Chapter Nineteen

 

Mournful howls rippled through the air, and Celeste leaned back in an overstuffed armchair in her bedroom, stifling a shiver. The full moon hung high in the sky, and all the werewolves were down in the basement, locked in. She hated it. She felt as if Grant and Jeffrey were a million miles away.

It would be hard on them too. Werewolves were meant to run free on a full moon. Being locked up would mean a miserable night of clawing at the walls and door, howling in frustration. It was the only way to be safe, however. On a full moon, werewolves were completely taken over by their animal nature. They were likely to attack any humans near them – possibly even Celeste. According to Grant, he and Jeffrey would know who she was because of their close family bond, but she wouldn’t be safe around the rest of the werewolves.

Grant had hired a security firm that his family had worked with for decades. There were times when werewolves needed security on a full moon, and when that happened, they worked with the Morganstein firm. They paid an enormous fee to the Morgansteins for their discretion.

The minutes seemed to drag by as she flipped through the pages of a book without really seeing it. Finally she set it down.

She walked out of her bedroom and paced through the halls.

When she wandered into the parlor, Norman, the human guard, looked at her in confusion. “How did you come through that door? And when did you change your clothes?”

A thrill of alarm shot through her. Something was wrong. “What do you mean?”

“You just came through the front door a few minutes ago.”

“No, I didn’t.”

He pointed at a hallway that led to the kitchen. “Yes, you did. You went that way.”

Jennifer. She’s in the house.

They heard the sound of shots coming from the kitchen, and shouts of pain.

“Go!” Norman barked at her, but it was too late.

Jennifer came barreling through the door, with Talbot at her side. Talbot pointed a Heckler & Koch MP5 submachine gun at them, and his eyes were blazing with fury.

Celeste struggled to swallow her panic. Norman had pulled his pistol from its holster, but it was pointing at the floor.

“Drop it,” Talbot barked. Norman’s face flushed with anger, but he obeyed.

“Don’t shoot him,” Celeste said quickly. “If you shoot him, I’ll make you shoot me, and then you’ll have no bargaining chip.”

“Sure, buy him some time,” Talbot sneered. “Jennifer. Restrain him. If he tries anything, I’ll shoot.”

Jennifer didn’t even spare a glance for Celeste.  She pulled a pair of handcuffs out of her pocket and ran over to Norman, who looked at her with murder in his eyes. Talbot had just killed his co-workers. She handcuffed him to the staircase railing, then returned to stand next to Talbot.

“Okay, now what?” Jennifer asked Talbot. The howls coming from the basement increased in volume. It was as if, even in their animal state, they knew that something very, very wrong was happening upstairs.

Talbot looked at Celeste, his gaze cold and angry. “You and your mate have made my life extremely difficult. You do not want to piss me off any further. Take me to Jeffrey right now. We’ve already been downstairs. There’s a combination lock on the basement door. You will open it for me, or I’ll kill your sister while you watch.” He waved his gun. All the bullets were coated with silver, Celeste was sure. If she opened the basement door, he’d kill everyone but Jeffrey.

“What?” Jennifer cried furiously, backing away from him. “No! I did everything you asked! I got you into the house! I’m giving Jeffrey to you!”

“Getting me in the house is no good if I don’t have the boy,” Talbot spat. He looked at Celeste, and gestured at Jennifer with his gun. “Which leg should I shoot first?”

Celeste smiled at him politely. “Dealer’s choice,” she said. “And please, take your time.”

“Hey!” Jennifer screamed at her, her face contorted with fury. “I’m your sister!”

Celeste shot Jennifer a look of withering scorn. “You are related to me by an accident of birth only. You were going to sell your son.”

“He’d be better off with werewolves!” Jennifer whined. “I tried to take care of him. He’s a freak of nature! I couldn’t hide it any longer, and if the government found out and took him away from me, I wouldn’t even get any money for it and they’d probably just experiment on him. This way, I get the money, and he gets to live with people who know how to take care of him.”

“Take care of him?” Celeste shook her head in disbelief. She looked at Talbot. “What did you want Jeffrey for?”

His lips skinned back from his teeth and his eyes were huge. “None of your business, you little bitch.”

Suddenly, it hit her. How could she not have figured it out immediately? “My God, am I an idiot. It’s a full moon. And you haven’t turned.” She stared at him. “Your ears are pointy, but you’re still human. Why haven’t you turned? I know you’ve turned in the past – Grant told me that you used to flip out and go wolf at a moment’s notice. But something’s gone wrong. You can’t turn anymore, can you?”

“Quiet!” he screamed. He spun around and shot Jennifer in the leg, a short burst that scored the outside of her right thigh. Jennifer screamed in shock and fury, and fell to the ground, clutching at her bleeding wound. Celeste ignored her.

“I think you need Jeffrey’s blood,” Celeste said to him. “Werewolf blood has a lot of unique properties. You’re only a half-werewolf, aren’t you? Probably had a lone wolf parent.”

“I’m a full werewolf!” Talbot screamed. “I have the right to shift! I have the right! I’m stronger than anybody when I have my wolf! I need him back, I need him! I need my wolf!”

“So fifteen years ago, you kidnapped a lone wolf and used his blood so that you could shift,” Celeste guessed. The startled look on his face told her she was right. “How did you know it would work? Research? Legend? Lucky guess? Doesn’t matter. You needed that unique combination. A half-wolf like you. Born of a human mother.”

“My father was the human. My mother was the wolf whore slut who cursed me,” Talbot spat at her. “She used to laugh at me when I was a child. She could shift, I couldn’t, she was so much better than me. It was her fault. Having a human father meant that I couldn’t shift. I need the blood of a half wolf born of a human mother. It’s the only thing that works. It’s my right. I can’t be trapped in a human body. Humans are weak. Humans are inferior. I was born to hunt. To rule.”

“The lone wolf you kidnapped. You kept him prisoner all this time, because whatever effect the blood has, it wears off. Your prisoner must have died recently, so you needed a replacement. Jeffrey.” She shook her head, nausea welling up. “And that’s why you wanted the database. You’d be able to find more like him. You didn’t want to risk ever running out of your supply again.”

Jennifer’s hands were soaked red with her blood. She scrabbled in her purse and pulled out a scarf, tying it around her wounded leg with shaking hands. Tears ran down her face. “It’s not fair, it’s not fair. I did everything you asked. My own son. I would have given you my only child. Why do men always fuck me over? Why, why, why?”

“Quit crying, you stupid bitch,” Talbot spat at her. “It’s just a flesh wound. The real fun comes later.”

“You won’t kill us,” Celeste guessed. “Boone mentioned using us to breed. You know that Jennifer successfully gave birth to the child of a werewolf. Not every human can do that. And I’m her twin, so I’ve got the same genetics. You want to keep us so we could be bred with a werewolf and forced to have more children to serve as your blood supply.” She shuddered in disgust at the thought. Never. She’d never let that happen.

While Talbot was distracted by Celeste, Jennifer slid her hand into her purse again. Celeste saw it out of the corner of her eye.

“I only need one of you,” Talbot said coldly. “I have safe houses all over. I’ve got lone wolves who work for me. They’ll be glad to breed a few little blood donors for me. I’ll keep you in a cage. In the dark. I’ll punish you for everything you’ve cost me. All you had to do was give me that little brat, that was all. I would have paid excellent money for him. We’re done talking here. I want the boy, and I want him now.”

He started walking towards Celeste. Jennifer whipped a small silver pistol out of her purse, and shot him in the back. He gasped, and swayed where he stood for a long, long moment. Then he slowly crumpled to the floor.

As he fell, Celeste dove at Jennifer and knocked the gun from her hand. Jennifer clawed at her face. Celeste punched her in the side of the head, hard, and grabbed the gun away from her.

Keeping an eye on Jennifer, she pulled the handcuff key from her bracelet and hurried over to Norman.

“You fucking bitch,” Norman spat at Jennifer. “You killed my men. You’ll pay for this.”

“Don’t!” Jennifer screamed. “He’ll arrest me! He’ll give me to the werewolves!”

Celeste uncuffed him. He grabbed his gun off the floor and pointed it at Jennifer. “Just give me an excuse. Please. Try to escape.”

Jennifer turned her tear-stained face to Celeste. “You never cared about me,” she sobbed. “You’ve hated me ever since we were kids. Why did you hate me so much? I just wanted you to love me. You were all the family I had.”

Once, that would have worked on Celeste. Now it just made her want to slap Jennifer.

“Save it,” Celeste snapped at her. “The damsel in distress routine doesn’t work on me. I’ll hand you over to Grant in the morning and he can do what he wants with you.”

“I just saved your life! I killed Talbot for you! Jeffrey’s safe now.” Jennifer started to get to her feet, but Norman took several steps towards her and she sank back down. She sniffled hard. “You owe me for that. You owe me millions, and a new ID and if you give me that, maybe I’ll let you have Jeffrey.”

“Are you kidding me? You think Grant would ever let you have Jeffrey, after what you’ve done? You think I’d let you have him? You only shot Talbot because he shot you first, and you knew he was going to kill you,” Celeste said. “You’ll be lucky if Grant lets you live, much less gives you one red cent.”

“When did you turn into such a bitch?” Jennifer whimpered.

“When I saw what you did to your child. By the way, what was the name of the woman in the car? The one who burned up and died for you?”

“Laura. I didn’t know for sure he’d kill her. I just paid her twenty bucks to go drive up to the meeting spot and tell him not to try anything funny. I told her if he wasn’t alone, she should just drive off. My leg really hurts. I need a doctor.”

“Suck it up, buttercup. What was her last name?”

Jennifer glared at her. “Pederson. Why does it matter? She was a junkie, and she used that twenty bucks to get a fix. She was a nobody. She didn’t have any family or anything.”

“She didn’t deserve to die like that. And I’m going to make sure that she’s buried with her real name on her grave. So tell me, did you get pregnant with Jeffrey on purpose so you could sell him?”

“No, that came later. I got pregnant so I could shake Grant down for money in exchange for giving him custody. We were going to take Jeffrey and hide out with him and tell Grant I needed ten million dollars if he ever wanted to see his son. It was Boone’s idea,” she added defensively.

“Of course it was.” Nothing was ever Jennifer’s fault.

“And then Grant’s father said he was going to kill me if I had the kid. So Boone found this rich werewolf who wanted him – but I heard him talking on the phone. He was going to let Boone come take me before I even had Jeffrey, and then they’d kill me afterwards. That’s why I was hiding from him.” Jennifer gave her a miserable look. “And I tried to be a mother. It’s hard.”

Celeste’s lip curled in scorn. “Yeah, you did a real bang-up job.”

“Hey!” Norman shouted, his gun wavering between Jennifer and Talbot, who was moving.

Talbot sat up. “You should have used a silver bullet on me,” he wheezed at Jennifer. Blood ran from his mouth. “Regular bullets don’t work on me. I’m a werewolf, bitch.”

And he shot Jennifer in the head, at the exact same time Norman shot him. “That’s for killing my men. I did use silver bullets,” the guard snapped as Talbot fell over.

“Oh God.” Celeste sank to her knees, choking on a sob. It was finally, really over. And Jennifer was dead. And the guards were dead.

“I’m going to be sick,” she said.