Chapter 42

Zane POV

I didn’t relax until my plane left the runway.

My original plan had been to leave Sarah and the girls at home while I went to the annual summit of the northern territories in Los Angeles, but after the attack on Grace and the shots fired at Sarah, there was no question I would take them with me. Part of me wanted to run to ground instead of someplace so public, but I had agreed to be the keynote speaker this year, and Travis had doubled our guards.

There were more bodyguards than family members on my Gulfstream, but the G650ER could handle the crowd. I nodded to Travis sitting in his chair, which he swiveled to face the back and keep an eye on things. Mike, who’d healed himself up in one of the smoothest transitions I’d ever seen, was sitting with Danielle, and I confess I didn’t remember the name of the three other guards on the plane. The six of them would take eight-hour shifts when we landed.

The plan was to stay in Los Angeles for a week, during which time whoever took that shoot at Sarah would have been apprehended and questioned about both the shooting and any possible connection to the attack on Grace.

I had never heard of a rogue attack being used as a weapon before, that is, by anyone other than the rogue themselves. But it just couldn’t be a coincidence that Grace and Sarah were targeted so close together.

I looked at my girls now, heads together over a table covered with their math assignment while their tutor sat with them and gave them quiet instructions. Who would see Grace or Sarah as a threat? Who had seen Chloe as a threat five years ago and taken her? Who was after my family, and why?

These were the questions I’d been mulling over for the past two days, and I wasn’t going to find any answers sitting on this plane.

I turned to Sarah who was sitting next to me and reading something on her phone. She sensed I was looking at her and looked up with a questioning smile.

“Tell me more about Dr. Hayes,” I said quietly, knowing that even a werewolf wouldn’t be able to hear my voice over the sound of the engines. “All three of the resumes you showed me were good. Why pick him?”

“Oh, it was obvious right from the start he was good with the girls. He asked them what they knew about poetry and got Chloe to recite a poem from heart.”

“Chloe knew a poem? Just like that?”

“Well, it was about a shelf on her ice-cream cone,” Sarah said with a laugh. “Grace was the real star though. She couldn’t recite it, but she said she liked the one with ‘a bunch of made-up words.’ He knew instantly she was talking about ‘Jabberwocky,’ which he then did recite by heart in full.”

She smiled with affection and covertly looked over at the tutor. “He did it with different voices for the characters and acted out the sword fighting. The girls ate it up, giggling the nonsense words like ‘burbled’ and ‘galumphing.’ Then he told them how fond he was of the poem and gave a simple explanation for why.”

“Impressive.”

“It was. They were hanging on his every word by the end.”

“And the other two.”

Sarah made a face. “One was a little too stern for my liking, and the other one!” She made a face again.

“Not good?”

“He was a disaster. Wanted to show off, I suppose, and tried to teach them algebra.”

“Ambitious.”

He didn’t start off too badly. “He explained that ‘x’ could be anything, like apples or elephants. Then he goes, ‘Let’s say I have 2x and then I add 2x, and I have 4x.’”

I smothered a laugh at the supercilious tone she’d adopted.

“Then he asks them what x plus x is.” She rolled her eyes. “Idiot.”

I wasn’t sure just what she was objecting to, and my face must have shown it. She took pity on me.

“He kept asking it over and over.” She dropped into the tone again. “‘If 2x and 2x is 4x, what is x plus x?’ Naturally, poor Grace said it was x.”

“I still don’t get it.”

“He never explained that x is the same as 1x, so she thought it was ‘blank x.’ Grace added what she thought was 0x to 0x and got 0x. I swear, had to intervene before he made her cry.”

“Hm,” I said, thinking about it and glad once again my girls had been blessed with someone with a degree in education and a sharp brain to put the degree to use. “Good catch.”

“So, Dr. Hayes was a lock after that. I told him about his responsibilities and he added a few extra. Unless you object, I’m thinking we’ll keep him even after the girls go to school properly.”

“Good idea. I appreciated the way he didn’t hesitate to travel with us.”

“I warned him about the possibility when I hired him. He said he’d be happy to do it and went on about the educational possibilities of seeing new places.”

I nodded with a smile, but then I thought about the reason for the trip and felt my smile disappear.

“What is it?” Sarah asked. “Worried about your speech?”

“It’s hardly my first. No, I’m just not happy at the prospect of all the politics we’re going to be dealing with. These summits are necessary, but they can get pretty vicious, even petty, with all the pack alphas in one place.”

“Petty?”

“Yes. You’ll see it for yourself while we’re there.”

She looked surprised. “I assumed I’d be with the children the whole time.”

“People are curious about you. Word the Luna Temple gave their approval, however provisional, to your goddess-mother status has made the rounds. I can’t look like I’m hiding you. Besides, there will be a function or two the girls will need to attend as future leaders.”

“Will one of them become the pack alpha for your territory?” I asked, well aware I was intruding on werewolf business. I trusted Zane to tell me if my questions went too far.

“Probably, but on their own skills, not as some sort of inheritance from me. I barely knew the pack alpha before me, though I heard about her all the time. She was ambitious.”

“Oh?”

I nodded. “She added substantially to the territory, particularly areas where she felt humans were being mistreated. When I took over, I promised her I would continue her work.”

I felt myself smile a little sadly. “It’s a shame the two of you never got to meet. She would have greatly approved of you.”

“That’s a lovely compliment,” Sarah said. “I’m sorry we never met as well.” She thought for a moment.

“What did she think of these summits?”

I snorted. “I was told she hated them with a passion and even tried to find reasons to skip them. When I went to my first summit, everyone seemed to be trying to top each other with stories of how insufferable she’d been.”

Sarah laughed, then looked over at my daughters. “Is there anything in particular you want me to make sure they get out of this experience?”

I shook my head. “Just keep them safe, and stay safe yourself.”

She nodded, but I knew we were both thinking about the shooting and the fact that the person with that gun was still out there.