Perigee Chapter 1: Corpse on the Shagpile
Once the sound of the SUV door slamming passed, none followed.
No birds.
No wind.
No whispers of the forest.
Calico inhaled a slow, full breath of mountain air, but it wasn't nearly as sweet as it should have been. Filtered light through the observing aspens patterned the overgrown path to an a-frame log cabin. It didn't feel right, smell right, but it was all hers now.
It wasn't animals, not carrion, but something was definitely putrefying.
With keys jingling at her side, Calico walked to the front of the building, steeled herself and approached the door. It was solid, secure, and through the large glass windows, the interior was immaculate - Oscar's hard-earned money at work, yet she'd known nothing about it.
Not that he'd been her problem for years.
Designer lounge, expensive fittings, warm colours, rotting corpse on the shagpile.
"Hey!" Calico barked, rapping against the two-way mirror. "I've been here four hours."
Though she knew there was at least one person on the other side, no response was forthcoming. She had already explained to the detective in charge everything she knew, but had been told to wait. Being the good citizen she was, she chose not to exercise her right to leave - since she was not being charged with a crime - but four hours was too much.
With hackles up, she went for the exit.
Before she could turn the handle, however, the door opened inward, and she narrowly dodged being hit in the face.
"Take a seat, Mrs Hollows," the man said; plain clothes, clean-cut, built like a brick shit-house.
Instantly, his presence filled the small space and threatened to smother her, an innate and powerful mien her instincts told her to be extremely wary of.
"Not a cop," she managed, forcing herself to look up and into dark blue eyes.
Everything about him told her to do as she was told, but that only made her feel more defiant.
"I've been sitting for hours," she growled, pacing away from him and then back to the centre of the room, squaring up. "In case the cops didn't tell you, I came to them with the whole dead body thing, so why am I being treated like a suspect?"
Calmly, with the restraint of a storm about to break, the man strode to the table where he waited expectantly.
"Sit," he instructed, no compromise, and the gravel in his voice scraped against Calico's patience, scraped under her skin.
And it wasn't the only thing, and he knew she knew.
Clenching her teeth, Calico kicked the chair away from the metal table and sat.
"Ethan Cole," he stated, remaining on his feet, a towering figure casting a shadow across her. "Cleaverlaw Alpha."
She's guessed as much, and as such, was not the slightest bit surprised by his behaviour or appearance. He reeked of entitlement, of arrogance, and an underlying confidence he had complete control in every situation.
But he'd never met Calico.
"Not my alpha," she declared, and was pissed that it didn't sound nearly as spiteful as she had intended.
The motion of his eyebrow was subtle, but the shift of his bearing crashed against Calico with the weight of a raging avalanche.
"Did your cowardly father teach you nothing?" he asked, but it was rhetorical.
The judgment in those eyes was demeaning.
Swallowing and forcing down the rising tumult in her stomach, Calico steeled herself against the urge to cower.
"I'm not here to talk about any of that," she said slowly. "I found a body in my late husband's cabin, so I reported it to police."
"Yes," he agreed, hands sliding into his pants pockets, at ease and yet still seeming like he might pounce at any moment. “Your human husaband.”
Rolling her eyes, Calico let out a long sigh.
"Ex-husband," she exhaled, then sat a little straighter, inching toward rising. "Now, if the police have no further questions..."
"You will do as you are told," he hissed, cracks finally forming in his impassive exterior.
"I didn't come here for a dogfight, Mr. Cole," she grated, pushing back the chair and getting to her feet. "I have an estate to settle, which I now cannot do until the small matter of a corpse is resolved, so until then, I will stay out of your way."
She stepped around the table but was stopped from moving any further by a broad hand splayed against her collarbone. It was warm, but a chill spread from Ethan's palm and spread to every part of her body.
Rage, however, quickly flushed her with heat.
"I don't care where we are," she growled, sneering and tensing her muscles in readiness. "Remove your hand, or I will break it off at the wrist."
"If you believe yourself possible of that, little McDonough," Ethan whispered, lowering his head closer to hers, his gaze, his lips and the teeth behind them a terrible peril, "you truly were taught nothing, and I intend to rectify that."
She was unexpectedly lithe for her size and not stupid when it came to violence and fighting - Ethan Cole may not have been her alpha, but that didn't mean she'd had no experience with one at all.
Her first move was to take a half step back, causing Ethan to lurch forward with the force he'd been exerting against her, and she ducked under his arm. Emerging on the other side of him, Calico reached for the inward opening door, but soon found her cheek pressed to its metal surface.
Ethan was swift, far faster than her, and the heat of his body against her back was oppressive. One hand gripped the back of her neck, holding her in place, and the other pulled her right arm painfully behind her.
"If you wish to fight, Calico," he breathed through her hair, tickling against the shell of her ear. "Then the whole pack deserves to enjoy your ultimate submission."
"Get the fuck off!" she barked, wriggling but unable to free herself.
A police station should have been a safe space, but they'd let Ethan in, probably called to alert him to her presence, so there was no relying on them for a rescue.
"In three days, at the New Moon," he rumbled, "you will come to Arc Lodge and submit."
"I will NOT," she snapped back but remained still.
"If you run, the police will chase," he went on, the brutality of his hold a shuddering contrast to the caress of his thumb against the soft flesh of her inner wrist. "If you evade them, the pack will hunt you down, and you will be dragged back in shame and humiliation to be thrown at my feet."
"Why?" she shrieked in utter outrage. "Why the hell do you care what I do? Why the hell does it matter?"
Calico hadn't been in Cleaver since she was three. The vaguest of memories sometimes teased at the periphery of her consciousness but left no impressions - her only ties to the place were her father, who fled, and the mother who raised her after his suicide.
"It should be enough that I tell you to," he answered, finally relaxing his grip, and though the idea of driving her elbow beneath his ribs flashed across Calico's mind, she forced herself toward calm.
"You're strong," she exhaled, biting back bile. "You clearly have money and influence and a beautiful town to live in, but just because you have these things does not give you the right to impose your will on me."
Carefully, keeping both hands on her at all times, Ethan turned her to face him.
"Keep your ridiculous pack mentality, run your little dictatorship and bask in the adoration of those who accept it, but I didn't practise in my childhood, and I don't practise now, so leave me out of it," she added.
"You were drawn here for a..." he began, but she cut him off.
"Stop seeing mystic signs where there are none," she huffed, tossing her head. "I told you, I'm here to deal with remnants of Oscar's estate; that is the only thing that brought me here, and when it's done, I will never come back here again."
"You're definitely forthright enough. I could take you at your word," he smirked, his hand sliding down her throat before falling away. "And even if you reject or disrespect old traditions, you know well enough the binding nature of a pact."
Chewing the inside of her cheek nervously, Calico turned this over, trying to figure out exactly what pact he was referring to.
"Your father..." he hinted, no longer angry or vicious, just... pleased.
"Whatever he promised, I'm not bound by that," she argued, but a creeping dread was slowly taking the place where moments ago fires had burned.
"We may look and act like humans most of the time, Calico," Ethan said, now totally back in comfortable control, "but even those who've fully integrated cannot deny some truths are equal part fact: immutable, kept and compelled whether you believe it's by a force magical in nature or some primal science we're yet to understand."
As he spoke his little spiel, he took two long, slow steps to the table and then turned to lean against it.
"My father challenged yours," he went on, matter-of-fact. "Yours lost."
"Then, by the traditions you seem to hold so dearly, he should never have made it out of Cleaver," she pointed out, but the ground beneath her was no longer as solid as it should have been.
"His life should have been forfeit, yes," Ethan agreed, then reached the punchline. "Though, there have been instances where another life, one of greater value, has been offered to pay that debt."
Calico didn't wait for him to say it.
She wrenched the door open and ran.
PART 2
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Author note: Soooo, werewolf is a new one for me, so if anyone still reads this stuff, what trope should I go with and which ones shall I break into pieces?
-B
