Chapter 28
Dirk and his men were staring at Zev, slack-jawed. He grinned inwardly. That’s what you get for pushing me to talk at your pace, asshole.
“I don’t, uh, I don’t understand. Killing a pregnant female, kidnapping and hurting another one… Why would they do that?”
Zev noticed that Dirk had made no mention of the attack on a human. Apparently, that piece of information hadn’t registered as significant.
“From what we’ve been able to piece together, they kidnapped Lori, that’s my sister, in order to force one of my pack members to help them isolate Kevin Marvel, that’s the human. And the reason they wanted the human is because they thought he was going to tell Leah Harrison that they were the ones responsible for butchering her pregnant sister all those years ago. To be fair, it looks like one of them, Jimmy Delgato, acted alone when he killed Joan Smith; the others had been on board for kidnapping, not murder. At least that’s what the three of them said.”
The room was so quiet that the grasshoppers outside the door sounded like a stampeding herd of cows.
“You’re telling me that Jimmy Delgato murdered Joan Smith and her unborn cub?” Dirk asked incredulously.
“I’m not dead,” Jonah mumbled under his breath.
Zev saw Leah lean close to Jonah and whisper something into his ear.
“That’s the story Chuck Hanson, Harry Ballings, and Walter Ford told us. They admitted to being there, but said they had no part in the actual murder.”
“But why would Jimmy kill one of our own? And a pregnant female… That just doesn’t make sense.” Dirk still sounded shocked.
Zev took a deep breath. He supposed saying Jimmy—and the other three shifters, too, for that matter—were closed-minded, hateful pieces of shit wouldn’t be a productive answer.
“According to them, they did it because Joan Smith was living with the human they attacked yesterday. They didn’t want a female shifter having a relationship with a human, so they broke into Joan Smith’s home and incapacitated the human, intending to return the female to pack lands by force. When Jimmy Delgato saw that she was pregnant with the human’s child, he shifted into his wolf, chased her through the house, and tore her apart.” Zev used a calm, even tone when he spoke. The facts were horrific enough on their own; there was no need to add extra drama to the situation.
Dirk shook his head. “I still don’t understand why they would do that and how they could have kept it hidden all these years.”
“I think the answer to both of those questions is exactly the same,” Leah Harrison said, her voice full of rage. She had jumped to her feet and her hands were firmly rooted on her hips in a pose Zev remembered from his childhood. It had scared the shit out of him when he’d been playing ball in her house or dipping into her cookie jar back then, and the extra couple of feet he’d gained on Leah in the intervening years hadn’t changed his reaction one bit.
Dirk glared at Leah, clearly not happy that a female had dared to speak to him in that tone. Or perhaps he wasn’t happy that a female had spoken to him at all.
“Leah, please tell us what you mean,” Zev asked gently.
“The reason they killed my sister is because they’re so damn afraid of anything or anyone that’s different. And that’s the same reason they’ve been able to keep it hidden for thirty years.” Every man from the Miancarem pack growled when they heard Leah’s words, but she continued, completely undeterred. “Yes, afraid. You heard me right. Jimmy Delgato and those idiots weren’t the only ones who were all up in arms about Joan taking up with a human. They were just the first ones to try and stop her with something other than words. And when witnesses came forward about the murder and we tried to tell the Miancarem Alpha what happened, he called them liars and turned them away.”
This was the first Zev had heard about witnesses. He furrowed his brow in concern and looked at Leah, hoping she would elaborate. She glanced at Miguel and Ethan. The men looked at each other, their hands clutched tightly together, and Zev was sure they were communicating through their mating bond. After a few seconds, they turned back to Leah and nodded. She looked at Zev and continued talking, her voice sounded calmer, or maybe it was just sad.
“Joan called me right before she died. She was screaming hysterically, saying she’d locked herself in her bedroom because shifters had broken into her house and hurt Kevin. She wasn’t living on pack lands, obviously, so there was no way for me to get to her in time to help. But our kin were visiting and they always stayed in town, because they weren’t allowed on pack lands either.” Her voice became deeper, her lips tighter with those words. “So I called Ethan and Miguel and asked them to go help Joan. They got there just as the shifters were leaving. They saw their truck, and Ethan could have identified them by scent, had he been given the chance. But the Alpha at the time refused to see them, refused to hear their testimony, even after I begged. He said he wouldn’t degrade himself by giving counsel to a bloodsucker and an abomination.”
Leah was shaking by the time she finished talking. Jonah pulled her down to the couch and put his arm around her slender shoulders. Given everything else they were addressing, Zev decided it wasn’t the right time to ask how it was possible for Ethan to have witnessed a murder thirty years earlier. Miguel was a vampire, which made ascertaining his age impossible. But Ethan was a shifter and he looked to be about the same age as Zev and Jonah. So unless he had witnessed the murder from the safety of his mother’s womb or a stroller, something didn’t add up.
Dirk barely spared Ethan and Miguel a glance before he looked at Zev and responded to Leah’s accusations. “I think we can all understand my predecessor’s reaction. An Alpha can hardly allow himself to be influenced by…um, by those types of people.”
Zev vaguely registered Ethan sinking into the couch and Miguel wrapping his arms around his trembling mate. He wondered how often the small shifter had heard this type of animosity from his own community. With the desire to belong to a pack being such a deeply ingrained part of a shifter, that rejection had to be tremendously painful.
“You know what, Dirk? You’ve been going on and on about how you don’t understand why your pack members behaved as they did. I think Leah’s absolutely right in her assessment. Those types of people are just people, no better and no worse than you and me. And if you continue to treat everyone who is different from you as if they’re lesser, then your pack will follow and do the same.” Zev took a moment to let his words sink in. “I think we’ve all been given a horrifying example of what can happen if this type of hate is allowed to persist. It drove four of your men to murder a pregnant female. Is a life full of anger, hatred, and violence really what you want for your pack? Don’t you think they deserve better?”
It was impossible to know whether Dirk took Zev’s words to heart. Not much more was said after that. Dirk joined Zev in his office, where they called the interpack council president and filled him in on what had happened. They all agreed that Dirk should take custody of the men responsible for the unusual violence and hold them until the interpack council could meet and determine their fate.
Connor, the shifter who had led Dirk and his men to Zev’s cabin, returned while Dirk and Zev were on the phone, apparently having confirmed that his bedridden wife had everything she needed. He escorted Dirk and his men to where their pack members were being held. With the Miancarem contingency gone, the air in the cabin felt somehow lighter.
Zev walked back into the living room and collapsed on the couch next to his mate. He rested his head on Jonah’s shoulder and his hand on Jonah’s thigh.
“Well, that was a party and a half. What else do you have lined up for tonight, Pup? A disembowelment? Maybe a root canal?” Jonah said with a laugh.
Zev couldn’t hold back his smile. He’d never stop being amazed at Jonah’s ability to make him feel happy under any circumstance. And he’d never stop being grateful that he had this man in his life. He truly felt like the luckiest shifter around to have been blessed with Jonah for a mate.
“You know, as strange as it sounds, I think that went well.” Leah’s voice sounded tired, but more upbeat than it had earlier. “Other Alphas aren’t like you, Zev. They’re not even like your father. So other packs aren’t as open and accepting as ours. You’d be surprised at how much animosity still exists toward humans and vampires, and well, anybody that isn’t a typical shifter. I think Dirk Keller left here today realizing that he’s got a lot to think about. And I hope the same message makes its way to the other packs once they hear about what happened to my sister.” Leah sniffled and wiped away tears that were falling freely from her eyes. “It’d be her ultimate legacy—forcing those old dinosaurs to open their damn minds and stop their hateful behavior. Joan would’ve loved that.”
Everyone sat quietly for some time after that, each lost in their own thoughts. Eventually, Jonah broke the silence.
“Leah, earlier you said you’d tell me what happened after Jimmy Delgato killed my mother. I’d like to know, if you’re up for talking.”
So that was what Leah had whispered to Jonah while they were talking with Dirk. Zev was curious about what had happened that day too. He wanted to know how Jonah could have survived in utero when, by all accounts, his mother’s entire body was savagely attacked and torn apart. And that didn’t even get into the question of how Jonah had lived at all without having shifter chromosomes from both his mother and his father.
“I think now’s when we turn things over to Ethan and Miguel,” Leah replied. “They were there and they’ve been waiting a long time to meet you and tell you what happened.”
Jonah turned to Miguel and looked at the handsome man carefully. “You look familiar to me, you know? Like I’ve seen you somewhere.” He bit his bottom lip and then looked over at Ethan. “Actually, so do you. Have we met?”
Ethan shook his head.
“No, we haven’t met. But Miguel and I have been keeping tabs on you ever since you moved away from Etzgadol. I’m sure you’ve seen us once or twice over the years.”
Jonah cocked an eyebrow.
“Keeping tabs on me? Why? Were you worried that Jimmy and those guys would find me or something? I know my dad was terrified of that happening. I still need to figure out how to tell him the guys who killed my mother have been caught without there being a trial or anything.” Jonah shook his head to clear his own thoughts. “Sorry, one thing at a time. So what happened when you got to my parents’ house that day?”
Ethan took a deep breath, seemingly gathering his courage, and then he started speaking.
“Your mother was already dead. There was nothing we could do. Actually, we didn’t think we’d be able to save you, either. When Jimmy bit her and clawed her and…uh, anyway, her stomach had been sliced, so you were lying there, but you were all cut up too. You had huge gashes across your stomach and you’d lost so much blood.”
Ethan shook his head, apparently too upset to continue, so Miguel picked up the thread.
“But we had to try. You were breathing a little. Not much, but enough so we had hope. We’d brought our emergency bag with us, not knowing what we’d find. So we got a line in you and started pumping blood in while we healed your gashes.”
“You’re saying you gave me a blood transfusion on the spot? Where’d you get the blood? And how’d you learn to do that? Is one of you a doctor? Oh, and how’d you manage to stitch up what sound like some pretty serious wounds without leaving any scars? ’Cause I can tell you that my stomach doesn’t look like I had any kind of trauma.” Jonah fired the questions off one right after the other, not even stopping for air in between.
“It was my blood,” Ethan said. “I’m not a doctor, but I’ve had a lot of experience with transfusions. When vampires get really sick, they sometimes have a hard time feeding, and when that happens to Miguel, I need to get blood in him as fast as possible to help him heal. Going straight into the vein is the best way for me to feed him my blood in those circumstances.”
Zev’s list of questions kept growing. From everything he had ever heard, shifter blood was poisonous to vampires. But if he got into vampire physiology at that point, the conversation would be completely derailed, so Zev kept quiet and let Jonah continue to lead the conversation.
“And the scars? Or rather lack of scars?” Jonah asked.
“That was Miguel,” Ethan answered. “Vamps have a special property in their saliva to close wounds without leaving marks. They use it when they feed. We didn’t know whether it’d work on such extensive damage, but it did. He closed the wounds and I pumped in the blood. It worked. We couldn’t believe it, but it worked.”
Even though they were sitting right next to each other, pressed together, Zev still felt like Jonah was too far away. Hearing how close he’d come to losing the person who meant everything to him, who made him whole, was terrifying. He put his arm around Jonah’s muscular frame and pulled Jonah onto his lap. Jonah didn’t resist or complain. He just cuddled up and nuzzled into Zev’s neck.