He punched in her number. No signal. He switched to the kitchen phone. His heart raced. He hadn't heard Brynley's voice in nine years. Would she be willing to do a favor for him? Would she even want to talk to him?
"Hello?"
His heart stuttered. Brynley's voice had acquired the deep, husky tone of a mature female werewolf. Memories flooded back. Growing up, she'd always been at his side. Werewolf cubs were usually born in pairs, so she was his twin. They'd gone through their first change together, their first hunt together. He'd shared his first kill with her. She'd licked the blood off his muzzle, and they'd howled their joy to the moon.
"Hey, I can hear you breathing, you pervert." She hung up.
He stared at the receiver. Now that went well. He started to dial the number again, then the phone rang. "Hello?"
"I star-fifty-nined you, you pervert. Now I have your number, and I'm turning you - "
"Brynley, it's me...Phil."
There was silence. He half expected her to hang up again.
"Philip?"
Now she was testing him. Most people assumed his full name was Philip. "No. Philupus."
She gasped. "Oh my God, it's really you!" She squealed, then burst into laughter. "Phil! Thank God! I've been hoping you would call for ages. How are you?"
"I'm...good. How are you?"
"Great! Now that you're back. You are back, aren't you?"
He winced. "No, I'm not."
"Phil, you have to come back. It's fate that you called just now. I was about to hire a P.I. to find you."
His skin chilled. "Why? What's wrong?" Surely the old man was all right. A healthy werewolf could live up to five hundred years, and his father wasn't quite two hundred.
"Everything's wrong," Brynley grumbled. "Howell is turning twenty next month. He's pressuring Dad to name him Heir Apparent."
Howell was almost twenty? Phil recalled his last memory of his younger brother and sister. Howell and Glynis had only been eleven years old when he'd left. "I didn't realize Howell had grown."
"Well, duh. We didn't stop living here when you left, you know. Howell has asked the Council for permission to become an Alpha."
"That's awfully young to be an Alpha," Phil murmured.
"Tell me about it. He's extremely ambitious, Phil. And if he manages to pull this off, the pack will be so impressed, they'll favor him over you. So you'd better get your furry ass back here to Montana and get your Alpha status. Prove you're the rightful heir."
He sighed. If the pack knew he'd managed to achieve Alpha status on his own, they'd never leave him alone. "I have a life, Bryn, and I like it."
"Are you crazy? Phil, you're a freaking prince here. You can have anything you want."
Except freedom. Or Vanda. The pack would never accept a Vamp as their queen. "Brynley, is my cabin still there in Wyoming?"
There was a pause. "Yeah."
"I may need to go there in a few days. Would you mind meeting me there?"
"I'd love to see you, Phil. I missed you."
"I missed you, too. Can you get there by tonight and make sure the place is stocked?"
"Okay. Are you on vacation? I don't even know where you work."
"I'll explain everything when I get there." He paused. This was going to sound strange, but there was no help for it. "I'll need some bottled synthetic blood at the cabin."
"You're kidding. Why?"
"I'll have a Vamp with me."
"A vampire? Shit, Phil. Dad will have kittens."
"Don't tell him I'll be there." Phil gritted his teeth. "I'm serious, Brynley. Don't tell him."
"I'm serious, too. Dad will want to see you. He's not mad at you anymore."
Phil groaned inwardly. Of course his father would be happy to see him. He'd welcome him back like the prodigal son. He'd dig his claws in and never let Phil go. "Brynley, we can talk about this later. For now, I need you to go to the cabin, take some bottled blood with you, and wait for my call. If I call, it will be at night."
"If you call?"
"Yes, and if I call, it'll be because we're in serious danger and need a safe place to hide. The Vamp will use your voice to teleport us there."
"Oh sheesh. We heard a rumor that you were working with vampires. I didn't want to believe it."
"Can you do it, Bryn?"
She sighed. "Sure. But the full moon starts tomorrow night. Dad's going to wonder why I'm missing the Hunt."
Ah yes, the Hunt. The highlight of the wolf pack's existence. Every month, on the first night of a full moon, the pack would gather for a hunt. His father's pack was so huge now, encompassing Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming, that only a handful of wolves were selected each month to hunt with the Supreme Pack Master. Other pack members and lesser pack masters would gather locally for their monthly hunt. Being invited to his father's Hunt was a huge honor, equivalent in the mortal world to being presented to royalty.
Phil had grown up seeing other werewolves bow to his father and call him Supreme Pack Master. His dad was the most powerful Alpha wolf in America. By the age of twelve Phil had realized that his father craved power more than anything. He would always want more power and more control over his subjects, including his own sons. And Phil, cursed with the same genetic makeup as his father, was not the kind of wolf who could accept being controlled.
He took a deep breath. "This is really important."
"Yeah, I figured that. Otherwise, you would have never bothered to call."
He winced at the resentment in her voice. "Thank you for helping. It'll be good to see you."
"Oh Phil." Her voice trembled with emotion. "I'd do anything for you, you know that. I'll be waiting for your call. Be careful."
"Thanks." He hung up.
A sense of foreboding settled in his gut. The cabin in Wyoming was the perfect place to hide Vanda. No one in the Vampire World knew of its existence. But the cost of using it might be way too high.
Vanda wrinkled her nose. "Smells like coffee in here."
"It was a coffee warehouse for a hundred years," Robby explained. "The coven used to live in an old wine cellar, but it was destroyed by Hurricane Katrina."
Vanda surveyed the huge rectangular room. Water stains marked the walls, showing how badly the warehouse had flooded. It was dry now, and empty except for a small sitting area that consisted of a sofa and several armchairs.
Robby, Zoltan, and Dougal had visited the New Orleans coven before, so the warehouse was embedded in their psychic memory. They'd simply grabbed onto Vanda, Phineas, and Phil and teleported them there.
Vanda tightened the whip around her waist. "Where is everybody? I thought they were expecting us."
Phil pointed at a surveillance camera above the main entrance. "They probably know we're here."
"Bonsoir, mes amis," a deep masculine voice echoed across the warehouse. "Welcome to our home."
Vanda looked around, and then up. A balcony spread across the width of the warehouse. From a door in the center, a couple emerged. The man was handsome, dressed entirely in black, and the woman by his side wore a shimmering golden evening gown the same shade as her hair.
"No stairs or ladders," Phil murmured. "A good way to stay safe."
More Vamps filed from the upstairs room. Elegantly dressed, they posed along the length of the balcony. Vanda realized the coven must actually live in the room on the second floor. With no access other than levitation, it kept them safe from mortal intruders.
The man in black stepped off the balcony and floated down, his black coat fluttering around him till he landed gracefully on the ground floor. He bowed. "I am Colbert GrandPied, at your service."
"Vanda Barkowski." She extended a hand.
He leaned over to kiss it. "Enchanté."
As Colbert greeted the rest of the Vamps and Phil, Vanda watched more well-dressed Vamps float down from the balcony.
"I am Giselle." The blonde, dressed in gold, kissed Vanda's cheeks. "We are honored to have you here."
Honored? Vanda didn't see much honor in being bait. And these elegant Vamps looked dressed for the opera rather than a battle with Casimir. "Ah, you do realize there could be a battle?"
Giselle cocked her head. "It was my understanding that the battle will occur at the Vampire Blues. That is the plan, non?"