Chapter 9
Caelan
Aheavy sense of deja vu clings to me as I stalk through the forested area around the Varenthrall estate.
It’s been over seventy-two hours since I’ve seen her.
More than three days since my pack started looking at me like I’ve gone insane.
Maybe I have.
My boots make no noise, and I make sure to keep to the shadows and follow the same path as before. The sky glitters overhead, and there are no sounds outside of my controlled breaths and the skittering of animals who make their home in these trees.
Since the last time I was here, nothing has changed.
Yet at the same time… everything has changed.
I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t anxious. Not because I’m worried I might get caught. I don’t get caught. My ability to ghost through places I’m not supposed to be is second nature, and I’m damn good at it.
No, it definitely isn’t the mission fucking with me.
It’s the girl.
Idril.
These last three days, I can’t get her out of my head no matter how hard I try.
I wake up in the middle of the night hard as stone, imagining I can smell her.
I see her when I close my eyes. Can practically feel that long white hair playing gently around her delicate face in the wind.
I hear her voice when no one else is around—lyrical, soft, and fragile
Just like her.
“I’m coming around the south end now,” I murmur into my comm.
“Copy.” Dax’s reply is short and clipped. Professional.
We’ve barely talked since the meeting when we blew up at each other not once, but twice. Haven’t said much outside normal conversations about mission prep. We’re basically using work as a band-aid, pretending that the last few days haven’t happened.
They did, though. I’d almost gone for his throat, and he’d accused me of being compromised in front of the entire team, including Gav.
Now, here we are, falling back into patterns we’ve perfected over centuries like nothing’s happened. I knew it would be this way. No matter how pissed we may be with each other, when one of us is in the field, the other always has our back.
Dax clears his throat, and it’s as if he has a direct line to my stream of consciousness when he asks, “We good?”
I clench my jaw, unwilling to roll over and forgive him, but also not wanting our issues to play on his anxiety tonight. I reply honestly. “For now. We can deal with our shit later.”
“Copy.”
A truce, then, if not total forgiveness. It’ll have to be enough.
Varenthrall is gone for the night. I watched him drive away twenty minutes ago while standing at the tree line, masked in the shadows.
I pull a slim device from the side pocket of my utility pants, another fancy piece of Dax’s tech that can bypass the wards, and use it to unlock the back door.
Dax already killed the alarms, and the jammer at my hip is riding the back of whatever interference those weird as fuck wards are giving off.
He says it’ll buy me two hours, tops, which is fine.
As long as I don’t get caught in an unknown magical trap, I’m good.
I slip through the back entryway and make sure the door closes behind me. The kitchen opens up on my left, and a locked door is directly to my right.
“The door to the right,” I whisper. “Where does it go?”
Dax, who pulled all internal blueprints in anticipation of tonight, answers swiftly.
“Basement level. Probably worth checking out.”
“Yeah, I’ll hit it on my way out. I want to get a feel for the rest of the house first.”
I continue down the hall on silent feet until it spits me out into a large open concept living room.
I nearly recoil in disgust.
The whole place looks like someone’s grandmother decorated it. Lace doilies, glass trinkets, floral print accent chairs, and… beige. So much fucking beige.
“Fates… The decor is a disaster.” I mutter in a low voice. “It’s like someone saw an episode of Bridgerton and said, ‘Yes, that.’”
Dax barks out a laugh, “Damn, that bad?”
“Worse,” I confirm, picking my way around a glass coffee table and heading toward the west wing. “I’m going to check out the study, since we know that’s where Daddy Dearest spends most his time.”
I continue down the long corridor, and the further I get into the west end of the home, the more jarring the drastic change in decor is.
This half of the manor looks like it’s been decorated by someone who grew up with dreams of living in the Bat Cave. If this is supposed to be a reflection of Varenthrall’s state of mind, then we may be underestimating the level of his delusion.
I check a few open doors, noting some guest rooms, and a bathroom swimming in marble and glass, before coming to a door on my left that refuses to open. I disengage the lock quickly, slip into the room, and shut the door behind me.
The room is spacious, with red velvet drapery and pristine hardwood floors. A large desk sits in front of a picture window that looks out over the yard and into the forest beyond.
Shelves line the walls, filled with leather books, and two large leather chairs fill the open area facing the desk.
It would seem I found Varenthrall’s study.
“Jackpot,” I mutter, and waste no time heading straight for the desk, where I dive right.
None of the drawers are locked—another oddity—and I search them one by one with a quick efficiency born of thousands of hours of experience.
Either there’s nothing here, or Varenthrall is so arrogant that he never considered that someone could make it this far into his home.
All the paperwork I find is normal shit: estate records, quarterly donations to public charities, tax filings, annotated printouts of corporate board meetings, security staff rosters.
“Boring, boring, boring…” I shuffle through the last few papers, and as I move to replace them, a folded piece of yellow legal paper slips out and flutters to the ground.
“Here we go,” I mutter, snatching it off the floor.
“What’d you find?” Dax asks, alert.
I read the words, trying to make sense of what the hell I’m seeing. “It’s a list of names. Five first names and a last initial and—”
I squint. What the fuck?
“There are blood types listed next to them.”
“That tracks,” Dax responds sarcastically. “When I’m bored, I, too, organize my victims by blood-type.”
“Not helpful,” I grunt, snapping a quick photo on my phone and replacing the paper. I shut the drawer and double check that everything looks the way it did when I came in.
I don’t see anything else of interest or any tech for Dax to hack into.
I head toward the bookcases to check out the titles.
I’ve always been a strong believer that what someone reads gives the most accurate insight into who they truly are.
I’m not about to miss a chance to learn more about this asshole.
Not with Idril’s safety on the line.
I don’t have a lot of time, so I have to clutch to each and every thread I find and pull until something unravels. I can’t handle knowing she lives with someone who brings Severed into their home and is obviously trafficking Omegas.
It can’t be money. The male has millions to his name and doesn’t do much with it. It’s something else… but what?
“This guy really has a hard-on for Nietzsche.” I run a gloved finger over the leather spines, my stomach twists with dread.
“Nothing like a little nihilism to spice up your personal library,” Dax mutters.
“I doubt he reads them,” I scoff. “None of the spines look like they’ve even been cracked.”
I pull out a hard copy of Beyond Good and Evil. Seems fucking fitting for this jackass. As it slips from its place in the row of books, I hear a distinct snick, and jump back when something bumps into my thigh.
I glance down, a grin spreading across my face.
“Holllyyyy fuck,” I whistle, crouching down to inspect my accidental discovery.
“What?”
Dax hates when he can’t get eyes inside on missions and has to wait for play-by-play. He’s going to be really pissed he missed out on this.
“There’s a hidden compartment.” I chuckle, kind of shocked the words are leaving my mouth. “Popped right out when I pulled out one of his books.”
Dax groans. “Gods, it’s like he’s trying to fit every evil villain stereotype available.”
A light clicks on inside the two-foot-long freezer refrigeration system as I peer inside, anxious to see what the asshole is hiding.
The moment my eyes land on the glass vials, all neatly labeled and aligned, I spit out a string of curses.
“Blood,” I snarl, disgusted. “He’s got vials of blood in here.”
There are choking sounds from Daxen’s end, followed by a drawer slamming shut and an urgent, “Are they labeled?”
I pluck one out of its row and turn the label so it’s facing me.
“Yup. This one says, Asset Z-1. Sample 7B. O-Fem slash NH. Assigned: B.R.” I frown. “Any idea what the fuck that means?”
“No clue. Take photos and send them to me. All of them.” Dax’s hands are already flying over his keyboard.
“I’ll do you one better.”
There must be at least ten vials of blood in here, all labeled in the same clinical fashion. I take as many photos as possible, making sure to get clear shots of the labels—then palm the first one I picked up and slide it into my pocket.
Zero fucking regrets. In fact, it feels strangely satisfying knowing I’m taking something of Varenthrall’s.
I’ve never been someone who lets missions get to me personally—I’ve always been able to shut that part of me off and focus.
It’s not that I lack empathy. More like I learned a long time ago, that the best thing I can do for those who need my help is to never let my emotions get involved.
That’s the quickest way to make stupid decisions.
Dax is right about that, at least. I can’t even argue with him, because it’s the same philosophy I’ve held my entire time as a Bastard.
This mission, though—this is different. In ways I can’t even explain to myself, let alone my packmate.
I know eventually he’ll understand why I’m acting the way I am, but there are things I have to do before I can come clean.