by Liv Rider
But rescuing Oscar shifted the power balance in the city. BlackEdge benefited from that, an uneasy voice chirped up at the back of his mind. What if Dev was right?
Aidan abruptly changed direction, heading back to the abandoned warehouse. Maybe there were more clues he’d missed in his anger at Dev.
Dev’s car was gone when he arrived back in the clearing that held the warehouse, and the sun was setting. Aidan’s heart squeezed as he caught Dev’s scent next to the faint tire marks, the strength suggesting he’d spent a long time waiting before he’d left.
Aidan put his nose to the ground. The scent of bleach swamped everything else, but he wasn’t the pack’s best tracker for nothing. He set the scent aside, working down through layers. Dirt. Grass. Trees. Vehicles.
Werewolf.
Aidan jerked, nearly losing the scent in surprise. Slowly he eased even close to the ground, hunting for it.
A werewolf had been here. A werewolf he didn’t recognize. Not pack.
Aidan kept working down through scent layers, crisscrossing the yard in a thorough grid pattern. He pulled to an abrupt halt as more signatures came through: fae. Fae he did recognize, from those guys that had attacked them out the back of CaFae.
What the hell?
Aidan was trying to follow the tangle of logic to its conclusion when a sharp pain burst in his flank.
He whirled, but his limbs took a moment to obey him, like he’d lost the strings to a marionette.
The world went dark.
Chapter 27
Dev’s heart lifted as he drove up to Aidan’s house. Maybe Aidan would be here already. But the house was silent and dark. He got out his laptop and, in petty spitefulness, did his best to shred BlackEdge’s proposal to metaphorical ribbons. He slammed the lid shut an hour later, annoyed by the fact that it wasn’t as easy as he’d suspected. If not for Mr. White’s information, they probably would’ve been his first choice.
Marshmallow arrived and grumbled at him until he fed her.
Aidan didn’t come back, and a bad feeling began to grow in Dev’s stomach. Something was wrong. The beast inside him prickled with it. Something had happened to Aidan.
The landline rang, shattering the stillness and making Marshmallow hiss. Dev answered it.
“Give me to Aidan,” the unfamiliar male voice said impatiently. “It’s Zeke.”
“Aidan’s not here. This is Dev.”
Zeke sucked in a breath. “Where’s Aidan?” There was a sharpness in Zeke’s tone that put Dev on high alert.
“Not here. What’s wrong?”
“Don’t go to that address I gave you.”
“Too late, we already did. And why not?” Cold dread filled his chest. He’d been right; something was wrong.
“Because I tracked the address back through like a million shell companies to find the owner: Barnaby White, a fae businessman who’s messed up in a lot of shady business.”
“I know who he is,” Dev said grimly. He thought of Mr. White’s oh-so-helpful call alerting him to BlackEdge’s involvement.
“Yeah, but you don’t know that the shady business I spent the day working through involves bribery of the head of the central shifter prison.”
Everything in him went spinning, a ball tossed into the air, weightless in the moments before Zeke’s next words confirmed his worst fear.
“There was a prison escape a few weeks ago they’ve been covering up. Carl Jackson.”
Dev was already running.
Chapter 28
Aidan woke groggily, his head on his paws, and for the first time in more than two decades, had a moment’s confusion as to what shape he was in. Why was he in wolf form?
And then he remembered.
Well, nearly remembered. None of his memories explained what he was doing here, back in the dingy warehouse. He got up, legs oddly heavy, and shook his fur out.
“Excellent, you’re awake. It’s hard to calibrate doses for half-breeds. I thought you might sleep longer.”
Aidan whirled towards the voice and pulled up short with a clank of chain. He hadn’t been imagining his legs were heavier. Thick manacles circled each of his hind legs, a chain running from them to a heavy bolt in the floor, solid enough to resist even a wolf’s strength. This…wasn’t good. The manacles had to be custom-made to be big enough to fit round a werewolf’s legs.
And there wouldn’t be any point in chaining up a werewolf with something they could shift their way out of—unless you knew you were chaining up the one werewolf in the world who couldn’t shift.
A fae male sat backwards on a plastic chair watching Aidan, his arms resting on the chairback in a casual, friendly pose. Aidan didn’t recognize the guy, but he was daoine sidhe, smooth-skinned and pointy eared, with buttercup yellow hair. He could’ve been any age, but his calm in the face of angry werewolf suggested he was older than the maybe mid-thirties he looked. Aidan hadn’t hung out with many daoine sidhe lately—Oscar didn’t really count, since he’d been raised human—but this guy’s expression took him straight back to childhood. The older daoine sidhe of his mother’s court had sometimes looked at him the same way, with something between disgust and fascination, as if they saw him as a creature rather than a person.
The fae tilted his head to the side. “I am Barnaby White,” he said meaningfully, like he was dropping some big reveal. Aidan had forgotten how much high fae loved their melodrama.
The name rang no bells whatsoever.
The guy’s face twitched in irritation. “You may know of me through your association with my future business partner. I own a construction company, Whitestone Ltd.”
Aidan froze, pieces falling into place. Well, some of them. This was about that stupid fucking business deal?
“Did I? That’s good to know.” Mr. White shrugged. “I wasn’t sure whether it would succeed or not, even with the serum my contacts gave me. It’s nice to know they didn’t lie about its effectiveness.”
Sabas’s blood—did the guy really not know what he’d used? How had he gotten hold of it in the first place? But it was irrelevant, right now. What was relevant was that Aidan was going to make this guy pay for messing with Dev.
The chains clanked, manacles biting into his legs. He snarled and summoned a tornado, intending to tear the place apart.
The winds rose, flattening his fur and rattling his chains, filling the air with magic…which slammed into an invisible barrier. Aidan stretched his chain to its limit, and saw, just beyond his reach, a circle inscribed into the floor. No matter how he pushed, the raging whirlwind wouldn’t pass it, and he couldn’t reach the line to physically break the containing circle.
Mr. White smiled, not a hair on his head lifting. Aidan let his air magic die, since all he could do was blow-dry himself.
“Ah, so my employees were right. You do have fae magic. Fascinating.”
Something clicked in Aidan’s head.
Mr. White gave him a patronizing look. “Of course. I may not be the lord of this court—yet—but I am not without resources.”
Okay, so he’d taken precautions specific to Aidan with the chains and the binding circle, but did he know about his extended mind-speech range?
He stretched as far as he could go and shouted mentally. Would anyone be in range? The warehouse was far from the city, far from central wolf territory. But maybe he’d get lucky and someone would be on patrol out here. He wouldn’t know if anyone had heard him or not, since they’d only be able to reply if they were in wolf form and close by.
But if he kept shouting, surely someone would have to pass within range sooner or later? He just had to keep this guy talking until then.
wasn’t a great idea, but he was pissed enough that he didn’t care. He pulled against each manacle in turn, testing the strength of the chain links.
The guy’s expression twitched, there and gone in a flash, anger replaced by unruffled serenity. Mr. White was good, but he had nothing on some of the high fae from Aidan’s mother’s court, who could gut someone without anything at all changing in their expressions. It only confirmed Aidan’s suspicion that Mr. White wasn’t high in the local court ranks. Daoine sidhe prided themselves on emotional control. He’d forgotten why he hated pureblood high court fae so much.
“There are many kinds of power. Money talks, even to fae.”
“I do my research. Anyone with half a brain could predict how Dev Jackson would react to the attempt.” His smirk deepened. “I hear he’s very unhappy with your Alpha.”
It made a horrible kind of sense, if you didn’t care about fucking up other people’s lives at all. Only one thing didn’t fit.
“Catching up, are you? I admit, Dev finding his mate complicated things slightly, but I have an offer for you. I will be the next ruler of the court. You’re half fae, and your magic is powerful. If you support me, I could open doors for you; doors that have been shut to you for most of your adult life.”
Aidan snorted.
“True. But you can take your fae form when your mate is near, and I’m prepared to accept the two of you as a package deal.” Mr. White smiled again, brilliant and shark-like.
Even though he knew it was irrational to be angry at Dev for being out of range—Aidan had told him to go, after all—he still felt abandoned. Would Dev be worried if he got home and Aidan wasn’t back? Would Dev even go back to the house? What time was it? There was a small, high window in the warehouse that showed darkness.
“Oh, but my court will be entirely in favor of a ruler who has wrested power from the wolves and delivered the reins to the city into their hands.”
He gave a little shiver of pleasure, and Aidan realized that he was getting off on his evil monologuing. Oh well, that worked in Aidan’s favor, but he still felt like rolling his eyes. Clearly the guy had a complex about being ignored.
“You think the Triumvirate will let him remain, when he’s actively working to destabilize the fae of this city, stealing the most promising young fae healer seen in years, turning businessmen into wolves to win contracts over the local fae court, and even going so far as to set his pack on a halfbreed who found out about his shady business dealings and was planning to defect to the fae court? That’s you,” he added sweetly. “Poor Dev will be devastated, and, I’m sure, willing to do anything to revenge himself on the wolf pack who turned him and then killed his mate.” He brightened. “Your halfbreed brother and his mate will also be remarkably motivated to avenge you, I’m sure.”
He’d never actually expected Aidan to take his offer, he realized with a sinking feeling. And ridiculous as his plan sounded, it might actually work. High court fae were way too easily impressed by overly complicated political machinations.
The door to the warehouse creaked open, and something shifted in the shadows. He tensed as the scent hit him, almost familiar but wrong in a way that made his wolf deeply uneasy.
“Ah, but I don’t have to. I have a werewolf, and one who owes me loyalty for getting him out of a…difficult situation.”
The scrabble of claws on the concrete floor, and a pale wolf padded up to sit next to Mr. White.
“Meet Carl Jackson, Aidan.”
The wolf—Dev’s father—grinned.
“I’ll leave you two to get better acquainted, shall I?”
Chapter 29
Aidan eyed the other wolf, backing up to give himself maximum reach of the chain. In any other circumstance, he wouldn’t be worried. He’d missed out on a lot, being trapped in wolf form for decades, but it meant he had a lot of practice at being a wolf, knew the fluid movement of his shape in a way that went deeper than most people’s. It gave him an advantage, physically.
But right now he had most of his mobility ruined by the manacles. His gaze flicked to the tranquilizer gun that had put him out in the first place. It was still resting on one of the benches, tantalizingly out of reach. Even if he could reach it with magic—which he couldn’t, thanks to the binding circle—aiming without hands would be nearly impossible.
He thought of Dev’s scars, worn white and smooth by time, and a low anger built in his belly.
Aidan’s hackles went up as the other wolf paced forward. Could he lull him into thinking his chain was shorter than it was? He feigned straining, as if he’d already reached the chain’s limits.
The other wolf leapt, and Aidan dodged. Or tried to dodge, the manacles messing with his balance. Fine lines of pain scored across his shoulder from Carl’s claws, but before Aidan could turn and bite, he’d danced out of reach. Carl’s eyes glowed yellow with glee, and Aidan saw a long, painful death coming his way. This wolf liked drawing things out. Good. That would give more time for help to come. And help would come. There had to be a wolf patrolling out here sooner or later.
Or Dev will come looking for us, his wolf suggested. Aidan hushed it. Dev wasn’t even in the city. By now he’d be miles away at his family’s place in the country. There was no way Dev could know something had gone wrong. Besides, Aidan wouldn’t willingly put Dev within a thousand miles of the man who’d given him those scars.
Carl lunged again, but Aidan was ready for it this time. He rolled with the blow, blasting out with wind and snapping his teeth at the same time. Carl moved out of reach again, but to Aidan’s satisfaction, a thin trickle of blood dribbled down his face from a torn ear.
But it was only a flesh wound, and it just seemed to make Carl angrier. He lunged again, and Aidan moved too slowly to avoid it, the chains pulling him up short. Jaws clamped down on one of his hind legs, and he couldn’t help a whimper of pain escaping. He shook free with another blast of wind, saving him from a broken bone, but air magic wasn’t much good in a confined space against something the size of a werewolf. If only he could move freely!
The world narrowed to the jerk of his chain, the scrabble of claws on the concrete, the panting breaths.
Screw this! Aidan refused to die here, slaughtered like a goddamn animal! Except he was beginning to fear there might not be any way to prevent it, his optimism dimming as minutes passed with no sign anyone had heard his mental cries and more of his blood splattered across the warehouse floor.
The doors to the warehouse slammed open. Aidan woul
d recognize that silhouette anywhere. His heart gave a painful thump. Somehow, Dev had known. Dev had come.
Dev, who in human form would die much faster than Aidan.
Chapter 30
Dev burst into the warehouse to find himself facing his worst nightmare. The scene imprinted itself on his retinas, overlaying a similar one more than twenty years old. The pale wolf, snarling, advancing on his mother, its fangs bared.
Except the person he feared for this time wasn’t his mother, but Aidan. Aidan, in wolf form, chained up.
He didn’t think. There wasn’t anything to think about. His mate was in danger, and Dev needed to protect him.
It was like relaxing a muscle he’d been holding tense his entire life, the change roaring over him between one heartbeat in the next. Senses sharpened, and he fell forward onto four paws.
He would be a monster for Aidan, if that’s what it took to protect him. Except as soon as he thought that he realized he was still him, Dev, furious and scared but…still him. A much furrier version of him, just as Aidan had said.
Dev didn’t have time to answer, because his father leapt.
Aidan threw himself to the end of his chains, straining against them hard enough that the metal bit into his flesh. The bolt didn’t budge.
