After Dawn, What Came Next

Chapter 82

Jefferson helped Jackson straighten his tie. The two of them were dressed in matching white tuxedos complete with bow ties and budded white roses pinned to the lapel. Their mother was the happiest he had ever seen her. Beaming at them as if the women, the wedding, and the wedding night were actually a choice they had made instead of one she had forced them into. Phoenix seemed to get it. Her lack of choice and hopefully she had convinced her friend to play along. Jefferson had left her the dagger to offer her one last option and to also drive home the point that death or marriage was the only options there were.

He didn’t want to fight his bride on their wedding night. He would rather have her willing and compliant than force himself on her. She didn’t deserve this any more than he did. But, at least his mother was happy. His father didn’t appear nearly so giddy. Sebastian had raised him and his brother. He had taught them when it came to their mother there was nothing but complete obedience to be expected. Their father understood the risks he had taken to see his wife happy. At any minute the brotherhood or the Guardians might find the wolves and the only outcome would be death and blood.

Where was their little sister? Their mother had drafted her into being a flower girl. But, Angelica often failed to do as their mother commanded and suffered the consequences. Their mother could do awful things.

Jefferson had asked about his real parents once…once. He simply wanted to know if the things he remembered about them were real or not. He would never ask again. Mother Starr had given him a gift wrapped in colorful paper with a great big bow. When he had opened it he found the severed heads of his parents staring blankly up at him. He had been five years old at the time.

A part of him wanted Phoenix to resist. He wanted her to use that kitchen knife to slice through his mother’s throat. Jackson had tried once to kill their mother. It was shortly after their conversion. He hadn’t succeeded. Hadn’t even gotten close. The punishment she had inflicted on him was just this side of hell on earth. A month in darkness starving had completely broken his brother. The experience had left Jackson cold and cruel. Jefferson had learned from that. He had learned to bide his time these long years and to wait. So far, the right opportunity hadn’t come along yet. But, someday, it would. “We’re lucky men, brother.”

Jackson didn’t see his impending wedding night as lucky. He didn’t want anything to do with that wolf. He did what his mother told him to, nothing more and nothing less. Someday, he was going to kill that old hag and her ball less husband along with her. This thing…this shallow replacement he had been given was no real life. Real life was beyond these walls. Real life was a place their father visited to keep them safe. Their mother had been out of touch with reality for so long. She saw this warped version of the life she lived as reality.

Danni would fight him. He had tasted her blood and formed a link with her mind. Her head was a storm of rage and fury. All he had to do was take that collar off of her neck and her wolf might finish the rest for him. Of course, her wolf might finish him as well. He couldn’t have that. He rather liked living. His twin hung onto the dim memories of his human life. The knowledge that there was something better out there was the only thing that kept Jefferson sane. For his brother’s sake, Jackson hoped someday his brother got the opportunity to find it.

Jackson didn’t want a wedding night with this female. He would do as he was told because he had no other choice. His mother had promised him great things would come. She had promised he would eat human food again, drink soda pop, and walk in the sunlight. Their father promised everything would be well. Once this deed was done, it would ensure the future. Knowing his father, Sebastian had a contingency plan. If the brotherhood or the Guardians somehow tracked the wolves and broke up this travesty of a wedding, he would put his own life on the line to save theirs. Good thing that, because Jackson didn’t plan to lift a finger to stop the slaughter.

Angelica snickered under her breath and dodged her mother’s glaring stare. She picked up the basket of flower pedals and flounced her skirts acting every bit of the eight year-old girl she so wasn’t. The women were beautiful dressed in their white wedding gowns. Angelica gave them a coy smile. She guessed the wolves hadn’t figured out she was on their side. She had made sure to leave a trail even an imbecile could follow. This wedding would never take place. Oh, the wedding might, but her brothers would never get their wedding night. She skipped up the carpeted aisle scattering white rose petals and played her part to perfection. Inside, she was quivering with anticipation.

Phoenix gripped Danni’s hand and dragged her instep beside her. “Play along,” she whispered through the plastic smile on her face. They expected them to fight. Complacency and smiles might throw them off. The kitchen knife was wound up tightly in her fist. Hidden beneath a bridal spray of white roses and greenery that trailed to the floor. She was going to get one chance at this. One. Rounding the corner, she gasped in shock at the man standing to the right of the twins and the woman standing beside him. “Sebastian? Starr?”

Danni shook her head in disbelief. Sebastian had betrayed them? Sebastian was behind the whole thing. Help wasn’t coming. Help was never coming. “No.”

Phoenix spotted her target. Starr. The woman stood at the makeshift altar beaming as if she were the bride. When the brothers and the Guardians found out who was behind their abduction all bets were off. Sebastian’s betrayal stung. He had forfeited the pact between the Guardians and the brotherhood. He had risked the life of every Guardian in bringing them here. Peace was a fragile thing and he had shattered over twenty-five years of it. Assuming the pack didn’t rip him to pieces first, the brothers would serve justice. She stared into the eyes of a dead man and his demented wife. Killing Starr quickly would be doing Sebastian a favor he didn’t deserve. This was a simple matter of practicality, Starr’s life or theirs. And guess what, Phoenix chose Danni and her lives over Starr’s.

Sebastian must have anticipated the move. He shoved Starr out of the way and took the brunt of the blow himself. Phoenix’s father had taught her too well. The knife embedded itself exactly where she had intended it to, up to the hilt in Sebastian’s left eye. She stood there shaking as Sebastian dropped dead to the floor. She had hunted deer, tasted the coppery tang of the animal’s life on the tip of her tongue, but she had never killed a living being with soul and conscious before.

“No! NO! NO!” Starr dropped to her knees and snatched Sebastian’s lifeless body into her lap. He was gone. His blood flowed from the wound in a river of red. She pulled the knife free and clutched it in her fist. She would have what she wanted. She would drink deeply and drain the both of the wolves dry. She would have her child. “Bring the bitches to me. Both of them!”

“No mother, it is over,” Jefferson said. Their father was dead. Without him behind her, they had no reason to fear their mother. Angelica stood there wide eyed and giggling, clapping her hands and bouncing on the balls of her feet as if she had just gotten a pony for her birthday. Jackson lunged for Starr. He would rip her to pieces with his bare hands now that he had the chance. Jefferson blocked his twin’s path and moved to defend the only mother he had ever known. It was better that justice come from the brotherhood than from either he or his brother. Their hands were clean and he wanted no taint of murder to ever touch them.

“No, is isn’t.” Starr threw herself onto her feet and went for the wolves. They were responsible. They had killed her loving Sebastian and threatened her family. Nobody threatened her children. She would kill them both.

“Phoenix move!” Danni shouted as she shoved Phoenix out of Starr’s path. Collared and without out weapons, facing a maniac vampire gone insane, they were both as good as dead, but they didn’t have to make it easy for her. Ancient energy rippled through Danni. Pack magic powerful as a storm threatened to tear her apart and rebuild her. In the face of danger there was no controlling the shift. The golden collar around her throat tightened with the shifting shape of her body. Gasping for air and clutching at the collar with fingernails transforming into claws, Danni writhed on the floor.

Phoenix was on Starr, fighting for her life to save Danni’s in the process. The shift was on her and there wasn’t a thing she could do about it except hope she took Starr out before the collar cut off her air supply. She battled against Starr and blinked at the black spots threatening to overtake her vision. Out of all the ways she had envisioned that she might die, this wasn’t one of them. Fangs tore at her flesh only stirring her wolf and forcing the shift to happen faster. She was losing the fight to her own dual nature. She was going to die.

Angelica picked up the knife. Her brothers stood there at the altar dumbfounded and not knowing which side to fight for. Their lives were already forfeit. They simply didn’t know it yet. Angelica had the outward appearance of a little girl and as such nobody really considered her much of a threat. Nobody ever considered her at all. She drew the blade across Starr’s throat and watched the flow of crimson roll from the wound. She was strong, but not strong enough to drag the blade through her mother’s spinal column and sever her head. The edges of the wound were already begging to knit closed. Her mother was scrambling for the wolf. Trying to get to a blood source in an attempt to replenish what she had lost and speed the healing before she bled out.

“Help the wolves,” Jackson shouted to his twin. In a swift move, he finished what his sister had begun. He gripped Starr by the hair and twisted the blade, forcing it through flesh and bone until it broke free. His mother stared up at him with eyes blank in death. He felt a twinge of remorse and then quickly dismissed it. She had killed his real parents and it was only fair that he was the one to kill her. “An eye for an eye, mother.”

Jefferson didn’t trust the wolves, but he did trust his twin. He wrestled with the collars and finally managed to wedge his fingers between the tufts of fur, smooth human flesh, and unyielding gold to break them free. He supposed he owed his unintended something and started with her and then moved to Danni. Unrestrained by the collars, the wolves burst out of their human form and shook off the tattered remnants of taffeta and lace. Jefferson eased back carefully, moving slowly and deliberately out of the way, dragging his sister out of the path of destruction along with him.

Jefferson…no his name was Paul and his twin’s was Steven. They would never be called Jackson and Jefferson again. Paul stood still and allowed the she-wolf to sniff him. Covered in vampire blood and his white wedding clothes ruined. He was sure he would make a tasty treat for the wolf. The she-wolf was a creature of immense beauty. Much larger than her natural wolf counterparts, the points of her ears struck him mid torso. Her unearthly golden eyes pinned his in a stare of acknowledgment. Paul had always assumed a wolf was a wolf and retained nothing form its human self. This wolf knew him, barred her teeth at him, but made no move to attack. Her fur was a mix of shades of brown from the lightest fawn to the deepest walnut almost black. She grunted in that way canines did and sat on her haunches contemplating him as he contemplated her. “Steven, stay still.”

Steven? Memories of things forgotten sprang to life in Jackson’s mind. The image of a woman smiling down on him in his crib softly whispering his name as she stroked his baby cheek came out of nowhere. He had forgotten his true name, but his brother never had. The she-wolf approached him, wrinkling her long snout and flashing her teeth in warning. Danni had transformed into a beautiful wolf with sleek fur the shade of a winter’s night. She could kill him with one snap of her powerful jaws. He lifted his chin and swallowed hard at the feel of her hot breath on his throat. “Steven, my name is Steven.”

Angelica admired the wolves. She stretched out her hand to caress the fur and quickly drew it back as the wolf turned to snap at her. Her name was just one more thing that her mother had taken from her. Her mother had condemned her to this living hell before the twins had arrived. She was just as bound now, as ever, trapped within the confines of the body she could never escape. Crouching in the congealing blood, she took in the fall of the only world she had ever known. “We are orphans my brothers. What shall we do now?”

The wolves turned and snapped their heads toward the door. Their ears twitched at the sound of footfalls bounding closer and closer to the room. Steven dropped his arms to his side and motioned for his brother and sister to do the same. This was it. The rescue the women had been hoping for had finally arrived.

Catcher burst through the door. The child vampire had wanted to be found. She left a trail of blood and scent far too easy to follow and it had led the team here. He hadn’t wanted to wait for recon to get a fix on the occupants or the lay out of the building. He had wanted to rush in and rescue his niece, but Daniel had held him back. Very little truly disturbed Catcher, jaded as he was to violence and death. The scene, the blood, and the bodies littering the floor, the sight of his niece and Danni, their wolf fur matted with blood, the male vampires decked out in wedding clothes, and of course the child vampire dressed in frills was more than his mind could allow him to take in. He loosed an unearthly howl from the very pit of his soul. A sound mixed with rage and relief.

“Shit,” Daniel muttered. His eyes flicked from the wolves to the men and the child vampire on their knees in surrender. Relief lightened him somewhat as he pawed through the wreckage of bodies and blood and salvaged a length of white taffeta to shelter the girls as soon as they had gotten control of their wolves again and could change shape.

Emotion had no place here. It was difficult to view the child as anything but a little girl. Cole picked his way through the litter on the floor and restrained the little girl with thick coils of titanium cabling. He couldn’t use the cuffs. Her tiny wrists were too small and she could easily slip free.

David cuffed the male vampires and dragged them to their feet. Oh, the three of them had a hell of a lot of questions to answer. Primarily, what the fuck had happened here? The men offered no resistance and neither did the little girl. He wondered what would happen to the three of them. Who would serve justice on a child who could be every bit as old as Carter himself? Sebastian had been behind the whole thing, he and Starr. The very idea of it sickened him. He was right not to choose a side but to remain a free agent. Loyalty was far too fickle.

Phoenix’s wolf was reluctant to let go of their shared form. Phoenix pounded at the borders of their shared consciousness. The wolf, her wolf padded over to Starr’s severed head and snuffled at her hair. Sometimes, it was best just to let the wolf have her way. The wolf picked up the head between her powerful jaws and dropped it at Catcher’s feet, as if it were a trophy, which to her wolf, it was.

Catcher bowed in respect to his niece’s wolf. She had done well. The gifts she had received from her father had served her on this day. The power of the omega had kept her alive. “Thank you, sister wolf.”

“Danni, it’s ok. You’re safe now.” Daniel crouched into a position of submission on his knees and allowed her wolf to sniff him and recognize him as pack and brother wolf. Her wolf sat on her haunches unwilling to relinquish her shared form. Sometimes, it was simply easier to let the wolf have control. He understood. The wolf knew no fear. The wolf accepted death as easily as it accepted the gift of life. Danni would return to him when she was damn good and ready.

How many more betrayals would the brotherhood and the Guardians have to endure before all of them had finally managed to destroy one another? Sebastian lay in a crumpled heap on the floor. Starr’s head gazed lifelessly up at Catcher. For now, it was over. The last reprieve from the violence had lasted over twenty years. Daniel too had betrayed and been betrayed. He had caused the deaths of his brothers and sisters for the glimmering promise of getting what he thought he wanted. There seemed to be no way to make it stop. History kept on repeating itself over and over again. Perhaps, it always would. For now, the brothers, the pack, and the Guardians, there was nothing left to do but clean up the mess, take what measures they could to ensure the safety of everyone, and serve justice to those that deserved it.

















































Chapter 83

The Great Father faced off against Carter. The incident happened on Guardian territory. One of his very own, Carter’s most trusted second had been the instigator, the betrayer. There was no way to raise Sebastian and Starr back from the dead. Their justice had already been executed. Drew was relieved that the wolves had been returned safe and sound. For the most part, this time the brotherhood had remained relatively unscathed. The Guardians and the pack, however, had taken a very hard blow. Who should dispense justice to the three guilty remaining? The brotherhood, the pack, or the Guardians? Who should act as judge and jury and most importantly, executioner?

Carter leaned back against his desk and eyed his friend. “What do you recommend we do with them? There is no way to determine the full measure of their guilt. Given the things that had been done to them as children. How responsible are they and how subject to the full measure of the law should we hold them accountable?”

“Accountable? Carter, this is your fault. You allowed such a thing to happen right under your very nose!” Drew shouted and pounded his fist on the desk to make sure he had Carter’s attention.

Carter crossed his arms over his chest as if he could deflect the truth in Drew’s words. There was no real knowing of a man’s heart. Drew should know that better than anybody. He wanted to throw stones. Well, they could hurl insults and accusations at one another for the rest of their very long lives and never accomplish a thing. The pack wanted blood and heads served on platters. The brotherhood was, for the most part, of the same mind. The Guardians were divided. Executing two grown men found guilty for their crimes was one thing, but a child. It didn’t matter if the child was as old as he or not. She was still a little girl and nobody wanted that kind of stain on their hands.

Carter wasn’t even certain if the males could be held accountable. A little internet surfing and they had found the men’s true identities. Starr had taken them from their cribs as infants and murdered their parents. This was the only life the twin males had ever known. And this life was a twisted, dark, and far to often demented travesty of a life. He wasn’t certain the males should go to trial at all. Putting them down like rabid dogs might be the best for everyone. What kind of future could the two of them truly have? What made a man guilty or cleared him as innocent and who were they to judge the difference?