He spoke in a lowered voice. “Did he coerce you? Because you didn’t want to be here before, and now you do.”
“I volunteered,” Zoey said, shaking his hand off her arm. “Should you be touching me in front of my mate?” She flashed a poisonously sweet smile as she said that. Ottavio looked rattled.
Dominic walked over to them.
“No, he should not. He will not do it again. And I can here every damn word you say, Ottavio, I may not be a born shifter, but I am a shifter nonetheless, and I’ve got shifter hearing. We’re done here.”
Ottavio let out a threatening growl. “We’re done when I say we’re done.” And he returned his attention to Zoey. “What are your powers?’
“None of your business.” Dominic stepped in between her and Ottavio. “She is my mate. She is here of her own free will. This conversation is over.”
“It is absolutely my business. I need to know everything about her before I decide if she is permitted to stay here. Arturo’s safety is my responsibility.”
“It’s the entire packs’ responsibility! Do you imply that his safety is not my first priority?” Dominic’s ears went pointy and furry, and cruel dark claws shot from his fingertips.
Ottavio’s lip wrinkled back in a snarl. “I imply nothing. I openly state that you have been making many questionable decisions recently, which weaken the pack.” He was looking at Zoey as he said that. Then his lips twisted into an ugly snarl. “We can take it outside.”
“Gladly.” Dominic’s eyes took on that scary glow.
“Enough!” A wave of power rolled into the room, making Zoey’s hair frizz. She felt as if she’d rolled in static electricity.
Arturo strolled in, big and imposing. His cold blue gaze swept the room, and he looked Zoey up and down slowly. “Welcome to our house.” He glanced at Ottavio. “Biting Zoey was a decision that Dominic’s wolf made. I do not expect to hear you bring it up again. As for her staying here, I can sense her powers. She is an Earth witch of low-level magic abilities. She is no danger to me. And my herb garden will enjoy the benefits.” His lips quirked in a brief smile. Then he gestured at Ottavio and Carlo. “Come with me, I require your assistance.”
Ottavio and Carlo followed him out of the room. Zoey waited until they were all gone before she spoke to Dominic. “I said I’d stay under this roof. I didn’t say I’d stay withyou. I would like my belongings moved into my own room.”
Dominic’s expression turned bleak, but he nodded. “I hope you’ll change your mind,” he said, but she was already walking away from him.
Chapter Sixteen
The gardens surrounding Arturo’s mansion were a patchwork of miracles.
Some of the land was xeriscaped, for the dry landscape, with cactus and other succulents and stone arrangements, and statues of wolves. However, there were enormous sections of lush, tropical landscape as well, with a cluster of rain clouds hanging over them. It only rained at night, and it always rained just the right amount. The privileges of ill-gotten gains; Arturo would have needed a full time upper level weather witch on hand to maintain that, which would be ungodly expensive. There were citrus fruit trees and pomegranate trees and banana trees. Waterfalls gushed into crystal pounds.
Arturo had “requested” that Zoey’s friends stay as guests in his mansion for the time being, because he didn’t want the Bianchi pack to be able to use them as collateral again. Nobody turned down Arturo’s “requests”, so there they all were. Danielle, Zoey, Dominique, Cin and Stewart had just finished a late afternoon snack of coffee and biscotti served to them in a gazebo.
At the moment, though, Andrea was blind to the beauty that surrounded them. Her attention was focused on Lorenzo, who was leaning on his crutches and talking to Dominic. And Lorenzo was hanging on every word that Dominic was saying.
He’d suffered shattered ribs, a fractured arm, and broken nose and cheekbones at the hands of the Bianchi pack, and he was still recuperating. Giuliana’s med-mage powers had saved him weeks of healing time, but he was only human.
Cin was in a funk too. Lorenzo used to hang on her every word, and now all of his attention seemed to be laser-focused on the Blood Oath Capo. She was happy that Arturo had relocated the rest of her homeless friends back to the Blood Oath territory, moving them into a motel where they actually were provided with hot showers and food, and he’d even given them all jobs – painting over the vacant buildings that they’d spray-painted. But she apparently hadn’t realized how much she returned Lorenzo’s feelings – until he started ignoring her.
Zoey had no idea what the two men were talking about; she’d spent the last three days treating Dominic as if he were a communicable disease. She couldn’t get past the fact that Dominic would have let a dumb innocent teenager die if she’d refused to stay with him. And Dominic didn’t deserve Lorenzo’s hero worship, but telling Lorenzo that would have been pointless.
“I’ve lost him,” Andrea said miserably. “How can I compete against a Blood Oath Capo? He’ll join the pack and get himself killed.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that. Lorenzo’s not Blood Oath pack material,” Zoey said, then winced. That hadn’t come out right. “I’m not trying to be mean, I’m just saying that he isn’t physically big enough that anyone would allow him to be bitten by a warrior class shifter.”
“They must want my son for something. Why else would Dominic have been talking to him for hours?” Andrea wiped tears from her cheeks. “They’ll use him as cannon fodder.”
Andrea had to be right. Dominic didn’t do anything unless he had something to gain, Zoey thought bitterly.
“If they did that, I’d never talk to Dominic again,” she said, eyes blazing.
“But my son would be dead.” Andrea’s voice was flat and hopeless. Lorenzo’s head was tipped up, riveted by whatever Dominic was saying, his head bobbing with eagerness. “I’m going to my room. I can’t watch.”
“I’ll go too,” Stewart said, standing up with a sigh. “I’ve got a chair to finish.” Arturo had provided Stewart with wood-working tools, and he’d even commissioned multiple pieces of hand-carved furniture from Stewart, which under other circumstances would have had Stewart over the moon. But Andrea’s misery had everyone down in the dumps.
“Yeah, me too,” Cin sighed. “I’m going to go work on some jewelry.”
