Beyond the Veil (3 page)

As Sally stepped forward to blow out the candles, Jen eased over next to Costin.

"Well played, lover boy. Well played." Jen nodded her approval at Costin's protection of Sally and continued past him toward the cake.

After Sally had opened present after present – with the help of Jen's incessant commentary – the night began to draw to a close. Sally was breathing more easily. Costin had graciously side-stepped a formal announcement of their mate signs and Jen had kept her clothes on. All in all, it was a successful party. In fact, she had been having so much fun with the girls that she had pushed her and Costin's bonding to the furthest part of her mind. It wasn't until she pulled her hair into a pony tail that the hell that she'd hoped wouldn't break out...did.

Jen, Jacque, and Sally sat on the far side of the great room, pretty much oblivious to everyone else as they reminisced about things from high school and how, if a year ago someone had told them they would discover the existence of werewolves, they would have busted a gut laughing. Then they started laughing over the things Jen had pulled over the past year once they all had gotten their driver's licenses.

Late one night, two weeks after Jen had gotten her license, she took her new found independence in her new Honda Civic and used it to wreak havoc on the good people of Coldspring. Jen – and, of course, she dragged Jacque and Sally along – made the rounds to each student or teacher that fit into her “waste of perfectly good oxygen” category. Depending on the amount of oxygen the person wasted, according to Jen, determined the intensity of the prank. Some got their cars saran-wrapped so they couldn’t open the car doors; some had their yard forked, which was very time consuming and utterly annoying to the prank-ee when it came time to mow the grass; some got Vaseline put on every visible handle of any kind. After that night, Sally and Jacque had wholeheartedly agreed that allowing Jen access to a vehicle was definitely not in the public's best interest.

"I can't believe your parents thought it was a good idea to let you have a car," Jacque said, then cocked her head to the side. "Speaking of parents, when are you two going to call dear old mom and dad and give them the news of your change in circumstance?"

Before either Jen or Sally could answer, Sally felt a finger brush gently against her back, directly over her spine. She knew instantly that it wasn't Costin because the sensation of ants crawling all over her skin rippled over her. Jacque's eyes looked like they were going to pop out of her head as her mouth dropped open and Sally just had time to hear Jen mutter under her breath before a deafening snarl ripped through the room.

"Guess I'm going to have to strip after all." Jen stood, motioning to the DJ by bumping her thumb in an upward motion, indicating she wanted him to increase the volume. As she climbed up onto the table, she watched Costin, who was now glaring at the young Serbian pack member who stood behind a terrified looking Sally.

Everything seemed to move in slow motion from that point on.

"Shit," Jen breathed out as she watched Costin lunge and phase in mid air. Only a few in the back of the room had realized what was going on, so Jen took the opportunity to jump across from table to table, like a frog on lily pads, until she landed on the table closest to the dance floor – and in one of those rare Jen moments, the DJ started
The Black Eyed Peas
' "Let's Get it Started in Here".

Jen thought,
How appropriate
, and then let out a loud whoop, pulled her hair out of her pony tail, and shook it out as her body moved to the rhythm of the music. She tried to ignore the growling in her mind. She knew that Decebel would be torn on whether to drag her off the table or help restrain Costin from killing one of his pack members. She could admit that maybe by now she would have learned not to poke the sleeping tiger, or in this case, wolf. But as she had said in other stripping situations, desperate times call for desperate measures.

The crowd was clapping and all turned to watch Jen as she kicked off a shoe. She was trying to do as much dancing as possible in between removing items from her body, hoping to minimize the damage. She kicked off her other shoe, and when she began to pull up the sheer black top she wore over a camisole, the room erupted in whistles and more applause.

The music switched and
Pitbull's
voice came across the speakers, "Give Me Everything" streaming out. Again Jen mentally rolled her eyes at the song, wondering if each one was going to describe the current situation. Someone in the universe was taking great pleasure in adding to the already dangerous situation.  Jen made a big show of using the sheer top as a dancing prop so she could keep from removing more clothing.  She heard Decebel's voice in her mind and the anger that radiated from it.

"
Why are you always the one to volunteer to take your clothes off in public?"
Decebel's tone barely covered the contained rage. She could feel his power pulsing through the room as he commanded Costin not to attack. She was amazed that he could admonish her while dealing with a feral wolf.

"
Is it some compulsive behavior that every so often makes you feel the need to strip? Because that can easily be accommodated. The difference? I will be your ONLY AUDIENCE! Now put what you have removed back on and step down from the table. If a male touches you as you remove yourself from that table he forfeits his life."

"Aren't you being a little dramatic? You would rather me fall off this table than let a gentleman help me?"
Jen put her shirt back over her head and took her shoes from Crina, who had picked them up.

Crina winked at Jen and mouthed, “You're my hero”.

"You got your butt up on that table on your own; you will get down on your own. I might not be bothered by a male helping you if you had not just sparked all kinds of excitement in their young, immature minds."

With an exasperated sigh Jen sat down on the table and slid off.

"It's not like they're going to get all hot and bothered over my sexy little toes," she muttered, heading back to the table where she, Sally, and Jacque had been sitting before the evening's main – and dramatic – event.

Costin's wolf was out of control and the only thing able to hold him in place was Decebel's dominance. Vasile had not intervened since a Serbian pack member had committed the offense.

Decebel commanded him to stop and the Alpha command wrapped around Costin and halted him in his tracks. He stood snarling, his eyes glued to the wolf that had so stupidly touched Sally. Costin was trying to push his wolf back and regain control, but the wolf was having none of it. The possessiveness he felt toward Sally was like nothing he had ever experienced, and on some level it worried him that as long as they weren't bonded he was dangerous to anyone and everyone. But it did not bother him enough to keep him from making it clear, when he walked over to Sally and stood in front of her, that no one was to get close to her. He snarled and met the gaze of each wolf and waited for them to lower their eyes. Costin looked at Sally and let out a low rumble. She started to take a step back at what seemed to be a growl, but Costin shook his head. Then he motioned with an upward nod.

"I – I..." Sally's voice was hoarse as she tried to speak to the wolf that was Costin. "I don't know what you want.”

Jen stepped up and gently pulled Sally's dark brown hair from the pony tail and arranged it in a way that covered the markings on her back.

"He wants these out of sight so that no other flea-infested fur ball will see them," Jen whispered.

Sally's head snapped around toward Jen and then back to Costin.

"I forgot." Her voice was apologetic. "I'm -" She started to say more but stopped when Costin nudged her hip, trying to push her toward the door.

"I think he needs to call it a night," Decebel told Sally.

She still had the shell-shocked look that had come across her face when Costin landed next to her, looking every bit the part of the big bad wolf.

Sally nodded absently as she turned and headed for the doors with Costin walking so close to her that she could feel his fur brushing her leg. Sally heard Decebel tell someone – she assumed Jen and Jacque – to come check on her in a little while.

Sally wasn't sure what she would say to them.
Am I okay?
she thought as she continued up the stairs toward her room. She decided to be honest with herself: no, she was definitely not okay.

"If you find yourself suddenly mated to a werewolf, whatever you do don't panic. Simply turn to Jen for assistance and she will give you a cool acronym to call him…because that's just so important." -Sally

Once they were at Sally's door Costin nudged her forward. She opened it and when she stepped back to let him in he stayed in the hall. Sally stared for a moment before it hit her.

"You need to phase back and get dressed," she said.

Costin nodded once and then stepped forward. With his right paw he stomped the floor just outside her room. Sally cocked her head to the side, not understanding. She watched as he did it again and then shook his head as if to say no.

"Oh." Sally brightened, proud of herself for deciphering his sign language. "You're telling me not to leave my room."

Costin nodded his big wolf head again. His eyes had begun glowing during the earlier confrontation and even now they shimmered an eerie shade of green.

Sally's inner Jen had been triggered as soon as she got the words out. So, naturally, she did what her inner Jen told her to – she stepped forward, putting one toe outside her door. Costin growled, so she stepped back. Watching him coyly, she put her other toe outside her door, and he growled again. Inwardly she was scolding herself for taunting him and allowing her inner Jen to control her actions, but she had discovered long ago that sometimes inner Jen was just more fun.

When Sally stuck her foot out for the third time, she giggled when Costin snapped at her. She could tell he was playing by the way his tail wagged and his eyes lightened.  It seemed her playfulness had helped calmed him. That was a good thing because she was going to need him calm for what she wanted to discuss.

"Are you coming back?" Her words were tentative.

Costin nodded once, then turned and trotted off toward his room.

Sally closed the door and stood with her back pressed against it. She closed her eyes and took slow, deep breaths, trying really hard to get the picture of Costin lunging across the room – lips curled back, eyes glowing, ears down and hackles raised – out of her mind. She wasn't afraid of him, not exactly. She was afraid of the intensity he felt for her, and she for him. It was one thing to see
your two best friends meet their soul mates and watch the passion they felt for each other flow out them like water, and another to experience it yourself.

She took one last deep breath and headed to her closet to change out of her dress. She put on a red, fitted long sleeve tee shirt and a pair of black, low waist yoga pants. She was going for comfort, at least physically because she knew as soon as Costin returned, emotional comfort would fly out the door as he closed it behind him.

Sally was walking out of her closet when the knock came.

"How long do you think it's going to take Decebel to deal with the wayward wolf who touched Sally?" Jen asked Jacque casually as they sat in the now nearly empty gathering room.

After Sally and Costin had left, both Vasile and Decebel had agreed it was time to call it a night. Jen and Jacque had been helping clean upm\, but just as Jen was carrying empty cups toward the trash, Decebel told her to park her cute butt and not move. So she had dragged Jacque with her to a table and parked it.

"I don't know, probably not long. Why?"

Jen shrugged her shoulders. "Oh, no reason."

Jacque's head slowly turned to look at Jen. "What do you have up your sleeve?"

"I'm just trying to calculate how much time it would take me to undress, phase, and go hide in the woods." Jen leaned in close to Jacque, whispering her words.

"Are you blocking your thoughts from him?" Jacque whispered back.

Jen nodded. "I'm giving him the impression that I'm pouting and that's why I'm blocking them."

"Do you honestly believe he doesn't think you are plotting some escape plan?" Jacque looked back to where Decebel, Vasile, Fane, Gavril, and Sorin had gathered around the young wolf, who was adamantly shaking his head. Jacque called on her newly-found wolf skills and used the hyper-sensitive hearing.

"I don't know why I touched her. I honestly wasn't challenging Costin. I didn't even know she was mated!" Jacque heard the guy tell them.

"She isn't mated yet," Decebel explained. "That is why Costin reacted so strongly. You
could
challenge him for her. Let me strongly advise against that." Decebel's voice was gruff but not harsh.

"Alpha," the young wolf looked up at Decebel, "I honestly don't know why I touched her. I was walking by and glanced at her and then I was touching her."

Jacque watched Decebel turn to Vasile and then Gavril, "Do you think this has anything to with her being a healer? Are wolves drawn to healers? And, if so, could the fact that she and her mate have the mate signs but aren't bonded essentially paint a target on her back?"

"How would this make her a target?" Jacque heard Sorin ask. She smiled to herself and mentally thanked him for taking the words out of her mouth.

Decebel answered, "As long as Sally isn't bonded to Costin he can be challenged for her. If there is any dissension in my pack that I haven't weeded out, they could use Sally as a way to attempt to kill one of our dominants, not to mention take one of our healers. Unbonded mates are a disaster. The males are unpredictable and violent."

"They have the mate signs, why not have them do the bond as quickly as possible?" Gavril offered.

"Have you discussed with Costin his place in your pack?" Vasile asked Decebel.

"Yes." Decebel nodded.

Jacque perked up at this information. This was news to her.

"Wolf-man, you holding out on me?"
she sent Fane the thought through their bond.

Fane had become so accustomed to having Jacque in his thoughts that he never indicated in any outward way that she was talking to him.

"I just found out today and was commanded by our Alpha to keep it between the ones you see standing here."

"That sucks,"
Jacque whined and turned back to fill Jen in. She tried to slap her hand over her mouth before the "hell fire," slipped out but her arm was not quick enough. She whipped her head around in time to see Decebel's eyes snap over at the sound of her voice. He looked at her and then at the empty seat next to her and chills ran across her skin as Decebel's eyes began to glow and a very wicked grin spread across his face.

Jacque shuddered. She knew that look. That was the look of a wolf getting ready to hunt.

"Do you think you should stall Decebel and let Jen get a little more of a head start on him?"
Jacque asked Fane.

This time she saw him visibly shaking his head as he answered,
"When are you females going to get it through your heads that you don't get in the way of a male and his mate? Especially an Alpha."

"Scared?"
Jacque taunted.

Fane slowly turned and looked at her from across the room. Jacque could see the blue glow in his eyes. 

"What is with all the glowing eyes tonight?"

"You know why our eyes glow,"
Fane responded.
"You've challenged me, love. That is why my eyes are glowing."

"Challenged you? When?" 
Jacque's voice squeaked out.

"I must now prove to you that I am not scared of the Serbian Alpha."

Jacque's chair crashed to the floor as she stood up abruptly.

"I was just teasing, Fane. I know you aren't scared of him. Don't do anything stupid."

She watched as Fane cocked his head to the side, a motion Jacque had seen him make in his wolf form.

"
Now
you think that it would be stupid of me to attempt to prove I am not scared of him because why? Because you don't think I could hold my own against him?"
  Fane's voice was thick with accusation.

Jacque stomped her foot, something that she hated doing, but somehow Fane managed to elicit the reaction on a regular basis.
"Fane, stop. I know you are brave and can take on any wolf who challenges you. I know that you can go all 'I can kick your butt with one paw tied behind my flanks' on your enemy. You've already proved it many times over."
She was pleading with him, and through their bond she let him feel the truth in her words.

Jacque watched as Fane's grim face turned into a brilliant smile.

"A paw tied behind my flanks?" 
he asked incredulously."
I don't know whether to be flattered that you think I am so capable or laugh at the imagery your words evoke.
In any case,
I think they are done here. You ready to go to bed?"

Jacque watched her mate walk toward her. Her jaw dropped open at his playfulness.

When he got close she crossed her arms across her chest and glared.

"You were playing me, weren't you? You were never going to challenge Decebel," she accused.

Fane laughed. "I may be paw-tying awesome love, but he just became pack Alpha and is mated. I'm not stupid."

Jacque huffed.

Fane took her hand and began to lead her from the room. They stopped abruptly when they heard a low snarl and then a loud howl. Decebel had phased right there in the gathering room. Jacque looked over her shoulder at the massive grey wolf with his four white paws. She felt the pull in her as her wolf responded to the Alpha. As the howl died, Decebel's head snapped down and his gaze landed right where Fane and Jacque were standing. Decebel began to move toward them at a fast pace. Fane quickly pulled Jacque to the side just as Decebel passed them. They heard another snarl as Decebel pushed open the mansion doors and took off into the night.

"He must get exhausted being mated to Jen." Jacque chuckled.

"Decebel was a stone before Jen came along. No life was in his eyes. She has brought that back to him. Everything about her is exactly what he needs. Just as everything you are is exactly what I need."

Jacque stopped and pulled Fane's head down to kiss him passionately.

When she pulled back she looked deeply into his eyes. "I don't know how you do it, wolf-man, but you always manage to say what I need to hear."

Fane winked and tugged her to keep moving. "I have a book."

Jacque laughed. "Naturally," she said, and rolled her eyes.

~

Sally stepped aside and Costin walked into her room. Her nervousness was obvious, but he didn't sense any fear of him. Nerves he could deal with; he didn't think he could handle her being afraid of him. He moved slowly, not wanting to upset her more.

Costin looked around for a place to sit. The queen size bed had a simple wooden headboard and a silver bedspread on it. It was against the wall in the middle of the room. There was a tall chest of drawers opposite the bed and on the wall to the left was a roll top desk and chair. He made his way to that chair and took a seat facing Sally.

She stood there looking at him, not with accusation, but with simple curiosity.

"I feel like there's something you want to talk with me about," Costin prompted.

Sally let out a breath and her shoulders slumped. She walked over to her bed and climbed up, sitting Indian style facing him. Her elbows were propped on her knees and her chin rested in her hands.

She drummed her fingers lightly against her cheeks as she considered how to begin. Then everything just came pouring out.

"I'm just not ready. I mean, I understand that we are connected by this whole mate thing, with the mate signs and what not. But I'm not – I just can't..." She was flustered, but paused as she watched a enthralling grin spread across Costin's face, revealing the cute dimple. That smile was disarming.

"Why are grinning at me?" she asked as she let her hands drop from her face and fall helplessly onto her lap.

"Are you scared of me?" he asked her gently.

Sally shook her head.

"Do you think I would ever hurt you intentionally?"

Again she shook her head.

"Do you believe I want what's best for you and that I will protect you with my life? Do you trust that I will hold you above all others and live to see that you have joy in your life? That I will hold you when you cry, laugh with you when you laugh, and honor you as my mate? Do you believe these things?"

"Yes, Costin. I see the way Jacque and Fane are – and Decebel and Jen. I get it. But that's the problem. You're intense. The whole mating thing is freaking overwhelming." Sally stood up and began to pace back and forth. "I...I've never even had a boyfriend. I've only kissed one guy and it was nothing to swoon about. Can't you see how this would be pretty drastic for me?"

She stopped and looked at him when she heard a low growl.

"You've kissed someone?"

Sally tried to hold back the snort of laughter that bubbled out. "Of course. I'm eighteen, Costin. Only having kissed one guy by eighteen is pretty darn conservative."