Page 42 of Depraved
Squaring my shoulders, I look down at the beta on the grass whose arms are twisted behind him in a way that looks painful.
The alphas holding him are rough and unforgiving, unabashed about their nudity or the fact that their eyes keep flashing gold as their wolves try to surface. Would they even listen if I told them to step back? Or would rank make them lash out at me?
My eyes travel across the crowd as if they hold the answers to my questions. The line has become a staggered stair step as each person tries to get eyes on the show at hand.
I make eye contact with the woman in the line who called out Mason’s name. Then I glance back at him. They don’t look similar enough in the face to be related, though Mason is sobbing so hard right now that his face is somewhat distorted.
“Mason,” I say softly.
But hearing his name only makes the man cry harder.
I look back up at the woman and gesture for her to come forward. “You know him?”
“He’s our neighbor. My son’s best friend. When we lost Adam, we knew he’d have wanted his friend—”
“He threatened my parents!” Mason cries out, his voice thick with mucus and tears. “I had no choice.”
I nod at the woman, whose face grows pale and horrified. She steps back, moving toward her spot in the line, but Black snaps his fingers. I stay silent as he asks for Mason’s parents’ address, and she provides it.
Black calls up a pair of the nude shifters and tells him to go to the parent's home. They dart away in a blur of fur.
It gives me time to stew on the tiny sliver of information I’ve been given.
I turn to look at Mason, canting my head to one side and studying him impassively until he gets his crying under control.
“Thomas Stone came to you and threatened your family, is that right?” I ask it loudly enough to be heard at the back of the line because I know that’s what Black wants. He wants everyone here to know exactly what’s going on.
What I don’t know, is what he wants me to do about it.
Mason gives me a slow head nod. But that won’t do. “Say it.”
“Yes. Yes,” he whimpers.
“Louder,” I command.
“Yes! He said he’d gut them so they died slowly.”
“So your family was in danger. But instead of turning to your pack for help, you decided that giving in to the demands of a madman was a better option?” I stare steadily at Mason as his shoulders start to quake.
I don’t look up even when a trail of whispers starts down the line of shifters as one passes my words to the next. I don’t know if they like or dislike what I’m saying. I don’t look up to find out.
Instinct drives me forward, and I feel it as if it were a tangible thing, like a soft silky golden flag inside my head. I have no idea if it’s human instinct or wolf instinct guiding me right now, but I follow it.
I kneel down in the grass and wrap my arms around Mason. I hug him as I say, “I understand. I really do.” He clutches my shoulders fiercely, and his cries shake the two of us. I hold him until he’s ragged and gasping, unable to do anything but fight for breath. That’s when I lean back, hands still firmly on his shoulders. I look into his eyes and say, “You know they’re already dead, don’t you?”
“No. No!” He pushes me over in wild denial, and I fall backward onto the grass.
Immediately, the alphas encircle him, growling, arms growing fur, teeth elongating, their monsters rising to the surface to protect me.
Black helps me to my feet just as a cell phone rings in the distance.
I can hear scolding whispers as the phone’s owner scrambles to silence the thing, but the caller doesn’t relent. Finally, there’s a muffled, “Hello?”
Someone steps out of line. I see it in my peripheral vision. They hold up a phone and march forward. Black takes the call.
I can’t make out words, but I can hear a sing-song voice on the other line and easily guess who’s calling.
The blood drains from Black’s face. The phone pings with a text, and he swipes to open it. Then he turns and holds the phone out in our direction.
