Jamie laid face down on the mats, reminding me much of myself when Davis and Augie had been “preparing me” for the Decennial Gathering. I had to give it to her, though. She’d given almost as good as she got today. She had the basic principles of fighting down. Now, she just had to hone those skills to become the badass I was sure existed inside her.
“Alright, I think you’ve had enough for the day,” I said as I gave her a hand up.
“I think I would have cried if you’d said we had to go again.” She laughed. “I know I asked for it, but damn, you kicked my ass.”
I slapped a hand on her shoulder. “But you took it like a champ. I can tell you with absolute certainty that even grown men wouldn’t have handled the beatings as well as you did.”
We walked over to get some water and take a seat. Once Jamie downed more than half of her bottle of water, she eyed me carefully, seeming unsure of how to say something.
“Use your words like a big girl,” I said with a smile as she flipped me off. “I promise, I’m really hard to offend and something tells me I don’t have to worry about you being a bitch.”
She sighed. “I’ve always hated how easy I am to read.” She blushed. “I just wanted to ask if you were nervous about going to the Catskills. I’m a wreck. Settling in here was easy, but I figured it was temporary, so I really didn’t care what people thought of me. But over there? I’ll be living with the alpha’s son. I don’t imagine that will make me anyone’s favorite person.”
I shushed her. “Girl, don’t you ever care what people think. You be you and the people who matter will love you regardless. Well, I’d attempt to at least get along with the parents, but everyone else? Screw them if they can’t handle all your awesomeness. I have to say, I’m sad to see you go and I normally never like women, so that should tell you something about yourself.” I laughed.
“I noticed none of them seemed very friendly around you. It must mean we’re both crazy.” Her laughter joined in with mine.
“I got burned so many times by girls who I thought were my friends growing up. I used to get close to people only to figure out they only wanted an in to get closer to my brother. I get it, he was easy on the eyes, but damn, I was tired of being a stepping stone in other people’s agenda.”
“I’m sorry you lost him. I’ve never really had family, so I can’t imagine how hard it was for you, probably still is. You’re a complete badass for all you’ve survived lately.”
My heart constricted for two reasons; I hated that she didn’t have family and that she’d been raised by Declan. He was no father. Also, for my brother. I missed him more than words could describe. Before this conversation turned emotional, I decided to change the subject.
“As are you. Just focus on being you and everything else will work itself out. Caleb seems over the moon about you and he had no intentions of settling down anytime soon. If you can do that to him, I think his pack will love you, too.”
“Thank you, Taya. I really appreciate it. I’m going to miss it here. I’m glad you’re going with us tomorrow, though. It makes it easier to know I won’t have to face a new pack by myself. Plus, they’ll all probably hate you for taking Liam away and not even pay attention to me, which I’m totally okay with.”
I slugged her shoulder, making her cringe from her sore muscles. “Gee, thanks friend.”
Before she could respond, the side door slammed open and two angry faces appeared. Liam and Caleb didn’t appear to be too happy with us. I guess at least one of us forgot to tell them we were going to be otherwise occupied for the last several hours.
“What are you doing to my girl?” Caleb screeched like a little baby as Jamie looked over at him with a grin on her face. She’d totally enjoyed getting her ass kicked today, and after her last smartass comment, I didn’t feel bad about it. At all.
“Oh, calm down. She asked for it. You wouldn’t teach her to be your equal, so I did.” I smirked. “Give her a day to rest and she’ll give you a run for your money.”
Caleb shook his head at me before swooping Jamie into his arms as if she was a priceless possession. I got that it was meant to be a sweet gesture, but I had a feeling Jamie was only going to tolerate it for so long. She was one chick I had every intention of keeping in touch with.
Jamie waved at me from her cradled position. “Thank you, again, Taya. I’ll find you later!”
“Don’t be afraid to give him a good jab like I taught you. He may not appear to be very tough, but he can take it,” I joked with pure happiness in my voice.
Caleb had been such a flirt and little shit when we met. Anything I could do to annoy him was going to be great. I loved him as a brother already, which made it even more enjoyable.
After they left, it was my turn to get swept up, and I was completely caught off guard. “What do you think you’re doing?” I asked Liam once I caught my breath.
“It looked like fun when Caleb did it. Thought we should try it, too.” He shrugged as he began to take long strides for the door.
“Just don’t think that everything your brother does is a great idea. I tend to like you just the way you are.” His cocky smile grew, and he opened his mouth to say something that I was sure would irritate me, so I slapped my hand over his face. “Except when you do that. Don’t. Do. That.”
His entire body vibrated with laughter as he continued to walk toward the pack house. I kept my hand over his mouth just in case.
We walked up the wooden steps with me being carried like a damn ninny, and Liam’s body still shook with the after effects of his joy. I didn’t want to rain on his parade by wiggling free. His right hand gripped my ass even tighter as he used the left one to open the door. Once we were inside, he set me on the couch before standing back up. “My brothers want to talk about our trip home, but they wanted you and Jamie in on the conversation. Your pack has that damn training room sealed up like Fort Knox and we couldn’t hear or smell you. Finally, after searching everywhere I could think of and Augie knowing we were looking for you, I realized the smirk on his face meant he was enjoying our suffering more than he should.”
Now it was my turn to quake in laughter. I had to give Augie props. I had not expected that from him. My best friend was finally taking a page from my book, because it was totally something I would have done.
“It’s not funny. We had been looking for you for over an hour!”
“But you never once specifically asked Augie where I was, did you?”
“No,” he grumbled.
“Ahhhh, I knew it! He’s getting evil as he matures. I like it.”
Liam shook his head at me. “Anyway, back to what I was saying. We need to talk about the trip. I know we need to make it short, so things will move pretty quickly once we get there and we wanted to prepare you and Jamie before it all happened.”
“Awe. Well, isn’t that sweet of you.” I batted my eyes at him like a southern belle.
“Being adorable doesn’t get you off the hook for disappearing,” he growled.
“Fine. It was worth a try.”
Liam left the room and I sat there by myself twiddling my thumbs. I was feeling better about the trip to the Catskills after hanging out with Jamie. The longer I had to process it, the more I felt I had been overreacting for nothing. I had met Elijah. Though it was brief, he had been a kind man. My dad thought the world of him. I couldn’t imagine the man my dad described in high regard would deny his son happiness.
The only person I still feared was Liam’s mother. I hadn’t been able to glean much from anyone about her without revealing how I was feeling. Casual conversation about someone I didn’t know was harder to do than I thought.
Caleb and Jamie entered the room. Caleb still looked put out and Jamie was on her last leg. I’d spent over three hours with her in the gym. I showed her a workout routine to build muscle and maintain her stamina. We practiced basic hand-to-hand combat as well as the use of a mixture of weapons. Sometimes when we had to defend ourselves, we couldn’t always count on our wolf. If we would be put at risk of exposure by humans, then we had to count on our human strength and skills.
“Long time, no see,” I joked when they took a seat. I was pretty sure it had been less than five minutes.
Jamie glared at me. “I’d prefer not to see you again for at least a week. Now that the excitement of learning something new and adrenaline has worn off, my body feels like it’s been through a blender.”
I laughed. “I told you that you’d discover muscles you never knew existed. You’ll feel better tomorrow, I promise.”
She shook her head at me in disbelief, then leaned her head back on the couch, closing her eyes to rest while we waited for Liam and Aiden to join us. I pulled out my phone and shot off a text to Augie, giving him virtual high fives for letting Liam and Caleb freak out for a while. It was a good feeling to know he felt comfortable enough with them to joke around like that. I needed all my favorite men to get along.
Once the other two arrived, Liam joined me on the loveseat, while Aiden settled into the chair. He cleared his throat and began. “We leave tomorrow morning at six. We should arrive by six that evening.”
“Twelve hours?” I complained.
“It’s actually only nine, but with the time difference, it’s technically twelve. Smaller plane, longer travel time. We could switch to coach and get there in six hours if you want.” I shook my head no. No way. The extra three hours was fine by me. “Didn’t think so. When we arrive, the three of us are going to have dinner with our parents. You’ll stay at our house while we do. Later –“
“Why can’t we attend?” I interrupted. I figured if they got to make the plans without consulting me or Jamie, then the least I could do was drive them crazy.
Liam settled his hand on mine. “Because we’ll be telling them right away about our plans and, unless you’d like to be in the middle of what could be a blowout between our family, I’d recommend you hang out at our house. If all goes well, we’ll bring you over right afterwards.”
“You guys have your own house? What does it look like?” Jamie asked before Aiden could resume speaking again.
“Are you two plotting against us?” Caleb asked suspiciously. “Liam, we need to keep them apart.”
“Ha! You try that and both of you will be sleeping outside for at least a month,” I replied, and Jamie nodded in agreement.
“Can we please get back to the plans and then you can ask all the annoying questions you want,” Aiden said, exasperated.
“Oh, I’m so sorry, Alpha Aiden. Please, continue.”
Liam covered my mouth with his hand before I could say any other outrageous comments. I grinned even though nobody could see, then winked at Aiden.
“Later,” he repeated, “if everything goes well, then you can come back to the house with us. The following day will likely go one of two ways: Elijah announces the switch between Liam and me, as well as his transfer to your pack or Liam announces he’s leaving and forces our father’s hand to go along with it. Elijah won’t want a public show and will back down if Liam makes the announcement without permission. If the latter is the case, Caleb will escort Taya to the landing strip, while Liam handles the backlash. A plane will be waiting to take Liam and Taya back here.”
“Well, that sounds like a shit plan,” Jamie said for me since I couldn’t speak with Liam’s hand still around my mouth. I nodded vigorously, showing my support of her statement.
No way in hell would I be swept away as if I couldn’t handle the backlash of this not going our way. I would stand by Liam’s side as his partner. I struggled under his hand, finally biting it before saying just as much to the three of them.
“Told you that wouldn’t go over well,” Liam said with a smirk.
Well, at least he knew it was a dumbass plan.
“Fine, have it your way. Do whatever you want.” Aiden threw his hands in the air. “I was trying to make this easier.”
I grinned at him. “Easier for who?”
I had a feeling he wanted me nowhere near his pack if things didn’t go Liam’s way. He knew my mouth spoke before my brain thought. I told people how it was and didn’t care about politics. Especially if someone was hurting my mate.
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Caleb said. “We don’t need to only think about worst case scenario. Our parents do have hearts. This could very easily be something good for everyone. Just because Liam is crushing their hopes and dreams, doesn’t mean it will be a bad thing.”
I rolled my eyes at Caleb. I thought he was actually going to have something constructive to say, but he had to ruin it with his smartass remarks.
“It’s going to be fine. We just –” Liam clutched his chest at the same time his brothers did.
I had flashbacks from when I did the same thing and knew something very bad had just happened.
Liam’s hands went from his chest to his head, gripping his hair as pain assaulted him.
“What’s happening? Liam, talk to me!” I said with force.
He shook his head, unable to speak. I held on to him, glancing over my shoulder at Caleb and Aiden. They seemed to be coming down from the pain, but Liam wasn’t.
“What is happening?” I screamed at them.
Before either of them could answer, Liam began to recover. I put all my focus on him, backing up a little to give him room to breathe. I heard Jamie’s sharp intake of air but hadn’t heard what Caleb said.
Liam’s phone began to vibrate, and he pulled it from his pocket. I almost knocked it out of his hand, irritated he would take a call before explaining what happened, but I saw ‘Mom’ on the screen.
Liam slid the answer button, then clicked ‘speaker,’ knowing we all needed to hear whatever she was about to say.
“What happened, Mom?” he grunted, still in pain.
“Our pack was attacked, and Shamus and your father are dead, Liam. Our pack needs their Alpha. It’s time for you to come home.”
Silence descended on the room. All of us glanced around, each person with a different expression on their face. I held on to Liam, giving him all the support I could while waiting for him to respond.
“Son? Did you hear me?”
“Yeah, Mom. We’ll be there as soon as we can.”
“Hurry, Liam,” she said urgently before disconnecting.
Well, shit.
***
Find out what happens next in Shades of Deceit, book three in the Raven Point Pack trilogy by ordering
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