by Lia Silver
Laura wondered if Nicolette’s supposed power was a con. Gregor could have researched to find that Laura’s mother had died when Laura had been a toddler. And Roy hadn’t said a word about having special powers.
“Does your father have a pet name for you?”
“No,” Laura said, testing.
“Lie,” said Nicolette.
“What is it?” asked Gregor.
“Cupcake,” Laura tried.
“Lie.”
“Little darling.”
“Lie.”
“Okay, fine,” said Laura, doing her best to sell her resignation. “It’s honeybunch.”
“Lie,” said Nicolette.
“Sweetie pie.”
“Lie.”
“Sweet pea.”
“Truth.”
Laura nodded, hiding her skepticism. It seemed unlikely for Gregor to know that, but it was possible if he’d tapped her phone or hacked her email.
“Third demo question. Who did you lose your virginity to?” Gregor asked.
“Seriously? Seriously?” Laura gave him a nice long glare. “Could you possibly think hard and come up with something a little more creepy?”
He spread his hands, as if he had no choice. “I’m assuming it’s information I couldn’t possibly already know.”
“I’m not giving any details,” she warned. But in a way, she was glad. If Nicolette could ferret that out, then she really was a human lie detector. And that was information Laura needed to know. “Carl.”
“Lie,” said Nicolette.
“Jackson.”
“Truth.”
“Okay,” Laura said reluctantly. “I believe you.”
She hadn’t thought of Jackson in years—she couldn’t even recall his last name, only that they’d laughed over his first name sounding like a last name. He’d thought her name was Angela Marks, her parents were divorced, and she was planning to attend the local community college. She’d never told Dad why she was so upset at leaving that town, but only claimed that she wanted to finish out her senior year at the same school.
Six months later, she’d graduated from a different school. But it had never even occurred to Laura to go back to that town (whatever town it had been) and look up Jackson again. He’d just been yet another person she’d lied to and left.
“On to the real questions,” Gregor said. “No lying, now.”
Laura wondered how precise the Nicolette’s power was. From what she’d said earlier, she could normally only detect the literal truth, not subtle intentions.
“Who’s the werewolf who was protecting you?” Gregor asked. “Tell me all about him. Nicolette, tell me if she lies.”
Laura flinched inside, but didn’t let it show. She had to make Gregor believe Roy wasn’t a danger to him, not worth worrying about and certainly not worth dispatching Donnie for a second try.
“His name is Roy,” Laura said. “He’s a Marine veteran. He’s homeless. My father was letting him live in the barn. I only met him a couple days ago.”
“Truth,” said Nicolette.
“Tell me more about him,” Gregor demanded.
As Laura spoke, she slipped into the state Roy had described, the place that lies beyond fear, where you feel completely alive and like you can do no wrong. Everything was bright and clear and simple as she talked for Roy’s life and maybe hers as well.
“His helicopter was shot down in Afghanistan,” Laura began. “He was badly wounded, and he almost died. He never completely recovered. Not just physically. He said he didn’t think he’d ever be able to fly again. He has nightmares and panic attacks. He can’t work. He sleeps with a gun under his pillow.”
“Truth,” said Nicolette.
“How did you learn so much about him?” Gregor asked. “What exactly is the relationship between you two?”
“We don’t have a relationship,” Laura said. Saying it aloud felt like taking a sledgehammer to her own heart, doubly so when Nicolette nodded: truth. “I took care of him after Donnie shot him because I didn’t want him to die.”
“He doesn’t sound like much of a threat,” said Gregor, ignoring her accusatory tone. “Though he must be strong to have gotten the gun away from Donnie. Enough about his sob story. Where’s his pack?”
“I don’t know. He never even mentioned having one.”
Gregor rubbed his chin, frowning. “Must be a born wolf. Did he offer to bite you?”
“No.”
“More fool him. Or maybe he already has a mate.”
Laura shrugged, trying not to think too hard about the fact that Roy didn’t have anyone and still didn’t want her.
“What’s his power?”
Laura let her eyebrows rise. “He can turn into a wolf.”
“Apart from that,” said Gregor, seeming to enjoy her sarcasm rather than being offended by it.
Laura had no intention of revealing any weakness of Roy’s that Gregor could use against him. But though “allergic to technology” might be some sort of side effect of a power, it wasn’t a power in itself. Roy had said he could track by scent, but surely all wolves could do that.
“I’m not sure,” Laura said.
“Think about it,” said Gregor. “It might be subtle.”
“Could be strength,” Donnie suggested. “Hard to say for sure. He’s a big son of a bitch.”
“No, wait,” Laura said, remembering. “He said he’s resistant to cold, up to a point. He did get hypothermic after he got shot and lay in the snow for a while.”
“Truth,” said Nicolette.
“Like I said,” Gregor remarked with a shrug. “Made wolf powers are more impressive.”
Even though Gregor was reacting exactly as she had intended, Laura couldn’t help feeling indignant on Roy’s behalf.
Donnie turned onto a narrow, unmarked dirt road.
“How did you get all those cuts?” Gregor asked. “Your car was scraped up too. Did you crash?”
“I was leaving Yosemite.” Laura chose her words with precision while taking care to sound natural. “Roy wanted to see a friend of his in San Diego, so I offered him a ride. I had a feeling it was a bad idea, but I felt so sorry for him that it overrode my judgment. Well, it was a bad idea, and I wish I hadn’t done it. We’d barely been driving for ten minutes before he told me to pull over. I could see there was something really wrong with him. I was scared. I didn’t pull on to the shoulder. I went around a few more curves, and then I drove into a bunch of thorn bushes. I jumped out of the car and ran through the bushes. Last I saw of Roy, he was headed back up the road.”
“That son of a bitch,” snarled Nicolette. “And after all you did for him! He probably only protected you in the first place because he was planning to rape you later.”
“I take it Laura’s account is true?” Gregor inquired.
“Oh, yeah, it’s all true,” Nicolette said. “That bastard better hope I never get my hands on him.”
Laura concealed her alarm. She’d been trying to ensure that Gregor wouldn’t expect Roy to come rescue her, not to set Nicolette on him like an avenging angel of female solidarity.
“No personal revenge-taking, Nicolette,” Gregor ordered. “Anyway, you’ll never see him again. It doesn’t sound like he’ll be back. Now, Laura, think about this one before you answer. Do you want to be a werewolf?”
In a way, she did. It would be a piece of magic, not only in her life, but in her. The way Roy had described it, being a wolf sounded amazing. And it had looked fun. She imagined running as a wolf beside wolf-Roy, easily keeping pace with him as they explored the woods together, and she couldn’t think of anything she wanted more.
But becoming a werewolf had shattered Roy’s life. It could easily do the same to her. According to DJ, it had a fifty-fifty chance of killing her. And she couldn’t think of anything more repulsive and horrifying than being forced to become not merely Gregor’s prisoner, but his mate.
“I would love to be able to turn into a wolf,” Laura said honestly. If tha
t was all there was to it.
“Truth,” said Nicolette.
Gregor smiled. “Do you want to be my mate?”
There was no finessing that one.
“No, asshole,” Laura spat out.
Nicolette snickered. “Truth. Every word of it.”
Gregor seemed undisturbed, which unnerved Laura more than if he’d been angry. “You’ll come round.”
Donnie drove up to a walled enclosure in the woods and clicked a remote control. The gates swung open, revealing a garden, a garage and several parked cars in a driveway, and a huge mansion.
“My lair,” said Gregor, with pride and a touch of irony.
“Some day, all this will be mine?” Laura asked.
“Exactly. See, I knew we’d get along.”
Donnie parked in the driveway, and they all got out. Miguel, who had followed with Laura’s car, handed her keys to Gregor.
As they reached the front door, Gregor held up his hand, bringing them all to a halt. He took a deep breath and stepped through the closed door.
Laura’s jaw dropped. She was still standing there gaping when he opened the door from the inside and beckoned them all inside.
“So that’s how you got away after the—” Laura forced her mind away from blood on the carpet and blood on my hands.
Gregor either didn’t notice her hesitation or didn’t care. “Yes. Unfortunately, I can’t carry anything out with me but the clothes I’m wearing, or I could simply walk into vaults and walk out with the money. When I’ve tried, the things I carry get… left behind.”
To Laura’s confusion, Nicolette and even Donnie looked horrified, then quickly wiped their expressions clean. Miguel gave a small, choked gasp, and his hand flew up to his scarred cheek.
“Miguel, Nicolette, you’re dismissed,” said Gregor. “Donnie, stay with me. Laura, I’m taking you to get those cuts cleaned up.”
Laura memorized the mansion’s layout as they walked through the ground floor. It was luxuriously furnished but in a lackadaisical manner, with some rooms full of antique furniture and some left completely bare.
Gregor beckoned Laura into a kitchen where a man was rapidly chopping vegetables. The cook was in his late twenties, tall and thin, with black hair, skin so pale as to be near-translucent, full red lips, and features that looked carved with a knife. He seemed incongruous in a kitchen; if he’d been an actor, he’d have been typecast as a decadent aristocrat or a villain who tortured the hero while making threats of an ambiguously sexual nature.
“Hello, Russell,” Gregor called. “This is Laura, your alpha female-to-be.”
Russell chopped harder, ignoring them.
“Russell’s our chef,” said Gregor. “Please inform him of any food allergies or dislikes—or requests, of course—that you might have.”
“You kidnapped a guy to cook for you?” Laura said incredulously.
At that, Russell glanced up and gave her a gallows-humor smile. “I’m a two-time James Beard Award nominee for best chef in the Northeast. Well worth kidnapping.”
“Actually, I selected Russell because I needed an initial cash infusion, and he has a large trust fund,” said Gregor. “His cooking skills were a bonus. But they’re an excellent one. What’s for lunch, Russell?”
“Salad is smoked trout with pink grapefruit, arugula, toasted pecans, and a sherry vinaigrette,” said Russell. “Main course is a seared flatiron steak with pepper and balsamic. Side of roasted Brussels sprouts with bacon and lime.”
“Anything you want to change, Laura?” Gregor asked.
“No substitutions,” said Russell promptly.
“Does he amuse you?” inquired Gregor, arching one eyebrow. “If he doesn’t, just say so. I promise you, he’ll never talk back to you again.”
“It’s fine,” Laura said quickly. “He’s fine. And the lunch sounds delicious.”
Russell resumed his ferocious chopping. Laura was relieved to follow Gregor out of the kitchen. Poor Russell!
Poor everyone, she thought. Well, maybe not poor Donnie.
“How many people are in your pack?” Laura asked. The mansion looked like it could easily house twenty.
“Only five at the moment, not counting myself,” said Gregor. “I lost Jesse at the bank, and the person I selected to replace him didn’t work out.”
“What do you mean, ‘didn’t work out?’” Laura had an idea, but she wanted to see if Gregor was ever going to tell her about the fifty percent death rate for prospective werewolves.
“Perfect timing. I’m taking you to someone who can explain that much better than I can.” Gregor opened a door with a flourish.
Laura stared in surprise. The room was set up as a small hospital, complete with beds, an examination table, medical machines, and a woman in a white doctor’s coat who stood with her back to the door, putting bottles of pills in a cabinet. When the door opened, she jumped nervously, dropping a bottle.
“Meet Dr. Keisha Smith,” said Gregor. “The final member of my pack.”
If Laura hadn’t known Keisha was a doctor, she would have guessed she was an actress or a model, with her huge brown eyes, black hair arranged in flattering twists, and flawless mahogany skin that glowed with health. She looked absolutely miserable.
“Take care of Laura’s cuts,” Gregor ordered. “And tell her everything. Understand? Take your time. Donnie will wait outside.”
To Laura’s relief, Gregor and Donnie walked out and closed the door behind them.
“Please have a seat,” Keisha said, indicating the examination table.
Laura sat on it, trying not to be too obvious about checking the room for exits and weapons. There was only one door, and no scalpels in sight.
Keisha brought a tray of medical equipment to the table. In silence, she began cleaning Laura’s cuts. The clear liquid stung in the scratches, and the smell stung Laura’s nose. It reminded her of applying iodine to Roy’s gunshot wound. She had the feeling that even though she’d been terrified that he would die and he’d been in excruciating pain, both of them had probably felt better at that moment than either Laura or Keisha did now.
Laura waited for Keisha to start talking and give her some cues. A con artist didn’t need physical weapons, only the freedom to speak and someone to speak to. If Keisha was what Laura had to work with, Laura would work on her.
Keisha said nothing. The only sense Laura got of her was that she was obviously competent and extremely depressed. Both those attributes seemed promising: Keisha clearly wasn’t helping Gregor voluntarily, and should Laura be able to persuade her to switch sides, she might have some good ideas.
Laura whispered, “Are they listening at the door?”
Keisha dabbed at a scratch on Laura’s hand. “No, you can talk freely. It’s soundproofed.”
Laura blinked. “Why?”
Keisha gave her a long, sad look. Laura’s fear threatened to break through her control as she considered what Roy had told her, what Gregor had told her, and the implications of needing a hospital room at all.
I’ll just say it, and then Keisha can laugh at me and say it’s because the room was originally a recording studio, Laura decided.
“So no one can hear the screaming?” Laura asked.
“Yes. It’s not because Gregor tortures anyone. Exactly. But the process of becoming a werewolf is extremely painful, and you can’t sedate people for it. If they’re not fully conscious, they can’t change. And if they can’t change, they die.”
“How often do they die?” Laura asked uneasily.
Keisha gave Laura another long, sad look. “Are you the type of patient who likes to know the exact statistical odds for their prognosis or the type that prefers a general idea? Statistics can’t tell you what will happen to you. Every individual experience is different.”
“I want the exact statistical odds.” Asking for information you already knew was an excellent way to gauge whether someone was lying to you. Or, in this case, whether someone had lied to
them and they’d believed it.
“Before he had me helping him, Gregor lost more than half of the people he bit,” Keisha said. “I think some of them did have the capability of changing, but their bodies gave out before they could do it. I can provide basic life support, and keep people going for longer. Give them more of a fighting chance. The numbers are much too small to be a statistically significant sample. But four out of seven of the people I treated survived.”
So Keisha had been forced to watch three innocent kidnap victims die, no doubt while she desperately tried to save them. Her blank stare reminded Laura of how Roy had looked when he’d chosen not tell her exactly what had happened to the guy sitting next to him in the helicopter.
“Though two of them died later, for other reasons,” Keisha added.
“How long have you been a—” Laura began.
“Werewolf?” Keisha interrupted. “About a year and a half. Gregor bit me two weeks after I finished my residency in emergency medicine.”
“I was going to say ‘prisoner.’ Though I guess it’s the same thing. You must have gone through hell.”
Anger broke through Keisha’s sorrowful gaze. “Through? I’m in hell. We all are. Russell’s made two suicide attempts. Miguel has nightmares and wakes up screaming. Nicolette paces around the grounds all night, whether or not she’s supposed to be on guard. Donnie’s the only one who’s here voluntarily, and I think he’s regretting it. He keeps coming in and complaining about backaches and headaches and stomach aches, but there’s no physical cause.”
“Maybe Gregor ought to kidnap a therapist next,” Laura said, with black humor.
Keisha answered her seriously. “You can’t do trauma therapy with people who are still being traumatized. It’s like trying to treat soldiers for PTSD while they’re still in combat. To do them any good, the first thing you have to do is get them out of the war zone.”
“Can’t you get out of the war zone?”
“No. Turn your head to the left.” Keisha held Laura’s hair aside to disinfect a scratch on her neck. “We all saw what happened to Nicolette. Another woman, Amy, ran away twice. The second time she returned, Gregor refused to take her back. She cried and begged and got down on her knees, but he told her she knew the rules. Then she took out a gun and shot at him. Gregor held his breath and let the bullet pass through him.”
