“Alevtina Petrovna Volkova,” I greeted.
“Sergei Sokolov.” She gestured to the werewolf keeping her company. “This is Grigorij Jakovlevich Maslov. Thank you for coming. I see you have brought your dog?”
Petra kept close to my legs, behaving more like an exceptionally well-trained Siberian husky rather than a proud wolf. “There was no reason not to bring her, and she has preferred to keep me company as of late.” Unlike at my cabin, I took a little more care with my Russian, although I still made the ved’ma wince. “I can’t promise my contact will answer. I don’t know what the time zone difference is, but if you want me to call, point me to a phone, and I will call.”
Grigorij approached me and held out a cell phone. “Use mine, please.”
I expected he would try to use the number later, so I would warn Dante to change his number or take whatever care he needed to protect himself. I accepted the phone, dialed the number from memory, and held it to my ear, listening to the dial tone.
“Anderson,” he answered with a yawn.
“Bob,” I greeted.
I almost smiled at Dante’s startled yelp. Once he recovered, he demanded, “Do you know what time it is?”
“I’m in Russia o’clock,” I replied. “I don’t know where you’re at right now, so I can’t even begin to guess what time it is. Does your group know anything about Blagoveshchensk, Russia?”
“We only operate in Moscow and St. Petersburg.”
“There are some people who’d like to meet Desmond in Blagoveshchensk.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. You?”
“We’re good for the most part.”
“For the most part?”
“Is the owner of this phone Normal?”
“No, he’s not.”
“Okay, good. Amber’s getting old, and her witchcraft can’t keep up anymore. Nicolina isn’t handling it well. My brother wants to authorize her becoming a Fenerec, but that can only happen under certain circumstances. So, I’m glad you called, because you happen to be one of those circumstances.”
“I am? How so?” I sighed and raised my hand, pinching the bridge of my nose. “Toad-spotted ratsbane. You just had to make this more complicated.”
“I’m good at complicated. You should know this by now, Declan.”
“All right. How can I help?”
“Basically, you’ll perform the ritual on her after getting her consent. Or maybe even without her consent if she is having severe health problems. Since you’re a dominant rogue wolf, sanctioned by my brother, with a severe case of single, he can write it off as amorous young wolf falling hopelessly in love with the woman who can still kick the asses of six SEALs at one time without thinking about it.”
My wolf sighed his longing in my head, and for a rare change, I agreed with him. “I want to watch her do that.”
“Of course you do. I’m happily mated, and it’s still one of the sexiest things I’ve ever seen. Not even my mate can argue with me over this one, because she thinks it’s sexy, too.”
“Does Amber want to become one of us?”
“She would if she could, but the current circumstances state she can’t. Since she’s old and has been in the Inquisition for a long time, she’s convinced there’s no chance for her to undergo the ritual. However, if I send her your way, and you take her off to wherever it is you’re denning, you can do it without real consequence. Depending on your wolf and hers, you might end up with her for life, but for some reason, I don’t think you’d mind that.”
“Is this revenge for having slipped off? I’m feeling like you are getting revenge for that.”
“No. It’s revenge for not calling sooner,” Dante replied.
“That seems cruel and unusual, but I also can’t state it’s not fair.” I sighed. “I had Bodwin’s wolf, and she’d been shot. I took the way out I had, and we ended up in Russia. It just happened I came here.”
“What is your current name?”
“Sergei Sokolov.”
“Patronymic?”
“I hate that question,” I muttered.
“You forgot to give yourself a patronymic?”
“I didn’t forget, but my mother did not provide it, if you please.”
Dante snickered at me. “Okay, okay. I’m never letting you live this down, as you’re usually better than that, but I bet you’ve put together a damned good story for yourself. You usually do. So, where are we headed?”
“Blagoveshchensk. It’s in eastern Russia. If you cross the river, you enter China. It’s north of Harbin and Changchun and across the river from Heihe.”
“I see your geography is as good as ever. It’ll take us a while to get there. Where can we find you?”
“Let me ask my hostess.” I lowered the phone and regarded the ved’ma with a frown. “They are willing to come, and they will come in a group. Where should they go once here?”
“You can invite them to your home if you would like, but we can issue them letters for a hotel in the area, but we will need to know how many are coming.”
Letters? Rather than ask, I lifted the phone to my ear. “I’ll need to know how many of you will be coming so you can get letters for a local hotel, although I’ll give you directions to my cabin.”
“You and your cabins. Don’t worry about the letters. We have access into Russia through Moscow. You can tell her that.”
“They’ll be coming through Moscow, so they don’t need any letters, but thank you,” I dutifully relayed.
The woman paled and said in Russian, “They are connected to Moscow?”
Interesting. She didn’t want Dante to overhear that question? I switched to Russian and replied, “They’re connected to everybody, Alevtina Petrovna Volkova. There will be too many of them to realistically stay at my cabin, so if you could give me information on a good hotel here, that would be appreciated.”
“There is a good hotel for guests near the train station.” She gave me instructions I relayed to Dante so he could handle any reservations they would need. “We have a guest home for visitors.”
“Please thank her for the offer, but we prefer to use hotels, as they can become neutral territory,” Dante told me.
I relayed his reply, which earned a nod from the ved’ma. “Your friend is wise,” she complimented.
“Oh, Dante?”
“When you have a question, I worry. I’ve learned this is something to worry about. When you have questions, you are thinking, and when you think, trouble brews.”
“I see you are displeased with me right now.”
“Only slightly miffed. Your programmer and your SEAL whine constantly, for you are a black ops legend and have disappeared again. What do you want?”
It pleased my wolf both of our friends cared we’d disappeared. “They seem to have issues with a lack of children and women among our numbers.”
“Ah. Simply addressed. Please ask if there are any bitches wishing to have children this winter. If so, we will invite them to the United States. We have room for four without me even thinking about it. That includes their mates, as we have found long-term separation makes it harder on them. There isn’t enough time to teach the Alphas how to stop the transformations, but we can handle that in the next year or so.”