Page 100 of Entombed By Blood
Gideon stops in his tracks and glares at me. “That makes it too easy. It’s a fucking trap.”
“So we spring it.”
If Gideon could kill me with a look, I’d be dead as a doornail a hundred times over by this point. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Eve has an open invitation. She can bring me with her as her prisoner. She said it herself, Cain loves dramatics. He’ll eat it up, and it’ll distract people enough for the rest of you to slip in, free Vane, and cause enough chaos for us all to get out of there together.”
Gideon doesn’t like it—I can tell from the angry set of his jaw—but heisconsidering it.
“Putting Evelyn in that kind of situation is unpredictable,” he argues. “She’ll be alone—under tremendous pressure—and sooner or later, she’s going to snap.”
“She hasn’t yet.” My girl has a core of steel, and if Gideon thinks otherwise, then he’s blind. “She drank silver and survived.”
“Only just. You’re letting your affection for her blind you.”
“Feel her,” I argue. “Look down the bond. Does she feel weak to you?”
He gives me a blank look, and I take a step forward. “You... you’re blocking the bond.”
Of course he is. Gideon is a control freak. The idea is completely anathema to me. After nearly two centuries of praying for a second chance, blocking my direct line to the other half of my soul is out of the question.
But for Gideon, who craves his independence so fiercely… he probably sees it as his only option.
“I refuse to allow it to dictate my actions,” he replies. “It’s probably also why I’m the only member of this pack who seems to be able to think rationally when it comes to her.”
I snort. “You’re the dictionary definition of rational and no bond in the world can change that.”
The clenched set of his jaw says he doesn’t believe me, but that’s okay. I have no plans to share her with more people than I have to.
If Gideon wants to remove himself from the running, that’s fine with me.
So I return to the point at hand. “It’s the only plan we’ve got, and you know it. Why don’t we put it before the pack? We need to know if Finn can score us tickets before we plan too far ahead, anyway.”
Finn won’t struggle with something as simple as hacking into someone’s messages and snagging us a couple of tickets, but it gives Gideon the out he needs.
“Fine. But if Evelyn refuses, we find another way.”
I raise a brow at that, but Gideon doesn’t give me a chance to comment before pushing open the door, sticking his head out and barking: “Pack meeting. Now.”
He doesn’t shout—with immortal hearing, it’s unnecessary—and it’s not long until the sound of footsteps follows. Draven is the first into the room, and my brows rise as I realise he’s fighting against the pull of dawn for the second day in a row. He takes a silent position across from the window, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest.
Silas is next, followed by Finn and Eve. The latter chooses a seat with her back to Draven, and his eyes narrow slightly at the gesture of trust.
Our psycho isn’t used to people trusting him to have their backs, I realise, with a tiny pang of guilt. He was one of my most trusted men before we were turned, but even I’m hyper aware of his presence whenever we’re in the same room.
It doesn’t help that Callista and Cain broke him and sent him out into the world to assassinate me. That kind of history, combined with his habit of slicing off body parts for touching his bike, or even looking at him wrong, makes him a difficult man to know.
Of course, it isn’t all Draven’s fault. Decades of running and hiding have taken their toll on all of us.
Eve is a breath of fresh air into our pack dynamic, and—unlike Gideon—I plan on embracing that whole heartedly.
“We’ve come up with a plan,” Gideon begins, and I nod.
We made the decision to never force the pack to choose between us a long time ago. Presenting the idea as both of ours cuts out any indecision on their part because the lycans have a tendency to instinctively band together and follow the strongest lycan’s decision, regardless. Gideon is a born alpha. He could command all of them if he wanted to. It’s a measure of the respect between us that he doesn’t just take over leadership of the pack entirely.
Sometimes, I wouldn’t blame him if he did. I make a pretty shit leader without him to balance my impulsiveness out. Then again, the cautious asshole would never get anything done without me pushing him.
It takes me a second to realise he’s staring at me, and that I’ve completely spaced out and missed whatever he’s just said.
