10. Chapter Nine
Chapter Nine
Jax
A week had passed since Key had come into his life. During that time, she had been explaining the nuances of immortal society and what they had been doing to circumvent the Citizens’ plans. They had spent their nights together, and the woman put up with his hundreds of questions with the patience of a saint. When he lacked the mental capacity to learn anything else, they watched Hallmark Christmas movies, out of season.
At the Citizens’ facility, he continued to do paperwork and file forms. Originally, he’d thought about asking to be reassigned, but then realized he was in a prime position to help Key. Jax had begun to catalog everything that went on at his facility, building his case against them, while reporting back to Key so that she was able to fill in the gaps between her visions.
Several days ago, she’d revealed the nature of her supernatural gifts. Though the thought of prophetic visualizations was a concept that perplexed him, he believed her. After seeing what she could do, there was no denying it.
Eavesdropping had become his favorite pastime. Rayn and Barlowe weren’t shy about discussing their plans, and taking coffee breaks at just the right moment made them even easier to follow. Being assigned to administrative duty meant he was virtually invisible to his commanding officer. In the days since they’d met, Key had been carefully connecting the dots from what her visions showed her to what Barlow and Rayn spoke about. Every detail he could provide solidified plans that’d been in the works for centuries—and it made Jax feel as though he was a vital part of the effort.
Zeus was already up and out of his dog bed before Jax even heard her knock. Dodging a waging tail, he grinned at the woman on the other side of the door.
“Back for more already, are we?”
“Can’t help it,” Key replied. “You’ve wooed me with delicious nuggets of information and a fluffy puppy. If I have to play a damsel in distress for your attention, I’ll happily comply.”
Stepping back to let her in, he asked, “Is that who I’m looking at? A damsel in distress?”
“Depends.” Mischief sparkled in her features. “Are you finding yourself in dire circumstances that require you to return to your small hometown, where a beautiful but complicated shopkeeper helps you save your grandfather’s farm from foreclosure?”
“We’re definitely watching too many Hallmark movies,” he chuckled.
She shrugged. “They’re reliably predictable. I find that comforting.”
“I can imagine.”
Giving a final pat to Zeus, Key moved to the couch and collapsed in her favorite spot. She closed her eyes, humming happily, as Jax sat down beside her. The intoxicating scent of fresh mint whispered to him as they snuggled together, the woman’s aroma begging him to take her in his arms.
“How was work today?” she asked.
“Disturbing. They brought in a dozen new people. Homeless, vagrants, runaways. Key, I’m not sure how much longer I can take being there. There’s a teenager there,” he shook his head, “can’t be more than eighteen. It took everything I had not to go unlatch the cell they’re in when Rayn left.”
Key stiffened beside him. By this point, he knew that she was experiencing a vision—it wasn’t a reaction to his words. When the tension ebbed from her moments later, he’d already tangled his fingers through hers.
“It must wear on you,” she whispered. “I can’t even imagine.”
Jax brushed his lips across her knuckles, hiding from the sorrow that her words evoked. He hated that his hands were tied, and the only thing that kept him going most days was that he was contributing to their downfall.
“If it helps, there’s light at the end of the tunnel.”
“Oh?”
She took a deep breath, almost as if she needed to prepare herself for what came next. “I need to ask you a favor—two, actually.”
“Even better.”
“We need to retrieve a document from Torrin Scayde’s apartment,” she began, “but he’s outfitted it with tech that’d seriously injure an immortal.”
“How so?”
“His lighting is ultraviolet, which means any vampire who enters would burn immediately,” she explained. “Rayn has created a type of auto-deployment system that emits silver particles into the air, which automatically count the werewolves and Raeths out.”
“What about the Elementals?”
“Every time I foresee one of them enter, they die.” Her eyes misted. “Gideon, Jeremiah, Rukia: none of them come out of there alive.”
“What about if I go in? Will I survive?” At her nod, his mind was made up. “When and where?”
“It won’t be easy,” she said. “It’s dangerous, and the more I’ve tried to search for a way out of it, the less I see.”
“Key,” he tilted up her chin to catch her gaze, “I’m in danger every moment I’m at that facility. Putting my life on the line to undermine their plans would give me no greater honor.”
“Just tell me where. I’m yours.”
It seemed to lift a weight off her shoulders. “Tomorrow evening, I’ll bring everything we have on Torrin’s apartment, and we can walk through the mission together.”
He nodded, already running through what he would need to know to ensure the operation’s success. Absently, he turned on the television to the Hallmark movie they’d stopped halfway last night. While it played in the background, he grabbed a pack of Oreos—Key’s favorite—and set them down in front of her. Nabbing three, she snuggled in beside him.
A lightbulb turned on. “You said you had two favors to ask. What was the other one?”
Key grimaced and looked at the cookie like she’d lost her appetite. “The other is in relation to your commanding officer. If we succeed, it’ll result in the immediate dissolution of the facility where you work.”
A kernel of hope bloomed beside the adrenaline that kicked into his blood. Though he loathed Barlowe’s actions to the core of his being, he wouldn’t agree to anything that required torture or murder.
“How so?”
“Sobell will be out sick in a week,” she replied. “That night, I’m asking that you bring Barlowe to me instead of taking him back to base. I assure you: he won’t be killed.”
“What will you do with him?”
“Scrub his memories and erase the facility from his mind.”
Jax didn’t know whether to be impressed or horrified. “You can do that?”
“ I can’t, but I have a friend who can.” Her fingers tightened around his. “It won’t hurt him, but it’ll give us the in to destroy the facility where you work and free the people who’ve been kidnapped. Once you leave there that night, you’ll never need to return.”
Jax nodded, mulling through her proposal. The strategy would require him to put some skin in the game, and careful planning on their part would be a necessity. If they failed, he’d be subjected to a court martial if Rayn didn’t take vengeance first. At this point, it didn’t matter.
The screams of the victims inside the cages haunted his nightmares.
“Can you hold out for another week?”
Needing to lighten her load, he adopted his most debonair smirk. “Absolutely. I have your word he’ll live?”
The solemn look gave way to a smile. “Yes. You’re a moral compass, Jax. Always pointing straight north. That’s one of the things I appreciate most about you.”
Just as quickly, Key sobered. Something behind the way she suddenly pulled away from him made him realize there was more under the surface. The emotion that pulled her eyebrows together wasn’t sorrow or anger, it was guilt.
“What is it?”
The silence stretched between them. Jax could feel the racing heartbeat, her fingers clutched tightly in his. A barely visible shiver worked its way through her, but just before he opened his mouth to apologize, she spoke.
“I’ve had to do things, Jax,” she murmured, “things that most people would find morally wrong. If I hadn’t, the future wouldn’t have played out in the way it needed to, but that’s no excuse. The sins that stain my hands—they’ll never wash off.”
The words were charged with guilt so deep Jax could barely fathom it. He tugged her against him, shielding her from the world, as she trembled. Though he longed to sweep it under the rug, he knew she’d brought it up for a reason.
“Key, if you want to tell me what those things are, I’m here to listen,” he said. “And if you don’t, that’s okay.”
She was quiet for a few moments. Neither watched the movie that played in the background, the actors’ laughter at odds with their current situation. Gently strumming his hand across her back, Jax made up his mind: he wouldn’t judge her for the sins she’d been forced to commit.
“A decade ago,” she began, “I gave Torrin Scayde a photograph of a man named Lucius. On the back, it said that he was a vampire, and that Torrin could find him at the address of a building in New York City.”
Jax remained silent but urged her to continue with a nod.
“That one single photograph doomed Lucius to a week where he suffered the worst kinds of torture. He was abducted, beaten, and blinded, and it was all because of me.” Key’s voice wavered as she grappled with her tears. “I’m the reason Lucius was taken. He’s a good man, Jax, and I threw him to our enemies.”
Jax held her close. Wrestling with what she’d revealed, he said, “Was there any good that came from it?”
“He met his mate,” she sniffed. “She rescued him from the Citizens and nursed him back to health. And from there, so many people found their soul mates. It set off a chain reaction that allowed everything to fall into place.”
“Sometimes, bad things have to happen to make way for the good.”
Key clutched at his shirt, sobbing through it all. He hated that he couldn’t alleviate this pain for her, but he could be present with her while she battled it. Guilt could rip a person apart, and talking through it would be one way to help her sort through those dark feelings.
Night gradually fell outside. They fell asleep snuggled together on the couch as they had so many times before. When he woke up near midnight, she was gone.
***
Jax couldn’t help but be impressed. The sheer volume of material Key had organized with relation to his mission was astounding. An architectural layout of Torrin’s apartment, complete with 3D room renderings, was printed and laid in front of him. In addition to that, a rough timeline and Torrin’s one-page biography was alongside them.
The handwritten document contained every werewolf kennel location currently in existence. Over the years, Key had found all of them—except two. Though Jax had done some digging on his end, he’d come up short.
Key had explained that the list would only be available during a short timeframe. After the housekeeper left, they had approximately two minutes before Torrin returned home.
For the last two hours, they’d been pouring over their plan of attack. Jax had set his watch to a timer—he would only have a minute after the heat kicked on before he had to get on the elevator. If Torrin caught him, it was game over.
Fortunately, Jax always functioned better under pressure.
It was nearing seven when he found himself on the sidewalk outside of a towering Manhattan apartment building. Key hovered beside him, her hand locked in his. Time and time again, having a cool and level head on missions had been in his favor. That sentiment prevailed even now, when he would use his training to enter Torrin’s apartment.
“Remember: when you’re in there, all you need to do is find his laptop bag. Grab the list, and we’re in the clear.”
“On it.”
She handed him a matte black card with ‘P42’ stamped on one side. The card would get him into the penthouse, and then the real game would begin. “Please, just be careful. If you’re not out in five, I’ll be forced to come in after you.”
He glared at her. “Absolutely not. You said it was dangerous for a Raeth to enter that apartment. Promise me you won’t.”
Though she looked taken aback by his sudden decree, she nodded.
“Good.” More to himself than her, he recited, “Penthouse on the forty-second floor.”
“Right.”
“Got it.”
Without a backwards look, he strode into the building like he belonged there. Fewer people noticed a man who seemed to know the layout and exactly where he was going.
He entered the elevator with two other passengers, then swiped the card over the electronic box before punching the button for Torrin’s level. The ride up was quiet, and everyone else got off before reaching the top suite.
A moment before the elevator opened, he glanced at his watch once more. The timer was set at sixty seconds. With a ding, the doors opened to reveal an ostentatious penthouse. It was spotless in a way that suggested no one lived here, but Jax knew better. The massive space would do him no favors, but he’d memorized the layout and knew where to head.
He walked through the grand expanse of the living room. White furniture and glass tables greeted him, making him chuckle. Going by the interior design, Torrin Scayde clearly had a void where a personality was usually found.
He passed by two bedrooms and a bathroom, then he heard the heat kick on. The moment it did, Jax tapped the wristwatch. Sixty, fifty-nine, fifty-eight, fifty-seven …
When he stalked into the office at the back of the penthouse, he was relieved that a laptop bag was front and center on the desk. Sliding his hand into the front pocket, he found nothing but smooth leather.
A flare of adrenaline coursed through him.
Forty-three, forty-two, forty-one.
Shoving aside the anxiety it caused, he flipped the laptop bag around and unzipped the pocket in the back. A stack of papers. As he flipped through them, he quickly found the handwritten paper that detailed the kennel locations.
He quickly folded the sheet of paper into a square and stuffed it in his pocket. Perfectly replacing the laptop bag where he’d found it, he rushed to the elevator as he got down to single digits.
The moment the doors slid shut, relief washed over him.
Elevator music was his only companion for the ride down. As he exited to the lobby, a man with dark hair peppered with grey at his temples was waiting. He wore the type of abrasive confidence that told Jax he’d been military—and high ranking—at some point in his life. It didn’t take Jax long to recognize him from the picture Key had printed out. This was Torrin Scayde, the man behind the Citizens.
As if he were a building regular greeting a neighbor, Jax murmured, “Good evening.”
Torrin ignored him.
Chuffing a laugh, Jax didn’t look back as he made his way out toward the street where Key was waiting. Mission accomplished, he held his head high. Her relief when he came into view was palpable.
“Jax,” she emphasized, “are you okay? Torrin—he didn’t recognize you or anything, did he?”
Jax shook his head. “No, why?”
“I couldn’t see anything after you met him in the lobby—I got the feeling you’d be fine, but my visions were too hazy to know for certain.”
Jax stole his arm around her shoulders and tugged her close. For a foreseer who relied on her absolute knowledge of events, the haziness of their meeting must have been torture. “I’m fine. He didn’t even say hello.”
The tension leached from her body. “Let’s go—I don’t want to stay here any longer than we have to.”
After finding a secluded spot, they teleported back to his apartment. Zeus immediately ambushed Key, voicing his appreciation for her scratches when she crouched and worked her hands through his coat.
Jax pulled out the list and scanned it before finding the one he was stationed at. Scowling at the name, he asked, “Which one do we start with?”
“There were only two I never foresaw,” she said as she stood and read over the list, “most of them have been earmarked for termination in the next few weeks.”
“And mine?”
“We should have a date in the next few days,” Key confirmed. “In the meantime, sit tight.”
He turned away to conceal his frown, stripping off his jacket and tossing it on the back of his couch. Now that he’d retrieved the list and seen how many torture facilities there were, he was even more keen on assisting Key’s mission. Some might be even bigger than the hell he went to work in each day, and in operation for longer. He couldn’t bear the thought. He had to do more to ensure no one else got injured in the kennels.
“How else can I help?”
White-blonde eyebrows pulled together. “More than the highly dangerous mission today and helping us with your commander in a few weeks? Jax, you’ve already done so much.”
“I want to make a difference with the kennels, Key. Please,” he insisted. “I assume you’re pulling teams together to dismantle them. I know the layout of mine—and presumably, that’d be of help.”
She shook her head as if she couldn’t comprehend what he was saying. “Jax, you’re human. Letting you go would be like playing with fire—a risk we can’t take.”
“What’s the risk?”
“If a rabid wolf were to get loose when we were dismantling a facility, trained immortals could withstand an attack,” she walked forward, gently linking her fingers with his, “but you could die. We simply can’t take that risk.”
“I’ve been in the military for years, Key. I know my way around a weapon—and how to defend myself. I want to help you, and I need to make sure no one else is hurt by what the Citizens are doing. I see it every day, and I think you do, too. You can understand why I want to make a difference.”
“And you are,” she reiterated. “You getting this list is one of the final pieces that needs to fall into place. But Jax, if you go in those kennels, I can’t confirm you’d ever come out alive.”
Raising their interlinked hands, he kissed her knuckles. “I signed up for the military knowing the stakes. We write our wills knowing that any day could be our last. I don’t need a guarantee I’ll come out alive, just that I’m working toward the greater good.”
Key shuddered, her fingers tightening around his. “But you—you’re different to me.”
“How so?”
“Risking your life is,” she hesitated, unsure, before saying, “ harder than risking everything else. I dragged you into this war, and if you were to be injured—” Her voice caught. “Jax, you’re human. Fragile. One bullet, one bite, could kill you. I can’t risk it.”
Mind spinning, the path suddenly became clear. “And if I was an immortal?”
“You’re not.” The possibility seemed to shake her from her spiral. “This list is everything, Jax. With the full moon tomorrow, it means we can stop any other wolves from becoming rabid. We can spare so much suffering.”
“That’s a relief.”
The words were true, but Jax felt like there was a vice tightening around his chest. As a human, he could do very little to help keep people out of harm’s way. He’d taken an oath to protect the innocent, and being unable to assist chaffed against him.
“That also means,” Key added with a saucy smile, “that we’ll have to put a hold on our Hallmark movie marathon for the next few days.”
“That’s a shame.”
And it truly was. He’d grown accustomed to Key’s nightly visits and adored the time they spent together. But perhaps her absence over the next few days would be exactly what he needed.
When another vision briefly stole her attention, he gently wrapped her up in his arms. He loathed the fact that they took so much out of her. Every time the future played out, it seemed to snatch at her sanity. Jax could barely stand the faint tremble in her limbs as she weathered the storm.
A moment later, she was blinking back into awareness. “I have to go—but Jax, thank you for the list. You are appreciated more than you could ever know.”
She vanished.
He immediately headed for the door. Already, he knew his path forward. Being worthless in the fight for the future was unacceptable. If his humanity would keep him from saving those he wanted to protect, he’d renounce it.
The drive to the kennels was silent, but he wasn’t nervous. If anything, the quiet only reinforced his decision. His card clicked the entry system unlocked, and the sound reverberated through every corner of his mind, like a gong ringing the enormity of what he was about to do.
The smell greeted him first. It’d only been a few hours since he’d been inside, but it made him shudder every time. Only a stray yelp or growl pierced the silence. All of the humans had been tranquilized until the full moon, and the wolves seemed calmed by the darkness.
Jax approached the cage with the wolf who’d bitten the bearded man during the demonstration on his first day. It paced back and forth, teeth bared and a growl getting louder the closer he got. Knowing this wolf was a person—and one who’d been forcibly detained and turned—sickened him.
He stopped a foot shy of the cage. Staring at the massive werewolf fighting to escape, Jax contemplated what he was about to do. He had no family, no close friends. Finally, he’d found a cause to dedicate his life to—and then been found wanting. If this was what it took, he’d gladly step into the gap.
Jax’s forearm slid partially through the gap in the silver-lined cage. Teeth flashed, sinking into him and drawing blood without hesitation. His nerves lit up like lightning, burning through his arm as he quickly yanked it back to safety.
He couldn’t help the wolves in this facility, but he could ensure it never happened again.
***
Jax didn’t feel any different the following morning. The pain was minimal. He’d bandaged his arm the night before while watching a Hallmark movie that Key had recommended. Though Zeus kept him company, his apartment seemed surprisingly lonely.
Since it was a Saturday, he didn’t have any place to be, which was a relief. It became a leisurely morning—as most of his weekends were—with a slightly increased appetite and quicker jogging pace, but not remarkable.
Part of Jax began to believe that the process he’d signed up for had failed. Perhaps he hadn’t done it right: the bite hadn’t been deep enough, or it hadn’t drawn enough blood.
By mid-afternoon, the bite that had seemed a significant wound last night was nearly healed. The patch of broken skin now looked pitifully small, and he began to doubt his recollection of it. He had no way of knowing if this had triggered the desire reaction—and no one to ask one way or the other.
It was only when the moon rose that his confusion turned to agony. Pacing the length of his apartment, Jax fought against the rising tide of nausea and building anxiousness in his gut. His body began to feel foreign. His hearing became painfully sensitive and the clothes he wore scratched his skin. Every light seemed obnoxiously bright, and things that’d had no smell before were now overpowering.
Jax barely had the presence of mind to put Zeus in the bathroom and close the door.
As he collapsed on the floor beside his bed, sweating and shivering, he realized that he might’ve made a mistake. He had no support, and no idea what was happening to him. Laying there pathetically, he began to understand that what he was feeling wasn’t nausea.
Something inside him wanted out .