“You’re not stupid,” Dariel says. “You know what will happen if you go to him.”
I do.
Rylan wouldn’t stuff me in his trunk and drive away. Not like last time. He’d want to punish the hounds for whatever thing they did to take me from him. And he would want them to know before they died—painfully—that I belong to him, and only him.
I don’t like Dariel, and I don’t trust him. But he doesn’t deserve to die because of me. “You owe me an apology,” I tell him. “A good one.”
He nods. “You’ll get one.”
Or you’ll die first.
Downstairs, glass smashes.
Dariel spins around and lunges down the stairs. “Kade!”
Kade presses me back into a familiar body. Aden. But he doesn’t let go. Neither do I. He smiles down at me, his silver eyes—wolf eyes—dark with anticipation. “Hunting time. Keep her safe, Aden.”
Aden said he looks like a brawler, and he’s right. More so now than he ever has before with his fierce eyes, stubborn jaw, and determined mouth. I lift my fingers to those lips. He takes my hand, turns it, and presses a soft kiss to the scar on my wrist.
Kade doesn’t say goodbye, doesn’t tell me he loves me, even though I could almost swear he does. Just peers down at me as if I’m everything he’s ever wanted and needed. “They die, angel. Today, they die for you.”
As I stare up at him with eyes brimming with tears, I’ve never wished so hard he’s the type who wins every single fight because I can’t lose him. I’ve just found him—just foundthem—and I can’t lose them.
And then Kade is flinging himself down the stairs after Dariel, leaving me alone with Aden.
Aden folds his hand around mine before tugging me up the stairs. “Come on, Saige. Let’s go. They have their place, and we have ours.”
CHAPTER 35
SAIGE
Our place turns out to be up another flight of stairs, and after we’ve rounded a corner, a narrower staircase leads us into the attic. Along the way, I brush the tears from my eyes and work on regaining my composure.
None of them would tell me how they got me from Rylan, so I have to assume it involved violence. Maybe even death. From the alarms and security cameras, it’s clear they’ve worked out some plan to keep me safe. I don’t intend to sit it out. Iwillhelp. And to help, I can’t let myself fall apart.
One step into the dusty, low-ceilinged space lit by two dangling, and far-too bright, lightbulbs reveals an attic unlike any I’ve ever seen before.
Aden said he liked to keep some of his things up here. I had no idea those things included the contents of a gun shop.
In our old house—back when Mom was still alive and Dad was still Dad—we had an attic.
It was a place I rarely went to. Steep stairs aren’t easy for a five-year-old to manage on her own, especially narrow ones. Sometimes, Dad would pick me up, sit me on his shoulders, and take me up there so I could pick around the jumble of dusty old boxes, dresses so ugly I thought I would die laughing when he would put them on and twirl around the room for me, and dolls so creepy I’d hide behind his legs and even then, their faces would follow me into my dreams.
Mom and Dad would always come running when I’d scream in the night. Mom would hold me, stroking my hair back from my face as she hummed a song I can never remember until I drifted back to sleep. Dad would tell me stories about how the dolls were nothing to be afraid of. He’d say, “Just because a thing has terrifying eyes, Saige, doesn’t mean it has an evil heart.”
How could I have forgotten that?
A door slams, the echo dragging me from the past into the present. Aden turns from the dark wood attic door with a smile of apology. “Sorry.”
I shake my head in a sign it doesn’t matter. “What are we doing up here?”
As if it isn’t obvious, Saige?
He takes my hand and leads me to the black folding table about three feet in front of the door. I wait for him to load himself up like Rambo with the eight guns he must have set up on it while I was downstairs sleeping, but he reaches for a folded thick black hoodie. “Here. In case you get cold.”
I stare at the hoodie, and then I lift my head. “Dariel and Kade are fighting Rylan and his pack, and you’re worried about me getting cold?”
My tone is so incredulous it triggers a lip twitch, and I know he’s fighting back a smile. “I’m being practical.”