The collective eye of the pack focused on me. Emmitt’s hand lightly squeezed mine as I struggled not to squirm under the sudden attention.
“All challenges will end now,” Thomas said. “Not only is this a command from me—”
“It’s from me as well,” Nana Wini said from the back of the room.
There was a minute shuffling in the crowd then everything stilled.
“Just as we count Charlene as one of our own, we now count Michelle.” Thomas glanced at me and gave me a warm smile. “Michelle has brought two cubs with her.”
Cubs?
“They are under pack protection, but I am looking for a Mated pair to protect them as their own, to put the safety of the cubs above the safety of the pack.” There was a slight murmur at this.
“I’ll keep them as my own,” Mary said from beside me.
“We will,” Gregory agreed.
Thomas nodded to Gregory. As if it were a sign, people started to leave. Many of them looked back to study me before they quit the room, and I wondered what they were thinking. I wasn’t even sure what I was thinking. The six of us stayed where we were.
“I’m sorry about that, Michelle,” Charlene said. “We needed to lay down the law right away so you wouldn’t run into any trouble.”
“And my brothers?”
“That’s what Mary and Gregory are for. While you’re here, they will be an extra layer of protection. Mary and Gregory will always be close by, and if you need to leave your brothers for any reason, they will step in while you are gone, protecting Liam and Aden even more ferociously than you could. They were guardians for Jim and Emmitt while they were growing up.”
It touched me that they already knew Liam and Aden’s names. But I wasn’t sure I could trust complete strangers to watch over my brothers, even knowing they were friends of Emmitt’s for a very long time.
Charlene must have sensed my hesitancy. “Nana Wini also spoke a command to the room. No one will harm them.”
I wasn’t about to mention Nana Wini’s word didn’t seem to work too well if Nana hadn’t already mentioned it.
“Now that that’s settled, we are hoping you will discuss your past with us. We want to help you,” Charlene said.
I gave a slow nod, not knowing what more I could share other than Richard’s address. I didn’t think the address would do much good. I highly doubted Blake would be sitting at the house with all the news coverage I saw online.
Charlene motioned for Thomas to lead the way. Emmitt’s thumb smoothed over the side of my hand as we followed. His touch momentarily distracted me from my thoughts.
Thomas opened the door to a small, windowless room. Its sole furnishing was a battered rectangle dining table, surrounded by mismatched chairs. Nana Wini and another man I’d never met already sat at the table. Everyone moved to join them.
“Michelle, this is Elder Sam,” Emmitt said as he held out a chair for me.
I recognized the name of Nana’s stock market friend and said a quiet hello as I sat. Sam nodded in greeting but remained silent. He looked just as I imagined him; aged, but not stooped, with neat, grey hair and kind brown eyes.
Emmitt took a seat beside me. “This room has been soundproofed, so we won’t be overheard.”
Charlene nodded. “Nana Wini told us the Forlorn ignored her command to leave. That is cause for concern. But I’m more concerned about the things you said on the way here.”
I gave Emmitt a sidelong glance.
“You shouldn’t need to live in fear,” Charlene said. “I’ve seen these people do amazing things. Let’s face this together. But in order to do that, we need to know everything you know about those men. Do you have any idea why they could ignore an Elder?”
I wanted to laugh. “How could I possibly know anything like that? I’ve known about werewolves less than a month.”
“Emmitt mentioned you thought Blake was one of us. You were near him for more than four years. Tell us about him,” she said.
Did I know something I hadn’t yet realized? I thought back to the beginning, scrutinizing everything I could remember. Sure, it had been Blake who was responsible for my prison, but he hadn’t been there most of the time, just at the dinners and infrequent visits to confer with David or Richard. There wasn’t much else.
They remained silent, patiently waiting.
“I don’t know what you’re looking for,” I said finally. “I thought Blake was just like everyone else. Human. But, he was mean. He’d come over and ask me about my premonitions. He sometimes asked if I saw anything other than market tips. I always wished I did see something more. But it wasn’t until…”
It wasn’t until I met Emmitt that they’d changed. With that thought, I realized Blake had known that my premonitions would evolve. It explained why he kept asking; he’d been waiting for my answer to change.
I looked down at the table in shock. Was that why he’d brought his men over?
His men. The thought stuck in my head and pieces fell into place.
“No. You’re wrong,” I said looking up at Nana Wini, yet still lost in my own thoughts.
“About what, dear?”
“Pack leaders control the pack. Elders keep the peace between the packs through the pack leaders,” I said slowly, reasoning it out. “Yet, there are some of your kind you have trouble communicating with.” My thoughts felt right, but the implications scared me. “Before the night he shifted, I thought Blake’s control over the men he brought with him was just a businessman’s hold over his lackeys. But that night, it was more. I think he’s their leader. A pack leader. Those were his men. I think Blake is different. You can’t communicate with him, and because of that, his men. They are their own pack. A large pack.
“Many of his men commented on my smell. No, not smell. Scent. I never understood what they meant.” I looked at Emmitt. “I believe Blake brought those men over because he knew my premonitions would change when I met the right werewolf. They changed after I met you.”
Emmitt’s lips twitched, and the look in his eyes grew warm. Before I blushed, I turned my focus on the other members of our group.
“Now, I’ve seen actual people in my premonitions, not just stock tips. I think Blake meant to unlock that new piece of my gift. He knows more than we think, not only about my gift, but about why Elders can’t communicate with everyone like they should.”
The room remained quiet.
“I think you’re right,” Thomas said finally. “He does sound like he knows more.” He looked at Sam and Nana Wini. “But, is it worth the risk to find out what he knows when we have no way of controlling him?”
Sam and Nana Wini shared a glance.
“These gifted women are rare,” Sam said.
Huh? What gifted women? I glanced at Emmitt, confused, but Sam kept speaking.
“And we have yet to determine why these gifted women are compatible with us. Are they gifted because they are compatible or are they compatible because they are gifted? Are there other human women out there who are compatible but not gifted? There’s so much we don’t know. Charlene, your gift has never been clear to you; and with Gabby less than a month away from leaving for college, I think we need to find out what Blake knows.”
“Gifted?” I said to Charlene then swiveled toward Sam. “Who’s Gabby?”
Sam reached into his pocket and removed his wallet as Charlene answered my first question.
“So far, the humans who are compatible with werewolves are gifted.” When I looked at her speculatively, she said, “Yeah, I can manipulate people’s minds, plant thoughts in there, and make them do what I want.”
The idea of that scared me, but no one else in the room seemed too bothered by it.
“I learned at an early age what I could do wasn’t a good thing and started to fear people would come take me away because of it. So I ran and ended up here.”
Though her gift concerned me, it also gave me comfort because now I knew I wasn’t alone. Maybe she knew why my gift had suddenly changed.
“Did anything happen to your ability when you met Thomas?” I asked, absently accepting the picture Sam had plucked from his wallet.
If my suspicions were right, her ability would have changed when she met her Mate. But, without knowing exactly what these strange abilities were for or where they stemmed from, it was hard to say if my theory was right or not.
“No,” she said, disappointing me. “But when I Claimed him, he changed.” She looked at Thomas, and he nodded as if encouraging her to continue. “A pack leader can only hold together a pack size equal to his mental strength. His command needs to encompass the entire group. When it can’t, the members see weakness and leave. So by nature, the pack size remains equal to the power of the alpha. Once I Claimed Thomas, his capacity to control more members grew. Even now, we could welcome more members if they wanted to join us.”
So Charlene’s gift hadn’t changed, but Thomas had. Why after the Claiming? Could it be that her ability had changed before that, but she hadn’t noticed? Did this mean when… if… I Claimed Emmitt, my gift could change again?
Stumped, I finally looked down at the picture in my hand. I felt the same sense of recognition as I had when I first saw Charlene’s picture, but this time I had an explanation for it.
“This is the girl from my first vision. She was studying. College texts, I think. One of you was lying beside her. A huge dog with a long, shaggy brown coat. I saw her petting him.” I looked up and saw Sam’s surprised expression. “Did I say something wrong?”
“No, no. It’s just… she tolerates coming here but doesn’t really have a fondness for any of us.”
I wasn’t wrong in what I’d seen. “I guess we just have to see what comes to pass. Maybe it was just a picture of a possibility.” I passed the photo back to him.
Sam stared down at the picture in his hand, a slight smile on his lips. The girl in the picture might not have a fondness for them, but Sam definitely had affection for her.
“Do you know of a way to reach Blake?” Thomas asked.
I started to shake my head no but then paused. “There’s a lawyer who seems to be in contact with him.”
“A lawyer?” Thomas said.
“Before I ran, my stepfather left me an envelope filled with documents and stuff, including a number for a lawyer. I looked the lawyer up online and sent him an email. He replied right away, asking for a meeting to read Richard’s will. But he mentioned Blake too, so I never responded.”
“Perhaps we could work through the lawyer,” Charlene said, hope buoying her words.
“If the Elders can’t communicate with him, the only chance we have to get the answers we want is face to face,” Thomas said. “Not through a lawyer.”
Sam nodded in agreement but looked troubled.
They were right. I doubted Blake would respond willingly to a phone call, email, or third party. If we wanted answers, Blake would need to be confronted face to face like Thomas said. And, I realized, I would have to do it. He had no reason to acknowledge anyone else in the room.
Ice formed in my limbs.
“I need to go back.”