Caged Kitten

by Rhea Watson

  Much to my surprise, Thompson didn’t knock. He waltzed right into an office that was so expected, so cliché, that I couldn’t help wondering if this was a dream—or if we really were on a TV show, this room more like a polished set than a room where someone worked every day. Mahogany desk. A huge empty high-backed chair behind it made of quilted black leather. Desk overflowing with paper stacks and folders. One metal tray that said Inbox, the Outbox on the opposite corner. A feathery quill and an iron inkpot. Two wooden chairs in front of said desk, one of which Thompson shoved me into. Bookshelves full of thick tomes lined all four walls, so neatly organized and vast that they could give Café Crowley’s collection a run for its money.

  The room smelled like leather and sandalwood and sea salt. A hearth nestled between two bookshelves directly behind the desk, the fire inside burning low, almost nonexistent save a few flaring embers.

  Three evenly spaced windows dominated most of the wall to my right, their pine-green curtains tied to the sides, thin bookshelves arranged between them.

  Was that a human skull—

  “Don’t touch anything, Fox.”

  I nodded, but by the time I looked back, Thompson was gone, the door open, the hallway beyond dark.

  Cool. Cool, cool, cool. This felt great. Totally safe.

  Adrenaline at an all-time high, I rubbed my sweaty, shaky hands on my thighs and continued my slow scan of the room, trying to keep busy—to not let my mind wander to the worst possible scenario. Eventually, I settled on the black nameplate in the middle of this huge desk, situated right in front of me. It had been staring at me since I’d walked in, but after weeks in either a cell, the block, or the bakery, the warden’s office was sensory overload.

  Warden Lloyd Guthrie

  I stared at the bright white letters, reading but not comprehending.

  Warden—Lloyd—Guthrie.

  I blinked down at the rectangle, everything inside going cold, and then tried and failed to reach out for it. I mean, I got my hand up, even moved it toward the name that had haunted my entire life, but it fell to my lap just before I could brush the cool obsidian.

  Warden Lloyd Guthrie—

  The door clicked shut behind me, and I sucked in a panicked breath, stiff as a statue, every internal alarm bell shrieking for me to run.

  “Hello, kitten…”

  10

  Katja

  This had to be a dream.

  I’m dreaming. That was why the room looked like a TV set, like the stereotypical head honcho’s office. I must have seen it before on a show, a movie, hell, maybe even a play, and now my mind was messing with me. Yeah. That was it. As if Xargi didn’t screw with me enough during the daytime, now I needed a new nightmare thrown into the mix.

  Only a dream.

  Wake up, Katja. Just wake up.

  Footsteps on hardwood—prim and precise, nothing like the heavy clunk of guard boots or the shuffling of soft-soled inmate attire. Still as stone, I stared at the overladen bookshelf on the other side of the desk, catching a faint whiff of leather that wasn’t from the high-backed chair. Leather shoes. Expensive. Paired with… peppermint. An even more delicate scent, it tickled my nostrils, begged me to turn around and face the nightmare head-on.

  But I couldn’t.

  I couldn’t move.

  As soon as a tall, dark figure loomed in my periphery, my mind went blank. Like an overloaded computer shorting out, it all went black inside. No high-pitched whine. No racing images. No whispers in my dad’s death croak urging me to run. Just—silence, except for the drumbeat of my heart, my pulse reverberating through my entire body.

  He settled into that huge, imposing chair without a word. Warden—Lloyd—Guthrie.

  A handsome silver fox, but I’d known that from perusing the odd society tabloid photo after Dad died—back when I thought I should finally look into what he’d been going on and on about for years. Only the photos hadn’t done crime lord Lloyd Guthrie justice. They didn’t relay the absolute power he carried in his broad shoulders, in his large hands, in the crisp suit and the steely grey eyes that seemed to look right through me, right down to the guts.

  And from the way he settled into his chair, hands folded on the mahogany desktop, eyes pinned squarely on me… It was like he’d found my very soul.

  Black hair tinged with grey, white at the sideburns. Neat. Swept back. Scottish heritage with a splash of Italian thrown in, if I remembered my research—what little public information had been available, anyway. He wore a pristine black suit far too good for the warden of some crap prison, and I swore the buttons on his shirt, from the glimpses I caught beneath a shiny black tie, were pearls.

  Attractive man. Tall. Strong. Lean. Hawkish.

  Terrifying warlock.

  My shoulders rounded, and try as I might to match his quiet ferocity, I just wanted to slink down to the hardwood and disappear through the floorboards.

  “Kitten… Sweet nickname,” he mused, his voice a deep, richly aged baritone. A New Yorker, distinctly not West Coast. “What your father used to call you, isn’t it?”

  My cheeks burned harder than they had since I’d arrived, no doubt a telling beet red from the way the warden’s thin mouth twisted up. I said nothing. Did nothing. Refused to even give him a nod. Lloyd Guthrie—if that obsidian plate was to be believed, if this wasn’t a dream—tapped his threaded hands on the desk once, twice, then leaned forward, his chair softly groaning.

  “Do you know who I am?”

  I swallowed thickly, gulping a mouthful of knives down a too-dry throat, and then nodded to his nameplate. “Warden Lloyd Guthrie.”

  Pride bloomed in my chest: I didn’t stutter his name. I didn’t whisper it or choke it out. No matter how I felt on the inside, despite the cold sweat on the nape of my neck, the blaze in my cheeks, the numb tingling that had engulfed my fingertips, I sounded strong. Good. At least I could pretend. Xargi was starting to teach me how to fake it.

  Lloyd smirked, amusement glittering in his stony greys. “But do you know who I am?”

  “I just said who you are,” I offered without thinking. It had just tumbled out, punctuated by a silent Duh that was probably akin to signing a death warrant under different circumstances. In all my research, I had never stumbled upon anything concrete—just rumors and hearsay, Lloyd Guthrie, warlock mobster, defined solely by his reputation.

  But as we stared off now, his smirk blossoming but the mirth dying in his unflinching gaze, I had a feeling his reputation was all he needed. That smile made my blood run cold. Frigid. Elijah had set me on fire every day for the last month; a smile from Lloyd Guthrie extinguished the flames I had come to crave and chilled my blood to ice.

  Elijah’s fire made me feel alive. It made me feel strong and capable, in control in a place where I had absolutely none from the time I woke up to when I crawled back into my cot after the lights-out siren.

  Lloyd’s ice made me want to give in to the fear—

  “You…” I tightened my trembling hands to fists, hoping he couldn’t see and knowing he did anyway. The warlock oozed predator before he’d even said a word; he probably missed nothing. “You’re a criminal… running a prison.”

  “A criminal?” His curt chuckle made the hairs on my neck stand up, and he eased back into his chair, the delight shimmering in his eyes again. “Am I?”

  I faltered, second-guessing myself, my dad, the cursory searches I’d done on this man over the years. Clearing my throat, I dropped my gaze to my hands, to my white knuckles. “Unless I’m mistaken, you’re the Lloyd Guthrie associated with the Guthrie crime syndicate that runs out of New York City… A crime family of warlocks who partake in, er, illegal activities, and…”

  “Go on.”

  I stared up at him, knowing that I should stand my ground even when I would rather look anywhere else right now—anywhere. Or, even better, jump up and take a running leap at one of those windows to my right. Crash through. Plummet to the gravel grounds outside—meet some o
f the wolves I heard howling come nightfall.

  “And now you’re a warden,” I told him. “That’s it.”

  My breath snagged there for the first time. Lloyd’s smile sharpened, and he stabbed at the desk’s top with his pointer finger as if to drive the point home.

  “No, you know there’s more.”

  My stomach twisted and knotted, the measly breakfast I’d had hours ago and the bit of bread I had munched on in the proofing pantry this afternoon suddenly a little too present. The churn brought with it a rush of acid creeping up my throat, the sensation infuriatingly familiar, but I pushed through and hoped the nausea didn’t read on my face.

  “Shall I say it, then?” Lloyd offered in a tone beyond patronizing. I just shook my head.

  “I think I’d like to go back to my cell now—”

  “Do you know why you’re here, Katja Isabella Fox?”

  Oh gross. Hearing my name coming from his mouth kicked the nausea up a few notches, and I bit at my cheeks, willing my insides to settle.

  “Because someone lied,” I gritted out, “and said I sold love potions.”

  “False.”

  I frowned, waiting for more, hating to have finally heard the truth from him. No one but the other inmates believed me. Processing staff, the guards… I was just an ingrate to them, another criminal who had been found guilty. And now this? Just like that—false.

  Lloyd dragged it out like he enjoyed making me wait, edging me for knowledge—staring at me with eyes like slate, like steel, just the shade to match his metal heart.

  You know… If all the stories were true. If Dad really was telling the truth.

  And from the look of him, this smirking man, my warden, it was impossible to say otherwise now.

  “You’re here because I ordered it,” he said at long last, his voice even and calm, as if we were having the most casual of conversations. “Because…” After fidgeting with his diamond cuffs, Lloyd leaned over the desk again, swooping closer to me and bringing with him a rush of sharp peppermint that almost made me gag. “Because you were mine before you were even born.”

  Smug, ever so pleased with himself, Lloyd Guthrie settled back in his chair again like he was doing me some kindness—like he had decided to allow me a few precious moments to process that monumental bombshell. Only I couldn’t think. Couldn’t feel. Hearing his words had triggered a wall inside me, a mental block that I couldn’t get around, couldn’t climb over. Just there, oppressive and towering, my heartbeat like a pounding fist against it.

  “What i-is this place?” I managed, all the smoothness from earlier dead and buried. Gone. My voice broke in a hoarse whisper. In fact, I was barely aware of what came out, only that I was speaking, my sense of self-preservation trying desperately to change the subject. “Supers don’t have… prisons.”

  “Ah, yes.” Lloyd pressed his steepled fingers to his lips, considering me, before snatching up an ivory pen from his desk and twirling it effortlessly. “It’s a creation of my own design. Xargi is the prototype for penitentiaries I intend to launch all over the world… Proof to the elders of our communities that troublemakers can be dealt with at no cost to them. Proof to the few human governments in the know that we can discipline our own.” He pressed the end of his pen into his chin dimple, some of his coarse blackish-grey facial scruff making a scratchy sound at the contact—like nails on a chalkboard. “And it’s a chance to earn an honest living.”

  The next stretch of silence implied he was waiting for a response—maybe for me to sing his praises. Delusional. I just stared at him instead, horror solidifying in my chest like an anchor.

  “Do you like that?” he crooned, dragging his pen over his lower lip. Somehow he managed to read as both rakishly handsome and disgustingly lewd. “An honest man?”

  Sidestep that land mine, girl. “Are you selling the bread we bake every day?”

  He tossed his pen on his desk. “I am.”

  “And what’s forged in the metal—”

  “Let me stop you there.” Lloyd folded his arms, staring at me like I was a child, a pupil, a little girl for him to mentor and mold to his liking. Patronizing piece of shit. “Every work detail makes a product. We sell that product and put the funds back into the prison. It’s all very legitimate.”

  “It’s not legitimate,” I fired back, the embers flaring inside me, a whisper of warmth coiling up my spine. “Most of us aren’t criminals… We shouldn’t be prisoners. This is a fucking labor camp!”

  Lloyd surged forward with a flash of teeth. “Oh, what a mouth on you. I like that. I like that much more than I’d have thought…”

  His wide eyes, that maniacal cackle, extinguished whatever fire had started up again. I shoved back in my chair as far as I could, suddenly realizing that like almost every other chair in here, it was bolted to the ground. Not going anywhere. No escape.

  “Xargi is a proof of concept, kitten,” the warlock remarked, either oblivious to the fact that I was stretching to get away from him, hands snapped tight around the armrests, or he just didn’t care. I bit the insides of my cheeks again, the flash of pain centering, and scowled back at him.

  “Stop saying that.” He had no right to call me kitten. He wasn’t my dad. He hadn’t earned that privilege. This asshole had no idea who I was. No clue. And he didn’t get to talk at me like he did.

  “And if I don’t?” He fished his wand out of his suit jacket’s interior, placing it delicately, almost reverently on the desk. Ivory handle—shocker. Grey eyes flicked to mine, locked on, and the world blurred around us, the slate goading me to react. “Will you show me your claws, Katja? Come on, then… Take a swipe.”

  My fingers twitched toward the wand, and a stupid part of my brain posed a theory that if I just moved fast enough, I could snatch it up and use it on its master. Never mind the collar. Never mind that wands had hearts and souls of their own, that they were major divas who sometimes freaked out hard if someone new used them without permission.

  It would be worth the risk if I could wipe that smarmy smile off his face.

  If I could never hear kitten coming out of his mouth ever again.

  But that, like so many other half-baked plans of escape, was just a fantasy. Useless to dwell on. Depressing to consider. So, I sat there, stiff and silent, trembling, seething—seconds away from crying. Because I still wasn’t the badass heroine. I was a witch who missed her dad, set off by a nickname that didn’t belong to Lloyd Guthrie.

  He ghosted his middle finger up and down his wand, the shaft a polished black wenge wood, and then let out a long, drawn-out sigh.

  “Do you want to leave this place?”

  My heart skipped a beat. Leave… Xargi? I had been waiting for those words, waiting for that offer, from the second I woke up cuffed to a chair. The penitentiary’s warden ran the show, and I had no doubt that he could snap his fingers and I’d be free.

  But making a deal with Lloyd Guthrie was suicide. It had to be.

  “I—”

  “You’re mine, kitten,” he insisted, stroking his wand’s handle, gliding over the twin serpents etched into the ivory. I had to watch his hand, his fingers—because the you’re mine thing tickled my gag reflex, and if I met his eyes, I’d probably hurl all over his ridiculous desk. But his fingers stilled, and a sharp snap made me flinch and look up just as Lloyd flashed a thin smile. “Say the word and you can come home.”

  I pressed onto the balls of my feet, seconds away from attempting the whole crashing-through-the-window thing. I’d take a broken ankle and prowling wolves over this conversation. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Nobody ever told you?” His dark brows shot up, and he sat in suspended laughter, waiting for me to deny it—to spill the truth. Dad had told me a lot in his final hours, but it had all sounded so… so… implausible. The rantings of a sick, paranoid man. Guilt knotted in my gut, and I busied myself with my nails, my refusal to meet his eye answer enough. Lloyd’s face screwed victoriously, ba
rking cackles bouncing around the office, and he slapped at the desk hard enough to make me jump again. “Ridiculous—but expected. An effort to protect you, most likely, but your father’s silence only left you unprepared, kitten. A fool to the end, Augustus Fox…”

  Fury nudged aside the guilt, just for a moment, and I glowered up at him, at this mobster pretending to be a warden—pretending he had some moral superiority over all the inmates in here.

  Pretending that he… owned me. That I belonged to him.

  No.

  Never.

  “You see—” Lloyd wiped under his eyes as his obnoxious chuckles settled. “—your mother was a filthy junkie—”

  “That’s a lie,” I snapped. This asshole had no right to tarnish her memory—none.

  “How would you know? You never met her.” He sniffed as he snatched up his wand, twirling it between his fingers, those hawkish grey eyes never once leaving my face. “She died in childbirth.”

  I sucked in a sharp breath, like I always did, to alleviate the stab of loss and longing. Growing up without my mom had left a huge hole in my heart, in my whole life. Irrational as it was, I had always feared Jackson and Ewan hated me for stealing her away from them, my brothers who had had five and three years with her respectively before I came around. Never once did they so much as hint at that. They died loving me just as fiercely as I loved them, missing her just as much as I missed a woman I’d never met but adored all the same.

  Fuck him. I gripped the chair’s armrests, nails gritting into the wood. Fuck Lloyd Guthrie for spewing such lies.

  “She was addicted to wolfsbane—deeply,” he told me, his tone bored now, like he was going through the motions. “She ran up debts she couldn’t pay, and in the end, she came to me. She was from the neighborhood—only sixteen at the time. Getting her out of that hole would have cost me almost all I had, but she was the loveliest witch I’d ever seen… You know, once you looked past the ravages of wolfsbane.”