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"Huh." Cai watched him in the mirror. Rand switched lanes, passing a farm truck. The passing margin was narrow enough that, less than a blink later, an oncoming semi passed them, rocking the van with its concussion. "You know," Cai observed, "I forgot to ask how long it's been since you've driven a vehicle. This is a little different from a commercial mower."
"The concept is the same," Rand said, unruffled. "Just faster."
Cai grunted. His eyelids were drooping, but he forced them to stay open a little longer.
"End-of-the-earth West Virginia is a big area. Why do you think that pack will have crossed paths with our merry band of Trads?"
"Fane had traveled there in his younger years, taken pictures. He and Lynn showed them to us when they visited us in Colorado. Some of the geographical features you discussed looked like what was in those pictures. He also described the area, in case they did get their wish to live there and we tried to find them."
"You were close with them," Cai noted.
"Yes. A long time ago." Rand lifted an uncomfortable shoulder. "But after Grey...I think Dylef, Sheba and I were afraid to make old contacts, bring trouble to anyone's door. Plus, once we settled in a more human-inhabited area, there were the pups to consider...just the daily demands, and then Dylef and my relationship wasn't something we felt like hiding, and we weren't sure how Fane and Lynn would feel about it. The years stretched out. We should have gone to see them."
The reasons not to have done so seemed ridiculous now. Rand pushed away the too-familiar surge of guilt and continued. "Most shifters do live primarily as humans, though on the fringes of towns and cities, so they can let their wolves run. This pack that might be near where these Trads are...I guess you could say Fane and Lynn are the wolf version of Trads, in their preference to be more wolf than human, though they do maintain connections in the human world. Their children have sought professions in those worlds, while the parents have stayed in the forest. Fane runs a home-building company that specializes in mountain get-aways, vacation homes, which lets him stay on the fringes of the deeper forest he prefers."
"Sounds like the perfect fit for you," Cai persisted. "You prefer to be more wolf than human, and I expect he could find a place for you on one of his building crews."
"It's not that simple," Rand repeated, with a touch of impatience. "Even beyond protocols, there's a probationary period. Some are immediately rejected as a threat."
No matter that he looked as if he was half-asleep, the vampire proved his brain was sharp and alert as he put it together. "There's room for only one alpha, and you're definitely an alpha."
"A sterile one, for all intents and purposes," Rand said, though it hurt to say it that way.
"One that won't snake in on another alpha's territory."
"No. And what I am, who I am...it's confusing to the way a wolf pack works. Wolves like continuity, consistency. Things that make sense. When a leader is already in place, but pack members begin to defer to me, it causes problems, even if I'm not making a play for the leadership. Because..."
"Because one of the main roles of the alpha male is mating with the alpha female. You did it with Sheba. You can't fake it enough to find yourself a place?"
Rand kept his eyes on the road. "You should rest. You're not at full strength yet and the sun will rise in a couple hours."
"None of my business. Got it." But Rand could feel Cai's eyes resting on him before he stretched out behind the second set of seats. A rattling, and the sound of the floor trapdoor opening, told Rand the vampire had decided to avail himself of the space between the actual and false floors. Earth packed in the walls around the cramped space made it possible for a mature vampire to travel during sunlight. While Jacob had warned that it wouldn't be incredibly comfortable, at least Cai was used to digging himself into the earth, so the familiar scent might make it less uncomfortable for him than for most vampires.
Rand turned his mind to the pack he'd discussed with Cai. The last time they'd crossed paths had been out in Colorado, before Sylvan had died. Lynn's aging mother was in West Virginia, so Fane and she had decided to move back there. They'd been part of a California pack, but the dynamic in that was changing, growing too large, and they were ready to split off with their offspring and form their own. Lynn had sent Sheba a postcard shortly before Grey's invasion, noting that her mother had passed and they were going to move deeper into the woods. Go off grid, as she and Fane had longed to do for some time. Their two litters were growing up strong and healthy, the foundation to a good family pack.
When he, Dylef and Sheba had to cut and run, they'd played with the idea of tracking Fane and Lynn down, but they'd detoured to Tennessee when Dylef had the good job opportunity there with the Park Service. Since Sheba and Dylef both gravitated toward the human world, Rand had followed their wishes because he loved them.
If he'd tried harder to get them to join Fane, they'd have had more protection. So many pointless what ifs. It was what it was. To Cai it was all about practical considerations. Go join this pack. Do this, do that. Yet when Rand was close to another wolf shifter, the memories of Dylef, Sheba and the pups crowded in, so hard he could barely breathe. Seeing another pack play and touch, rub against one another, run together...
If the hunter had shot him in the chest three times, it could not hurt worse than how Rand felt when he remembered those things.
Cai's initial reluctance to get back into Rand's head meant that he'd missed why Rand had been able to accept the third mark so readily--after they got past the Split part, that is. It was a way to be in a pack a different way, bonded to the vampire. It helped ease that ache in Rand's chest, without taking him too close to the jagged grief that made him worry he wasn't ever going to be strong enough to get that close to his own kind again.
Cai was right. Lone wolves didn't exist except where one was too injured or broken to be part of the pack. Or, in the case of a shifter, one who had no idea where he belonged anymore. Or if Rand could bring himself to want to belong.
He started as an arm slid over his chest. Cai rested his chin on the seat back. Rand had been so deep in his head, he hadn't heard the vampire emerge again. Cai's fingers tunneled inside his shirt, caressing his chest. He didn't say anything. Didn't indicate whether he'd heard Rand's thoughts. Just sat there and stroked while Rand drove. He stayed that way until the sun started to threaten the horizon with glimmers of rose and gold light. Then Cai squeezed his pectoral lightly, offered a teasing caress of his nipple, and withdrew, putting himself beneath the false floor again.
Rand drew a steadying breath and decided to fish around in the bag for food. It was better than thinking about what it all meant. He found a pack of homemade cookies and several ham sandwiches, and ate them all, which also helped. Food always did, but the quiet solidarity of a very unpredictable and hard to understand vampire had as well.
By late afternoon, Rand had reached their destination, a national park where the hiking trails would start leading them deep into the mountains and beyond the touch of human civilization. He parked in a corner of the lot and laid the seat back, intending to catch some sleep before twilight. He used the burner phone to text Gideon where the van would be and their current location. Greenwald's cronies would probably come and pick it up.
As Rand drifted toward a doze, he thought about his earlier conversation with Daegan and Gideon. Both of them were hunters, in every sense of the word. Despite the earlier confrontation with Cai, Rand had felt comfortable in their presence. He thought Gideon would have made a pretty good wolf. He'd also been honest with Cai about his understanding of Cai's actions, for when Gideon opened the door for Rand at their quarters, Rand had scented no lingering antipathy toward the absent vampire.
Anwyn was curled up on the couch in their suite, a glass of wine close to hand and a book on her lap. She wore a light robe that clung to her curves and suggested that the two vampires had found other ways to restore Gideon's strength.
Gideon was putting on a f
resh shirt when Rand arrived; he'd opened the door with it unbuttoned and open. He'd already changed into a non-bloodstained pair of jeans and, though the wound was still angry and red, it was knitting and Gideon looked steady on his feet. Daegan's blood had restored him quickly.
The female vampire appeared wary of Rand, but didn't show the open hostility she had toward Cai. "Is your Master healing?" she asked politely, surprising him.
"He's not my Master, but yes." Despite the assertion, Rand felt an unmistakable satisfaction, knowing his own blood had provided equal benefit to Cai.
"Good. Means he'll be leaving sooner than later," she said.
"You're always saying I need to be taken down a peg or two," Gideon pointed out to her. "Some vamp has the cojones to do it; excellent fast strike, by the way"--Gideon tossed that to Rand--"and you get mad at him."
"Call it the capriciousness of women," she said, an edge to her voice.
"The craziness, you mean." He snorted, but his expression upon her was fond. Daegan sat in another chair, cleaning and sharpening that sword. He nodded to Rand without speaking.
It put Rand in an odd place. Cai wouldn't want him making apologies or excuses for him, and it wasn't Rand's place to do so. Yet this world had so many unfamiliar protocols for vampires and servants. He didn't know if showing up like this to get the information they'd been invited to have would be considered rude, since it was the servant who had come for it, instead of the vampire.
Gideon's relaxed behavior helped ease Rand's mind on it, particularly as he spoke again. "When I wasn't worrying about my heart getting ripped out of my chest, I noticed you're a good fighting team. You slid in there almost seamlessly to take on Brian. Good thing you didn't crush his arm. Lyssa's almost as fond of that geek as she is of Jacob.
"You should do some of that," Gideon continued thoughtfully. "Spar with a pair like me and Daegan so you can coordinate moves and tactics. It's done wonders for my fighting style when I'm with him."
He nodded to Daegan. The vampire had sheathed the sword, the scabbard balanced on his knees as he watched the conversation with an unreadable expression.
Rand remembered hunting with Dylef, moving together as one, cornering a deer, bringing down the creature with the help of Sylvan's offspring, to feed Sheba when she was pregnant. "I'll keep it in mind. Is that some of the information you want to share with me?"
"Yeah. We'll go over some other stuff. If Cai's as well-versed with the Trads as he said, he's right. He doesn't need a lot of direction from us on that part, but I suspect this is the first time he's going in with backup, so most of our suggestions will have to do with different extraction scenarios and working as a team. I get the feeling that's not been his forte in the past."
