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WE PRACTICED TARGET shooting for the next few hours until it was time for my father to leave. I offered to drive him to the airport near Denver, but he had a rental car that needed to be returned.
“Let me know the test results,” he said to Mark as we lined up outside to see him off.
“Will do,” Mark replied and they shook hands. He shook Flynn’s and Reece’s hands as well, then bent to place a kiss on Kala’s cheek. The look she gave him was bordering on steamy.
“Don’t even think about it,” I whispered to her.
She sent me an innocent look. “What?”
“You know what,” I glowered and she grinned cheekily. I made a mental note to make sure she and my father were never alone together.
“Ready?” he asked me and I climbed into the front passenger seat. I told Zeus I’d be back in a minute and he sat down to wait for me.
We drove to the gate in silence, then I gave him a hug that made his ribs creak. “I love you, Dad.”
He stroked a hand down my hair and kissed my temple. “I love you too, sweetheart. I’m so glad we were able to stop the vampirism from spreading through you and Reece.” My surprise that he included Reece must have shown on my face. “I know he treated you badly, honey, but maybe you should give him a second chance.”
I scowled at his advice. “I’ve given him plenty of chances. He always lets me down in the end.”
His gaze was disturbingly astute. “Was it always his fault?”
“Does it really matter?” My reply was bitter.
“He’s strong, but I’m not sure anyone could fight Fate.” Knowing how stubborn I could be, he gave up. “I’d better go, or I’ll miss my flight.”
“Have a good trip,” I said lamely and climbed out. I had no idea where he was being sent on his next mission. As always, the location was classified.
I opened the gate for him and waved until he was out of sight. Zeus wasn’t alone when I returned to the compound. Flynn was with him. He tossed a stick and the Rottweiler took off after it.
“My Dad said you were the one who talked him into accepting the fact that I’m a werewolf,” I said when I reached him.
“We may have had a brief chat,” he said nonchalantly.
“I owe you big time,” I said and hugged him.
“You don’t owe me anything, sis,” he argued and tugged my hair just like a real brother would have. “As I recall, you saved my mind when the hydra put me under its spell.”
Hunting down the stone golem had been the last mission we’d been on together. “Did you guys run into any trouble after I left on my stupid plan to confront my undead mother?” I hadn’t been gone for long, but anything could have happened while I’d been away. I wanted to make sure I hadn’t missed anything important that might relate to the task Fate had set for me.
“Nope.” Zeus returned and eagerly shoved the saliva encrusted stick into his hand again. He dutifully sent it sailing off into the distance. “Nothing terrible ever seems to happen unless you’re around,” he teased me.
“The curse of Lexi,” I said with a grin. “Don’t worry, something horrible will happen soon now that I’m back.”
He hesitated before asking the question that was on his mind. “How did you and Reece end up back together?”
“We’re not,” I said a trifle more harshly than I’d intended. I knew I was going to have to tell this story and I didn’t want to have to repeat it. “Let’s go inside so I can brief the whole team.”
He grinned at my terminology and saluted me. “Whatever you say, Agent Levine.”
“Smartass,” I muttered. Zeus realized we were about to head inside and discarded the stick. He pushed his way past us and drank down half a bowl of water that had been left for him in the kitchen. Mark, Kala and Flynn had taken good care of him while I’d been gone. He’d changed from being a barely tolerated nuisance to being loved by everyone.
Mark had made more coffee and was waiting for us in the living room. Reece’s eyes settled on me and tension seemed to seep out of him at my reappearance.
“We’d all like to know what happened to you after you went in search of Katrina,” Mark said.
Picking up my coffee, I sat down and curled my legs up beneath me. Zeus sat on the floor in front of me. He wasn’t about to let me out of his sight again. “I was on my way to see my father when Reece contacted me,” I began. “He told me he was going to bite Gloria and that I needed to release him from our bond.”
All eyes swung to him and he flinched. He didn’t give them the excuse that he hadn’t been in control of himself.
“I realized there was no chance that he could ever love me, so I tore the bond free.” I shuddered at the remembered pain that had been both mental and physical. “After that, I went a little mad.” I didn’t want to confess how weak I’d been, but they deserved to hear the whole story. “I decided to commit suicide by hunting my mother down and killing her.”
Kala made a pained sound and Flynn put his arm around her shoulders and hugged her to his side. They weren’t surprised, but hearing me say it so starkly was still a shock.
“How did you get the necklace?” Mark asked and pointed at the gold chain that I was still wearing. I’d decided it would be a reminder of the mistakes I’d made.
“That took some ingenuity,” I admitted. “I drove back here and parked out of sight of the cameras. I took over Zeus’ mind and made him enter my room and take the jewelry box out of the drawer. Kala let him outside and he brought it to me.”
Kala was miffed that she’d unwittingly been duped into letting my accomplice out. “How did he get it through the fence?” she asked.
“He didn’t and that’s where it gets weird,” I said. “I raised a coyote zombie and sent it under the fence to get the box.”
Mark didn’t even try to hide his astonishment. “Wasn’t it daylight when you did this?”
“Yeah. I told you it was weird.”
“It shouldn’t even have been possible. No one can raise zombies during the day.”
“I guess that can’t really be the case, because I managed to do it.” He gestured for me to go on. “I drove to our base in New Orleans and left the SUV there.” His nod indicated he already knew that, so I continued. “I put the necklace on and it led me to my mother. I pulled my gun and fired off a shot, but she was just too fast.” Telling them that she’d tricked me into believing she cared about me was just too embarrassing, so I glossed over that part. “She fed from me, then made me drink her blood and I went through the most agonizing pain of my life. When it finally faded, I’d changed into some kind of hybrid.”
“What differences have you noticed about yourself?” As usual, Mark was fascinated by learning new things.
“My speed has improved dramatically. My eyesight and hearing are also better. I still breathe, eat and sleep, but my reflection is kind of weak now.”
Mark turned to Reece and lifted an eyebrow in silent query. “I’m the same,” Reece confirmed. “We can both drink blood, but we don’t need it to survive.”
“Sunlight obviously doesn’t have any ill effects,” Flynn observed.
“It seems you have all the benefits of being half-vampire and few of the downsides,” Mark added.
“I’d call having a weak reflection a downside,” Kala argued.
Mark wasn’t about to let us get sidetracked. “What was it like living with a nest of vampires?” he asked.
“Not much fun. They don’t have a conscience. All they think about is their own gratification.” I grimaced at the things I’d witnessed and what my mother had tried to order me to do with two of her servants. “They live for blood and sex and nothing else.”
“Please tell me you weren’t forced to have sex with any of them,” Kala said in a pained voice. She’d been at the mercy of an alpha werelion who had stripped her of her will. She’d enjoyed every moment of her captivity, but being taken over so completely had left its mark on her.
“She tried to make me sleep with some of her minions, but it didn’t work.”
Flynn frowned when Reece smiled in self-satisfaction. “What do you mean? Why didn’t it work?”
“Some part of me is still bonded to Reece, I guess,” I shrugged. “My body rejects everyone else who tries to touch me.” I didn’t want to admit to anyone that I had pledged myself to Reece, body and soul.
Mark was dubious about my explanation, sensing there was more, but he didn’t call me out on it. “How did you manage to resist killing any humans?”
“It wasn’t really that hard,” I said, glad to change the subject. “Since we’re only half-vampire, we still have our souls. We didn’t surrender completely to the vampirism.”
“But we might have, eventually,” Reece added. “Whatever it was that the necromancer did seems to have reduced our vampires’ dominance. I feel as if my wolf and vampire are equally balanced now.”
“Then I’m thankful I didn’t have Viktor killed before he was able to assist us,” Mark said. “Can you explain how Reece ended up with Katrina’s nest?”
“This is where it gets even weirder,” I warned them. “We still change into werewolves at the full moon.” As I’d guessed, they were astounded by that news. “When I changed, all of the emotions I’d suppressed as a vampire welled up and overwhelmed me. I started running and ended up in West Virginia.”
“You went to get Reece back,” Kala said. The hopeless romantic in her was coming out again.
“No,” he said softly. “She came for revenge.”
I was surprised that he remembered that part. “I was going to tear his pack apart, but I decided it would be better revenge if I brought him back to Denver and asked my mother to turn him. I thought he’d end up like me, completely devoid of emotion.”
This next part was going to be difficult to relay. I wasn’t sure if Reece remembered it. “Gareth caught my scent and followed me to Reece’s cell.” I couldn’t bring myself to call him Garrett again. Not now that I knew how much he’d suffered at his mother’s hands. All eyes swung to Reece again before they turned back to me. “Gareth knew I was different, but he didn’t know the extent of the changes I’d gone through. He bit me and tried to force me to bite him in return so we could become bonded. I could have resisted him, but I decided to give him what he wanted. I bit him and he didn’t quite get the result he’d expected.”
“You’re now vampire enough for your bite to be fatal to shifters,” Mark deduced.
“Bingo,” I said without amusement. “After I bit him, the inevitable happened.” I didn’t think there was any need to describe how he’d died screaming and coughing up blood.
I looked at Reece to find him watching me with an expression that was close to serene. It didn’t seem to bother him that I’d killed his little brother. “He deserved it,” Reece said. “He was born defective, just like our father. Nina should have killed him years ago.”
“I take it Katrina agreed to turn Reece?” Flynn asked.
“Only after I killed a few of her minions,” I said.
“How did you manage that?” Kala asked. “I thought you had to obey her every word.”
“I guess being half-werewolf meant she couldn’t control me like she could her other servants. I couldn’t kill her, but I could fight her in other ways. I did my best to convince them they didn’t have to kill humans. For a short while, they were hypnotizing their meals and were only taking enough blood to survive rather than draining them.”
A memory rose that I wished I could banish forever. “Then I witnessed Katrina killing an entire family,” I replied. “I walked in on her to see her draining a baby. It was exactly what she’d done to me so long ago. I knew she’d just keep on reliving that night over and over again and I couldn’t stand it. That’s when my wolf gained ascendency and I headed to West Virginia.”
“Whatever reasons you had for trying to stop your mother and her minions from killing humans, you acted for the good of humankind,” our boss said. “If you ever wonder why Fate chose you to be her champion again, remember that.”
“If you’re Fate’s bitch, what does that make us?” Kala asked.
“You’re my family,” I said honestly. “Whatever she has planned for me, I can’t do it without the Shifter Squad at my side.”
“We’ll be there for you, Lexi,” Mark promised. “No matter what happens now, we’ll have your back.”
A lump formed in my throat and I fought to swallow it down before I started sobbing again. I was grateful to know that I wouldn’t be alone in the trials that were coming. The worst wasn’t over yet. Fate had more horrors to put me through and I had no way of knowing what they would be.
