t look good. I had the feeling we didn’t have much time.

  I crossed the room and knelt next to him. “How is he?” I asked House Lloyd. He was still breathing, but his pulse was faint.

  She shook her head, biting her lip. It was the first crack in her buttoned-up armor. She was desperately afraid for her kin.

  A sensation filtered through my Athanate senses of Amanda Lloyd’s age. I knew many older Athanate, but they toned it down. House Lloyd didn’t. She was older than Yelena, Pia or Bian. I wasn’t good enough to make an accurate guess. Not really old. Not like Skylur or Diana. Younger than Naryn or House Prowser. But a helluva lot older than me.

  And her kin was old, too. I wondered how many years—decades—they’d been together.

  “He’s getting steadily worse,” she said. “That’s why we drove through the night and I had to call ahead when I did.” The same smooth voice as the telephone call, but in person I could taste the whip of adrenaline, and elethesine, the Athanate equivalent.

  I’d forgotten to introduce myself.

  “I’m Amber Farrell, House Farrell,” I said.

  “Amanda Lloyd.” She seemed to collect herself and added: “House Lloyd.”

  She stepped forward for the formal Athanate greeting, and we met in the middle, taking hold of each other’s forearms.

  She was shivering. Black swiftly chased the gray from her eyes.

  The primary purpose of the Athanate laimia, the greeting by kissing each other’s necks, is to allow both parties to gauge the state and mood of the other. I hardly needed that; I could see Amanda Lloyd was barely under control.

  I couldn’t blame her. I could imagine what she was feeling—I remembered kneeling by Jen, feeling her life slipping away.

  But that didn’t mean she and her kin were a good fit for my House. I needed to know how to handle this—whether to merely offer sanctuary, or to take this even further.

  I kissed her neck, breathing deeply.

  Coppery, as all Athanate marques were. I concentrated on the remainder: Gardenia. Springtime peony. As Athanate marques went, House Lloyd had one of the most attractive I’d ever come across.

  Laimia greetings aside, the Athanate marque had deeper purposes. The pleasure two Athanate got from their perception of each other’s marques were indicative of the potential benefits from an exchange of Blood.

  My instincts were telling me House Lloyd’s Blood was strongly compatibl
e and complementary to mine. A powerful addition to my House.

  Mine.

  My fangs started to ache with need. They wanted to erupt and claim her for my House now.

  Unable to stop myself, I took a second deep breath.

  Amazing.

  Also rude in Athanate manners, but Amanda wasn’t complaining; her reactions mirrored mine, right down to the surprise.

  Thrills chased over my skin and I felt a shiver in response from Amanda.

  The intensity of it scared me—I was being rushed into decisions by reactions that worked at some deep level I couldn’t control.

  I forced myself to step a little back, cleared my throat in embarrassment.

  “Thrice welcome,” I said in Athanate.

  My voice was hoarse.

  She blinked a couple of times and then she swallowed. Her face steeled.

  I opened my mouth to suggest we sit, but she moved before I could: she knelt at my feet, taking my right hand in hers, her head bent.

  “House Farrell.” She spoke quietly, her voice ragged. “I beg sanctuary for us, but first I beg—”

  I pulled her back up onto her feet.

  “We don’t do kneeling for petitions here,” I said.

  My Athanate was responding to it though. Mine. Mine. Mine. My whole jaw throbbed in sync.

  Behind me, Pia entered the room. I could feel her caution reaching out to steady me but I knew, deep down, that my instincts had just picked a direction and sent me on a runaway train. Every worry or reservation in my head was being battered aside by a conviction that House Lloyd and her kin belonged in my House.

  “Yes,” I said quickly, before Amanda could start again, or Pia could interrupt. “I grant sanctuary. I will also attempt to infuse your kin, if you are willing to accept responsibility for the risk.”

  She blinked again, her tightly-bound eukori opening.

  “Please,” she said. “It’s why we came all this way. It’s our last hope.”

  My eukori touched on hers, and sensed the way she was linked tightly to Scott, synced deeply with his vital functions. I got the feeling it was the only thing keeping him alive. If nothing else convinced me, that would have: I’d been warned it was possible to die, bound to your kin that way.