Primal Bonds

Andrea switched her gaze to Wade. Wade didn’t have anywhere near the presence of Sean, but he was the dominant Lupine in the room, and it was clear that he didn’t think much of Jared.

“Why did you let him come here?” Andrea asked Wade.

Wade shrugged, pretending indifference. “You are of my pack so it was natural for him to come to me about you.”

“She’s no longer of your pack,” Sean said. “She’s in our pride now. Or were you forgetting?”

Sean didn’t even have to raise his voice. The simple syllables in his Irish lilt spoke of danger lurking below the surface. The fear scent in the room rose sharply, and sweat formed on Wade’s upper lip.

Wade brought his fingertips together in a nervous gesture. “That’s a little tricky. Andrea is still not quite in your pride. You’ve only been blessed under the sun, and one more mate blessing is needed. Technically she’s got one foot in both camps, and on that technicality, Jared can make his request.”

“What request?” Andrea demanded.

“A challenge,” Jared said. He couldn’t meet Sean’s gaze or Andrea’s, so he looked at Wade. “Witness that I challenge Sean Morrissey of the South Texas clan for the mate Andrea Gray. Or, I should say, I accept his challenge, since I made the mate-claim first.”

“Done,” Sean said before Andrea could speak. He took Andrea’s hand, and Andrea felt his rage matching her own. “Wade, set up the time and place. Andrea and I have things to do.”

“It’s ten feet under the trees, Ronan,” Andrea argued. “You can walk next to me the whole time. Or behind me, whatever you want.”

“That’s where the Fae appeared,” Ronan said, his dark eyes narrowing. Seven feet tall and full of muscle, Ronan still had to flick his gaze aside when Andrea pried him with hers.

“I know that,” Andrea said. “I want to talk to him. I have some questions to ask him.”

“Oh, come on, Andrea. Sean will kill me.”

Sean had escorted Andrea back to the Morrisseys’ house to leave her under the protection of Ronan while he, Eric, Dylan, and Liam joined the hunt for Glory. Andrea wasn’t thrilled by Sean’s easy acceptance of Jared’s challenge, but more because she worried about Jared trying something treacherous than Sean’s ability to defeat him. That Jared thought he had the right to challenge, and that Wade agreed with him, made her taste rage.

“Kick his ass, Sean,” Andrea had told him before Sean left. Sean had smiled, said, “That’s my girl,” and kissed her.

Now Andrea faced Ronan. “Sean wants you to protect me from Jared. And so do I. Fionn is my father, he’s not going to harm me, and I need to ask him some serious questions. Now hurry, before everyone gets back.”

The problem with leaving Ronan as a protector was that, while few could best him physically, Ronan was not as dominant as Sean and Liam. Andrea might find it a challenge to get her own way with the Morrisseys, but Ronan only groaned at her demands.

“Ten feet,” Ronan growled.

“I promise.”

Ronan held up his hands. “All right. All right. We’ll walk out there. You’ll talk to your dad. Then right back inside.”

Andrea patted his shoulder. “You’re a sweetie, Ronan.”

Ronan marched so close to Andrea as they crossed the yard that their bodies touched. Andrea felt him quivering hard with fighting instinct.

Andrea stopped at the weak spot on the ley line, her skin tingling as she neared it.“Father,” she called.

The air split, and a pale, cold light touched her. Fionn Cillian stood tall and strong in the shimmering entrance to Faerie.

Andrea held out her hands. “I need you. Can I talk to you?”

Fionn smiled, his warrior face filled with triumph. He caught Andrea’s hands in his, ignored Ronan’s cry of surprise and outrage, and tugged Andrea, alone, into Faerie.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Sean checked Glory’s usual haunts and turned up little. Glory was more adventurous than most Shifters, liking to hang out in human bars and dare the patrons to make something of it. No one could mistake six-foot-tall Glory for anything but a Shifter, but she enjoyed letting humans be fascinated by her.

In a bar way out on the west side of town, Sean finally found a trace of her. Glory had told him about this place a few years ago, though Sean had never taken her up on her offer to visit it. It was closed this early in the day, but Sean didn’t need to go inside to catch Glory’s scent.

The scent was strongest at the field beyond the parking lot, where asphalt crumbled into waist-high weeds. No cars lingered in the lot, including Glory’s, but here, he smelled blood. Not much—someone had cleaned it up, and he couldn’t smell who under the stench of blood. But he knew the blood was Glory’s.

Sean stood up, heart thumping, pulled out his cell phone, and called his father.

Faerie wasn’t what Andrea had expected. Instead of shimmering mountains of ice or trees of silver, she saw ordinary-looking trees stretching up to gray sky, the muddy ground laced with ferns and other undergrowth.

On second glance, the trees weren’t ordinary. They were a species she’d never seen, with dark green needles, somewhat like pine, but the trees were studded with bloodred berries. Fallen berries littered the forest floor, scarlet juices staining the mud where the berries had burst. Behind Andrea, the rent in the fabric between the worlds snicked shut. She searched the air but found no sign of the bright light that marked the doorway.