by Laken Cane
“And they mean what?” I demanded, already angry, already terrified.
The guards weren’t concerned. No human got in trouble for the conditions inside a supernatural prison. Maybe someday that would change. Maybe it wouldn’t. Everyone knew what prisons for supernaturals were like. Everyone knew how bad they were.
But I guess I hadn’t really known.
“I’ll give you a pamphlet when you leave.” Cindy was growing impatient. “We’re here. You have half an hour.”
I shook my head. “That’s not long enough.”
“Sorry, but those are the rules. You would have gotten an hour but you didn’t show up on visiting day—so you get thirty minutes.” She waited, impassive.
Finally, I nodded and turned to face the barred entrance. No sense wasting time arguing. Honestly, I wasn’t sure I could have taken an hour in that soul-sucking horror of a place.
The discordant buzz sounded, and I straightened my spine and walked into BSec to visit Angus.
And that was the scariest damn thing I’d done in a long, long time.
Chapter Five
We were led into a large area similar to a high school gymnasium, pointed into a small, windowless waiting area and told to wait. We wouldn’t be taken to Angus—he’d be brought to us.
I sat, then twisted my fingers and stared at the floor, my heart in my throat. The stress was enormous. I might be human, but the moment I’d stepped into the prison I’d felt somehow…owned. Lost.
If something happened in there, would anyone come to get us out? Or would we be stuck in cells and forgotten?
I had to keep reminding myself that I was human. They weren’t going to do shit to me, Shane, or Alejandro. We were human.
More than that, Shane and I were hunters. The city needed us.
The door opened and I jumped to my feet, but it was only two of the guards. Cindy and her accompanying guards had turned us over to new people when we’d entered the Blood Section, but not before she’d insisted they enforce the thirty-minute visit rule.
“Let’s go,” the guard who’d opened the door said. “He’s ready.” His voice was unemotional, his eyes calm, but he had a hard coldness to him that I’d seen in the cops of Red Valley. I wondered if he’d been a cop at one time. He had a bushy red beard and red hair.
He told us his name, but I barely heard it and forgot it immediately. To me, he was Beardy.
Beardy turned and strode away. Two guards walked on either side of us, and one followed behind. It seemed a little much, but then Angus was led through the double doors at the far end of the large, echoing room, and I forgot about the heavy security.
His steps were short and shuffling, which was all the restraints around his ankles would permit. His hands were behind his back.
His hair had grown out. That’s what I concentrated on. His hair had grown out. He’d kept his head shaved for as long as I’d known him, and in the months he’d been in prison, it’d grown, and it’d grown fast.
He’d fastened it into a short ponytail at the back of his neck, but a couple of strands had slipped free and hung over his face. All the sections seemed to have different color coveralls, and BSec’s color was a red so dark it was almost black.
It was as though I didn’t even know him. His hair grew faster than a human’s would, but it wasn’t just his hair that made him seem like a stranger.
The guards stopped his awful shuffling walk, brought his hands from behind his back, then shoved him into a huge metal chair. They fastened his wrists into cuffs on the chair arms and his legs—although they were already restrained—into cuffs that went from ankle to knee.
Lastly, they pulled a collar of yellow, red, and blue wires from the back of the chair, wrapped them around his neck, then stepped back.
“He’s all yours,” Beardy said.
And finally, Angus looked up.
We were only halfway across the floor, but as soon as Angus looked at me, I gave a sob I hadn’t meant to give and sprinted across the floor toward him.
I didn’t care what any of them thought. Everyone but Angus disappeared at that moment.
I was almost to him when someone stepped in front of the chair and lifted his hand. “Stop.”
I skidded to an immediate halt and looked around for Beardy, who seemed to be the one in control. “Why?”
Beardy was no help. He shook his head. “Maintain a safe distance at all times. No touching the inmate. And keep your voice loud enough so we can hear you. You do that, and you can have your thirty minutes.”
Did I have a choice?
Not really.
I nodded, then looked at the guard blocking Angus from my view. “Get out of my way.”
His expression didn’t change. He went to stand on one side of the chair, the other guard stood behind the chair, and Beardy stood close to me.
Because Beardy knew he didn’t have to worry about the restrained shifter. He had to worry about Shane, Alejandro, and me.
I dropped my gaze to Angus.
“Trin.” His voice was hoarse, raw, and filled with something I didn’t quite recognize.
Whatever it was, it hurt me to hear it. I took a step closer to him, and Beardy tensed. I felt Shane at my back, warm and steady, and Al was on my right.
I cleared my throat. “They wouldn’t let me come see you, Angus. They wouldn’t clear you for visitors. I tried.”
He nodded, slowly, and kept his stare glued to mine as though he were afraid to look away. As though I were his lifeline.
He looked surprisingly good. The last time I’d seen him he’d been hovering on the edge of death. Now, he was pale and quiet, but his arm muscles bunched beneath the short sleeves of his uniform, and his body looked sleek, strong, and cared for.
Sure, there were some wounds, some new bruises, some cuts, even something that looked like bite marks.
I swallowed. Who the fuck was biting him?
And when I lifted my worried gaze from his body to his eyes, he looked away.
There was guilt deep in his eyes. Shame, too.
Shit. “Angus…”
Whatever else they were doing to him, they weren’t starving him. He looked nothing like the poor creatures who’d been forced to kneel in ISec, with their sharp shoulder blades and knobby spines.
Shane squeezed my arm and when I looked around, he pointed at the chair he’d dragged from the table. I sat down on the edge of it, murmuring my thanks.
“My kids?” Angus asked.
“They’re okay. They miss you so much. Alisa had her baby, a little girl. She named her Pearl.”
“And Jen?”
“She miscarried.”
He swallowed, then nodded. Miscarriages involving supernaturals were very common, but a person wouldn’t believe that based on the number of Angus’s children. He seemed to be singlehandedly trying to match the human population with the shifter population.
Truthfully, it was as Rhys had told me. Bulls were driven to do two things—fuck and fight. And Angus wouldn’t use birth control. Some of the women did, but not Angus.
A flash of hot possessive jealousy came out of nowhere and lit me on fire. There and gone, it nevertheless left me gasping in its wake.
“What’s wrong?” Shane asked.
I shook my head, not taking my stare from Angus’s. “Nothing.”
“Trinity,” Angus said. “You shouldn’t have come. It’s not safe for you here.”
I leaned forward, trying to ignore the listening guards. “I’m going to get you out of here, Angus. Hang on for a few more days.”
He narrowed his eyes, but I could see the hope trying to creep in. “How?”
I glanced at the guards. I didn’t want to give them too much information. Maybe I shouldn’t have let them know I was working on getting Angus released, but Angus needed to know. “Just…hang on. Okay?”
He nodded. “Hurry, Trin.”
I put my hand to my chest. His whispered words told me more than anything else that
he was going through some bad shit.
From the corner of my eye I saw Beardy stiffen, and I hurried to change the subject. “Cory wanted me to let you know he got his shift.”
Angus widened his eyes and leaned toward me, flinching when the collar around his throat bit into his skin. “That’s my boy.”
I smiled. “He knew you’d be proud of him.”
“Who was with him?”
“Rhys and Clayton.”
“I owe them. Give them my thanks. And tell Cory…”
“I’ll tell him you’ll be home soon,” I said fiercely, when he faltered.
Angus’s next question was for Shane. “You’re staying?”
Shane’s answer was so long in coming that I tilted my head back to look at him. The hunter didn’t glance down at me, and his voice was emotionless when he finally replied. “I’m finding it hard to leave.”
Angus grinned and looked so much like his old self that it took my breath. “We were drawn to her for a reason, my friend.”
I frowned. “There was no reason. Miriam brought him.”
“But she couldn’t make me stay,” Shane said, almost reluctantly, and still, he wouldn’t look at me.
“Hey, buddy,” Al said to Angus, and I took my attention from Shane. We could revisit that conversation later.
“Alejandro,” Angus said. “Thanks for coming.”
I was surprised they knew each other, but I shouldn’t have been. The supernatural community was small, and Angus would have met Rhys’s friends.
But it made me more curious about Al. He must have had some skills for Rhys to have chosen him to walk with me into the Byrdcage.
“You smell like sunshine,” Angus told me. His voice was full of longing, but maybe the despair was less.
He believed in me.
“Soon,” I promised. “I swear.”
“Move on,” Beardy growled. He caressed his holstered baton, and I was nearly certain he didn’t even realize he was doing it. But it told me something, that touch.
Beardy hurt the inmates, and he liked it.
Angus took his stare from me and planted it on Beardy and that was the moment I knew they hadn’t broken him. No matter what else they’d done to him, they hadn’t broken him.
Beardy took an involuntary step back, then stiffened and clenched his fists. “You have two seconds to lower your eyes, inmate.”
I frowned. “He’s not allowed to look at you?”
“The first thing the prisoners are taught is subservience to their handlers,” Beardy said, grim but gleeful. “We need them calm and submissive. By looking me in the eye, he’s trying to dominate me.”
“And you can’t have that.” I stood, and Shane and Al slipped up beside me.
“Absolutely not,” Beardy agreed. He watched me a little too greedily, as though he needed me to step out of line. He shot his stare to Angus, and I understood then what he wanted. He wanted Angus to watch helplessly while he beat the shit out of me.
“You know,” I said, “if you attack me, Shane and Alejandro will tear you to pieces. And I will make sure you never work here again.” I pursed my lips, thinking. “Actually, I think I’ll take your job from you anyway. I know you’re not the only asshole working here, but maybe you’re one of the worst.”
He laughed. “Lady, I’m a sweetheart compared with some of the guards. And you’re just making things worse for your freak of a boyfriend.”
“Gaines.” Angus' voice was low and despite his restraints, full of a dark threat.
Beardy looked at him. He narrowed his eyes but said nothing.
“When I get out of here, I won’t forget you.” His smile slid across his face, dark and full of promise. “And you’re just making things worse for yourself.”
I knew Angus. Still, his voice made me shiver with a cold fear. The guard should have been afraid.
And he was—but that just made him angrier.
He blew out a hard breath, then squared his shoulders. “You’re not going anywhere, inmate.” He stared down his nose at me. “And your time is up. You and your boys need to get the fuck out of my prison.”
“We’ll go,” I said. “For now. But first, I’m going to hug my…boyfriend. And you’re not going to try to stop me.”
He hesitated, then gestured toward Angus. “Be my guest. Make it good, because it’ll be the last sweet touch he gets for a long, long time. I’ll make sure of that.”
I flinched and he smiled, pleased with my fear. I couldn’t hide it because I was too afraid that Beardy was telling the truth. That I’d fail. That I wouldn’t find Mrs. Bennett. That I wouldn’t be able to get Angus out.
And more than anything else I was afraid that the guard would kill Angus while freedom was still just a gleam of hope in the shifter’s eyes.
Chapter Six
“Go on, then.” Beardy crossed his arms. “Don’t back out now. He can’t hurt you.”
Hurt me? Hurt me?
I closed my eyes for a second, clenching my teeth against the boiling rage that rose up so suddenly I was taken off guard. It was a killing rage. A rage so filled with hatred and frustration that I couldn’t breathe through it.
It was the rage Amias had created inside me the night he’d tried to kill me, the rage once reserved for only him.
Shane knew. He and I were connected as hunter and bloodhunter, and he felt the darkness inside me. I knew he could feel it because I could feel his.
He snaked his arms around my waist and pulled my shaking, stiff body back against his, then put his lips to my ear. “Control it, Bloodhunter.”
His whisper echoed through my entire body.
It gave me something to concentrate on besides the rage, the pain, the injustice. And as I followed that whisper, I regained my control.
The guards watched with impassive faces and curious stares. Beardy walked to stand beside Angus and as I watched, he patted Angus on the head.
Like Angus was his little pet dog instead of a huge supernatural who, if he could have freed himself, would have ripped off the guard’s head and stuffed it up his ass.
Al walked toward the guards. “Can we smoke in here?”
“Sure, buddy,” one of them said.
Al laughed. “In that case, can I bum a cigarette? I left mine in the car.” Then he began chatting about something nonsensical, something that had the guards laughing and handing smokes all around, and I understood at that moment that one of Al’s talents was distraction.
He knew how to handle situations.
How to handle people.
That was why he hadn’t shut up the entire time we’d been in the car.
I calmed a little more, then lifted my fingers to the ugly piece of jewelry pinned to my shirt and gave it a tiny squeeze. Thanks, Rhys.
Sometimes a person didn’t need a fighter at her back. Sometimes she needed a thinker.
Rhys had been right about something else, as well. He would not have been safe here. Not only would he have been in danger, but we all would have been. If the guards had noticed he wasn’t human, they’d have tried to take him. And we wouldn’t have let them—not without a fight.
The Byrdcage was not a place for free supernaturals.
I shuddered and stepped out of Shane’s embrace.
I took a deep breath, then strode across the floor to Angus.
My supernatural.
One of my supernaturals.
The rest of the room disappeared as I stood in front of him. Al and the other guards joked and talked and laughed, but their voices faded away. Beardy watched me like a hawk, but I forgot about him.
Shane stayed at my back, his warmth heating my chilled body. It’d be okay. It would.
I slid my fingers over Angus’s face, closing my eyes as I leaned into him and put my lips to his ear. “Just a few more days. You’ll be home as soon as I can get you there.”
Then I inhaled, deeply, pulling the scent of him into my brain. It was faint, buried beneath the stench of prison and s
orrow and darkness, but it was there.
“That perfect scent,” I murmured. “I can’t resist it.”
He turned his head slowly, and a whisper couldn’t have gotten between our lips.
“As I can’t resist yours.” And he brushed his lips across mine.
The thrill of that touch lit up my entire body.
“That’s enough,” Beardy said. “Back away from the inmate, Sinclair.”
I didn’t want to back away. Angus was mine. That was how I felt. He was mine, belonged with me, and the guards were keeping him from me. It pissed me off.
“I said back away.” Beardy tapped Angus on the shoulder with his baton, gently, but Angus sucked his breath through his teeth and his body tensed in preparation for a familiar zing of electricity that didn’t come. But the threat of it was enough.
Shane tensed to grab the baton, but before he could do something reckless and get us all killed, I backed away from Angus, my hands up. “Sorry.”
Beardy’s narrowed stare went from me to Shane, and finally, he nodded and lowered the baton. “It’s for your safety. Those are the rules.”
And he was eager to enforce those rules.
Asshole.
I met Angus’s stare, and my entire body shook with the need to touch him. I doubted he’d been touched with kindness in six months. I could barely stand it.
I twisted my fingers together to keep them where they belonged. “I’ll be back,” I whispered.
His face softened. “I know.” Then he looked at Shane. “Take care of her.”
Shane grunted.
Then I walked away. It was hard.
But I did it.
I stopped at the door and looked back once, but the guards were already busy loosening the various cuffs and straps and my view of him was blocked.
“Soon, Angus,” I couldn’t help but call.
He didn’t reply.
Then the guards ushered me through the doorway and hurried me down echoing, dirty hallways, eager to get me and my friends out of their way. Beardy stayed behind with Angus.
“Where is Angus kept?” I asked my escorts, as we waited for Shane to retrieve and stash his many weapons. “Where is his cell?”
