Chapter 23 To Kill a Mocking Man #2
I also did my best to keep my eyes on their faces rather than on their other body parts. And both their faces were surprisingly freshened up, if a little pale.
Lucien stared at the two of them for a quiet moment before he spoke again. “Tell me everything you know about Mack Page’s dealings with the Sable Syndicate.”
Some part of me expected the two of them to be surprised Lucien knew about the Syndicate’s involvement in his attack, but instead, they kept blank expressions, seemingly impassive about this turn of events.
Dianna was the first one who spoke. “If I tell you, will you let me see her?”
Alby’s head whipped toward her, glaring in warning, but Dianna kept her eyes on Lucien, determined.
Without missing a beat, Lucien said, “I will.”
Alby bared his teeth as he turned his glare to Lucien. “What will I get, then?”
“A more merciful death,” Lucien said in a darker voice. “Considering this is not your first crime.”
That seemed to shut Alby up.
Dianna rose to her feet, her dark hair gliding over her shoulders as she did. “Mack has always hated you,” she said without preamble, glancing briefly at me before returning to Lucien. “Though it was a mere distaste in the beginning, when you first arrived.”
Lucien’s face remained devoid of emotion, but I saw his eyes glint. There was pain there from Mack’s betrayal still. It made me want to hold his hand, but I had a feeling he needed to keep his hard-ass Alpha mask on.
“When you declared your first order would be to change the pack’s name, Mack was livid,” she continued, her hands curled into fists as she seemed to tremble.
“He, and others, too, felt like you were trying to erase Jericho’s memory from existence.
Even worse when the name you chose was not of American origins, but French.
It felt like you were pissing on our territory, not to mark it—but to spite us all. ”
She shook her head and stared at the ground. “At first, Mack felt he should protect the pack from you.” Her voice grew tight. “He pretended to be civil around you and was elated when you appointed him Beta. It was his ticket to have as much influence as a werewolf can have without being the Alpha.”
Pausing, Dianna’s lip trembled as she glanced up at Lucien, hesitant. Lucien, who was now as still as a statue, prompted with a low voice, “What changed?”
Wincing, she sucked in a breath and looked away, hugging herself.
“Mack kept tabs on you. He knew you had frequent visits to San Diego, to the Lane Medical Center. At first he didn’t think much of it, since he knew part of the Alpha’s duty was to be in continual contact with the regional Otherborne medical facility.
Until Dr. Lane came to visit for the first time two months ago.
“That’s when he started digging into you.”
Lucien’s lips curled, but he didn’t say anything.
Dianna was shaking like a leaf now, as though speaking was too hard on her, yet she seemed to force herself to continue.
“Mack has . . . friends within the ASS. He asked those friends to obtain certain classified files. I’m not sure exactly which, but he told us that they contained sensitive information.
Information like the fact that Dr. Enoch Lane is being closely monitored not just by the ASS but by the global Council as well, as a potential threat to the Treaty.
The math was simple after that, and Mack realized what your true objective is. ”
She stilled, then, and raised her gaze to meet Lucien’s cold one. “Both you and Dr. Lane are part of a terrorist organization known as the Imperative for Transparency and Symbiosis.”
I froze and glanced at Lucien. There was no sign on his face that he was surprised. If anything, a dark realization seemed to settle on him, clouding over his face.
Alby interjected then, and his voice made me jump. “We know what happened to your pack in France,” he growled deep in his chest, and I could feel Lucien go still. “Mack, and us, too, know you’re the weakest, most waste-of-space Alpha that’s ever existed.” He spat on the floor.
Anger built up inside me, and before Lucien could talk, I snapped, no longer feeling so guilty about shooting them—or at least Alby.
“The only waste of space here is you, now that Mack is gone, and thank fuck for that.” Venom dripped from my voice.
“You can only wish to be half the man, the werewolf, Lucien is!”
Lucien grabbed my arm and murmured in a low, grim voice, “Don’t.”
But I was too angry, as if something had cut my fuse short, especially when Alby smiled in both delight and viciousness and snarled, “At least I’m not a fucking coward who used his own pack as a shield.
” Then, he practically crooned, “And I know for sure that, Alpha Marker or not, Mack would’ve been ten times the Alpha this terrorist could ever be! ”
I hardly understood what he was saying, and yet I couldn’t help but laugh. He thought Mack could’ve been a better Alpha? “Then why did your precious Mack send some Fae asshole to kill Lucien and didn’t do it himself, if he’s oh so capable?”
Alby was suddenly at the bars, grabbing them with dirty hands and pressing his face against them so I could smell his disgusting breath. “I don’t need to answer to you,” he growled, eyes bright. “You’re just a fucking human slut—”
The cell door was suddenly wrenched open, and Lucien strode inside, oozing fury as he grabbed Alby by the neck and pressed him against the wall, jamming his arm against Alby’s air pipes.
“Forget about merciful death,” Lucien growled, and the sound was far stronger than Alby’s, and far more terrifying, as it echoed through the entire prison.
“I’m going to watch as the air leaves your lungs and you silently scream and beg me to let you breathe. ”
Alby couldn’t speak. He moved his mouth, grabbed at Lucien’s arms, as his face started to turn purple.
I instinctually barricaded the cell entrance at that time so Dianna wouldn’t take the chance to run—though, rationally, I knew I stood no chance against a werewolf—but to my surprise, Dianna merely stared at Lucien and Alby, her expression dark and weary.
She didn’t seem like she wanted to push me aside and flee—which she definitely could have.
If anything, she seemed utterly defeated.
The choking sounds of Alby, though, drew my attention from Dianna back to Lucien.
His murderous gaze remained on Alby’s face.
“Don’t you dare,” he snarled. Tears escaped Alby’s eyes as he tried, weakly, to struggle against Lucien’s unbreakable hold.
“Not after you plotted and aided Mack to get rid of me, and the countless occasions where you couldn’t contain your anger and assaulted other pack members.
As far as I’m concerned”—he squeezed his throat—“you don’t deserve a trial. ”
My heartbeat was so loud as I watched Alby grow weaker by the minute. “Lucien,” I whispered, but clamped my mouth shut, doubt ringing in my head. It wasn’t my place to tell Lucien what to do. He was the Alpha here. I was merely a human. An Eteria. Effectively a slave.
And yet some part of me wished he wouldn’t kill him. His death wouldn’t solve anything.
Most terrifyingly, however, a deeper, meaner, and far more sinister voice inside my head thought, He dared to call Lucien a waste of space. He dared insult my man right in front of my face after he wanted to kill him. He deserves everything coming his way.
That voice won, and I kept my mouth shut until Alby stopped writhing, the choking noise faded away, and his body became limp and eerily still.