“Whitney said that Mikel couldn’t see me either. None of the skinwalkers can see me in the eyes of the others,” Cassie explained. “I don’t know why, maybe a night human thing. Don’t ask me. I’m new to all of this.”
Jared reluctantly nodded. After he had nodded back, Ryder turned to go across the hallway to his room, and Jared shut the door behind him.
“I guess I get to meet your dad … rather, see him again after many years,” Cassie added. She had seen enough of him in Jared’s memory to not really want to meet him again, but it wasn’t like they could say no. He was now the alpha of the wendigo. She had to assume he had the same power as Nate’s dad.
“I’d rather not, but you get it.” Jared didn’t look too enthusiastic about it.
“When do we have to go?” Cassie asked. She was comfortable where she was but had the feeling you didn’t keep an alpha waiting.
Jared glanced back at his clock on his desk. “I’d say we have maybe five or ten minutes.”
Cassie nodded and stood. “I’ll go get Nate.”
Jared’s eyes grew wide. “I don’t think my father wants to see him now, or maybe even ever.”
‘And I don’t think I’ll ever leave you alone with two wendigo alphas,’ Nate said in her mind.
He was awake and walking into her thoughts as easily as she just remembered her memories.
‘How long have you been up?’ Cassie wondered how much Nate had heard of what she and Jared had shared.
‘Since the other wendigo came back,’ Nate replied.
Cassie heard him walking noisily down the stairs, so she sat back down.
“I don’t think you get in choice in him coming.” Cassie shrugged when Nate came into the room. The tiger was almost as large as the futon Cassie was sitting on. Heck, maybe even a bit bigger.
Jared stared at Nate. Nate glared back at him with his tiger eyes, willing Jared to challenge him.
Jared gave a shrug. “Your funeral.”
‘Ask him if he trusts his dad to not do something to you, one-hundred-percent trusts him.’
Cassie looked at Jared. “Do you trust your father completely to not do something to me?”
Jared paused. He was debating with himself. “I guess.”
‘See. That’s why I’m coming with. If he trusted him, he would have answered right away.’
Nate was right, but Cassie didn’t need to tell him that. From what she had seen, she didn’t trust Jared’s father. Nate coming with them might upset him, but she would feel safer. Jared was a wendigo beneath his father. He would have to follow any command, and Cassie wasn’t sure that Ben was exactly stable. He could outright order Jared to kill her, and she’d have no way to defend herself. Yes, Nate had to come with them.
“You guys agreed to a truce, right?” Cassie asked, looking first at Jared and then tiger Nate. Both nodded to Cassie. “Then get along well enough to keep that truce. If it’s safer for Nate to stay here, then he will. But if not, he comes.”
‘I will not,’ Nate protested mentally, but Cassie ignored him. She needed Jared to make choices and not force his hand. She needed Jared and Nate to be friends again. Their life worked much better that way.
Jared thought for a moment, and Cassie didn’t need to read his mind to know that she made sense.
“Fine. I don’t trust my dad,” Jared remarked.
That was an understatement. He was the one who turned Jared into a monster instead of the beautiful black jaguar he really was supposed to be. He’s the one who caught him and let Jack skin him. He was the one looking for vengeance above all else. If his dad, for any moment, had cared about him, he would have never taken Jared’s totem or his future away from him.
Jared walked to the doorway and opened his room door.
“Then follow me,” he said as he led the way out.
Cassie paused. She didn’t really want to leave the safe barrier of the room. Stopping, Jared turned back to Cassie and offered her his hand.
“I won’t let him hurt you,” Jared promised her.
‘Neither will I. No matter if you have his mark on you or not. I found you first. You are my mate, and I’ll protect you forever,’ Nate added. ‘Take his hand and pretend to play your part. I don’t know what Ben is planning, but we need to tread carefully with him. He’s very smart and cunning. Always has been. We’ve had several run-ins with him over the past few years. We need to play this cautiously.’
Cassie turned back to Nate and touched his head. She smiled as she looked at him now with all her memories intact. Jared had always defended her as best he could, but he was a bit smaller than Nate. When it came to a fight, Nate was the one who made sure Cassie never got hurt. They didn’t have all the past she remembered, and Nate still didn’t seem to remember it, but Cassie did. Nate’s personality was one that protected people. It was a risk to leave the room, but she trusted him. He would keep her safe, and in the life she should have had, he always kept his word on that.
Reaching through the spell, she took Jared’s hand. She didn’t need to read his mind to see his jealousy, but that was nothing new. That had been their lives since they were little. Nate was jealous of Jared, and Jared jealous of Nate. Each one wanted what the other had, and nothing was going to change that … well, at least, Cassie thought nothing would. Now she saw the weird truth. They both had what each other wanted. Jared was now next in line to be alpha, and so was Nate. They always said they both couldn’t be alpha. The joke was on them.
Swiftly, Jared led the way back through the house and turned down a hallway Ryder hadn’t shown Cassie. She wondered where they were going, but she kept quiet as Nate padded along beside her. It didn’t take long to make it to the doorway of where they must have been going, because Jared stopped at the closed door. He looked at Cassie and then to Nate. The guys locked eyes and nodded.
Jared pushed open the doorway with his free hand and took Cassie into a large dining room. It was out of place. The whole house was normal and cozy, maybe a few thousand square feet at the most. The dining room, though, was easily the size of the rest of the house. It was more of a banquet show-off room than anything. Right now the room had one long table in it that could have seated over twenty people. High backed, ornately carved chairs lined both sides with an even larger chair poised at the end. It was occupied by a man who was so large that it looked like he had to squeeze into a chair that both Cassie and Whitney could have sat in at the same time.
Ben Colley glanced up from his food as they entered. His light blue eyes watched them and turned to a glare as Nate came in the room. He did his best to hide it, but Cassie saw it.
“Glad to see your brother gave you the message,” Ben said as they came closer.
Jared nodded as Cassie saw that the table had two more settings at it, across from each other and on each side of his father. Jared walked over to the nearest chair and pulled out the one next to it and further from his father. He nodded to Cassie, and she sat in it. Jared then pulled out his own chair and pushed his plate and cup down for Cassie, keeping her away from his father. Jared reached across the table and took the second set of dishes for his own place.
Ben watched his son and then began laughing. Normally, Cassie liked to hear people laugh, but not the blond man at the end of the table. Something about his laugh gave her goose bumps. Maybe it wasn’t even his laugh. It was him in general. He might have been smiling and laughing, but there was no happiness in him. His eyes told everything, and Cassie didn’t need more than the glance she got. She kept her focus on the plate of food before her. Ben Colley was evil and not just a little bit. Everyone had some evil in them. No one was just good or bad. But he was as close to all bad as one could get.
“Ahh, dear Son, why don’t you let me and your mate get to know each other a little better?” Ben said, casually motioning to the seat next to him.
“You have a little problem with witches, Father, and I feel better with her on this side of me,” Jared replied, not even playing i
nto the pretending.
Ben smiled. “I can’t help it if witch blood tastes good.”
Jared looked up at his father, and his father smiled back at him. There was no love between the two of them.
“You’ll find out soon enough, Son. For your sake, hopefully, you won’t suck her dry.” Ben reached down and took a large piece of steak and shoved it in his mouth.
Nate growled at Ben, and he laughed again.
“Cute pet. I hope it’s house broken.” Ben grinned with a mouthful of food.
Cassie looked at the food before her, and her appetite was gone. It had actually faded the moment she walked into the room, but his talk of bleeding her dry was enough to make any lingering bit of hunger disappear.
Jared turned to her and mouthed the words ‘I’m sorry’. Her hands were still at her side, and he reached for the closest one.
“Do show,” Ben commanded. “I had a hard time believing Ryder when his mind was completely blank of any images of your mate. I had to think it was another imaginary friend he was talking about.”
Jared ground his teeth as he lifted up Cassie’s marked hand to show his father. As soon as his father could see it, Jared dropped their hands back beneath the table.
“Miss Cassandra, you will have to forgive my son and his rudeness. He hates to be ordered around, but until he can show he’s stronger than me, I have to remind him from time to time.” Ben kept eating, but now Jared wasn’t picking up his own fork.
Ben paused shoveling the food into his mouth for long enough to finally notice that both Cassie and Jared were just sitting there.
“Eat this well-cooked food,” he ordered again.
Jared’s hand shook as he picked up his fork. Cassie didn’t move. She had no appetite. Ben raised an eye at her as she sat there staring at her plate.
‘Cassie, eat something before he realizes you don’t have to follow his orders,’ Nate told her through their bond.
‘What?’ Cassie asked. She wasn’t a wendigo. Alpha status didn’t matter to her.
‘As Jared’s mate, you have to follow his alpha just like him. If you don’t, it proves you are stronger than him. As soon as he figures that out, there’s going to be a fight to get out of here,’ Nate explained just as quickly as before.
Cassie was still learning the basics of everything, but she trusted Nate. And what he said made sense. There was no argument in her. Getting out alive sounded like the best plan. She’d keep her questions for later.
She shakily reached for her fork, dropping Jared’s hand in the process. Jared didn’t look over at her as he chewed the piece of food in his mouth very slowly. Each bite seemed to brew more anger in him toward his father. They were now locked in a staring match. Cassie raised a piece of the food to her mouth, but she still didn’t want to eat it. It got closer, and she could feel the sprinkling of magic on it.
‘It’s laced with magic,’ Cassie said to Nate. He jumped up, and with a swipe of his paw hit the food to the ground, splattering it everywhere and knocking Jared’s food over in the process.
Jared stopped his chewing and stared at the mess.
Ben smiled at the mess. “Part bloodhound I see.”
Cassie looked back at Nate. He was still sitting behind her with his lips raised and a low growl in his throat. Jared spit his food out.
“First rule of witchcraft,” Cassie said quietly as Jared looked at her, “never eat anything that has magic on it.”
With the food all on the floor, Ben’s order faded. Jared turned back to his father.
“What are you trying to do to us now?”
Ben shrugged. “I figured a love potion couldn’t hurt anything.”
Jared continued to glare at his father. “She has my mark,” Jared replied.
“And his didn’t go away,” Ben observed.
Cassie reached up and rubbed her neck. She hadn’t pulled her hair up and had no clue how Ben knew that.
“I figure it’s a race to bond to her, and since you insist on falling in love, a little magic would be needed,” Ben explained, like it was obvious.
“I don’t need magic, Father. She has all her memories back,” Jared told him.
Ben smiled, and this was the first time Cassie thought it might actually be genuine.
“That makes things a bit easier for you. We’ll do the ceremony tonight to bond you to her.”
“That’s too soon,” Jared complained.
His father silenced him with one look. “Tonight you’ll join my ranks as my second-in-command, one way or another. Bond to her if that’s what you want, or we kill her and her tiger. Choice is yours.”
Ben nodded to Jared as if dismissing him. Rising, Jared took Cassie’s hand to lead her away.
Cassie glanced back as they neared the doorway. Ben was sitting there, still smiling at them.
“And, Son, you’d do best to remember this is an order. You bind, or you kill her. It will be a celebration tonight. We can celebrate your first tasting of witch blood. I promise you, Son, you’ll never steal blood from the hospital again.” Ben raised a glass full of dark red liquid to them as Jared pulled Cassie away.
Cassie was more than happy to pass the barrier back into Jared’s room. Dinner wasn’t exactly inviting, and she felt more and more unsafe with the alpha wendigo as they sat there. Ben was creepy, and by how he was talking she got the feeling that he would prefer Jared kill her instead of bonding with her. Cassie sure didn’t feel safe anywhere.
“Sorry about my dad,” Jared apologized as he dropped her hand and went over to a mini-fridge beneath his desk. He pulled out several sandwiches.
“Stocked up?” Cassie asked, sitting down on the futon and hoping her nerves would settle. Nate sat down right next to her feet and laid his head on the seat next to her, keeping Jared from sitting down beside her.
“Most of the meals with me and my father end that way. Thanks for keeping us from eating that.” Jared nodded to Nate, then placed all the food on the table in front of Cassie.
Cassie reached for a sandwich and opened it, but Nate leaned forward and licked it quickly before it could go to her mouth.
“Ew,” she complained and handed him the food. Tiger Nate swallowed it down in one bite. “If you wanted one, you could just tell me.”
Tiger Nate grinned at her and flipped his tail on the rest of the sandwiches.
Jared unwrapped one and sat at his desk in the chair backward to face them. She handed another sandwich to Nate before grabbing one for herself.
Cassie ate in silence as she thought. They were being backed into a corner with the whole bind or be killed stuff from Ben. She knew it was impossible for her to bind to someone if she were already bonded, but no one knew that was the case. They all thought Nate was just picked as her mate and wasn’t really her mate yet.
‘We have to tell him,’ Cassie told Nate as he woofed down yet another sandwich.
‘I was thinking the same thing,’ Nate replied.
‘Did you finally get your memories back?’ Cassie asked.
‘No, but if you trust him, then I have to.’
“So the whole binding thing …” Cassie began.
Jared stared at her, waiting for her to say more. She looked at Nate and then at the food.
“Nate and I are already bonded,” Cassie spat out as fast as she could.
Cassie didn’t want to look up and see Jared’s face. He would be mad and maybe even a little sad. She waited for a second to see if the mating bond with him would tell her how he felt. Nothing came across. She couldn’t help it. She glanced up, and she immediately felt bad. She had all the memories of their past now and what their future might have been. She knew exactly what Jared was feeling. He was crushed. She had to explain.
“When Jack made me make the potion, I didn’t tell you guys that the secret ingredient to it was my blood. One of the wendigo had attacked me the day before, and Nate had used his blood to heal me. When I was forced to prove the potion, I had to add my blood to it a
nd ended up bonded to Nate. It wasn’t intentional, and no one knows. My aunt put a covering spell on it to keep it hidden. Now I don’t know what we can do about tonight because you can’t defy what your dad orders you to do.” Cassie spoke quickly, but it wasn’t like she had to be slow. Both the guys had super hearing.
“No one can defy my dad,” Jared replied quietly, not even commenting about the bonding.
“I can, but that doesn’t do us any good,” Cassie added.
“Cas, why did you bind to him?” Jared asked, and Nate growled. Jared was more sad than angry with Cassie, but as he looked at Nate, the anger flashed behind his eyes again.
“I didn’t want to, and he wasn’t going to make me do it. He already told the coven no when they tried to do it after I got hurt.” Cassie thought back to just days before Nate told the leader of the coven that he wouldn’t do it. And Cassie remembered the words she heard back. “Shoot.”
“What?” Jared asked at the same time as Nate.
‘What?’
Cassie laughed. It wasn’t that it was funny, and she wasn’t happy. She just didn’t know how else to respond. Her life just kept getting worse by the moment.
“When Nate didn’t bind to me in front of the coven, he made them a promise. If I ended up bonding to the wendigo, then it’s his job to hunt me down and kill me. Now your father says if I don’t bond to you, you will have to kill me. Either way, one of you has to kill me. Life sucks. This whole night human world crap is the worst, but this is just icing on the cake.” Cassie shook her head as she got out one last laugh.
“If I free you guys, you won’t last long. They’re still tracking Maria each day and are getting closer to getting her. There’s no clan or witches to protect you. Running means certain death. Why in the world would fate allow you to choose a person as a mate if you were already bonded to another person?” Jared was now standing and pacing around the room. His anger was gone, and he was genuinely concerned about the situation.
‘If there was only a way to trick Ben and gain more time. Once John frees the witches, we will be safe. Your uncle has talked to me several times, and they are safe. He can’t explain much, but they have to keep changing locations,’ Nate explained. ‘We can’t join them right now. But it won’t be long before he gets to the witches. Then the coven will be back, and we will be safe. We just need more time.’