The Deputy and His Enforcer (Kincaid Pack #3) - Kiki Clark Page 0,5
not to come back for at least twenty-four hours.
That had been strange in and of itself. He’d been buried up to his eyeballs in old Council archives for weeks, trying to find either an old instance of a situation like theirs or maybe a way to usurp the Council’s authority.
His gut clenched at the very idea. His entire life he’d lived and breathed the belief that the shifter Council was to be respected and deferred to at all times. They were an absolute authority.
But recent events had shown him that wasn’t the truth.
As soon as he’d gotten home to his neglected house, he’d discovered that one of his plants had died while he’d been holed up in the manor. He’d come home a few times, and his neighbor had said they’d have their son pop over to check things and water his plants, but that obviously hadn’t happened. As he’d held the small pot in his large hands, he’d felt an overwhelming urge to try and revive it.
There were very few things Marcus allowed himself to truly care about outside of his pack, but his collection of plants was one of them. The sense of purpose and accomplishment he felt when he helped them not only stay alive but to grow and thrive was something he’d rarely felt.
So he’d taken the dead plant to Tashmica, the head of the pack’s coven, to see if she could help him bring the thing back to life. While she mixed up a potion to help him, she’d casually brought up the county deputy that had been following all of them whenever they were in town and mentioned that she thought he might like watching Marcus more than the others.
At his confusion, she’d laughed and patted his hand, telling him to take the next opportunity he found to get to know the other man better.
Then when he’d arrived at the rec center for his and Vanessa’s first pack mentorship meeting, he’d been floored by the turnout. Adults, teens, and children had all shown up, some interested in becoming mentors but many hoping to learn more about the pack and themselves. It had been overwhelming for a moment to realize that so many of their kind knew so little about themselves, their abilities… their bodies.
He and V had worked on the fly to come up with a new plan to address the needs of everyone, splitting the group into smaller groups and proposing a schedule of speakers and topics.
Having spent years assisting the Council, Marcus had more knowledge about shifters and the formation of packs and the Council than most, so it was agreed that he’d begin the series the following week and talk about their history.
After all of that, he’d stepped outside alongside a few packmates, with V just behind him in a conversation about starting a sex education class, to find Deputy Robson Medina suddenly right in front of him. The human police officer was blocking Marcus’s SUV in its spot, but based on his raised hood, he was having some sort of car problems.
Marcus slowed to a stop as his eyes ran over the deputy’s body, taking in the sinfully tight jeans and bare arms on display. Medina’s skin was tan in a way Marcus’s never could be, his pale whiteness never seeming to absorb any UV rays, though his shifter healing kept him from burning at least.
When Teresa O’Neal stepped forward and called Medina by name, Marcus was jerked out of his lustful thoughts and raised his gaze from Medina’s fine backside. He nodded at him and used his title to address him, but Medina barely glanced at him before zeroing in on Teresa.
“Reesa, what the hell are you doing here?” The with him was unspoken, but Marcus had learned at a young age to read between the lines and infer what was not being said since it was usually even more important than what was.
“Me? What are you doing?” Teresa crossed her arms over her pronounced pregnant stomach and glared at the deputy.
Marcus looked between them and stepped forward since it appeared Teresa’s mate, Patrick, wasn’t going to step in, too busy listening to V’s conversation and offering his own suggestions.
“Is everything alright, Teresa?” he asked, keeping Medina in his line of sight but moving between him and Teresa.
Teresa beamed up at him, and Marcus couldn’t help but let the corner of his mouth quirk up as well. “Yes, Marcus. He’s my brother. My annoying big brother.”