“No. I think you’ll do what I want because it’s the right thing to do and because…”
He let the sentence dangle out there as the bear tugged on her cabinet and her hands turned into fists, her eyes cutting back to the wolf. He smiled at her.
“Don’t mind him. He’s naturally curious.” His head dipped down a bit. “You know how bears are.”
Yeah, she knew. That’s why she wasn’t surprised when she heard something tear and turned back to see the bear easily holding her six-foot-tall cabinet in one hand and feeling around the now-tattered wall it had once been attached to with the other.
“I didn’t know this was attached to the wall until it came out.” The bear winced. “Sorry.”
He pushed the cabinet back into place, but with such force the curios inside were slammed together. “I’m sure I can fix it.”
“No!” She stood up and the wolf rose with her. “Just leave it.” The bear stepped away from the cabinet, but his attention was quickly snagged by her television. Since that television was worth nearly seven grand and she’d only paid one grand for it in a back alley, she wasn’t about to lose it to a frickin’ bear. “Spit it out already, Van Holtz. What do you want?”
“What the Board says anyone with a first-offense territory breach is owed. Twenty-five hundred for me and twenty-five for Brendon Shaw.”
“You want me to pay that cat?”
“The Board represents all of us. It protects all of us.”
“Fine. Whatever. Just get out.”
“Of course. And thank you for your assistance. You can send the money directly to the Board secretary. He’ll be expecting it and it will be split up appropriately.”
He headed toward the door. “Lock? You—”
A snap of thick plastic cut off the wolf’s words and they both looked over. The bear held the sixty-five-inch flat screen in one hand like it weighed nothing and half of the TV’s base in the other. “Um…do you have another stand for this TV?”
“Just put it down,” Sharyn growled out between clenched teeth.
“I can get you a new stand or—”
“Down.”
The bear did as she asked and she walked the two interlopers to her front porch.
As the limo pulled off, Sharyn’s daughter and her idiot boyfriend walked up to her.
“Everything okay?”
Staring after the limo as it drove off her Pack’s Staten Island territory, Sharyn calmly asked, “You went off neutral territory to nail that mixed cat on Labor Day weekend?”
Donna Noreen Maire McNelly blinked a few times, which meant she was debating whether to lie or not.
“Well…you said to get her. So we got her.”
“Got her where?”
Donna licked her lips. “We tracked them to lion territory. Found the mutt first, went after her, and O’Neill showed up.”
“Then you chased them into Van Holtz territory?” And brought that rich asshole wolf right to her door.
“Well…yeah.”
Sharyn backhanded her daughter, sending her flying across the porch.
“What the fuck was that for?” Donna screamed, blood dripping from her cut lip, while her useless boyfriend, Jay Ross, leaned against the porch railings and kept busy by texting his “clients.”
“First you didn’t even kill the bitch like I told you to. Then you opened that fat yap of yours and led a goddamn Van Holtz to my fuckin’ door!”
“It wasn’t me!”
“Then who?”
Sharyn looked over at the boyfriend and without even looking away from his phone, he said, “Don’t even.”
“I look at you,” Sharyn sneered at her daughter, “and I think again why didn’t I make him wear a goddamn condom? Too bad I never have an answer that doesn’t make me throw up a little.” That said, Sharyn went back in to her house and slammed the door shut.
Donna McNelly glared at the hand held out to her, then slapped it away. “Fuck you!”
“Whatever.” Jay went back to his cell phone and her eyes narrowed. Useless. He was absolutely useless!
Pushing herself off the ground, she wiped the blood from her lip. “I can’t believe you didn’t do anything.”
“I’m not getting between you and your mother.”
Angry and needing to take it out on somebody, Donna slapped the phone from her boyfriend’s hand. He stepped toward her but stopped when she didn’t back down, their eyes level as they were the same height, the same build.
“Why do I bother having you around?” she sneered. “You’re fuckin’ useless.”
“You have me around because I give you what you need.”
She blinked, briefly studied him. There were only two things she ever really needed from the man. Money, to keep her mother off her back, and a good fuck.
Oh, wait. There was something else her boyfriend provided—information. “You know where they are.”
“’Course I do.” He smiled, showing his fangs. “And those bitches are closer than you ever knew.”
CHAPTER 10
Gwen was inputting the information from recent receipts and was taking her sweet time about it, too, when Blayne received yet another text message. She responded quickly and shut her phone. Placing the phone in her backpack and her backpack over her shoulder, Blayne got up and headed toward the office door.
Gwen kept typing, waiting until Blayne’s hand was on the door handle before she said, “Where you going?”
Blayne stopped, her body tensing. “Huh?”
She continued to work. “I said, where are you going?”
“Out.”
“For drinks? I haven’t had a Guinness in forever.”
Blayne stared at her. She’d been a nervous mess all day, jumping when the phone rang, tearing papers she had on her desk into shreds, and twisting and untwisting poor, defenseless paperclips. When it came to emotions, Blayne was always an open book.
“No,” she finally answered. “Not drinks. I’m…uh…” Gwen could see her out of the corner of her eye, struggling with what she wanted to say. Struggling between lying and telling Gwen the truth. After a minute, she went with the lying. “I’m going to the hospital. Again.”
“The volunteering. Right. Okay.”
Blayne nodded, stared at Gwen for another moment—her frustration evident in the way she was twisting and untwisting her fingers—and went out the door.
Gwen went back to work…for about thirty more seconds. Then she shut off her monitor, pulled her backpack onto her shoulders, and ran to the office door. She stopped long enough to lock the doors and took off running. It still amazed Gwen that Blayne had finagled office space in the Kuznetsov Building. It was a small space, barely big enough for their two desks, small fridge, and coffeemaker, but the rent was too good to pass up and there was basement space to accommodate their company trucks and supplies. Really, Gwen couldn’t ask for better, especially in this city.
Stopping at the main doors of the building, Gwen stuck her head out and looked both ways. She could see Blayne running west and she took off after her. She didn’t get too close, though, not wanting Blayne to catch sight of her.
Thankfully Blayne didn’t grab a bus or take the subway, which was good because Gwen was still learning her way around this nightmare town. Still…the door Blayne disappeared into nearly fifteen minutes later did nothing but convince Gwen that she’d have to rescue Blayne from herself yet again.
Gwen walked to that door, stopping immediately when she stepped inside. Nope. Not a hospital—a place Blayne knew Gwen would never willingly go into—but an ice-skating rink. The entire floor teeming with full-humans watching their children skate, all of them hoping to be the breeder of the next gold Olympian.