Silver Borne (Mercy Thompson #5)(46)
Author: Patricia Briggs

"Hey," I told him. "I love you."

He didn’t answer, but I didn’t need one – I knew how he felt. Only after I rolled painfully off the edge of the bed did it occur to me that Ben was missing. A glance out the window told me it was still morning, not early, but not late enough to make me feel like a slugabed either.

I limped stiffly to the bathroom. One hot shower later I could move again. And even if my clothes were on their second day – and smelled of blood and smoke and all – I felt ready to face the morning. After a little dithering, I put my shoulder holster back on.

I didn’t feel any urgent need to go armed – but I didn’t have anywhere to put the SIG out of harm’s way either. Adam probably had a gun safe around somewhere, but I didn’t know where it was. So I wore the shoulder harness under my T-shirt, which was loose enough to conceal it. I’d have a hard time drawing the gun, but that shouldn’t matter: it was loaded with lead bullets, and the house was full of werewolves. If I had to draw the gun, I was probably dead anyway.

On that cheery thought, I left the bedroom and shut the door quietly behind me. The lovely smell of sausage and butter pulled me into the kitchen.

Darryl was cooking.

Auriele grinned at my expression. "Sundays," she said with satisfaction, "he cooks, and I wash dishes. Mostly we end up here at Pack Central, and when Darryl cooks, everyone stops by. It’s a pretty big job."

The way werewolves eat, it certainly was. A big job that was one of those little things that pulled a pack together: Sunday breakfasts at Adam’s house.

"If you’re doing dishes while he cooks, does he do the dishes when you cook?" I asked.

"Nope," Darryl said, serving each of us a plate of sausage, eggs, hash browns, and French toast with a snap that looked awfully professional, and returned to the stove. "Not that enlightened."

She smiled at his back. "He vacuums, though." And Darryl made an irritated noise.

"Have you seen Ben?" I asked, then said, involuntarily, "This is really good." The French toast was spiked with real vanilla, cinnamon, and a host of other things, including authentic bitter-sweet maple syrup.

"Mmmm." Auriele nodded, taking a bite of her hash browns. "He cooked his way through grad school."

"Made good money at it, too," Darryl agreed. "Ben’s been down, eaten breakfast, and gone. He’ll be back soon. I called Zee last night."

I set down my fork. "What did he say?"

"Nothing, if you are going to let my good food go cold."

I took a hasty bite, and he went back to cooking – and talking. "I played last night’s ransom call back to him, and he picked me clean of everything you told us. Then he said he’d see what he could do. He called an hour or so ago and told me to tell you he’d be over here as soon as he could. It might be a couple of hours, though, so stall the villainess if she wants you to move before he gets here."

"How did he sound?"

"Grumpy. Coffee or orange juice?"

"Water is fine."

His eyebrows went up.

"Uh-oh," Auriele said, but she was smiling.

Darryl was not. "Are you implying that my coffee is not the best in four counties? Or my fresh-squeezed orange juice is less than perfect?"

Jesse breezed in and squealed. "Oh my goodness, Darryl is cooking. I’d almost forgotten it was Sunday. Orange juice, please." She glanced at me and laughed. "Mercy doesn’t do orange juice or coffee," she said, grabbing a glass out of the cupboard and filling it out of the pitcher Darryl had set out. "So sad. More orange juice for me."

She was being cute and upbeat, but there were dark circles under her eyes. She took the plate Darryl handed her and sat down next to Auriele.

"So," she said. Her pink hair helped her cheerful act – hard to look sad with pink hair – even if her eyes were a little pink, too.

"How are we going to save Gabriel?"

"Have you ever noticed that everyone who knows Mercy eventually needs saving?" asked Mary Jo as she walked into the kitchen.

I was going to have to do something about Mary Jo. I took another bite of French toast and put the fork down on the plate. Sooner was probably better than later.

I stood up. "Excuse me," I said to Darryl. To Jesse I said, "I’m borrowing your bedroom – any complaints?"

She stared at me a moment. "No?" she said, her voice rising as if her answer were a question. Which maybe it was.

"Your stereo is pretty effective at keeping voices from being overheard by all the werewolves in this house. And from the noise coming from downstairs, there are a lot of werewolves here."

"It’s Darryl’s cooking," said Auriele, sounding a little apologetic.

"I can see why," I said. "I’d appreciate it if you would guard my plate until I come back." I looked at Mary Jo. "You. Come with me."

And without looking behind me, I led the way up the stairs to Jesse’s room. I walked into Jesse’s room and turned on her stereo until it was almost painfully loud. The CD wasn’t something I’d have chosen to listen to, but it was loud, and that was all I was interested in.

"Shut the door," I told Mary Jo. I was almost surprised she’d just followed me up as I’d asked.

Face blank, she did as I’d requested.

"Okay. Now, if you come over here by the window, it’s almost impossible for anyone to overhear us."

All the precautions weren’t really necessary. With this many people in Adam’s house, no one, no matter how good their hearing was, could really listen from one room to the next – there were simply too many conversations going on. But the stereo made our privacy virtually certain.

"What do you want?" she asked, not moving from the center of the room.

I leaned against the wall next to the window and crossed my arms over my stomach. It felt wrong to be in this position. I’ve been a solitary person my whole life. Even when I lived in Aspen Creek with the Marrok’s pack, even then I’d really been alone, a coyote among wolves. But Adam needed his pack behind him – and because of me, they weren’t. If I was going to be the problem, I owed it to him to be part of the solution. So I was going to see if all those times I watched the Marrok twist people in little knots would allow me to use his techniques to achieve the same results.

I smiled at her. "I want you to tell me what your problem with me is. Right here, right now, where there is no one else to interfere."

"You are the problem, Mercedes," she snapped. "A scavenger coyote among wolves. You don’t belong here."

"Oh, come on. You can do better than that," I goaded her. "You sound like you’re Jesse’s age – and Jesse doesn’t sound like that."