by Dana Archer
Although no danger awaits on the other side, I can’t help but enjoy the knowledge Lyla remembered my words to her. And obeyed them.
“This time, we go together.” I skim my fingers down her arm and link our hands before opening the door.
At first glance, Rick’s slouched posture on the opposite side of the hallway conveys indifference and boredom. I’ve worked with him long enough to see beyond the image he portrays to the world. Anger drives Rick, and when innocents are endangered, Rick’s anger is a fierce force I can’t help but admire.
I glance from where Rick’s fingers are shoved in his front pockets to the bunching of muscles in his forearms, and then to the tendons standing out in his neck. No signs of tension show, however. Just a boredom that’s hovering on irritation as if waiting on me is the hardest thing he’s had to deal with in ages. Oh yes, tonight, something’s stirred his rage.
“What happened?” The demand in my voice is one Rick is used to. He’ll answer, knowing I need the information before my fury rises.
“A homeless single shifter was picked up by the police. The guy’s been asking for Lyla ever since. Begging for her, actually.”
Lyla steps closer to me, our bodies touching, and tightens her grip on my hand. “Does this homeless shifter have a name?”
“Harry. No pack name. His file lists him as a lone wolf. Close to four hundred years old.” Rick answers with a hard bite of irritation in his voice. “He’s also the same Harry we were looking for last night. Izzy confirmed the description.”
“How did the local police find him when we couldn’t?” Especially considering we had Izzy, and she was supposed to meet him to buy one of the syringes he was selling.
“Loitering.” Rick cracks his jaw. “They got reports of a homeless man hanging around Lyla’s old clinic. The arresting officer actually had to physically remove him from the sidewalk. Harry fought him, saying if he left, he’d miss you, and he’d die if he missed you.”
Lyla covers her mouth, but no sound comes out. I feel her shock, though. The tiny hairs on my arms stand on edge. Her scent or the vibe she’s giving off clues me in to her mood and preps me to be ready to act on whatever’s triggered her. The response is instantaneous and powerful, and we don’t even share a mate bond yet. Once we do, it’ll make us both powerful.
“I know Harry. He’s a sweetheart. Really, Uri. He is. He would sometimes pick dandelions for me whenever I brought him coffee or the newspaper. Sometimes a four-leaf clover too if he could find one.” She shakes her head. “That does not sound like him. Harry is not crazy. This doesn’t make sense.”
“Obviously, something changed.” Rick shrugs as if that’s the obvious answer.
“Did they run a drug screen on him yet?” Lyla asks.
“No. He was picked up by the human police. Harry was brought in sweating, running a fever, shaking uncontrollably, and begging to see you. Shifter Affairs got wind of it and intervened. They brought him here before they could do so much as open a case on him.”
Lyla takes a single step closer to Rick. “Did he say why he wants to see me? Does he need me to heal him?”
Of course that would be Lyla’s first thought. My true mate aches for those who are hurting—mentally and physically.
“Harry won’t say why. He just keeps asking for you.” Rick’s features harden. “Begging for you, Lyla. As in, down on his knees and crying.”
Lyla wets her bottom lip and looks at me. She doesn’t say anything. She just stares at me expectantly, exactly as she had before she took the comfort from Izzy I didn’t offer when she needed it. I have no choice. At least no choice I can live with and still say I’m respecting my true mate. Her instinct to heal and help is an integral part of her, just as my primal side is vital to who I am.
“I don’t like this.” My cats’ cautionary stillness leaves me agitated, waiting for danger. It’s close. They feel it, but they don’t understand why. Neither do I. A homeless old male is no threat to Lyla as long as I’m close to protect her.
“Neither do I.” And the worry in Lyla’s voice reflects her anxiety. “But Harry is a friend. Er…maybe not a friend in the true sense of the word, but he…”
“He triggered your instincts to protect him.” I put my guess of Lyla’s driver where Harry is concerned into a concept I can understand, just as I did when Lyla first told me about Sam being sold to a monster.
“Yes.” Lyla nods. “I want to at least try to help him, even if that’s just monitoring his progress as he comes out of withdrawal. Because that’s what his symptoms sound like.”
“There’s only one way to find out.” Rick heads toward the elevator, hits the button on the panel, then props the door open with his foot. “After you.”
The trip to the detainment floor passes in silence. So does the walk past the general cells, where a few shifters and human criminals implicated in shifter-related crimes watch us pass. Gaze straight ahead, I avoid them. They’re no danger to me or Lyla. Petty crimes landed them here, nothing more. The howling wails coming from the end of the hallway do warn of danger, however.
“He sounds like a sick dog.” Or wolf, to be exact, but the noise is the same. “And he’s in pain.”
“An incredible amount of pain.” Rick’s scowl deepens. “I can taste it on my tongue.”
So can I. This is what my cats sensed earlier when we were in the hallway outside Ella’s office. They just couldn’t express to me why Harry would be a threat.
I shake my head. While my cats are attuned to the world, their interpretation isn’t always the one I’d make. Unfortunately, they can’t share their thoughts with me, only their emotions and flashes of memories. In this case, without a source of the threat or a memory of Harry, they had nothing to show me. All they had was the sense of danger, so that’s what they gave me, letting their emotions bleed into mine.
And this is what makes Ezra’s life difficult. He’s bombarded with the sensory and instinctual overload of predators who don’t view the world the way a human would. Now he has yet another animal to guide him.
The guilt rises up and threatens to choke me.
Blocking everything out, I let Lyla’s hand in mine lead me while I wrestle with the self-blame and resentment. A freak accident took Ezra’s vision. I never told him to fire that musket. I don’t even know where he found it. The plan was supposed to have him causing a distraction while I saved Bryon. If he’d only followed my direction, he’d…
I shut off the train of self-destructing punishment. Ezra made a choice back then, just as he’s making a choice now not to rely on me. It’s been over two days since I saw Ezra or shared my view of the world with him. Even this last time when he shared my eyesight, he hadn’t wanted to go out with me. He’d only done so because I refused to leave him alone. Because I felt guilty.
“Live your own life, and let me live mine.” His words replay.
On a long exhale, I glance at Lyla—the female who’s always been mine. She’s my life, my other half, my world. There’s someone out there for Ezra too. And my twin won’t find her if he lurks in the dark for eternity or looks through another’s eyes. My view of heaven looks different than his.
Lyla smiles at me. “Thank you for coming down here with me.”
“You’re mine to protect. Mine to care for.” I lower my chin and my voice. “Mine to treasure for eternity.”
Rick steps away from the guard on duty and walks closer to us before Lyla can ask the question I sense hovering between us—how do we claim our eternity?
“Harry stopped asking for Lyla a little while ago.” Rick glances over his shoulder at the door. “Now whenever the guards check on him, he’s begging for a death collar.”
The traditional metal prong collars are fitted around the necks of the most dangerous shifters and are meant to act as a form of torture device, preventing the shifter from embracing their animal. Long-time use of the death collar causes insanity and oftentimes ends in suicide with the shifter finally chang
ing shapes and triggering the collar to contract and sever their head.
“If he’s determined, he doesn’t need a death collar.” I study Rick. That was one of the situations I was supposed to watch out for when I signed on with Rick. His file listed him as suicide probable. I was tasked with making sure that fate didn’t happen, but it was Rick’s true mate who ensured he never will take his life.
“Yeah.” A solemn look settles over Rick. “As a single shifter, he just needs to bleed out. Ripping his own throat out or tearing into his wrist will do that. Most opt for guns, though. Since Harry doesn’t have one, he might get creative, and there isn’t a whole lot we can do to stop him other than restrain him.”
“And that’ll break his mind.” Shifters have to move. They need to embrace their animals. And they crave freedom. Eliminating their access to any of those things will turn them feral.
Lyla swallows hard. “Then let’s see if we can help him before he commits suicide.”
As soon as the door to the visiting area around the cage is opened, the old shifter’s piercing screams surround us. Blood runs down the male’s scalp from where chunks of his hair are missing to the deep gouges dug into his chest from his own claws.
His nostrils flare. The scream cuts off. His glare zeroes in on Lyla, homing in on her as if she’s the prey he’s meant to take down. The predatory look fades in the next moment, and he rushes the bars, reaching an arm through. “Miss Lyla! You came to see your old friend. Thank you, little girl, thank you. I always knew you were an obedient child. I told your mother the same. That out of you and your sister, you’d be the one who’d listen to what you were told.”
The tremor in Lyla’s hand travels up my arm. I glance at her. Terror leaves her eyes wide. She blinks them and takes a calming breath, visibly getting herself together. “Your order didn’t bring me here. I came on my own for the memories we shared. I want to help you. Tell me what’s wrong.”
Because in this moment, the older shifter appears completely fine. He’s not shaking. He’s not screaming in pain. And he’s not down on his knees begging for my true mate. “And tell us quickly, or Lyla will leave. She has other people to help.”
Harry exposes a fang on a low snarl. “Lyla has time for her old friend. Lyla always has time for old friends. And you can’t stop her. There’s no mate mark on her shoulder.”
The borrowed clothing she’s wearing—a wide-necked T-shirt with track pants—makes Lyla’s unmated status perfectly clear to any shifter who looks at her. My scent clinging to her tells another story, however. As my beloved human, I can prevent Lyla from doing anything I think will put her in danger whether she likes it or not. I’d rather explain why than give her an order. She remembers my intent when I take the time to give her my reasoning. Not opening the door a few minutes ago proves that.
“Lyla is busy, but Lyla”—she emphasizes her own name—“will help you if you tell her what’s wrong with you.”
Harry motions to himself. “I’m sick, Miss Lyla. I’m in withdrawal. Can’t you tell?”
If he is, it’s the oddest case of withdrawal—in pain one minute, fine the next.
Lyla takes a step forward but doesn’t release my hand and doesn’t get too close to the bars. “In withdrawal from what? Last time we talked, you weren’t doing drugs.”
Harry glances at the ground. “I don’t know. Something bad. Something I didn’t mean to take.”
“Did someone give it to you?” Lyla lowers her chin and raises her brows in a pleading expression. “Or did you find it and take it on your own?”
“I couldn’t sell it until I proved it was real, so I took it. I needed money for a train ticket.” Harry jerks his wild scrutiny from the door to his cell, to Lyla, and then to the door leading to the hallway. “The old alpha is dead. I need to get back home before it’s too late. The real alpha’s son took over. He’ll let me rejoin. I just gotta get home before I can’t resist death. It’s calling my name.”
Lyla glances at me, pity slackening her features.
“Where did you find the drug you took, Harry?” Rick asks in a persuasive voice.
“He didn’t need them anymore.” Harry’s tone rises along with his heaving chest. “The dead don’t need anything!”
“You took the syringes from the last murdered homeless victim, didn’t you?” I add a leading bit of information to my question. Harry’s not in the right state of mind to give us easy answers.
“Not the last.” Harry runs a hand over his bloody head, then walks to the opposite side of the cell before falling into a quickening loop around his cell. “Not the last. You just didn’t find them yet.”
“Where are they?” Because if there are more Category 3 scenes waiting to be discovered, we need to act to contain them.
“Jaguars like trees. Cops like donuts.” Harry bobs his head with each word. “Bad girls like to swallow hard shafts.”
“Where can jaguars find trees in the city? Or cops eat donuts?” Lyla squeezes my hand, no doubt sharing in my same guarded fear. “Or bad gir—”
“The park has trees, Miss Lyla.” Harry stops. “Lots and lots of trees.”
Rick turns to the guard at the door. The man nods and slips into the hallway, no doubt to alert Ella and the others of where to look for more dead bodies. There’s a large park just outside this city and a few smaller ones scattered throughout.
“And where do cops eat donuts?” Lyla asks once another guard slips into the waiting room to replace the one who’d disappeared.
Harry unleashes his claws and scrapes them over his neck, bleeding himself.
“Harry!” Lyla raises her voice, a touch of panic in her tone. “Answer me. Where do cops eat donuts?”
“In their cars.” Harry flexes his hands, digging his nails a little deeper into his throat, but not enough to do any major damage. “Coffee and donuts in the car before the shift starts.”
“And bad girls?” Lyla lowers her voice, a coercion that has Harry dropping his hand and cocking his head to the side to listen to her. “Where do they find hard shafts?”
Harry laughs, the sound twisted and depraved. “In their pants, Miss Lyla. In their pants.”
“Girls don’t have shafts in their pants. Boys—”
“They do when they’re bad.” Harry laughs again, then says in a singsong voice, “Bad girls, talking about the sad girls. Sad girls, talking about the bad girls. Toot-toot, hey, beep-beep!”
“That’s not enough.” Lyla balls her fist. “Tell me more about this bad girl. What does she look like? What’s her name? Where does she live?”
“I told you stuff. Lots of stuff. All the stuff I was supposed to say to hurt you.” Harry walks over and yanks on the locked door to his cell. “Now let me out of here, Miss Lyla. I have a train to catch. You’re supposed to help me get on the train now so I can go home.”
Lyla glances at me with a question in her eyes, but she addresses the shifter trying to coerce her into letting him out of his cell. “I think you lied to me, Harry. I don’t think you’re in withdrawal. You’re not even sweating anymore.”
I smile at Lyla, letting her know the only way I can at the moment that I’m proud of the deduction she came up with, and she’s right. Harry is lying. The scent of his deception dominates the smell emanating from him, whereas a couple of minutes ago, pain had twisted his personal fragrance.
Harry wipes the back of his hand over his head, then studies the bloody streak on his skin. “Yeah, I must be better. You should let me go so I don’t miss my train. Do you have my ticket for me?”
Lyla shakes her head. “You can’t leave until you tell me who’s killing humans and shifters.”
Harry doesn’t answer. He paces again while flexing his claw-tipped fingers.
“Harry?” Lyla speaks louder. “Answer me.”
“I told you lots of stuff, Miss Lyla. Lots of stuff. Can’t tell you anymore.” His words echo his earlier ones. “You’re supposed to help me get home now. I have a train to ca
tch. Can’t miss it. Trains go faster than death. I can outrun death. Just gotta get on one.”
“Yes, you can tell me more. You—”
“I want to go home, Miss Lyla. I want to go home. Please send me home. Just send me home. My train! I can’t miss my train!”
“I can’t.” Lyla walks backward, tugging me along with her into the hallway. “I’ll come check on you—”
“Please.” Harry rushes the bars and shoves his arm out as far as it’ll go. “Don’t leave me in here. Death is coming for me. I hear her calling me. Tempting me. Need to get home before—”
Rick slams the door, cutting off the homeless shifter’s bellows. The screaming starts next. It’s mumbled, just like it was not long ago, only this time, Lyla’s name blends with the shrieks.
Shaking, Lyla releases my hand and hurries to the elevator. Once inside, she wraps her arms around herself but doesn’t speak until the elevator doors close behind Rick. “He was lying. Wasn’t he?”
“Maybe. Maybe not.” Rick faces Lyla instead of selecting the button for Ella’s floor. “We’ll find out once we get agents in the park and do a check on the city’s police.”
“And the local street girls.” Lyla rubs her hands over her arms as if warming herself. “And in the meantime, I’m going to give Abby a call. I have her number. If she picks up, I’ll meet with her and see what she knows. If she doesn’t, maybe Shifter Affairs can do a location search on her number.”
I draw Lyla close and wrap my arms around her, warming and comforting her. “Just because Izzy referred to Abby as a sad girl doesn’t mean she’s the one Harry was talking about.”
“I know that.”
Her words say one thing, but her cold hands tell me differently. “Not alone, okay? Kade and Ezra can go with you.”
“Not you?”
“No. There’s another lead I want to follow up on after I help the others look for these dead bodies.”
“What?”
I glance at Rick. “Harry didn’t behave as if he was in withdrawal. He acted as if he’d been ordered to give you certain information, and only certain information.”