Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
"Oh, did you now?" The man chuckled. "You expect me to believe that?" His eyes hardened, turning a granite color.
He had to be kidding, but my mind sputtered, not quite able to catch up with this development. I think I’m looking at my dead brother. Cyrus. I had to say the words, and my gut told me that saying them out loud was the wrong move. "You’d know if I were lying."
When she’d gone to clean us both up, the witch who’d attended our birth had told my father that my brother had died…and yet, this man was standing here in front of me, and the resemblance couldn’t be denied. Something tingled inside my chest, and I had no clue what the hell it could be.
Your brother? Griffin sounded as bewildered as I felt. The one who died at birth?
The very one. I mean, I’m not absolutely sure, but he looks like Dad and smells like him and Mom. Like me.
Frosted Tips scratched his head and glanced back and forth between the man and me. "You two know each other?"
"No, we don’t," Maybe-Cyrus spat.
"I can’t keep up." The wolf kicked at the ground, making a dust cloud. His cornflower-blue eyes filled with confusion as a slight breeze ruffled his pecan-colored hair. He wasn’t nearly as large as my brother or Griffin but more slender and athletic, reminding me of Carter. "She said you were dead, so how do you two not know each other, Julius?" Scrawny looked small compared to the other two guys.
Frosted Tips crossed his thick, hairy arms over his massive chest, straining the top two buttons of his shirt where even more chest hair spilled out. Just like I remembered, his hair was an awful vanilla color on the tips, with dark-brown everywhere else. His long, dark-brown beard reached the top of his chest hair, and he puffed out his chest—which made him look nearly the size of a truck. He wasn’t much larger than Cyrus, though.
"It’s none of your damn business," Cyrus retorted, and turned his hate-filled gaze back on me. "I’m taking her inside. You two idiots keep an eye out for anything that seems abnormal. We can’t be too careful since she went and got fucking mated. Like that was actually going to save her." He chuckled nastily.
He was definitely a silver wolf…but maybe he wasn’t my brother. Scrawny had called him Julius—which wasn’t my brother’s name—and he wasn’t old enough to be my uncle. Maybe he was a cousin? Various ideas ran through my head. Negativity rolled off him, but it wasn’t as overwhelming as the bear’s or Dick’s, so maybe there was hope. "You think I was trying to save myself and that’s why I got mated?" I focused on the safest topic.
"That’s what I would’ve done." He shrugged his shoulders. "But the boss wants you whether you’re tainted or not. I mean…he doesn’t want you for love."
Frosted Tips growled. "Get one of your flunkies to stand guard. My ass—"
Julius almost blurred as he rushed the bear and punched the guy’s jaw. The force of the impact caused the bear shifter to fall back on his ass and clutch his face.
Even though it was daylight, the silver moon would soon be upon us. The power of that moon was already sizzling through my blood, so it had to be doing the same thing inside Julius.
"One more word and I’ll withhold your pay and get the joy of teaching you a lesson." Julius’s nostrils flared as he stood over the bear. "Got it?"
"Yes." Frosted Tips nodded so fast I was surprised his neck didn’t crack. "We’ll stand guard." He averted his gaze to the ground.
"If he gives you any lip..." He turned to Scrawny. "You let me or one of the guards in the house know. I will not have any of my men challenge me."
My stomach dropped. I didn’t know why I hadn’t realized it immediately—probably because of his familiarity—but this silver wolf was in charge. Which shouldn’t be possible. We were born inherently good and were protectors of good for all supernaturals. Of course, we felt most comfortable around wolves because we were part of them—but we still had the best interests of all in our hearts.
"I’m taking her downstairs before she gets even stronger." Julius clutched my arm and dragged me toward the door.
Something inside me popped as the tingling grew warm—it reminded me of when fur sprouted across my body, but inside me instead. I tried to move my hands to rub the spot, but the handcuffs restrained them.
He hissed but didn’t release his hold. Instead, he yanked harder, causing my feet to drag. I had to get my shit together if I was going to make it out of this. Maybe the connection I felt was because he was a silver wolf like me, and not because he was actually part of my family? It felt similar to my pack bond, but more intense. Maybe because he was one of the last of our kind?
Pushing the horrible thoughts away, I managed to steady my feet underneath me. If I played off like I was pathetic, this guy would know; I had to come across as strong…but not too strong. Hopefully, he’d think I was weaker due to being female—his followers thought that way, so maybe that was a reflection of him.
A large, one-story brick house sat about a hundred yards ahead. It was easily twice the size of Griffin’s, which wasn’t small to begin with. As we reached the front door, I could see around the edge of the house and saw that there were at least ten cars parked at the side.
This had to be their home base, which meant the rescue mission just got trickier. The sun was beginning its descent from the midday point, which told me it was shortly after noon.
"One wrong move and I’ll make you regret it," Julius promised, as we reached the door. "You may be strong, but between me, the bear shifter, and all my men inside, you won’t make it far. Silver wolf or not."
He was expecting me to fight but, right now, it was more important for me to focus on every single detail I could. I needed to absorb everything and relay good intel to Griffin…and form a plan of escape in case it came down to me having to get myself the hell out of here. "Noted," I snapped.
We reached the large wraparound porch, and he swung open the oak door and pushed me inside. We entered a gleaming, high-ceilinged foyer that led into a modern living room, confirming my suspicions. This house must have been built in the last ten years.
The walls were a light gray that seemed more commercial than homey. The natural wood floors made the room seem even brighter. There were two large, dark-gray couches in front of a flat-screen television centered on one wall. Other than that, the room was bare; I guessed that only men lived here.
No one else was in the room, and some of the tension in my body slackened. Maybe there were only three of them, after all.
"You’re not getting the lay of the land," he said, as he jerked me across the living room to a door in the center of the wall, to the left of the television.
The door swung open, revealing narrow stairs that led down to a basement. Not bothering to turn on the lights, he pushed me forward, making me stumble a few steps down the stairs.
Somehow, I managed not to fall, even though I didn’t have my hands at my disposal. I took the first few steps fast, trying to maintain my balance.
He followed closely behind. "You’re more nimble than I expected."
That was why he was yanking and pushing me along—he was gauging my capabilities. I should’ve realized that, but I had been too shocked by his existence and had let him get the best of me.
Again.
How did this asshole keep getting the upper hand? My connection to him pulsed and nagged at me. I wasn’t sure what was causing it, but it needed to stop. I didn’t want any sort of bond with this monster who was shoving me into a basement so some douchebag could come and force me to be his breeder.
My stomach roiled.
Babe, what ’ s wrong? Griffin linked, and his anxiety mixed with mine.
I would never shut down our bond, but I did try to even out my emotions so he wouldn’t feel the turmoil that brewed inside me. That was an alpha tip Dad had given me growing up. Our mates could feel our emotions and could be overwhelmed by them when we lost control of our own minds.
That problem had been steadily increasing since I got here—and by losing focus, I’d given Julius more control. Other than being led into a basement by a silver wolf who might be my not-so-dead twin brother, nothing, I tried to joke…but it fell incredibly flat. I should’ve just given him an update.
What? His voice was girl-shriek level through our link. We ’ re getting you now.
No, not yet. I wanted to get out of here and away from Julius, but we couldn’t be rash.
Rash would get us killed.
He laughed hysterically. Not yet? There ’ s no way we aren ’ t.
Just give me five minutes. I took a deep breath as I approached the bottom of the stairs. I focused on calming myself so I wouldn’t upset him more than he already was. Let me see what we ’ re up against. There are a ton of cars out front. If you come in here and we ’ re outnumbered, then our worst fear will come true: I won ’ t get out of here.
This is what I was afraid of. His anger and concern grew thick between us. That we won ’ t be able to get you out. We just handed you over to them without a fucking fight.
He had every right to be upset. We’d been put in an awful situation. When I thought about the fate of my pack, so much hate rumbled inside me. I know, but we ’ re going to get out of this. I refused to accept any other option. We ’ re going to get through it and stay alive. Is Rosemary with you?
Yes, and she said the same thing. He growled, not pleased. That she saw a ton of vehicles when she did her fly-by, and that we needed to wait. There’s a crow on the lookout, too. She was almost spotted.
That confirmed what I’d already suspected. We ’ re going to have to do the escape at night; otherwise, if there is a bird watching, they ’ ll be alerted since they can see excellently during the day. I ’ ll also be at my strongest, since it ’ s a full moon. I hadn’t wanted to remind him of that last night because he’d have wanted to know why I thought I had to be at my strongest. All it would’ve done was add more worry.
Yeah, she said the same thing.
When I took the next step, the entire basement came into view. My stomach swooped and churned with nausea. A group of five men were sitting around a table on the right, and straight ahead were two rows of what looked to be six open, barred jail cells with a walkway in the middle.
One of them had a person in it.
"So, this is the girl that you’ve been obsessing over?" One of the burly men’s dark-chocolate eyes perused me as he leaned back in his chair and bounced his foot. His grassy bear scent was strong. "I mean…she’s hot, so I get it, but you two look like you could be siblings."
"So, what I’m hearing you say is that you think Julius is attractive too." I ran my mouth, wanting to get under both of their skins. Just as Julius had tested me, I needed to see what I was working with.
"You stupid bitch," the bear sneered, his mouth gaping open with a crazed smile that reminded me of a hyena. "You got a mouth on you. Maybe I should teach you some manners." He stood and rolled his shoulders like he was preparing to hurt me.
"Don’t touch her," Julius spoke low and menacing.
Wait. Was he actually protecting me?
I must not have been the only one surprised by his reaction.
A wolf shifter leaned forward across the table, placing his elbows down. He wasn’t as large as Julius but was similar to Killian in size. His butterscotch hair hung in his eyes a little, resembling a llama. "Since when do you care if we bust up the prisoners?"
"I don’t," Julius barked, as he shoved me again. "But I have someone picking her up tomorrow, and she can’t be beat-up, or we won't get paid for the job."
Not bothering to pay attention to the others, I glanced at the prisoner we passed. He looked like a younger version of Carter with the same shaggy brown hair and moss eyes. It must be Randall. The only difference between them was that he seemed stronger than his brother. A bruise circled one of his eyes, making the iris seem brighter.
Great, this was going to be fun. So, we need to plan on rescuing Carter ’ s brother, too.
I love that you want to save people. Griffin didn’t sound like he loved it at all. But we have no clue where he is, and we know where you are.
We do know where he is. I ’ m looking right at him. He ’ s in the basement with me—in a cage.
Of course, he is. Griffin sounded defeated. And you won ’ t leave without him.
I hadn’t even considered the possibility, but now that he said it, I realized he was right. Yeah, pretty much.
Choosing to divert the conversation, I pressed forward. There are five large guards down here. One is a bear shifter, and the other four are wolves. That’s in addition to the bear shifter and the other wolf who are stationed out front, keeping an eye out for you.
Rosemary saw at least ten men in the woods before she noticed the bird. He paused. I want to rush in and get you now, but Rosemary and Killian won ’ t budge. They ’ re threatening to tie me up.
We ’ re outnumbered. Once again. I was sick of getting into these situations—but at least, having fewer people allowed us to be more flexible. We could hide more. However, having a pack link between all of us would be even more helpful. Something we needed to figure out when this was over with. We ’ re going to need the darkness.
Fine, I ’ ll tell the others. Warmth spread through the bond as he said, I love you.
I love you too. I pushed back my feelings toward him.
Julius unlocked the cell across from Randall’s and pointed inside. "Get in there now. And no funny business. I’ve got to patrol the area."
Once I was locked in the cell, he spun on his heel and walked back up the stairs, leaving us down here.
Once again, time moved at a snail's pace. There was no visual indication of it passing because we were underground—but the moon was close to rising.
My blood told me that.
Ignoring the pain in my wrists, I sat on the floor of the prison. I hung my head down, pretending to be defeated for the five guards who glanced my way and snickered, from time to time. I’d named the other three. The one with dark-auburn hair who kept reaching for a red solo cup, made the obvious choice, Solo. Then, the sandy blond guy who kept picking his nose with his left hand became Leftie. And the last guy, fidgeting in his seat the entire time, was dubbed Twitcher.
I ignored them and considered all I knew about Julius. I hated that he knew things about me that other wolves wouldn’t. Of course, the best way to hunt a silver wolf was with another one, but who the hell was he? My pack had been the only one of our kind, so I could think of only two options; they’d been swirling inside my head, creating chaos, because one of them wasn’t plausible.
The most logical one would be my uncle, who ran. He must have run for a reason—and maybe working with assholes was his motive. But Julius was too young to be my uncle, which left two options but, with the similar features to Mom, really only one viable one.
He was my brother.
The very one who supposedly died at birth—which meant the witch had lied to my parents and kidnapped a member of our family. But why?
However, the why didn’t matter at the moment. I had to get out of here and take Randall with me, but I couldn’t alert him to anything without tipping off the guards.
I had too much damn time to think, and it wasn’t good. My wolf itched to take action, and I along with her.
Footsteps pounded down the stairs in Julius’s leisurely rhythm. Others probably didn’t notice that he purposely walked that way—pretending to be calm for the masses—as any leader would do when they were worried or scared.
"Something wrong, boss?" Hyena, the bear shifter, asked as Julius reached the bottom.
"No." His words were clipped. "But the cavalry is pulling in shortly. They’re showing up early to take her." He nodded at me as he headed over. "It’s time for you to learn your place in the world."
They ’ re here. I linked with my mate, not able to keep my panic hidden. Randall and I gotta get out now or never.