by Lisa Ladew
Wade clapped him on the shoulder. “You’re a cop, son, this is what you do best.”
Chapter 11
Ella stalked into her driveway, trying to keep herself together. She hated the state of her mind and thoughts lately. Painting in her sleep was just one more reminder of her recent failings. Maybe her mother had been right about her.
Ella dug her keys out of her pocket, her eyes glued to the arc of white paint on the front of the house. She would paint over that mistake now. Tonight. She didn’t want to have to look at it anymore.
Before Ella could step up onto her porch, a small animal shot out of the bushes on the side of the house and ran for her like it wanted to attack her. Ella almost screamed until she realized it was Smokey. He put his two paws around her ankle and aggressively smelled up and down her leg as far as he could reach. She could hear the sniffs of breath he took in and out of his nose.
“Smokey, what?”
He looked up at her and yowled, a mournful, sad sound that confused her.
She reached down and tried to pick the cat up, but he evaded her hands and shot out of her reach. He looked at her one last time, then prowled to the center of the driveway and sat on his haunches, looking very little like a cat and much more like a guard dog. Ella watched him for a moment, then shook her head and stepped up to the house. He had a cat door. He could get in whenever he wanted.
By the time she was inside, his strange behavior weighed on her more heavily. What if the man from Mrs. White’s shop had been here? What if he was in her house right now? Ella had never been much of a cat person until she and her mother had moved in with Aunt Patricia, so she didn’t know a ton about them, but it stood to reason that they would be good at sniffing out bad people. What if Smokey had been trying to tell her something?
Ella dropped her keys in the bowl next to the door, her eyes wide, attempting to take in the entire house at once. She snapped on the light, then walked through the front room and kitchen slowly, barely breathing, placing her feet lightly, trying to hear noises from the house. It felt empty to her, but did that mean anything?
Ella took the three thousand dollars out of her pocket and put it in the fake can of soup in the kitchen pantry where her aunt had always kept cash. She changed the cats’ water dish and filled their perpetual feeder. Then she began a thorough investigation of the house.
She swept through all the bedrooms, looking under beds, in closets, and behind things. She checked each bathroom and shower, then pulled down the attic stairs and checked up there. She didn’t know what she would do if she found someone, but she knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep if she didn’t at least look.
Finally, most of the house clear, she stood at the top of the basement stairs, looking down the too-steep steps. Her mind ran free, imagining many different kinds of monsters down there waiting for her. But the only other option was to leave the house. She had to look.
The stairs creaked as she walked down them, each one making a different sound. Ella tensed more with each stuttering descent, until she finally reached the bottom, mostly because the closer she got to the bottom, the more her legs were exposed to the rest of the basement.
But when she got all the way down, the basement sat completely empty, which she had expected since she’d already given away or sold everything that had been in the large, open room. What she didn’t expect was how safe she felt down there. Sounds were dampened, making her able to hear her own blood rushing in her ears. The heavy concrete walls pressed in from all sides, making her feel like she was undetectable. Ella shook her head. What a strange thought.
She purposely took a deep breath, her first of the day, and wished for a chair to sink into. She felt the tension retreat from her muscles and she smiled, another first.
The basement was one large room, mostly unfinished, except for a custom shelf and entertainment center built against the far wall, a semi-circle of carpet jutting out in front of it. Ella had always found the combination incredibly strange. Who leaves the basement unfinished, but only puts in some shelves and a sliver of carpet?
She walked to the carpet and lowered herself onto it, cross-legged, happy that it was there. She would go upstairs later, but for now, she just wanted to relax for a bit, shake off some of the day.
She listened to the tiny noises of the old house and thought about the money she had put in the fake soup can upstairs. She only needed eleven thousand more and she could pay off the back taxes on the house and keep the city from taking it from her. If she wanted to do that. Maybe she should let them have the house, take that money, and move somewhere else.
As Ella thought of moving, a deep resistance filled her that she didn’t understand. She had nothing in Serenity. No friends. No real family. If Shay came back to town that would be a reason to leave, not a reason not to leave. She could get a bus or plane ticket and go anywhere with that much money. France, even, or Australia.
Ella tried to think of somewhere she would want to go and couldn’t do it. Every part of her had begun to think of Serenity as her home.
Another thought struck her, rocking her. What if the cops were looking for her because of what had happened that day? Maybe there was even some sort of a warrant out for her? She had to go see if she had really done what she remembered doing. Tomorrow, she decided. Tomorrow she would go back and see what the place looked like. Maybe peek in on Mrs. White. Prove to herself that Mrs. White was fine and her shop was still intact. That everything Ella thought had happened had really been a… a hallucination.
Great. Just what she needed. To add having vivid, violent hallucinations to the list of things that were wrong with her.
Ella laid there, stroking the soft carpet with one hand, forming a pillow for her head with the other. She tried to make herself get up and get paint out of the shed to paint over the would-be moon on the front of the house, but as she argued with herself about doing it, she closed her eyes, just for a moment.
She fell asleep.
***
Trevor sat in the overstuffed chair and stared absently at the wall, his eyes running over the recorded prophecies, but not seeing them. Wade had left hours ago. His brothers had checked in and said they were heading home through the tunnels.
Let loose, Trevor’s mind wandered, occasionally touching on everything that had happened that day, but mostly, it circled around and around the One True Mates. There were many who believed they didn’t exist, but Trevor knew they did. They had to. His soul longed for a mate, not just any mate, but one born for him. One who would understand him, who would support him, be there for him no matter what, help him raise his young. He appreciated humans, had been born with a fierce drive to protect them, but he’d never met a human woman who had created a desire in him to mate with her. Maybe it was because he wanted full shiften pups. Maybe it was a biological or chemical thing. But at thirty years old, he felt the pull to be mated stronger than he ever had in his life. It was a physical pain that mixed with his hatred for Khain and weighed him down in everything he did.
He thought about the upcoming rut he had agreed to. A band-aid. A chance for his pack mates to scratch a sexual itch like they’d done in the old days. Not that Trevor considered anyone but Trent and Troy and maybe Blake and Wade his true pack mates. He and his brothers were transplants from New York, transferred to Serenity two years ago, when Wade had decided both the Death of Matchitehew and the Savior prophecy referred to Trevor. There were many Citlali that disagreed, but Wade held a favored position, as the leader of the region where Rhen’s physical body was housed, and the region where Khain was said to reside within the Pravus.
So Trevor was pulled from duty as a Sergeant in his local police station, transferred to Serenity, IL, promoted, and put in charge of the Khain Special Response Team, an unlikely collection of wolven who all had been named in prophecies, but Trevor was the only one who appeared to be named in two of them. He also was the only one with a Citlali for a father, but many had said that Crew could b
e a Citlali if he were fit for the job, so Trevor didn’t think that part mattered.
Trevor sighed, missing the old days, when packs were small enough that they were made up of only family and mates. His own father had been born into a pack at the turn of the last century that only had eighteen wolven in it. His father had shared many stories of pranks and jokes played on his brothers and sisters, the smile on his face revealing how close they had all been, how much they had loved each other.
But today, with the way the job of the wolven had grown with the populace of the country, there was no such thing as a small pack anymore. Alpha leaders had been replaced by Chiefs and Lieutenants and Sergeants of sprawling police forces, and that just didn’t work as well. Some families still tried to keep pack alliances strong within the family, but when a working wolven’s first loyalty had to be to his chain of command, there were conflicts.
Serenity PD had two hundred and ninety sworn police officers, all wolven. That was no simple pack. Truth be told, Trevor thought the lack of one clear alpha that every wolfen worked with on a daily basis created many of the problems that Mac thought a rut was going to fix. He would see. After the rut, he would check the temperament of the KSRT and see if anything had changed. He doubted it. The KSRT was a boiling pot of nine alphas, all trying to live together and do the same job, without killing each other. It barely worked. So far, most of them tolerated him, but none of them accepted him as leader, and he didn’t think they ever would. According to Wade, when Mac had been leader they hadn’t accepted him either. Too much aggression, drive, and testosterone crashing around, but then, their aggression and drive were reasons why each of them had been chosen for the job.
Trevor thought about going home, but decided against it. If Khain had crossed over once, he might do it again. Trevor wanted to be ready. He wanted to be close.
He crossed his arms over his chest and relaxed in the mildly-comfortable chair, but with no place to put his legs. Sleep tried to come quickly, as he was exhausted from not having slept the night before, but the chair was not made for sleeping.
Desperate for just a few hours of shut-eye, Trevor slid to the area rug on the cold ground, laid his head on the pillow of his arms and fell asleep immediately with his boots still on.
He dreamed of his One True Mate. Sleeping somewhere close by. Needing him. Wanting him.
Made just for him.
Chapter 12
Ella’s eyes snapped open and she shifted uncomfortably, her body stiff from sleeping on the basement floor. She groaned and wondered how long she’d been there. She forced herself to her feet and stretched her back, turning in a circle towards the window, staring for a long time at the early morning sunshine. Had she really slept all night? The sun, barely skimming the tops of the trees from the east, said she had.
No wonder she felt stiff. She used the tiny unfinished bathroom in the corner of the basement, not bothering to check her hair or face. She knew she looked awful. Her mind began spinning almost immediately with what she needed to do that day. Paint over the white splash on the front of the house, then head downtown and check out Mrs. White’s shop. Assure herself it had all been a─ what’s a nice word for a hallucination? A fantasy maybe, or a mirage? Ella snorted then laughed at herself for snorting and walked to the stairs. As she ascended, holding onto the hand rail with her left hand, looking at nothing in particular, something caught her attention on one of the shelves built into the wall. She stopped and stared at it. It was flat, but colorful.
She stepped backwards down the stairs and made her way to the shelf, reaching above her head and feeling around where she had seen whatever it was. Her fingers found it, but as she drew it off the shelf, the shelf moved smoothly toward her, about a half an inch.
Ella gasped and stepped back, pulling the piece of paper with her. She could see immediately what it was, a bumper sticker of a police badge with the badge number K27 on it. Above the badge was written, Remember Forever. Ella frowned. She hadn’t known her aunt supported the police. She hadn’t known much at all about her aunt, even after she and her mom had moved in with her. Her mother had always seemed to discourage her and her aunt from talking, and after her mother had died, her aunt had gotten sick, so there had been no talk then either. But maybe this explained the police officers at Aunt Patricia’s funeral?
Ella put the sticker back on the shelf and dropped her fingers to the wood. She pulled, experimentally and the entire shelf swung out easily, as if on oiled hinges. Ella blinked at the small room that lay beyond, her heart beating hard in her chest. She took a step forward without meaning to, then another, and another, until she was inside. It was colder back there, as if the heat didn’t reach the area. The room was small, only about six foot by six foot, lined in concrete like the rest of the basement. The light was dim, but she could still see well enough. To her right were six large boxes with lids, piled as tall as she was. To her left was a door.
Ella looked at the boxes, then looked at the door. She turned and approached the door, slowly. It looked heavy. All metal, steel maybe. She grasped the knob and twisted, then pulled, but the door didn’t budge. Ella let her fingers fall away, glad that it hadn’t. She felt suddenly like she was at a pivotal moment in her life, like everything hinged on the next moment, and if she had managed to get inside the door, her life would have changed forever.
She slumped to the side wall and tried to calm her nerves. “Calm down, jeez. It’s just a door.”
Her voice didn’t soothe her at all. Electricity jumped and buzzed through her nerves. She noticed, built into the wall at eye-level, a small brown, plastic contraption. She lifted her hand and ran her fingers over it. Smooth. Secure. She bent forward to stare right at it. A light played over her eye, startling her, and the plastic contraption beeped, making her back up.
The door opened as if on hydraulics, but only for a moment. Then it slammed shut, making Ella glad she hadn’t tried to step inside but she didn’t think about that for long. Instead, she tried to puzzle out what she had seen. A wide concrete tunnel stretching into darkness. She had no way of knowing, but her sense was that the tunnel was long, maybe miles long.
Ella backed up, trying to figure out the puzzle. Life had been so boring for so long, only an endless procession of bed care and hospital visits, punctuated only by death and awkwardness. She felt bad for thinking of her mother’s last years as boring, but her mother had never liked her, had never spoken a kind word to her that she could remember. Her aunt hadn’t seemed to dislike her, but she’d never talked much either. The lung issues that had stolen her last years had stolen her breath and energy also.
The door could be what? A─
Ella’s thoughts were interrupted by a strange sense that something in the house had changed. She cocked an ear towards upstairs. Hearing nothing, she stepped outside the tiny room and looked at the ceiling over her head. Footsteps. Big, booming footsteps sounded over the corner, the area she knew to be just under the front door. Ella’s throat constricted and suddenly she couldn’t get enough air. A realization dropped into her chest, freezing her in place. Him. She knew it was him. She knew everything she’d hoped she imagined the day before had really happened and she was in more danger than she’d ever faced in her life. Too bad she couldn’t move. Too bad she was going to die here, because─
Movement on the stairs caught her eye and she almost screamed. Smokey, practically flying down the stairs, ran at her and jumped from six feet away, forcing her to break her paralysis to catch him.
She turned him in her arms so she could see his face. “Smokey, where’s Chelsea?” she whispered, knowing he couldn’t answer. A word still entered her mind, and it was enough for her.
Safe.
She stared at the cat’s yellow eyes. Had she really just read the mind of an animal? Smokey turned in her hands and bit down on her thumb, as if telling her to hurry, hurry!
Ella sucked in a breath. Upstairs, the footsteps continued into the kitchen where they stoppe
d.
“Promised.”
She didn’t know if she had heard that awful word out loud, or in her head, but when she realized she had heard the horrid voice before, she had her confirmation. It was him.
Ella ran to the east window on legs that felt unable to hold her. She slid the glass open, wincing at the slight noise the window made in its frame, then pushed the screen out. She put Smokey in the well outside. “Go,” she hissed at him, but he grabbed her thumb again with his teeth and pulled. “Ouch,” she moaned, fear eating at her insides. She couldn’t explain the terror, but she couldn’t stop it either.
She boosted herself onto the windowsill and stepped out into the well, never so glad for the egress window. The sides had indentations, like a ladder for her feet and she hauled herself up and out onto the grass, her fingers sliding in the frost there.
Smokey picked his way up the side of the well and joined her on the grass, then yowled once, softly, and took off running toward the street. Ella followed, pulling her phone from her pocket, wishing harder than she’d ever wished for anything in her life, for battery.
Twelve percent. Enough to do what she had to do. She dialed 911, still running to the street, throwing terrified looks over her shoulder. She knew whoever was in her house already could tell she had left. She could practically see him through the walls, swinging around, tracking her easily. She didn’t know what he was, but she didn’t think he was human. The thought terrified her, and she wondered if the police could even stop him.
“911, what is your emergency?”
Ella stopped running so she could talk. She was on the sidewalk several houses away from her house. It looked quiet, normal, like nothing dangerous ever could or would happen there.
“Sorry, yes. There’s someone in my house. Someone… dangerous.”
“Your address please, ma’am?”
Ella rattled off her address without thinking about it, when a change in the light of the front window caught her attention. He was there. The man with the voice, standing at the window, staring at her. Fear hit her so strongly, she stuttered, then stumbled, and almost dropped her phone.