“How are the other children reacting to her now?” Diane asked, knowing Rachel had mentioned problems a few months earlier.
“They growl at her, snap at her without thinking.” Rachel reached out and tickled Amber’s tummy as she kept her tone soft.
Amber was no dummy. She watched her mother somberly for long seconds before Rachel was able to draw a smile from her.
“Those little hybrid brats giving my girl a hard time?” Diane whispered as Amber curled closer to her and gave a sleepy little yawn.
“They don’t mean anything—” Rachel began to protest.
“Geez, Rachel, I know they don’t mean anything by it.” Diane sighed as she rocked the baby gently. “It’s the changes in her scent that frightens them perhaps? They’re just babies too.”
She wanted to give her sister something to hold on to, something to ease the fears Diane knew tormented her.
“Not David,” Rachel whispered as she ran her fingers lovingly over Amber’s heavy curls. “Callen and Merinus’s son isn’t a baby, Diane. He growls at her if he doesn’t stop himself first. Just having her around seems to irritate him. Low, involuntary growls rumble in his chest before he becomes angry and simply leaves the room.”
Rachel’s voice trembled painfully. “He’s being groomed for his father’s position, trained to take over. He’s the children’s alpha, do you know the implications of his rejection of Amber?”
Diane smoothed her hand down the baby’s back as she made a tiny sound of distress once again. “What are the implications, Rachel?” she asked gently, though the look she shot her sister was berating. “David is in puberty, he’s going through maturation of not just human hormones but also the animal ones. He was Jonas’s favorite before Amber. Subconsciously, perhaps he resents her for the love Jonas has for her, and his animal DNA is simply reacting.”
Jonas loved children, but David had been his favorite before Amber’s arrival. Once Rachel had given birth, Diane heard Jonas had fallen head over heels for the infant. Nothing in this world mattered as much as Rachel and the child he claimed as his own. Though Diane knew David still received quite a bit of attention from the director.
“When it’s all said and done, he’s still human,” she reminded her sister. “Have you told Merinus?”
Rachel rolled over to stare at the ceiling, one arm across her stomach as she scowled heavily.
“Rachel?” Diane urged her.
“I’m not going to Callan or Merinus,” Rachel muttered, though this time, she kept the anger and any pain she felt out of her tone.
“Why not, Rachel?” Maybe her sister couldn’t, but she could.
“And you won’t either.” Rachel’s head snapped to the side, her expression fierce as she stared back at her.
Diane’s lips thinned. She hated it when Rachel could so easily guess her intentions.
“Why can’t you go to Merinus?” Diane asked rather than arguing. “She’s David’s mother, she can talk to him. If not Merinus, then Callan.”
Rachel sniffed as she rubbed her hands over her face before starting back at Diane heavily. “Because I refuse to play tattletale on a child.” She sighed wearily.
Diane had to laugh. “But, Rachel, it’s children you’re supposed to tattle on.”
Her sister’s lips almost twitched in amusement.
“Laugh, Diane.” She sat up and it was then Diane saw the tears glittering in her eyes. “I’m not going to play the bitch mother and beg Merinus Lyons to please make her son stop being so mean to my baby.”
Diane was confused now. She stared back at her sister, wondering what the real problem was here.
“I all but went to school with you for the first six years because the older kids liked to bully you,” Diane reminded her sister fondly. “I yelled at teachers and I argued with principals. Then Uncle Colt came in, glared at them all and even visited their parents and all but threatened them. But what happened to stop it, Rachel?”
“This isn’t school, Diane.” She sighed. “Kicking the bully in the balls isn’t going to fix this.”
And oh how her baby sister had kicked the bully and left him crying. Diane loved that memory.
“No, it won’t,” she agreed reasonably. “But if you don’t speak to Merinus, Callan or David, I don’t care which, then I will.”
Ignoring Rachel’s scowl she laid the now-sleeping Amber back in the bed beside her mother.
“Let it go,” her sister ordered.
“No. Find the cause and fix it, or I’ll do it for you.” Diane shrugged, unconcerned with her sister’s arguments. “And you know I will, Rachel. That’s my niece and she’s too young to have to endure a teenager’s temperamental attitude. I won’t have it.”
“It’s not that easy,” Rachel whispered. “They’re Breeds, not human children, Diane. Just as his father is. There’s more involved than puberty or teenager temper.”
“Bullshit.” Diane was in her face, nose to nose, leaning over Amber and glaring in her sister’s eyes, though she kept her tone soft, gentle, without a hint of anger or emotion that would awaken Amber. “It’s that easy. You find David, you ask him what the fuck his problem is. You get to the bottom of it, or I swear to God I will.”
Rachel’s eyes widened at her sister’s tone. “You’re serious.”
“Why so surprised, Rachel?” Diane asked between clenched teeth. “I protected you when you were little. I fought for you. Do you think there’s a chance in hell I’d not do the same for your baby? My niece?” Diane reached out, touched the tears on her sister’s face, wanting to cry herself. “Rachel, you’re my sister. We’ve been through hell together, and I’d walk through hell for my niece. Don’t you realize that?”
Rachel shook her head and Diane realized her sister feared the same things now that she had feared as a child. That her actions would hurt someone else she loved or somehow offend someone she respected.
“Jonas is a big boy and David’s parents are reasonable adults,” Diane told her sister gently. “Your mate is as alpha as his leader is. Does he even know what’s going on?”
“Not fully,” Rachel answered.
“Fix it, Rachel,” Diane ordered as she leaned close and hugged her gently. “Fix it for Amber, or I’ll do it for you.”
Diane moved from the bed and headed for the window she’d used as an entrance.
“You’re leaving, aren’t you? To find the Roberts girl,” Rachel whispered, a vein of fear filling her voice. “Alone.”
Diane turned back slowly. “You have Jonas,” she stated firmly, her voice low. “Your loyalty is to Jonas and his causes, and that’s how it should be.” She forestalled her sister’s protest with a firm look and a quick raise of her hand. “I have my own battles to fight, Rachel. There are things I have to do and I can’t do that if I’m shackled to your side, or locked inside Sanctuary.”
“I don’t want you to risk your life for us,” Rachel cried suddenly, the softness of her voice made hoarse by her tears. “That’s what you’re doing, Diane, and I can’t bear it. I’d die inside if anything happened to you because of us, because you feel you have to protect us.”
Diane shook her head. “That’s not what I’m doing, Rachel.”
“It is.” She heard her sister moving from the bed. “You’re still chasing information on Brandenmore, aren’t you? You’re still trying to save Amber.” Those tears were thicker in her voice now. “Trading your life for hers. That’s why you won’t accept Lawe—”
“No.” Diane turned quickly, furiously. “I’m not his pet, Rachel. I’m not a child he can lock in a room for my own safety. I fight.” It burned in her gut, it flamed through her mind. “I do what I need to because that’s who I am. That’s what I am. And he wants to take it from me.”