Vanessa took a deep breath. She had avoided thinking about this for so long, but ignoring her past clearly didn't make it go away. It was time to try something different.
"When my mother was accepted in their pack, the high priest had a dream."
"A dream?"
"He was said to have prophetic dreams. A gift from the great Moon Goddess who had chosen him as her emissary on this earth to usher the planet into a new era. The era of the white wolf."
Green blinked.
"It was more of a cult than a pack," Vanessa explained. "The high priest wasn't the alfa, but everything he said was treated as law."
"And he made a prophecy about your mother?"
Vanessa shook her head.
"About her daughters."
"Daughters... you have sisters?"
"Had. A sister. She died."
"Oh. I'm sorry," Green said, reaching out to take her hand and squeeze it.
"It happened long ago," Vanessa said, though to her it still felt as if it had happened only yesterday.
"That doesn't matter," Green said.
Vanessa nodded and reached out for her glass of juice. She gulped it down until the tightness in her throat eased.
"Anyway, according to the prophecy one of my mother's daughters would deliver the white wolf into this world."
"And they thought that meant you?"
"No, it could have been either my sister or me. Which was why the alfa and the high priest decided that when we grew up the high priest would marry my sister and the alfa's son would marry me."
She felt Green's hand tense up and she kept her gaze on the red-checkered tablecloth in front of her. She didn't think she could tell the rest of the story if she was looking at him.
"I don't like to think about my childhood. It's not important anyway."
"Of course it is."
"Not to explain why they're here," Vanessa said, clearing her throat. "My sister was three years older than me. When she was fifteen the high priest decided that it was time for her to join him."
"Fifteen!"
"My mother argued that she was too young and refused to give her up. It's the only time I remember her standing up for us, for anything." Vanessa took a deep breath and tried not to remember the screams and the blood. "They killed her. We tried to fight them, but there were twenty of them and three of us so... Isha and the high priest were married that night."
"You mean to tell me that they killed your mother before your eyes and made your sister marry the man who'd ordered it?"
Vanessa nodded. She pushed away the plate of food before she threw up over it. They said time healed everything, but it had been ten years and she hadn't done any healing.
"I'll kill them," Green vowed.
Vanessa had to smile at that. "That's what I said," she told him. "And I would have, but two weeks later Isha managed to sneak out from the encampment. It was set near an old gold mine and there was a high drop and she... she jumped."
"Oh, my god," Green said. "I'm so sorry. You don't have to tell me anything more if you don't want to. We can..."
Vanessa shook her head. She needed to finish this and he had to know. "They got me started on the blue powder the next day. Figured that if they could keep me docile I wouldn't take myself out of the equation like my sister did."
"How long were you drugged for?"
"Three years. They stopped giving it to me a week before I turned fifteen and was set to marry the alfa's son."
"Jesus."
"The thing is that it's a new drug, and no one had been on it as long as I was, so they didn't really know what they were doing and what doses they should give me. I don't remember much of those years. I have dreams now sometimes of strange worlds that remind me of where I spent those years. It wasn't so bad a place to be lost in. It beat being in the encampment, that's for sure."
"How did you escape?"
Vanessa smiled. "Like I said, they didn't know how it would work. They reduced the dose gradually before the wedding, but I went through a terrible withdrawal anyway. The only thing I remember clearly from that time is a silver knife I kept seeing in my dreams
The wedding is a bit of a blur. I remember there being lots of food. Then Shane escorted me to the tiny building that was going to be our house."
She still remembered the feeling of his hand on her arm. Hard enough to bruise as he dragged her inside the house and into the bedroom. He'd told her to get undressed. When she said no he'd used his alfa voice on her and she'd been mildly surprised to discover that it didn't work. Mildly surprised, because she'd been too groggy to feel anything more intense.
"I had grabbed one of the knives from the table at her wedding dinner and I drove it through his heart," Vanessa said.
That action had been almost automatic, she reflected. It was almost as if she hadn't been in control of her own body, like someone else had reached through her and made her walk up to Shane and drive the knife into his heart.
No, she thought. She'd killed him. It was the drugs that made it seem like it was happening to someone else, the drugs that made her strong enough to drive the blade through his chest despite him trying to hold on to her arms.
"They used silver knives?"
"What? Oh, yes," Vanessa, startled from her memories. "Only the newlyweds and the guests of honor. They thought I was too gone in the head to be a threat."
"But you weren't?"
Vanessa shook her head. "Like I said, they didn't know what they were doing with that drug."
That was the only reasonable explanation to why she'd had the strength to overpower a larger and more powerful wolf, why she to this day remained unaffected by alfa commands.
"And then you ran?"
"Not quite."
Vanessa had only fragments of memories from that night. She remembered standing over Shane's body, seeing the blood on her hands and pulling the knife out. Her next memory was standing over the snoring high priest.
"I went to the high priest's house and killed him too."
"Didn't he have bodyguards?"
Vanessa shook her head. "He always said the Goddess would protect him and send him a vision of any danger approaching."
"Arrogant."
"Try deranged," Vanessa said. "But he was able to predict a whole lot of things when I was growing up. He didn't expect me, though."
He'd opened his eyes right before she'd brought the knife down. She'd never forget his look of complete surprise. Whenever fear of her old pack catching up with her had haunted her over the years that was the image she focused on. He'd thought he knew everything and he'd never seen her coming.
"But then you left?"
"I wasn't done yet," Vanessa said. "I went to the alfa's house."
Green cursed softly. "There's no way he wasn't protected by a bunch of wolves."
Vanessa smiled softly. "I didn't even get into the house."
"How did you survive?"
"His wife met me on the porch. She gave me my birth certificate, some money and the keys to the alfa's car."
"To save him?"
"No, to save me."
"Did she know you'd just killed her son?"
Vanessa nodded, tears coming into her eyes as she remembered. "She knew."
"And she still helped..."
"Must be hard, don't you think? To know you've given birth to a monster?"
Green frowned. "Yes, but not a lot of people admit that to themselves."
"She didn't have much choice. She was my aunt."
Green flinched. "You married your cousin?"
To her great surprise, Vanessa laughed. "After everything I've told you, that's what you're most disturbed by?"
"No, but it's still disgusting," Green said, crossing his arms.
"A great many things in my childhood were. Anyway, she gave me those things. I asked her to come with me, but she gave me a hug, took my knife and told me she'd slow them down."
"With a knife?"
"I hoped she'd try killing the alfa, but I don't think she did. I don't think she could," Vanessa said.
"Why not? He sounds like a horrible person."
"He was, but they were mates."
Green's eyes flew to Vanessa's as if he suddenly thought he understood why she'd been doing her best to keep her distance since the moment they'd met. Vanessa stared back. It wasn't the only reason, but knowing that one's destined partner could be a psychopath did make a person think twice about falling in love.
"I'm sorry," Green said and reached out to take her hand. "Is that when you came here?"
"Yes. I had dual citizenship and I knew I couldn't hide in Australia for long. There's a lot of uninhabited land, but the things hiding out in the bush make werewolves seem like cuddly pets."
"And you've been on the run since?"
"More or less. I mean, I've settled in for a few years at a time, but it's not easy to be without a pack," Vanessa said with a pointed glare at him.
"I'm sorry."
"I know," Vanessa said and realized that she wasn't angry with him anymore. Not about running her out of Tell City or following her or insisting they belonged together. Maybe it hadn't ever been him she was mad at.
"I still love you," Green said, making Vanessa shake her head in amazement.
He cut off as Vanessa's phone began ringing. She picked it up without looking at the display.
"Yes?"
"Where are you now? Why haven't you called?"
"Hi, Lettie. We are well, thank you, and how are you?"
"We don't have time for social niceties," Letitia snapped. "Where are you?"
"In the yellow house like you said."
"What? Still?"
"Yeah, we..." Vanessa cleared her throat and did her best not to blush when she thought about what they'd been doing that morning. "We had a bit of a lay-in."
Green smiled widely at her description of how they'd spent their time and she felt his hand travel along her thigh under the table.
Vanessa nearly dropped her phone and Green laughed.
"I bet you did," Letitia said. "Have you forgotten that there are people following you?"
"You said we'd be safe!"
"For a few hours! Not for all of eternity!"
"That's not what..."
"Listen, they're tracking you and while they may be dumb and a bit inbred, they're not completely incompetent. You need to get going!"
"Fine," Vanessa sighed, pushing Green's hand away. "Where?"
"New Orleans. And no more dallying."
"Ma'am, yes, ma'am," Vanessa snapped, but Letitia had already hung up.
"Time to go?" Green asked, sounding resigned.
"Yes," Vanessa said and froze when she heard a sound she'd hoped she wouldn't hear while they were still in Utah.
"Wasn't that..." she started.
"A wolf howl," Green said, already moving. "Let's go."