Chapter 27 #2
“We were nowhere near the trees. The tree line was thirty yards off, easily…I was telling her about the kitchen garden. Two wolves came out of the pines so fast, I barely even had time to register them. The first one was on us before I could shout for help. He went straight for Lillian.”
She stops. Shakes her head.
“I fought him. I got him off her once, but then, he came at me. He was strong, Lucas. Stronger than any wolf I’ve ever sparred with.
I had my hands on his throat at one point, but I couldn’t hold on.
The second wolf took my legs out from under me.
I went down hard, and they dragged us both toward the trees. ”
She licks her dry lips. Violet releases her hand to help her take a sip of water. Lydia’s throat moves as she swallows.
“A third shifter was there, giving orders. Must have been their leader. He stayed in human form. Stood in the trees and watched.”
All of a sudden, I cannot feel my hands.
A chill climbs up the back of my neck. I am back in the moss with the taste of my own blood in my mouth, the white edge of unconsciousness pulling me down.
There is a shape at the edge of the trees.
A man. Tall. Wide at the shoulders. Watching me bleed. Not moving. I thought I’d imagined it.
My hand lifts to my mouth. “I saw him.”
Every face in the room turns to me.
“What?” Lucas is on his feet now. “Sienna.”
“The night the rogues had me down. The night I almost died. There was a shape in the trees beyond the fight. I thought I was hallucinating. I thought my brain was firing wrong because I was bleeding out. There was a man. He was just standing there. Watching me.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I forgot until just now. I’m sorry, Lucas. I forgot.”
His arm comes around me before the apology has finished leaving my mouth. He pulls me against his side, and the bond pulses once, hot and furiously, chasing away my fear from the inside out.
Lucas turns his attention back to Lydia. “What exactly did this man say?” he asks her.
“He told the bigger wolf to be careful with Lillian. Said something about her being valuable. Then, he stepped forward into the moonlight to direct the one dragging me. The moonlight caught his arm.”
She lifts her hand and, weakly, traces a line around her own bicep.
“He had a dark cloth tied here. With a symbol stitched into it. Two crossed lines through a circle, with smaller marks around it.”
Darius’s head whips sharply toward Lucas.
All the color drains from Violet’s face.
I feel my own breath stop in my chest. “Lydia,” I say softly. “The Covenant?”
Her eyes meet mine. She nods once.
Darius’s hand goes to his jaw. Violet grips Lydia’s hand again and tightens until I can see the tendons in her wrist. Lucas has not moved from his position between me and the bed. I place my hand on his shoulder, and the bond spikes between us, hard, cold, sharpened to a point.
“There’s something else,” Lydia whispers.
We all wait.
“The bigger wolf, dark gray, almost black at the shoulders. The leader called him by name.”
“What name?” Lucas asks.
Lydia looks at him. “Zion.”
Darius reacts immediately. “Did you say Zion?”
“Yes. I heard it twice. Why? Do you know him?”
“He’s my brother. He tried to kill Violet because she’s a hybrid.” Darius’s voice is grim. “We searched for him, but he escaped. He was a wanted criminal; no pack would have given him refuge. I was sure he was dead.” He shakes his head slowly. “To think, he joined this organization.”
Violet covers her mouth, fear in her eyes. “Zion hated my mother. If he has her…”
“We will get Lillian back,” Darius says tightly.
The healer returns to check on Lydia. My mate looks around the room at the rest of us.
“I think we should move this into my office now,” he says.
We file out together. When we reach Lucas’s office, he immediately heads to a map on the wall. Darius follows him. Violet stands next to me with her arms crossed against her stomach.
“They must be taking her to the compound.” Lucas’s finger taps the map. “It’s the closest Covenant base to here.”
“Then that’s where we go,” Violet says.
“Violet.”
“Don’t.” She doesn’t look at her mate. “Don’t even start.”
Darius lets out a breath through his nose. A knock interrupts us before he can argue with her.
Hennessy is at the threshold with two of his lieutenants behind him. Lucas waves them in as he keeps talking.
“They have hours on us. The compound is forty miles west, give or take. By the time we mobilize, we will be looking at a fortified location with an additional contingent inside.”
“So, we don’t go through the front door,” Darius says.
“No.”
“I’ll have my men in the air before sunrise.” Darius is already pulling his phone from his pocket. “Two transports. Two hundred fifty soldiers each. They can be at your airfield by eight.”
“Good.”
“They’ll make a big noise on the southern face of that compound.
Coordinated, loud, aggressive. They’ll draw the bulk of the inside force out.
While they do that, a smaller team goes through the north wall.
Am I remembering correctly that the squadron’s reconnaissance saw a service entrance on that side? ”
“You are.”
“That team finds Lillian. Gets her out. We extract through the trees north. Meet our transports two miles up the ridge.”
“I’m going,” Violet says.
“Violet—”
“I am going, Darius.”
They stare at each other. She lifts her chin.
“This is my mother. I am a hybrid. I have powers I have not even tried to use yet because I’ve never had to. If anyone in that compound can read magic, I can. You are not leaving me out of the room she’s being held in.”
Darius looks at Lucas. Lucas looks back, expressionless.
“It’s your call,” Lucas tells him quietly. “She’s your mate.”
Darius shakes his head in defeat. “Fine.”
A small sound at the doorway has us all turning toward it.
Lydia is there. She has changed into loose, dark pants, a shirt she must have buttoned with her one good hand. Her injured shoulder is in a sling, and her face is still the color of old paper. She is holding herself upright by the doorframe, but her chin is set.
“I want to be part of this team.”
“Lydia.”
“Don’t, Lucas.” Her voice comes out steadily.
“I know what you are about to say. I know I am hurt. I know I will not be at full strength. I also know exactly what those creatures look like up close. I know what their leader sounds like. I will not sleep again until I have had the chance to look for her. Lucas, please.”
He studies her.
“Your father trained both of us to fight,” she reminds him softly.
“I remember.”
“Then trust him.”
He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “Alright.”
I step forward before Lucas can turn back to the map. “I’m going, too.”
All eyes move to me.
“Sienna,” he begins, and his voice has dropped to the careful register it takes when he is about to argue with me and already knows he cannot win.
“I know how a Moonvale assault team handles a fortified extraction. I designed the framework half of you in this room have been quoting back at me for the past month. I am not sitting around while one of my best friends goes after her mother.”
His hand lifts toward me, and he runs his thumb along the curse line at my collarbone. “Sienna.”
“Lucas.” I cover his hand with my own. “If you’re thinking I’m going to let you walk into that place without me, stop. It’s not going to happen. We go together.”
There’s a dangerous flicker in his eyes. It’s not anger. It’s hotter and lower than that, and it has nothing to do with this situation and everything to do with how close to each other we are standing.
His thumb moves once more, against the pulse point in my neck this time. “Fine,” he murmurs.
It’s not the word that pierces my chest; it’s the look in his eyes when he says it. Heat. Pride. A fury narrowed to one bright point, waiting to be aimed.
“Then it’s set,” Darius says behind us. “Lucas, you and I run the southern push with my men and yours. The three of you—Lydia, Sienna, Violet—plus a strike unit of ten of our best take the north entry. You find Lillian. You bring her home.”
Lucas’s hand drops from my throat. He does not step back. “We brief at first light.”
The office empties. Darius folds his arm around Violet’s shoulders and walks her to the door. Lydia turns under her own power and disappears down the corridor toward her room, her good hand braced against the wall.
Lucas catches my wrist before I have made it past the desk.
He turns me into him in one slow motion. I let him. His mouth comes down at the side of my throat just above the curse mark. He breathes in once, deeply, and holds it.
“Sienna…”
“I know.”
“If anything happens to you in that place…”
“It won’t.”
He pulls back enough to look at my face.
“You stay close to Lydia. You stay close to Violet. You do not, under any circumstance, engage Zion. You see him, you go the other way. Do you understand me?”
“I understand.”
“Say it.”
“I won’t engage him, Lucas.”
The look on my face must satisfy him. He drops his forehead to mine.
“First light.”
“First light.”
He lets me go and turns back to the map.
I leave him there with the desk lamp catching the worried look on his face, the line of his shoulders pulled tight.