by SJ Hayslett
He looked at his watch and saw that it was three in the afternoon. "I'm assuming she's upstairs studying," Reed was annoyingly flippant with Angela and the conversation that Angela wondered how he didn't seem to care.
"You sure about that?" Angela's eyes narrowed on the alpha. "How about you guess again. But then again since you've been pushing her away for a week now. Even guessing will be especially hard for you."
Angela shook her head in disgust before storming out of the office.
Reed stared at the spot where Angela once stood before turning to look at Garrett. "Do you know what she's talking about?"
Garrett took a moment to consider his friend. "I can't comment on what Evony's whereabouts are but, ever since the info came through from our informant at Silver Fang, yes you have avoided Evony. You don't even know if it's true and you've ostracized her. And even if what we think we know is true, the best coarse of action should have been to get closer to Evony to find out what she knows."
"I don't know what to do." Reed ran his palm down his face in frustration. He had no idea how to separate himself from the possibility that Evony had betrayed him and the pack.
"In my opinion. If it turns out that the information is false, you've already betrayed your mate."
Reed closed his eyes as he listened to Garrett leaving the conference room. He handled the whole thing wrong, he knew that. Part of him couldn't reconcile that the woman that he had fallen so deeply for could use her connections to her father to take Blood Moon down.
Who to trust?
Should he trust his informant who has been spying on Silver Fang since before Evony left Silver Fang?
Or should he trust his mate who came from an enemy territory? However, trusting Evony meant that his informant was feeding him false information. Whether it was purposeful or unintentional remained to be seen. It also meant that she was right about the person he had working at Logan airport.
Reed remembered Evony's theory regarding the airport reports, and the more he thought about it, the more plausible it seemed. Yet that meant he had two traitors. That thought didn't sit well with him.
"Reed, Evony isn't upstairs," Garrett had gone up to check the bedroom, but it was as empty as a pool in the dead of winter.
"Where's Evony?" Reed asked through the mind link to Paul and Connor. They didn't answer right away and Reed wasn't sure how he felt about that.
Reed was so in his thoughts that he was a bit startled when he heard his phone ringing.
"Hey boss, it's Connor," Connor didn't even allow time for Reed to answer the phone and just started right away. "We lost her while we were tailing her at Harvard. But we caught a break. She used her credit card to check into a hotel in downtown Cambridge. We just pulled up now. Hold on."
Reed heard movement from the opposite line as the two brothers got out of the car and walked into the hotel. The lobby was particularly loud even through the phone when a muffled conversation caught his attention.
"Here, you tell him."
"No you. You called him."
"Will one of you just tell me! Now!" Reed demanded impatiently.
"Uhhh, Alpha, umm. Evony isn't alone. There's a man sitting at her table in the bar." Connor finally answered.
"Where are you?" Reed grounded out between his teeth.
Connor barely had enough time to say the name of the hotel before Reed crushed his phone in his hands.
Chapter 21
After her shower, Evony's stomach made its presence known with a vengeance. Not really in the mood to be by herself, Evony decided it was best for her to grab some dinner in the hotel restaurant. Evony got dressed in some low-rise jeans and an off the shoulder peasant top. She didn't need to worry about the outside temperature so Evony didn't bother with a jacket and just threw her flip-flops on.
The elevator ride was quick and quiet with no stops and no other passengers. Evony was also pleased that there wasn't a crowd in the restaurant and was seated right away. Everything looked great on the menu but in the end Evony chose a simple steak quesadilla and a chipotle chicken salad.
It was a little nerve-racking for Evony to sit at a restaurant by herself so she pulled out her phone as she waited for her food to arrive. She was obsessed heavy in her game of Infinity Blade on her phone when a shadow stepped to her table.
"Excuse me?" The stranger said. Evony looked up to see who was speaking. He was handsome, not on the same level as Reed though. Where Reed was dark, the stranger was light. He had blonde hair and hazel eyes. He was dressed in a suit, but something about the way he had approached her, or his look, did not suggest that he was with hotel staff. Just one whiff confirmed that he was human and not a werewolf, so there was little need for Evony to feel timid in his presence.
"Yes?" The man took her response as an invitation to sit down across from her. Evony couldn't help but be a little put off and sat up straighter in her chair in preparation for whatever his intentions were.
"I just wanted to say that you are hands down the most beautiful woman that I've ever seen. I would really like to take you out for dinner and get to know you better."
"Thank you," Evony smiled. "But I'm married."
There was a flash of anger on the man's face before his smile returned. Only this time there was no genuineness to the expression.
"I don't see a ring on your finger," he insisted.
"Doesn't change the fact that I am indeed married." Evony was confused why there was an intense stare down with this stranger. Finally, her waitress returned with her food, and Evony was able to turn away from the man. "Actually," Evony looked at her waitress before she could place the plates on the table. "Would you be able to have these sent to my room?" Evony pulled her driver's license out of her bag and handed it to the waitress along with a hundred dollar bill. "You can keep the change. Thanks."
The waitress rushed through her thanks to Evony and left the table to find the runner to bring her food to the room. Evony gathered her purse and her phone and wanted to wait by the hostess stand for her license but the man grabbed her quite forcefully. It felt like a piece of his watch had clipped her as her wrist was captured in his grip.
"Let go of me." Evony growled out with her wolf close to the surface. The man was frightened enough to slacken his grip so that Evony could snatch her hand back.
"Is everything okay?" The waitress had returned with her license quicker than she had expected and Evony felt so grateful. This time when she returned, she had two men who definitely looked like they were hotel security. "Does security need to be called?"
"Yes please. This man refused to leave me alone and just grabbed me. I'll be in my room if you need a statement." Evony made her way to the elevator and impatiently waited for everyone to get to his or her floors before the elevator finally dropped her off on her own.
Once in her room, Evony kicked her flip flops off and dropped her bag on the chair near the desk. She was about to take her jeans off when the bell to the executive suite rang at the door. Evony stumbled on her feet, suddenly tired, until she realized that it was probably someone from the hotel with her food. She shook her head to clear the fogginess that was taking over her.
When she finally made her way to the door, she was not expecting to see Reed standing there. She didn't even care that he seemed so angry with her. She grabbed onto him and held on tight, calling his name.
"Who was he?" Reed demanded, but all Evony heard was Reed was yelling at her from under the water.
"Reed, somethingiswrong," she mumbled before the entire world was consumed by the darkness.
Reed held tight to his mate that fell into his arms. He listened for her pulse but it was considerably slowed down and still somewhat erratic.
He carried her into the room and once he closed the door, he laid her down on the couch. Reed didn't spare her another glance before going into the bedroom of her suite and began packing up her schoolwork, laptop, and duffle bag. He was just beginning to call out to Connor and Paul throu
gh the mind link to help him figure out how to get an unconscious Evony out of the hotel when there was a knock at the door.
"Room Service," someone called out from the other side of the door, however whoever it was didn't even give the occupant an opportunity to get to the door. Reed could hear the lock disengaging by someone with a keycard. He quietly dropped her bags and hid behind the door to the bedroom.
"Paul and Connor, I need you to come up to Evony's suite. Now!" He ordered through the mind link.
Through the crack of the door, Reed could see two men enter the room with a covered food service cart. They looked like they worked with the hotel, but Reed could smell that they were also werewolves.
One of the men closed the door to the suite and hurried beside his partner.
"Is she out yet?" He whispered, but Reed was able to pick the conversation out perfectly.
"Yeah let's hurry up and load her on. Anthony said he wasn't sure how much of the drug he was able to inject. Who knows how long she'll be out." The two of them were about to lift her when Reed silently made his move. The first guy he hit went down with one tap to his temple.
"What do you want with her?" The second guy was surprised to see Reed, even as he wrapped his hand around his throat. Reed was angry and the wrath of his wolf was very close to ripping the guy's throat; whether he got information or not.
"I Don't. Know," he struggled to get out. "We were approached."
"By who?" Reed demanded, but eased up on his grip on the man's throat so he could speak.
"He didn't give a name."
"Why did he come to you?"
"We were rogues. He wanted this untraceable. I don't know who he is. I swear it." Reed no longer cared what the rogue had to say. He smashed his head against the wall.
"That'll teach you to try to take what's mine." He said as he scooped Evony against his chest bridal style. Paul and Connor showed up just as Reed reached the door. "Grab her bags."
"Boss, I parked the SUV by the exit of the kitchen. I already informed staff and security to keep our exit under wraps."
Good, Reed thought. His wolf, and if he had to admit it, himself had calmed down considerably with just the touch of holding Evony in his arms. Even the stress from the previous week seemed to melt away. Reed prayed that Evony hadn't betrayed him, forget the pack, but him. He loved her so much, and wanted to weep at the thought of never holding her in his arms again.
With Evony in his arms, Paul leading the way, and Connor bringing up the rear with Evony's bags, the three made their way through the kitchen and to the back ally with no problems.
"Connor make sure no one follows us back to the pack," Paul whispered as they climbed into the vehicle. "Alpha, what would you like to do with Evony's Jeep?"
"Leave it. I'll send someone back for it later." Reed said absentmindedly as he watched Evony's chest lift slightly with her breathing. He brushed away some hair that had fallen in her face and just stared. If his pride hadn't gotten in the way, he would have come close to losing her for goddess knew how long. Hell, he didn't even know that she wasn't on the property had it not been for Angela. That's not even true. He didn't move from his chair until the brothers mentioned that she was at the hotel with another guy.
Had she gone there to meet with this guy or was he connected to the kidnapping? Was he the "Anthony" the two rogues had used to get close to Evony?"
"Find out all you can about the guy that was in the restaurant with her. I don't care if you need to hack the security feeds of the hotel. I want to know his connection to this. Find out if he has any connections to her father. I want to know every detail of his life."
Someone was out to get Evony, and somehow he made it all that much easier to get to her. Garrett was right, he had pushed Evony away, and judging by the kidnapping attempt, he pushed her away for all the wrong reasons.
The drive was quick the way Paul was driving, and before he knew it, Reed was running towards the pack infirmary.
"What did you do to her?" Reed heard Angela's voice but didn't stop until he laid Evony down on a hospital bed. The nearest nurse came into the room and started taking her vitals while Reed explained what he knew had happened. Despite his insistence that he stayed by her side, the infirmary staff insisted that he go to the waiting room. Telling an already impatient alpha to wait, especially one that was heavy with guilt was almost a death sentence. Thankfully, someone, probably Angela, had alerted Garrett that Reed was back, and Garrett was able to talk Reed down. Momentarily.
"Are you happy?" Angela was like a dog with a bone. Garrett had to pull Angela back before she did something she'd regret, like punching the alpha in the nose. He tried to get her to calm down, but Angela was not feeling it. "No Garrett, if she did anything to herself because he was an asshole, he needs to feel every bit of it. She is like a sister to me," Garrett couldn't deny his mate that. He had noticed that in the weeks that they had met, that they'd grown very close; even when they weren't working. Hell, he even looked at Evony as a sister since the first day that they had met.
"You think she did this to herself? I swear to the goddess you better not be spreading that shit to anyone! She was attacked, and I got there just in time. You don't need to remind me of my shortcomings, Angela." Reed stormed out of the waiting room and shifted as soon as he felt the breeze of open air.
He just needed some time.
Chapter 22
The sudden pounding headache was what Evony would swear woke her up. Even beneath the dark blanket of her eyelids, she could tell that she didn't want to open her eyes to the bright light. She brought her right hand to her head and moaned at the pain such a simple action caused. It was only when she was able to focus her senses despite the pain and not having opened her eyes that she heard the incessant beeping to the left of her.
"How do you feel? You've been out for a long time?" The lights were still too bright to attempt to open her eyes, so Evony just let her head adjust slightly to the voice of who sounded exactly like Angela. But how was that possible?
"What happened?" Evony asked.
"You were brought here unconscious, the doctor hasn't said what was wrong yet."
"Can somebody shut the light off? And do something about that beeping?" Evony could feel her headache pulsing with each beep, and found it exasperating. "Why hasn't the doctor said anything? What's wrong?"
Evony could sense that someone had in fact turned the lights off and was finally able to open her eyes. It was a bit of a struggle since her body seemed hell bent of protecting her. There was a pitcher of ice chips on the rollaway table and she hesitantly poured some into the pink cup and brought it to her lips.
"Relax, the doc wouldn't say anything because I'm not family and Alpha Reed isn't here right now."
That made a pseudo amount of sense, and Evony closed her eyes on a defeated sigh. She could catch snippets of what happened before she blacked out and thought she remembered seeing Reed before she fell. Was that a memory? Was he actually somewhere that he had to seek her out? Her eyes snapped open when she replayed everything that Angela had said about Reed.
"How long have I been out?" Evony asked Angela.
"Eight hours." Ouch. Evony felt a pain in her heart. She was in the infirmary for eight hours and nobody knew what was going on with her because Reed couldn't be bothered to show up beside her long enough to get a report from the doctor. Tears prickled the corners of her eyes but she refused to shed a tear. He was still mad at her for whatever reason that he wouldn't even wait for her to wake up.
Evony's eyes had closed once again to give her a semblance of processing the physical and emotional pain alone. The door opened and the scent of the new arrival wasn't who she had hoped it would be.
"Alpha Evony?" A well-groomed man walked in reading a clipboard but had yet to look at the occupants in the room. "I'm Doctor Sade, I heard you were awake." He finally looked at Evony and offered her a gentle welcoming smile.
"Yeah, apparently it's my lucky day." Ev
ony replied with a deadpanned tone. As mad as she was with Reed in recent days, he was the only person she wanted to see. But for reasons unknown, he was even angrier at her. What did she do to push him away?
"Actually it is." He briefly looked around the room and saw the visitors that were holed up in the corner. "I'm going to have to speak to the alpha alone." Angela and Garrett looked at Evony for confirmation and only moved once she nodded that it was okay. Evony had half a mind to tell the doctor it was okay, that he could say what he needed to say in front of them. However, his tone suggested that his terms were non-negotiable even from an alpha. Even though she didn't care if Garrett and Angela knew what happened, Evony was even more curious. And if that meant she couldn't have the support of anyone near her, then so be it.
"How are you feeling? No, I imagine that's a stupid question. Can you tell me what you remember?"
Evony's forehead furrowed together as she tried to focus on her last memories. She took a huge sigh as memories started flashing in her head. "Ummm, I was at the restaurant in the hotel. I'd just placed my order when this man, a human, sat down and tried to hit on me. When he became persistent after I rejected him, I felt it was time for me to leave. I made arrangements for my order to be sent to my room and I was about to leave when he grabbed me, here." Evony held up her left hand and showed him her wrist. The waitress and security came and gave me a chance to walk away. I was in my room and then so was Reed, but he was so ang-umm, that's when I passed out."
"You said he grabbed you?" Evony nodded and Dr. Sade gave a heavy sigh. "We did a toxicology and the results were a little troubling. Your blood was teeming with properties of liquid silver, jimson weed, and wolfsbane. I expect the light was hurting your eyes when you woke them? It's a side effect of the jimson weed, and you may or may not have vivid dreams. You may feel out of touch with your wolf while the poison is still in your bloodstream. There wasn't enough of whatever was injected into you to do any permanent damage to you but we can't be sure about the fetus. We'll need to keep you in observa-"
