The Society Series Box Set 2

by Mason Sabre

  Avery was leaning against the hood of his own car. Two other men, Jon and Clay stood close by, talking. They were a lower rank than Cade, even lower than Avery. More like the hired help of the DSA than anything. But they were young, hopeful and eager to please. Cade knew Jon from the pack, but Clay, he was a bear. Built like one too.

  “They put it out then?” Cade said as he got closer to Avery. Avery was tapping something into the screen of his phone. He hit send and then pocketed it.

  “Boss.”

  Stuffing his hands in his pockets, Cade positioned himself near to Avery, but he didn’t lean the same way. He cocked his head to one side, surveying the damage. The car … if it had been a car, was nearly indistinguishable. It was small, a hollow husk of whatever it had been. Magic fire always burnt hotter than real fire. It could melt things that weren’t flammable. Turn metal into liquid. Turn people into nothing. It was magic. Cade could smell the edge of it in the air. “Who called this in?”

  “The Rossendales.” Avery nodded toward the house that stood at the side of the road. The back of it ran out into the slats and then gave way to the trees which ran down to the water. Jimmy Rossendale, Human. Cade knew him from various times. The point where their house was had become a favourite wash-up point for bodies swept along in the waters. They owned a campsite there. It was a good spot. The water wasn’t so deep, so harsh. It was a good place to rent out small toppers to would-be sailors and dinghies to the kids with less chance of one of them drowning. “The ground is fucked to shit,” Avery said. He pointed down to his legs, his jeans. They were covered in mud, wet to his thighs.

  “You didn’t go around?” Cade pointed to the grass nearest to where the Rossendales kept their water sports equipment. There was a jetty, but the ground under the grass had been reinforced. There was concrete under it. “You go along there and down the side and around. The drainage to the campsite runs along the middle.”

  “Drainage?” Avery’s eyes widened, his forehead crinkled and then realisation flitted across his expression. “Drainage …

  “Yep.” If this had been another night … another life, he might have laughed at the inexperienced DSA officer. The rights of passage into these kinds of things were always there for the amusement of those there longer. Humiliation and tough lessons were something they all passed down to each other. No doubt, Avery would pass this down to another one day.

  “Well shit.”

  “Exactly.” Cade raised a small smile.

  He left Avery to stand there as he walked along the walkway at the side of the house. There was a small path that led down toward the jetty. The car was on its roof. The tyres on one side were smoking now. Cade had a handkerchief over his nose and mouth, but that didn’t stop the smoke from making his eyes water.

  One side of the car was a melted mess. The metal chassis dripped like it was chocolate in front of heat. Smoke rose from the sides, from the ground where the paintwork and the car had created a liquid pool. Cade crouched down, hands resting on his thighs as he kept himself back enough from the car.

  “You okay?” Avery asked. He had come along the same path Cade had. Not getting stuck in the mud this time.

  Cade gave a long, slow nod. “Maybe …” He shut it down there, though. Shut Avery out and himself back inside his dark box. Danny would still be wolf-less in an hour, and his father would still be the arsehole responsible for that. He let out a breath. “Can we crack her open? See who’s inside?”

  He pulled a pair of blue latex gloves from his pocket. He always kept them with him. Every jacket, every pair of pants, almost every item of clothing he owned had a set of gloves stuffed into them. Snapping them into place now, he still put his hands into his pockets to stop himself touching anything and to give himself that second to focus and not react on what he would see.

  Avery motioned for Jon and Clay to come down. Called for them to bring a crow bar with them and whatever else they needed to do the hard lifting. Avery had his file and pen ready, plus a camera. With the fire out, the fire crew packed their shit and left. God forbid they stay around and help. Cade shook his head. Bloody Humans.

  On the road above them, where the house was, another car arrived. More DSA. Cade and Avery both stopped to stare at whoever it was. Cade was ready to send them packing. He could deal with this shit.

  Jon was the first to get to the car. “We’ve got the tools,” he yelled.

  Ignoring the new arrival, Cade climbed down, ready to get this show on the road. “Cut her open,” he ordered, but as he took a step onto the solid ground and wind caught him, he caught a scent …

  Gemma …

  She leapt out of her car … her father’s car. Jumped down and made the same mistake Avery had earlier and sank into the mud. “Don’t,” she said. She put her hands up, stayed where she was. “Cade.”

  He raised a brow at her. All of them had stopped. “Don’t?”

  She lifted one foot to move and almost fell backwards, but she moved the other. She had her hands out at either side to keep her balance. “Come here,” she said, looking right at Cade. “Please.”

  “Boss?” Jon had the bar at the car door. Clay had laid down a sheet of plastic to catch it. But Gemma out ranked them. As second to the Council leader, she out ranked them all.

  “Just a second,” Cade said. He waved a hand at them to pause, then he went to the edge of the solid ground.

  “Please,” she said, holding her hands out to him and gesturing. “Please come here.”

  He could feel her … feel her heart beating wildly in her chest. Feel the anxiety all over her like an aura she was giving off.

  Her eyes were wild, bright. The green in them shone with emotion … the shifter tell. “Please, Cade. You don’t need to be here for this. Avery can work it.”

  She pressed a shaky hand to her mouth, held something in. Cade found it hard to move, hard to speak. His wolf was picking up on her distress and it was rooting him to the spot, making the air around them feel out of control and choking. She inched closer, pushing her legs through the mud, going deeper. She still had her hands out.

  “Please, Cade. Please come to me.”

  His own movements were slow, lethargic almost, but only Gemma could make him feel this way, only her panic could knock him so off balance that he wanted to listen to her almost as much as he wanted to get that car opened.

  Behind him, something moved, someone moved … they stepped out from the shadows of the tree line that ran from the other side of the jetty and all the way to the big bridge near his house. The edge of the river was different here. A couple of trees had fallen into the water. The earth sort of stopped like it had been chopped with a purpose. But the waters had spent years lapping away at it, cutting in to the underside until the ground was too weak to hold anything.

  The man who stepped out was tall, slim, dark haired … familiar.

  “Cade,” Gemma said again, her voice more desperate this time. “Please. Come to me.”

  The sound of Gemma’s voice was distant now, a muffled echo he couldn’t latch onto like he was sleeping. The man in front of him … “You,” Cade said. “I know you.” Cade’s jaw twitched, his brain jolted into gear with recognition of the man … he remembered him … him. He touched his arm where the vampire had bitten him. Where he had caused a snowball to bring down the avalanche that was now Cade’s life.

  The vampire stepped out into the rays of the artificial light the DSA had put all around. He had his hands up. He nodded, came closer. His hands were covered in blood. His clothes were splattered with it. Across his face was a thick dark smear. “I come bearing a gift,” he said. His accent was different now as he spoke louder, his words more pronounced. He took another step, and Cade reached into his jacket, curled his hand around the comforting feel of hard plastic in his pocket and reached for his tranquilliser gun.

  They didn’t use normal bullets to take down Others. It would be too hard to ensure the right bullets loaded for the Other they might fac
e. If they loaded it with silver and the perpetrator was a witch, it would do little damage. But a tranquilliser … that took anything down. “Stop,” Cade said. Aiming at him.

  Avery followed suit, flinging the files to the ground. Turning he pulled his own weapon out and then put a space between him and Cade so they had other areas covered. It left the vampire two places to run … the way he had come, which would mean now getting passed Gemma, or into the water.

  “Henry …” Gemma called. “You need to go.” She was closer now. Almost at Cade, but not enough. The earth in front of her was softer, deeper. If she waded into it, it would go up to her chest. She moved to the side, angling herself so that she could pull herself out somewhere between them.

  “You know him?” Cade said. She looked at him with those bright green eyes of hers. They bore into him, making him frown and question.

  The vampire moved, and Cade quickly shot his attention back at him. “I said stop.”

  “Please, Cade. Just come to me. Okay?” She was reaching for him. Her chest heaved from the effort of getting through the mud. Panic laced through her voice. “Please.”

  Cade stepped back, back away from them all. He was caught between the man, between Gemma and between whatever was in the car. Jon and Clay had stopped when Gemma had said, but they had stayed there, their own guns drawn and at the ready. He went toward them, toward the car, making Gemma try to launch herself forward more.

  “Please.”

  “Open it,” Cade said. He had his arm up, his gun aimed at Henry, his body angled so he was facing Gemma but could see the car.

  “Please, Cade. Please just come away,” Gemma said.

  Ignoring her, Cade nodded at Jon. “Do it.” He had to do as Cade ordered or he would lose his job, but Gemma … conflict brought his brows together and he nodded back at Cade.

  The car door came open with a crack, a loud thunderous crack that snapped the silence that pressed around them. It had burnt all the way through and broke under the pressure Jon applied with the bar. Cade moved so he could cover everything all at once.

  “Come away from the car,” Gemma said. “You don’t need to see that. Please. Trust me.”

  Cade was silent. A coldness ran through his spine like someone had taken an icy blade and ran it down his middle. It was too late now. He couldn’t walk away, couldn’t not look, no matter how much Gemma pleaded with him. He took a step toward the car, ready to peer inside … for him to see the charred corpse.

  He froze. Unable to move. Unable to take his eyes away. Unable to comprehend what it was he was seeing.

  Chapter 42

  Gemma

  Cade moved, almost abruptly. His heart gave a stutter, but he slammed his hand against his gun and used both hands to steady his aim and target Henry. He ground his jaw so tight that his temple bulged. He pushed his chest out, shoulders back, his face ready to break with grief and disbelief. “You,” he ground out taking a long step in Henry’s direction. “You …” He screwed his face up as if he was trying to close his eyes, but keep them open at the same time. He clicked the hammer back on his gun and took another step.

  Gemma leapt up from the muddied water. “No,” she screamed as she threw herself into the space between Henry and Cade. She put her chest in the way of Cade’s gun. He’d have to shoot her to get her out of the way and she knew that was something he would never do.

  Rage and fury burnt behind his perfect eyes, and he growled at her. “Get out of the way.”

  “No.” She shook her head and squared her stance in dark defiance. “I can’t let you shoot him.”

  Teeth clenched, eyes filled with hatred. “Get out of the way.”

  “No.” She put a hand on his chest. “I can’t.”

  He breathed harshly through his teeth and kept them tightly together, his cheeks puffing as he did. Gemma stepped purposely into his line of sight and blocked him from blasting out the dart at the asshole standing close by. “Move,” he demanded.

  “He didn’t do it.” Even as she uttered the words, she felt the utmost sincerity to them. She didn’t know for a fact if Henry had done it. He was certainly capable of such an act, but her heart told her it wasn’t him. It couldn’t be. “I promise you. He didn’t.”

  She stepped into Cade’s personal space and forced him back, making it so the edge of the gun was aimed directly at her heart, touching her breast bone. “Gemma …” She put a hand against his chest and felt his heart pounding in there. His eyes were so bright, so blue.

  Behind him … the charred car. The charred car that she wished wasn’t there.

  Aaron.

  Cade’s brother.

  His body was mostly burnt, his corpse charred to the bone in some places, but it hadn’t taken his face yet. It hadn’t burnt away that face … that expression.

  “Move out of my way, Gemma.” Suddenly, Cade was stepping around her, moving to the side. Gemma got in his way again and he let out a short sharp growl. “Move.” Henry was doing the same. He was dodging, playing … messing around in the same way he had with her at the fell.

  Gemma put a hand up at him too. “Henry, stop it.”

  He put his hands down by his sides, and moved back. Maybe he could feel Cade too. Cade’s fury, his pain, it was rolling off him like a blind rage ready to come out and cut everyone down in one fast and easy swoop. “It is your brother who perished?” Henry said. He put his hands into his pockets. “He did not pass at my hands.” For a brief second, Gemma caught the movement in the same way Cade would do it.

  “Then what are you doing here.”

  “Please, put the gun down.” Gemma gently touched Cade’s arm. It was stiff, rigid, a solid pole made of steel at the ready. Avery had his gun on Henry, but she wasn’t concerned with him. He wasn’t raging in his head. He wasn’t losing himself inside. She could hear the wolf howling. It reached out through the link between them. In pain, grieving, lost … wondering what the hell had just happened that he had lost two brothers in the space of an hour. The ache in him made Gemma want to sob. She wanted to wrap her arms around him so tightly that nothing would ever hurt him like this again, but it was impossible.

  Cade blinked, long and hard. His chest rose and then he let the gun drop and shifted his eyes to meet Gemma’s. “Why is he covered in blood if he didn’t do this?”

  Henry held one hand out. “Do not be alarmed. I did not end his life. The blood comes from another,” Henry said.

  Gemma felt herself sag at Henry’s words. He needed to run. He needed to get out of there and save himself … save Cade … save her.

  “Who?”

  Henry angled his head, smiled … his face was filled with ill-timed mischief that only heightened Cade’s desire to shoot him and made him raise his gun once again. Cade pushed into her, pushed past her, using one arm to go around her waist and pull her out of his way.

  “Please. Don’t shoot him.”

  “I happened across a fellow who needed my aid. I offered it. He lives, yet I fear it shall not be long if you remain with me.” He pointed behind him, to the space in the muddied sand between the trees. There was a figure sitting there, slumped, his head lolled to one side, blood all over his chest.

  “Tom …” Gemma’s heart jackhammered at the sight of her best friend’s husband. It knocked the wind right out of her. Shelley’s Tom. All logical thought escaped her right then as she left Cade and leapt down to the soft ground beside them.

  “Watch him,” Cade said to Avery. He didn’t put his gun down, but he followed Gemma, walking to the edge where she had jumped down.

  Henry held his hands up again, palms out, showing his surrender. He said nothing.

  “What did you do?” Gemma asked. She narrowed her eyes at Henry, trying to understand him.

  He didn’t answer, and Gemma wasn’t caring for answers as she ran down, climbed over the first tree and then slid over to Tom. There was a rope attached to one tree. The other part of it was attached to Tom’s feet. “Tom,” she said and s
ank down beside him. She went to touch him, but then hesitated. He was covered in blood, his chest, his legs, his face. Someone had put a jacket over him, but that too was dark now, dark red where his blood had soaked in.

  “Is he alive?” Cade asked as he climbed down. He cast his gaze back at Henry. Henry was just watching, waiting.

  Gemma touched Tom’s throat. His skin was cold, clammy and wet from the water and the blood. His pulse beat under his skin, much to Gemma’s relief. “He’s alive,” she whispered. She kept her gaze on his face, on his closed eyes. She didn’t want to look behind her at the scene that had played out there, and she certainly wasn’t ready yet to lift back the jacket and see what damage it was holding. She was a coward … a coward who had faced too much in one day. A coward who wanted to just go home.

  Biting down on her lip, she dared to reach for the jacket. She owed this to Tom, to Shelley. “Ah, fuck,” she sobbed out, as she peeled away the cover. She pressed the back of her hand to her mouth stifling her sorrow, her heartbreak … the anticipation of Shelley. “We need to get him to the hospital,” she said when she could find her voice again. The problem was, they couldn’t take him to a regular Human hospital. He was Human, but he had chosen the other side. He had given up his rights in their eyes to ever have the privilege of care again.

  Coming down the side next to her, Cade kept his sights on Henry. He didn’t crouch. She knew he was watching Henry from where he was. He didn’t trust him. He still had the gun aimed and ready if Henry tried anything. “What is it?”

  “His hand,” Gemma said. She didn’t dare move it. Not that it mattered. His hand was so fucked. She was no doctor, but even she could see it was beyond repair. He wasn’t shifter. He’d never heal those bones. It was like someone had crushed it in a vice as hard as they could. It bent backwards—folded over. Tom was out of it. She suspected Henry had something to do with that too. Tom was Human. It would have been easy for Henry to put him in a trance like state. She would thank him later. If they made it to later.