Page 90 of Bearly Hanging On

“Trouble in paradise?” he asked. “Or just you thinking you can save my brother from his fate?”

That cut way too close to how I actually felt. I rubbed at my forehead.

“Swap Daria for me, that’s what you said,” I growled. “I’ve slipped away from Mack and will come to you.”

“That betrayal will kill my brother.”

Dax didn’t exactly sound sad about it.

“And that should make you really happy, so, are we doing this or not?”

A whistle of breath, then he finally spilled the beans.

“The abandoned quarry in the south,” he replied. “Follow the river and you’ll find me.”

“Then put Daria on the phone.”

“Having second thoughts?” His voice grew colder, harder by the second. “Don’t try to betray me, my mate. You won’t like the consequences.”

“And I just want to make sure my friend is still alive before I walk right into the wolves’ den.”

Dax didn’t say a thing, but the muffled sounds made clear he was on the move. Someone said something, then Dar came on the line.

“Harper?” I’d never heard that kind of terror in my friend’s voice and after this, I’d do whatever it took to make sure it never happened again.

“Dar, I am so, so sorry?—”

“Don’t come, Harp. I mean it.” Her shaky voice was killing me. “Don’t. He’s going to?—”

“Wait for his fated mate with open arms.” Dax’s slimy voice cut her off. “Tick tock, Harper. The boys are getting restless.”

“I’m on my way.”

I walked through the house, grabbing my boots, Mack’s keys, before going out into the garage, but as I did so, I put through a call.

“Harper?” All the fear, all the anxiety, I was feeling was evident in Kieran’s tone. “Are you alright? Where’s Mack?”

“Downstairs, asleep, in the basement safe room of doom where I left him,” I replied. “But don’t ask me about that. I’m on my way to Dax’s.”

“What? No, Harper?—!”

“Yes, and I need you and your dads and every damn bear shifter you can find to follow me. Tor and the tigers too. After I get off the phone, I’m calling the cops. If they’ve been looking for Dax all this time, then maybe they can bring in the SWAT team or whatever they’ve got. He has Daria, Kieran.”

“Fuck…”

“You told me to jump last night, Kieran, and this is me jumping.” A moment of silence. “I need you and everyone else you can drag into this fight to catch me. I’m going to his lair and I’m gonna need back up. Back up that can turn this fuck and his stupid cronies into bloody smears on the ground before Mack even wakes up.”

He was going to argue, tell me to wait for him, but I’d already taken too long. Kieran would rue the day he encouraged me to jump into anything, because I may have been just a little reckless at times. I threw myself behind the wheel and then started the engine, as I put through a call to Tor, then the police.

The police dispatch I spoke to was incredulous, then patched me through. The detective I spoke to made clear this was a very bad plan, right as I replied this was the way it was going down and he and his team could be there to take down a notorious shifter underworld figure or be held responsible for my and Daria’s deaths. I heard the far off wail of police sirens as I got out of the car, having bumped along the dirt road to get to the quarry.

The hideout was ingenious in a way, forged from an old mine shaft. The rabbit’s warren of tunnels underneath the quarry made clear it would be near impossible for people to track Dax and his crew down. Then he emerged from the darkness. A gasp escaped me as Daria was hauled forward. That bruise on her face? Dax would fucking pay for that, but the moment he saw my thunderous expression, he smiled.

No one would ever mistake him for Mack. My grumpy mate had walls ten feet high to protect his heart. Dax’s cold, calculating crazy was out there for everyone to see. He flashed a fang, then moved closer, but I retreated back to the car.

“Let her go,” I said.

“You’re not in a position to bargain, my mate,” he sneered.

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