PAWN AMONG WOLVES CH. 13-PT2

"Well, if that is what they were trying to do, I can't say I noticed. I remember being a bit surprised at the time at all the things they thought they could somehow get me to do."

The Whites brought the post with them as usual when they arrived at the house the following morning; there was an official-looking letter from Gemma's faculty, which someone had somehow brought from her flat, and Penny took it down to where the werewolf was intently journal-surfing on the computer in the lab, reading up on the use of barbiturates for mental disorders. After a brief halt to read her letter, Gemma tried to go back to work, discussing possible new tests to try with Ada and Valerie, but after a short, restless half-hour, she gave up and went to find Mac up in his studio on the top floor.

The wide expanse of the A-frame ceiling was lined with tongue-and grooved boards, the warm pine striping up to the high peak of the roof. The wooden floorboards were dappled with the moody, cloudy sunlight which was flirting through the eastern of the huge windows embedded in each slanting roof, with more rays just peeking through the southern of the additional large picture windows under the eaves. The scent of old sap rising from the floorboards tingled soothingly into her spine; she knew why her mate liked to spend time up here. He and his hunter Whites had turned it into their planning room, and a group of them were crouched with the Alpha on the far side around a huge trestle table, murmuring tactics over some Monopoly pieces they were moving around over a map when she stepped in. There was a huge blue expanse on the paper, with a black blotch staining one corner, but it was miles from where they were moving the pieces over the dark green forest.

Gemma jerked her eyes away.

They all rose to their feet: Mac, because he came striding across to her, face creased in concern; the others, she thought, out of courtesy. She found being an Alfamme a bit unnerving. I mean, she didn't feel like she should be in charge of anybody. Or worthy of respect. From wolves, any of whom could stand her on her head effortlessly.

Mac reached out a hand to her as she stepped up to him, "What is it, picchu?"

She glanced at the others, and her lips turned up in a slight smile. The warriors were already loping past her out of the room, nodding acknowledgement as they passed, no doubt having sensed something in her scent. She waited until the last had left, then held out the letter, her brown eyes troubled.

"I'm about to be sacked," she said succinctly. "Unless I can provide evidence of my medical condition."

Mac glanced at her, eyes unreadable, and then began to carefully read the letter.

"I could ask Will or Amy to provide you with a medical report," he murmured slowly as he read. "Probably Amy, because she's registered here, with a human medical degree and training, but -." The deep green eyes lifted back to hers. "Do you want to go back to work at the university?" he asked.

"I don't know," Gemma murmured, head tilted slightly defiantly. She didn't know why there were tears lurking in her eyes, why she felt so wobbly on getting this letter. An arm slid around her shoulders. "I don't know what's going on," she whispered. "I don't know - what future to plan for."

Her voice began to rise, reflecting the feeling of helpless panic bubbling up inside her as staccato phrases began to jump out of her: "I don't know. Don't know where I belong. What to do. Should I let go of a job I worked so hard to get? Will it be a black mark on my record?" She paused to heave a breath, dropping her head as a tremor of unease shook her. "How will I earn my living? Where does all this come from?" she added, flinging an arm out in a staccato gesture at the room, while Mac lifted her off her feet, strode over to the leather-cushioned flat bench underneath the western skylight, and sat down with her sitting half-sideways on one of his knees, both arms around her.

"Why am I even worried about this?" Gemma added, her voice breaking on the last sentence. Mac hugged her to him.

"Because your whole life has been turned upside down," he answered softly.

Gemma cracked a broken little laugh, and turned her head into his shoulder. Breathed deeply. Mac smelt nice: clean, musky, male, with a slight tang, a wild undertone. A little smile wobbled on her lips as she breathed in his scent, soothing herself.

This aromatherapy seemed to work both ways.

After a few moments, she muttered, "I do know where I belong," into his skin quietly, her voice still wavering through tears. "With you. But I don't know, physically, where that is. Will be. How to live. What will I do?"

She lifted back and looked at him, blinking the moisture from her eyes.

"Make me peanut butter chicken?" replied Mac hopefully, but instantly sighed and continued seriously, "I'm sorry, picchu. I - if you want to keep your job at the university waiting for you, I'll arrange an official sick note."

Gemma smiled shakily at him, but shook her head, "I - would feel bad, doing that. I would like a sick note so that they will sign me off honourably, so that I can prove I'm leaving them in the lurch for a good reason - chronic medical incapacity," she bit back a half-gulp and grimaced expressively, continuing, " but I couldn't keep the job hanging open for me, they can't afford - will need to replace -." Her voice cracked, and she rested her forehead down against his shoulder again, then laughed and added tearfully, "At least I won't have to work with Craig any more."

Mac sighed, and kissed her above her ear, tightening his arms. "My brave picchu," he murmured.

Brave picchu began to cry in earnest into his shirt.

After long, comforting minutes huddled in his arms with her face pressed into his chest, leaking emotion, allowing herself to just cry, the sobs began to subside. Gemma hiccupped a few times, sniffing, feeling just - mellow. His. And then she began to feel a little melodramatic, stupid, emotionally naked. Of all the things to cry about! Embarrassing. Cheeks flushed with self-consciousness, Gemma took a deep, shaky breath, sat up and began to wipe her eyes, smiling shyly up into soft green eyes through her tears. Her heart melted and lip wobbled again.

Her mate murmured such nice things into her ear while she was crying on him.

"Sorry," Gemma gulped. Mac rolled his eyes at the unnecessary apology, and lifted her wet face with a gentle hand under her chin.

"If you write back to the faculty," he suggested, carefully wiping her cheeks himself with a corner of his brushed cotton shirt. "Tell them that Dr Amy Waring is the specialist dealing with your condition, and will be sending them a supporting letter, separately." He paused.

"You're sure she'll be OK writing it? For an outlaw?" Gemma asked doubtfully, her voice still a little wobbly.

Mac snorted. "You saved her life, picchu," he replied dryly, smiling as his mate lifted startled eyes to his. "I'm sure."

Who -?

Mac interrupted her thoughts, sounding thoughtful, "A better idea would be to get one of the troops to write your reply for you, and just sign it. It will sound more official, and you've got plenty of more important things to do. All they do is sit around all day drinking our coffee and messing up the kitchen with toys."

"Besides cooking," Gemma reminded him, then paused to release a watery little hiccup. "Shopping, cleaning, gardening, guard duty, and helping you up here and me in the lab," she rattled off, more calmly.

"You're an Alfamme now, picchu, get used to it," Mac shrugged. He grinned at her, green eyes sparkling softly. "Nowadays the only letters you should bother to write yourself are love letters to me."

Gemma shot him a smiling look from the corner of her tear-sparkling eyes, filing that advice away for future notice, then took in a faintly wobbly breath, turned slightly so she was fully sideways on to him, and sank to rest against his shoulder, sliding her left hand around the back of his waist and the fingers of her right into his open shirt collar to tease light fingers over his collar bone.

"I still feel a bit - unsettled. Where does all this come from? Are you really rich?" she asked, gesturing around the room again. "I don't like just living off you. Indefinitely."

Mac sighed deeply. She could hear him thinking, just couldn't catch the words. He took another deep breath.

"Damn," he muttered.

Gemma's fingers stilled. His scent was - she didn't know, hadn't caught that fragrance before, it wasn't threatening, just - unusual.

"What?" she asked.

"You would ask that, wouldn't you picchu?" he asked in return, his tone slightly sheepish.

Gemma lifted herself upright again on his thigh, and just looked at him, eyebrows raised.

Mac rolled his eyes again, and ended up looking at the ceiling, avoiding hers. "No, I'm not rich. Comfortable, with the proceeds from my photography, but not rich," he told the mellow pine boards.

"Mac?" she asked softly, tone slightly dangerous. She knew when her mate was teasing her.

His eyes dropped back to hers and there was an amused yet challenging look in his face as he told her, "The Wolflord is paying for this - the house, the conversions, the rent for the troops' dens, and - well, he provided a salary, so our alchemist could live comfortably while working for him, for us."

Gemma stared at her Alpha while it sank in, amusement beginning to creep into her eyes. He looked away quickly.

"I provided the touch screen in your panic room!" Mac insisted, slanting another look at her.

"Thanks," murmured Gemma, her face perfectly straight. Then it split into a grin when her mate twitched his eyes away again to stare intently into the distance, his jaw set.

"You mean, you're living off me?" she concluded quietly. She was trying to remember the exact words of a discussion they'd once had back on Kate and Bethan's sofa bed.

"It was for both of us!" Mac returned, the amusement creeping back into his eyes as he looked at her, "Provision was made for both of us - you needed a guard and an assistant. It's you who always refers to our research."

"That was before!" she protested. "Now you just spend all your days running around in the woods pretending to hunt for ex-Greys. I'm the one providing for us, here."

"You're the one who insisted I hunt ex-Greys," Mac retorted. "And so the bulk of the earnings must be mine - I risk my limbs to provide you with valuable assistants, so I should get danger money in my share!"

Gemma's heart lurched in faint worry, and she sank back against him, sliding her arms back around his waist and hugging him tightly, kissing his jawline, chuckling. His head turned and he caught her lips with his.

When his head lifted again, her eyes were clear.

"Why didn't you tell me this earlier?" Gemma asked quietly, reaching up a hand to stroke along the strong line of his jaw.

He shrugged, and his voice was quiet as he replied, "It didn't come up - and then I didn't want to influence your decision about your human job. But now you've decided to give it up - Gemma, the Whites will start to come to you with their problems too. Things they find it difficult to approach me with, or sometimes matters too personal, especially in the case of the females. Also to argue about orders I have given which they disagree on - you are the second voice. And we need to work together to rebuild this pack - they are such a mess, they will require a lot of training, and help - counselling - there is no wolf counselling, I have no real idea how to go about this, I need your help. And - what you are doing right now, downstairs, too few wolves understand. Once your sentence is lifted - there is no wolf chemistry training, it has been illegal for centuries, which is ridiculous when you consider how vulnerable we are. If you wanted to start your own school, in the future -."

He left the sentence trailing, and Gemma smiled at him. Her heart was beating slightly faster at the phrase, "Once your sentence is lifted." Her songmate was always so sure that they could sort things out, that he could sort things out. She loved that incorrigible facet of him.

"Not short of possibilities, then?" she said cheerfully. "Sorry I got so upset."

He smiled back, his green eyes shining with deep feeling, and leaned in to kiss her nose gently.

"Picchu, I'm always in slight awe of how well you're dealing with this."

"That's because I've got you," she replied, hopping blithely down from his knee.

He caught her hand as she turned away and drew her back for a last, lingering kiss. Then he sighed as he lifted his head, "Send the troops back in on your way out, would you, love?"

Gemma blew him a kiss as she left.

*

Late one evening five days later, Gemma was in her and Mac's bedroom sitting between two of the other girls, concentrating hard as she stared at herself in the mirror of the huge mahogany dressing table.

The soft electric lights surrounding the glass lit the reflection of the muddle of clothing strewn around the large, square room on the moss green carpet; various dresses, socks, and pieces of underwear tumbled haphazardly across the floor. Some had even landed on the pristine white coverlet stretched over the huge bed while she'd danced, trying to distract herself as instructed. But none of the damn garments were on Gemma. She checked again in the mirror that the long, heavy grey-green curtains on the opposite wall, across the other side of the bed, were tightly closed: this was not something she wanted to explain to the neighbours.

A crease appeared between her brown eyes, and Gemma's delicate, furry features began to scrunch together in a frown, the pelt across her shoulders lifting as she tensed.

"Steady," murmured Soledad. "Calmly."

She never could do this calmly.

A jolt shot through the wereem as she shifted abruptly, and she growled at her human features, exasperated. She could shift easily, instinctively, bare naked, but the only way to build in clothes was to think about it, to think of them as fur, so she was told. But if she thought of how she looked, it was like someone was watching her driving, and she crashed from one form to the other.

She couldn't do it.

"Heey!" cheered Penny, and lifted her Alfamme's left wrist. A small gold bangle gleamed in the light of the lamp, winking up at Gemma.

"That - was it there when I was wolf?" she questioned softly, heart jumping in hope.

"Nope," the older woman assured her. "You were totally bare naked. You furred it."

Great. Not completely naked then. If she could just hide behind a thin gold bracelet.

"It's a start," Penny informed her, tossing the slinky cream dress across from the bed. "So that'll do for tonight. Time to dress for dinner. Again."

Gemma smiled as she scrabbled under her chair for her underwear. Her pack were really insistent that she dress for the A's return, and the girls had spent quite a bit of money - her money! - replacing the old clothes she'd ripped through in her weeks of raging.

Only one rage this week! her heart sang.

Gemma was fastening the last of the large circular brown buttons which ran between her breasts up the front of the dress when they all sensed the alert frisson which ran through the guard at the front door, the tension which meant he'd caught the scent of the Alpha approaching up the street.

The Alfamme dashed into their en-suite bathroom, a lurch of excitement and faint trepidation in her stomach, ears twitching to the quiet rustle of hasty activity breaking out all over the house. When she sped back into the bedroom a moment later, a small smile on her lips, the other two sjeste had already disappeared. She swung through the doorway and bounded three at a time down the thickly carpeted steps before skipping joyously down the corridor to join the hive of activity in the kitchen. The blinds had been closed over the wide window above the sink, to her left, and the sink, draining board and solid wooden work surfaces surrounding the large, square room were scrubbed spotless, as was the mellow wooden floor. The pine table in the centre of the room had been waxed again by someone recently, and was gleaming in the soft lighting from the wall-lights, the warm tones blending with the wooden doors of the cupboards and contrasting with the brightly gleaming cooker against the opposite wall. Gemma sighed as she glanced around. Nothing for her to do, as usual.

Gustav was already sliding the steaming shepherd's pie onto a mat in the middle of the large wooden table while Ada straightened the two place settings, pushing into line one of the colourful leaf-woven place mats that was lying slightly askew on the scrubbed pine surface and realigning the already opened bottle of wine. Fabian was pouring water into tall glasses, holding the jug as high as possible to see how many bubbles he could create while his older sister, her sad face shadowed, silently arranged the tall pepper and salt grinders to flank the oven dish, opposite a fragrant bowl of sliced tomatoes and avocado and mozzarella. Erik hummed from the corner softly as he mixed his leader's favourite aperitif in a squat tumbler.

The wereem almost tripped over Lucy as the puppy lolloped across the floorboards to her mother, whining with tiredness. The little yip knew it was time to go home. Gemma halted to wait for the tired shadow of Alexandra also wobbling across to Ada, in the wake of her natali. Mac was very late tonight; the cubs were exhausted.

"Wait," whispered Erik suddenly, lifting his head, his eyes alert. They heard the click of the front door closing, and then a harsh, scraping sound approaching slowly down the hallway. Startled, puzzled by the noise, Gemma's wide eyes met Ada's across the room, both silently wondering.

Then the scent hit them all.

For a moment, everyone froze instinctively, a startled, shocked tableau shuddering in the stillness, skin prickling. Oh my god, not again, cried Gemma's heart. Parents stooped swiftly to scoop up abruptly silent cubs, the wolves stepping back out of line of sight, lining the walls while Gemma slid into her seat and turned worried brown eyes toward the door.

Mac was seething over something; bitter, angry and emanating a feeling of intense aggression.

The door opened, and Gemma bit her lip at the sight of his exhausted, lined face.

Still. He needed a break!

The Alpha barely seemed to see past the blind, distant raging in his eyes, one hand pressed against his forehead to push back the spiking pain inside his head, while he dragged himself across the floor, weaving slightly, and dropped into the chair that Hakan had silently pulled back.

He was melded with the Mackelds. Something was badly wrong. Again.

Eyes frowning with worry, Gemma swiftly served him a huge portion of the hot, fragrant dish, not even trying to distract him with a question, and pushed it across under his nose.

Mac barely seemed to see it, but the scent caught him, and a slightly shaking, blood-and-mud grimed hand peeled back the crisp potato layer with two claws so that he could absently scoop the hot meat up into his mouth with his fingers. His head was propped on his other palm, elbow on the table, the fingers clenched around his skull as though to hold the bone together while the barrage of thoughts ricocheted back and forth inside his skull.

Gemma's soft brown eyes puzzled worriedly over the white caking under the fingernails pressing into his skull, and then as the door was swinging to behind the last of the silently departing Whites, she caught a glimpse of coarse, deep scratches scored along the wall of the hallway, and absorbed a flicker of scent under the rich swirl of meat, gravy, carrot and potato he was swiftly scooping into his mouth. Plaster dust.

Well, if all he's going to do is vandalise the house a little, good, she thought to herself. He has to ease a little of the tension somehow.

Gemma's heart ached with worry as her hot, dry eyes traced over her exhausted mate. She sat silent, watching, her own plate forgotten.

He had changed so much in such a short time. Just five days: the morning after the chase was the last moment of peace he had had, and the relaxation from that short break had long since dissipated.

His cheekbones looked sharp under his grey skin, and his beautiful hair was a lank, lifeless mop. The bloodshot eyes glaring unseeing at the tabletop were pained, dull black, she hadn't seen the green sparkle in days. He tried, but he was so tired, tense, the calls were unrelenting. And he barely got any sleep. His pale skin was trembling lightly, the shiver of intense weariness, but each night, soon after he closed his eyes, either his over-tired brain started shocking pulses through his limbs, or his betrothed cried out under torture.

It was a raw cycle: the sun rose on the Whites, bombarding him with their cries for help, for Mac to help rescue mates, cubs, natal and natali and friends; the demands had spiralled exponentially as the circle of the new pack expanded. Moreover, Grey had recently increased his collection schedule also, as his enslaved workforce expanded, so there were dozens more despairing ex-Grey wolves who needed to be intercepted.

As the day wore on and her mate tore around trying to free more and more of the wolves being recalled, the Mackelds awoke. Often under attack, at dawn. Someone was sneaking into Mackeld range using guerrilla warfare, vicious stealth attacks on small groups of travellers or the outlying homesteads. The Tzo were ostensibly withdrawing from the borders. But the attacks were increasing.

And at night, invariably, Natasha was tortured by Grey.

Mac's strained face was testimony to the relentless, painful circle of burdens. Gemma's eyes clenched closed. If only she could do something.

You've done enough, she told herself bitterly. You're the one who made him go and start rescuing the Whites in the first place.

Her depressed thoughts were spiralling, and she ached as her eyes traced the harsh lines of sad exhaustion scoring deeper day by day into her mate's face.

You're the one who separated him from the Mackelds, she berated herself further, so that he has to burn himself out, guiding them at this distance.

Bizarrely, Mac had found that the strength built from the new ties with the Whites gave him enough reach to be able to battle meld with the Mackelds, even half-way across the continent. It was more exhausting, but possible.

It would have helped further if, as a true Alfamme would, Gemma was able to bind with him to lend him her own strength also. Mates apparently shared strength, as well as burdens. But, useless mate that she was, she looped into insanity at even a hint of the cloying pack meld. And that he could do without.

Gemma drooped as she watched the flickers of strain wrenching the drawn, gaunt face of her mate, her eyes burning with dry tears. She carefully scooped out a spoonful of extra meat sauce to add to his plate.

Wow, such a help you are.

His focus miles away, Mac picked up the crispy potato crust and bit into it, tearing off a large piece to chew down on autopilot. Gemma sat silent, heart echoing in the ache, shuddering at the look of him. He looked worse every day. Worse than she had ever seen him - even poisoned; even shot and blood-mottled and torn to shreds by Grey. He was withering with exhaustion, being sucked dry by the different calls from them all.

Mac's head lifted; his blazing eyes focussed, meeting hers for an instant, an unreadable message flickering through the black depths before the blank distance swamped over his vision again.

Just before someone rang the doorbell.

Gemma lifted her head, startled. All the Whites would have left by now. She looked doubtfully at her mate.

He was back in the battle inside his head, whatever it was. But he had evidently noted the arrival. And left it to her. He was back to staring into the distance, wincing occasionally in twitches, claws drawing blood as they bit into his scalp.

The bell rang again, insistently.

No reaction from her mate.

Silently, Gemma rose and drifted past him to open the door to the corridor, then padded swiftly down toward the large, white-painted front door.

She rose on tiptoe to peer through the spy-eye, heart thundering. After a second or two, confused by the smart grey suit jacket over a smart cream shirt, she gasped in recognition and dropped back onto her heels while she clicked back the lock.

"Will!" she cried as she swung the door wide.

The Mackeld wolf physician stood unmoving on the doorstep, looking down at her, eyes cold.

"May I come in?" he asked.

She stepped back in shock, a little chill running through her, dumbfounded, his harsh scent blasting at her. Will had always been so nice to her. The tall, lean wolf took that as permission and stepped into the hallway, striding swiftly past her down to the kitchen doorway and turning in, unerringly sure of where he was going.

Gemma was running along in his wake, and she caught the burst of fury in Mac's eyes as he looked up and semi-focussed on his brother-in-law, wild-eyed, snarling a deep furious roll as he flashed to lycan and surged from his chair.

What?

Will leapt blurringly fast across the space, also changing form mid-air, and slammed his hands down on Mac's shoulders, shoving him unceremoniously back into his seat, an equal, answering snarl echoing above Mac's.

The pair struggled, power battering against each other, flashing through the air to burn every hair on Gemma's skin and scalp alert as she gaped from the doorway, open-mouthed. Her mind wavered. She should help. But the wolf within her was cringing at the idea - this was an Alpha face-off. Stay out of it.

"You're too tired to win, cunyanido," the doctor barked harshly, words rasped between heaving breaths in the fierce struggle to hold the tawny lycan in his seat. "Let it go." Mac wrenched again at Will's grip, eyes aflame, but couldn't twist free of the fingers clenched to his shoulders, and suddenly his eyes cleared, rushing back to fully here-and-now, and he howled in anguish and slumped suddenly face-down to the table in exhaustion. The tawny Alpha trembled in his seat, almost fainting under a sudden rush to his head, then his head snapped back up to his opponent's, black eyes flashing.

"He can have it for now. But he can't deal with it all," Mac growled angrily at his brother-in-law, propping his elbows on the table and picking up his tumbler to gulp some of the golden liquid.

"Nor can you," bit back the wolf physician sharply, and pulled out Gemma's seat for himself. "You have no choice in this."

"You want it?" Mac said viciously. "After all this time?"

"You know what I want," Will snapped back. Then he sighed, and added on a softer, pained note, "What Rebecca wants. We all want."

There was a short, pungent silence. Then Mac sighed slowly in release and pushed his half-empty glass along the table-top to his brother-in-law. Will took a deep swallow, relaxing in turn with a sigh. The two Alphas sat together in an echoing, seething silence for a moment.

Then Mac's sighed for a second time, sounding very tired, and his eyes were dull, opaque pools again when they lifted and landed on the shocked, uncomprehending face of his mate, standing wavering in the doorway.

"Could you give us a bit of privacy, Gemma?" he asked softly, rubbing a tired palm across his forehead.

William Bancroft had unearthed a small glass tube from one of the pockets of the once smart jacket, now split across his broad, furry shoulders and hanging askew around his torso. He unscrewed the small cap and deftly tilted the open end against the tip of one index finger, then the other, so that a round, golden drop of glutinous liquid quivered on each. He carefully lifted them to massage the ointment gently into his Alpha's temples.

Eyes closed tight and shoulders shuddering with jolts of releasing tension, Mac sighed a third long, deep sigh of release.

"Sure," whispered Gemma, heart aching in fiery pain. "Whatever you need."

And she stepped back and paced quietly off toward the stairs down to her basement, heart sinking, and also surging in anger.

Will could help him.

Her lips twitched, the anger smothered briefly under the rich irony. Typical.

A wereem finally manages to synthesize a very complex drug, keyed to her mate, so that he can hopefully order her to do whatever he wishes without her going insane (temporarily at least), and what does he say? Go away.

HAH!

Her lips were smiling, humour rising over the tingle of anger humming through her. And triumph.

She had no choice about walking out of earshot, it was like an order, but less irritating. The control drug was working.

Gemma tripped tiredly down to the lab, and turned on the radio, looking up at the clock to work out how much longer the drug was likely to have an effect. It must be about at the limit of its duration by this time anyway, her head was already clearing of the stuffy fuzziness, the bonds with her pack reaffirming in her mind. That had been unnerving, when she'd nervously injected herself in the bathroom while he approached up the road. By the time he had made it to the kitchen, it had felt as though she was wearing a weird, muffling set of earplugs, blocking out the sense of the Whites who had sworn to her. But intensifying the sense of Mac.

He could have ordered her to do anything.

Bit of an anti-climax.

Her stomach was doing little somersaults, however.

It had worked.

Gemma sat chewing her lip as she pondered how to get it to work properly, long term. Upping the dose didn't make it last longer, or become more intense, it just made her vomit - she'd tried the muffling drug without the key of Mac's pheromones many times before combining the two.

In some ways she was glad it was wearing off now, before Mac noticed. Telling Mr Overprotective that she'd been testing drugs on herself - well, that might have become a bit of a tricky conversation. Which is why she hadn't told anyone else either, you couldn't trust the Whites to keep a secret from their Alpha. They were all such sycophantic Mac worshipers around here. Including herself.

A little smile was playing over her lips.

Her brain twitched to a new thought.

More important than finding how to synthesise it properly, she should now just concentrate on working out a way of switching it off, so that he wouldn't have to exhaust himself quite so much intercepting and fighting to a standstill all of the ex-Greys. One small injection and they'd be able to think freely for themselves again, at least for a little while.

Despite the internal grump, and the worry about what Will had come for, the wereem had a bubble of suffocating pride lodged in her chest. But dammit, she couldn't tell Mac without also incriminating herself. It would have been so nice to have had her turn being smug.

*

Gemma's thoughts were still making her turn restlessly in the wide bed that night, half-awake. She always found it hard to sleep without her mate beside her, although with her guards in the house she was safe enough. Mac had left on retrieval somewhere straight after Will had departed; one of the White koiru had picked up a trail of a former packmate. Her mate hadn't mentioned what Will had come for.

Drowsy with sleep, her ears twitched to a low buzzing noise close beside her. Gemma's skin shocked tight with fear and she twisted over frantically, claws extended, pouncing before the sleep fully left her. She speared the bedside cabinet with her claws, one a millimetre from her mate's vibrating phone, and smothered an embarrassed laugh. Good job he hadn't seen that one.

Her heart twisted in sadness. He must've been exhausted to have forgotten it.

The light of the screen flashed again with an incoming call, and the phone buzzed as it tried to vibrate out of the cage of her fingers. Gemma was just about to sleepily switch it off when the name caught her eye and a flash of electricity shot through her, jolting her fully awake, sitting upright. She yanked her claws out of the wood, and stared at the handset, heart thundering.

This could be a trap too. She felt her hackles rise slightly, wolf quivering closer to the surface.

Hakan, she called silently, while she picked up the phone.

The door was already silently swinging open, frame silhouetting the bulk of the large wolf, when she pressed the answer button and hissed out angrily, quietly, "Nicolas Grey?"

"Gem? No, it's me - oh my god, thank god," Bethan's voice sobbed down the line.

Gemma felt her eyes flash lycan, the fur lengthening along her limbs. Bastard Grey - what the hell was he planning now, tormenting her with his hostages? Her voice was rasping hoarse with anger as she asked her human friend sharply, heart thundering, "Where are you?"

Bethan drew a shuddering breath, choked, and said, "I don't know." Gemma drooped, she hadn't really expected anything else, but the fire in her head grew. Then it was swamped in a feeling of astonished hope as her friend continued breathlessly, "Kate's driving - like a maniac. Away from that maniac. We have no idea where we are." Bethan choked on a second sob, drawing another deep, shaky breath, while Gemma demanded incredulously, "What happened?"

Had they escaped Grey?

"I don't know!" Bethan almost shouted at her, then drew another uneven breath and half-sobbed words began to tumble from her rapidly, "He - he said his name was Nicholas Grey, and you had something of his, that he wants back. He just - took us. From home. Drove endlessly around in this huge silent car of his, with us packed in the trunk, stopping only in the middle of nowhere - no-one ever heard us, and he would - torment us, if we made a sound, shut in." Bethan paused, the silence only broken by her hoarse, tearful breaths, then she added quietly, ashamed, "We stopped trying. Too afraid to."

"Oh, Bethan," Gemma murmured, her heart clenching in guilt and sorrow. Yes. She knew how scary Grey could be. Wished that Bethan and Kate had never found out. Her hackles rose further, anger heating along her skin.

"We were locked in that damn trunk nearly all the time, treated like cattle - sometimes he'd give us some water and bread, exercise us, sometimes he'd stop in some woods and let us pee. Once Kate tried to fight him, hit him with a branch, but it just broke, and he laughed, and slapped her so hard she fell over."

Bethan was crying. "He liked it, made her get up so that he could do it again. And again." She heaved another breath, before her hysterical gasps quietened.

Gemma bit her lip viciously to keep back the growl which rolled through her body, urging her furious internal wolf to just listen.

"Today he made us get out - stand on a bridge; a narrow old bridge over a big river. We were standing there for hours, freezing, not daring to say anything, call his attention because - he likes hurting people, Gemma, he - well, we knew. Sometimes he would just - examine us. Like we were cattle. Sexual cattle. Terrifying. He got off on our fear."

Gemma's skin was crawling, remembering her own terrified stasis while Nick had examined her, slowly undressing her beside her bed, and she fought to keep her simmering blood from boiling over.

Listen, she snarled the reminder at her internal wolf. They need us to work out a plan, to help. Not just fight. Wait.

Bethan gulped, and her voice began to rise again, terror deepening. The fear in her friend's voice cut through the muffling anger growing in the wereem's head and the simmering wolf within her subsided, quivering in tension.

"He was making hundreds of calls by the bridge, tracking something, ignoring us, ignoring us like we were nothing - and he'd got in and turned the engine back on to charge his phone when suddenly a man appeared, out for a run down toward the crossing. A big man. When he got closer, he slowed down, but Grey got out of the car and straightened up. The runner had started to turn away when Grey dragged us forward by the hair, stalking like he was some jungle cat and shouted, "I'll give you an exchange.""

Bethan was sobbing now, deeply, her voice a pained whine, "It was Gus. He - he recognised us just before we recognised him, and something seeming to flash in his eyes. He just came sprinting: unbelievable; so, so fast and -." She gulped on a sob, "The bastard waited then - just drew a gun and shot him." A shaky, gasped inhalation. "Four times." Another. "Point blank."

Gemma's skin ran cold, mind burning with fire, blood a sharp tang in her mouth when her teeth ground together through her bottom lip. Rage flooded her brain, but if Gus was gone - she knew how much Bethan needed her support, and she fired the reminder through the raging wolf within, forcing it to subside so that she could catch the soft, continuing words of her friend.

"Shot him dead," the choked voice gasped. "Gus sort of - bounced in the air, crumpled. I couldn't believe it - I just, it was so fast. I was just - choked up, staring."

"But not Kate," she added.

Through the bitter sobs, Bethan managed to whisper, "The bastard had let us go to fire, and he then stalked carefully towards the body, keeping the gun on it; I think he'd forgotten we were even there, we were so insignificant to him. He bent over and pulled some damn package from Gus's pocket - your packet that used to sit in our fridge, still sealed."

Bethan's voice had a little tinge of awed glee when she added, "And Kate rammed him with his own damn car." She giggled hysterically. "He'd left the motor running. Probably the kind of chauvinistic idiot who believes women can't drive. I wouldn't have dared."

Gemma couldn't help but choke her own broken gulp of laughter at the pride in Bethan's voice, glee rising above the fear and strain and sorrow, while she licked sealed her bottom lip.

"Yup, the bastard was knocked flying and dropped the damn package he'd killed Gus for, whatever he'd kidnapped us for, is after you for. Kate threw open the door for me and I grabbed the packet as I jumped in. She hit him a second time while we drove past him, he clung on to my door for a while, it was terrifying, looked like he was going to rip the car in two but Kate was awesome - she scraped him against a tree and we shook him off and now -."

Bethan giggled in desperate mirth again, then added on a frantic shriek, "What the hell is going on, Gem?"

Gemma became aware of the alert Alpha in her head as he pushed her silently to ask a damn insensitive question; she snapped back that she wanted to know how they were, more than where, but he cut her short, insisting that unless they could get that car on a highway, and up the speed, Grey would catch up.

Her spine tingling in sudden dread, Gemma withdrew all objections and meekly relayed the staccato volley of questions as they appeared in her head:

"Which side of the bridge are you on? Gus's side or the other?"

Startled at the suddenly brisk tone, Bethan said, "Gus's."

"Have you passed a crossroads?" Gemma could feel the meld on the edge of her mind - Mac was linked with someone outside, possibly several someones, while he directed her questions.

She heard Bethan questioning Kate, heard her other friend's voice in answer, hesitant, then, "Kate thinks we passed a crossroads a few minutes back."

"Good. At the next crossing, turn left. That'll take you to the highway, which will lead back over the river. You need to pick up speed, Bethan." Gemma realised as she said it that one of the other minds Mac was talking to was the Wolflord, she could feel the raw pulse of furious, grieving power battering unsheathed against him. Her heart sank further, and a last glimmer of hope died. If the Wolflord was that wrathful, then his grandson probably really was dead.

Her heart clenched in sorrow, anger surging, but she pushed the feeling aside. Now was not the time.

Bethan's breath caught, and her voice was a frightened whine as she asked, "You think he'll be after us?" Then she added, "Is Mac with you?"

"Mac's working out your route," Gemma assured her human friend.

"I thought they were Macish questions," choked Bethan, almost a smile in her voice, obviously not noticing how bizarre it was that Gemma's ex-flatmate knew where they were. Her mind was on other things, tone holding a hint of terror. "Is the bastard going to catch us?" she repeated. "We couldn't get a signal earlier, but we can call the cops if we know where we are now."

Gemma's voice was soft, trying to keep her internal doubts out of her voice as she repeated Mac's words aloud, "Mac has already called the cops for you, they're on their way." Which cops? she thought suspiciously. But the rest of the explanation in her head was not a lie: "That maniac has developed a very nasty biological weapon, which Mac inadvertently picked up when he was looking for something else." True.

She wished she didn't have to say this next bit.

Better warned and wary than reassured and dead, her mate conveyed starkly.

"Nick is very dangerous, Bethan, and very resourceful. Don't trust anything that is going to make you slow down; drive around, over, or through obstacles if you have to."

Gemma shivered in sympathy, hearing the shocked, frightened silence down the line.

However, there was a little smile in Bethan's voice as she replied, "No shit is Mac with you." Then her voice faded on a plaintive whisper, "This is so surreal."

Gemma's heart contracted. She knew the feeling. Not Kate and Bethan too.

A surge of the blackness of rage swelled again, but she cajoled the wolf within her - yes, she wanted to fight for her friends, but not now. Right now, the best thing she could do was stay on the phone and guide them, not drop into killing rage.

Wavering in stubborn disbelief, the wolf growled, the anger hardening again. Mac's voice in her head pushed it back, and she relayed his question, "You OK for fuel?"

Bethan repeated the query across to Kate, and a panicked babble of voices echoed down the line, "No!" called the girl desperately, "We're into the last quarter - the warning light is on and we have no idea how long we've got." She gulped, "We'll fill up."

Gemma could hear Mac swearing in her head, Not easily in that car they won't, and her spine curved at the sudden increase in power streaming from the connection, her anger subsiding as she suddenly had something to do. She could hear him firing orders off, while he sprinted somewhere. His voice was sharp as he barked more orders at her, and she was already leaping out of bed and yanking on clothes, hearing the urgency in his mind, and the panic in Bethan's voice.

Gemma. Hakan can't drive - very few wolves can drive, but drug up him, Erik and Xavi and take them with you. Your licence is in the top left-hand drawer in my studio workbench. Take your pills, our credit card, and move - Erik is hiring a car at the place on Western Avenue. Head Northwest out of the city, route 57. I will rendez-vous with you en route to them if I can. Bring a pill for me too.

"Bethan," said Gemma urgently into the phone, feeling her internal wolf surging in overenthusiastic eagerness at the thought of racing to the rescue. "Mac and I are coming to get you. Don't stop for fuel, for anything. Just keep going. You'll be OK, we can get out there before you run out, if you just keep moving. Stay on that highway."

"OK," gulped Bethan again, a scared whisper. "We're just turning onto the Interstate now."

"Good." Gemma replied.

Hakan had already disappeared from the doorway, and she could hear Erik downstairs on the landline. Xavi appeared on the landing with her licence in his hand, and they raced downstairs together.

Mac. I've not been outside without you since you brought me here. Not really, even on the run, Gemma conveyed worriedly. She could feel nervous adrenaline shivering through her veins and tried to rein herself back under control as Hakan came bounding up from the basement holding a small plastic bag of white powder; she hadn't had time to fill more capsules.

Unstable emotions were teeming through her, rocking her, and the wereem feared going outside, where all the unknowns could bombard her, invade her defences, ignite the already simmering rage.

You haven't been in a rage for almost a week, answered her mate, calmly. And you just reasoned your wolf into accepting the reasoned way to act. Think, picchu: what do you most want to do?

The answer fired from her heart. I want to help Bethan and Kate.

Then trust yourself, advised Mac softly. You can do this. And you won't be alone.

Gemma's heart stopped jumping quite so violently and her eyes cleared as she looked around at the three huge wolves pressed around her in the small corridor. She sighed, muttering, "That looks so dodgy," as she grabbed the small bag of white powder from her chief bodyguard and checked the labelling on it. She took the teaspoon Xavi handed to her and coughed over a dry mouthful, gulping down water from the bottle he also handed over while she instructed hoarsely, "Half a teaspoon."

Hakan took the bag and spoon from her and she heard him choking on the powder behind her as she started down the hallway, checking the licence Xavi had passed her. She glanced slightly incredulously at the accompanying shiny new gold credit card with M and G Macmillan on it as she loped to the door, hearing her other guards gagging slightly. She paused for a moment, not wanting her koiru to be seen on the street with that bag. No point tempting fate for a few seconds of extra time.

"We're just setting off," she said into the phone while Hakan carefully stowed the bag of powder and water bottle inside a small rucksack slung over his shoulder. "I'll have to ring off for a little while Bethan, but will ring you back as soon as we're out on the highway. Call if you need to."

"OK," murmured Bethan in reply, her voice shrinking. The line went dead. Gemma could feel her wolf within jumping close to the surface: alert, angry and simmering but prepared to hold back, to run and rescue. And the wolf part was so attuned to the seething readiness of her bodyguards ranged around her at her back that she could sense exactly where they were without looking, making her feel safer. She took a deep, calming breath and opened the door, exploding into action.

The four of them raced out onto the street and down toward the main road.