Big Bad Wolf Chapter 19

Big Bad Wolf Chapter 19

To The Point

Luke

What the holy fuck! Fox was a king. That thought kept rolling around in his mind. Eli had distracted him from it before, but that explained a lot about his aristocratic air.

He had both shifter magic and medieval druid magic at his disposal. He was a fox shifter and even though direwolves were the most powerful of the canine shifters, Fox was in a class by himself.

He was likely the most powerful fox shifter on the planet. Why not lead his own pack?

Luke knew his old friend had never submitted to another alpha. He always stayed to himself. He took care of his mate, Artie.

Fox had amassed wealth over his lifetime. He still kept a low profile and lived comfortably with fine things. He had fit into the California lifestyle easily.

His and Artie’s clothes were all tailor-made. He had driven a Hummer. Their home had been a small beachfront mansion.

What about the Elliot situation had his friend, who was far more powerful than Luke ever imagined, so distraught he would willingly join a pack?

He knew his friend was more about protecting Artie than he was about protecting himself. The entire mess with Artie still had him weirded out.

Something wasn’t adding up. Fox was smarter than that. He had a personal reason to want to join the pack, and it wasn’t just about protecting Artie.

His phone vibrated. Fox canceled their meeting again. He asked to reschedule and added soundproofing rooms in the retreat to the meeting’s agenda. Damn it, that meant he would have to wait to find out what the hell was going on.

Well, at least he’d been able to help Fox and Artie with their issues, sort of. Luke hoped there were no more secrets between them, and it seemed as if Fox’s fealty magic was indeed still able to override the shifter magic and protect his mate’s sanity. God almighty, their relationship was convoluted.

Luke had plenty enough pieces to understand his old friends better. Something was still pushing at his mind. That made him want to yank Fox out of his bedroom, tell the man playtime with Artie was being cut short, and shake the man until he explained the missing pieces.

Fox was Ruiri. Luke guessed he wouldn’t take too kindly to having his playtime interrupted. Luke could envision his friend’s ‘wroth wrath’ as Artie described it. His curiosity would wait until tomorrow.

Luke opened the email from Artie and read it and the forwarded email from the leopardess.

Why would a shifter want to torture other shifters? What kind of research were the Pillsanderz people doing? Then he read a name that was familiar to him: Jonathon Sanchez.

It was the coyote shifter that had been in Afghanistan. The man wasn’t one of Luke’s company, but they’d gone out on patrols and scouting missions with other companies. He knew the man and knew Sanchez was a shifter. He’d seen the guy try to save one of his friends, who was dying from a gunshot wound, by turning the man.

Luke and Talbert had helped Sanchez get his friend back to base. The man sat up in the back of the truck like a coyote. Sanchez had shifted to release the magic. His friend submitted and then they both shifted back into men.

The friend shot himself in the truck. Sanchez went stateside for psychiatric evaluation and later retired disabled. He worked with Elliot somehow.

Talbert went missing in Afghanistan for a while. He’d seen Sanchez shift and turn his friend into a shifter. Talbert had followed Luke’s orders to assist Sanchez with the turned man.

Talbert later saw Luke regenerate his ankle enough to run after being shot. The man disappeared after that. Was it too much or was there something else to cause Talbert to go off the rails?

Were his military missions somehow involved with what Elliot was doing? Could there be a connection between Elliot, Sanchez, and Talbert? He was going to have to fill Fox and Javier in on some things and see if they could make more sense of the puzzle.

Luke finished his email and made a few calls. He spoke with his lawyer about signing the house over to Fox and Artie. He had some lunch, then visited Javier.

He needed a sounding board, and Javier was good at seeing the parts Luke missed. It was one thing he’d learned about Javier in the months he’d worked for Luke as a human. It was part of the reason Luke had wanted Javier as his partner and his beta.

Luke was pulling up to the construction site at two in the afternoon. Everything was almost ready for the Mennonites to arrive and begin work on constructing the log cabin. Javier was walking back from inspecting the fencing crew. They met at the garage.

Javier grasped forearms with Luke. “What brings you out?”

“Did you get Artie’s email?” Luke asked his friend as he looked him over.

Something was different about him.

“Yeah, I shared it with Isabell. Her immediate reaction was a panic attack. We got past that. She asked me an interesting question. What if Elliot isn’t looking for immortality? What if he sees being a shifter as a disease? Isabell first met Fox and Artie while trying to find answers. What if Elliot hadn’t wanted to be a shifter, and he’s looking for answers with a more sinister twist?” Javier asked.

He always got right to the point, but something was off about Javier’s appearance, and it was messing with Luke’s concentration.

“Eli told me she wondered if she was sick and tried to find a cure after she first shifted. Maybe Isabell is onto something, especially if Elliot was born a bear and didn’t like his life to be disrupted when he first learned it. It’s another angle to investigate. Was she able to remember anything else that might be important?” Luke asked, trying to focus on the important things instead of figuring out what was different about Javier.

“No, not yet anyway. She’s getting better. She still has panic attacks, and her anxiety level is pretty high. With what she went through, I’m surprised she functions as well as she does,” Javier confessed.

“Did you dye your hair? You look different?” Luke still couldn’t figure out how his friend was different.

Javier laughed. “No, Isabell regenerated this morning. She has her flames back in full force. She turned one hundred twenty-five while she was being held and was too weak to go through the process. A phoenix rises from the ashes every twenty-five years. I was holding her as we slept to keep the nightmares away. Nothing happened.”

Luke conciliated and wiped the knowing grin off his face with a dramatic effect. Javier shook his head, grinning too.

“She woke to find the flames regenerating her and me. Look at this,” Javier said, as he removed his shirt.

“No more chest wound scars.”

“Holy shit. Did it burn?” Luke inspected his friend’s chest. All the wounds that had scarred over when he became a direwolf were gone.

“No, the fire coated me in fine ash afterward. No grey hair, no scars, and my lungs are clear. My crooked toe I broke playing football as a kid is straight, all perfect. I feel fantastic. If you think I look different, you should see how beautiful Isabell looks.” Javier grinned like the Cheshire cat.

“Where is she?” Luke asked.

“Down by the lake, painting me,” Javier said, still grinning.

“Why is she painting your sorry ass?” Luke joked with his friend.

“You’re just jealous because she’s not painting you.”

Javier shot the eighth-grade juvenile taunt back at Luke. Luke smiled.

Isabell was good for his friend. Javier needed something positive to refocus his life. Isabell did that for the man in spades.

“I think she likes you,” Luke said, just to see Javier’s reaction.

“I hope so, because I like her. I wish she was healthy so I could ask her out. There’s this crazy part of me that wants her to stay messed up, so she’ll still want me around.”

Javier shook his head at that admission. It surprised Luke.

“Don’t even tell me how messed up that is. I know I’ve got it bad for this girl. The worst part is she’s so innocent. She’s seventy-five years older than me, and I’m the experienced one. Thank God, you turned me. Winning her may take forever.” Javier whined.

Luke liked Isabell even more while he watched Javier’s face. She made him a better man. He lit up talking about her.

It was good to see Javier happy. He and Eli had weathered a lot of years in limbo when their relationship failed. Javier was a good guy. He could make Isabell happy.

“I’m glad to see you enjoying your role.” Luke smiled at Javier’s obvious happiness with his infatuation with Isabell.

“I need to talk to you about Fox.”

The Talbert, Sanchez, and Elliot connection got shelved to the back of Luke’s mind as he tried to work out what was going on with Fox.

“You talk, I listen, and Fox never finds out. Gotcha, so shoot. What’s troubling the alpha that his beta needs to know?”

Damn, Javier was uncanny with that talent of perception he had. It was almost as cool a talent as Eli’s dream talking, except it was simply who Javier was. It had nothing to do with magic.

He was good at reading people and the situation. He also had a knack for speaking in a way which left one feeling as if it wasn’t super weird that he knew all that. The man had skills.

“What do you think of him?” Luke asked first to get his head in order.

“Cool, old uncle, who has a kinky relationship with your favorite auntie. Wears a face of calm assurance, thinks deep, and has a keen intellect. He likes puzzles and wants to solve them. I like the guy, even though he’s a bit of an aristocrat. A powerful alpha male. Why do you ask? I can see from your expression you agree with my assessment. What are you chewing on?”

Javier asked, always blunt and to the point.

Thank you for listening to a part of Big Bad Wolf by Ophelia Kee.

Thank you for your support! Welcome to the dream… Sincerely, -OK

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