8. Graeme #2
Avery looked up then, and our eyes met briefly. Something, a thought, perhaps an emotion—I couldn’t discern which—flickered in his, there and gone before he returned his focus to Remy and continued the interview.
“Which scared you, because he knew who you belonged to. He’d done his homework.”
“Yes,” he whispered shakily.
“Okay,” Avery stated, clearing his throat. “So this man warned you about a specific girl, and he came to your house just that once before tonight?”
“Yes, just the once, and then, as I said, twice tonight,” Remy declared.
“Twice tonight,” Avery repeated. “And then what happened?”
“She screamed when the man came up behind her.”
“So she screamed because she was scared?”
He shook his head. “No. She was screaming at him. Definitely at him. She was telling him something about how it wasn’t fair, that it was her turn. I don’t—he scared the crap out of me, so that was all I was focused on. Well, that and I do know her hair was black, not platinum blond.”
“Could you tell which direction the girl was headed when she left? Was she on foot, or did she have a car?”
“I think she ran, but that’s just a guess. He started hitting me, and I couldn’t do anything but try not to be killed.”
To the humans looking at Remy, it had to sound absurd, because whatever damage the man had inflicted was already healed.
“It looks like your X-rays corroborate your story, Mr. Talmadge,” my mate told him.
“I wouldn’t lie, not about this. It was so scary. I’m an alpha, but this guy was big and strong; he had to be an alpha too, and I’m guessing trained in some kind of martial arts or—I would have died if Trent hadn’t started yelling and threatening to call the police.”
“Which he would have never done since there were still omegas in your home,” Avery commented. “Correct?”
“A few, but yes,” Remy agreed. “Which perhaps my assailant realized.”
It seemed reasonable.
“Let’s continue, then,” Avery prodded him after a couple moments of silence.
In the story Remy continued to tell, the alpha, or the man Remy assumed was an alpha, chased him out to the street, where Remy had fled.
His assailant punched him for the final time and then took off.
By then, there was an audience, his neighbors.
After assuring them that he was fine, he walked back inside.
Trent had been waiting, and helped him to the hall bathroom because Remy was going to be sick and couldn’t make it to the one in the master.
Remy heard the doorbell ring while he was vomiting.
When he finished, he splashed water on his face and rinsed his mouth, then headed to his room to change out of his sweat-soaked, filthy clothes.
“I noticed my bedroom door was closed, but was sure I heard a woman’s voice and assumed it was another omega.
I was going to go back to the living room, figuring Trent was taking care of her, but then I heard a scream.
I was worried that maybe he forgot my instructions, so I opened the door and saw a girl bent over the end of my bed, passed out.
” His voice was monotone, as though he was back there, in the moment, narrating what he was seeing.
“She probably screamed before she fainted, and because I was so worried about her and what Trent must have done, it took me a second to register he was in the middle of the floor, choking to death.”
I watched Remy filter through his memories, saw him wince and jerk before tears welled in his eyes.
“There was so much blood and that awful, wet gurgling.”
“Could you tell why he was choking?” Avery asked.
Remy lifted his hand to his neck as though in a trance. “Because a wolf had its jaws clamped around his throat, suffocating him and ripping at the same time. When it yanked free, it kept its jaws locked, didn’t let go, so most of Trent’s neck was gone,” he rushed out, his voice catching on a sob.
“What’d you do then?”
“Trent was convulsing and trying to shift, but he’d lost too much blood, and then the wolf just—the wolf…”
“The wolf,” Avery prodded him. “Go on, please.”
“It started pulling him apart, ripped into his stomach with its claws and bit through his wrist, and then it stopped and turned its head to me, like it was in slow motion, and stared at me for a long time. I mean, it felt like a long time, and I watched the blood drip off its muzzle, and then it opened its mouth and went back to Trent.”
“And then?”
His eyes had flicked away, but he returned his gaze to Avery. “It was going to kill me. I knew it was seconds away from being done with Trent and would be coming for me next, so I ran.”
I could imagine how terrified Remy had to have been, faced with his own mortality.
“I rushed out of the room, and I was going to go out the front door, but the girl suddenly flew by me, into the hall, headed that way, so I went in the opposite direction, to my panic room, and locked myself in.”
“Did you hear anything after that?” Avery was in full interrogation mode now, pressing Remy for the final details.
“No, the…the room is sealed and soundproofed, so no.”
“Okay—” Avery took a breath. “—thank you, Mr. Tal––”
“If the room is sealed and soundproofed, why did you come out and attack my partner?” Detective Massey phrased it as an accusation more than a question.
Remy’s eyes widened fearfully as he turned to Avery. “Are you the one who was outside the room?”
“I was, but it’s—”
“I’m so sorry,” he apologized, his voice bottoming out. “I just—I was so scared, and I could have sworn I smelled Graeme, and I knew if I could reach him I’d be safe so—oh God, I didn’t hurt you, did I?”
“No,” Avery assured him. “You were out of it, so it wasn’t much of an attack.”
“But I… I seem to remember there were marks on your face and…your neck, and…thank God you’re not mated. I don’t think I could fight a wolf for––”
“It’s fine,” Avery affirmed, shooting Detective Massey a pointed look before returning his focus to Remy.
I suspected that Avery wanted to get on with the investigation and not delve into the reason he was carrying my scent on him.
“You didn’t hurt me; I just don’t heal as quickly as an alpha.
I’m fine now. The important thing is that we found you; you needed medical attention. ”
He inhaled deeply. “Thank you. I—” He inhaled again, parting his lips, tasting the scent in the air. “It’s so odd, but all I’m getting from you is Graeme.”
“That’s because he’s standing right beside you,” Detective Massey groused at him. “Of course he’s all you can smell.”
“We found your DVDs, Mr. Talmadge,” Avery redirected, “but not the location of the camera in your bedroom, and we need to look at the footage from tonight.”
“The camera is behind the mirror above the headboard of my bed.”
“I was just in your room,” Detective Massey told him. “There’s no mirror above the headboard. There’s a mirror on the opposite wall, beside the armoire in the corner.”
“No,” Remy assured him. “It’s a two-way mirror, with shelves behind for positioning the camera.”
“There’s a painting above the headboard…and two shelves behind it. But nothing else.”
Remy caught his breath. “Detective, I assure you that’s where the camera was. The mirror was there, the painting was next to the armoire. If they’re switched now, whoever did that has the camera and the footage of Trent’s murder.”
“Okay,” Detective Massey said after a moment. “We need to go back to that house.”
“Are all the copies of your interactions with the omegas on DVD, or do you keep them backed up in cloud storage as well?”
“I don’t trust a cloud not to be hacked, so I have the DVDs and an external hard drive.”
“Which is where?”
“In my safety deposit box.”
“We already have access to your phone records, but I’d like to look at the phone as well, if that’s not a problem.”
I moved then, from where I’d been standing near the head of Remy’s bed, to the foot, pulled Remy’s phone from my outside suitcoat pocket, and passed it to Avery.
His eyes met mine. “Thank you,” he murmured.
I tipped my head at him. “And now, gentlemen, if there’s nothing more, I need to speak to my cousin, and then to his doctor.”
Avery promised to return the phone as soon as possible.
“I look forward to hearing from you, Detective, but perhaps in the meantime you can give me your number in case I need to contact you.”
“Absolutely,” he acceded, his voice husky, gravelly, as his gaze met mine for only a heartbeat, but it was enough.
He and the others were gone moments later.
In truth, I had nothing to say to Remy, so I ordered him to be silent and rest, and then pulled out my phone to call Kat.
“Make arrangements to send a vordr to Remy’s home.”
“No,” Remy gasped behind me. “Graeme, you can’t do that. It’s not––”
“It is,” I snarled at him before speaking into my phone. “Kat.”
“Yes,” she replied hoarsely. “Yes, Graeme, I’m here.”
“Did you hear what I said?”
“I did,” she replied softly, steadily, not asking the question that my brother would have—if I was certain of my decision. “Anything else?”
“Not at the moment.” I clipped the words before I hung up.
Walking to the door of Remy’s room, I stepped outside, nodded at the two police officers there standing guard, and then walked down the hall to a deserted seating alcove I’d seen earlier. Only then did I call Stone.
“Tell me everything,” he said when he picked up, even though it was a ridiculous hour of the morning. “Gigi’s here too.”
I cleared my throat. “I’m sorry to have kept you both up with this.”
“That doesn’t matter, Graeme,” my sister-in-law assured me. “We’re family, this is a family matter. Now tell us.”
I explained all about what Remy had done, not bothering to sugarcoat the details about him preying on the omegas, or my plan to make reparations.
“We’re going to have to agree to disagree on this.” Gigi’s sigh was long.
“You don’t think a vordr should be called?”