Chapter Thirteen
Ethan
Ethan had to make himself sit quietly in the Camero’s passenger seat while they drove over to the McClanahan Pack house, though the urge to fidget with his too-long sleeves was nearly overwhelming.
This wasn’t the first time he’d been here, of course, and his thoughts strayed irrevocably back to that previous visit: a brunch, seemingly innocuous at the time for all it had left him nervous in the pit of his stomach. And now, it felt as though it had occurred a lifetime ago. Back before. Before he’d instrumented the death of his half-sister and stopped his own mother’s resurrection, before he’d moved in with the alpha’s son and beta, but also after. After he had bonded to Pat, after they’d traveled around the globe together, after he’d left his father dying in a bed in Argentina with no hope of recovery. After he had almost accepted what he meant to Patrick: mate? husband? partner? That brunch rested in the crux of his memory, nestled like the eye of a storm between upheavals, and he didn’t quite know how to think of it now as they parked on the curb outside the sweeping, old Victorian house.
“We can turn around,” Pat interrupted his thoughts.
“I’m fine.” Ethan climbed out of the car. The McClanahan den sat on a quiet street of tall graceful old houses. Not the mansions of the 90s and early 00s, but old and well-maintained with cultured lawns that spoke more subtly of comfortable wealth. They climbed the steps, and the werewolf led the way in without knocking. Why should he? This was his family’s house; a place he visited often. In a way that couldn’t have been more at odds with Ethan’s own familial relationships, Pat actually liked his family and went out of his way to see them on a regular basis.
Unlike before, when the den had been teaming with Patrick’s siblings and their noise, it was comparatively quiet tonight as they stepped inside. Pat took their coats and hung them in the hall closet while Ethan toed off his wet boots. He followed the wolf to the kitchen, which was also empty—another surprise.
“You want something to drink?”
Ethan shrugged. “What are my options?”
Pat frowned and stuck his head in the refrigerator. “Water, juice, beer, wine…I could make coffee if you want?”
He smiled wanly at the offer. “Thanks. I don’t know. Water I guess.”
“I was going to make hot cider.”
A female voice interrupted them, and Ethan felt a warm body come up behind him, a hand brushed against his shoulder, and then he met blueish green eyes that were many shades darker than her brother’s. Ethan racked his memory, trying to put a name to the young woman’s face, but he came up empty.
“You want some?” she asked.
“Sounds good.”
“Move, Patty,” the woman said, shoving her brother away from the fridge. “Cara brought a couple cartons of cider with her from Lattins.”
“Nice,” Pat said, moving over to make room and to pull mugs out of the cupboard.
“What’s that?” Ethan asked, feeling awkward while he stood there in the middle of their kitchen in his socks like an idiot who didn’t know what to do with his hands.
“It’s a cider mill down in Olympia. That’s where Cara lives.” The young woman shot him a sly look under her lashes. “I’m Grace, by the way.”
“Ah. Sorry.”
“It’s fine. Been a while.”
“Right.”
Grace went through the motions of putting cider in the kettle. While it heated, she and Pat argued over the perfect amount of caramel sauce to add to each mug and whether or not whipped cream would make or break a perfect hot cider—Grace was for it, Pat against. Ethan perched on a barstool and watched the easy way they argued with one another without it ever turning rancorous. Before they had finished, the kettle only just beginning to rattle on the stove, a dark haired woman came in and leaned on the counter next to him.
Ethan glanced over and then again, startling when he recognized Sabira Mallory—Detective Mallory—standing there, watching the two werewolves with an inscrutable expression on her face. To be fair, Mallory always seemed inscrutable to him. They hadn’t had much cause to speak, Patrick their only connection, and every time the younger woman—and even her age was merely a guess based on her recent promotion to detective—had been cool and professional but also removed. In many ways she seemed like the polar opposite of Patrick. The two of them would have made the ideal couple for a buddy-cop show, both of them tall and strong, beautiful, dark haired, but also opposites: from Mallory’s darker skin to Patrick’s icy eyes, to their hot and cold running temperaments.
“You’re staring, Detective Ellison,” Mallory said, causing Ethan to sit up and flush at being caught. The crisp, English tones of her voice made him desperately curious to ask for her life story. How did a woman who wouldn’t have looked out of place in Egypt or Israel come to be here in overcast Seattle sporting an accent like that? Like he said, prime buddy-cop show fodder.
“Sorry, just lost in thought.”
She considered him with a tilt of her head. “Good thoughts or bad?”
“Just thoughts.”
“Here,” Grace said, interrupting them and coming over with a mug in either hand. At the stove, Pat fussed with the kettle. Grace offered one mug to Ethan and the other to Mallory. The redhead grinned at Mallory. “I put pumpkin spice in yours.”
Mallory’s nose scrunched into the ghost of a frown.
“Not actual pumpkin flavor, I meant the spice that you put in actual pumpkin pies. Cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger?”
Mallory took a cautious sip under Grace’s watchful gaze as the werewolf muscled her way onto the barstool beside him, perched her feet on the top rung and leaned her elbow on her bent knees, her upper body and her attention focused solely on the other woman. Waiting for Mallory’s approval.
It felt a little bit like lightning—the epiphany kind rather than the magical sort—watching the two woman lean into each others space, easy and familiar. Easy because it was familiar to them. On the other side of the kitchen, Ethan watched Pat notice Mallory for the first time and freeze, the mug in his hand wavering while his mouth dropped open in surprise. Ethan bit his lip to hold back his amusement.
“It’s better than the powdered kind,” Mallory allowed, offering the mug back to Grace who huffed.
“No one appreciates my genius,” she said, spinning on her stool to address Ethan and, in the process, banging her right elbow into his left and sending a wave of hot beverage over the rims of their mugs and all over his sweater. Ethan jerked, half fell off his own barstool, and cursed at the heat.
Pat was across the kitchen and up in his business faster than the eye could track, yanking his mug out of his hand and patting the soaked wool with solicitous hands that Ethan grabbed and pulled off his person.
“I’ve got it,” he said, pushing and then pushing again until finally Pat gave, stepping back.
“Shit, I’m sorry,” Grace said, contrite.
Mallory appeared with a roll of paper towels and started wiping up the mess.
Ethan shook his head. “Is there a bathroom I could use?”
“Come on,” Pat replied, grabbing his elbow to steer him down the hall. Ethan permitted the manhandling all the way to the bathroom before he put his foot down and closed the door in the wolf’s face. There were only so many concessions he was willing to make with his personal space and his skin felt hot not just from the cider.
Ethan stripped off the sweater, thankful he’d picked one in a dark color at least so it probably wouldn’t stain. Most of the mess was contained to the left sleeve, so he ran some lukewarm water over the wool while he examined his skin in the mirror—bright baby pink, but otherwise fine. He washed off his arm and was ringing the water out of the sleeve when he caught a glimpse of another presence from the corner of his eye. He turned and met ghost Adam’s pinched look
“What’s she doing?” he asked in the ghost of a whisper.
Ethan snorted to himself. Ghost of a whisper.
The ghost’s eyes narrowed at him. He opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, raised voices on the other side of the door distracted Ethan and the ghost winked out of existence. Someone banged on the door, followed by the sounds of a tussle before Grace said:
“You fucking lout, get out of the way!”
Ethan yanked the door open and stepped out of the way as Pat stumbled inside. Grace brandished a clean shirt at them, already apologizing.
“Don’t worry, you didn’t break me. And that’s not the first time a Rightie has taken exception to my left arm,” Ethan said, taking the clothing from her and pulling it over his head. The soft turtleneck smelled foreign, kind of woodsy like maybe it had been packed in cedar, and he caught the way Pat frowned at it like he’d been personally offended, but the fit wasn’t terrible and anything was better than soggy wool. He tossed the sweater in question over the shower door to dry while they ate dinner and shoved the werewolves out of the door so he could leave the bathroom.
“Seriously,” he said, “you both need to chill the fuck out.”
“That’s what I’m always telling him,” Grace muttered with a jerk of her chin at her scowling brother.
He pinched Pat’s arm, making him jump and swing his frowny face to Ethan.
“I’m fine,” Ethan said, over-enunciating such that the wolf’s frown stayed put on him.
They were excused from the argument stretching any further by Jon Clanahan calling everyone in for dinner. In the dining room, Mallory had opened two bottles of wine and was pouring while Pat’s parents bustled around with platters and serving dishes. Ethan smelled something like fish and citrus and the dining table itself had been covered in layers of newsprint that only made sense when he caught a look at what they were eating: piles of golden fries and fresh battered fish. Bowls of lemon wedges crowded in next to ketchup and tarter sauce and china that was not the Good China. There was something about the casual scene that helped ease a few of Ethan’s rawer nerves, despite the fact that two of Pat’s other siblings and their families had popped out from wherever they’d been hiding themselves—Pat’s brother Campbell, his wife and their toddler sat down at Jon’s end of the table, while another one of Pat’s sisters came around to introduce herself to Ethan.
“I don’t think we’ve met,” she said with a grin, that same reddish blonde hair and greenish gaze that she shared with their father and all of the siblings save Pat himself. “I’m Cara and that’s my partner, Ash.”
Ash waved stiffly at Ethan and gave him a curt nod.
“It’s good to meet you,” he said, taking her hand.
“You too. The mysterious Mr Ellison.”
“What have you heard?” Ethan asked, trying to make it sound like a joke rather than anxiety.
When had he started to care what these people thought of him?
Right after he started to worry what Pat thought about him, probably.
“No need to look so concerned. Not much. Not going to lie, for a while I thought you were just someone Grace had invented.”
“Ah, no. Very real.”
“You’re a cop, right?”
“What’s with the twenty questions?” Pat said, interrupting them. He steered Ethan to the table, hesitating before he sat him down next to Grace and took the empty seat to his mother’s right hand. He started dishing up food onto their plates while Ethan tried to catch Mallory’s eye as she was pouring drink. He didn’t want to get drunk, but a little wine could only help lubricate the scene.
The werewolves settled in to eat, and Ethan was relieved when the conversation turned to Cara and Ash rather than himself. He gleaned that the two lived and worked down in the state capitol, Cara at a local college as an art instructor and her partner did something with “a shop” that he didn’t manage to catch more about. Their visit had been an unexpected delight for the pack, which wasn’t planning a big shindig until closer to Christmas. Their words, not Ethan’s.
Next to him, Pat ate in desultory bites, head up and listening to the news from his sister, but casting frequent concerned looks at Ethan that he tried to pass off any time the mage caught him at it. The low grade anxiety pouring off the wolf kept Ethan’s own anxiety about the strange wolves hovering on the edge, and he wished he could have been seated next to Mallory instead, solidarity between the non-wolves or something.
After the food had been decimated, Patrick disappeared down the hall, trailing his mother for a half hour, which left Ethan cooling his heels in the living room with Jon, Pat’s brother with the toddler, and Ash while the rest of the younger wolves made a racket cleaning up.
Ash sat down in the chair next to Ethan with a wry look. “You must not be used to wolves.”
“Why do you say that?”
Ash flicked a look at the way he was clutching at his empty wineglass as though it were the only thing keeping him on firm ground.
“I’ve known werewolves before. Maybe not on personal terms…” Ethan said.
“Well, that’s good. It’d suck if Pat started a war with another wolf you’d been…personal with.”
“Like there would be a wolf who did casual,” he said.
“That’s true. It get’s easier, if you let it. All of them. They’re good people.”
Ethan turned to Ash. “How long have you been with Cara?”
“Oh, a few years. We met at Evergreen.”
“That’s the college where she works, right?”
“Right. But she wasn’t working there then.”
“I didn’t catch what you do?” he didn’t particularly care, except that if he kept small talk going with Ash, he might be able to avoid being pulled into a conversation with Patrick’s father whose attention had remained focused on his grandchild thus far.
Ash gave him a shrewd look. “I own a coffee shop.”
“I like coffee.”
“Who doesn’t?”
“Strange people who do not work weird hours.”
The wolf finally cracked a smile at that, sitting back in their chair with a clap. “That’s right, you’re a cop like Pat. Have you met Vector?”
“The cousin?”
Ash nodded.
“Briefly.”
“He’s FBI.”
“I know.”
“It’s good, seeing them get their claws into government positions like that. Gives us representation, you know?”
Ethan huffed a mirthless laugh. “Better than you realize. I’m the only mage with the South Precinct,” he said. There was no point in trying to keep it to himself, Teagan Clanahan knew what he was even if the rest of them hadn’t clued in yet.
“A mage. Well.” Ash gave him a once over. “That is not something you see every day. You must be one hell of an odd duck to catch Pat’s eye.”
“Hey,” the wolf in question appeared at Ethan’s elbow, a deep line etched between his eyebrows. “You ready to go?”
“Sure,” Ethan stood. He gave Ash a nod, and then he and Pat said their goodbyes to the rest of the family.
Mallory walked them to the door, confirming plans with Pat to visit the Linetti’s before ten the following day. She gave Ethan a small smile, and said she was glad to see him doing better before closing the door behind them.
Ethan barely made it to the car before he turned on Pat and demanded, “How long has that been going on?”
“What?” Pat asked, scowling into the rear view mirror while a line of cars passed them.
“Mallory and your sister.”
“Oh, that.” The scowl deepened and he shook his head. “I have no idea.”
Ethan laughed, the sound bubbling up out of him without warning. He met Pat’s surprised eyes, light and glowing in the dark car. “Your partner and your sister. Can you imagine—?”
Pat’s expression curled up in exaggerated horror, “I’d rather not.”
“Okay, okay, just watch where you’re driving,” Ethan said, sprawling out in the passenger’s seat while the warm air kicked on from the heater, beating back the night’s chill, his head full of the fuzzy haze that came from being full of good food and better wine. And not a ghost in sight to spoil anything.
The body was broad in the shoulders and wearing masculine clothes even though they were soaked through with congealing blood that turned his stomach. He didn’t want to look, but he knew that he had to. Had to grab the edge of a sleeve and turn the body over onto its back on the dirty street. Had to see the face and know for sure that—
“Ethan?”
But the face wasn’t the one that he’d been expecting. Instead of Adam staring up at him with dead eyes and half his throat torn out, it was Ethan’s face that stared up at him. It was his own face that—
“Ethan! Come on, wake up.”
He felt a tingle travel up his arm, from the back of his hand. Burning cold it made a shiver ripple across his skin. Ethan jerked his hand away and opened his eyes, confused for a moment about where he was, his eyes struggling to recognize the shape and stretch of shadows across the walls. There should have been a balcony door with a bit of light seeping in through the hanging slats. His bed should have been against the opposite wall. He slept on the right side not the left. And then it all came back to him: Patrick’s house, Patrick’s bed—no, not quite, the house next door, some other stranger’s bed, but now he could register the werewolf’s heat soaking into the sheets. His back cracked as he tried to sit up, disentangling himself from the threads of a dream that didn’t feel like his own. Ethan looked into the shifting, transparent eyes of a ghost and had to breathe through the instinctual panic, but it was only Adam Sloan again, rather than a nightmare.
He frowned and hissed, “What are you doing?”
“I need to talk to you.”
“You’re dead, what could you possibly have to say?”
Adam frowned. He was a young man, younger than the two of them, which made sense, Ethan supposed, considering he’d been dead over two years now. When he frowned like that it looked more like a pout.
“Rude,” Adam said, sitting up straight. He was kneeling by the side of the bed, eyes on a level with Ethan’s, and ghostly hands braced on the edge of the bed though he didn’t leave any indentations in the puffy duvet. In the weak moonlight he appeared nearly colorless, but otherwise strangely opaque for once.
“You woke me up; that’s fucking rude,” Ethan groused. “Well?”
The ghost’s eyes flicked over to Pat, and Ethan sighed. He was warm and comfortable, even if his sleep had been far from untroubled, and he felt loath to leave the bed. He was tired. It had been a long night. Why was it his lot in life to be plagued by people who should have known better and stayed dead? Had he really been such a terrible person in some past life to warrant all of this?
Ethan slipped out of the bed, hesitating between the master bathroom and the cold dark kitchen. He didn’t want to go downstairs either.
Maybe it wasn’t the product of past lives, maybe this was his present karma all kicking him in the ass at once.
He led the way to the bathroom and shut the door silently behind him. There was just enough light pouring in through the skylight that he could skip the fluorescents; in fact, when he sat on the edge of the tub and looked up, Ethan could just make out the bulbous curve of the moon, nearly full, shining down through a cloudless sky.
“So, talk,” he said, waving a hand at the chagrined looking ghost who hovered next to the sink, eyeing the mirror even though he didn’t cast a reflection. Only, instead of speaking, Adam just fidgeted there in the moonlight while Ethan’s ass went numb. Exasperated, he started to rise, grumbling, “I cannot believe you woke me up for—”
“Does she ever talk about me?”
“Who?”
Adam chewed on his lip and made an impatient gesture. “Grace.”
“How should I know?”
“Well, you saw her. You’re dating her brother.”
“Dating’s a strong word.”
Adam rolled his eyes. “You’re living with him. You’re mated to him, or did I hear that incorrectly?”
“Eavesdropping is considered rude.”
“Yeah, well, I’m dead. There’s no Ms Manners in the afterlife.”
“Why would Grace Clanahan talk about you?”
Now, the look Adam gave him spoke of hurt pride, the pout reappearing to prickle Ethan’s patience.
“Never mind.”
“Seriously?” Ethan snapped, standing up and crowding into the ghost’s space. He could feel a chill along his front where an inch of static air separated them. “You woke me up for this? Fucking hell.”
“So, you’ve never… I mean, how long has she been… That other woman, I recognized her.”
“Well, if you’ve been haunting Pat, I’d expect so,” Ethan said, unlocking the door.
“Mallory. Detective Mallory. Who would have guessed, she had a thing for the uniform?”
Ethan gave him a strange look. “Mallory doesn’t wear a uniform.”
“That’s not what I— You think she only liked me because I was his partner too?”
“Who, Grace? You and Grace?”
“No need to sound like that,” the ghost said with bruised pride.
“Oh, excuse me,” Ethan said, rolling his eyes. “I have no idea how long they’ve been together. It was as much a surprise to me. But, I hate to remind you, whatever you and Grace might have had, you’re dead now and she’s still living. You can’t really tell me that you’re bent out of shape just because she’s moved on?”
“That’s a totally reasonable response to have, dude,” Adam protested. “We were dating when I died! I love her.”
“And yet I’m the only unlucky bastard who can see you. Dude.” Despite his irritation, Ethan felt the corners of his mouth crinkle with involuntary amusement. “Pat hates it when I call him that.”
Adam gave him a dark look. “I wonder why that is.” And winked out of existence.
The smile slid off Ethan’s face, and he climbed back into bed with an uncomfortably tight feeling in his chest. He didn’t have to wonder why.