Page 52 of The Bodyguard and the Alpha
The women in front of me reached an intersection in the corridor and turned left. Towards the Palace garage. My steps slowed. I didn’t want to leave the Palace. I didn’t want to leave my mate.
I stopped walking. The team around me stopped with me.
“Where are you taking me?”
“I’m not at liberty to divulge that, Ma’am,” said the one on the left without looking my way, her gaze sweeping the corridor. “Just come with us by Order of the Council.” Five foot ten or so, fit, her gun now in a holster under her shoulder. She looked competent and calm. Carrying out her orders to take me somewhere else, she would do whatever had to be done.
I had a couple of choices. I could resist. My shield was still up. One of the women had put a set of cuffs on me after the door closed behind Bastien, so I was limited in how I could fight physically, but if I used magic I’d beat them easily. The cuffs were little more than a reminder of the Council’s directive and the women escorting me had to know that I could still access my power. But if I escaped and harmed them with magic? Then what? I was being politely escorted by lawful authority of theCouncil and I would be the one to blame if I attacked. It would merely give them an excuse to lock me up. Perhaps that was what someone was hoping for.
The alternative was to co-operate. Control the narrative. Thanks to my sister, and the book she had delivered to me yesterday, I had a heads-up about the accusations Bastien was going to face. And forewarned was forearmed, as they said. I was going to lie through my teeth. Threaten my mate? No fucking way.
But I was also going to get help. I looked down the corridor, towards the right. A security post was just nearby.
C’mon, c’mon.
Charlie exited the small guard room, probably after seeing me and my entourage on the bank of security cameras in the room. To a casual observer, he probably looked relaxed, but I could see the signs of tension. I had worked with him for years, after all. He spoke up. “Remember, regardless of your Order, the President will not take kindly to his mate being injured.”
The leader of my guard squad had already turned away. Charlie tapped his shoulder in our special code.Help is coming.
“Tell Luc,” I mouthed.
“Ms Ferrera, I must insist that you come with us.”
Charlie gave a miniscule nod of his head.
Luc would help.
***
I had expected to be taken to the Council headquarters in the centre of the city. Instead, the van that transported me and my very polite escort headed out of town. My stomach droppedwhen, after about half an hour, the van turned into the driveway of a large mansion which I recognised. Unfortunately. I didn’t need the pinging of my pre-cog to know that being brought to the home of Maximilian Veder, the head of the Humans First faction, was not a good sign.
My gut twisted when my escort deposited me in an overdecorated lounge room in front of the man himself. Any sense of personal security I’d still retained disappeared like a mirage in the desert.
“Ms Ferrera, thank you for coming.” Maximilian stood as if this was a social call, motioning towards the couch where his companion sat. “Please take a seat.”
I perched on the edge of the couch, as far from the man as I could get. At first glance he was handsome, his body fit and toned with a light tan, probably from playing golf. But one look at his eyes and I knew he was dangerous. His eyes held the spark of fanaticism.
“I believe you know Mr Barrone,” said our host.
Yes, I knew Silvio fucking Barrone. The man in question was lounging on one overstuffed cushion, a glass of amber liquid held in one hand. The years since college had not been good to him. His face was florid, his hairline receding. But he was still recognisably the same man.
We had gone through Witch College at the same time and he and I had jostled for top spot in our graduating cohort. That wasn’t why I loathed him though. I loathed him because he was a total prick. He was scum. He had used his power to cheat and manipulate his way to success. Most of all I hated him because I had caught him coercing a female student and I’d helped her to report it. His methods of bullying me after that had been creative, to say the least and the memory of how he’dtried to hurt me were usually stuffed deep in the box in the back of my mind. But he had given me extra incentive to beat him academically. If I hadn’t already wanted to get the top spot because of my mother pushing me to be perfect, I had fiercely, desperately, wanted to stop him from taking the prize.
That desperation had nothing on the fear that now clawed at my insides. With Silvio in the room, I was going to have real trouble lying. I jammed my hands between my thighs so he couldn’t see how they’d begun to shake.
“I thought you’d crawled off to die somewhere, Slimy,” I said, deliberately using the nickname that I knew he hated. He used to have a temper and it disrupted his concentration. How was he connected to Maximilian? Last I’d heard, Silvio had gone off to some godsforsaken tinpot dictatorship to be a warlord’s personal lie detector.
Ping. Ping. My pre-cog tapped loudly in my skull. Shit. Fuck. Damn. As if I couldn’t have worked it out myself, my magic was telling me that Silvio was a real threat to me or to Bastien. And I’d walked into the trap like a meek little mouse. Everyone had been very careful so far to not threaten me with any sort of violence, I couldn’t start a fight in the home of a Council member without clear and provable justification.
But I could let Bastien know. I’d promised that I would.
And if I waited any longer, I might not have the concentration to spare.
“I’m not sorry to disappoint,” he said, leering at me over the rim of the glass he held to his lips. “I’m very much looking forward to our little chat. Just like old times.”
Don’t react. Don’t react. My fingernails dug into my thighs, until it felt as though I was drawing blood.
I had to tell Bastien. Now. I reached down the bond, my mind finding his easily.
