Seeing Red

by Lyra Evans

  Then there was Preston. Phoebe was essentially his mother, in a sense. Perhaps she was in most senses. He didn’t refer to her as ‘mother,’ but he did say she’d raised him. He spent more of his life in her care than with his biological family. And for all her despicable views and actions, Preston still seemed less abused by her than he had been back with his blood relatives. That thought was trying on Niko’s already tired mind.

  The memory of the day he’d watched his own father leave him, trying to sneak away without saying goodbye, filtered into Niko’s mind. But however painful that moment was, it wasn’t surprising. Niko had been trying to escape his father in the years before that, running away to his hideaway in the old warehouse. And even after all that, it still took years for Niko to allow himself to accept that his father was responsible for his mother’s death. It was still difficult for him to discuss it, which is why only Cobalt actually knew that information now. And this illogical loyalty was to a man who had never really showed Niko any kindness at all. How much more difficult must it be for Preston to turn on Phoebe when she was the one who saved him from the streets?

  Paw prints. I was told to leave paw prints outside the fencing of the warehouse. And not just regular ones.

  The one print had had a scar down the middle and was missing a toe. Niko had never told Preston that part, just that there were prints. And the look on his face when he found out the details…

  But as Niko glanced over to Preston’s hands on the wheel, he found them whole. No missing fingers. And he remembered no scarring on Preston’s palms. A scar significant enough to change the imprint of a paw would have to be large. Niko shook his head.

  Preston would have known Phoebe was the one to order Sade’s murder; he just couldn’t speak to Niko about it. That Noor could discuss it with Preston was likely a quirk of the contract; discussing Woods matters with outside people was impossible, but with each other it was fine. They would have to speak to each other about things now and again, wouldn’t they? And Niko was no one, just a slave destined to die. Dead men tell no secrets. But he had seemed genuinely afraid, even if only for a second, when Noor mentioned the prints.

  It pulled at Niko, fraying the edges of his mind. He shut his eyes to cut off his senses, but his persistent erection brought him back to the feeling of the Sluagh Staff against his skin. His brain played out those memories with pieces from the case in alternating flashes. Pain cutting through his back. The photos of Preston in his condo and photobook at the cabin with everyone except Phoebe. She was always in the background if there at all. The Staff twisting over his chest and belly, as though cutting him open. The log book with those final sums paid to Preston and only three letters by each entry. His skin burning, as though disintegrating, all over his body. “I’ve been living in the jungle, Junebug, I haven’t spoken with anyone. Lying low, remember?” His every nerve ending on fire, tearing him apart from the inside. They’d kept me hidden away, locked in a room most of my life… What I had to do to myself to get out of there… Staff to his underarm, a fork of lightning cutting through his entire chest and trying to burst his heart. The newspapers have already moved on from your claims. Even the tabloids don’t bother with it anymore. No one believed you. Why would I bother setting you up this way?

  No one believed you.

  Niko jerked, as though he’d fallen asleep in the bath and woken when the water covered his mouth. He groaned slightly from the soreness in his body, his muscles complaining, but his mind was clearer than ever. Chest rising and falling visibly, Niko finally thought he saw enough of the picture to get a sense of what was going on. Or what had been going on.

  “It wasn’t all bad, was it? Playing my slave for a few hours?” Preston asked, and the question felt jarring to Niko. He looked over at the Werewolf with wide eyes and furrowed brows.

  “You used an ancient torture implement on me,” he said in response.

  Preston laughed softly. “It wasn’t all that bad,” he said, glancing again to Niko’s tented jeans. Niko glared at him, his traitorous body longing to shift around to get friction. Preston’s smile turned more wolfish. “I did offer to help you deal with that, if you recall.” His tone lowered to a deep, husky rumble. “Sincloud doesn’t need to know the details. Maybe it was all part of the ploy.”

  Niko frowned, his chest tightening. “You don’t give up, do you?”

  A flash of teeth, and Preston answered, “You’ve no idea. A pity we didn’t meet before Sincloud showed up. The fun we could have had…”

  Before he’d met Cobalt, Niko had made himself essentially celibate for months. Before Cobalt, Sade was his last sexual partner. If you could call Sade a partner. He didn’t like to think too hard on the words his mind provided. But thanks to Sade, Niko hadn’t allowed himself to go out to a club or any other establishment. He might never have allowed himself to go some place like The RACK or the Palm anyway, but if he had, it was reasonable to think he would have run into Preston at some point.

  “What makes you think I would have let you touch me even then?” Niko snapped.

  Preston tilted his head to the side. “Have you ever been fucked by a Werewolf?” Niko didn’t respond immediately, opting to shift and turn his body slightly away from Preston instead. His erection throbbed more insistently. Preston hummed. “Thought so. I’m rather certain you would have let me have you at least once, just to try. I can smell it on you.” Niko’s reaction was instinctual, flinching and pulling away, but Preston only laughed. “I’m not going to eat you. Not unless you want me to, that is.”

  Trees and wilderness zoomed by outside the car, and Niko saw Cobalt in every shadow, in every line of forest. He thought to the burns on Cobalt’s arms. He had no idea if he was fully recovered, and he felt wrong. Working with Cobalt had come easily, quickly. Working with Preston wasn’t difficult, per se, but it didn’t feel as natural as Cobalt did. And the guilt in his stomach and ache in his chest made it all the harder to act himself.

  “You’re pretty good-humoured for someone who just learned his surrogate mother is setting him up,” Niko said, determined to throw Preston off-kilter.

  It worked remarkably. The Werewolf’s mask of flirty amusement faltered. His smile sagged at the corners, his eyes shading darker. “How do you figure that?” he said. It was a question, but it came out flat.

  Niko leaned back in his seat. “I saw you,” he said. “I saw your face when Juniper described the paw prints she left at the scene.”

  Preston shrugged. “You already told me about those.”

  Shaking his head, Niko said, “Not the missing toe. Not the scar. You thought they were normal paw prints. That’s why you were so dismissive when I mentioned them. Because you knew normal paw prints wouldn’t relate to you.” Preston said nothing here, instead getting very, very still. The atmosphere in the car changed. It was cold. And if Preston hadn’t been driving, Niko might have worried he was about to transform and maul him. “But your paw prints aren’t entirely normal, are they?” He paused, and Preston stared straight ahead along the dark stretch of road. “You basically told me yourself, you know,” he went on, watching the Werewolf’s profile as he did. “Your family locked you up as a kid, keeping you from the outside world. What you had to do to get out of there. I can’t imagine how desperate you were to escape to mutilate yourself like that.”

  Preston jerked his head straight suddenly, as though fixing his mask back into place. “Do I look mutilated to you?”

  Niko didn’t smile, though maybe someone crueler would have. “I’ve never seen you without shoes,” Niko said. “You never take them off. Even in your own cabin, you wear things that cover your entire foot.” He could have smacked himself for his own stupidity. “Easy to forget Wolves have four paws. Hands and feet. Weird how bipedal races overlook things like that. But it worked to your favour for a long time, I’m guessing.” Niko sighed. “How did you do it? Cut off your own toe?”

  Preston was expressionless now. The edge to his features
softened slightly, as though fading away. Like he had coloured outside the lines to make himself more dangerous, but his true self was harmless. “With a rusted butter knife,” he said. The words were flat. Hollow. Niko’s mouth fell slightly open at the thought. “They didn’t notice it missing when they took my dishes after dinner one night. So I hid it away until I couldn’t bear it anymore.”

  “Why? Why cut off your toe?”

  Preston glanced at him, still without emotion. “I was cuffed by the ankle,” he said. “Tried to cut off my heel to get it through the metal ring. That didn’t work, obviously, but the gash I made down the middle of my foot provided enough lubrication to make it through. But it was such a violent effort I slipped and accidentally stabbed through my two outermost toes. Still not sure how I managed. They weren’t severed completely when I ran off. But the wounds got infected during my time on the street, so…” There was no reflect in his eyes, and the effect left him with a hollow look Niko recognized. He’d seen that look in himself, years ago. “Phoebe had me treated when she took me in. The two toes had to go, by that point. When I transformed, it amounted to missing one digital pad. Only Phoebe knows that.”

  There wasn’t much to say to that, so Niko didn’t try to answer it. Instead, he redirected. “So why would she do that to you? Phoebe?”

  At this, Preston eyed Niko sidelong, likely reading his conclusion on his face. But Preston shook his head. “If she knew I was feeding you information, police would be finding my body somewhere, not just paw prints that might turn out to be mine.” Niko frowned. “It’s obviously one of her backup plans. She always has backups.”

  “How is placing prints meant to look like yours a viable backup plan?” Niko asked. “Wouldn’t she be burning a bridge she could use? You’re her—her—”

  “Her pet?” Preston finished for him. Niko grimaced. “It’s more accurate than anything else, really. Not in the sexual way, obviously. But I was little more than a dog to her. An animal to sic on enemies. Until I was compromised.”

  Niko shifted again, his erection seeming to increase in insistence. His mind would flit, every few moments, to a deep carnal desire to act and get off. Despite the hollow in his chest and his thoughts of Cobalt, he worried he would have to give in and pleasure himself right there next to Preston.

  “How are you compromised?” Niko asked, unable to focus as clearly as he wanted. He shifted again.

  Preston’s smile was slightly lopsided. “That would be your doing, thanks,” he said. Niko stilled a moment, unsure of precisely what Preston meant. “You naming me in the papers tarnished my name, even if it was only slightly. I was connected to criminal activity because of that. Thanks to the internet, nothing ever dies. Whenever someone searches me, they would inevitably find some link to the auction case. And you.” He shrugged, his eyes slowly finding their gleam again. Niko flexed the muscles in his jaw. “I should have killed you, but I didn’t. I didn’t kill you during the auction, and afterward I couldn’t kill you. Once you had named me, your death would have blown back on me. Or at least blown back on the Woods, indicating there was still something there. But you knew the truth. I was stuck. Compromised.”

  “So why didn’t you kill me then?” Niko asked, not sure he believed Preston was ever in a position to do it effectively. Niko was no helpless victim; he was trained. Even against Werewolves.

  Preston’s mouth pulled further toward his eyes. He shifted lanes and turned along a narrow path into the jungle. “You smelled just as good then as you do now.” He shrugged. “I guess I was momentarily sense blind.”

  A shudder ran over Niko’s body. He knew that look, that language. It wasn’t unlike the way Cobalt had talked of Soul Mates when Niko had been determined to ignore it. He didn’t want to admit he had the same feelings Cobalt did, the same images in his head, the same weakness to Cobalt’s scent and Song. He knew Werewolves operated more on scent than anything else when it came to finding their Fated Mates, though, and that Preston kept on about how good he smelled unnerved him. He didn’t have the same draw to Preston he had to Cobalt. Did he? He had been obsessed with Preston for months, but that was determination to see him arrested. And when Preston had kissed him, it had felt all off, as though reality fractured, not quite aligned properly. But was that only his feelings for Cobalt causing that? And if he was Cobalt’s Soul Mate…could he be Preston’s Fated too? Was that even possible?

  “I don’t buy it,” Niko said sharply, aware his voice was huskier than he wanted. His swollen cock started to become painful, but even that pain was strangely pleasurable, and Niko damned himself internally. Why was he like this? “You looked into me before Cobalt and I showed up. You said as much. You were already planning on using me as a way out of the Woods, a way to bring it all down. I think you left me alive because you needed me alive, and maybe Phoebe thinks that too.”

  Preston laughed as they rolled the car backward through the waterfall to hide it. The water thumped down like rocks hitting the roof, drowning out Preston’s amusement. “Who knows? But like I said, if she knew what I was doing, I wouldn’t still be walking around. If she’s got an inkling, that’s all it is. And we’re both luckier for that.” He turned to check behind him as he backed into the space he’d vacated earlier. The car’s cameras and sensors allowed him to let it do the work, but he didn’t. He seemed to want to park it himself. “More likely I’m just the best patsy. If you wriggle out of her clutches and prove your innocence, leaving my paw prints there is a smart move. Who, apart from Sade Hemlock himself, has the most to gain from you being arrested or killed? I do.” He turned the car off and adjusted his hair in the mirror. “It’s only logical.”

  Niko unbuckled himself with some effort, noting the jerkiness of his movements. He took deep, calculated breaths to calm himself, but his blood pumped through his veins like rapids down a mountain. He forced himself out of the car.

  “You’re not hurt she’s betraying you?” Niko asked, studying Preston’s face as he emerged from the cavern.

  “I’m betraying her too, remember?” he said in response. Then, with a laugh, he added, “It’s been a long time since I’ve let myself be hurt by Phoebe’s actions. You don’t maintain a relationship with a psychopath like that without knowing what you’re dealing with.”

  Niko struggled to walk comfortably along the pathway back to the cabin. The monkey, Dagonet or whatever his name was, seemed to be waiting for them, lingering in the darkness of the upper branches. Niko felt something like a pebble strike his head. Looking up, he found the monkey lobbing chestnuts at them. Preston stopped, caught one of the flying nuts, and launched it right back. The nut zinged by Dagonet’s head, missing by hairs, and sent the monkey screeching away. Niko suspected Preston had missed on purpose.

  “So what is her big plan then? What’s the end game of this whole mess?” Niko asked. The announcement Phoebe had made public was troubling enough, but Niko felt certain it was not the end goal. It was too small, too insignificant in the long run for someone like Linden to waste her time and energy on. Preston stopped again, chewing silently on his tongue. Niko watched as he tried to open his mouth, struggling with his jaw. Dark brows furrowed, he looked at Niko with confusion. Niko sighed heavily. “You can’t tell me. Contract.” He shook his head, thinking about all they’d just discussed, trying to sort through what Preston could and could not say. “You don’t know for sure why Phoebe planted your prints. That’s why you could talk about it. But you do know what she’s after now. It’s not a guess.” Preston nodded. “Can I guess?”

  The Werewolf seemed to think it over, raising his shoulders in a kind of shrug. But it was difficult to tell exactly what he meant by that given that Niko could barely see him clearly anymore. Night had fallen deeply over the jungle-forest, and Niko realized, in the shifting shadows of the trees, just how long they’d been gone. He needed to check on Cobalt.

  Pushing onward down the path, he overtook Preston, increasingly urgent in his need to find the Selki
e. His body wasn’t sure whether to yield to the concern for Cobalt’s well-being or Niko’s deep hunger for release more, so he was left with a dizzying sense of panic and hypersensitivity. Reaching out to brace against a tree trunk as he climbed over exposed roots, he felt the bark scratch at his palm. The slightest scraping caused a surge of pleasure in him, and he nearly tripped and fell on his face.

  Preston caught him, pushing him slowly backward into the clearing where the cabin stood. Niko was panting. Preston’s tongue flicked out along his lower lip.

  “You seem to be struggling,” he said, his voice deep and quiet. “Why fight it? Let me help you out. I can be gentle, I promise.” He breathed the words as though they were wind, wrapping around Niko’s body as he moved backward to the cabin. Niko’s heart raced. Preston closed the distance quickly. “But I know how rough you really like it.”

  Suddenly Niko’s back was up against something hard and wooden. Chest heaving, he was caught between his hunger and his alarm at what Preston was proposing. A voice in his mind and a song in his chest called for Cobalt, singing his name again and again, but Niko couldn’t make his own mouth move. He couldn’t push Preston back, couldn’t move another inch in any direction. He remembered the wounded look on Uriah’s face when he found out Niko had had sexual contact with Sade. Consent or not, that Uri took it to be cheating left him crumpled. The idea of seeing that same expression on Cobalt’s face was unbearable. But as that thought made itself clear, so too did the memory of Cobalt’s confused, squinting look when Niko donned the cuffs and collar with the glamour. He didn’t look like himself, and Cobalt hadn’t looked at him like he usually did. Was it that easy for Cobalt to lose the twinkle of affection for Niko? What if his appearance changed permanently for any reason? Would Cobalt want him less if he was less attractive?