Dawn's End

"It has," Carter answered. His body hummed with the feeling of eyes on his back. Bianca wasn't alone. She had others hidden in the darkness. Watching and waiting for her signal.

Bianca walked closer to Carter. Leaning in she whispered, "What of our little Yessette?" The grimace and quick shift of his eyes answered her question. He'd killed her. A mercy killing, yes, but that wouldn't matter to O'Sullivan. He'd want revenge on Carter. He'd follow Carter to the ends of the earth to get it.

She did not want her city to become a paranormal war zone for Eric's little grudge match. It had taken months for her to clean up Eric's last mess. He could do to Carter whatever he wanted, just not in her city. Maybe, she'd get lucky and they'd both take each out and solve the problem for her. Nah. "Eric will be looking for you." The dark prophecy hung spoken aloud in the air between them.

"I know," Carter said. His brow raised as a warrior silently dropped from the fire escape above their heads and landed on silent feet. The warrior, Michael, was one of the Son's best. A smile curved the corners of his mouth as the warrior stalked to Bianca's side and wrapped a protective arm around her shoulders. Even the loveless, it seemed, could fall in love. Anyone who could afford the risk could become ensnared in the tender trap. Not him. Love was too expensive a price to pay.

Bianca snuggled into the safety of the crook of her honey bun's arm and winked at Carter. Better to have him guess at the truth than to realize that Michael had her willingly by the tail. This cat still had claws. "Make certain he doesn't find you here or you'll have more than Eric to worry about. I will have peace in my city."

"You don't know where he is do you?" Carter chuckled. Throwing his head back as he laughed at the irony. "Even now he devils us with the very whisper of his name on the wind." His laughter stopped as suddenly as it began. "Perhaps, I should lure him out. End this for once and for all. I, for one, am tired of the game."

"Perhaps, you are not enough to lure him out. Possibly he desires another."

"You can't mean," Carter said, shaking his head.

"The wolf queen has bore a daughter. Eric was right. Who do you think he'll choose for his bride now that Yessette grows cold in the ground? Who would you choose if your seed could bring life?" Bianca glared at Carter, suddenly hating his ignorance. It was so easy for him to retreat into the solace of his guilt and leave her Guardians and the Sons to pick up the pieces. "What would cost you more than your own death? Who could possibly mean more to you than your own life? What one person could cause you the most pain and still accomplish his goals? You know Eric. He's efficient in his choices. The easiest with the least possible risk will be the one he targets. Who is that Carter? If I were you, that's where I'd begin my search."

Carter bristled beneath Bianca's casual observations. "Shayla means nothing to me," he gritted. "She has chosen her mate well." The Omega already pursued her heart. He'd readily agreed to Carter's plan to protect her. She'd never know at what price her safety had been purchased. He would uphold his end of the bargain as long as the Omega upheld his.

Bianca gave Carter a sarcastic, depreciating glare that said nothing and everything at the same time. "Really?" she taunted. Carter was gone in a flurry of snowflakes and sharply biting winds as quickly as if he'd never been standing there at all. He had fled to lick his wounds no doubt, but to where? The Sons wouldn't take him in and he had no place in her city. The Guardians didn't want him here. Better he'd stayed away than to have returned to all this pain. She snuggled in closer to Michael. "Best prepare for the worst."

Michael nodded. The showdown was coming. Whether it was between O'Sullivan and Carter or Carter and Tracker, he didn't want to guess. It really didn't matter one way or another. The three men, the brothers, Guardians, and wolves were all involved and a bitter, bloody battle and it was coming soon.

Chapter 14

Robert knelt down on the sidewalk and pressed his palms against the concrete. The cold dampness bit into his fingertips and left them stinging. His breath was a cloud of white puffs encircling his bent head. The brothers stared down at him expectantly, unblinking, as if he was a circus charlatan about to perform a cheap parlor trick and they were anticipating a hell of a good show. His gift didn't work like that. Sometimes, it didn't work at all, and other times, it worked far too well. He might conjure up the images they sought or he might drag up an image from twenty years ago, or he might produce nothing at all. It wasn't that he didn't want to help. He just wasn't sure he could. He blew out a curse in a white cloud of exhale and closed his eyes.

His fingers grew numb with the cold. To him, he'd been dragged out of his bed in the middle of the night. To the brothers, it was almost quitting time. In a couple of hours the sun would begin its trek across the eastern sky. Damn if it wasn't just cold out here, but freaking freezing. The leather-clad legs forming a loose circle around him did nothing to keep out the biting winds from the north. The brothers were for the most part oblivious to the temperatures hovering just above zero. He was human, not quite so impervious or unbreakable as they.

Fingers of cold air seeped into the deep pile of his coat and stroked their way over his skin making him shiver violently. He had to focus. Hard to do when all he could think about was the warm bed waiting for him at home. The first image flickered on the periphery of his vision. A little girl dressed for summer in a pair of cotton shorts and a t-shirt fell off her pink bicycle and skinned her knee. Not helpful. Not going to get him back into his bed any sooner. His vision switched to a couple strolled by holding hands, deeply in love. That was also not helpful.

With just a brush of his fingers he could sense vibrations off inanimate objects and reconstruct them into moving pictures. Whispers of the long past and shouts from yesterday, for him, they played on the two-dimensional view screen of his mind's eye. There isn't anything that hasn't been touched repeatedly by everyone. Everyone shed thoughts and emotions. Leaving them behind just the same as they did invisible particles of skin, strands of stray hair, and bacteria all over anything they came in contact with.

Before the Sons taught him better control of his gift he hid from everyone, even the people he loved the most. He could read a person's thoughts, see their past and their present with nothing more than a brush of his fingertips against an arm. A layer of thick gloves kept out the world. Things were better now, not great, but better. He had a relationship with his son again and he'd finally made peace with his ex-wife.

He'd come back to save Cole. It wasn't, in the end, his son that needed saving, but him. Jess had what she'd always wanted. Another man had taken his place and fulfilled her dreams. She had a home filled with love and the laughter of children. He'd left both Jesse and Cole behind. His gift, his curse, had driven him away. He had been the one trapped. Stuck in a quagmire of fear and loneliness and held hostage by his gift. He didn't have to hide anymore. He didn't have to dread a casual touch or the intimacy of an embrace.

He wondered about the possibilities that stretched out before him. Especially on lonely nights when the sheets were cold and the big bed in which he slept seemed all the emptier. He could meet someone. He could have what he'd always dreamed of. He could move on. He owed the Sons and Cole a great debt of gratitude for opening the door he thought would be closed to him forever. He wanted to help. He needed to help.

Robert did not relish the trip into O'Sullivan's mind. He did not want to see what visions his gift might conjure up. He'd taken a tour of the twisted maze of O'Sullivan's mental landscape before and he hadn't cared for it much. The bastard was a lunatic, and a very, very, dangerous one at that.

Pain shot through his cheek as he clenched his jaw tight enough to shatter his molars and ruin thousands of dollars of dental work. One of these days he would have to learn to be careful of what he asked for. Oh...God...was he ever getting his wish in spades. Grotesque images flashed through his mind. The horror of them was enough that he fell on his palms gasping at what he saw.

He needed a physical location. If the Sons could find O'Sullivan they could stop them before the images flashing through his mind became a reality. God help everyone if O'Sullivan's grizzly imagination was ever born into the physical world. Robert was limited by what the viewing field of his mind chose to show him. Nothing that flashed behind his eyes was tangible. The sick fuck was close. That, he could tell, but nothing more. Other than the fact they already knew. O'Sullivan was one demented son of a bitch. Years of therapy wouldn't cure him. There was only one sure fix for the level of depravity that danced behind Robert's closed lids. Death.

The terror of O'Sullivan's plans made bile rise up high in Robert's throat. High enough that he choked and retched the thick, bitter fluid into the sidewalk. Strong hands pulled at his shoulders, tugging him onto his feet. His head spun dizzily as he gasped for breath, wincing at the acidic burn in his throat. He blinked away the last remnants of the vision and struggled to keep from falling into a heap on the sidewalk. "I'm ok," he rasped. When the hands failed to release him, he shouted, "I'm ok!" And shook himself free.

"Dad, what'd you see?" Cole asked. His dad wasn't looking too great. The scent of his terror hung thick and heavy in the air. The smell burned his nose and made him afraid for his father. He knew he should have talked the brothers out of dragging his dad here. He should have told them not to ask. His dad would do anything to help the Sons, to help him. But, seeing his father so pale and shaking like a leaf on a tree, recoiling at the horror of what he'd seen, made him regret that he hadn't done more to stop him from carrying out this gruesome task.

Robert pushed the images to the back of his mind and took a deep, cleansing breath. The concrete beneath his feet was real. The cold bite of the air in his lungs was real. The horror of his mind was not. "Nothing. I couldn't pin down a physical location. O'Sullivan wasn't exactly thinking about apple pies cooling on the windowsill or hot cocoa by the fire. His head is full of ideas for the future. Plans that we can't afford for him to bring to fruition." He pinned his son with a meaningful look. "Short of death, nothing will stop him from getting what he wants. He's biding his time. Waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike. The wolves are in great danger, all of them."

"Shit," Dane muttered under his breath. His brothers and he had been chasing this bastard for months. For an insane maniac O'Sullivan was quite resourceful and always one-step ahead of them. Rumor had it that O'Sullivan was one of the oldest of their kind. Now he knew why. It was damned hard to kill what no one could catch.

Responsible for all the lives in this little town and beyond, he wasn't satisfied with Robert's synopsis of the visions. If it breathed and moved, it left a trail. "Fan out and check the neighborhood and the woods. Again," Dane ordered. The brothers responded to his command with the efficiency credited to their race alone. If the bastard were out there, they'd find him. The Great Father had ordered him captured and brought to him alive. Free will was a wonderful thing and Dane had no intention of doing that. Returning with the son of a bitch's head in a basket, maybe. But, bringing him to their doorstep alive. Never.

"Come on dad, let's get you home," Cole whispered, navigating his father by the shoulders back to the idling SUV.

Robert gripped his son's leather jacket. His son was nineteen almost twenty. Compared to the brothers he was just a baby. A new vampire with his fangs barely broken in. "Do you love her?"

"Maggie? Sure."

"Then find a way to keep her out of this." Robert was haunted by his vision. Cole thought Maggie's humanity was enough to keep her safe. It wasn't. His little trip into the trail of breadcrumbs left by O'Sullivan's mind was enough to for him to see that no one was safe, human or not. "The bastard is here. He's close. If he can use her to get to you and through you to get to the Sons, he will. If you love her, get her as far away from here as you can, son. Keep her safe."

Chapter 15

Shayla was rudely awakened from a deep sleep by the flipping on of the overhead light. Ripped from a most pleasant dream by Tracker riffling through her dresser and closet, stuffing R.J's and her things into a suitcase. Not bothering with the tone of annoyance in her voice, she asked, "What are you doing?"

Tracker was practically naked except for a pair of hastily pulled on gym shorts. He smelled of his wolf, wild and musky, of pine and raw earth from his run in the woods. "Getting you and R.J. to safety." He answered in clipped words as he forced the lid of the suitcase shut. "You're going to Texas."

"Texas?" She sat up in the bed. What in the hell was going on? Something had Tracker rattled to the marrow of his bones. He moved with the grace and stealth of his wolf. His wolf was just barely contained under the surface of that human looking skin. "What are you talking about?"

Tracker's wolf answered his female with a growl. There was no time for a debate. Not time enough for an argument over the topic. He had to get her out of her. Protect his mate. Instinct was hard to battle against. His wolf wanted their mate someplace safe. He wanted the young far from this place and his wolf was going to get what he wanted because Tracker whole-heartedly agreed with him. Sending Shayla and R.J. away would be difficult. Entrusting them to his twin's care harder still. Catcher would keep her safe. Not having to worry about her safety would afford him time to concentrate and take the enemy down. Texas was the safest place for Shayla. "Catcher will take care of you. There's nothing to worry about." He motioned with his hands toward the bathroom. "Go get dressed."

It was four in the morning and he was bossing her around like he owned her. Stubbornly, she crossed her arms over her chest, ignoring the scent of wolf radiating off of Tracker's skin. He was agitated, barely in control of his beast. Arguing with him in such close quarters would not be the brightest thing she'd ever done. However, she wasn't about to let him go all 'I'm the boss because I'm the man' on her either. "Tracker, you're not making any sense. What in the hell are you talking about?"

Tracker flopped a second suitcase on the foot of the bed and began filling it up. He stopped long enough to answer Shayla's question, silencing her with his stare. "I saw him. The bastard has been in our woods. I'm not giving him the chance to get his hands on you."

"O'Sullivan? He's really here?" Shayla asked in disbelief. Sure, she'd heard the speculation and the rumors. She had convinced herself the man she saw in the Super Center was not Eric O'Sullivan. No one was stupid enough to test the combined territories of the Sons and the pack. Not even O'Sullivan had balls enough to put himself on their radar. "Why am I in anymore danger than anyone else? I'm not about to turn tail and run. Go hide somewhere while others are out there risking their lives. Why would he be more interested in me than anyone else? I'm just another one of the pack. I'm not that powerful of a wolf. He's going to go for somebody stronger. Somebody more important than me."

Tracker gritted his teeth at Shayla. She really didn't know. She didn't get it. She wasn't in danger because she was one of the strongest. Her blood and her life were more valuable to O'Sullivan than even that of the Great White Wolf's. Because it mattered to Carter, and there was only one thing O'Sullivan wanted more than a wolf. And that was a way to make Carter suffer.

The goddamned vampire was still in the way. Always inserting himself between Shayla and he. Always! Tracker hated it. He hated that because of Carter he had to send Shayla away and leave the job of protecting her in his twin's hands. This was not a time to be gentle with her and he had no patience in which to spare for her feelings. "Think about it, Shayla. Don't you know why O'Sullivan would want you? Don't you get it? How valuable you are? As long as Carter still loves you and O'Sullivan lives, you will always be in danger. Don't you understand that? Carter still loves you and that fact puts your life at risk."

"I...I...," Shayla stammered. She took Carter's rejection of her as a sign that he didn't want her. She didn't bother to examine the truth any further than that. What was the point? Analyzing the truth wouldn't change a thing. It wouldn't accomplish anything beyond causing her more pain.

Tracker crammed a wad of socks into the suitcase, watching Shayla's reaction as he did so. Realization of the truth washed over her features. Her lips moved, floundering for something to say to lessen the blow of the truth. "Don't," he said. He didn't need brutal honesty rubbed like salt into his wounds. He hurt badly enough as it was.

Shayla slid onto her knees. The long flannel nightgown was trapped beneath her weight. She reached for Tracker. If only she could wipe the pained expression off his face. "Tracker, my place is here and this is where I intend to stay." She pulled her nightgown free and crawled across the mound of covers he'd tossed aside. "I belong here with you. I've chosen you. Nothing's going to change that. Whatever danger we face. We'll face it together."

Tracker closed his eyes. The gentle brush of Shayla's warm lips seared his mouth. The spoken words of her promise weakened him to almost agreeing to let her stay. Almost. Promises, however well intended, would not save her life. Distance, for however long it took, would keep her alive. He rested his chin in the softness of her palm. Her fingers cupped around the rough stubble on his jaw. The warmth of her thumb stroked over his lips, softening the hard line of his mouth. "You have to go. You and R.J., tonight."

Carter wasted no time returning to the woods. He wasted no time talking his way past the guards and up the stairs to Shayla's room. Bianca's casual observations had cut him to the quick and left him raw and bleeding. He hadn't seen it before. How much danger he'd placed Shayla in. She was his Achilles heel. The only weapon O'Sullivan had left to use against him. He lingered in the open doorway of her room, watching her and Tracker. Hearing her promise to Tracker, seeing her lips on his, stabbed at his heart like the cold, steel blade of a knife and produced just as much pain. Hadn't he come here to do the same thing? Whisk her and the baby away to safety and play the big hero? Tracker had already beat him to the punch. "Yes Shayla, listen to Tracker. You and R.J. have to go."

Shayla pulled her hand away from Tracker's cheek as if the warmth of his skin had burned her. As if she were guilty of committing some wrong. The heat of Tracker's lips burned her mouth. Carter filled the doorway. He was a shadow of the man she'd given her heart to. He was thin and gaunt from starvation. His hair was a matted tangle of curls, dropping to his shoulders. His clothes still bore their expensive designer labels, but they hung off his thin frame in tatters. His blue eyes, eyes that once pierced their way straight into the depths of her soul were focused on the rug. Dulled by regret and the toll the last few months had taken on him. She wanted to go to him. Comfort him. Offer her throat to ease his self-imposed suffering. She willed herself to stay put. There was enough danger in the air was it was. "Carter."