“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“No. I just know she’ll always be in danger as long as we both breathe. He knows I’ll always come for her.”
“If you knew why they’re chasing you, that would be helpful.”
I go to the windows. So many roads in, so many entrances to the large facility. I can’t guard them all. I can’t guard Ann without getting arrested.
I don’t know how to give her the safety she needs. I have to hunt and kill Lazarus, but I don’t know where to start.
I stare down at the parking lot, remembering the flashes. The news vans. The fear and bewilderment I felt.
It reminds me of what Ann said, about light making things safer. Better. More knowledge and less secrets is always safer.
I realize with a deep shudder what I have to do. And it goes against everything in me.
Garrick comes to me. “You can’t take her out of here, if that’s what you’re thinking. She’s too sick to move.”
“You remember how it was the first time? How many of you were out there?”
“Well. Savage Adonis,” he says, like just that name explains it. “Feral teen idol,” he adds. “Everyone wanted a look.”
“How long would it take to everyone back here to see me? To take all the pictures they want. Ask all their questions.”
“Wait—I thought that’s exactly what you didn’t want.”
“I don’t want it,” I say darkly. “But it’s all I have left.”
“Making yourself a target? Is that what this is about?”
“No. Getting answers.” I turn to him. “You’re right to ask why they hunt me. Ann asked, too. I never cared, but I do now. If I had that answer, maybe I’d know how to stop them. Ann says there’s safety in light over darkness. Truth instead of secrets.”
“I see Ann’s been filling your head with ideas.” I don’t like the twinkle in his eyes, but I have to trust my mate now. I’m out of ideas that will work.
“More light is what Ann believes in.”
“Oh, I know,” Garrick says.
“She thinks I’ll get the answers that way.”
“You sure the fuck will. A story like this and everyone comes out of the woodwork. We’d have to leak out some of those pictures of you. Have you sign a blanket consent. We have the pictures.” He says something about her phone being cloned.
“I’ll do it,” I say, knowing what the world will see. Me on that patch of grass. Me eating like a savage. None of it matters anymore.
His fingers fly over his phone. “If I say I’m delivering Savage Adonis, I need to deliver Savage Adonis.” He lowers his voice, his tone very nearly sexual. “I’m talking about you turning on that growly thing. Giving the juicy stuff. You’ll hold back some details for my story, though. Deal?”
“Deal,” I say through gritted teeth.
He reaches up and messes up my hair. It’s all I can do not to break his hand. “We’ll let your shirt hang open so they can see the scars. And make that stormy face you do. Where you look like you’re lost and you want to kill somebody.”
My pulse races as he messes up my hair some more.
“That’s it, Kiro—that’s the look! Fuck—yes. Do that up there and you’ll be trending on Twitter and showing up on half the phones in America. Nothing held back. Paraded up there with that angry lost hot guy look…you have to have that look.”
“I’ll have the look,” I say.
“I’m calling BMZ Confidential right now. You sure you’re serious? You gonna fuck me?”
“I’m not going to fuck you,” I spit out.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Aleksio
The desk in our suite at the Sky Slope Hotel overlooks the endless pine forest. But I’m not looking at the view; I’m examining the images from the cave again. A few of the bodies are impossible to ID.
Our guy got DNA, and he’s flying back. We’re hoping Kiro isn’t among the dead.
We got there just a few hours after the attack. So fucking close. We could’ve been there. We could’ve helped him. Instead it was just carnage.
Is Kiro among the dead? Is he wounded? Was he taken? He had a journalist, A.E. Saybrook, with him. Are they still together? Or is she dead, too? Some of the bodies are badly mauled.
I sent Viktor to his room to cool down. I’m hoping he doesn’t break anything. Mira’s on the bed, fucking around online.
I zoom in on a tattoo on one of the dead. I can’t imagine Kiro would have tattoos. And honestly, I can’t imagine that Kiro, a man who lived more than half his life in the wilderness, would be ripped apart by wolves.
There’s a tip that a gunshot wound went into Duluth Memorial Medical Center—something out of the wilderness area. I sent a guy to check it out. They’re saying it’s a hunting accident.
Probably is.
“Aleksio!” Mira screams. “Oh my God! Oh my God!”
“What?”
She’s off the bed. She’s shoving the phone at me. “Look!”
I take a look and the world drops out from under me. I’m staring into the face of Kiro. My brother.
His lips are moving. Talking. It’s a gossip website of some kind. Underneath him in a blaring red rectangle, it says, “LIVE REPORT: Savage Adonis is alive and well, and you won’t believe where we found him.”
“What the fuck? This is live? Where is this?” I fumble on the sound.
Mira grabs the laptop. The shot switches to a reporter asking a question about his feet. Something about bare feet in the snow. There’s a mob of reporters out in front of him.
The feed switches to a still shot of him with long hair in some sort of gloomy hotel room. Another of him in a store wearing glasses. All these weeks of searching for him, and now this firehose of information.
I grab my shit. “Get Viktor. Tell him to meet me at the car. Then you get the rest of everyone you can round up—”
“I got it,” she says. “Go!”
Five minutes later I have the SUV in front of the hotel. Viktor jumps in, and we peel out. There’s a load of automatic weaponry in the back, and I have half a mind to use it on the mob of reporters taking apart our brother.
Viktor has Mischa and some of his other guys on the phone. They’re on the road, too.
“Tell me they’re nearer to the hospital than we are.”
“No. They were at one of the park entrances.”
I gun the fucker. Nothing matters except getting to Kiro. “If we’re seeing him out there online, it means Lazarus is seeing him, too.”
“Bladny,” Viktor says. “All they need is a clear shot.”
“Not if we kill them first.”
Chapter Forty
Kiro
The lights are blinding. The questions don’t stop. How did I get the wolves to accept me? Is it true I went in bare feet even in winter? When I caught animals, would I simply eat them right then and there? Still warm and bloody? The reporters ask more about this. They want me to say that the animals would still be alive when I ate them.
“Sometimes,” I growl. “Sometimes they would still be alive, and I would rip out their throats with my teeth.”
Garrick tries to hold his mouth in a neutral line, but I see the smile in his eyes. They begin to ask about the professor. They want me to talk about killing him.
Now and then Garrick takes the microphone. “We’ll get the deeper details on this in the Stormline article—we want to get to as many questions as possible here today.”
Garrick wants me to show my scars.
I rip off my shirt. Nothing matters. I’m baring all. Allowing myself to be made into a thing. Their savage. Their circus spectacle. Blindly following her advice.
There’s a squeal of tires. Voices yelling to get out of the way. A commotion. The reporters part for whoever is coming through.
Garrick puts a hand on my shoulder, thinking about getting me out of there, maybe.
Uniforms. Somebody official.
The police.
I exchange glances with Garrick. We knew this could happen, that this is how it might end. Garrick has a lawyer. He says the lawyer will keep me free.
My heart pounds as they come. Reporters are getting footage of them now, though I’m sure they’re capturing my expression, too. Fear, despair—I don’t try to hide how I feel. This is like after the professor—a moment of freedom, then the police come.
Garrick’s lawyer tries to stop the cops, but they push him aside. Guns come out. Two familiar faces appear alongside the police. One is Dr. Fancher, head of the Fancher Institute. He would walk around with Nurse Zara every week, peering into the room.
The other is Donny. Donny grins at me.
I freeze.
The lawyer comes up to Garrick, says something about a commitment order.
Panic rises in my chest. I’m beyond hearing.
The instinct to fight surges through me. I imagine hurling myself at Donny. I could rip his throat out—possibly before I die of the bullets they pump into me. But cameras are rolling. And Ann’s out there. She’d say to trust the story. She’d say light is better than darkness.
I let the cops cuff me.
Garrick protests loudly. He wants to stay with me, keep a film crew on me.
Donny comes at me. Grinning. Something flashes in his hand. A needle. The police push me away as the Fancher director takes the microphone. The Fancher director makes an apology to the gathered press. As the police push me away, under instructions from Donny, it seems, I hear the Fancher director using words like “unstable.” And “mentally ill and dangerous.”
Yelling. Garrick is being cuffed and taken away, yelling about lawyers.
Reporters trail us as we head to the Fancher van. Cops bar the way.
The van.
I know that van. It’s more than a cage on wheels. It’s a fortress on wheels. Seeing it nearly breaks my spirit, and I think maybe I should’ve fought, that maybe Ann is wrong about trust and light.
A sharp bite on my arm. The needle. I feel Donny’s breath on the back of my neck as the numbness spreads.
I meet his eyes. He smiles as spots cloud my vision, as I’m pulled along.
I stumble, limbs sluggish. I’m unused to the drugs. Or maybe he’s increased my dose.
Probably both.
Donny oversees the orderlies who shove me down onto the padded bench. They chain my ankles to the ring on the floor. They chain my handcuffed wrists to the bar that runs along the side.
I yank in fury, desperately trying to free myself. They close the cage and then the outer door.
Darkness. Confusion.
We’re on the move. I focus on sounds. There’s a siren behind us, and one in front of us.
Taking no chances with me. The savage. Drugged and bound once again.
My limbs feel dead. It makes me want to give up. I try to remember the feeling of sunshine. I try to remember the feeling of Ann.
I remember about working against the drug. Vigorous activity.
I yank and struggle, clanking the cuffs and chains. My lips begin to feel fat. My thoughts slow. I fight on with everything I have.
I tell myself that if I don’t stop, the drugs will take over. It’s a big dose, maybe too big, but I fight like crazy, thinking about Ann. I have to get back there. I pull and pull, feeling the cuffs cut into my skin. My wrists feel warm. Blood.
I don’t care. Nothing matters except getting out. I have to get back to Ann.
I rail and bellow as we speed down the highway to the Fancher Institute. It’s where we’ll go.
Or somewhere worse.
I yank and yank. I know I’m wearing myself out. I just need my alertness back.
I think the hopelessness I feel makes the drugs worse. The hopelessness makes my limbs feel heavy. I tell myself to keep fighting.
I fight to exhaustion, and then I collapse. It’s just me in the darkness, breath heavy. The sirens have stopped. There’s only the hum of tires. The engine.
The van takes a violent turn.
Or maybe it’s my equilibrium.
I fold forward, head over the floor, arms stretched out behind me, shoulders nearly out of their sockets. It’s here I realize one good thing: Ann’s finally safe. My enemies surely know I’m away from her, that I can’t get to her. They have no more reason to go after her.
I press my forehead to my knees, hanging, swaying.
It’s me they want. So her plan worked, at least for her. It’s enough.
The other thing I realize, chained up back there, is that I probably won’t make it to the institute alive. My enemies need me to die. Donny needs me to die.
I hang there alone in the van, thinking about fishing with Ann. I’m back there on the downed tree with her, a pack of two. More than a pack. Back there with Ann was the first time I’d stopped being an outsider to people. It was the first time I belonged with another human being.
You’re not a wolf, she said once, and she was right.
She showed me I was human.
Complete with a heart that’s breaking. But for one shining moment, I belonged. I had somebody.
The tires hum.
The ride seems to last forever.
Alone.
The loneliness hurts more than ever. Because I know what it is to belong, I suppose.
In my mind, I’m back with her.
The van turns again—careens. I feel a little ill. It’s the drugs, the fatigue. The hopelessness is making things worse. The hopelessness can be worse than the drugs. Its fingers spread through me, deadening my soul.
And then a gunshot blasts out. There’s a pop below.
Tire. I sit up.
Lazarus—it has to be.
The ride’s bumpy, and it comes to me that the tire’s blown. The van turns and speeds up. The bumping is more pronounced. I’m bumping off the bench.
Donny’s up there—he’s either driving or directing the driver. What is happening?
More gunshots.
I can’t imagine why he’d try to get away from a man who’s trying to kill me. I’d think he’d be happy to see me gunned down and not have to answer for it. He’d fling open the doors himself.
For whatever reason, though, he’s running. We take another turn. The going is rougher. I grab the bar behind the seat. We’re off the road, maybe. Or maybe it’s the tires being shot out.
More bumps.
A crash jolts me forward, nearly pulls my shoulders from my body. It’s as if the whole planet comes to a stop.
Silence.
My pulse races. They’ll come now. I yank at my chains. I hear keys in the door. Bolts slide open, the cage mechanism unlocks.
I may be chained up for them, ready to be gunned down, but I sit up straight. I’ll meet my death head on.
I squint as daylight fills the space. Dark forms jump in.
“Bratik,” one says, coming to me.
He puts his hands on my cheeks.
More strange words—urgent, emotional. A language I don’t know. I cringe. Is he going to snap my neck? Gouge out my eyes? I could take him with just my legs if only they weren’t chained.
He pulls me into an embrace. “Bratik!”
Another voice behind him. “Fuck. Kiro. Fuck.” This one knows my name. He’s working at my chains, unlocking my bloody shackles while the first one hugs me like a madman, speaking that strange language.
Suddenly I’m free. I push the first one off.
The other grabs my shirt. “We’re your brothers, Kiro.” He pulls me up. “Can you stand?”
“Brothers?” I whisper, swaying, hardly grasping the meaning of the word.
He watches my eyes. “We’re your brothers.”
I blink, eyes adjusting to the light, lips still numb. “Brothers?”
The American’s eyes shine. He holds my shoulders, steadying me. His eyes are darker than mine, but his hair is the same, his face is the same. “We’ve been looking for you forever.”
My pulse races.
He pulls me to him, chest to chest. “Fuck, Kiro. We’re here now. We have your back.”
I feel numb. It’s not the drugs this time; it’s too much emotion. I pull him to me, bloody hands digging into him. A brother. My eyes feel hot. Brothers.
“Out of the way, brat!” the other one growls. The music of his growl connects to something inside me. There’s something so familiar in his voice. Then I realize it’s like my own. These are my brothers.
The other one claps a hand onto the top of my head, ruffling my hair. “Baby brother!”
The American one lets me go and nods at the other. “This is Viktor. I’m Aleksio. Fuck, we’ve been searching for you. They said you were dead, but I knew you weren’t.”
My heart thunders.
“We have to get out of here,” Viktor says.
“The reporter said they shot you up with something. Is it true? Can you walk? Run?”
“Can you shoot?” Viktor asks.
I scrub my face and take a deep breath. I have brothers.
Viktor is on the phone, telling somebody to hurry. A dark thought comes to me. “The hospital,” I say. “Ann. He’ll go after her now.”
“The gunshot wound victim?” Viktor asks.
“Yes, she has a gunshot wound. Room 363.”
Viktor instructs somebody on the other end of the phone to go to the hospital. “Tanechka,” he says. “Whatever it takes.”
“She’ll be safe,” Aleksio says. “We’re sending people.”
“Brothers,” I say him.
He grins. “For better or worse.”
“Worse right now,” Viktor says. “Our vehicle is toasted. This one, too. We have to get out of here. We’re vulnerable.”
My mind is beginning to clear. I feel happy. Then I spot movement outside the open van doors—out in the field, behind my brothers.
They turn.
Donny’s face is bloody. He holds a gun. “Lazarus is coming,” he says, swaying. “You’re not going anywhere until he gets here. One step out of this van and I’ll shoot you.”
Lazarus survived? I stiffen, wanting to fly at Donny. Aleksio seems to know it. He presses a hand onto my shoulder, holding me in place.
Savage Mafia Prince: a Dangerous Royals romance Page 28
