Pride Mates

Chapter Sixteen

Kim had never seen Liam less than completely self-assured, never at a loss for words. Not her Irish Shifter with his gift of blarney.

Now Liam stared at the paper while his face flooded with color and his eyes changed to white-blue.

"I told Dad"--Sean's voice was strained--"that he needs to confront Fergus and get it over with. Dad refused."

Kim folded chilled fingers into her palms, deciding for once to keep silent. She remembered Liam telling her that he didn't know why Dylan never fought Fergus for dominance, but that he thought it was so the Shifters could live in peace.

"Son of a bitch," Liam said. "Dad, why?"

Dylan's voice was tight, his hands clenched. His fingers had changed to claws, and blood smeared his fists. "Leave it alone, Liam."

"I can't. Fergus wants you to step down? To put one of his lackeys in your place? Our lives won't be worth shite if that happens. He's undercutting your position in your own pride, not to mention the clan."

"I said, leave it alone!"

Liam didn't flinch. "Dad, this is a blatant smack in the face, an invitation to challenge him."

Dylan's eyes were red with rage, but Kim saw anguish behind the animal fury. "Don't you think I know that? But I won't. Not now."

"Why the hell not?"

"I have my fucking reasons!" Dylan roared.

If he'd directed that anger at Kim, she knew she'd run like hell. Liam stood his ground, his own hands showing claws. "If you think you're giving in for the good of Shiftertown, you're crazy. This will be his first step to drive us out of here. He'll make sure we end up in a Shiftertown far from here, where we're clanless and at the bottom of the pile. Kim will have to abandon Brian, and Brian will go down for the murder."

Kim noted Liam's big assumption--that if the Morrisseys had to go, she'd go with them--but she decided this was not the time to bring it up.

Dylan's eyes were bleak. "I know."

Liam's claws shredded the paper, which fell to the floor. "I can't go after Fergus myself. You know that."

"Yes," Dylan said quietly. "I do."

"Then why..."

His words trailed off as the back door banged open and hot wind flooded past them. Glory charged in, dressed in hot pink with silver sandals, her finger-and toenails painted in matching pink. "Dylan, what the hell is going on?"

Dylan gave her a weary look. "Glory. Not now."

"Fergus wants Grandda' to step down from leading Shiftertown," Connor babbled from the kitchen.

Glory's mouth opened in shock. "What? We won't stand for that. The asshole."

"You said it," Kim agreed.

The males in the room, except Connor, ignored both women. Sean met Dylan's gaze, his face quiet. "I'll do it. I'll fight Fergus."

A chorus of shouting drowned him out. Liam huffed a bitter laugh. "What, Sean, you'll kill me, then Dad, then go after Fergus?"

"No." Sean's face was white. "I'll just kill the gob-shite. I can shoot him, can't I, and then stick him with the sword. Fergus is dust, no more problem."

"And then by Shifter law I'll have to take you out," Liam said in a hard voice. "Bad plan."

"What does it matter?" Sean asked.

The others fell silent, and Kim couldn't contain herself. "Are you all crazy? Why would you let Sean even think of that?"

"Stay out of this, Kim," Dylan said without looking at her.

"No, Kim has a point." Glory folded her arms, her perfect breasts straining against her pink shirt. "Sean, why should you sacrifice yourself?"

"To keep the peace," Sean said in a tired voice. "I would be the logical choice to be the assassin and pay the price. Because I'm mateless." Sean shot Liam a hard look, and Liam, surprisingly, dropped his gaze.

Glory said, "Listen to the human girl. If anyone should pay for this, it's Fergus himself. Let him be the sacrifice."

"Good idea," Connor echoed.

Dylan let his voice roar through. "There will be no argument. We do what Fergus says."

Kim opened her mouth to protest, and so did Glory, but suddenly Glory shut hers, as though she understood something. Dylan was staring hard at Liam, those nonverbal cues flying between them. Dylan's eyes were feral white, Liam's not much better.

Liam dropped his gaze and turned. Dylan gave him a look of almost disappointment, then swung away and slammed himself out the back door. Glory took a deep breath, but to Kim's surprise, she didn't follow Dylan.

"I really don't understand," Kim said into the silence. "Why would your dad stand back and let Fergus win?"

Liam shot her a quick look. He was worried. "I don't know."

"Because Dylan isn't ready to die," Glory said. "He's not that old, and he's completely virile. Besides, he has me."

Her smug statement broke the tension a little. Connor even gave a nervous laugh. "Sure, that would be worth living for," he said.

"You're a cub, youngling," Glory said. "You'll learn."

Liam remained silent, the smiling, damn-your-eyes man Kim had come to know fading into a bleak, angry Shifter. When he looked like this he was scary as hell, but Kim walked to him and ducked under his arm. The others had backed off, and for the first time since she'd met this group, they were giving another Shifter space.

Kim sensed that Liam didn't need space right now; he needed touch, reassurance. She melded to his side, and Liam finally looked down at her, the feral white-blue of his eyes darkening to human blue once again.

"We'll fix this somehow," Kim dared to say. "Without anyone dying or Sean shooting Fergus in the back. Although I wouldn't mind doing that--after I give him a piece of my mind."

"Don't you dare," Liam said, lips flat. "Or I'll chain you up in the basement."

"Are there spiders down there?"

"Possibly."

Kim lifted her hand. "All right, I'll try to be sensible. I see that I need to speed up my campaign to free Brian, and I have a few ideas about that."

Liam's gaze flickered, as though suspicious about her ideas, but his fangs and claws had retreated.

Glory snorted. "The little kitten has teeth, Liam. Watch that when she goes down on you."

Connor laughed out loud. Liam gave Kim a little smile. "I'm willing to risk it."

Glory stepped past them. "Excuse me. I think Dylan's had time to cool from killing rage to an even simmer. Time for me to go be a good little lapdog."

"I don't even want to know about that," Connor said in disgust, as Glory sashayed out.

Connor came to Kim and put his arms around her in a smothering hug. "I'm glad you're Liam's mate, Kim, and I'm glad you came home. The full-moon blessing tomorrow night is going to be some party. Me and Sean have invited everyone."

Kim remembered Liam saying something about his father pronouncing his blessing under the moon, but she hadn't paid much attention. "Party?"

"Mate blessings don't happen very often, so all of Shiftertown will want to see it," Liam said. "Don't worry, we dress casual."

"Oh, thanks." All of Shiftertown, coming to stare at her. Then again, it might be a good time to put some of her ideas in motion. If Silas was dying to learn about Shifters, she could give him a glimpse, and he could help Kim's cause at the same time. "Do you mind if I invite a friend?"

Liam's eyes narrowed. "Friend?"

"Someone I know who's helped me out in the past. Is this blessing something humans can witness?"

Liam gave her a nod. "Sure. It won't make Fergus happy, but screw him."

"That's what I keep saying." She smiled up at Liam. She knew she couldn't ease all his tension, but she could tell how far she'd made him relax. "I need to make a few phone calls. Mind?"

Liam released her. "Is this human all right about Shifters?"

"Yes, he likes them."

"He?"

Kim laughed at Liam's sudden, possessive stare. "Don't worry. He's just a friend. I've known him for a long time."

Liam's gaze softened a little, but Kim made a mental note to warn Silas not to touch her, not even casually.

"You make your calls," Liam said, his voice gentling. He'd climbed down a long way from the ready-to-kill Shifter, but he was still tense. "Myself, I'm going to go visit Sandra again. I'd like to figure out why Fergus is pulling out all the stops to keep Brian from going to trial."

Liam found Sandra in her backyard, alone. She'd wheeled her shallow charcoal-burning grill to the middle of the grass and started a fire in it. As Liam approached, he heard her chanting a prayer to the Earth goddess at the same time she tossed fragments of paper into the fire.

Liam approached silently. He meant to give her privacy to pray, but when he saw what she burned, he stepped forward and grabbed them out of her hands.

Sandra jerked around with a sharp intake of breath. Her wildcat fangs extended, her eyes going white.

Liam looked at the photos Sandra had been trying to burn. One showed Brian grinning at the camera with his arm around his mom, a bottle of beer dangling from his hand. Another showed Brian and his friends at a lake. Then Brian and a human girl, probably the murder victim, Michelle.

"It's not desperate enough for this yet," Liam said.

"Don't stop me. I need to make sure he gets to the Summerland."

"Brian's not going anywhere near the Summerland." Liam put his arm around Sandra's shoulder, trying to let his warmth comfort her. "That's why I've come, to ask for your help in springing him."

Sandra looked up at him with dead eyes. "There's nothing I can do."

"That's not true. Now come on, let's go in and have something cold to drink. It's too bloody hot out here to be doing any straight thinking."

Sandra let Liam take her into the house, where he fetched her a cold beer. He opened a bottle himself and sank down onto her couch to drink it. He'd sat here a couple days ago, he remembered, massaging Kim's feet. She had lovely feet, tiny in his big hands.

Liam tucked the photos of Brian into his pocket, knowing that if he let Sandra have them, she'd go back to burning them after he'd gone. An image of the loved one, sacrificed to fire, was the best way to make sure the loved one's passage into the afterlife was peaceful.

Sandra drank the beer but made no sign of enjoying it. "What do you want, Liam?"

"I want to know about this human girl, Michelle. Did Brian intend to make her his mate?"

Sandra regarded him in surprise. "I don't know."

"Because he would never have killed her if he did, and you know it. I hadn't thought of it before, because taking a human female for mate wasn't something I'd ever considered. But Kim, she's damn smart."

Sandra eyed him sharply. "I heard that you claimed her."

"That I did. Don't worry, it was sanctioned by Fergus himself. He insisted on it, actually, though I intended to make the bond anyway."

"Sun and moon?"

"Under the sun, so far. The moon is at its fullest tomorrow night, and Dad will bless us then. Come over. It will be a grand party."

"And Kim, she's fine with you claiming her?"

Liam thought of Kim's confusion, her outrage. He grinned. "Maybe 'fine' is going a bit far, but she'll get used to it. I'll make sure of that." He took a sip of beer and saw Sandra actually smile.

He got Sandra to let him have a look in Brian's room. Brian wasn't a cub anymore--he'd come of age and found his place in the hierarchy, but he had continued to live here to help out his mother. The custom of human kids moving out as soon as they turned eighteen had always struck Liam as odd. Shifters lived together in family groups for generations.

Sandra had lost her mate long before she and Brian had moved to Shiftertown. Only Brian and she lived in this house, and before Brian's arrest, Sandra had been hopeful that Brian would soon claim a mate and fill the house with little ones. Now her eyes were devoid of any hope as she led Liam upstairs.

Brian occupied two rooms on the second floor--he'd used one as a bedroom, the other as an office. An old computer stood on his desk, jury-rigged to a couple other boxes as though he was trying to set up a network. Liam wasn't a computer whiz by any means, though he could navigate the Internet fairly well. But he didn't know enough to understand whether Brian was trying to make his computer do something illegal or simply work better.

Sandra turned away after she let Liam in, as though she couldn't bear to enter Brian's rooms. That was fine with Liam. He went through Brian's desk thoroughly while he waited for the computer to boot up, but he didn't find anything useful. Old receipts for gas, cardboard coasters, souvenirs from various attractions around Austin, and old raffle-type tickets.

The computer, it turned out, didn't have the helpful screen full of icons to click on. A list of files scrolled by when Liam hit the Enter key, and then the cursor sat at the bottom of the screen, blinking at him.

"Shite." He'd have to have Sean take a look. Sean knew far more about computers than Liam did, more than Shifters were allowed to know.

The rest of Brian's living room--his video and DVD collection, his books, his magazines--told Liam nothing except that, like Connor, Brian had an obsession with cars. Cars were a sickness among younger Shifters. Liam couldn't see the attraction; it wasn't as though they were Harleys.

Liam took a quick look through Brian's bedroom, but came up with even less. If Brian had secrets, he didn't hide them in the house he shared with his mother. Liam did find a few pictures of Michelle tossed carelessly into the drawer of the nightstand. She'd been a pretty girl, with honey-blonde hair and a sweet smile, her skin tanned from the Texas sun. Photos of her and Brian together told Liam she didn't mind at all that he was Shifter.

"Did you put these in here?" he called to Sandra.

"No," she said when she looked. "Brian kept them there. The police took away about half of them when they searched."

Liam was surprised they'd left any. But maybe they'd taken enough to show the jury what a pretty, helpless innocent Brian had corrupted.

"Can I have this one?" He held up a photo of Michelle with both arms around Brian.

"Sure."

She was trying to make herself stop caring. Liam recognized the signs, having seen them in both his father and Kenny when they lost their mates. Pretending that they'd let go, that their beloved's things were just things, of no importance.

"Will you ask Brian about her?" Liam asked as he pocketed the photos. "Find out whether he was going to claim her? It's important."

Sandra shook her head. "I'll not be visiting him again."

"Don't give up yet."

Vehemence entered her eyes, making her come alive. "I can't visit him. He won't let me."

"Who?" Liam's eyes narrowed. "Fergus?"

"Yes, Fergus. I've been told to stay away, to let Brian go."

Liam went to her and rubbed her shoulders. "Sandra, you can't do that. He's your son, your cub. He needs you now more than ever."

"Tell that to Fergus. I had orders."

"Well, here's me overriding those orders."

Sandra laughed, an unhealthy sound. "You can't."

"I'm using my prerogative of second in command of this Shiftertown." For now, he thought silently. "I say go see Brian, and let me deal with Fergus."

"I can't let you do that. He can kill you."

"He already wants to kill me for so very many reasons. You're the only one who can do this for us, love. Fergus won't let me near Brian, and he won't let Kim talk to him anymore, but stopping a mother from seeing her cub--that one he won't be able to justify. I'm betting he knows that."

Sandra looked tired. "I can't stand up to him, Liam."

"You won't have to. He's not here, and his lieutenants won't interfere with a mother's rights." Liam gave her an encouraging smile. "Even Fergus's thugs have mothers who wouldn't let them hear the end of it if they kept you from your cub."

Sandra relaxed a little. "You are full of shit, Liam."

"Try it. They won't hurt you, not around so many humans. You want to see Brian, don't you?"

"Will you come with me?"

"I can't." Liam rubbed her shoulders again, wishing he could tell her that everything would be fine and mean it. "They'll waffle about stopping you, but they won't let me anywhere near the jail. But you go on. Have a good talk with him, and tell me everything he says."

Kim hung up her cell phone as Liam walked in the back door. A strange sensation flashed through her, and it took her a minute to recognize it--she was glad to see him.

She hadn't been so happy to see someone enter a room in a long, long time, not since her parents had passed. Friends were fine, and Abel was--All right, so whenever Abel had walked in, her first reaction usually had been impatience and irritation.

Seeing Liam made her heart beat faster and not simply because of lust. She went warm as he smiled at her and leaned down to kiss her cheek.

"Where is everyone?" he asked.

"Your dad, still next door with Glory. Connor went out to hook up with some friends, he said. Ellison came over, and he and Sean took off."

"Oh, did he? Leaving you alone and unprotected?" He played with the hair at the back of her neck.

"Not with every single one of your neighbors outside staring at the house. Maybe you noticed them?"

"Wondering what I'm doing in here with the human woman." Liam massaged her neck, leaning down to nip the shell of her ear. "What would you like me to do?"

Kim's body grew pliant. "Liam, about this friend I want to invite..."

"What about him? He wasn't your lover, was he?"

"No. Really, he's just a friend. I've known him since college. I didn't want to say this in front of all the others, but Silas is a journalist. A very good one. He wants to do some pieces on Shifters and make a documentary. Kind of show how they're mistreated, that kind of angle."

Liam straightened up, eyes wary. "Let another human uncover Shifter secrets?"

"No, I mean show Shifter life in its reality--the kids playing in the yards, like that Michael in his pool I saw the first day I was here. He's cute, and he'd have great appeal. Humans can watch Shifter moms planting gardens, dads coming home from their working-class jobs. Teenagers like Connor playing soccer or holding hands with their girlfriends. Let people see how peaceful you are, how normal."

"Is that all? You know Fergus would never let that happen,"

"That's why I'm asking you." Kim smiled up at him, trying to look impossibly sweet.

Liam's gaze softened. "You're a crafty lass, Kim. You want these stories to switch public opinion to Brian's side, don't you now?"

"It couldn't hurt."

Liam laughed softly and kissed the top of her head. "And you know if I say yes, I won't tell Fergus."

"Something like that. Or your father?"

"Or my father, who would feel obligated to pass on the information. Bring this Silas to the party and let me meet him. No cameras, no notebooks. Strictly off the record until I get to know him."

"Of course. He's fair, Liam, which is why I thought of him."

"But if I don't like him..."

"I tell him no. Promise."

"All right then." Liam leaned down, resumed nibbling her earlobe. "But enough talking. I'm thinking about the fact that we're alone in this house."

"Having someone in the house didn't stop you yesterday," she pointed out in a shaky voice.

"That was mating frenzy. Today I want to take it slow. To give you everything I want, in my own time." Liam ran his fingers down her spine, trailing fire. "I want to see if you're wearing garters under that sexy skirt."

Kim leaned against the kitchen counter and slid her skirt up a few inches. "I am."

Liam's warm hands covered her thighs, his thumbs hooking into the tops of her stockings. "That's my girl."