I watched her face closely. She was worried I’d guess. Not Paul, then who? Further down the ranks things could get murky to an outsider as I had been and really still was. I ran the wolves I knew well through my head, then stopped. Henry? He was a nice guy. Smart and quick. A banker, I thought, but I wasn’t sure, something with finances. He would never—Hmm. “Never” was an awfully strong word.
I wondered how Henry felt about Mary Jo’s crush on Adam.
“Henry,” I said experimentally and watched her face whiten. Maybe she didn’t know how much she was telling me without opening her mouth at all. “Henry was out with you last night. Henry told you to leave the fae alone when they set my house on fire.”
Jesse’s door opened, and Adam came in and shut it gently behind him. He was obviously stiff, and, from the set of his jaw and the tightness of the skin around his eyes, he was in pain as well. If I could see it, he was hurting a lot more than he showed. And the Alpha didn’t show weakness if he could help it.
He was dressed only in a pair of gi bottoms that ended mid-calf, leaving the weepy wounds on his feet clearly visible. Oh, there were other bits in rough shape, but next to his feet, nothing looked all that bad.
“I heard your voice,” he told me, pulling my eyes away from his feet and up to his face. “So I pressed my ear to the door, and even with the noise my daughter calls music blaring, I overheard what you said, Mercy.” He looked at Mary Jo, who had turned around to face him and lost her formal parade-rest stance. She just stood there, looking vulnerable.
Had it been Samuel standing there, I’d have worried that he would be too soft on her. But Adam didn’t really see women as the weaker sex, and he knew how to organize and how to recognize organization when he saw it.
His unreadable face was focused on Mary Jo. “So Henry was there when the fae set Mercy’s house on fire. And here I thought you were out there alone. Because I knew Henry was in the house when I had plainly told him to back you up last night. Doubtless if I asked him, he’d tell me that he thought I only meant for him to be there while the meeting was going on . . . or he’d come up with some other explanation.”
“Henry was the one to tell you my house was on fire, wasn’t he?” I said. Like Adam, I was watching Mary Jo. I couldn’t see her face, but her shoulders tightened. A friend of mine from college, a drama major, told me that the shoulders are the most expressive part of the body. I had to agree with him. She was almost to the point of seeing the big picture, because she expected Adam to say yes.
“I see you’ve followed this to its logical conclusion, Mercy,” he told me, but his eyes were on Mary Jo. “I wonder if she’s seen it yet—or if she’s part of it.”
“Henry ran in and got you out to the trailer before anyone else came out of the house?” Mary Jo’s voice was stark, but she wasn’t arguing.
“That’s right,” Adam agreed. “More or less. He wandered into the kitchen. Before I could ask him why he wasn’t out watching Mercy, he looked out the window, and said, ‘What’s that? Is that a fire? My God, the house is on fire.’ ”
“He knew,” Mary Jo said uncertainly. “He saw them start it. He wouldn’t let me confront them because he was afraid I’d get hurt. He said Mercy and Sam were gone, what was the harm if the upstart coyote’s house went up in flames? She deserved a little hurt because of all the pain she’d caused.”
Mary Jo looked at Adam. “He meant to me. He was really angry about how the vampires had attacked us . . . how I was hurt because they were trying to get to Mercy. He wanted to get back at Mercy.”
“He could care less about me,” I told her. “His girlfriend didn’t like me better than she liked him. Henry was interested in Adam. He saw an opportunity to get back at Adam, and he jumped at it.” I looked at Adam. “The next time you leap into a burning building after me, you’d better make damned sure I’m in there. And wear your shoes, damn it.” I looked at his feet again. “You’re leaking nasty burn ooze on the carpet.”
He smiled. “I love you, too, sweetheart. And thanks to the time you bled all over it, I now know a place that can clean almost anything off the carpet.”
“He wanted Adam hurt,” I told Mary Jo. “Because if he’s hurt, then he’s vulnerable. An Alpha can be challenged at any time. Since Adam is hurt, usually he could put it off without anyone complaining, especially since the Marrok doesn’t allow fights for an Alpha position without his consent. But the pack is—” I looked at Adam. “Sorry, I know it’s my fault. But the pack is broken. Adam can’t put this off—not when the pack is in this much turmoil. If he does, he’s liable to have worse than a formal fight on his hands—he’ll have a rebellion.”
See, I grew up in a werewolf pack. I know the dangers. Not even fear of the Marrok can completely control the nature of the pack. That’s why an Alpha will do anything in his power to hide his weakness in front of the pack.
“Henry challenged you?” Mary Jo’s voice was shocked. “The Marrok will kill him, if you don’t manage it first.”
“Almost right,” said Adam. “Paul is actually the one who challenged me. Climbed in the window of the bedroom about four minutes ago and challenged me in front of Ben, Alec, and Henry. Henry having volunteered to drive Ben to pick up some clothes for Mercy because Ben’s hands are still too sore for him to drive easily and suggested Alec tag along.”
He paused, and said heavily, “Henry is helpful like that.”
Mary Jo nodded. “And Alec is known as a neutral party. Not one of your biggest fans, but not one of the hotheads either.”
Adam continued in a gentler voice. “They must have had some signal so that he and Paul appeared in my bedroom at virtually the same moment when neither Warren nor Darryl was there to interfere. Ben and Henry witnessed the challenge. Henry was appalled that Paul would challenge me when I was hurt.”
“They set you up,” said Mary Jo numbly. “They used me to set you up.”
“That’s what I was trying to tell you,” I said, then added a question casually. “Was it just you and Henry at the bowling alley, or did Paul help, too?”
She nodded, not even noticing all the assumptions I’d made because she was too distracted by the realization that things might not have been as she’d thought they were. “Paul, Henry, and I. Paul suggested it to me. ‘Can’t have a coyote second in rank in a respectable pack.’ ” Mary Jo looked at Adam. “He said she wasn’t good enough for you—and I agreed. Henry was pretty reluctant. I had to talk him into it. He set me up, didn’t he? Both of them set me up.”
I felt sorry for her. But I’d felt more sorry for her before I’d found out that the wolf who’d challenged Adam was Paul. Henry was a good fighter—I’d seen him play fight a time or two—but he wasn’t a tithe on Paul. Paul . . . Normally I wouldn’t worry about Paul taking Adam either, but normally Adam’s feet weren’t oozing goo on the carpet, and his hands weren’t swollen and raw.
That was why I wasn’t sorry enough for Mary Jo that I’d let her escape blame by pointing her finger at the other two.
“The bowling alley was you,” I said. “Oh, Paul wouldn’t cry if Adam and I broke up—but he wants to get rid of Adam more than he wants to get rid of me. Henry . . . Maybe that was the straw that broke the camel’s back for Henry—you’d know better than I. Was that the first time he realized how much you wanted Adam?”
Adam jerked his head toward me. I guess he hadn’t noticed how Mary Jo felt.
“Paul,” began Mary Jo. Then she stopped. Closed her eyes and shook her head. “Not Paul.” She gave Adam a wry smile. “Paul is tough, and he’s not stupid—but he’s not a planner. He’d never have figured out how to force you to accept a challenge before you were ready. She’s right. It’s Henry. What can I do?”