Bloodlines (50 page)

Eyes bleary and bloodshot, Jed blinked at him, brain struggling to figure out what the hell was happening. “How the fuck do you know what a goddamn bar smells like?” he grunted, scratching his chest and looking around. Were there hidden cameras? Some sort of prank where more people would jump out and surprise him? Because he had a gun, he
would
shoot. “Aren’t you twelve?”

“I’m twenty, and I’m not exactly an idiot.” Edwin didn’t seem to care that he was pantsless. Jed would, because he really wasn’t too keen to see all that, but he was too busy wondering why the room was rotating. “Let me in.”

“No.” Jed frowned petulantly. “You go away, unless you’re bringing more booze. Even then, put some fucking pants on.”

He moved to shut the door, but Edwin stopped it with a hand against the cheap wood, eyebrow raising. “Yeah, the last thing you need is more stuff to drink. Seriously, you look like you fell into a beer bottle and then got swished around.”

Jed decided he wasn’t up for a fight with some naked-ass wolf. So he just turned and stumbled back inside, face-planting onto the bed with a grunt. He could hear Edwin locking up behind him, but Jed decided it was much better to fish around on the nightstand through the empty bottles, looking for anything that might be left to drink.

Edwin was poking around, sniffing things, sneezing loudly at the dust he found on the chair. He sat anyway, on his heels, crouched there and still looking like he was half a wild thing. Jed just grimaced and averted his eyes. “Seriously, Cujo, get some fucking pants.”

“I must have left my clothes in my other fur,” Edwin replied with a slow grin. “Humans are such prudes. What does it matter? Do I have something you’ve never seen before?” He looked down at himself. “I think we’re pretty similar.”

“I am not discussing cock size with you, kid.” Jed found a beer that was only half done, gulping the warm, disgusting liquid like it was nectar. “Even I’m not drunk enough for that.”

Snorting, Edwin at least consented to dig through Jed’s bag and tug on a pair of sweatpants. He went back to perching on the chair, watching Jed, blue eyes bright with interest. “Why are you drunk?”

Knievel sashayed out of the bathroom, where she’d been perfectly content to sleep in the sink. Upon seeing Edwin, she chirped out a happy purr, padded over to him, and leapt gracefully up to insistently nudge her head against his knees. Edwin wound up with a delighted cat curled up on his shoulders, gnawing at his hair and flexing her claws into his chest. He didn’t seem to mind at all.

“Because,” Jed answered with a grunt, fishing out the empty whiskey bottle and staring into it mournfully. “That’s fucking why.”

“You’re not a very chatty alcoholic.” Edwin reached up to scratch behind Knievel’s ear.

“Why the fuck are you here again?” Jed glowered at him, sprawling back in bed, a heated buzzing in his ears as he choked back the insistent urge to vomit. Maybe later. Or maybe on Edwin if he didn’t stop talking. It was way too goddamn loud.

“Because you’re an idiot who left your mate.”

Jed cracked an eye open, peering over at Edwin. For a moment, no words came. It took way too long for the meaning of that to filter in, anyway. In the end, though, Jed didn’t protest. He didn’t bitch.

He did surge upward and fumble his way to the bathroom, falling down twice and slamming his shoulder painfully against the wall. As everything he’d eaten in the past two days came back up again, he thought he might have been crying. Maybe not. Maybe it was just how fucking sick he felt. In any case, passing out on the cold tile of the bathroom floor felt pretty damn good.

Jed woke up in bed, face mashed uncomfortably into a pillow. A damp feeling on the pillowcase let him know he’d been drooling, which just made the whole situation ten times worse. And there was a goddamn half-naked wolf picking around his room, sniffing the empty alcohol bottles. Jed tried to turn over, he really did, but the bed was rolling, and he wound up half propped up on his side, grunting painfully. He hooked a hand onto the side of the mattress. At least stabilizing himself made the room stop spinning a bit.

“You’re awake.” Edwin sounded way too fucking cheerful. Jed wondered if he could shoot him. No, better not. He’d have two angry wolves on his ass. “You slept a long time. And you snore.”

“If you don’t stop talking, I will do something that will make you stop.” It wasn’t his best threat, Jed would admit, but he didn’t hurl or fall off the bed while saying it, so he’d count it as a win.

“Like what? Drink me?” Edwin laughed, obviously not realizing that Jed was one loud noise away from dying. Bastard. “You drank everything else, might as well.”

“You’re a judgmental asshole.” Gathering up all his strength, Jed hauled himself into a sitting position, clutching at the blankets for a handhold. Squinting, head throbbing, he peered over at Edwin. Who was… in his hotel room. Had they covered that yet? Jed honestly couldn’t remember. There had been drinking and puking, and somewhere between Edwin had shown up.

And before that there’d been Redford standing there, whole fucking camp swirling around him, so goddamn beautiful. A willow tree in the middle of the desert. And Jed had left him there, had driven away, because it was the best thing to do. Because he had to.

He hated himself for it. Of course he goddamn did. But Jed had been in plenty of situations with his back against the wall and no way out. He knew what it felt like. He wanted Redford to be happy. To have a shot at being
whole
. As much as it pissed him off, apparently he couldn’t do a damn thing to give that to him.

Edwin pressed a mug into Jed’s hands. The sharp scent of coffee hit Jed, and he practically moaned in relief. Taking huge gulps of the liquid, burning his mouth and not caring at all, he swung his legs around to the floor. Baby steps. At this rate he’d be walking by the time he was sixty. “There’s pills in my bag. Side pocket.” For good measure, Jed swiped a mostly empty bottle of Jack and tipped the last dregs of it into the coffee—hey, hair of the dog worked wonders.

Redford would have already had them out. Then again, Redford had a freaky way of knowing exactly what Jed needed before he’d gotten around to realizing it himself.

And he was going to stop thinking about Redford right the hell now, or else he’d just drink himself stupid again and not care about the consequences. Thinking about Redford made him bring up the mental image of Redford’s goddamn upset face, and even the
memory
of that face made Jed want to do whatever Redford asked. It wasn’t fair.

“I’m here because you left your mate.” Edwin sat on the bed beside him, looking at him like he was some curiosity. But he had the pills, so Jed just snatched those, shaking three directly into his mouth and washing them down with the fortified coffee.

“What, you want to take a fucking picture?” Rubbing his fingers across his stubble, Jed scowled deeply.

“No.” The exasperation in Edwin’s voice was practically visible. “I’m here to take you back.”

Okay, either he wasn’t sober enough or wasn’t drunk enough for this conversation, and Jed honestly wasn’t sure which. “You’re the one who told me we wouldn’t work,” he pointed out, finishing the coffee and looking sadly down at the bottom of his too-small crappy hotel mug. The ancient coffee maker was all the way over on the other side of the room. It was like God was punishing him for past sins. “So what, now you’re changing your mind? Did you forget I was a dirty, stupid human?”

“Nope.” Edwin took pity on him, going to get the pot of coffee and pouring him a refill.

“So, what? ’Cause I gotta say, Rin Tin Tin, I’m kind of talked out.” Another long gulp of coffee and Jed felt fortified enough to stagger upright, going to the bathroom. He gratefully brushed his teeth, doing his best to wash out the nasty fuzz from his tongue. It made the shitty coffee taste even worse, but Jed really didn’t care. “I get it. Redford’s a wolf, I’m a goddamn human, I hold him back. Not to mention I turned him into a killer. Trust me, kid, you’re preaching at the fucking choir.”

Edwin was watching him, crouching in the chair again, head cocked just like… well, just like a dog who was trying to parse out what a human was babbling at it about. “Did my brothers ever tell you why my parents left the pack?”

“Uh.” Shit. Pop quiz. “Bad food? Too many Lassie reruns during movie nights?”

“Probably.” Edwin gave him a quick smirk. “They didn’t agree with the pack anymore, apparently. I don’t know. I never got a chance to ask them.”

Sheesh. Was he really pulling out the dead-parents card? “Yeah, well, that sucks,” Jed said flatly. “But that still doesn’t tell me why the fuck you suddenly want me to be with Red.”

“I’m just saying, I don’t know why they left. But they did. They decided that what everyone else said pack had to be didn’t work for them.” Edwin wrapped his arms around his knees, shrugging. “They were afraid of humans. I mean, they had to be, right? They took us way out in the woods. I, uh, I don’t really remember them. I remember… my mom laughing. And I remember dad had this beard that was scratchy when he hugged us good night.”

Jed sank down to sit on the bed opposite the chair Edwin had commandeered. “You were just a kid when they died, right?” he asked, rubbing a hand through his hair.

Nodding, Edwin smiled slightly. It was dimmer than his usual ones, worn down by years of borrowed grief. “Yeah. They died, and then it was just Ant and Randall and me. And that’s not normal either. I mean, Anthony was way too young. Now he’s sick, and Randall is starting to take over and… look, my point is, we’re not exactly poster kids, you know? Maybe that’s why I like listening to Phoenix. I don’t really know how I feel about humans.” Edwin’s eyes flicked to Jed, and he amended, “Other humans.”

“Thanks,” Jed grunted.

“Yeah, you’re okay. But, you know, other humans, they might be like those hunters in the woods. Or the ones that killed my parents. Phoenix doesn’t just talk about them, though. He talks about how it’s okay to be different. It’s okay to be a half blood, it’s
better
to be what we are, and we shouldn’t be ashamed of that. He wouldn’t think my family is strange or broken just because we’re not like everyone else.”

Slowly, Jed nodded. “Thinking you’re better, though.” He drummed his fingers against his mug. “Gotta admit, I’m not a fan of that. A lot of bad shit seems to go down when one guy wants to raise himself up at the expense of everyone else getting knocked down.”

Edwin, surprisingly, looked a little sheepish. “Maybe,” he agreed. “Sometimes it seems like we have to be better, you know?”

“Why?” Jed snorted quietly. “Because you can turn into a wolf? Baby, I knew a woman who could hit a target from half a mile away in a windstorm. I knew this guy, part of my team, he could get you into any safe, any locked door, in five minutes flat. Go to a museum, read a book, hell, just listen to goddamn Metallica, you tell me that we’re inferior just because we can’t do your kind of tricks. We’re not. You might live longer, you might run faster, you might have a pert little tail or suck blood or, hell, do
whatever
the fuck Victor does, but that just makes you different, junior. Not better.”

After a moment of Edwin staring back at him, wordless, Edwin began to laugh. Not loudly, just almost-silent little chuffs of air, a grin spreading across his face. “Yeah, okay,” he agreed. “I guess you aren’t
entirely
worthless.”

“Damn straight,” Jed grumbled. “Just because there’s some shitheel hunters out there, don’t write the whole bunch of us off. I mean, come on, there are bad vampires, you know that. Ask your brother. There’s got to be bad wolves. Having asshole members of your group is kind of universal.”

“So if you’re not inferior, why did you leave?” Edwin asked, sounding genuinely curious. “I mean, you don’t think you’re somehow less than, so….”

Heaving a sigh, Jed leaned forward, arms resting on his knees, staring down at his once again empty mug. “Because I’m not good for
him
,” Jed answered finally, quietly. “He deserves better.”

“Why do you think you’re not what he needs?”

Rolling his eyes, Jed grimaced. His fingers wrapped more firmly around the coffee mug, as if that could hold him together. He was fucking hungover. He did not have it in him right then to be having this conversation. “You saw him out there,” Jed muttered. “Running around, being who he is. He’s better with you guys than he was with me. I’m…. I’m a cramped apartment and shitty processed dubious meat products. The only sky I see is some sliver between buildings. He should be free.” Something broke in Jed’s expression. He rubbed a shaky hand across his face. “I thought he was. I honest to God thought he was, until I saw him out there. Shit, I didn’t even know.”

“You couldn’t,” Edwin told him. He sounded almost kind, eyes softening with sympathy. “You’re not a wolf. You gave him what you thought he needed.”

“I gave him what
I
needed,” Jed shot back, voice cracking.

“That’s the kindest thing you could have done.” Edwin gave him a barely-there smile. “Look, I…. I know I sounded harsh, before. During the full moon. But I’ve never had to be cooped up. Hell, my brothers took me out of school because I cried all day to be let out of the room. Being indoors too long makes me feel like my skin is too tight, like I need to just…
climb
out of it. That’s who I am, and my brothers have worked hard to make sure I get to be who I am.”

“So you’re saying I tortured him, basically.” Jed sighed, gaze dropping again toward the floor. “Fantastic.”

“No. I’m saying you gave him what you thought he needed. You gave him
your
freedom, what you think that means.” Edwin paused, searching for words. “You gave him the sliver of your sky. That’s kind, Jed. It’s not right, but it’s kind. And that’s more important than getting it perfect your first time.”

Jed just shook his head, jaw tight. He’d locked Redford up. He’d locked him up, and he’d exposed him to a life of blood and violence. Which was the life Jed knew, the one he was soaked in, but he shouldn’t have sullied Redford with it. He shouldn’t have rubbed his dirt all over someone so clean.