Burn Bright (Alpha & Omega #5)(24)

Because he was talking to Sage, he could watch his mate through the largish picture window in the main room of the cabin. Anna was leaning up against the truck staring at Jonesy’s parting gift of flowers—or the flowers that the earth had given Jonesy as a parting gift.

She had been hurt—and he wasn’t talking about the wounds she’d taken from the silver or the ones she hadn’t taken from the flying bullets. His mate had been hurt, and, for all his best efforts, he had not been able to stop it.

If she had never become the victim of the Chicago pack’s desperation, who would she be?

Would she have found someone else? A boy her age? Sweet and strong, full of hope—unfouled by centuries of killing? Could she have made a home with some other man? Had a dog, a couple of cats, and 2.3 children?

The only thing that he knew for sure was that Anna wouldn’t have been crying over a pair of dead werewolves, one whom she’d tried to save and the other whom she had killed herself.

Brother Wolf huffed at Charles’s self-indulgence. And maybe she’d have been crying over the death of someone else she couldn’t save. Grief is not the sole purview of werewolves.

Even more indignantly, Brother Wolf continued, Maybe she’d have found a serial killer to marry, maybe she’d have married a gentle soul like herself and always wondered why she was so bored. But she didn’t. She found us. She didn’t need to find anyone else.

Charles felt Brother Wolf stir restlessly inside him until he found some surety amidst Charles’s guilt.

She would have found us even if she had never met Leo or Justin. There was no doubt in Brother Wolf. She has always been ours. She will always be ours.

“Charlie?”

Sage’s voice was a tentative question where she’d been all business before. The change brought his attention back to their conversation.

“Yes?”

“Have you heard from Bran? I mean, we all felt her die through him. Leah thought he’d call the house to see what happened, but he hasn’t. She tried his cell, but it went right to voice mail. I know he’s supposed to be out of the country, but his phone is a satellite phone. It should work wherever he is.”

Charles frowned. “Both of us left our cell phones at home. They’re in the office—you can check to see if he called.”

“We know, we did. And there’s been nothing. We were hoping that maybe he’d gotten in touch the other way.”

If something had happened to his phone, Bran could talk to his pack mind to mind. He couldn’t hear them in return, but it was still a handy thing.

“No.” And wasn’t that odd? And unlike Bran. Almost as unlike Bran as taking a vacation in Africa.

Sage squeaked, then Tag’s soft voice said, “What are you doing with Hester’s body and Jonesy’s … leftovers? He was the sort who wouldn’t leave a body.”

Charles paused. He’d been going to bring Hester back for cremation and burial—the same as for any pack member who had no other family to make decisions for her. Tag sounded like he knew Hester and Jonesy a lot better than Charles did, enough better to know what would happen to Jonesy’s body.

“What do you think we should do?” he asked because Tag wouldn’t have voiced the question without having an opinion.

“Hester’s people burned their dead with their homes and possessions—freeing their spirits from the mortal world.” Tag was enough of a Celt to make that sound poetic and stubborn enough that he would insist on it now that Charles had asked him his opinion.

Charles shouldn’t have asked.

“It’s high summer,” he told Tag. “The cabin is in the middle of the forest. If we start a fire here, we’ll have the whole forest up in smoke.”

Tag made a negative sound. “All due respect,” he said. “But that cabin had a firebreak all around it. I recleared it this spring myself. We had rain last week, so the underbrush is damp. If we light it at night, we can keep an eye out for stray sparks.”

Tag had been Bran’s contact with Hester and Jonesy, Charles realized. Bran liked to do that. Give the wildlings some contact in the pack other than himself in the hopes of helping the wildling to remain stable. Usually, that other person was Charles, Leah, or Asil. If not one of them, he should have at least picked a wolf more stable than Tag, who was nearly a wilding himself … but if the two wolves had known each other from an earlier time, it would make some sense.

Outside, Anna pulled the emergency blanket out of the truck and climbed into the truck bed. She shook the blanket out, then, with a graceful flick of her wrists, flipped it to cover Hester.

“She was old,” Tag was saying. “And tough. She survived things that would make your red fur turn gray—and she did it with style. On her own terms. She deserves what we can do for her.”

“I agree,” Charles said. “Tell Sage I’ve changed my mind. We’ll still gather all the pack up here to check things out—but it will be a funeral, too. We’ll need food and drink. Fuel enough to burn the house to the ground.”

“Gasoline and diesel?” Tag asked, as Anna came into Hester’s living room.

“Ask Asil,” said Charles.

“Asil?” Tag said doubtfully. “He’s old. Older’n me. What’s he know about setting a house on fire?”