Chapter Nineteen #2
“Okay, fine, I was there to buy…something. But I’m not…I mean, that wasn’t my place. It wasn’t my stuff. There was another guy. He was short, and really gross, and—”
“Save it for your lawyer, bud,” said the passenger, shaking his head. “You’re going to need one.”
My heart began to race, the reality of my predicament settling over me.
In four hundred years, I had never once been in this kind of situation.
I’d been a model citizen in both human and shifter circles.
And now…now I’d been framed, and the evidence seemed pretty damning (even I could tell that) and nobody even knew where I was!
Emotion tightened my throat, and my belly churned again.
“I’m going to be sick,” I warned.
“You vomit in my car, and you’ll be cleaning it yourself,” the driver growled. “Fucking junkies.”
I shook my head, denying the accusation, but stopped as it made me dizzy and lightheaded. Panic was setting in, the edges of my vision darkening while my chest felt constricted.
I wanted my mates. My brothers. Hell, even my Pack Alpha. Anyone to save me from this ridiculous —and terrifying— situation.
I leaned my forehead against the cool glass of the window and closed my eyes, trying to calm my breathing. It was ragged and loud, on the verge of hyperventilation, and I ignored the officers telling me to ‘man up’ and get my shit together.
It was no use. All the worst-case scenarios were building up in my mind.
With nobody else to pin the crime of having gods-only-knew how much drugs and crap stashed in that old shack, and with no way to prove that there had been another shifter there, and with being found holding a giant bag of weed…
I was fucked. They were going to throw the book at me, especially because I was a dangerous shifter.
Plus, once they worked out my species, I doubted the humans would be any kinder or more lenient.
A dragon —Eric— had levelled a building in Manhattan a few years earlier and people were still fearful of the idea of us lurking amongst them.
Imagine adding drug dealing to the crime of being a fire breathing monster on top of that!
And the last thing I did was tell Serge and Dex to fuck off.
“Buddy, are you…are you crying?” the officer in the passenger seat asked in a strange mixture of horror and humor. He turned to his partner. “He’s crying. Can run a fucking drug den, but not man enough to face the consequences, huh?”
I shook my head but stayed mute. It didn’t matter that I knew I was innocent; there was no way they were going to believe me.
I couldn’t really blame them. If I had burst in to find a guy holding a bag of drugs and nobody else in sight, I would have thought the same thing.
That just made it feel all the more unfair. More tears dripped down my cheeks.
I’m sorry, I thought miserably as I watched miles of uninterrupted fields and dirt fly past through blurred vision. Dex, Serge…I’m sorry.
The station I was taken to was in Sioux City, but was unlike any police station I’d ever seen before, not that I’d been in many, even over my extended lifetime.
The sheriff's officers handed me over to a pair of menacing men in suits, neither of whom showed me a badge or any form of ID.
Then I was led through an old, unmarked building which appeared more industrial than for the purpose of public service, and I found myself thrown unceremoniously into a small cell.
The space was maybe six feet squared, surrounded by bars and with a brick wall at the back.
A tiny window for air —also barred off— was embedded into the rough red bricks just above my head height.
On one side of the space was a stainless steel sink and a matching toilet without a seat, and on the other side was a bare cot, bolted to the floor.
That was it.
“Turn around and back up against the bars,” one of the guys said, while the other observed with his hand hovering over the weapon holstered to his hip, his fingers twitching. “I’m going to uncuff you. Don’t bother trying to shift — you’ll find this cell was made to hold your kind.”
I frowned and, even though I’d been told not to, I tried to pull some of my dragon forward. It was like he hit a wall of magical resistance. I couldn’t even bring a single scale to the surface!
Despite facing the brick wall, I obviously couldn't conceal my panic from my new guards. They chuckled cruelly.
“Told ya,” said the one who was directly at my back, roughly unlocking the cuffs with a metallic click that seemed to echo through the room. He shoved me forward, making me stumble. “They built these cells back in the old days, when hunting shifters was legal. Used to round you all up and—”
I turned towards the toilet, horrified and panicked, but taking comfort in the fact that my loud retching covered up whatever the end of that sentence was.
“Jesus,” the other guy said, his voice more nasal than the first’s. I heard him take a couple of steps back. “Gross, man.”
What’s gross is that you’re gloating about using magic to subdue and kill magical creatures, I thought, fighting another wave of nausea. Couldn’t they see the hypocrisy in that?
“Anyway,” the first guy said, rattling the bars of my cage, “welcome to your new digs. Court system is awfully backed up. You’ll be here a while.”
I spat into the silver bowl and turned my face their way. “I get a phone call, don’t I?”
Guy number two snorted. “What do you think this is, an episode of Law And Order?”
Trying not to hyperventilate or work myself into another vomiting fit, I scowled and repeated, “I get a phone call.”
That was assuming they really were law enforcement agents.
A chill ran down my spine at the possibility that they weren’t. But then why mention the courts?
Unless they’re trying not to play their hand…Ugh.
I was beginning to feel paranoid. The panic writhing and spreading inside me wasn’t helping me to think clearly or calmly.
“Fine,” the first guy eventually said, taking my silence as expectation rather than the meltdown that it was. He pulled a phone from his breast pocket and held it out to me through the bars. “One call.”
I spat in the toilet bowl again, then surged to my feet, flushing the mess away and rinsing my mouth at the small sink before I turned to snatch up the phone.
My heart longed to call Dex, but that wasn’t the smart choice.
And, not having a lawyer up my sleeve —especially not one whose number I knew by heart— I called the only other person whose voice could calm me outside of my mates.
“Pick up,” I begged as the ringtone sounded in my ear, “pick up, pick up, pick—Bran!” His name burst out of me on a sob when he answered with a tentative “Hello?”
There was a pause. “Sage? What’s wrong? Where are you calling from?”
It took everything in me not to burst into tears at just the sound of his concern. “Bee,” I sniffled, trying to pull myself together. I turned away from the prying gazes boring into me. “Bee…I’m in trouble.”