Chapter 15 Ezra
EZRA
I wasn’t asleep as light filtered into the small room where Reign and I had been installed. Imprisoned was the correct term, but I hadn’t used that with Reign. He was under enough stress without thinking about how we were Stravon captives.
I’d been awake most of the night because not only were we on Stravon pack land, Reign and I were alone without my brothers as backup.
My wolf repeated the same warning throughout the night: This is wrong.
But unless I intended to start a skirmish that could develop into a battle and from that to a war, we’d had little choice but to agree to Viktor’s demands.
I kept telling myself we had a mutual enemy in Calloway and he had to be defeated.
We were sleeping in a single bed, and Reign was tucked under my arm, still asleep, when a loud hammering had him awake and leaping out of bed. He crouched low, and I hauled him into my arms, whispering that it was just someone at the door.
“It’s okay. Someone doesn’t want us sleeping in.”
“Alpha wants to see you in ten minutes.” It was the Beta from the bar, one of the ones who’d stood with Viktor yesterday. “Make sure you’ve brushed your teeth. He loathes bad breath.”
That was oddly specific. We had access to a basic bathroom where water dribbled out of the showerhead. We’d both run back and forth under it last night, so parts of us were clean.
“He has coffee,” the Beta announced before stomping off.
Reign and I stared at one another, and a giggle escaped his lips. I joined in because it was a laugh or cry situation, and my mate had done enough of the latter last night.
He saluted. “Brush teeth. Drink coffee. But need to brush teeth again to get rid of coffee breath.”
“I think the idea of coffee was meant to entice us.” I was far from a coffee snob, but I hoped Viktor wasn’t going to offer us instant coffee swill. My brothers would definitely label me a snob for calling it that, but I’d grown accustomed to the proper stuff.
Not Lake, though. He’d join me in the No Instant Coffee protest. I wondered how Viktor would react if I walked in with that on a flag or handwritten sign on a piece of cardboard.
“Hurry up.” Gods, that damned Beta was back and demanding we come immediately.
“Need to brush teeth.” Reign and I dashed into the bathroom and ran toothpaste around our mouths. It’d have to do.
The Beta, whose name was Archer, opened the door without waiting for permission. “Hurry. Alpha doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”
I took Reign’s hand, and our eyes locked on one another. I hoped he could read the empathy in my gaze.
How does he do that? my wolf asked. Is it spelled out?
I couldn’t get into that at the moment, so my mate and I followed Archer out of the building and toward a smaller one.
There was a house to our left nestled under some trees and a huge vegetable garden behind it.
This pack land was on the edge of town and much more pleasant than the compound I’d visited with the treaty.
Viktor was waiting in what appeared to be a meeting room. There was a large table in the middle and maps on the wall. It was a place to conduct pack business.
He looked up as we entered and told us to sit. But it was the coffee aroma that caught my attention. Oh, he had an old-style mocha pot on a small burner in the corner. Nice. The brew from that would be strong enough to energize me and wake Reign up.
I kept one hand on Reign's knee under the table, letting him know he wasn't alone, but Viktor told me to pour three cups of coffee. When I was seated again, he told us if Reign was to face Calloway, he had to understand what he was dealing with.
“He’s a hunter,” he said. I paused because shifters trembled and spoke in low voices when referring to hunters. “He’s killed many of our kind because he can detect us.”
“But do you know how he does it?” I asked as Viktor leaned back and tossed the coffee down his throat. “How does he identify and track shifters when we're indistinguishable from humans?”
His swivel chair creaked as he twisted it from side to side. “He's latent.”
The way Viktor said the term, it sounded like a curse. And if I was honest, many shifters viewed it that way. But I’d had latent friends growing up, and they were cool and they had a unique perspective on the human and shifter worlds.
“His mother was a healer.” Viktor was talking more to Reign rather than me. “She was powerful and could lay her hands on someone and identify their ailment. He must have inherited something from her, though not a beast of his own.”
This gave us an inkling into his character. If he had been treated as less-than by his community, if his shifter peers had taunted him because he didn’t have a wolf, I understood how anger and resentment might have festered if there was no mentor to explain to him how valuable his skills were.
“Wouldn’t a healer help people?” Reign asked.
“Most do,” I agreed. “They can feel our beasts even when we're in human form. It's how they know where to direct their healing.”
“Exactly.” Viktor took over the explanation. “Calloway inherited that ability. He can identify shifters by sight and scent, and he knows where we're vulnerable.”
“He's built his entire operation around hunting us.” I shivered at the thought of Reign encountering him. “And he does it with what his shifter mother bequeathed him in his DNA.”
Viktor’s grim expression matched what I was feeling. “After he was arrested, we thought we were done with him. But his wily ways got him out from behind bars.”
That scum of the earth was involved in human trafficking. I kept that tidbit to myself.
“Human trafficking was his MO.” Viktor didn’t share my intent to keep quiet about that.
“What?” Reign was paler than when we’d walked in.
“Yeah, he wasn’t fussy. Humans, shifters, he didn’t care.” I added that he wasn’t just a hunter. “Predator is a better description.”
The room was silent, and the tension was claustrophobic.
“I don't understand something.” Reign fiddled with the cloth hanging over the side of the table. “You're a shifter, Vik… Alpha. You understand about fated mates. How could you agree to bond your son to me when I wasn't his mate?”
Viktor shrugged. “I never said you'd be his mate, only that you'd marry him.”
“What's the difference?” Reign’s head swiveled from Viktor to me.
“Marriage is a human contract. It’s a piece of paper that carries huge significance for humans.” Viktor showed no emotion. It was as though he were discussing a grocery list. “Mating is fate.”
“But—” Reign looked at me, confusion etched on his features.
“Some shifters marry humans for practical reasons and wait for their fated mate to appear.” I hated that practice and hoped it would die out. “Or they never find their fated mate and choose a human marriage partner instead. It's not common in our pack, but it happens.”
“Hawthorn is young.” Viktor poured himself more coffee but didn’t offer us any. “He may never find his fated mate. I was offering him a partnership that would benefit the pack while we waited to see if fate had other plans.”
“And I was just... convenient.” Reign’s voice was tinged with bitterness.
“You were necessary.” Viktor twisted his mug around. “When Kalen came to me with his financial problems, I saw an opportunity. I needed a human sharpshooter to deal with Calloway. He needed his debts cleared and protection from his creditors. You were the solution to both problems.”
“A means to an end.” Reign sighed.
“Yes, I manipulated the situation to benefit my pack. That's what Alphas do. We make hard choices to protect our people.”
I was tempted to punch him because of the casual way he talked about using Reign. But Boaz’s glowering face appeared before me. If I survived a fight with Viktor’s wolf, my brother might finish me off for being a fool.
“You could have just asked.” Reign gripped his cup. “If you’d explained the situation, I might have agreed to help.”
Viktor rolled his eyes. “Would you? A college student with no connection to the shifter world, being asked to hunt down a dangerous killer?” He shook his head. “The marriage arrangement gave me control.”
“And now?” I asked. “Now that Reign is my mate and the arrangement is broken?”
“We adapt.” Viktor glanced between us. “I won't pretend I'm happy about how this turned out. But the mate bond is sacred.”
“I still don't like what you did.” Reign studied his hands.
“I don't need you to like it. I need you to understand that if we don't stop him, he'll keep hunting until there's no one left.”
“That's why we're doing this.” I squeezed Reign's hand.
Reign stood. “Okay. We'd better start training.”