Chapter 27
Chapter
Twenty-Seven
Nico struggled against his bonds.
He'd been in the basement for several hours at this point, but he still hadn't seen whoever had captured him. He expected a witch to come in at any second.
Was this payback for his kidnapping of Elise? If so, he had earned that, but that didn't mean he was going to go down so easily. Even if it was, he couldn't bring himself to think that she was in on it.
Elise had plenty of opportunity by now to tell her coven everything about the Southern Basin Pack headquarters, but they hadn't faced any magical incursions in the weeks since he let her go. He hoped she'd kept their secrets. He hoped she felt the bond between them just as strongly as he did.
He was ready for pain. He was ready for torture.
At this point, he just wanted to get it over with.
A door opened, and heavy footsteps came down the stairs. He braced himself for whatever came next. But then Elise's scent washed over him. That lilac smell still lingered in his room and followed him into his dreams.
Even if he had suspected her coven, she was the last person he expected to see.
She made it to the bottom of the basement stairs and stopped.
Her expression was horrified as she took in the ropes holding him in place and whatever injuries had been inflicted upon him.
His face felt swollen, and his muscles were stiff from being tied up for so long.
He was pretty sure someone had punched him a time or two while he was unconscious.
She rushed towards him and crossed over a chalk circle drawn on the concrete basement floor that he hadn't paid much attention to before. More magic shit.
"I am going to kill them." Elise dropped to her knees beside him and reached for the rope around his hands. It came free fairly quickly. She ran her fingers over the angry red marks it had left, and he felt her magic in his blood.
It didn't feel like corruption.
No matter what Cole had said about the feeling that lingered in him, this felt natural. It felt right. And truth be told, it didn't feel that much different from when Mark used his own healing abilities on him whenever he hurt himself on pack business.
"I am so sorry." Elise shifted to kneel in front of him, working on the bindings at his feet.
Nico put his hand on her head and ran strands of her hair between his fingers. Getting kidnapped was almost worth it for that feeling alone.
"My coven sisters took things way too far," Elise said. "They never should have taken you. This is beyond messed up, and I had nothing to do with it." She sounded desperate. "You have to believe me. I didn't tell them to do this."
He moved his hand, tracing a finger down her jaw and tilting her chin up at him until their eyes met.
"I know." His thumb brushed across her cheekbone.
"I know this wasn't you. You would never.
You and I are …" He trailed off, but she nodded, understanding what he meant, even if he wasn't sure what he would have said.
"I'm getting you out of here." She returned her attention to the knots at his ankles. "It's the least I could do."
"You don't owe me anything." He wanted to spring out of the chair and run up the stairs, but a stronger instinct kept him in place.
"Don't get in trouble for me." He leaned close, unable to resist the nearness of her.
"Not with your sisters, not with your coven.
I don't want you sacrificing yourself for me. "
Elise tugged harder on the rope at his feet. It went slack. He had enough room to kick it off. Then she stood up and bent over him, running her hands over his face. He felt that tingle of her magic as she healed whatever bruises and scrapes he was carrying.
"I'm not going to get in trouble," her palms were warm against his jaw, "it doesn't work like that. And frankly, they are the ones who should be in trouble with me for pulling this crap." She held out her hand and waggled her fingers. "Come on. Let's go."
He took her hand and laced their fingers together. Then he held it up and kissed the back of her palm. She gave him a soft smile.
He wondered if he could arrange kidnappings like this every so often just so they could have an excuse to see each other. Because staying away from her was killing him inside.
He would undergo a lot more damage if it meant he could be with Elise, even if only for a few minutes.
They walked to the edge of the chalk circle, and he had to struggle to get past it. It felt like walking through liquid rubber. His final step released him with a pop, and he stumbled forward, almost losing his hold on Elise's hand.
"What was that?" He steadied himself against her.
"Magic," she explained like he was slow, tugging him toward the stairs.
"It's a holding spell. They didn't really need to tie you up.
You couldn't have gotten out of it on your own, no matter how hard you tried.
" Then she considered, "I guess maybe if you managed to destroy the concrete, but the chalk is more of a construct than a physical thing, so that might not even work.
" She squeezed his hand. "Only a member of the coven can walk through the circle or guide someone out of it.
I think Delainey just wanted to tie you up. She likes rope."
Nico looked back at the discarded ropes and considered that. They were silky and red and didn't look like something you would buy at a hardware store. Interesting.
Elise led him up the stairs and had her hand on the door to push it open when Nico stopped her. "Wait." He placed his free hand against the door frame and took a deep breath, listening intently, trying to figure out if anyone was out there waiting for them.
"The coast is clear," Elise assured him, her shoulder pressing against his arm. "One of my coven members is running interference. I convinced her that we needed to let you go before this whole thing blows up in our faces."
It was nice to know that there was at least one other reasonable member of her coven, and that Elise wasn't completely alone. He wanted her to have allies, friends. He wanted her to have everything.
She guided him through a quaint and surprisingly big kitchen and out the door and onto an empty driveway. She pulled her phone out of her back pocket with her free hand and punched something into it.
"I'm calling an Uber," she said, thumb swiping across the screen. "It'll take you to the edge of the city. You can get in touch with your pack then. Or you can run home or do whatever you need to do."
"And you're sure you won't be in any trouble?" he asked again.
"It really doesn't work that way," she assured him, glancing up from her phone. "I'm a witch, not a werewolf. It's a totally different power structure and hierarchy. The worst they could do is kick me out of the coven, and they're not going to do that."
"You sound sure."
"I am sure." She gave him a reassuring look.
"We're friends, sisters, really. And I am just as pissed at them as they're going to be pissed at me.
So we are probably going to have a terrible fight.
And they might hex me a little bit." She shuddered, and he wondered what she was thinking.
"And I'm going to hex them right back or refuse to heal them the next time they have really bad period cramps.
Eventually, we'll get over it. I'm going to be fine. "
She checked her phone.
"The car is arriving in one minute." And then she tilted her head and looked at him intently. She took a step closer and stuffed her face into the crook of his neck, breathing deep.
Nico couldn't stop himself from wrapping his free arm around her and placing his hand on her lower back. "Isn't that my move?" he asked, his fingers splaying across her spine.
She squeezed his hand and then pulled back. "Oh crap." Her eyes widened.
"What is it?"
"Someone put a tracking spell on you."
That didn't sound good. "What does that mean?"
Elise looked more angry by the minute, and she glared up at the house before looking back at him. "It means that whoever did this, probably Delainey or Serena, can find you as soon as it triggers."
He looked at the door, bracing for someone to rush out. "Shouldn't it have triggered as soon as we left the circle?" That made the most sense. If he had magical powers, that's how he would have done it.
"Probably." Elise's grip tightened on his hand. "But it's the same concept—the spell is recognizing me as a member of the coven because I'm holding on to you, so it hasn't triggered yet."
Lights flashed down the street as a car pulled closer and then into the driveway. Elise's phone buzzed, announcing the Uber was there.
"Can you undo it?" he asked, stepping closer to her.
She closed her eyes, and he smelled the scent of her magic briefly before it disappeared. She opened her eyes and shook her head. "Not right now." She looked at him for several seconds. Then she looked at her phone, then at the car, then at the house, then back at him. "I need to come with you."
Nico immediately knew they couldn't do that. "It's one thing to let me go," he said, gesturing toward the waiting car, "but you can't. I won't put you in more danger."
"It's the only way to keep you safe." She wasn't backing down.
His wolf rumbled in satisfaction, and they climbed into the car.
He expected Elise to go around the other side, but she didn't drop his hand, instead urging him to crawl through to the opposite seat, while she got in beside him.
She closed the door, and the driver greeted them before turning up the music on the radio.
"You probably don't need to hold my hand this whole time," he forced himself to say, his thumb tracing circles on her palm. He never wanted to stop touching her. But they were acting a little bit like teenagers.
Elise leveled a tough stare at him. "I literally can't do that or the spell will trigger. Magic, remember?"
A smarter wolf might have paid attention to where they were within the city, but all of Nico's attention was on Elise.
The scent of magic rose and fell intermittently, and he could feel his hand vibrate with her power every so often.
She would let out little curses, usually nothing more harsh than a "dammit," and once she even said "drat," which made him smile.
"I can't figure it out," she said, her free hand clenching into a fist on her thigh. "What the hell did she do?"
That wasn't a good sign, but Nico couldn't regret that it meant he got to spend a little bit more time with his mate before they had to say goodbye for the final time—again.
The Uber pulled into a chain hotel on the edge of the Hobson city limits near the highway. They got out.
"Why here?" Nico asked, scanning the parking lot as the car pulled away.
Elise shrugged. "It came up when I started putting in an address. I just needed to get you away."
They were standing under the lights of the entryway. If Nico had been alone, he might have gone inside and asked to use the phone to call Hugh to come pick him up. But there was one glaring problem.
"I can't take you to the pack," he said. They thought she was dead. They thought he had killed her. And they had no idea she was a witch. If that tracking spell engaged, it would lead the coven straight to the pack house, which he couldn't allow.
Elise squeezed his hand. "I can't let the coven find you."
They both looked toward the sliding glass door.
"It'll buy us some time," Elise said, pulling him toward the entrance. "If I think it through for a few hours, I can figure out some way to trick this spell."
He would trade years of his life for a few hours more with Elise. They went inside and approached the front desk.
"One king bed," he said quickly before the receptionist could even ask.
Next to him, Elise smiled. He reached for his back pocket to pull out a credit card and realized that he didn't have any money, or ID, or anything that could allow this transaction to take place—he didn't even have his phone—and he knew why: they were all back at the pack house.
It was standard operating procedure to not take any identification including a phone on a secret mission through enemy territory.
But Elise was pulling out her phone from her back pocket, and she had one of those cases that was also a wallet.
She set the device on the counter and used her thumb to pull one of her credit cards out of the case and handed it over.
It was a little awkward to do one-handed, but the receptionist didn't seem to care.
Elise got her card back, and they had their two room keys. They took the elevator up to the room, quiet the entire time. They walked down the hall to room 1221. Elise used the key to open the door. She set the key and her phone on the small side table and turned toward him.
They stared at each other for a beat, and then they crashed into each other and kissed.