After Dawn, What Came Next

Eloise stepped in before the two men could bring the house down around them. She let her alpha loose and grimaced as Catcher and Tracker instinctively bent to her will. She hated that she had that kind of power over them. Catcher was fighting her, but then again, he always had. She kicked up her preternatural energy a notch and let it fly. Catcher turned every bit of his lethal attention on her, growling low in his throat.

Nash stepped in between Catcher and Eloise. The hair on his hackles rose as he stared the man down. This could get ugly, very ugly. The hallway wasn’t big enough to contain so many egos. Catcher had threatened his wife…his mate and there was nothing Nash wouldn’t do to defend her. Damn his grandson. Nash didn’t know what Daniel’s game was this time, but it was a very dangerous game he played. As usual, when it came to Daniel the trickle down effect left a wake of destruction in its path. The pack had had unity for the last two decades or so until Daniel showed up on the doorstep and in less than forty-eight hours sides were being chosen.

Tracker could see the train rolling off the track. He hauled his twin by the hair and pinned him against the wall. It took every bit of force he had to keep Catcher contained. He could do nothing to diffuse the situation. There was only one person who could and she was behind a locked door with another man. “Let it go, brother.” Tracker hazarded a glare over his shoulder and luckily he didn’t have to say another word. Tempers were short. Unspoken challenges had been issued and threats abounded. There was going to be violence soon. His brother had never backed down before in his life and he wasn’t going to do so now. But, this was one fight Catcher couldn’t win and a fight best avoided. Tracker’s loyalties were too scattered to choose one side over another. He would die to protect his mate, his children, his twin, but also his pack and all the people here in this hallway were his pack.

Tensions eased as the hallway cleared out and people retreated to their respective corners of the house. Tracker stuck by his brother’s side. Right now would not be a good time for Daniel to poke his head out of his room. Catcher would snatch it off his shoulders before Tracker could do a thing about it. Gingerly, he released his hold on Catcher. “We good?”

Catcher nodded simply to get his twin off of him. There were two people in the world he would never hurt, Tracker and now, Fallon. It was the fact that he was incapable of hurting her that kept him from busting down that door and snatching her out of Daniel’s clutches. It was for that fact alone that Daniel was still in one piece in the first place. A wolf knew no loyalties based on friendship. Sometimes, the way of the wolf was simpler. Things were cut and dried and priorities pretty much based around basic survival. Being human, or at least pretending to be, was hard. “Do you love your mate, brother?”

Tracker hadn’t expected that question to come out of his brother’s mouth. He had expected a thorough cussing out and at least a dozen inane threats, but never questions about love. “Shayla? Yes, with all my heart and soul.” He glanced from his brother to the closed door and imagined Fallon and Daniel on the other side. He had been where his brother was now. It seemed like a lifetime ago. When Shayla had been torn between her heart’s desire and the simple logic of the impossibilities of loving a man who could not love her in return. She still loved Carter and always would. Carter would always be a better man than him. Carter had been able to let her go and he never would.

Tracker took a deep breath. How to best explain this to his brother? Catcher dealt in fact and with things in terms of black and white. Either things were or they were not and there was no in between in his world. He clapped Catcher on the shoulder. “Sometimes, brother you have to accept that you will never have a woman’s heart all to yourself. Women love and they love deeply and wholeheartedly. The love of a woman is a precious and limitless thing. They have so much to give and plenty of room in their hearts. Think on it, brother. You may not be her first love. That’s just the fact of it. But, when a woman decides to love you. It is a rare and wonderful thing. Don’t let your pride get in the way of it, Catcher. Think long and hard and know you’ll have her, but you’ll never have her completely to yourself. If you can’t accept that then walk away, while you still can.”

“You live with it.”

“Everyday, brother.”

“And it’s enough?”

Tracker nodded. “It’s enough.”

“For you, but what about for her?”

Tracker was spared the truth of answering that question by the turning of a lock and the rattling of a doorknob. He gave his brother’s forearm a squeeze and turned to walk away as Fallon emerged from the bedroom.

Catcher’s breath caught in his throat. Fallon wore Daniel’s clothes and the scent of him was trapped in the cloth. She didn’t look back as she closed the door behind her. She looked ahead, straight ahead, at him. He could see the hurt etched in her features, but she said not a word about it. Whatever had happened behind that closed door had been an ending of things. The door had been shut and would remain closed behind her. She had opened another one though and through it the way led to him.

Fallon longed for the shelter of Catcher’s arms around her. She wanted to forget and leave Daniel behind, but the lingering doubt in her mind wouldn’t let her do it. Lives ended and others began. It was the way of nature. She grabbed Catcher’s hand and clung to it. With a gentle tug, she led him to her bedroom and closed the door, locking the world and her past away.



















Chapter 62

Shayla didn’t bother turning around as Tracker eased the bedroom door shut and came to join her. She stood in the window looking out at the moon washed world beneath her second story perch. The commotion of the night had left the pack restless and unsettled. Nobody would sleep very well tonight, but for her insomnia was nothing new. Tracker wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her into the warmth of his chest as he sighed into her hair. “Everything ok?”

Tracker nodded into Shayla’s hair. Everything was going to be ok unless he couldn’t keep Daniel and Catcher from killing each other and dragging Fallon into the fray with them. At least though, the matter was settled for the night. He shifted his hips and pressed his arousal into the cleft of Shayla’s bottom. He was too agitated for a middle of the night toss between the sheets. He only wanted the warmth of her and the reassurance of her body snuggled nice and tight against his.

Shayla didn’t dress to impress, especially not in the bedroom. She had given up the frilly lacy things intended to entice a male a long time ago. These days it was flannel or cotton or just plain bare skin. He didn’t mind. Shayla had never had to work at getting him interested or into her bed. All she had to do was crook an index finger in his direction and give him that slightly off center smile of his and he was hard and ready. She settled against him, leaning on him and giving him the burden of holding them both upright. He didn’t mind that either. Her burden had never been too heavy for him to bear.

Over the past twenty something years they had settled into a comfortable companionship. Sure, there was the urgent meeting of bodies under the cover of darkness. But, they also had what came on the other side of such heated passion. Love. Respect. Understanding. Tracker knew she was thinking of Carter tonight and wondering if he was out there, in the city, staring out across the glittering lights and silvery streams of moonlight thinking about her. “You miss him?”

Shayla was surprised by Tracker’s directness. After twenty some years of marriage there was little they could hide from one another. Plenty they didn’t discuss, but nothing they could hide. She sighed and rested her head against his chest, feeling the reassurance of his heart beating against her ear. Did she miss Carter? Yes, she did. But, she would have missed the life Tracker had given her far more than she had missed what would have ever been between Carter and she. Still, she couldn’t lie to Tracker. “Everyday.”

Tracker rested his chin on the top of Shayla’s head and stared out the window into the darkness. Fucking vampire. Catcher’s question had raised one hell of a shadow of doubt in Tracker’s mind and Shayla’s reluctant answer had only served to darken it. She gently patted his arm. “I’d miss you more though,” she added.

Shayla felt Tracker’s chest rise and fall against her head as he chuckled and smoothed his cheek over her hair. She had the quiet life she had always dreamed of with Ramon. Their life together had been cut short, too short. The life she had found with Carter, it was not what she was looking for and she had known from the very beginning he was not one to be domesticated. She had been a dream he thought he wanted and nothing more. He loved her, but not enough, or perhaps too much and in the end hadn’t had the stamina a lover needs to make love last.

She had been hanging on the edge of a very steep cliff when Tracker careened into her world. He had pulled her back from the edge, dusted her off, and set her on her feet again. Carter…he was the one who had sent her hanging over the edge in the first place. She had no desire to repeat the past. Sure, her heart held a special place for Carter, but it was so small in comparison to the bounty Tracker held in the palm of his hands. Tracker’s deep voice was a rumble in his chest, vibrating against the shell of her ear. “You know I’d never stop you if you decided to go to him.”

Shayla snorted at that. Such noble words spoken with sincerity, but he really wasn’t honest with himself as he spoke them. He wouldn’t simply stand aside and let her go and she had no intention of going anywhere. Carter was a dream, an illusion, and while dreaming of him was a pleasant diversion, it wasn’t real. “Forget it buster, you’re stuck with me.”

Tracker hugged Shayla to him. The cloud of doubt dissipated. He was enough for her. Tracker worked his hands underneath the faded cotton of Shayla’s sleep shirt inching the worn cloth up her thighs and over her hips. Nipping at the base of her neck, he tickled his fingertips across her stomach before trailing them down to the juncture between her thighs. They were going to make love. They both knew it. Shayla leaned against him and opened her legs, shuddering sweetly and exhaling a breathy sigh as his fingers found just the right place. “I don’t mind being stuck with you.” Shayla hit a high note as her body bucked in time with the flick of his fingertips. He got her there and clung to her tightly as she drifted back down to earth to land in his arms. “Forever, babe.”

Shayla smiled and grabbed hold of Tracker’s capable shoulders as he lifted her and carried her out of the path of the moonlight and to the bed. She took him into her body and delivered him to a place where there was no room for doubt or anybody else but him. He shuddered and thrust his hips as the orgasm brought him home. Cupping his cheeks and bringing his lips to hers, she whispered, “Forever, babe.”









































Chapter 63

Carter hadn’t expected his story to take as long to tell as it did. Nor, had he expected to feel the twinges of emotion he felt in the telling of it. R.J. listened with a calculating expression on his face. It wasn’t easy to learn your mother was not the person you had always thought she was.

They had moved out of the gym and taken up residence in his study. Carter had never been shy of the day and relished the pain the sunlight brought to his eyes. He had made a few personal modifications to the Guardian’s headquarters over the years and given up a few square yards of prime real estate in his study to install a balcony overlooking the beauty of his one true love. Whore that she was.

The city had always held a certain allure for him. The lights twinkled like jewels around a woman’s throat. Moonlight streamed down through the towers of glass and steel like the silken tendrils of a woman’s hair drifting over her naked shoulders. The velvet dress of night was beginning to lighten into a vibrant gown of iridescent glowing shades of pink and gold. Her perfume was the musk of humanity, it’s passions, it’s filthy secrets, and the lives, the births and the deaths of such a temporary world.

Carter sat on the railing surrounding the balcony, balanced gracefully with one foot trailing over the edge as if he were inches off the ground instead of fifty some odd stories above it. Ray wasn’t quite so brave. His wolf didn’t like heights any more than he liked enclosed spaces underground. Something about the very reasonable fear of plummeting to his death or being entombed beneath a mile of earth didn’t quite agree with his sense of self-preservation. Damn vampires. They had no such qualms about heights or burrowing in the ground like a bunch of fanged earthworms.

Ray looked at Carter with a sense of awe and amazement. He remembered now! He remembered Carter. The memories were vague and hazy, dream like. He envisioned Carter’s face staring down at him. He saw the veneer of Carter’s cold exterior stripped away. He was just a baby when Carter left. Carter had held him on his lap. Carter had rocked him and fed him, changed his diapers, and he had loved him. Ray blew out a breath and ran his hands through his hair. Carter had done that, riffled his hair affectionately and he had stroked those impossibly long, artful fingers lovingly through it to calm a frightened toddler’s nightmares. Ray could hear himself in the clear, high-pitched voice of a toddler. He had called Carter dad. “You left.”

Carter nodded and stared out over the city skyline. The wind rippled his shirtsleeves and tore at the ends of his hair. He sat out here sometimes, wishing he could fly above it all, the city, the oceans and mountains, hell, the whole damned world. But, he was earthbound and trapped in the dark eyed stare of a stranger remembering his face. “My choice. Your mother, she was pregnant with Phoenix. And before you think it boy, don’t judge. The fault was mine. I held her once, you know. Phoenix. She was the firebird arisen from the ashes and I was the flame that had set you mother’s world on fire. Tracker is a good man. Don’t ever doubt it. A better man than I could ever be. We both loved her, but he was the only one capable of giving her a life.

“I’m a vampire. I know nothing but death. What business did I have with a woman as rare and alive as your mother? Absolutely none, and I knew it. You were the voice inside of my head. Clear and beautiful and so pure…it almost drove me to insanity and probably would have if your mother hadn’t pulled me back. I loved you as much as I loved her and in trusting you both into Tracker’s keeping instead of condemning you both to a life of darkness I proved the depth of my love. My blood is in you. Don’t doubt that. Sometimes, just looking at you, seeing that pale blue ring encircling your irises, I see myself in you. How much of me is in you, boy? I wonder if I’ve condemned you to spite myself.”

Ray drew his knees up tightly under his chin. Damn, had it been a night for revelations or what? First there was the kiss and now this. Thank God the sun was starting to clear the tops of the buildings and there’d be no more secrets revealed under the cover of darkness. Ray’s jaw was a little sore. Carter had a mean left hook. But his body was not as bruised and battered as his spirit by the truths Carter had confessed. Carter loved his mom. Ray could still see it in the vampire’s eyes. Carter was such a fucking martyr it made Ray’s teeth ache. Brooding, moody bastard. He had no idea of how many nights Ray had awakened from his bed in the middle of the night and caught his mom staring out the window into black void of nothing. “Mom still loves you, you know.”

Carter nodded. He did know. There was nothing to be done about it now. Shayla had her life and he had his and though their paths may cross they could not travel them together. He was eager to change the subject. He had confessed enough truths for one night. Now, it was Ray’s turn. “What are you going to do about your drunk friend?”

Ray eyed Carter. He had closed his eyes and opened them and peered out at Carter from the slit. Carter knew too much about him. The fact of it should have at the bare minimum embarrassed him. Hell, it should have sent him running for the hills. Somehow though, that he didn’t have to hide who he was from the man that had changed his diapers and had God knew how many shirts stained with baby barf in the back of his closet, was a relief. “Nothing, I guess.”

Carter chuckled at the sight of R.J.’s heated cheeks. The child was simply too precious. Carter had forgotten what it was like to be so damn young. He could ease R.J.’s angst. Reassure him that no matter whom R.J. chose to love. That person was the luckiest person in the world. Carter was no lover of men and he had no particular envy of R.J. in that regard, but he also knew that sometimes, male or female made little difference. He had loved Eric in every way possible. He knew what a fool’s errand it was to love someone incapable of loving you in return in the way that you needed it or thought that you did.

He understood the pressure R.J. was under. Simply being born what he was came with certain responsibilities. He would be expected to choose a mate and bring the next generation into the world. R.J. couldn’t exactly do that with a male. The pack as a whole probably cared little for R.J.’s sexual orientation or for what he wanted out of life. The pack was a singular, living, breathing entity and personal preference had nothing to do with the survival of the whole.

Carter could already see the truth of it written all over R.J.’s face. R.J. craved the little drunk fool, but he would do what he had to do for the benefit of the pack. “When you get to be as old as I am, kid. You realize things aren’t nearly as black and white or as big as they seem at the time.”

“But.”

“There are no buts’, kid. Go to bed.”

The thought of bunking down with Tom left a cold knot in the pit of his stomach. It would be bad enough to face Tom when he had to. Luckily…hopefully Tom was still passed out cold. “I can’t go back in there.”

“You want to sleep curled up at the foot of my bed?”

Ray wanted to hate the stoic vampire bastard, but he couldn’t. Not with so many memories of a happier, much more contented Carter rolling around in his head. Carter was a man who knew a great many things about life. Came with the territory of being as old as fuck. Carter shot him a sarcastic, crooked smile as if he hadn’t smiled in a very long time. Probably, he hadn’t in over twenty-five years. “Nah, your couch will be fine.”

At least everything was out in the open in all ways. He knew about his past. He no longer had to lust after Tom in secret and feel ashamed about it. The Brat Pack loved Cat, always would, but now they would have to love her in a different way. There was no pissing contest between Tom and himself about which one of the two of them might end up in her bed. And yes, he would have happily taken Cat to bed. In actuality other than facing Tom in the morning, Ray felt as if a number of weights had been lifted off his shoulders.

Everyone knew what he was, but he’d never met anyone besides Carter so accepting of it. Everyone operated under the belief that it was a problem that would correct itself once he bedded a female and God willing, got her pregnant. The idea of sleeping with a woman was not a repulsive one, but he would rather bed someone he was in love with than an unlucky female out of a sense of duty.