Wrangler (Sheppard’s Shadow #3)

Chapter 1

After their honeymoon, in which they’d flown to a tropical island, Archie decided that he wanted to bring a little of the place where they’d had so much fun. Their home and his brother, too. They’d enjoy some of the foods that they’d eaten while here. So, while waiting for the drinks, he wandered into a gift shop and found a cookbook on the local cuisine. He was looking through the pages, thinking that it had just the things that he’d wanted in it, when someone brushed up against him while standing still.

While not really thinking about it, he did turn to look at the person. He looked to be about ten years old and extremely malnourished. Archie thought that while clean, his clothing was worn through, and his little body did the same. He was sure that the kid had tried to pickpocket his wallet, but Archie had it in his breast pocket, having been told that there were a lot of undesirable sorts around the area. Archie was doubly shocked when the child spoke to him.

“Mister? You have any change? I’ve not been able to eat for a few days.” He asked him where his parents were. “I can’t go back there. They’re planning to sell me and my sister off. She’s got herself a job now but she doesn’t get paid for a few more days. We’re about starved.”

For whatever reason, he believed the kid. Pulling out the money that he had in his pocket, he handed it over to the kid. It was about forty dollars, and when the little man took the five and tried to hand the rest back to him, Archie told him to keep it. To get his sister a meal, too. He wrapped his arms around him.

The boy was shaking. He was crying so hard. He kept thanking him for the money and that he’d pay him back. He didn’t know how that was going to work but didn’t say anything to the boy. After he seemed to have a handle on his emotions, he stepped back and put out his hand. The connection to the kid was immediate and profound when he took the hand that was offered. Archie knew then that the kid had been telling the truth about not just him starving but about his parents as well.

Paying for the cookbook, he held onto the kid until they were out of the shop. The woman at the counter didn’t look happy about having the boy in her place, but she didn’t say anything other than what he owed on the cookbook. Hurrying out of the shop, he found Carrie just where he’d left her. Telling her briefly what had happened, he asked the boy for his name.

“William Damon. My sister calls me Wills. My parents called me Shit for Brains. Amber, she doesn’t allow me to talk like that, so don’t tell her if you see her. She’s the best but she can be a bit on the harsh side when I mess up.” He asked about his sister. “She’s on the cleaning crew here. Cleaning up after people when they get off the planes. People sure do leave a lot of crap behind when they leave, don’t they? She was…never mind. She talks about her job a bit sometimes.

“I agree. The beaches here are a prime example of that happening, too. Can you locate your sister? I have an idea that the two of you are in deeper with your parents than you told me.” Wills lowered his head and said that they were. That they’d been hiding from them for over a year now but that didn’t stop them from chasing after them when they were out and about. It was a painful reunion, he told them. “Get your sister, Wills, and we’ll make arrangements for you to come home with us. You’ll be safe there.”

“Just like that. You’re going to take my word for all this?” He asked him if he was lying to him. “No. Amber told me that if you start lying, it’ll catch up with you sooner rather than later and that it’s hard to keep track of what you say to people. Also, it’ll give you a heart attack, trying to keep it all straight. It’s just easier to tell the truth.”

“Your sister sounds like a brilliant woman.” Wills said that he could find her, and Carrie said she’d go with him. Archie went to the front desk, purchased two more tickets and was thrilled to no end that it worked out that there was enough room on the plane, even in the same place that he and Carrie would be sitting.

He had a moment of wonder. Like Wills, he wondered why he was doing this for strangers. He’d seen in the kid’s mind when they connected that their parents had beaten the two of them just recently, and it was only now that his sister, Amber, had been able to get up and around enough to work. Wills was too young, of course, but he would keep an eye on his sister when he could so she’d not be found by them. He just could not understand people nowadays. They all seemed to be a bit or more at times like his own mother had been. If you weren’t going to love your kids, and he also knew it was no fault of their parents at times, you shouldn’t have any.

Amber was coming toward them with Carrie and Wills just as he was beginning to worry over them. The young woman had a backpack in her hands, and Archie knew instinctively that she couldn’t wear it on her back because of the beating she’d recently had. Again he was sickened by the way that people treated their children. As soon as the introductions were made, the four of them sat in the airport lobby while he went to get them some food and drink. Wills came with him to help him carry whatever it was he was going to get. He had a feeling, too, that he wanted to make sure that he was on the up and up as well. It wasn’t like him to trust immediately, and he doubted very much that they did either.

“You don’t have to do this, mister.” He told him to call him Archie. “All right, Archie. We can get by on the money you already gave me for a few days. Amber is getting better, and we’ve found us a good place to hide at night. I think we can make it our place for at least a week before we have to move on.”

“My brothers, I have five of them and a sister-in-law that would murder me if I didn’t help you out. They’d be appalled if they ever found out that I left a young man and his sister that I knew was in trouble. That’s something that we’ve decided to do for anyone who needs it. To pay it forward. You know what that means. It’s to help out people that have been hurt by the very people that were supposed to love them.” He handed him three subs and asked him to pick out some chips that his sister would like. “You’ll be far enough away from them that they won’t be able to hurt you. And if they end up finding you, they’ll never harm you again. You have my word on that.”

When Wills agreed that he’d take the food to his sister, Archie picked up a couple of fruit cups along with several bottles of water. While they had asked for water to drink, he didn’t know that either one of them would turn down some more of it. As soon as he sat back with his little family, he handed out the things that he had and noticed that one of the subs was already gone. Good, they weren’t shy about eating when someone offered it to them.

When their flight was called, the four of them got up to stand in line. He could feel the exact moment that Amber was stressed out and turned to ask her what was happening. Apparently, their parents had figured out that they were staying at the airport, but today, they had shown up together. That didn’t mean as much to him right now as the fact that the kids were in trouble. He had to do something right now and so he called on the only person that he knew who could get to them quickly.

Calling to Sunny to help them out, it was her mom that showed up instead. Lily was dressed like the people in line with them but she glowed with magic that he was sure they were the only ones that could see her. Just putting her hands on Amber and Wills, she asked them both to stand very still. Archie let out a huge breath when the older couple walked right by them without noticing the kids.

He didn’t want to judge people without knowing them, but he felt like he might be justified in this. He’d seen in Wills’s mind what sort of people they were and was quick to judge their asses when they simply walked by them.

They smelled of old clothing, sweat as well as an odor about them that had him thinking that they’d stepped in some dog shit at some point and hadn’t done a good job of cleaning it off them. There was also the odor of pot or weed. Whatever they called it in their home, it was going to get them into nasty trouble without the kids to sell off. The two of them owed their dealer a great deal of money. He looked at Lily just as she was leaning down to talk to the two people that they’d fallen in love with in a short amount of time.

“My name is Lily. I’ve been keeping an eye on the two of you for a bit now. I’m so happy with the two of you. You’ve done so much for my earth every day by picking up things left behind that I wish to reward you.” She looked at Amber. “You’re in a great deal of pain. I can almost taste it on you. How about I fix that up for you and your brother?”

She didn’t wait for an answer but touched her hands to their faces. Amber was shocked, he could see that but it was Wills that seemed to be the happiest. Not knowing how he had been hurting, he was glad to see that the young boy was smiling. Then, what Lily had said occurred to him.

“Is Amber going to be a part of my family?” She just smiled at him, and he grinned back. “Oh, this is going to be epic. Which one?”

“I shant tell you. You’re much too eager to have entirely too much fun with this. They’ll be safe with the family and that is a great deal more important than anything else right now. But you’ll need to keep an eye on them for now. Things have a tendency to switch up with humans, as you well know.” He agreed with her. Archie didn’t like it but he did agree. The queen of the earth looked at their new family members. “All right. The four of you will be safe but you’re to keep an eye out for traps. The couple will stop at nothing to get you two back. No matter where you’ll be hiding. All right?”

“Yes, all right. And thank you for taking the pain away. I was sick with it.” Lily told Amber that it had been her pleasure. “I don’t know how to thank you, too, for keeping us safe. It’s been a very long time since anyone has shown any kind of compassion to either of us. Now we have had it twice in one day. Thank you all.”

When they were seated on the plane, he was glad now that he’d purchased the last two seats in first class. They were the first to board, and they’d be the first to disembark. While the flight wasn’t long, Wills must have been exhausted as he fell asleep almost as soon as they were allowed to take their seatbelts off. He did notice that neither one of the sister and brother duo looked as if they’d had a good rest in a while, so he was content to let them sleep until they landed. But he would watch over them with the help of Carrie.

“What do you think is going to happen once we get home? Do you think that their parents will follow them to our home?” He nodded telling her what he’d figured out about Amber being a mate to one of his brothers. “Good. I was willing to adopt the two of them, though Amber is about my age, just so they’d be safe. But this is so much better. He agreed and then thought of something else.

“Do you think that they’ll all meet us at the airport? It would be like them that everyone shows up but one of them and he’d be the mate.” They both laughed quietly. “I’m glad that we were able to do this for them. It feels really good to have the funds and the means to help someone who is in as much trouble as we’d been as children. I don’t understand people nowadays.”

“Me either.

Archie hoped that all his family was present when they got to the airport. He wanted this meeting between whoever was her mate to happen quickly. Archie only wanted the best for his family and honestly didn’t care which one of them would find a mate in Amber. He wondered too if whichever brother it was, they’d be fine with taking on Wills too. If not, he’d have a place with them. He had enjoyed talking with the boy and thought that he’d fit right in with the rest of the family.

Leaning back, Carrie laid her head on his chest and closed her eyes. Archie wasn’t tired, but he was happy to be able to watch over his little family while they did sleep. Christ, he thought, who would have thought that their wonderful vacation could end on such a note as having brought more family with them. Smiling, he was glad that he was going back now. But in a few days, he knew that he’d wish they were back on the island.

When they were ready to land, he hated that he had to wake them all up. It had been a good flight but short. When he touched Wills to wake him, he had to defend himself from his fists. The little boy was nearly unconsolable when he realized that he wasn’t in danger. Amber, having woken up when Wills was yelling, calmed him down quickly so that people wouldn’t be upset with them.

“I’m sorry, Archie. I didn’t mean to hit you. I swear it.” Archie told him that he understood completely and that he was sorry that he had to live like that. “It’s nice to have a long nap, but I shouldn’t have fallen asleep. You might have needed me.”

“I would have woken you, I promise. Now we’re going to meet my family. I didn’t tell them that you were coming home with us, so they’ll be surprised.” They were wide awake now, and he was glad for it. He was so excited to see who would be Amber’s mate. However, the more that he thought about it, the more he wished he’d had more time to get to know her. He was sure that she was going to be a mate to Beau or Jameson. She had a cool head on her shoulders from what little he’d been able to glean from her.

~*~

Sunny knew that they were bringing home a mate to one of her brothers, but her mom wouldn’t tell her who it was. She had had to nag them all into coming with them to the airport and wasn’t happy that they were grumpy and out of sorts. But they’d perk up once they saw the newest additions to their family. Or they’d better if they knew what was good for them.

She saw Carrie first. She was beautifully tanned and looked so relaxed that she envied her. But with the property that they’d purchased where they’d been, as well as the house that Carrie and Archie had been staying at, they could go down anytime they wanted and enjoy the same thing. She couldn’t wait to have some time alone with Nash. He’d been working so hard lately, getting ready to go back to college, that she worried that he’d forget about her. She should have known better but she was feeling less than secure about a lot of things of late.

Hugging Carrie and then Archie, she was thrilled to meet the other two as well. Amber was beautiful, her skin a nice tan, and her hair, long and curly, was as red as fresh rust. She wanted to see if it was as soft as it looked but didn’t know how the woman would react to that.

“Everyone, I’d like you to meet Amber and Wills Damon. They’re going to be staying with us until we can get them settled in.” Carrie watched the faces of the other brothers and wanted to smack the shit out of them when they were acting backward and shy. It wasn’t until Wills stepped forward with his hand out did they start to get their brain cells working and acted like the men that she knew. The moment that Wrangler touched Amber’s hand, she knew that he’d met his mate in Amber. Now, it was just a matter of them getting to know one another.

The connection to each other affected her immediately as well. More than likely, the contact magic because of her being the pride bitch, a name that she wasn’t all that thrilled with. If not for the small wince of pain or something akin to it, she wouldn’t have been able to tell that either of them had touched their mates. It was time for them all to have their mates if she was in charge, but since she wasn’t, she’d wait. And love them all when they came to them. But if that hadn’t alerted her, then the woman’s reaction would have. She was spitting mad.

“What was that? When we touched just now, what was that a spark or something?” Wrangler looked around, seeming to be a little confused. But what he was confused about, she had no idea. He could have been looking for help, for all she knew. “What did you do to me? I felt like my heart and arm were shocked or something.”

“I didn’t do anything to you. Just shook your hand. You get all bent out of shape when people are being nice to you all the time?” She told him it was more than that, and she was demanding answers. “I don’t know what…” Wrangler looked at his brother, and when Archie nodded, he no longer looked confused but as pissed off as Amber was.

“Well? What did you just realize? And if you think that it’s something to do with my brother and I, we’ll be on the next plane out of here.” Wrangler asked her how she was going to pay for the ticket. “You bastard.”

The slap was hard, and Wrangler’s head snapped to the side, but he didn’t do anything more than to look at Amber. Wills stepped in front of his sister and all she could think about was that had been the wrong move on his part. When Wrangler reached to touch the boy, Amber seemed to come apart at the seams in that moment.

She leapt at him, and Wrangler was barely able to catch her. If he had moved even a few inches, she would have landed on her face. As it was now, she was smacking him around like he’d hurt her. But being the man that he was, he didn’t so much as raise his hands to keep himself from being hurt.

Carrie had enough and as soon as she could put her fingers into her mouth, she let go of a whistle to rival even the train whistles that blew once a day in the middle of town. No one moved for several seconds. It was Amber who got down from Wrangler’s arms, and she stomped away. He looked around at the rest of them, his face battered and bruised, and he looked like a man down on his luck.

“What did I do?” She didn’t know what to tell the other man other than she didn’t know either. She just became this…well, lunatic was all she could think about. “I should go and find her.”

“I’ll go with you. Though if I were you, I’d not touch me again. She’s never done that before. Scared the bejebbes out of me too.” Wills and Wrangler walked away, but he was still upset. Gathering the rest of the family up to leave the three of them alone, Carrie suggested that they all get some dinner before heading home. Archie said that he’d take care that Wrangler knew where they were.

There was little talk during the drive to the diner. She knew that everyone was upset, but really, she didn’t understand why the woman had gone so bat-shit crazy. It wasn’t as if he’d harmed the young boy. He’d not even touched him to keep him from getting hurt. And if that was his intention, she hoped that Amber would apologize to everyone before too long. This wasn’t something that needed to be lingering between them all.

The little diner next to the airport wasn’t all that busy. It was after dinner time, so that was more than likely why. As the waitstaff was putting together tables in their banquet room for all of them, she reached out to Archie and asked him what he thought was going on.

“Fear. I could almost taste it on her. I have a feeling that she’s been fighting battles with herself and her brother for a while now. You know, guilt for not being able to protect him from their parents. They were pretty beat up when they got to the plane. I was just as startled when she jumped at him as everyone else. I wonder now if this was a mistake.” She pointed out that she was Wrangler’s mate. “Still. None of us did anything wrong, and she didn’t have to take his hand when he offered it.”

“True. I don’t know what to think right now. We’ll just have to let it go until they come back. If they do.” Just as she was finished speaking to her mate, the door opened, and the three of them walked into the diner. No one asked, and they looked about as shell-shocked as anyone she’d ever seen. Whatever happened, she hoped to goodness that it would resolve itself before everyone in the family got it into their heads to dislike Amber.

As soon as they were seated, Amber stood up. She looked as if she’d been crying, and it hurt her to see that. After clearing her throat several times, she began to speak. It was then that things became a little more clear for the rest of them.

“I want to apologize to everyone. And to say that I’m sorry to Wrangler for acting the way that I did. I didn’t mean to attack him. It was…I’ve been so stressed out all the time, trying to keep us both safe and food in our bellies. Then, this man and his wife come along and things are just perfect. I didn’t want to believe that things could be so wrong for so long then bam, they’re not. I’ve been keeping myself and my brother as safe as I could while we’ve been out on our own. Which has been a very long time for the two of us. And when he touched my brother…well, I lost it. I was feeling like we had really trusted you people a great deal, and I was…I was being proactive when I should have just kept to myself. I’m not used to… Neither Wills nor I are used to people being nice to us. Unless they want something else.” She looked at Wrangler. “I’m not sure what to think about you being my mate. I’ve not trusted anyone for a very long time, and I don’t know how to be a person with others around without always looking around for the knife.”

“We’ll work on it. You’re going to be safe. I want you to know that. I’d die for you and Wills.” She snorted, and Wrangler laughed. “All right. I can understand that as well. Like I said, we’ll work on it.”

After dinner, they made their way home. Luggage was taken in when they dropped off Archie and her home. The other two didn’t have anything but literally the shirts on their backs, so that made it easier to drop off Amber and her brother at Wrangler’s home. He was going to stay with them as his home hadn’t been built as yet, and the apartment that he’d been keeping was too small for the three of them. Carrie had a feeling that by this time tomorrow evening, not only would Wrangler have a home, but it would be filled up, too. Smiling to herself, she also wondered if they’d be in a much better mood all around.

“I have to leave first thing in the morning.” She was disappointed but knew that now that they were back home, things would need to be taken care of. “I have a council meeting with the other members of the pack. Not all of them, but the ones that have been doing most of the work since the previous leader wasted a great many years by doing absolutely nothing but sitting around.”

“You just reminded me that I have a meeting with the women of the pack. I’d completely forgotten about that until now.” She lay on the bed, watching Archie put together his notes for tomorrow. “They said that there hasn’t been a meeting with all the leap in decades. I find that hard to believe. I thought that you were to have them once a month.”

“That’s the wolves. They meet monthly because they’re trying to keep their pack together. We don’t have anyone to pull together. I’ve looked over the leap and if you don’t count us, the average age for the leap is sixty-three years old. Putting all of us in there it does bring it down, but not by a great deal. That’s not really what I’d call a productive group.” She asked him what his plans were. “I don’t know, to be honest with you. I know that I have to do something or the king of our kind can simply disband us and put us all with other groups if we aren’t putting up a good showing of us. I’m also going to meet some of the people in town. We need businesses, and soon or the town will up and disappear as well.”

Carrie decided to get herself a glass of juice and was headed down the stairs when a ghost suddenly appeared. They weren’t supposed to meet at the house, a rule that she liked very much, unless it was an emergency. She only had to look at the woman in front of her to know that something terrible had happened.

“I don’t know who I am. Or who you are, for that matter.” Carrie told her that she couldn’t tell her. That she’d have to figure things out on her own. But she did write down a note that she was going to pass to Archie when he came to her. “Where am I?”

“What’s the last thing that you remember?” She looked as if she had to concentrate, and that worried her. With the head wound that she had, it would have been a quick death, but not without a lot of blood. “I can’t help you. You have to do it yourself.”

“I was going to work.” Archie joined her in the room, and she handed him the note. When he left her there, telling her that he’d check, Carrie waited on the woman. “There was something going on at work. Usually, I’m the first one there, but tonight…I don’t know what happened. My name is April Mendoza. I’m a stocker at the grocery store in…there was a man there. He shot me. He shot me in the head. I’m dead. Aren’t I? He killed me.”

“The police are there now. The man is dead as well. He went to her place of work to find out why she was having an affair.” April nodded, telling Archie that was right, that she’d been working when he came in and killed her. “He shot her, then shot himself.”

The man, April’s husband showed up about the time they were figuring out what had happened. He was upset. Not because he’d killed his wife but because he’d not gotten to kill the man that she was having this supposed affair with. He was badgering her when he arrived until she raised her hand up to stop him.

“You murdered your wife.” He said that she was having an affair. “She wasn’t. Even I could tell that, and asking her about it got me the correct answer. You cannot badger her either. She’s told you the truth, and if you persist in this line of bullying her, I’ll send you away.”

“You would take her side in this. All you women, you stick together when things aren’t the way that you want them.” She told him that he wasn’t making any sense. “See? Right there. You’re taking her side, and I won’t have it.”

Carrie snapped her fingers, and the man disappeared. She looked at April before sending her on her way as well. The shooting at the grocery store in the next town over would go as a murder-suicide, and the couple would be thought of as having a rough patch due to money issues. The affair, which there wasn’t one, would never be brought up as a problem.

Carrie made her way back to the bedroom and decided that she was going to take the emergency clause out of ghosts coming to her home. There was nothing that couldn’t wait until tomorrow that she couldn’t deal with. Besides, cooler heads might prevail by then.