Lion's Share(6)

Don’t start, I thought as I choked back an instinctive growl in Brian’s direction. She is not yours.

But she was mine, at least on some level, and she had been since the day she’d joined my Pride. And that wouldn’t end until…

Until she swore she would have Brian as a husband, then later let him take her as his wife.

The thought of him touching Abby made every muscle in my body clench with rage.

Vic’s brows rose in my direction and I realized he’d caught some small, revealing twitch. Or maybe he could sense fresh pheromones rolling from my body like smoke from a fire. He would have questions for me later.

Fortunately, both Brian and Abby seemed oblivious.

“Are you hungry?” he asked her. “Can I get you…”

“No, thanks, I’m…” Abby shrugged, absently twisting the ring on her left hand.

Could neither of them finish a sentence?

A door on the left side of the hall opened and Owen stepped out, mercifully drawing my attention from the poor junior enforcer who’d unwittingly inspired my disdain. Cradled in the crook of his right arm was a tiny bundle wrapped in a pale pink blanket. “Abby!” The new father’s eyes lit up when he saw her. “Come meet your new cousin!”

“Oh, let me see! Letmeseeletmesee!” She brushed past Brian on her way to view the new arrival, and his obvious disappointment soothed me. “I’ve seen a million pictures of her, but that’s not as good as holding the real thing!”

Owen’s baby was the first tabby born in the US in more than a decade—we’d all seen the pictures. But few outside of the immediate family had actually held her.

The proud papa put his daughter in Abby’s arms, and she practically melted on her feet. “You named her Mercedes, right?” she whispered, obviously afraid to wake the infant.

He nodded. “Manx didn’t want to, but I insisted she be named after her mother.” He ran one rough finger gently down his sleeping daughter’s cheek, love for his family stamped all over his face.

Owen was a lucky, lucky man. Manx was the first tabby in history, as far as I knew, who hadn’t married an Alpha. She’d fallen in love with his gentle spirit and honest affection almost from the moment they’d met, and if not for him, she might never have overcome the trauma and grief that had brought her into the South-Central Territory from the war-ravaged Prides in South America.

Owen shrugged and smiled at Abby. “But Parker started calling her Sadie, and it stuck.”

“Stuck!” the two-year-old in question echoed, and I glanced through the open doorway to find him curled up on the bed with his mother. He looked just like the pictures Owen sent out periodically. Tall for his age and gangly, like his father.

Manx waved at me over the top of the Spanish-language storybook she was trying to read to their middle child. They’d named him after Parker Pierce, the only South-Central Territory enforcer who’d died in the fight against my stepfather.

“Full house tonight,” I said, watching Manx with her son. It was great to see her happy after all the tragedy that had preceded her acceptance into the Pride.

Owen laughed. “Yeah, we came up to watch the kids during the council meeting, but I’m starting to wonder if we don’t create more chaos than we cure,” he said as Des and Logan tore past us down the hall in matching superhero capes. Owen and Manx had built a house of their own on the other side of the property the year they were expecting Parker. That kept the kids close to their extended family, yet gave everyone some much-needed space and privacy.

“We should all be so lucky.”

Owen’s happiness was like a light shining just beneath his skin, casting its warm glow on everyone he came into contact with. He was perfectly content managing the ranch for his mother and raising his family, and I’d never in my life seen an existence fit a man so well.

“Hey, Ab—” Brian began, but the last half of her name was cut off by a shout from the office.

“Jace! Abby!” Rick Wade’s voice boomed down the hall, startling baby Sadie awake. She began to fuss and Abby reluctantly handed her over to her father as we were summoned to the meeting. “We’re about to get started in here!”

“She’s beautiful, Owe,” I said, as Owen took his daughter back. Then I gestured for Abby to lead the way toward the office, conveniently cutting Brian off before he could finish his sentence.

I could feel him glaring at my back all the way down the hall, and if he’d had the balls to call me out, I might have thrown my support behind his engagement to Abby.

Maybe.

But he didn’t say one damn word.





THREE



Jace

I stepped back to let Abby head into the office first, and from the hallway, my eyes confirmed what my ears and nose had already told me—that several of my fellow Alphas hadn’t shown up.

That was no surprise. The rogue was killing in my territory, which meant he was ultimately my responsibility. Those who’d supported my stepfather in the war would rather sit this meeting out so that if anything went wrong, they could legitimately blame me and my allies.

My least favorite part of leadership was the politics. Which was why Abby’s choice of college major baffled me.

I stood back while she accepted hugs and greetings from Jerald Pierce, Ed Taylor, and Umberto Di Carlo, Alphas of the Plains, Midwest, and Southeast Prides, respectively. Faythe sat behind her desk at the back of the room, trying to tune everyone else out while she spoke on the phone, but she looked up when I stepped through the doorway. I could tell from the tension in her frame that she’d known the moment I walked into the house.

She’d probably heard my car before it had even turned into the driveway.

Faythe’s green-eyed gaze met mine and I froze, bracing myself for the flood of conflicting emotions that had engulfed me every time I’d ever looked at her. Every time she’d ever looked at me.

Love. Lust. Jealousy. Frustration. I expected the entire toxic cocktail, and I was prepared to hide my pain behind the professional mask I’d been wearing for years. But instead of a flood of emotion, I got just a trickle. A mere echo of what I’d once felt and had long ago been forced to let go of.

My history with Faythe was now the rainy-day ache of an old wound.

I could live with an ache.

Still staring at me, Faythe tucked a strand of black hair behind one ear while Paul Blackwell spoke into her other one from the phone. For one long moment, she didn’t breathe. When I was sure my heart wasn’t going to implode—that it felt more bruised than injured—I grinned, and the tension drained from her frame. Her smile looked genuine. She was happy to see me, even under such grim, official circumstances.

Counting Faythe and me, we were still missing representatives from four of the ten US Territories, yet even from across the room, I could hear Paul Blackwell listing the litany of old-age complaints that were keeping him from attending. Faythe rolled her eyes, and I knew exactly what she was thinking—that if he was too old for the job, it was time he passed on his position to the next generation. It was past time, in fact. Blackwell’s daughter and son-in-law already had a two-year-old grandson.

“Slim turnout,” I said with a pointed glance around the room as Abby’s dad, Council Chairman Rick Wade, came to greet me.

He shook my hand for the first time since I’d been confirmed as an Alpha, with his support. Wade was my unofficial—yet very real—ally on the council. “We only need six for a quorum.”

And that was all we had since, as co-Alphas, Faythe and Marc had to share a single vote.

“How’s school, Abigail?” Ed Taylor rose to engulf his future daughter-in-law in a hug. As unwise as I thought the union   was, Abby’s marriage to Brian Taylor would create a genetic, personal, and political alliance between her birth Pride and his. Their parents would share grandchildren. Brian would someday run Rick Wade’s territory. When problems arose on the council, Ed Taylor would go to bat for Rick and vice versa.

“School’s good,” Abby said. “Just one semester to go.”

I frowned at the reminder of how quickly time had passed. If she only had one semester to go, then she was, what? Six months from being married?

She wasn’t ready. She still hardly wore the ring.

I made a mental note to talk to Rick about postponing the wedding on Abby’s behalf in light of the fact that she clearly needed more time. And the equally important fact that her fiancé was a gutless asswipe.

Wait, that wasn’t fair. Brian wasn’t a coward. He just wasn’t an Alpha. But my point would stand.

“Well, I have one semester left for my bachelor’s,” Abby qualified, and her father looked up in surprise.

Ed laughed, but he didn’t sound truly amused by the implication that his son’s wedding might be postponed for another two years. “Sounds like she has plans for some more of your money, Rick.”

“It’s not my money.” The council chairman smiled at his daughter, practically swollen with pride. “She’s on a full academic scholarship.”

“Three-point-eight GPA,” I added.

Abby glanced at me with both brows raised, obviously surprised that I’d been listening to her chatter on the plane.