Chapter 25
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The scrape of boots against concrete pulls me from whatever passes for sleep. I lift my head. A watching figure stands beyond the bars. What’s left of dusk spills through the high windows, catching only half of Greer’s battered face.
“They should call you Da Vinci.” I laugh, lifting my shackles.
Greer tilts her head slightly, and shrugs. “Sounds fitting.”
I shift an inch causing the chains to rattle. “Certainly fits tight enough.” I snap.
Greer’s smile widens for a moment, then disappears. Her gaze traces along the floor before finally settling onto her boots. Silence settles heavy in the warehouse between us. Five minutes of nothing. Ten. Maybe fifteen now. I don’t know, time moves differently when you’re trapped in hell.
I break first, no longer able to bear it. “Why?” I ask.
“I already told you,” Greer mutters.
“No.” I lean my head back, struggling to see her clearly. “I want the truth. Without the audience.”
The silence looms again. Greer shifts her weight, the fabric of her B.A.I.T suit dragging like Velcro against the concrete wall.
“Ben and I were in love,” she begins. “I knew he was married. But she was never around. His wife was actually a member of the Red Earth Directive Unit, an Oracle, just like Cici. Her work always came first.” Her eyes drift somewhere beyond me as she sighs.
“When you’re a lead with someone, you get close.
You spend months, even years together. You trust each other in way nobody else understands. ”
The corner of her mouth twitches. I stay quiet, absorbing the story.
“We just ended up in love,” she says, clearing her throat once before she continues.
“Our own director noticed immediately. They never offered behavioral management, like you get,” she snaps.
“No. I was fired. But then they countered back on my day of leave, offering me to transfer. I accepted of course. But what I didn’t know was the only reason the choice was given to me is because Ben turned it down. ”
I swallow. “And then?”
Greer sighs. “He disappeared.” Her voice hardens. “No goodbye. No explanation. Nothing.”
The chains connected to me creak as I shift. “And they sent you to Greyline.”
Greer nods. “Not as a lead.” Her jaw tightens as she pushes off of the wall, taking slow, deliberate steps toward the bars. “As your subordinate.”
Greer reaches the bars, wrapping her fingers around the steel.
Her face is almost unrecognizable. A thick white compression bandage circles her forehead, disappearing beneath sleek dark hair.
Both eyes are swollen; one nearly sealed shut beneath deep shades of violet and black.
Angry bruising spreads across her cheek bone and nose, which has been crudely reset and stitched, but still sits swollen beneath strips of white tape.
Dried blood clings stubbornly to one nostril, and fresh crimson stains the gauze every time she breathes too hard.
Her upper lip is split, mottled with bruises that crawl toward her throat.
I blink as her voice breaks through my observation.
“And then I met you, Florence Belcher. One of a kind.” She displays her hands as if she were showing a neon sign.
I snort. “So, I’ve been told.”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Greer barks. “You walk around with this title yet bend every rule in the handbook,” she laughs. “You have Jasper wrapped around your finger.”
I don’t respond.
“And Nyx too,” she adds. “Yet, you’re so stupid.”
Still nothing. I only blink as I hold her sharp stare.
“And the worst part?” Greer laughs again, but the sound isn’t amusement. “Everyone sees all of it. Every single person at T.A.L.O.N sees it. Yet nobody cares.”
I roll my eyes. “I’m not special, Greer.”
“No.” Her eyes narrow. “You’re worse.”
This actually gets my attention.
“No.” Greer shakes her head. “You get grace. You get second chances. You get therapy. You get it all.” Her grip tightens on the bars.
“I’m not special, Greer. So, stop acting like it. I’ve earned my way, just as you could’ve done.” I snap. Just the movement of my jaw sends the chains in a rattling fit.
“Not with you in the way.” Greer huffs. “You kind of left me no choice. At first, it wasn’t personal, but once I figured out your role in Greyline, you became the easiest target of them all.”
A cold laugh erupts from my throat. “My only role is to save these wolves and make Scott Delacroix money by doing it.”
Greer tilts her head as if the weight of my answer has her questioning her own.
“Yes, that’s true. Yet your love for these animals clouds any amount of money you could potentially earn.
Which is your mistake. Did you know that Greyline is the highest-ranking team in T.A.L.O.N?
I saw the charts while looking for your file— back to the wolves.
” Her fingers tap the steel. “B.A.I.T recruits the same way as T.A.L.O.N in a way, more so on the released criminal side. And of course, when anyone is fired from T.A.L.O.N, that gives them the perfect opportunity to grab someone already trained. Even better, someone with a motive.”
I shift my weight, yanking on my shackles to grab her attention again. “And you had a motive.”
“I had a motive.” Greer agrees. “They hit the jackpot with me. I wanted to get even with T.A.L.O.N, and they wanted Scott’s number one team taken down.”
I raise my brows, nodding once. “I see.”
Greer’s lips spread into a wicked grin. “Nyx would’ve been easy. Greyline would have mourned of course, but Scott would eventually replace him. That’s not all though. Guess whose name is at very tip top of that chart?”
I huff. “I’m hoping it’s Bear Blackwood because?—”
“You.” Greer says, smacking her hand against the bar as she pushes off, returning to the corner wall. “And Greyline would’ve done way more than mourn you. Again, the roles you play.”
I low growl rumbles in my throat. “I don’t play anything, Greer. We’re a family. You were part of that family.”
“Was I though?” she snickers mockingly. “The way I was treated?”
I groan, throwing my head back. “Greer, you’re so young. You’re a hot head just as much as I am and you refuse to obey any authority. Greer, listen to me, you have your whole life ahead of you?—”
She grunts, cutting me off. “I do. And I will, once you’re out of the way,”
“So, what? You’re going to kill me now?” I ask, yanking again on the shackles.
Greer shrugs. “Not now. And it won’t be me.” She nods to Kova, who is solidly braced against the bars, her fur bristling with fury.
“Greer, think clearly for a minute. You could release me. I could take you back to Greyline and give you the proper training and we could create your own team if that’s truly what you desire.”
Greer laughs, cold and wicked. “You asked for the truth. You got it. Yet, you still don’t get it!”
I grunt, growing impatient. “If you don’t let me go, this is only going to end in one way. Greyline will come.”
Greer only smiles, smacking her hands together.
“Greyline has no clue where you are. Miles and miles away beyond their vicinity. And Florence? I don’t know if you realize, but from where I’m standing, you’re right.
This is only going to end in one way.” She pushes off the wall and walks away into the dark without another word.
The door begins to roll upward; the metal clanging sends my head into a steady throb. Boots thump against the cold ground, hurriedly approaching. I squint, attempting to make out a figure. It’s so dark I can’t see his features, only that it’s a male. An abnormally large male.
“Bear?” my voice hopefully croaks.
“Do I look like a damn bear?” the husky voice snaps.
My shoulders sag. The chains answer immediately, rattling softly as the movement pulls against the collar.
The leather rubs raw into my throat with every breath, grinding against skin that’s already been stripped raw.
Heat radiates from the wound, sharp enough to make swallowing feel like dragging broken glass down my throat.
Every breath stretches the torn flesh another fraction of an inch.
A tray smacks against the ground, soup spilling out. “I was told I had to feed you, regardless of your little show the other day.”
He kicks the tray beneath the barred gate, the cup of water spilling into the contents of the soup bowl. “No thank you?” He laughs darkly. A growl rumbles in Kova’s chest, her head snapping to the stranger. She pins her ears back, rising swiftly to her feet, and begins pacing the fence.
“Shut up dog,” he yells, kicking the fence.
“Canis Lupus,” I snap, correcting him.
“Dead meat,” he responds. “I still haven’t heard a thank you.”
I refuse to look at him as his fingers tap the cold bars impatiently.
“Fine then. Let’s see if we can teach you some manners.
” The man fumbles in his pocket for the keys.
I lean forward, ready for it. Steel scrapes against the bars at my movement.
Over my dead body will he teach me some manners.
Even if I can’t move, I’m still standing.
But the lights flicker on and I hiss, unable to cover my eyes. Ugh my head.
“Not tonight, Jonathon.” Vincent’s cane clicks against the floor.
He runs his hand into his pocket, shaking his head, before eyeing the messy tray. He clicks his tongue. “Maybe she does need some etiquette.”
Jonathon’s predatory smile lights up, his eyes
turning darkly to me. His body is jittery next to Vincent’s stone posture.
Eyes dark with bags, face broken out in rashes and pimples.
A shiver runs up my spine at the all-too-familiar look.
I study the large man, looking for any track marks along his arms. He catches the movement and crosses them quickly.
I return my own wolfish grin. I know exactly what you are, Jonathon.