The Society Series Box Set 2

by Mason Sabre

  They came to the garage at the side of Karl’s house. A line of cars were parked out front. Cade leant in to look at one of them and peered in through the dirty window. The seats had been removed. The faceplate from the dash was gone too, but from the shine on the mechanics and the bright colours on the cables, it was clear this car was being worked on. “Take down the plate numbers and make sure these cars are registered to him,” Cade said. He was clutching at straws perhaps. There might have been something off with Karl, something Cade couldn’t figure out just now, but he wasn’t stupid. Not by a long shot.

  Avery nodded and scribbled down the numbers of each car in the file. “Looks like he has a hobby?”

  “Maybe. He works for Humans, in computers. I think.” Tom worked for the Humans, and he had said Karl worked with him. It was a logical conclusion. Gemma had matched herself to someone who gave himself freely to the other side. Who offered his services to the enemy. Cade wasn’t sure why, or what bothered him with that. Maybe it was nothing more than his wolf targeting things to feel unrest because this was Gemma—his Gemma.

  Without a word of warning to Avery, Cade went to the next car and the one after that. They all looked pretty much the same, but at varying states of repair and remodelling. Maybe Karl was selling them. It wasn't a hobby far removed from Cade’s own. While Karl liked to rebuild old cars, Cade liked to work on old houses … houses with history and life. Not those new build things, the fancy ones with no substance to them at all. Gemma had asked him once. Why did he like the old houses?

  “I like the way they feel haunted. The way it creeps in,” he’d said.

  Gemma had smirked. “You wanted pet ghosts?” She knew exactly what he meant, but she had teased him anyway, teased him and laughed. Did she tease Karl the same way now? Did she make jokes and have her eyes light up when he said things to her?

  “Doesn’t look like he has been here in a few days,” Avery said.

  “What do you mean?” Hurt coated every part of his tongue, making it hard for him to swallow, but he had to, didn't he? He had to swallow every fucking thing that would come from this.

  Avery was standing next to a grey plastic bin. He had the lid propped up. “Collection day was yesterday, and this is full, meaning he didn't put it out front for them.”

  “Meaning, he hasn't been home.” Cade peered in. The bin was half full. “He could have forgotten?” The words … words of reassurance for Cade, for their life … lies. Even as he spoke them he knew he was grasping at nothing. Hoping, wishing … As he tried to reason he knew what it meant. If he hadn't been home, the only place he would be was with Gemma.

  Cade’s wolf stretched out inside and pushed against Cade with claws going wide, digging in … wanting something … someone. Her. He tried to fight against the shadows that cruised into his mind with malignant force. They’d no doubt fill him with a feral need he’d not be able to hide nor quench. He pined for her, his wolf. It roamed in the darkness looking for her … for something. She was the missing piece of himself.

  Cade turned away, his face reddening and guilt crept along his spine as bile rose in his throat. He had to put his shields back into place, no matter what. No matter what danger Gemma might be in. He would do neither of them any good if he fell apart. He belonged to Natalie now, and Gemma belonged to Karl. That was just how it was. How it would always be.

  Some part of him withered away and went to a corner to die at that thought. How could he live without Gemma? Without her touch, her kiss, the way she looked at him. How long would he live? That was probably the bigger question. It was like being slowly starved of oxygen. Being given just enough to get through, but little enough he felt the need to gasp building in his chest.

  It didn't matter now, though. The rules had changed and there was a baby … a baby.

  It was so fucking insane in his head. All such a mess that he couldn't even grasp onto a single part of it and figure it out in his mind. He rubbed a hand across his face and then thrust that same hand into his hair, tugging at it to snap himself out of this downward spiral. He’d not sit in a pity hole.

  He followed Avery further around the back of the house. He followed him because it was about all he could manage. The main streams ran along the back, down the bottom of the garden. Streams that connected everyone to the river, like tendrils reaching out, spreading themselves far and wide. Like him … like the parts of his mind that could reach out to those who meant something to him so he could feel them as a warm hum pulsing somewhere on his radar. He didn't dare reach along the one that went to Gemma. To do that would be to sever ties with Natalie. To cause her pain she didn't deserve, didn't need.

  “No one is home, I’d say,” Avery said, pushing himself down from a small stack of bricks. He had peered in through the back window. One that presumably went to the kitchen.

  “No.” Cade stepped up to where Avery had just been. The room inside was a kitchen and a dining room all rolled into one. It had a breakfast bar across the middle, a divider of the two rooms. Images of Gemma in there, with him … living, flashed into his head again. This had to stop. He was driving himself crazy.

  “Door’s locked,” Avery confirmed as he checked it. He was learning fast. Check the doors. Sometimes, people did stupid shit … they left in hurries.

  Cade nodded and then turned. “I’m going to have to try to catch him at the Davies’ house.”

  The garage had a door at the back of it, a proper door, not like the one at the front that could be raised to let the cars in. No, this was an access point, and by the flatness of the grass and the dark shade of it, Cade knew this was Karl’s frequent path. Cade tried the handle there, and to his surprise, this one was open. He raised a brow, cast a quick glance at Avery and pushed the door open.

  “You can’t go in,” Avery warned him. “No warrant, remember?”

  “I’m just looking.” He didn’t have to go in, though. His gaze landed on the ramp, eyes blanching, the colour draining from his face. The car was in the middle of a paint strip. The windows were covered with paper. The side panels were smoothed down to a dull grey. Cade took in a small breath and his wolf sat back, satisfied.

  “Is that—”

  “Jessica Cooke’s car.”

  Chapter 33

  Cade

  Gemma’s car was parked alongside her father’s, wedged between that and another car Cade didn’t recognise. Karl’s. It had to be. There would be no one else at the property. No reason for anyone else to be there. Cade stared at it for a long time, his hands so tight around his steering wheel he’d be lucky if it didn’t leave an imprint. Focusing his hate onto the car released something locked inside him—something so deep and profound it was eating him alive. With Stephen gone, he had no one to unload the burdens on, but now Gemma was gone too.

  If Avery hadn’t been sitting in the car with him, he might have given into the urge to release it, but all his wolf managed was a soundless snarl that echoed through his head. He needed to go in the house with the calmness of Cadence MacDonald, lead in the DSA. Not as Cade. Not as the wolf who loved the tiger and wanted nothing more than the chance to protect her, to have her … to keep her to himself. His wolf wanted to take her away from the beast roaming in the man she had chosen as her mate … chosen over him.

  “Are you sure about this?” Avery asked. His voice was a distant sound and Cade sucked in a breath and pulled himself out of his head. Avery didn’t know about Cade and Gemma’s history. No one did. They had been careful. They’d never been seen outside together in that way, never done anything public that would bring an axe down on either of them. Even when she had been pregnant, they’d hidden her swelling belly. Her shifting abilities made it easy for her to hold Connor closer inside.

  “There isn’t another choice.” They had discussed it on the drive over. Asking Malcolm for a warrant for his son-in-law’s house … But they had to. They had enough reason to get one. Cade hadn’t stepped foot into the garage, but he had made sure the car w
as visible through the windows. The last time Cade checked, peering through glass was not something that would get him into trouble, or cause the whole case to fall down around his ears.

  “We could wait till he has gone?”

  Cade gave a slow nod. “We wouldn’t wait if it was anyone else. What if Gemma is in danger? Malcolm would want to know that. The fact that this is Gemma, should make it more important.” And he would … if the information wasn’t coming from Cade. That was the problem stopping him, and it shouldn’t have been this way … shouldn’t have felt like he was doing wrong, when every part of his soul told him he was right. But the thought of driving away and waiting was against Cade’s nature … if he took out Gemma. Knocked her from the equation, he’d not wait. He’d not care about it. But now Karl was Malcolm’s Son-in-Law … it was a bad idea. A bad, bad idea.

  He could have got the warrant from his father, but that would give Trevor more weight on his side of the scale in the, let’s throw Malcolm out of his seat, battle. Did Trevor not realise what a fool he was? To take on the great Malcolm Davies. Oh, Malcolm was quiet, even gentle looking. He was anything but. A man did not rise to power and keep that seat without blood on his hands and working the system in his favour. Society and the Preternatural Council could write their rules. They could make their laws, but everyone broke them when needed. Even when Gemma had got pregnant, Malcolm had stepped up and done what he had to, to protect his daughter. Malcolm was a man who did what was needed, when it was needed, regardless of the rules. Trevor would be a fool to think he could take his place.

  “We can—”

  “We’re here now.” Cade pushed his car door open and got out. The cool air smacked him in the face with an icy bite. The winds were changing … everything was changing. He pulled his jacket on and straightened his tie. “You stay here,” Cade said to Avery as he got out of the car.

  “You’re going in alone?”

  “I’m asking for a warrant for the house of the man who has just mated with his daughter.”

  “All the more reason for me—”

  Maybe it was. Maybe he’d need back up, but he needed to do this alone. Holding his shields in place for Malcolm was one thing, doing it for an outsider, was even harder. “I got it. I won’t be long.”

  He didn't give Avery any more opportunity to argue, because there was nothing to argue about. He was going in there alone. This was something he needed to do. For him. He took the files and turned away without hesitation. He could feel Avery’s gaze on him like a weight pushing against his spine, but he didn’t look back.

  Cade had never been a stranger to this house. Hell, this house was more like a home than the one he had grown up in. The tree in the garden was the one he had fallen out of as a boy when Stephen had goaded him with were cats or dogs the better climbers? The broken brick wall was where they had spent summer evenings swinging their legs, drinking beer and talking about how they would run Society … they’d run the whole world … kids with innocent dreams. Even the back porch held the glimmer of broken dreams and a hundred different ways he had kissed Gemma.

  He pulled at his tie again and swallowed before knocking. Instead of going to the back door like he would normally, he took himself to the front. To the door not normally used except for tradesmen and those not welcome. Right then, he was fairly sure he fell into the latter part of that description.

  He lifted the knocker and rapped it lightly, then waited.

  It was Evie who answered the door. Evie with her bright eyes and a face like whoever had created her, made a perfect blend of Gemma and Stephen. She had Stephen’s dark hair, his square jaw, but the expression she gave was one of Gemma’s. She had Gemma’s shade of eye colour too and the same slight dusting of freckles across her nose.

  “Cade,” she said, her face breaking into a smile the moment she saw him. Then she jumped out at him and hooked her arms around his neck. The momentum of her jump almost knocked him down. He hugged her back and let his arms snake around her waist, and for a brief, selfish moment, he took the embrace and inhaled deeply. She smelt so much like Gemma … so similar. It rocked him down to the very core, shaking him. He gave her a brotherly kiss against her hair and then let her go.

  “Cade?” Emily was in the hallway. She peered around the edge of an internal door. Her expression wasn't anywhere near pleased. In fact, it was the exact opposite to Evie. He released her and moved up a step, pushing business confidence back into himself. “You know you shouldn’t—”

  Come here … he finished the heart breaking sentence in his head and almost visibly winced at it. His body wanted to slump, his wolf drawing back, but Cade raised his shoulders. He held up the file. “Official business,” he said before she could finish her sentence. She was wrong. It was Karl who wasn't supposed to be there. Karl who needed to be the one to use this door. “Is Malcolm home?”

  A slight twitch danced across Emily’s features for a moment, almost mirroring what Cade knew she had to be thinking. Never … not in all the years of being here, had he ever felt as uninvited as he did right then.

  “My dad’s in his office … like usual,” Evie said before her mother could. She seemed so much younger than they had at her age. Not less mature, but there was a vulnerability to her … innocence that had perhaps passed them by. Cade wished with anything she could hold onto that, but already, she had seen death … she had lost her brother, and her friend. She moved out of the way and let Cade in.

  “We’ll be in the kitchen,” Emily said. She held out her hand towards Evie, the way a mother would to a small child.

  Evie’s cheeks flushed, but she went with her, leaving Cade to stand in the hall. Emily cast a glance back over her shoulder at him before she went to the kitchen. There was a coldness in her green eyes now. A coldness that didn’t match. She had told him not to dare give up … Had that changed now? Did she approve of Gemma’s new mate?

  Malcolm was sitting at his desk, just as Evie had said. As usual. His head was down as he read something. “Close the door,” he said, not looking up.

  He did.

  As the latch clicked, Cade’s wolf thrashed. He’d clearly hoped for a sighting of Gemma … wished for it even. Cade had dreaded it. It brought a lump to his throat and icy fingers down his spine. “I’m here on official business,” he said before Malcolm could reprimand him or anything else he would think to say.

  Malcolm was almost methodical with his movements as he took his glasses off and then swivelled his chair around, so he could face Cade. “There is a meeting tonight. At your father’s house.”

  Cade frowned. “My father’s?”

  Malcolm nodded and then folded his arms across his chest. “He has a wolf in need of intervention. Council business. Consider this your official notice.” Malcolm’s tone was clipped, perhaps more than normal—colder. Either that, or Cade was just feeling the weight of it all … the depth of his own reasoning about being there.

  He simply nodded in acknowledgement to the information, and then he handed Malcolm some papers—copies of the new additions that Malcolm needed to add to his own file.

  “You have information on Jessica?”

  “We have a person of interest,” he said, pushing any emotion from his own words. Thanks to his own father, he was well practised in that. “We received her itemised call records. Incoming and outgoing. My brothers had both called her for various reasons, but there was a third.”

  Malcolm was already sifting through the new papers. He said nothing, but then he raised his eyes back to Cade. There was no friendliness in that expression. No affection. “Is this a joke? Some part of you not letting go and accepting things as they are?”

  “No. I need to speak to him.”

  Malcolm closed the file. “No. That would not be a good idea. You know as much as I do.”

  “It is for—”

  “I will speak to him,” Malcolm said, cutting Cade off. He rose from his seat with smooth, feline ease. He had the grace of his cat, the
predatory movements. He walked across the room, passing Cade as if he didn’t have a second thought, then he opened the door. “Come with me.” His voice was thick, heavy and commanding. It delved into Cade, straight to his wolf, to his heart and wrapped fingers around it, squeezing it, ready to be shown the door.

  He wasn’t afraid of Malcolm. There was little anyone could do to him now. Gemma … Connor … Stephen …. His heart was already broken from those. They left a gaping hole. One he was certain he’d never repair. He followed Malcolm to the kitchen, though. Emily and Evie were still there. Their faces dropping, smiles stripped away at the sight of the two men.

  “Cade …” Evie said, jumping from her seat, but it didn’t matter. He appreciated the gesture.

  Outside, on the swing was Gemma. She was lying on her side, her head resting on Karl’s thigh as he rocked them both, pushing backwards and forwards.

  A fist clenched even tighter in Cade’s chest, cutting off the blood supply between his heart and his soul. It sent him dizzy. His wolf slammed inside at the sight. Karl had his head back, his eyes closed, but he had an arm resting across Gemma. Gemma was reading. She held the book in one hand, the other was trapt between her bare thighs. Shorts … she always wore shorts. But it wasn’t the sight of her bare legs that caught Cade’s attention, no. It was the book. One of their books. One he had read to her as they had lain in bed together, her head on his chest. So many nights she had stayed like that, curled next to him, listening to him, her eyes closed as he read tales of fantasy to her. Stories with impossible ever afters.

  “She’s happy,” Malcolm said.

  Cade only nodded. If Malcolm wanted to believe that, but the sight of her, the way she held herself. She was leaning with an arch to her back, she was leaning away. She was doing the same as Cade … she was pretending, and the book on top of it … It made his wolf stretch out its claws and scratch hope inside him.