Page 11 of Wolf's Mark

Our mother, the matriarch of the pack. She liked to remind everyone who came into contact with her that she was.

After the earlier meeting, I’d anticipated her call. She’d rushed from the park as quickly as possible. I hadn’t realized she’d driven herself, flying away from the other council members like a bat out of hell.

She’d also ignored my calls immediately afterward.

I head the disdain in Chase’s voice and in truth, I felt the same.

The three of us had gone to a local bar for a drink after the strange event. We hadn’t engaged in conversation, not that we really had needed to. We understood the heavy burden placed on all of us.

“Why did you get the dirty deed?” I asked. I was already pacing the parking lot, my mind not on the call but on the beautiful woman. I infrequently went to dance clubs, but I’d been drawn to one tonight for some inexplicable reason.

At least there’d been some gorgeous eye candy as my reward.

“Hell if I know, other than Mother knows I won’t ignore her call. She’s like a praying mantis. No, she refused to answer anything about earlier today. I tried. I’m over the council.”

He didn’t have much choice if he wanted to continue thriving.

“Who eats her young?” I teased. My brother always had a dramatic flair about almost everything.

“You know she would.”

“What did she want, Chase?”

“A mandatory meeting on Monday at the East River plant office.”

“Why? The quarterly meeting isn’t for another three weeks. Maybe she’s prepared to answer our questions.”

Chase snorted. “Do you really think she was going to tell me? She just said it was vital. She was awful cagey today.”

Yes, she had been.

Vital. Chase had gotten his enthusiasm and flamboyant ways from our mother, Mary Wolf herself, a woman that seemed to have enjoyed living in the seventies far too much. However, vital was a keyword in her vocabulary. She sensed something and her perceptive skills were never off.

Would she provide the truth? That was something unusual. She was bound by an entirely different set of rules to maintain classified information.

“What time?”

“Ten a.m. sharp. She issued her standard warning about being late. “

“I wouldn’t dream of it.” As I hit end, I took a deep breath. I’d sensed a stillness in the air, a strange sense of foreboding that I hadn’t felt in a very long time. I had the distinct feeling that whatever was going on would change the peaceful calm we’d been experiencing.

I’d sensed something for weeks, although I hadn’t been able to put my finger on what.

After slipping my phone into my pocket, I headed for my vehicle. I’d enjoy nothing more than heading back inside, asking the stunning woman to dance or at least share a drink with me, but I had a feeling I needed to search the internet for clues as to why my mother had called a sudden meeting.

A man’s whistle caught my attention, a laugh from another indicating there were at least two assholes up to no good. The club had decent lighting, but there were still dark areas vagrants and criminals had decided to make their playground. The stench was enough that my senses pushed my tension to a high level.

When I turned my head, I immediately noticed the reason for their piqued interest. Two women were walking toward their vehicle from the club. It was the gorgeous woman I’d been attracted to with one of her friends.

There was no doubt what the two assholes were up to. I could easily see their figures in the dark, shadowing the women as they chatted. They were completely unaware they were being targeted.

After the horrendous meeting I’d been forced to sit through, I was still angry, which meant I could taste blood. It wasn’t in my best interest to interfere, but I wasn’t the kind of man to follow anyone’s rules.

I moved through the darkness, choosing to head to the edge of the lot near the mile of forest that backed up to the parking area. The two men had already pulled hoods over their faces to hide their identities. The shine of weapons in the dim overhead light identified just how much danger the women were in.

While I owned a stock of weapons, including carrying two inside my vehicle, I didn’t need them. I wasn’t in the mood to have thepolice involved or to drag my name through the town papers. The family might be well known but not as killers.

At least we hadn’t been seen that way in decades.

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