Jennifer Lynn Barnes Anthology (88 page)

But Devon would never be Shay, and while I thanked God for that fact, I wasn’t entirely certain that Sora wouldn’t have preferred it if he were.

“We should go,” Callum said, stepping between Sora and Devon—between Sora and me. “Shay will have felt our arrival, and I wouldn’t put it past him to send out a welcome party.”

I wouldn’t put anything past Shay.

I’ll take dysfunctional families for five thousand, Alex
. Devon’s voice was bright and sardonic in my mind.

I swallowed a laugh.
Seriously, Dev, are you okay?

Peachy
, Dev replied.
You?

Almost of their own volition, my shoulders pushed themselves backward. My chin went out, and as a sense of detached calm flooded my body, I told Devon exactly what he wanted to hear.

I was ready for this. If Shay wanted to dance, I’d dance.

CHAPTER EIGHT

S
HAY OBVIOUSLY HADN
’
T BEEN LIVING AT THIS END
of his territory for long. The smell of his pack should have been thick in the air. The trees, the grass, the very earth should have absorbed it like soot or smog, but instead, I could make out only the scents of the wolves present. Devon, whose nose was infinitely better than mine, didn’t seem to be able to smell much more than that, at least according to what I could pick up through the bond.

Consider me an open book
. Dev must have caught me looking at him, because he sent the message straight from his mind to mine.
Mi casa es su casa. Mi nose es su nose
.

Dev was the only wolf in my pack who could choose to completely block his mind from me. We both knew that was a good indication that someday, he might leave the Cedar Ridge Pack to rule his own, but tonight he was telling me—in his own oh-so-Devon way—that there weren’t going to be any barriers. I was at a distinct disadvantage, with my human nose and my human ears, in the company of men who had senses ten times as keen.

Devon—strong, solid, sensational Devon—would be my eyes and my ears and my nose.

You’re the best, Dev
.

If we hadn’t been quickly approaching a variety of wolves from other packs, he might have preened. Instead, the expression on his face stayed carefully neutral.

To our left, Callum and Sora held back, allowing Dev and me to enter first. There were fifteen, maybe twenty men spread out on the field in front of Shay’s house, none close enough to touch another. Some were smiling politely. Some were playing human. But the two closest to us didn’t bother to mask what they were: the weight to their presence, the unearthly grace in the way they moved, the hint of fang in what a regular human girl might have mistaken for a grin.

Those weren’t grins, and these men weren’t our friends.

They’re from the Ash Mountain Pack
, Devon told me silently, and I let his senses flood my mind. These men smelled like wild grass and charcoal and dirt. To another person, it might have been a pleasant enough smell, but to Devon—and by extension, to me—it was tinged with something rotten, something sour.

Not Pack
. My pack-sense and subconscious were equally sure of that fact. The Ash Mountain alpha and his second-in-command were foreign. They had no allegiance to me or mine. They were a threat.

“Hello, girl.” Of the two men, one looked vaguely familiar,
and he was the one who spoke. The last time I’d seen him had been the day I’d become an alpha myself, but his tone left little doubt that he didn’t consider me his equal.

I schooled my features into an expression I’d seen on Callum’s face a hundred thousand times, one that gave away nothing to what lay underneath. I didn’t respond to the fact that the man had called me
girl
or the implicit
little
his sneer had tacked on to the front of that word. I didn’t avoid his gaze, but I didn’t force him into a staring contest, either.

If these men wanted to be condescending, I couldn’t stop them, but if they were looking for a response, they weren’t going to get one.

“Hello.” My lips quirked their way into a subtle smile. I may not have had Callum’s knack, but I knew these men. Not personally. Not by name. But I’d known plenty of men just like them, and it was a good bet that they had never, ever known a person like me.

“You remember Devon,” I said politely. Beside me, Devon inclined his head in greeting.

“Charmed, I’m sure,” he said, but I doubted anyone else caught the mischievous glint in his eye. The Ash Mountain alpha—and the others, spread out behind him—were too caught up assessing my best friend’s size, the way he’d filled out, the power that told them that someday—not too far in the future—he’d be a physical match for anyone here.

Suddenly, their collective gaze shifted from Devon and me to a place just over my left shoulder.

Callum.

He’d hung back, letting me make my own first impressions, letting the others see how Devon had grown, how effortlessly I commanded his loyalty, how I carried myself as their equal in every conceivable way—but from the moment Callum stepped out of the shadows, the other alphas only had eyes for him. Physically, Callum wasn’t the most imposing man here, and he made no move to make himself seem bigger. He didn’t puff up his chest. He didn’t raise his chin. His face was relaxed. His arms hung loose by his side.

“Hello, William,” he said, greeting the Ash Mountain alpha and then letting his gaze roam out to the rest of them, standing there watching us.

Watching him.

“Callum,” the alpha who’d been taking measure of my mettle returned, his eyes narrowed, his chin jutting out.

“You’ll want to be careful of your new neighbors,” Callum said, meeting the other man’s eyes. “They enjoy hunting and don’t pay much mind to property lines.”

I realized, belatedly, that Callum was talking about human neighbors, and that the words were meant as a friendly warning about a future the Ash Mountain Pack would most likely wish to avoid.

“I’ll take that under advisement,” William replied, his even voice at odds with the tension suddenly visible in his neck.

Callum didn’t wait for a thank-you. He wasn’t expecting one, and he didn’t act like anything extraordinary had just passed between the two of them, because to Callum, it wasn’t extraordinary. Seeing the different ways the future could play out was as natural to him as breathing—but to everyone else present, Callum’s casual words were a reminder and a warning.

Whatever they did, whatever they had planned, whatever they even thought of doing—he’d know it.

“Glad to see you made it.”

Shay’s voice was louder than it needed to be, surrounded by people with enhanced senses, but as he strode through the crowd, toward Callum—and me—I got the impression that wasn’t an accident. This was his rodeo, and he wasn’t ceding the spotlight to Callum.

And they say
I’m
melodramatic
, Dev commented, with a mental roll of his eyes. Despite the levity in his words, I could feel a change in my friend as Shay approached—like every muscle in Devon’s body was hardening to stone.

Like his heart was hardening, too.

“Little brother.” Shay came to a stop directly in front of Devon, and I realized that Devon had grown since the last time I’d seen the two of them next to each other.

He wasn’t exactly the “little” brother anymore.

Devon didn’t reply to Shay’s greeting. Instead, he turned his head slightly, deferring to me and declaring for everyone present that I was his alpha and not the other way around.

I was probably the only person present who realized that Devon’s deferral had less to do with forcing Shay to acknowledge my status, and more to do with the fact that there was something inside Devon that he couldn’t afford to let out. He wasn’t about to engage Shay, because right here, right now, with adrenaline high and the collective power of the alphas in the air, Devon had a fragile hold on the desire to introduce his fists to Shay’s jaw.

As wild and feral and vicious as the undercurrent of power all around us was, violence wasn’t an option. The men in the Senate had chosen to play by certain rules, and Devon knew them as well as I did.

Within a given pack, a person could challenge the alpha for dominance, but inter-pack aggression wasn’t allowed. Unless Shay transgressed first, Dev couldn’t take a swing at him—not without bringing the wrath of the Senate down on our entire pack. That was the reason Shay couldn’t kill me outright.

The reason he’d sent other people—first the psychics and then Lucas—to do his dirty work.

“Hello, Shay.” I stepped in between Devon and his brother. “Long time no see.”

The glint in Shay’s eyes told me beyond a shadow of a doubt that he had never expected me to survive Lucas’s challenge. He’d known I would accept the abused boy into my pack, and that as a member of my pack, Lucas would be able to do what Shay could not.

Challenge me.

I was a human, and Lucas was a Were. In a fight to the death, I shouldn’t have stood a chance. And yet, there I was. Alive. Shay had to have been wondering how.

Maybe they all were.

“Bryn.” From the way Shay said it, you would have thought it was a dirty word. “So glad you could make it.”

Like I’d had any other option. This was just Shay’s way of suggesting that my attendance here was a farce—that I wasn’t really an alpha and didn’t have the right to stand side by side with these men.

“Oh, Shay,” I said, like he was a child, one I had some level of fondness for. “I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.”

A muscle in Shay’s jaw tensed. I could get under his skin just as easily as he could get under mine.

“You said there was a problem that needed to be addressed, Shay.” Callum’s voice carried, even when he made no attempt whatsoever to make it do so. “Perhaps we should head inside to discuss?”

Callum’s suggestion was every bit as pointed as my response to Shay’s taunts, a reminder to everyone present that the Snake Bend alpha wasn’t calling the shots, that, officially, all of the alphas were on even footing.

And that, unofficially, it wasn’t even close.

“Of course,” Shay said tightly, before turning his attention back to me. “I’m afraid you’ll have to leave your protection out here, Bryn.”

Referring to Devon as my protection was an insult, implying that I couldn’t protect myself.

If Shay thought it was going to get a rise out of me, he was wrong. “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m sure Devon can find some way to entertain himself.”

Dev didn’t miss a beat. Towering over everyone else there and looking every inch the werewolf warrior, he nodded austerely. “I’ve been considering teaching myself to juggle.”

Biting back a smile, I took the first step forward toward Shay’s house. Callum followed my lead, and a second later, all of the alphas were breaking off from their backup.

Alpha. Alpha. Alpha
. I felt the call, heard it in the air all around us. These men were dominant. They were strong. And each and every one of them was pushing down the animal instinct to fight the others, the whisper telling them—and me—that there was only ever meant to be one.

Alpha
.

If the power was this overwhelming outside, it was going to be unbearable with the entire Senate crammed into a single room, but I wasn’t intimidated, wasn’t frightened.

Something about this moment felt right. Like I belonged here. Like this was what I’d always been meant to do.

The last thing I saw, as we filed into Shay’s house, was Devon and his mother watching us go, three feet between them, miles apart.

Game on.

CHAPTER NINE

S
HAY
’
S LIVING ROOM WAS OPEN AND LARGE, BUT
where Callum’s house was made of stone and wood, Shay’s seemed to be all glass and steel: cold and sleek, with sharp edges everywhere you looked. Instead of arranging the furniture around a central hearth, the room boasted a larger-than-life conference table.

In a show of restraint, Shay didn’t seat himself at the head of the table. No one did. But from the moment a screen descended from the ceiling, it was clear that this was the Shay Show. If the performance outside had been aimed at making me feel like I didn’t belong here, this room had been constructed to make the other alphas feel like artifacts of a different time—and to remind them that in the modern world, exposure wasn’t a minor threat. It couldn’t be quarantined or contained.