Page 70 of Pack Obsession

But those precious hours of delay of dodging Julian’s men around and the construction blocking roads sit heavily on me. My stomach drops as I kill the engine. Beside me, Logan’s gone rigid. We’re too late. Fuck, we’re too late.

“Son of a bitch.” His voice comes out deadly quiet. He’s out of the car before I can respond, darting inside.

I rush close behind as we clear the doorway. The cabin’s dead silent except for our ragged breathing and?—

“Casey!” His call booms through the house, bouncing off wooden walls. No response except the quiet hum of the AC. The hair on the back of my neck stands up—wrong, everything’s wrong.

We take the stairs three at a time, muscle memory taking over as we clear rooms. The bathroom door stands open. The tub’s half-full, the water lukewarm when I test it, and it’s all over the floor too. Her honey-peach scent lingers here. She was here not long ago.

“Fuck!” Logan’s roars to a level that would make most Alphas submit on the spot. His fist connects with the doorframe, and the solid oak splinters like kindling. “I should have thrown that piece of shit, Julian through a window when I had the chance. Better yet, off the fucking roof.” Another punch, more splinters. “This is on me. I knew he was obsessed with her, knew what he was capable of. FUCK!”

“Hey.” I grab his shoulder, forcing him to look at me. His steel-gray eyes have gone almost black with rage, pupils blown wide with adrenaline. “Listen to me. We need clear heads right now. Casey doesn’t need us throwing furniture around—she needs us thinking.”

He draws a shuddering breath, and I watch him wrestle his inner demons back under control.

“Where’s Axel?” he asks.

The question hits me like a bucket of ice water.

“Shit.” My heart rate kicks up another notch as I spin toward the window.

Logan’s already moving, darting in and out of the rooms upstairs. “If they hurt either of them?—”

“Then we’ll deal with it,” I cut him off. “But first, we find them.”

I dive in and join the search, checking every damn room in the house, then we pound out the back door into the coolmidday air. Mist still clings to the ground in patches, but there’s something else—the metallic tang of blood mixing with wet earth. I follow my nose, moving fast but carefully.

“Here!” The word tears from my throat as I spot a crumpled form near the tree line. Axel’s sprawled facedown in a puddle of dried leaves, one arm twisted beneath him. His black hair’s matted with morning dew, and a knife glints with blood nearby.

I drop to my knees beside him, checking his vitals even as I catalogue his injuries.

“He’s alive, thank fuck! And he’s not cut, so the blood is someone else’s. His pulse is strong but slow, as if he’s in a deep sleep. Breathing steady. No major wounds except some bruising.” I turn him onto his side to search his back. “And no fatal injuries I can see.”

Logan crouches beside me, and pulls out Axel’s hand tucked under his back, then pries open his fingers to find a small dart.

“Smart,” Logan groans. “Leaving us a clue as to what was used to poison him.” He sniffs it carefully and his expression darkens in a way I’ve only seen a few times. Never ends well for whoever caused it. “MS-47. Military-grade tranquilizer, fast-acting, long-lasting. We used it sometimes for... extracting high-value targets.”

“They knew what they were doing,” I say, examining a bruise forming on Axel’s jaw. “Can you wake him?”

“Maybe.” Logan’s already moving. “Got something that might work. Help me get him inside first.”

I slide my arms under Axel’s massive frame, Logan has his feet, and I grunt as I lift. For a guy who practically lives in the gym, he’s somehow even heavier than he looks.

“Jesus Christ, he’s a heavy bastard. All that protein finally catching up to him, huh?” His head lolls against my shoulder as we carry him toward the house. “If you were awake, you’d never let me live this down.”

“At least he’s not drooling on you,” Logan observes dryly as we stumble inside. “Yet.”

We lay him on the couch, and Logan disappears upstairs, returning moments later with a small case I’ve never seen before. The metal box looks military issue, complete with warning labels I pretend not to be able to read. He pulls out a preloaded injector that definitely isn’t available through normal medical channels.

“Military counteragent,” he explains, rolling up Axel’s sleeve roughly. “Not exactly approved for civilian use, but neither was the shit they used on him.” The injector hisses as he slams it into Axel’s bicep. “Used to keep these on hand for... complications in the field.”

"It has to be Julian." I slide into the chair at my workstation, fingers flying across keys. "Someone knew exactly what they were doing—they killed the security alarms, but..." A grim smile crosses my face as multiple screens light up. "They missed the cameras. I keep them on a separate encrypted network, ghost-mode protocols. Most hackers wouldn't even know to look for it."

"Show me," Logan demands, leaving Axel's side to lean over my shoulder.

"Pulling it up now." I access the security feed, rewinding through the morning hours. "There—9:43 AM."

The footage makes my blood boil. Casey racing down the stairs, panic clear on her face. She falls over and they grab her. Two men in tactical gear, faces hard to see from the angle, but they’re dragging her backwards by her ankles as she kicks and fights. My insides boil, hands curled into fits. Those bastards.

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