by Cathryn Fox
I fight down a dark shudder but still can’t shake the bone-deep cold turning my blood to ice as I pace restlessly around my cell. Impatience runs heavy in my veins, and only one thought keeps rattling around inside my brain: get the master key and free the wolves before Logan and Stone are forced to fight to the death.
I wring my hands together and frantically work to calm my thoughts. I have to clear my mind and keep my vision focused on my mission if I want to pull it off. Failure is not an option, otherwise tomorrow will end in bloodshed and I refuse to let that happen. I won’t let anyone else die at the hands of the master because of me.
Once the upstairs has grown quiet and I’m sure Sandy is asleep in her bunk, I let myself out of my cage and climb back into the ventilation system. Moving with speed I retrace my steps to the master’s office. I try to quiet my rapid heartbeat as I approach and valiantly struggle to keep my breathing regulated as panic threatens to overtake me.
Soon enough the scent of the master overwhelms my senses and my blood curdles like spoiled milk. That’s when I know I’m near. I crawl toward the shaft at the end of the tunnel, the one that will lead me directly to his office. When I see light filtering in the vents a hot wave of dread hits me. There is only one reason his light would be on.
He’s inside.
With his presence putting a crimp in my plan, I slow my pace and slide along the duct until I can peer through the plastic slats. When I see the master sitting alone at his desk my wolf howls with pleasure, and that’s when it suddenly dawns on me. This turn of events isn’t a bad thing after all. Finding him inside alone provides me the perfect opportunity to let my wolf off her leash so she can crash through the wall, go for his throat, and end this once and for all.
Instincts sharpened, I can feel her pulling at me, clawing her way from my body. My nails elongate and my snout punches from my mouth, but when heavy footsteps herald the arrival of someone else, I crouch low, hush my blood hungry wolf and wait in hiding.
The master glances toward his door, and the heavy lines around his eyes fold as he smiles. And when he gestures with a wave, an indication for his visitor to have a seat, my heart goes into my throat and I clamp my hand over my mouth to keep myself from screaming.
I don’t need to see his visitor to know who he is. His smell hits me like a hard fist to the gut and curls around my body like a deadly serpent. Fear rushes through me and my mind rebels, some small coherent part of my brain letting me know I was right all along—there really are things going on inside the mansion that I don’t want to know—things I might not be able to handle.
Even with the turmoil shutting down my ability to think with any sort of clarity, it doesn’t go unnoticed by me that the master is smiling, welcoming this visitor like they’re old friends.
Waves of nausea flood my stomach and it takes every ounce of willpower I have not to vomit. Sweat breaks out on my body, despite the cool air rushing through the ducts and chilling my flesh.
I press my hands to my ears to still my racing mind, and as I block out the world and all its cruelties, Stone’s words of warning pierce my thoughts. “Run. It isn’t safe for you here anymore.”
Is this what he was trying to protect me from?
Then my thoughts race a million miles a minute only to settle on Mario. I take a quick moment to recall the words he spoke to me in the elevator. “Do you have any idea what’s waiting for you on the outside? Or even on the inside?”
All along I thought he was referring to the master, and never once stopped to consider that he was warning me about the man who disappeared from my life when I was just a pup, a man I once called father.
I brace my palms on the sides of the metal duct and take deep breaths as emotions ambush me, desperate to slow my chaotic thoughts so I can hear what they’re saying. What they’re planning.
I catch snippets of the conversation, and as the pieces of the puzzle known as my father come together to form a clear picture it becomes glaringly apparent who rules all the new wolves in the courtyard and how these two brutal men are creating a formidable army.
How could he have done this to his own kind?
His wife?
His daughter?
My wolf wails and my heart seizes. Then I hear them discussing Gem. The master informs my father that he’s found the key to breaking her and come tomorrow morning she’ll be under his full control.
As air evacuates my lungs, my blood thickens to a heavy sludge and I can’t seem to push it through my veins. Feeling lightheaded I sink backward, emotionally battered and not quite sure how to deal with this turn of events.
I suck air and try to refuel my body with oxygen as I remember my father’s parting words when he came to me in my cage just two days ago. “Some things are worse than death.”
Finding out your father is a drug lord who’s harboring wolves of his own and using them to assassinate others definitely ranks right up there in my books.
My head goes from left to right as I sort through this new information. I need to move. I need to run. I need to do something.
Just then my father stands, and I don’t dare move, let alone breathe. He turns his back to the master and when his attention flickers to the duct, his eyes meeting mine, my heart goes into my throat and a gasp rips from my lungs.
He knows! He knows I’m here.
I squirrel backward and hold my breath. My pulse thrums in my throat as I wait for the silver to pierce, but when he leaves the master’s office I don’t hang around to find out if he’s coming back. Instead, I turn, scurry through the ducts and hurry back toward my cage. Tears sting my eyes and blur my vision, but I continue to push forward, going left and right and getting myself all turned around as emotions tear me up inside.
I go deeper into the ducts and suddenly don’t know where I am anymore. But what does it matter now? My plan has failed miserably. I press the heel of my hands to my eyes and realize I’ve never felt so alone before. So lost. So completely and utterly defeated. And I can’t forget how many people are counting on me. How can I possibly tell them I failed, that I’ve let them all down?
As grief overwhelms me, my world feels like it’s on the verge of collapsing. I sink backwards, my body and legs numb as I use the back of my hand to brush the moisture from my eyes, and that’s when I hear a deep growl rumbling through the vents, rolling toward me like a huge, thunderous snowball. It instantly cuts through the chaos in my mind.
“Stone,” I cry out, opening my thoughts as I frantically search for him.
“Pride,” he returns and even though his voice is faint inside my head, I hear such emotion and turmoil in that one word that I know he knows.
He knows I found out the truth about my father.
“Pride, where are you?”
“I don’t know.” I look around it the darkened duct. I sniff and say, “I’m lost.”
“Reach out to me and follow the sound of my voice.”
I do as he says, and soon my legs are moving again. I make my way though the vents guided only by instinct until I can feel his voice getting stronger and stronger inside my head.
When I reach his vent, I ease myself out, and land on the hard cement floor with a thud. Heart hammering, I take in his quarters and that’s when I see his sleeping bunk mates, Cruz and Star.
Stone presses his fingers to his lips and gestures me closer. With my knees threatening to give, I sag against his cage and when he reaches through the bars and curls his arms around me, we both sink to the floor. A shiver wracks my body and he holds me tighter, offering me his warmth and protection.
We stay locked together for a long time, two lost wolves seeking comfort in the darkened cellar. I choke back tears and when I sniff I breathe in his scent. There’s something so primal and raw about this alpha that it almost makes me feel safe.
“Stone,” I begin, breaking the quiet, but then I close my mouth because no words need to be said between us.
Sensitive to my needs, Stone brushes the rough pad of hi
s thumb over my cheek and the tenderness in his touch has me melting against him.
“Shh,” he whispers and I sidle closer as his soft words fall over me like a comforting blanket.
Cradled in his arms, his warm familiar scent seeps under my skin and I know it’s wrong to take comfort in his touch—which feels far more emotional than physical. Yet, as Stone adjusts his body and pulls me impossibly closer, I don’t stop him. I don’t even lecture myself on how wrong this is.
His hold tightens and my small frame crushes against his and while everything inside me is warning that I should run, that I should get as far away from this alpha as I possibly can, I let him wrap his arms around me, let him absorb my grief and fears. He’s protective, caring and familiar and right now and I need that more than I need my next breath.
“You were trying to protect me,” I finally say, tipping my head to look into his eyes.
He drags his fingers through my hair to tuck it behind my ear, then his eyes move over my face before dips his head and presses his mouth to my forehead. His warm breath washes over my flesh when he whispers, “I didn’t want you to know.”
I blink a fat tear from my eyes. “How long have you known?”
“Only recently.”
I take a minute to process then say, “He reached out to me the other night.” A shudder moves through me when I add, “Until tonight, I never knew if he was really here in the mansion or if he was simply a figment of my imagination.” For a brief moment my mind goes to the bread and bacon left for me. I’m not sure why I’m thinking about that, or why it seems significant, but I suddenly have the sense that he left it for me. Honestly, if I had known, I never would have touched it. I’d rather starve than take anything from him.
Stone inches back, his brow furrows as he looks me over. “He came to you in your cage?”
I nod and Stone’s face goes dark. “What did he want?”
I run over our conversation. “My forgiveness.”
This seems to take Stone by surprise. “Your forgiveness. What is he asking you to forgive?”
“I…I guess for what he’s done. Or maybe it’s for something he’s going to do. I don’t know.”
“I don’t know either, Pride. I just don’t know.” He goes quiet and he brushes the rough pad of his thumb over my cheek.
I blink up at him. “What I don’t understand is how he started working with our master. I know I was young and don’t remember a whole lot but wasn’t he a caged wolf like the rest of us?”
“Your father was a very powerful alpha. Maybe he was the one who had our master under control.”
That thought catches me by surprise, but speaking of powerful alphas has me thinking about tomorrow. I swallow uneasily and when I say, “About tomorrow,” I see a strain in his Stone’s eyes when they settled on me.
“What about it?”
“Can you walk away?”
Anger sharpens his words and his muscles tighten, but he still doesn’t pull away from me. “So you’ve made your choice then?”
“Stone,” I hurry out. “I don’t want anything to happen to you or Logan.”
I see a flash of possessiveness in his eyes and a low growl rumbles in his throat as his lips compress. “I’ll be fine,” he answers through grit teeth.
I work to keep myself from sounding frantic, knowing he won’t be fine. In a struggle for power, Stone should never underestimate Logan, which makes it all that much more important for me to put a stop to this. “You don’t have to do this.” An ominous wave of heaviness falls over us and the air crackles with tension.
“Do you really think I’m going to walk away?” His nostrils flare and emotions thicken his voice. “And here I thought you knew me better than that.”
“Can’t you just be happy and settle down with Sandy?” I plead, trying to change tactics.
He gives me a perplexed frown and questions, “Sandy? Why would you think I’d want to settle down with Sandy?”
“Aren’t you…?” My voice falls off as I reconsider the situation. “Didn’t the master make you…?”
“Make me what?”
“Make you breed with Sandy,” I finally choke out.
Understand dawns in his eyes, then it fades to disappointment. “You think I’d do that?”
“Only if you had no choice,” I go on to explain, wanting him to know I understand. Sometimes we do what we have to do to survive.
Which begs the question, did I mate with Logan because it meant surviving? Or did I mate with him because I chose him?
Stone’s face goes dark, thoughtful for a moment and he gives me a look I can’t quite decipher. “When you first brought up her pregnancy in the courtyard I thought you were angry with me for not being able to stop it.”
“That’s why you were defensive?” I pause for a moment. “I thought it was because—”
“I’m not the father, Pride,” he says, and I feel a strange sense of relief rushing through me, then anger moves in to take its place, considering I shouldn’t be worrying about such a thing when there is so much more at stake.
“Then who is?” I ask quietly.
“I don’t know. You’ve seen all the new wolves in the courtyard. It could be any one of them.”
Thinking about all the new wolves—animals under the control of my dear old dad—has me once again thinking of the master and what he wants Stone and Logan to do. A moment of silence falls between then I blurt out, “I don’t want you to fight with Logan.”
“You know I don’t have a choice,” he counters and the look on his face is almost frightening.
I briefly close my eyes in distress. “Yes, you do. You can walk away.”
The muscles along his jaw ripple and his eyes are hard, unwavering when he says, “What if I don’t want to, Pride? Have you ever stopped to think of that?”
“Stone,” I say, and pound on his chest, the lump in my throat aching painfully.
A small frown forms on his forehead as he grips my fists and pulls them to his mouth. His warm lips press against my fingers to seal my protest and he just holds me like that for a long moment. Then, taking me by surprise, he lowers my hands and his lips move to mine. My breath catches in my throat at that first soft touch. His kiss is so gentle, so achingly tender and so needy it catches me off guard and has my entire body going weak.
Blindsided by his actions, my thoughts derail and a melee of emotions run through me. As Stone connects with me in a possessive way, a way only a mate should, it begins whittling away what little control I have. Then when I feel his hunger—dark, primal, needy—and hear a low growl in the depths of his throat my composure begins to slip. I tremble from head to toe and my hackles bristle, a physical reaction to Stone’s alpha wolf.
As a storm broils inside me and my head begins to buzz, Stone inches away and severs the intimacy. He lets out a long- suffering sigh and I’ve never seen him look so tortured when he says, “It’s getting late. You’d better get back before someone notices you’re missing.”
13
With Stone’s familiar scent all over me, I carefully make my way back to my cage. After I finally find the vent leading to my quarters, I slip through the tight shaft, let myself into my den and hide the key before climbing into my cot.
My thoughts race a million miles an hour, trying to sort through everything that has happened tonight, from finding my traitorous father alive and learning he’s a drug lord in cahoots with the master, to taking comfort in Stone’s arms while my mate sits all alone in his cage prepared to fight to the death for me—the girl he chose above all others. And I can’t forget about Gem, and what the master said about breaking her.
Guilt and fear eat at me and I shift restlessly on my tattered blankets, knowing I’m going I have a sleepless night ahead of me and feeling like I deserve one.
If my father is a traitor what does that make me? Will I eventually turn out like him? Turning my back on those I care about for my own selfish purposes?
Then agai
n, maybe he never cared about me at all.
My heart clenches and I fight back the hot sting of tears. I toss in my bed and the worn springs groan as I think about tomorrow and what it will bring.
Will Stone walk away like I asked?
What will Logan do? After one look at me he’ll surely know I found comfort in Stone’s arms. Will he be the one to turn his back on me?
Unable to get comfortable I flip over on my mattress again, and I pound the dusty cot as a low torture moan crawls out of my throat.
I toss and turn for hours, until Lawrence finally comes for us. I climb from my cot, and with my body tired and my sleep deprived brain making me feel completely unstable and desperately emotional, not even the cold cement floor can pull me from my stupor.
Out in the courtyard I squint against the blinding sun and there is little I can do to shake the fuzz from my brain as I wait for Logan and Stone to appear. I push away from the crowd as Sandy is led to the obstacle course. Since I was unable to get food to her yesterday, I pray she wins the competition. She’s pregnant, which means she get a daily allotment, but because she’s so thin she needs the nourishment that comes with victory.
With one eye on Sandy and the other on the crowd I search for Logan and Stone. A long while later after Sandy finishes up her race and is led inside to eat because she’s beaten her opponent, I see Logan moving past her as he enters the yard through the kitchen entrance, Lawrence standing behind him, gun in hand.
Logan looks hard and dangerous, but his guard slips a little when his eyes meet mine and my stomach revolts because I sense that he knows I’ve betrayed him. Guilt rushes through me and everything inside me reaches out to him, asking for forgiveness. But thinking about forgiveness has me thinking of my father and what he said to me. “Sometimes we have to do what we have to do.”
Then I turn to see Stone closing in from behind, a powerful wolf on a mission. I swallow hard and wet my suddenly dry lips. When I do, I can taste my own fear as it saturates the warm air around me.
At the sight of the two moving toward the center of the yard, the other wolves all move back to give the two alphas room to fight. Clearly news of this deadly battle has spread through the underground quicker than a mutating virus. In no time at all cheers originate in the crowd, the restless wolves goading the two alphas on.
