Page 39 of Griffin Undone
Arik took my bo and walked to the rack to put our weapons away. “Words have power, remember?”
“I…yelled.”
“And you were angry.”
I thought about that a moment. “You did that on purpose.”
“Of course I did.” He prowled closer, forcing me to drop my gaze or reveal far more than I wanted. When his chest teed with my shoulder and his breath blew hot on my sweat-damp neck, he whispered, “Don’t. Trust. Anyone.”
Heart pounding, I whispered back, “I trust you.” Foolish or not, there it was. This man had rescued me, helped me heal. He was showing me how to function in a world gone mad. I trusted him.
One hand settled flat on my belly, holding me in place. Arik leaned closer until his lips met my ear. Over the bass drum that was my heartbeat, I heard clearly, “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
ChapterSeventeen
Maddox
For a single moment as I lowered myself into my chair, I felt the wound across my stomach pull. A shot of panic hit my chest. The skin had barely healed, just enough to keep my guts in place, and I needed my guts to stay right where they were.
I squelched the panic and the groan my pain engendered, and sat. Weakness wasn’t an option, even in front of my pack; both the animal and the commander inside me raged against revealing anything but the utmost strength. Yes, the five werewolves standing before my desk were weaker, beta, but that didn’t mean any one of them couldn’t take me in my current state, pack or not.
The animal hidden deep in my chest licked his lips, knowing why the pack was here, knowing soon he would have the female beneath his fangs again. The psych bitch would pay and pay deliciously—for a long, long time.
“Alpha.” Baer lowered his shaggy head to me, his four brothers following suit. I had claimed the five orphan werewolves in their infancy, raising them to serve me, to fear me, to belong to me with unswerving loyalty. That I had been the orchestrator of their parents’ deaths and their subsequent abandonment, they didn’t need to know and, after these hundreds of years, would no longer question. Not if they didn’t want to die as well.
They alone controlled the growing of my army—turning humans, training them, instilling the same loyalty to me in their recruits that they held themselves. Building my empire. I rarely let them loose, but no one could retrieve my prize faster than my pack.
“Time to hunt,” I growled, letting my pain and my animal add a savage edge to my voice. “One female, triggered, most likely in the hands of a griffin named Arik.” I threw my five-day-old bloody clothes onto the desk.
Baer retrieved them, lifting the bundle to his sensitive nose. His werewolf senses would untangle the scent not only of his alpha, but also the cloying musk of fear and psych energy that had coated the female that night. No mention was made of the dried evidence of my extensive injury before Baer passed the bundle to his left, allowing each of his brothers a chance to catch the scent.
Wise of him.
Baer tilted his head. “Her power… The smell is unique.”
“And strong,” one of the others threw in.
I nodded. “It is.”
“What is her gift?” Baer asked.
I examined my memories of the psych’s attack for the hundredth time. “I’m not sure how, but she cut Feral’s head off with nothing more than a scream.” Not to mention practically disemboweling me.
Baer’s sharp eyes met mine. “Any leads?”
Not with me flat on my back.“A fresh team reconnoitered the scene but found nothing. The griffin must have flown her out.”
“We’ll find something.”
They would. I had trained my pack to be the best. I didn’t tolerate failure.
I stared down the wolves. “Hit the streets.”
Each male nodded, then turned to leave, intimidating even the guards outside with their silent, menacing display. Baer turned back to me before reaching the door. “The griffin?”
I drew my mouth into a smile that would send shivers through the body of any who witnessed it. “Bring the griffin to me as well.”
Baer bowed his head, then followed his brothers into the warehouse. I listened to the sound of five werewolves, heavy bodies lockstepping their way through the building. The sound of power—mypower. My will imposing itself on the world. Satisfaction overrode the pain in my body.
