Page 9 of The Healer

Johanna flopped into a nearby chair. Her crisp gray pantsuit didn’t crease, it dared not.

“It’s about trust, Jo-jo.” He lowered his bulk into the leather Queen Anne chair beside her, despite its proximity to a roaring fire.

His bear pushed him to move, skittering goosebumps along his skin, but he resisted, enduring the discomfort for now.

Ignoring his ever-miserable inner beast, he gathered her hand in his massive one, dwarfing hers, and ran a large digit along the delicate vein running from middle finger to her wrist. “You are weaker than us yet hold more power than you realize. Your men can take down a beast, just not during a full moon.”

“He has a point, Captain,” Callie said from the doorway.

Rhys’s head whipped up, and he sucked in a deep breath even as his bear’s attention focused on the one woman he couldn’t have. Mate, his bear roared. He shook his head, trying to displace the urge to toss the gorgeous redhead over his shoulder. Her scent invaded his nose, his lungs, filling him with this driving need to fuck. Crossing his denim-encased legs to hide his growing reaction, he dampened his roaring bear, unable to deal with his continued castigation.

“Morning.” One glance was all he needed.

Her jeans hugged her hips and muscled thighs. Her T-shirt clung to curves and indents he dreamed of running his lips over. She wasn’t his. Gabriel de Winter had claimed her before Rhys knew she existed.

He focused on Johanna, needing to break the mesmerizing lure of Callie’s delicate features and pulsing strength. As a newborn vamp, or suckblood as she called it, she oozed power. For shifters, there was nothing as seductive nor addictive as an alpha female.

“My men won’t follow someone they don’t respect.” Johanna sighed. “That’s true, no matter the species.”

“I’m not saying my men lead, Jo-jo. I’m suggesting my team work alongside yours. What they encounter out in the field will require various skill sets.”

“I like that.” Callie sank into a materialized chair she summoned out of the ether.

Rhys smothered a grimace. Since she had befriended then adopted a polymorph shifter she called George, suckbloods and beasts had formed some sort of truce. He’d learned way more about vampires and their capabilities than any alpha before him. And what they had known hadn’t scraped the iceberg.

“If they’re stumbling on two arguing beasts, let Rhys’s unit handle it and vice versa,” said Callie, now the voice of reason.

Johanna stared at Callie for a while, her brow remaining furrowed. “We’ll do a trial period. So, where have you been, Devereaux? How do you manage to sneak out when Rhys and I are in the middle of an argument?”

Callie’s eyes sparkled as a cheeky smile flared to life. “Gabe had a growing ache I needed to—”

“Nice try, Devereaux. Quit running away.” Johanna’s lips twitched before she morphed them into a scowl.

She chuckled. “Yes, ma’am.” She rested her emerald gaze on Rhys. “George’s en route.”

Rhys nodded. Convincing the new parents that George needed interaction with shifter-children—now that had been an exhilarating argument. Callie hadn’t backed down, her actions that of a defensive mama bear. He had won, but he suspected killing little George’s birth mother and saving her siblings might have played a role in Callie and Gabe’s agreement.

Rhys wanted George to meet with her brothers. She hadn’t seen them since her mom kicked her out of the house. But he didn’t know if she was ready, whether they were after the condition he had found them in. When he returned to the lodge, he would talk to their new father, Reade.

Callie stilled and tilted her head as a shadow entered the luxurious lounge. Not a flame on a candle or in a sconce flickered at the intrusion. A stoic man in black formed in front of them. He was one of a booth of assassins. They served the neighboring vampire hold and had been instrumental in the pseudo battle between vamps and shifters that had brought down a corrupted politician. All at her instigation.

Rhys gritted his teeth, not appreciating the man’s presence and the distrust that came with him, as if Rhys would harm a child. Seconds later, six-year-old George skipped across the Persian rug with her pigtails swinging behind her. She spotted Rhys and ducked behind the man’s leg.

Rhys forced a smile as he sucked in some of his alpha, trying to minimize the dominating effect it would have on a young shifter. “Hey, George. Ready to play?”

“Play?” She peeked around the man. “Hide and seek? Tea parties? Hopscotch?”

He laughed. With each question, she ventured closer, and excitement swished in her unbearably pink skirt. “I wouldn’t know, little one. As far as the children know, a polymorph is coming to visit who has the powers of a goddess.” He tucked a black curl behind her ear, then leaned in to whisper. “I think they’re more excited to see one of the pal’tsy.”

He nudged his head at the assassin who belonged to Dimitri Vasiliev, head of the Vasiliev Hold—one of five vamp holds in the city. Unlike shifters who had one pack per city or town, the vamps shared territory.

Her pale blue eyes crinkled, and a giggle slipped out, which she covered with her tiny hand. “I think so too.”

He grinned, unable to help it. “Shall we, cupcake?”

When she slipped her hand into his, he stared at it for a moment, at how fragile it was, weighing nothing. Something intense swept through him, and his bear whimpered, cubs.

After raising his gaze to meet Callie’s, she wore a sweet smile. “Now don’t terrorize those poor kids, George, and remember, they don’t all have what you have.”

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