Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
MIKO
Lance.
That prick. Already making his moves.
I half expected him to crash through the front door with his usual bravado and a gun, come to finish me off once and for all with a bullet between the eyes.
He’d almost killed Orion. My Orion.
The fae who blew my world apart.
The fae I’d have to lose to save the world.
The fae I should reject to spare both of us. It’d make things easier, but I was already adjusting to him being my mate. Wanted him with me every damn second.
Holding him was incredibly easy. The perfect fit. And I offered him a side of myself I believed to be forever dormant.
Soon it’d all fall apart.
Fuck.
I held back a roar of frustration, focusing my rage on Lance.
The prick had to die. No one hurt my mate or my pack and survived.
Let Lance come through that door. I was so ready to break every bone in his body.
Come on! Make my fucking year!
I assembled my pack in the living room, explaining what’d happened with Ben.
Paige and Cate took the sofa, Trev the floor, Basil still in the armchair.
James stood to my right, always the loyal beta, Orion on my left.
Daria stood over in the corner, dabbing the side of her bloody mouth with a tissue.
“We’ve been compromised,” I added. “Daria has offered to take us underground again. We move in five minutes.”
Every eye bore into me.
I kept up my defenses, hating having to do this. Always acting for their greater good, always the bearer of bad news. Especially these past two years.
One day very soon, I’d have to do my duty and end Dawn to give them all a better life. The longer I didn’t follow Trev’s words and get this shit done, the more I put them at risk.
But I couldn’t walk away. Still here with them, hope trapping me in steel claws.
What did you do, Dad?
Yeah, the million-pound question. What the hell had he done to make Dawn possible? He wasn’t the kind of man to get involved in anything dodgy. Nose always clean, full to the brim with strong morals and principles, instilling them into me and my sisters.
What had he done?
I suppressed rising memories of my family.
Stay the fuck back!
Orion brushed his hand against mine, setting my pulse on fire.
For a moment, I closed my eyes, transported to some private rooftop of some posh restaurant.
The city lights twinkled like sprinkled stars before us, the table done up to the nines.
Then there was me and Orion, suited and booted, wooing modes activated, our eyes meeting across the lavish centerpiece, my hand reaching for his.
Everything as it should be in some parallel, zombie-free world.
“Sir?”
But we couldn’t have any of that.
“Sir?”
Why were we put together only for this shit to land at our feet?
“Sir?”
Holding Orion wasn’t enough. I needed more, wanted to give him more. To learn more about him, discover what kind of mates we’d be.
A second brush against my hand.
“Sir?”
My muscles tensed at the clearer sound of James’s voice.
I blinked. “What?”
“Are you okay, sir?” He faced me, his orange cap turned backwards. The angry scar on the left side of his dark brown face looked more prominent tonight. At least to me.
“I’m fine.” I crossed my arms, taking a step forward. If Orion kept making skin contact like that, I might break when the priority was to move my pack to safety.
No. Fucking. Breaking.
“Make that four minutes,” I said. “Gather what you can.”
We’d harvested supplies from the other apartments in this block, filling up rucksacks and bags with food, bottles of water, some flashlights. Anything that helped.
I grabbed two rucksacks from the kitchen.
“Can I take one of those?”
Orion appeared in the doorway.
“No need,” I said.
“It’s fine. Let me take one.”
“They’re too heavy.”
He cocked his left eyebrow. “I told you I’m built from sturdy stuff.”
“They’re heavy with tins and jars.”
“Oh. I’m not that sturdy.”
“That one’s light, I think.” I pointed at the rucksack with my boot.
“Mine,” he declared brightly, quickly checking the contents. “Easy.” He threw the strap over his right shoulder.
Though he was just carrying a rucksack, I felt a strong surge of pride for him.
Weird.
“Let’s get moving,” I said.
He took a breath as if to speak but didn’t say anything.
“What’s up?” I questioned.
He licked his bottom lip. “What happens now?”
“We find somewhere safer. Hopefully a new Haven outside London.”
“So we’re, erm…” He sighed. “Sorry.”
“We’re leaving London, yes. Going north.”
“To this Dunstable place.” His eyes glistened in the light of a wind-up lantern.
“Yeah.”
“To the heart of Dawn…”
Oh, God. “Can we talk about this later?”
“I’m just telling myself this is really happening, you know?”
“I know.”
A series of quick nods, stray tears breaking free from his pretty green eyes, the flecks of golden glitter in his irises losing their radiance.
“Orion…” I went to him, taking his face into my hands. “Don’t cry.”
He sniffled, more tears breaking free. “Sorry. What a bad time for this nonsense.”
“It’s not nonsense.”
“But it is the wrong time.”
I wiped his tears with the pads of my thumbs. “Let’s just get out of here.” I kissed his forehead. “Then we can cuddle some more.”
His hands found my hips. “Yes, please.”
His tears hurt my heart. I never wanted to see him cry. I wanted a special scoop to dig out all his pain, all his sorrow and anxieties, then wrap him up in cotton wool. Because he was sunshine and beauty, a special guy requiring every part of my strength to keep him safe.
James appeared. “All set, sir. Cate is doing a sweep of the immediate area with Basil.”
“Good. Thank you.”
Cate and Basil returned to give the all clear.
“Ready?” I asked my mate.
He tapped the handles of three screwdrivers poking out of his coat pocket—new weapons since he’d lost his axe. “Ready.”
Daria led the way through the night, taking us to a manhole cover a few streets away.
We kept low, vigilant, ready for any signs of life or walking death in the residential street. I scanned every house, every vehicle, every corner, waiting for attack.
No biters. No scouts. No Lance.
Shouldn’t that be no speedies or slowies, as Orion called them?
I’d adopted those cutesy terms into my vocabulary. After all, they were spot-on terminologies.
What an impact he’d had on me.
A gust of wind ripped through the street, churning up a pile of rubbish.
Nothing else stirred.
That didn’t mean shit. My shoulders would only unknot, slightly, when my pack got clear of this street.
Are you out there watching? I thought at the shadows.
Again, I wanted Lance to show his face so we could get to our inevitable showdown.
Trev went into the manhole first, the space just wide enough to accommodate his bulk. His arms only slightly scraped the sides of the shaft. When he gave a small sound to say he’d reached the bottom, Cate went down halfway, the go-between wolf for lowering our supplies.
Once that was done, Paige followed her, easing herself onto the ladder, taking her time to get to the bottom.
I gestured for James to go next. I could tell he’d rather go last, but he didn’t argue with me.
Every nerve in my body raged, my insides churning, my fear palpable. But things ran smoothly. All we had to do was find a quiet spot in the underground darkness, then knuckle down and sleep off the rest of this night.
Tomorrow was another day.
What did you do, Dad?
Orion’s turn next. He smiled at me, moving to grab the ladder.
Pounding footsteps and hissing sounded off to my right.
Oh, fuck.
Speedies.