She turned and looked at each of them, stacking her hands on her hips. No one escaped her glare. If she was my mom, her flip-flop would have been off and in her hand as an unspoken threat, but that may have been taking it a little too far with these shifters. “What do you have to say for yourselves?”
If I hadn’t been standing here watching it happen, I wouldn’t have believed it. I glanced at Carol just to make sure we were seeing the same thing, and she had a knowing smile on her face. They took off their hats, dropped their heads, displaying their epic hat hair, and from what I could tell, each of them mumbled apologies.
“Now,” Deva continued. “Get this bullshit cleaned up before I go find all of yall’s mamas. I can’t believe how badly you’re disrespecting nature. Get that paint off the trees. You think mother nature will put up with your shit forever? Don't make her have to tan your hides.”
All of the pack stood frozen until Deva pointed at two of them and snapped her fingers. “You two, clean the paint off the trees.” She pointed at two more. “You two, get all the trash up and in bags. Now. And make sure to sort out the recycling.”
Everyone ran into action, except for the alpha, Nathan. He stood as if waiting for further direction. “Go help,” Deva said, sounding exasperated. “You’re not above cleaning up your mess!”
The three of us moved to one side and sat on their yard chairs as we watched while they scurried around the clearing. The guys who had jumped off the cliff came up and saw all the hullabaloo, then immediately ducked their heads and got busy. It didn't matter that they were dripping wet, they just joined in and started cleaning.
When it looked quite a bit better, Deva sat up. “Nathan,” she called. “We have a question for you.”
He walked up, pulling his ball cap off once more and flexing his hand around the bill, curving it even more, looking all contrite. “Yes?”
One arched eyebrow from Deva was all it took. She was going to have to give me lessons. Apparently my arched eyebrow pissed people off while hers commanded respect. I must have been doing something wrong. He blinked rapidly. “Yes, ma’am?”
“Emma here has a question for you.”
The young alpha turned to face me, since I was sitting slightly off to the side from where Deva was. His gray eyes looked stormy, but the way his eyebrows pinched together told me that he truly regretted his earlier actions, or at least regretted being called on them.
“I’m looking for my brother,” I said. “Henry Foxx.”
His eyes widened dramatically, the gray circles of his irises perfectly visible. “Henry?" He dragged the hand not holding his ball cap over his mouth and the stubble that sporadically decorated his face. His eyes were full of apology as he said, "Man, that dude is inbigtrouble.”
10
Emma
“What are you talking about? What trouble?” I demanded as Nathan stumbled back slightly at the tone of my voice. He couldn’t talk fast enough to calm my racing heart.
This side of Henry was completely new to me. Getting in trouble? Gambling? Gambling with shifters and vamps? Lying to me? My brother had changed so much. Part of me wondered if Alice knew what he was up to and that was why they still hadn't moved in together. Or maybe they were just that quirky.
Nathan shifted on his feet, switching his weight from one side to the other and back again, as though he was physically uncomfortable with the conversation. “People thought Henry was counting cards. The other night he won a ton of money. Before he could leave, the whole club turned on him, shifters and vampires alike. Asking how he was winning so much and so on.”
“What happened?” I cried, bolting upright from where I'd been sitting on the edge of the lawn chair. “Where is he?”
“He tried to explain with a bunch of math jargon, but it was confusing and high-level. It only pissed everyone off worse. He would have been better off keeping his mouth shut.” Nathan shrugged.
I wasn't sure I believed that he shouldn't have said anything. If it was me and someone stayed silent in the face of accusations, I'd take that as an admission of guilt. I could understand why it only pissed them off even more when Henry started talking math at them. My brother wasn't exactly easy to understand when it came to that subject. His knowledge was just so in-depth and, if I was honest, overwhelming that I can understand them getting pissed off.
“Tell me where he is,” I demanded as I took a step toward the alpha, the fear leaving my voice and being replaced by anger.
“They’d gathered he was doing something like counting cards. Even convinced the owner of the club that he was. After he won big, he got a lot of threats, but the Vampire Mistress that runs the vampires wouldn’t let them hurt Henry. I think because he's human, or maybe she has a soft spot for him. I don't really know. Either way, she warned him about not coming back unless he wanted trouble. And we all know what vamps mean when they say trouble.”
“Then what? He’s not home, and there’s been an incident at the house. Would any of your shifters have gone after him even after the Vampire Mistress said not to?”
Nathan shook his head, swiping the air with his hand to emphasize his point. “We’ve all been here, goofing off and recovering after a big party last night. I'd be surprised if one of my guys went against the Vampire Mistress. But I wouldn’t put much past those vampires. There's some political bullshit mixed up in there that might make them want to do the opposite of what she ordered.”
Great. Political bullshit with the vampires had just been added to the list of things I needed to figure out about the supernatural world.
They should really make a handbook or something.So You've Become Karma. OrThe Supernatural: The Real, the Fake, the Weird.I'd totally read both of those. It would be like theHandbook for the Recently Deceasedbut, you know, for the supernatural.
Deva stood and looked around. I followed her gaze and was surprised to find how much they'd accomplished while we'd been talking. The trees were clean of the paint splatters that had been covering them when we arrived, but the bark was still in place, which was good. I had been worried when Deva asked them to clean it that they'd choose a more destructive path to accomplish the goal.
All the beer cans, bottles, and general trash that had been around the area had been picked up and bagged. The overflowing trash can had even been emptied. I wasn't surprised when I noticed a stack of trash bags by the meeting house, but I was surprised to see a number of green bags as well. They'd followed their orders and separated out the recycling. They could be taught!
We couldn't do much to fix up the actual cottages, but the area had been vastly improved already. Even the grills around the fire pit had been cleaned, the silver bars shining in the light, and pushed back toward the cottages that I assumed they came from. The fire pit itself had been restocked with wood and a fire was just starting to glow within the stack of logs that had been placed within it. They had even moved extra over to the side where the grills had been sitting.
