A/N~ Sorry for the slight delay n posting. I had unexpected company yesterday, who I had to entertain and that put me behind. Please post reviews and let me know what you think. Hope you are still enjoying the story. This chapter didn't come out as well as I would have hoped but it got the point across. Read, enjoy and review.~A
Chapter 23
Several weeks later: Gerard and Victoria have started working at the school Scott is having dinner with a somewhat reluctant Allison and her too enthusiastic family. Well, her mother and creepy grandfather anyway, Chris was called away for business suddenly.
The family are just sitting down to the dinner table, the starter is a beautiful salad, prepared by Victoria herself, not from a bag. As evidenced by carrot curls, chunks of yellow squash, and purple flowers and little rose tomatoes. "I expect everyone to eat all of their vegetables or no steak," the redhead says with a smile before sitting down to the table after serving the other three.
Scott offers, "Not a problem for me ma'am. My mom is always feeding us fresh vegetables, and this looks fantastic." He says admiringly, "Almost too pretty to eat."
The older woman looks startled but blushes and responds, "Why thank you Scott. Let's dig in, shall we?"
"Rabbit food," the elder Argent grumbles good-naturedly, before settling down to take a few bites of his salad.
Scott stopped after a couple of bites and asks cautiously, not wanting to offend his hostess, "Ms. Argent did you put, is this squash in the salad?" he says wonderingly.
"Why yes, yes it is. Do you like it?" she asks a little nervously.
"Oh yeah, I mean like I said Mom being a nurse and all she's really into the vegetables. I just never would have thought to put it in a salad before," he said honestly.
Then they heard the door open and close and Chris Argent joined them in the dining room. "Honey, I'm home," he called as he came around the corner. He hesitated when he saw Scott, who looked like a deer in the headlights when he saw Allison's father.
Victoria and Gerard Argent's reaction to Chris' unexpected arrival were a little more over the top. Victoria stood and tried to direct her husband back towards the kitchen, but the man's eyes had caught on the salads and his expression had turned, not angry so much as cold and hostile.
"Allison, would you mind taking Scott up to your room, we have some business to discuss," her father asks. Allison recognizes that wile her fathers tone is warm and friendly, the cold expression is still on his face. She gets up and Scott quickly follows her out of the dining room and up the stairs.
When they hear the bedroom door close upstairs, Chris lashes out. Dual 9 mils are out and pointing at his wife and father before his father can rise from the table. "Why?" he demands but there is no denying the pain in his sharp tone. "Why are you trying to kill that boy and our daughter?"
"That boy," Gerard says derisively, at the word, "is a werewolf. An animal that girl brought into this house."
"And if he's just a regular human boy the aconite will still kill him and our daughter.." Chris repeated hostilely to his father and to the woman he had been married to for the better part of two decades.
"She's not my daughter," the woman shouted nearly at the top of her lungs. She gasped a little, "She's your daughter. I'm stunned and a little offended you never figured it out."
"What? You said…you had a one night stand…I-I don't…" the redhead snorted and a twisted expression came to her face but it was Gerard who answered.
"I knew what was going on between you and that werewolf. I tried to put an end to it. I tried but I missed and put you into a coma instead. Moved you from the Beacon Hills Hospital to a private facility. Even they had questions when you turned up pregnant."
Gerard gave an evil smirk and said, "I wanted to take you off life support and just let you die, your mother convinced me not to. The woman always was too soft hearted where you were concerned. She demanded we let the cur live, so she gave it to Victoria and told her to raise it."
"Of course she didn't tell her where it had come from. I did that when I came back and we decided to finish off what your sister started. But first I had something I needed to take care of, so I came back here to try and discover a way to finish off the Hale Pack and now I think I have the perfect way," the man trailed off absently.
"Still if the boy is human?" he remembered belatedly, "He'll die." he repeated staring in horror between the two.
Victoria said without a hint of remorse, "Collateral damage, just like the rest."
"I gave birth to Allison….that means Peter really is, and I…" he said in an awed tone.
"You won't speak his name in this house," Victoria demanded in a nearly hysterical scream as she drew a carving knife from under her apron. Chris' hand had dropped as they had explained their attempts to kill him, his daughter and the McCall boy.
A scream came from Victoria this time pained instead of enraged as an arrow protruded from her shoulder, right below her clavicle. Allison now wearing a dark jacket over her pretty dress and carrying her bow which she had already reloaded. Said arrow was aimed at the woman she had called her mother since she could talk.
Behind her came the boy with his lacrosse stick held like a baseball bat. Chris could already see the signs of aconite poisoning the pallor and sweaty skin on both of them, but the pair stood steady, shoulder to shoulder.
A loud crash drew their attention and a Gerard shaped hole showed where his father had jumped through the window. Allison and Scott made to go after him but Chris said, "No, Scott call Deaton we need to get the cure in you before it really hits you two."
"Stiles is closer," Allison said. Looking over at Scott with an intense gaze as though daring him to argue with her. The boy looked to be having an internal conflict before he lowered his lacrosse stick and pulled out his cell phone. He sighed after a minute and pressed a number in his contact list.
He walked away to have the conversation, and Christ told Allison, "There are some zip ties in the basement, sweetheart. Would you mind getting a pair for your…for her?" He concluded as he saw the flash in his daughters eyes. The teen merely nodded as she headed toward the kitchen.
Chris caught sight of an expression on his wife's face, it was quickly gone. But for a split second he could have sworn he saw fear in her eyes. Then he heard his daughter come running back up and he noticed she had the zip tie in one hand but had left her bow somewhere. He also noticed that she was paler than she had been when she had headed downstairs.
He did not expect what happened next, Allison went to stand in front of where Victoria was kneeling in pain and punched her mother in the jaw. She then put the zip tie on her mother and pulled it tight before taking the gun from her father and said, "Dad you need to go look downstairs."
Chris walked down the steep stairs to the basement cautiously the disgust in Allison's expression had already told him he wasn't going to like what he found. The smell of a decomposing body made it a certainty.
He vaguely recognized the man stuffed in the corner, then he remembered where he knew him from. PTA, this man was the principal of the high school. The one who Gerard had replaced after he had mysteriously disappeared. He had a sick feeling that the teacher who Victoria was supposedly substituting for would also be found dead somewhere or perhaps worse never seen again.
The hunter slowly stalked back up the stairs and into the living room. Standing there were Stiles, Derek and Peter Hale. Allison was staring at the older Hale with curiosity and a hint of suspicion. Peter was attending to Victoria despite the rather repulsed expression she had on her face. Someone, Chris wasn't sure who, had placed some duct tape over the woman's mouth.
xox~POV change~xox
Stiles was standing at the kitchen table with several vials on the table in front of him as he examined one of the purple flowers. Yeah definitely aconite and then a thought occurred to him. He ran his finger over the vinegar and oil dressing that was still on the plate and smelled it before a look of abject distaste had him drop the plate back on the table.
Picking up the bottle of homemade dressing he said, "Derek take this out back and very carefully smell it. Tell me she didn't do what I think she did." The werewolf didn't bother to go to the back door, instead carefully un-stoppering the bottle, he waved the glass stopper like a perfumier or a wine connosieur and took the lightest of sniffs, careful not to draw the fumes into his lungs. He still nearly gagged before he managed to slam the stopper back into place.
Even Peter standing several feet away began to cough into his sleeve. Grabbing the salad dressing from the werewolf Stiles trotted into the kitchen with the bottle. Glancing around and trying not to panic he opened the fridge and putting the bottle on a shelf, slammed the door shut before rushing back into the dining room. He didn't curse much, but there was cursing.
"Werewolves outside now," when both hesitated he said in a louder, firmer voice, "Now!"
Derek moved past the younger man, but Peter didn't move until he finished with his makeshift dressing. They all watched as the werewolf's eyes began to swell and he held his breath until he was done and then turned removed his gloves and tosses them into the garbage can before walking outside after his nephew.
The teen at the table was shaking his head with a muttered, "Stubborn ass."
The teen was moving fast but precisely, Chris vaguely remembered something from when he had been attacked in the woods. Stiles standing over him, he had recognized the boy of course from their previous meeting with the sheriff. He'd also kind of stood out during PTA meetings and sporting events. He watched as he mixed several compounds including charcoal. He remembered someone telling him the boy had ADHD, and while his hand had a fine tremor he was very careful with the measurements.
"Allison, Scott?" he called, the pair appeared from where they had been sitting on the stairs. "It's gonna taste gawd awful," the teen warned as he gave them both vials he had brought with him. "Don't drink or eat anything from in here because I don't know what she might have cross contaminated making the salad and dressing. Not even from the tap, the glasses might be contaminated too." Then the boy stopped talking for a minute and just froze, then there was a loud pop and a flash of light right next to Chris.
An elderly woman that Chris was sure he had never seen before stood next to him with a rather large shoulder bag. She walked past him as he stared at her in shock. Of course this was one more shock on top of too many, Chris Argent sat down…on the floor, staring around to where his daughter stood.
"Here we are cubs," the woman said pulling large bottles of water out of her bag and handed one to each of the teens. As soon as she had the bottle of water in hand Allison downed the concoction that Stiles had made and made a grimace of distaste. She handed the vial back to Stiles and then swished and swallowed before downing several deep swallows of the water.
She then walked over to where Chris sat on the floor and kneeling down, kissed him on the forehead and said, "Love you daddy." She then stood back up and went over to where Victoria was tied to the chair.
She tried to lift her mothers face with a finger to the chin, when Victoria resisted Allison grabbed the woman's jaw in a painfully strong grip and turned it so Victoria was facing her. Allison gave her mother a chilling smile as she said, "I imagine it goes without saying that you are as dead to me as you were trying to make me. Now here's a little warning for you Victoria. Stay in jail!"
"Don't try to escape and if they want to release you, confess to another crime. I've been trained very well by the best hunters in the world. He may have hated what I was and who knows it may have been the symmetry of it that he admired. But Gerard Argent made sure that I was one of the best hunters and planners the Argents have ever trained. So imagine all of that focus, training, and deadly purpose centered on hunting you down, and just don't."
"Please don't misunderstand this to be any kind of familial connection. The whole me not wanting to kill you," she said and very deliberately reached out and putting her hand on Victoria's wounded shoulder gave a very deliberate squeeze and said, "I think this proves how very easily I could."
"I just want to make sure you stay where you belong, in jail. Because if you don't, I will hunt you down, and I won't bring you back alive. I won't even try to and you won't escape me. Because after all you're a planner, not a hunter, Mother. Oh and don't worry Gerard will be joining you soon, well as long as he comes along quietly, so maybe not." With that she gave her mother an affectionate pat on the head and said, "Bye, bye," before turning and heading out the front door.
Scott came up to Chris and patted him on the shoulder before saying, "That badass is your daughter, and my girlfriend," he said with puppy-like devotion, before trotting out the door after the teenager.
Chris shook his head before slowly getting to his feet. Stiles glanced at the other man and shook his head slightly. Finally he said, "How's your chest?" as he used another bottle of water the woman had brought with her to clean up after himself. She was in the process of doing something with several herbs she had them ranged around a tall glass jar with a lid sitting beside it. She was being very meticulous, then his mind finally registered what Stiles had asked.
"So I didn't hallucinate. I remember Peter being there, I thought he might have…" Chris said in a bit of a confused ramble.
"Oh Peter saved you too, more than me I'd say. I just pulled a rib out of your lung and knit it back together. Peter saved you from the wolves, three betas. Shouldn't have been able to even if he did have Malia with him, but he did." the boy rambled right back.
"Yes I remember," Chris started, when the woman held up a hand to him and said, "Hold that thought, I'm ready now Stiles. You should take Mr. Argent outside now."
"Yes, ma'am," the teen said and then realized that Victoria was still sitting in the chair, "should we?"
"Leave her," Mary said without looking up from something on the table, "If she happens to get a little wolves bane poisoning it's the least she deserves."
Chris is about to argue the point when the woman apparently begins weaving her spell. The hunter feels the hairs on the back of his neck, the guttural sounds the older woman is reciting has him turn to look back and see a truly horrified expression on Victoria's face that even with all she's done he would leave her behind. For a moment he almost goes back for her, the boy behind him though manages to manhandle him down the stairs into the front yard.
Where Scott is looking a little dazed sitting on the step side of Derek's Range Rover. Malia is leaning against the side of the truck, near the teenager. Watching everything with the intensity of a scientist, mentally cataloguing it all. Allison is obviously having a very intense conversation with Peter, if the uncomfortable expression on the werewolves face is any indication. The almost desperate glances he is sending Chris are also showing he's not quite sure how much to tell their teenage daughter. Then the memory of the conversation they had at the vet's office hit him and he realizes he, no they have two teenaged daughters.
Determinedly Chris Argent walks toward the arguing pair and says, "Allison, Peter, I think we have a lot to discuss. First though there is the issue of Victoria…and Gerard. They have killed at least one and perhaps two human beings. No matter what excuse they gave they need to be punished for that, agreed?"
He knew instantly he should have tempered the statement, when his daughters stoic expression crumbled a little and then was obviously pieced back together by Allison. The girl, no the woman disappeared back behind the stoic warrior's expression. He cursed himself, Victoria, and Gerard for that, but mostly himself.
"Dad, you know what I don't even care about them right now." He didn't need to see Peter's wince to know his daughter was lying. "I want to know how two men who supposedly were enemies had a daughter," and then she looked at Malia and something clicked in her head and she offered, "or is it two daughters?"
"Aunt Kate… she thought your call sign from the Middle East was hilarious, but it wasn't your call sign was it?" she said in a hushed voice. Then she looked at Peter and continued, "It was yours. Dad wasn't the Desert Wolf you were, weren't you?" At the mention of that name Malia looked at Peter with a look of recognition as well. At the mention of the Desert Wolf though, Peter only had eyes for Chris.
"You took my call sign?" He said and even Scott heard the almost love struck awe in the older man's voice. Then realizing that both girls were staring at him, he slid back into his oily charm as he replied to Allison's question, "If you think she was amused by him having the name Desert Wolf, she wouldn't have let him hear the end of it, if she'd known his real call sign." He pulled Malia in close to his side and rubbed his cheek into his daughters hair as he gave a chuckle.
He shrugged a bit and said, "Tell me Allison are you familiar with the term Silver Fox?" When the other girl shook her head, there was a groan from her father. She glanced over at him to find he had both hands covering his face in mortification if the red tinged tips of his ears were an indication.
"A silver fox is slang for…well I guess the best way of putting it is, it's a male version of a cougar." When the brunette was looking askance at her father. "Of course this was all before he met your mother, we were both in the military at the time." He said looking over at the hunter, "We were both in the military," he told the girls easily. "We joined together, we trained together, and we were stationed together. Our specialty was scouting and intelligence gathering, our families had no idea we were stationed together." He seemed to hesitate and looked over at the still mortified Chris and said, "I have no idea what's appropriate for teenaged girls?"
"The same thing that's appropriate for teenaged boys," Allison said sternly. Looking around at Scott, Stiles, and Derek who were pretending not to listen and yet obviously could hear everything. She shook her head and headed around the side of the house before looking over her shoulder and saying, "Come on if it's going to be a family meeting, we may as well be comfortable."
Scott was up off the side step of the Range Rover with a bound. Derek had an arm wrapped around Stiles shoulders and seemed almost to be hovering over the teen. "Derek, we're with Pack. Tone it down or everyone will know. Which for the moment, we don't want remember?"
"Can't help it," Derek said through his teeth, "They tried to take out two of our Pack and you were in the same room as one of them. The wolf feels a threat to it's mate."
Slapping a hand against the Alpha's chest to stop him for a minute, and faced him with a serious expression, "Well remind him, the threat was neutralized before I even got there. The pack is safe for now, and as for me, remind him we are equals in this. I am not an Omega." He said and gently drew his fingernails down thru Derek's beard, before walking around to where the rest of the group were arranging themselves in the seating area of the Argents patio.
Peter was still standing his chin in his hand and there was a sad and distant look in his eyes that somehow made him look older and a little tired. "First things first, Derek I will be telling Talia today that I am officially joining your pack. While from what Chris says she didn't know about he and Allison. I have a feeling she was behind Malia and I being separated and erasing my memory."
He shrugged his shoulders and said, "My family is part of your Pack, it only makes sense that I should also become part of your Pack. Unfortunately for your Mother I imagine Cora feels the same way, but she's still a minor." he said sadly.
"Chris and I, I think we're very much like Scott and Stiles. Friends since grade school but unlike you two we had to keep it secret. At first we didn't know why our families were enemies. You should have heard the theories we came up with, some of them were incredibly fluffy and romantic. Those were usually Chris's theories. We won't talk about those, ever again, too disturbing for your young minds. A few were closer to the truth, after several years we finally figured it out. Especially after some hunters who were friends of Gerard's took a few pot shots at us in the Preserve one evening."
"I wonder now how my father would feel if he had known the truth. How close his friends came to killing his own son?" Chris offered before adding, "On second thought, considering what happened here this evening, I may not want to know." he added thoughtfully.
"We became involved romantically while we were in high school. We were discreet, we had to be. It was a different time, and of course there was the whole werewolf/hunter issue between our families. As soon as we graduated we went into the military, we both became pilots. Thankfully we were posted together, then the Middle East happened."
Chris snorted, "We were in demand but we still remained discreet…or thought we did."
"We were together all through our military careers, we were together even when we came back. This is where things apparently get a little hazy. There are several months for both of us, that are missing. I doubt very much that Talia and Gerard wee working together but the fact of the matter remains that both of us had daughters and they were taken away by our families. That hardly seems credible as a coincidence but I have no other way to explain it," the older werewolf said with a look of frustration on his face.
"Question," said Scott raising his hand as if he were in school. "You both have time missing, Chris, sorry Mr. Argent. He was in a coma after his accident, I get that lost time. During which they apparently took Allison presumably through a C-section. Needless to say this discussion is a very awkward one for me. My question is how did they take Malia from you, how did you lose time?"
Peter and Derek shared a look and then Derek shrugged and nodded, "Werewolves are capable of accessing memories, erasing them, manipulating them, sharing them. It takes skill and practice to do any of these but it is possible. Usually only Alpha's or trained Beta's can do it. Others aren't usually allowed to because if you don't know what you're doing, you can really do serious damage to a person's psyche."
"Basically you could turn them into a living, breathing, drooling zombie," Stiles said without a hint of amusement.
"So not to be crude or anything and details are so not necessary. I mean really not necessary but how do two men have two kids. Kind of flies in the face of all those anatomy and biology lessons we've been having in school.'
"That's because you've been having human anatomy/ We're werewolves, where werewolves are concerned a little magic is to be expected." Peter explained with surprising patience.
"So human and werewolf mates could have babies. Premise One accepted. Higher ranking werewolves can mess with werewolf minds, what about human ones?" Stiles asked in a certain tone he got when he was in research mode.
"If you mean can a human mind be influenced by werewolves, yes." Peter replied easily.
"Premise two accepted. A werewolf can tell if another werewolf is pregnant, presumably by hearing the fetus' heartbeat or possibly smell it in a change of scent, like pheremones?"
"Very astute Stiles, yes either one of those is possible." Peter said, curiously trying to figure out where the boy was going with this train of thought.
"Premise three accepted. So could they also tell who the other father was by scent or whatever?"
Peter frowned and a cold sense of dread slid into his heart like a knife, he answered truthfully, "Presumably if they were familiar enough with the other person's scent then yes, it would be possible. What are you getting at Stiles?"
"So Gerard probably figured it out when Chris had his accident and was in the coma. You though, I was trying to figure out how they would know you were pregnant to do the mind whammy on you, so you explained that. So either Talia, Laura or someone high ranking in the Hale Pack figured out what was going on with you and Chris. They decided for whatever reason you couldn't keep Malia and did what they did. So my next major question? Why?"