Help Wanted

Leo’s POV

I asked Ian, Dorothy, and Amy to join me for the phone call. They gathered the opened bottles of wine and spirits and some of the food to bring along. The twins and Sharkbait’s security detail headed off to bed, and Linda went back to her room to start editing the video she’d shot today.

It was disconcerting having a mermaid around in such proximity, but Sharkbait trusted her, and I would learn to. They weren’t exactly an issue in the middle of the United States, preferring small coastal towns on the oceans. Only Vicki could have bridged the gap, just like she did with the vampire nation.

It was early morning back home, and even earlier in Oregon, which was two hours behind Miesville time. I sent a meeting invite over text message to Alpha Steven, Olivia, and Adrienne while we rode up in the elevator. Almost immediately, I got a call back from my mate. “What’s going on, Leo? Is everyone all right?”

“Everyone is great, but you know how good Vicki is at creating headaches. This one is a whopper, and I’ll need your help.”

“What happened?”

“She got her second chance. I’ll tell everyone at the same time, all right? We’re heading back to my room now. Love you.”

“I love you, Leo. Talk to you soon.” By the time I had everyone settling in my room, which was on a different floor so Vicki wouldn’t smell me, I’d gotten confirmation texts from the others. I set up my laptop for the videoconference; it used encryption so we could talk freely. We sat back far enough that all four of us could be seen on the camera, and waited for the others to get on.

Brent and Olivia were on first, quickly followed by Adrienne. It took a few minutes for Alpha Steven and Luna Carolyn to get on, and then I started. “Good morning, everyone. Did you get a chance to see the wedding?”

“It was beautiful,” Adrienne said.

“I’m so jealous of the weather,” Olivia agreed. “Amy, you looked beautiful too.”

I turned to Ian and Dorothy. “You might recognize these two from the video. This man is Ian Corcoran, formerly of the Australian SAS and recipient of the Victoria’s Cross. Hammer invited him because Ian saved his life in Africa years ago. His wife Dorothy and son Nicholas came as well.”

“Was Nicholas the one sitting with Vicki,” Olivia asked.

“Yes, he was her date,” I replied. “Has she talked to you recently?”

“Not for two days,” Liv said.

Great; the kids hadn’t called home before starting to mate. I’d have to tell. I let out a breath, deciding to go for the band-aid approach. “Ian and Nicholas are werewolves, and Nicholas is Vicki’s mate. They are in his room completing the bond right now.”

I didn’t say anything; I just watched the emotions play over their faces. Shock, confusion, finally ending on wide smiles and pure joy for Vicki, finally catching a break in the love department. “My baby is mated?”

I smiled back at Olivia, the former human waitress who had a fling with my brother, and my niece was the result. Her mate Brent was hugging her to his side as the tears flowed. “He’s a good kid, and I’m sure she’ll talk to you later tonight after they emerge from their room.”

It was Adrienne who caught on first. “There aren’t supposed to be any werewolves in Australia,” she said. “Ian, what Pack are you with?”

“That’s the problem,” Ian replied. “My entire family descends from Philip Corcoran, who the British imprisoned at thirteen years of age and transported here after the 1798 Irish Rebellion. Up until today, I didn’t know what a Pack, a Mate, or an Alpha was. Everything we know about being wolves got passed down from our ancestors.”

“How many are you?”

“Eighty-seven in the extended family, fifty-six of whom are werewolves. The rest are like my Dorothy, humans we have married and started families with. There are small family groups of ten or less along the southern coast and Tasmania.”

Adrienne was gobsmacked; it was inconceivable that the Council didn’t know about that many wolves, or that the Aussie wolves didn’t know about werewolf life. The Council would freak about thirty-one humans with knowledge of our kind, much less so many wolves not under Council and Alpha control. “What did you know about werewolves before today?”

Ian let out a sigh. “Secrecy was the most important thing. To be revealed was to die, so we rarely shift unless we are miles from any humans. If one parent is a werewolf, the children will be too. We avoid sex unless we find someone we can love and trust to keep our secrets, someone like my Dorothy.” He lifted her hand to his lips, then continued. “Biting someone will kill them horribly and painfully over a day or two, so we don’t do that.”

“There are thirty-one humans in your family,” Alpha Steven asked. “Are any your mates?”

“There are thir females and one male,” Ian replied. “As for mates, we didn’t know what that meant. What Vicki described to me is something I’ve never felt. We marry our spouses, and we damn sure don’t bite them as it would kill them. As for bringing humans in, we kind of had to. We can’t marry our cousins, right?”

Adrienne was starting to see what I was referring to with the headaches Vicki could cause; she rubbed her temples and looked back at the camera. “Ian, what do you know about Philip Corcoran’s family? Where in Ireland did he hail from?”

“The Wicklow Mountains,” he said. “Philip sent a letter back to his parents after he was a freeman. Eighteen months later, he got a letter from the local priest. Philip’s entire family died in the rebellion or the reprisals. The soldiers burned their homes to the ground. That’s why he never thought to return to Ireland; there was nothing there for him anymore.”

“Do you know his parent’s names? Or any of the other members of that village?”

“No,” Ian replied.

Adrienne was already thinking. “The European Pack genealogies are available through the Council so I can start there. What rank was Philip?”

“Beta rank,” I said. “Feels like low Beta, but their dominance could have weakened over the generations.”

“I’ll see what I can find. Maybe some of the wolves escaped to other Packs, or they moved elsewhere,” Adrienne said.

“I think we need to keep all this secret until we are ready,” I said. “No one has even told the people here about wolves yet. The last thing I want is a bunch of Council fools running down here with Alpha-bloods hoping to form new Packs. They deserve a chance to determine their future.”

Luna Carolyn was first to react to that. “With Vicki mated to one of them, she is the obvious choice to be their Alpha.”

“If they even want her as Alpha,” Adrienne said. “What if their old Pack still exists? Or what if they don’t want to join Packs? It’s a mess, and that isn’t even considering the whole mate situation.”

Now they were getting it. “Vicki is still eighteen. Her life was complicated before, and this will just add to it. She needs to figure out what she wants to do with her mate and her life, and we need to be there to help her with it. If she decides to be the Australian Alpha, then we help her get her Pack up and running.”

“We need to talk to Ian’s family,” Steven said. “Is it possible to gather them all together in the next few days?”

“We have two more days on the Gold Coast, then a travel day to Melbourne before events and a dive trip there,” Amy said.

“My Uncle has a station a hundred and fifty clicks from Melbourne; it’s one of the places remote enough for us to shift,” Ian said. “I’ll call him now and set up a short-notice family gathering.”

Steven nodded. “Try and get all the adult wolves there that you can. Leo, what help do you need?”

“Trainers and teachers,” I replied. “The population has been so isolated that they don’t know the full capabilities of their wolves, and they know nothing of Pack life. Ideally, we’d have enough that each of the ten family units could have someone travel back home with them after the gathering ends. That way, we get everyone up to speed quickly, before long-term decisions are needed.”

Steven considered this for a moment. “The teachers we use with the children would be best suited. I’ll ask my Pack who would be available for an assignment of a couple weeks or more and get you a list.”

“I’ll do the same,” Adrienne said. “What are you going to do?”

“I’m already here, so I’m going to stay for a while,” I said. “Vicki can’t walk away from her commitments, and she only has a few more stops in Australia. Her tour doesn’t end until almost Christmas.”

“Take Vicki back into your Pack, the girls too,” Steven said. “That keeps the link between them and places Vicki under your authority. If the Aussies want to join a Pack, it’s better to do it with you than Vicki right now. You can stick around and visit each of the groups while she finishes her commitments.”

“It gives her a chance to settle with her mate,” Carolyn agreed. “If Vicki decides she wants to be Alpha, you can turn them over to her and return home.”

It was quiet for a bit as everyone thought it over. “What about Hammer,” Amy asked. “They were going to head back to Miesville so he could make the change.”

“Do it there,” Adrienne said. “You are there as Alpha, and it’s only fair for them to see what all is involved before considering if they want to change their wives.”

“I’ll fly down too,” Olivia said. “Since I’ve been through the Change, I can help. I want to be there for Vicki and meet her mate.”

I looked at my watch. “All right, it’s late down here, and there’s a lot to do. Let’s have another call at eight PM Central, six Pacific. That’s ten in the morning here, so it gives us a chance to sleep and eat first.”

“That sounds good, Alpha Leo. I have to say that life is far more interesting with Vicki around. We’ve started calling her The Love Wolfy.”

I laughed. “And you’ve only had Sharkbait in your Pack for four months.”

I said goodbye and sent everyone back to their rooms.