Savannah glanced over at Austin’s truck. All the doors were open. “Has anyone seen my rifle and my tranqs? Are they in there?”
“There was nothing like that in the truck,” Rusty said. “I’ll go search the cabins. But we also brought our own.”
“Normal tranqs don’t work on him,” Savannah said firmly. “My family makes a special formula that’s stronger than anything else on the shifter market, and if we don’t have those, my friends, we are in deep shiitake.”
Rusty hurried off, and she heard him telling his men to help him search.
“You want to know why Cliff was looking for me for the last six weeks?” Austin said to Grant. “Because Tully told him about the fucked-up visions I’ve been seeing. He told him that I’m going crazy. Turning rogue.”
Grant looked at him with a surprisingly good imitation of concern. “Fuck, Austin. I’m sorry. I really am.” Or maybe it was genuine. Austin could never really tell what was what, with his family.
“You’re not going crazy,” Cliff growled.
Austin felt a surge of anger. Nice try. Lull him into trusting Cliff, and then Cliff would grab him, tranq him, and shove him in a padded room for the rest of his life. The crazy brother dilemma, solved.
“Yeah, thanks for that. You’ve spent so much time with me, you’d definitely know,” Austin said. “And Korbin would disagree with you.”
“Korbin is the healer for Jason Washborn’s pack,” Cliff pointed out. “And he’s Jason’s uncle. He’s loyal to Jason. Jason loathes you and would do anything to get rid of you, because you publicly humiliated him and handed him his ass.” He held up his hands as Austin started to argue. “I’m not saying it wasn’t deserved. From what I’ve heard, he got what was coming to him. I’m just pointing out that of all the healers in the country that I’d trust, Korbin would be last on the list.”
Savannah was staring at him intently, squinting up at him.
“What?” Cliff said defensively.
“You’ve got a tell. There’s a tiny jump in the muscle next to your left eye when you lie,” Savannah said, frowning in concentration. “But what are you lying about?”
Austin grinned fiercely. His mate didn’t miss a trick, and unlike most people, she didn’t let Cliff’s bulk or his air of dominance intimidate her.
Roy stirred on the ground, and they all froze and looked down at him. He was still unconscious, thank God. But how long would it last?
If they couldn’t find their rifle and tranqs, they were screwed.
Cliff looked annoyed at being called out by Savannah. Good. People should stand up to him more often. “Well, foxy little lie detector, I’m not lying about Korbin. Austin is a Seer. I can’t tell you how I know this, I just know. How am I doing now? Lying, not lying?”
“I…think you’re telling the truth. You think Korbin would actually lie?” Savannah demanded, sounding astonished. “He’s a healer. He took an oath, bound by a Truthmaker.”
Austin hated the hope in her voice – hated it because it gave him hope too. If it were anyone other than Cliff talking, he’d feel differently, but he’d learned from bitter experience how far he could trust his brother.
Hope was sharp and pointy and dangerous. Giving up was easier than fighting. It was easier than wanting Savannah more than anything, wanting to be the man who would protect her and love her and father her cubs, the reason she laughed, the man who made her smile in the morning, the man who made her cry with pleasure at night. Because if he let himself dream of a future like that, only to find out that he’d fallen for more of Cliff’s lies…it hurt too badly even to think about. And he was a man who’d had been shot in the heart with a silver bullet.
But this was worse.
“All that means is that he was telling the truth at the time that he took the oath,” Cliff pointed out. “Which, in Korbin’s case, was twenty years ago. Things change. I think Korbin decided that family politics were more important than his oath. I don’t trust anyone in Jason’s family. I didn’t trust his father, I don’t trust Jason, and I don’t trust Korbin. They’re a nest of snakes.” His voice was growing more and more heated.
Austin was puzzled. He’d never known that Cliff hated the Washborn Pack that much. In fact, he hadn’t even been aware that Cliff was that familiar with them. The bigger packs were aware of each other’s existence, sure, and they met up from time to time, but the Washborns and the Bronsons weren’t close. The Washborn Pack was in the stock market and investment business and lived in Washington State. The Bronsons were in the pharmaceutical business and they lived in North Dakota.
“We’re seeing other healers,” Savannah said firmly, putting her hand on his arm. “You hear me?”
“I don’t want you to let Cliff get your hopes up,” Austin said to her. “Let me tell you what happened the last time I trusted Cliff. I was sixteen. Everyone knew that Cliff wanted to replace my dad as Alpha. When I hit my teens, I got stronger, and all of a sudden I started regularly tying with Cliff or even beating him in sparring contests. Then one day Cliff asked me to sit down and talk to him at lunch, and I ate the sandwich he handed me, tasted something funny, and woke up in military school. Where they regularly beat my ass, starved me, and held my head underwater until I passed out. Then I ran away from military school, and years later, I found out that Cliff was the one who convinced dear old dad to send me away. I don’t play happy families any more. The end.”
Savannah looked at Cliff with horror. “You fuckingdick!” she spat at him. “Seriously. How could you? Your own brother?”
Austin felt a glow of warmth inside. She was genuinely furious with Cliff. She absolutely had his back. Anyone who hurt him was on her shit list, instantly. Until he’d met Savannah, Austin had never realized how much he’d craved that feeling. When he’d joined Tully’s pack, it had been more of a business arrangement. Oh, they liked him, he liked them, but they had asked him to join because he was a stone-cold killer, not because he felt like one of them.
Savannah was his home, and his heart. She was the family he’d never had.
Cliff shook his head wearily. “How could I? Because I didn’t know that the military school would be like that, but I did know that my father hated Austin and planned to kill him. At that point, my father and I were still about evenly matched, and I was too young to get the pack to rally behind me. The Elders wouldn’t have backed me. It was a stalling tactic to save his life.”
“Why did he hate Austin so much?” Savannah asked, her voice hoarse with emotion.
