Pack of Lies

by Edwards, Hailey

  “Kid.” Doing a quick twirl, I showed her the tank strapped to my back. “You’re lucky you didn’t hit him, or me. One spark, and you could have blown us all sky-high.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “I don’t know what happened to your sister, but I believe that you believe Midas is responsible.” I navigated the debris. “That doesn’t give you the right to exact vigilante justice on him.”

  “That’s what you and the POA do,” she challenged. “You’re above the law.”

  “We enforce the law. We step on the wrong side of it, and we get punished the same as you.”

  “I don’t believe that.”

  “Believe it.” The grimness in my tone must have made a dent. “No one is above the law.”

  Head down, she stared at her lap. “Will he press charges?”

  “Not at this time.” Admitting he wasn’t in his right mind was inviting her to reconsider her act of mercy. “He’ll be in touch if that changes.”

  “I fall under your jurisdiction, right?”

  “You attacked a gwyllgi. You committed a violent crime against the pack. They’re the ones who will dole out the punishment.”

  “I can’t believe I blew it.” She puffed out her cheeks. “What if I promise not to do it again?”

  “You’re beating yourself up for not murdering him, and you asked him to step back out into the street. I’m not sure I can trust you not to mow him down the next chance you get.”

  “I came to Atlanta to find him.” Her bottom lip wobbled. “I didn’t think this would be so hard.”

  “Taking a life is no small matter.”

  “Not that.” She braced her elbows on her steering wheel. “Getting him alone.”

  “Yeah.” I rocked back on my heels. “Not hearing any remorse here.”

  “You don’t get it.” She gazed out her cracked windshield. “He killed her.”

  “How?” Better yet, I wondered. “When?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then how do you know he’s responsible?”

  “Ask him.” Her gaze went distant. “Ar scáth a chéile a mhaireann na daoine.”

  “That’s beautiful.” A bad sign, but lovely. “What does it mean?”

  “People live in each other’s shadows.”

  Unbidden, my gaze swung to Ambrose. “What did you say to Midas earlier?”

  “Bad ending upon you.”

  As far as curses went, that struck me as mild, but it clearly meant more or different to him.

  Headlights flashed across my face, and sirens wailed in the distance.

  It was time for us to go.

  “Call me tomorrow.” I passed her one of my cards. “We’ll sort this out then.”

  “Sure. Fine.” She took the card without looking at me, just kept staring a hole through Midas. “Whatever.”

  “You might want to work on faking remorse in the meantime.”

  As much as I wanted to ask what she was, how this all fit, etiquette forbade me from questioning her.

  Honestly? I would have smashed etiquette to pieces with a reality hammer if she hadn’t spouted fae-sounding language at me. That was the equivalent of flashing her Faerie card, and the good little necromancer in me, what scraps remained of her, cringed away from that which the Society had forbidden. But the rest of me acknowledged I had a job to do, and if the pixie girl, who might actually be a pixie, got in the way a second time, I would have to address the issue.

  “What’s your name? It’s not on the card you gave me with your contact details or on the app.”

  Until she attempted to mow us down, I hadn’t noticed her name and picture never showed on screen. I hadn’t questioned the glaring absence either, which was a magic of its own.

  Names and contact information were part of the Swyft contract with its drivers. I got a sneaking suspicion she was stealing identities to make the system acknowledge her, which would explain why I never expected her when she roared up to the curb. And why, despite her long hours, she was hard up for money. The system would credit the employee, tips and all. Not the thief moonlighting their gig.

  Her choice of occupation, one of them anyway, made much more sense to me now. She must have been hoping Midas would use the app one of these days, and she sat hunched over her phone, waiting for his ID to pop.

  Ghosting another online driver would also explain why she was always so frantic to load me into her car. The driver whose ID she had jacked to sneak into the system would be hot on her heels to pick me up once she accepted the fare on their behalf.

  That shed new light on why she had been racing as many folks across town as she could in a night too. She had wanted to maximize her chances for landing him. Or the next best thing—a sucker like me.

  No wonder she was so quick to give me her number and offer private rides at the rate charged by the app. She struck gold making that connection, and she didn’t want to go back to the mines.

  “You can call me Remy,” she said, defeat crushing her voice to a whisper.

  Backing away from the girl, from Remy, I returned to find Midas in the same condition as when I left him.

  “Our ride is here.” I couldn’t defer to his preferences at this point, I had to act. “I’m going to put my arm around you.” He struggled, against me or his thoughts, I didn’t know, but he didn’t fight me off. “Now I’m going to walk you to the car.”

  The driver eyed us through his window, clearly not thrilled with the pickup point.

  All smiles and forced laughter, I threw open the door and shoved Midas in as he began to protest.

  “I’m so glad you’re here.” I talked over him, not letting him get in a word edgewise. “My friend got soused, and there’s no way I could carry him back to his place. You’re a lifesaver.”

  Ah yes, the old drunk-friend line. Worked every time. There wasn’t much you couldn’t blame on alcohol.

  The man’s scowl melted into a grin, relieved his fare was a pretty girl with nice manners. Too bad there was no way to hide my ID from the driver. I would just have to deal with acting like an airhead or a drunk or a drunk airhead to get us back home. Not a great image for the future POA, but whatever worked was my motto.

  “Where to, cuteness?”

  I piled in behind Midas. “The Faraday.”

  The building, paired with my ID on his screen, must have clicked in his head.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  The newfound respect was nice, but it didn’t extend to Midas. The driver kept eyeballing him, trying to place him. Me? I would have been more concerned I might have brought a dangerous criminal into his car instead of the promised harmless drunk, but I could tell this guy was all about the dish.

  Midas was borderline comatose by the time we arrived at the Faraday, and I cracked my door long enough to yell, “Hank, get over here.”

  Casting his gaze skyward, he gave up on divine deliverance from dealing with me and did as he was told.

  “You’re running up one hell of a tab…” He froze when he spotted Midas. “Move.”

  Happy to oblige, I scooted out and let Hank try his hand at wrangling the beta. “I’ll get the front door.”

  The unmistakable crunch of bone breaking glued my shoes to the pavement. “Hank?”

  A heavy thud announced his body smacking the pavement, knocked out cold by Midas, who came out swinging.

  “Whoa, boy.” I held up my hands. “It’s all right.”

  The guttural spate of what sounded suspiciously like the pixie girl’s fae lingo poured from his mouth.

  Gaelic? Irish? Scottish? Faelic? Faeish?

  Whatever the language, my patchy high school Spanish was not up to the task of helping me decipher it.

  “Midas, it’s me.” I eased closer. “It’s Hadley.”

  Eyes wild, he whirled, lost and confused and spewing words I couldn’t decipher.

  The way I saw it, I had two options.

  One: I could hope he didn’t bolt while I ran inside for hel
p.

  Two: I could knock his ass out and drag him into the lobby and then find help.

  Option two won by a landslide when Midas’s unfocused eyes settled on me with no recognition in them whatsoever.

  “Ambrose,” I said under my breath. “Take a little off the top.”

  Unspooling across the sidewalk, my shadow took his sweet time. He wasn’t a fan of the taste of gwyllgi.

  “Now,” I snapped, louder. “Do it now.”

  You remember what Snowball did to us, right? I thought at him, uncertain if it worked or just made me feel better. Do you want that to happen again?

  The shadow paced back and forth, drawing out the moment and backing me into a corner.

  Snowball was a danger to us both. Do you know why? I can guess. Her fae blood. Snowball was half fae masquerading as a gwyllgi. He’s a gwyllgi prince with buckets of fae blood in his lineage. Do you really think he can’t hurt us too?

  The threat worked, even though I was spitballing, and the shadow began weaving in and out of Midas, nibbling on his power with each pass.

  Snowball had been able to see Ambrose, and she had been able to hurt him. She bit his shadow-self, and the pain was some of the worst of my life. Recovery required letting Ambrose feed, and that was dangerous. Right now, so soon after my episode, it was an impossibility.

  Bishop might have retraced my daytime footsteps to put my mind at ease, but we still didn’t know why I had made the trek. I had theories, but I couldn’t trust my future, and other people’s lives, to a hunch.

  Crimson magic splashed onto the pavement, and my heart skipped a beat. “Midas, no.”

  Head thrown back, eyes closed, he showed no signs of hearing me as his power kept sloshing higher.

  Hank was unconscious, Bishop wasn’t in his crow’s nest to dispatch help, and I didn’t know how long it would be before we attracted the attention of someone in the lobby. Worse, we were starting to get looks from people on the street. The Faraday’s protection only extended so far, and the curb sat just outside the wards protecting the paranormal from the view of the normal.

  “I really don’t want to do this.” I wasn’t sure I could take him down without killing him. “Please, don’t make me do this.”

  Ambrose was licking his chops, ready for more, but I reeled him in before he got any bright ideas.

  Dipping my hands into his cold center, I reached for my blades and drew them.

  Big mistake.

  Huge.

  Ruby-bright magic spouted up and over Midas’s head, washing down him and leaving his other self in charge.

  The blond gwyllgi lowered his head, growl revving up his throat, and I braced to defend myself.

  “Midas, please,” I begged. “Remember me.”

  The beast shook its head, blinked its bright eyes, and charged.

  Swords raised, palms damp, I ran quick mental calculations on how best to disable him and came up empty.

  I was going to do this. This was happening.

  Please don’t make me do this.

  At the last second, Ambrose darted between us, motioning at me to drop the swords.

  For whatever reason, I did. Goddess, I listened to him, lowered my weapons, and stood defenseless.

  Massive paws with wicked-sharp tips hit me in the center of my chest, and I fell back under Midas’s weight as he pinned me to the concrete…and began licking my face like he wanted to learn how many licks it took to find the Tootsie Roll center of a Tootsie Pop.

  “Ugh.” I wiped thick goo off in slobbery handfuls. “Killing me would have been more merciful.”

  The beast huffed in my face, nuzzling my throat, and stuck his tongue down my ear.

  “Gack.” I thrashed under him. “Mercy.” I shoved at his chest. “Have mercy.”

  From the corner of my eye, I watched Ambrose stroke Midas’s shadow, petting his head like he was a good doggie. That was bizarre enough, but come on. Ambrose had saved Midas’s life. He might have even saved mine since killing a gwyllgi, let alone their prince, came with a guaranteed death sentence.

  He was screwing with my head, and I didn’t like it. Ambrose didn’t have an altruistic bone in his… Fine, so he had no bones and no body. Still. His intervention lent weight to the argument he had figured out a way to take me over again. He wouldn’t want his vehicle of choice totaled in a collision with a rabid gwyllgi, now would he?

  “Sit.” I forced the trembling from my fingers when I reached up to scratch Midas’s ears. “Sit, boy.”

  Boy did not sit. Boy kept slobbering all over me. Boy was I in trouble.

  It beat getting eaten, though. Or thrusting a blade through his heart.

  “What am I looking at?” Ares called from a safe distance. “Do you need help or…?”

  “Call him.” Muscles coiled in preparation, I got ready to roll. “Throw a stick or something.”

  “I’m going to pretend you didn’t ask for help in one breath and then insult me in the next.”

  “Thank you.” The Faraday’s front door opened and shut, Ares leaving me alone with Midas. “Hey, I said thank you.”

  A few minutes later, she emerged with a raw steak on a plate and set it down near the entrance.

  The soft whine in Midas’s throat urged me to pet him and tell him everything was going to be okay, but I was trying to get him to move his furry butt. I couldn’t afford to comfort him, or he might not leave.

  “Go on, boy.” I held still as a log. “I’ll wait right here.”

  Slowly, slowly, one paw after the other, he inched away from me toward the meat. He glanced over his shoulder every other step, so I had to time it just right to get vertical before he could cover the distance back and keep me pinned.

  At the last possible second, I sprang to my feet and did a quick inventory of aches and pains. The back of my head throbbed from smacking the cement, and my stomach hurt from him stepping on me. Otherwise, I was just slimy and reeked of dog breath.

  Ares skirted Midas while he ate and came to stand with me. “What’s wrong with him?”

  “I don’t know.” I leaned on her for help to get in before I made a bigger spectacle, and Midas followed me into the lobby with the steak bone sticking out of the corner of his mouth. “Get the healer.”

  Ares dropped me on one of the fancy sofas, and Midas leapt onto it and walked over my lap, flopping down across me. He chewed on his bone while I sat there waiting, losing all feeling from the thighs down.

  “Midas,” Abbott greeted him about the time paralysis set in. “What seems to be the problem?”

  Crunching away, Midas gave no indication he heard or cared, but he did kick his hind legs out straight behind him.

  “I’m glad one of us is comfortable.” I shoved his hips, but it was a waste. “I can’t feel my legs.”

  “Ares,” Abbott said, congenial as ever. “Clear the lobby, please.”

  His guards, the same two, stuck to his side while she ushered everyone staying in upstairs to their rooms and everyone going out onto the sidewalk.

  “I need a syringe and the bronze nitrate.” He held out his hand, and a guard passed it to him. “Hadley, would you mind holding Midas still?”

  “I don’t like this plan.” I wrapped my arms around his neck. “I really, really don’t like this plan.”

  Abbott struck like a rattler, stabbing Midas with the needle and injecting him with the viscous fluid.

  The beast stretched across my lap fell asleep before he could do more than peel back his lips.

  “Bronze nitrate?” I stroked Midas’s coarse fur. “Bronze is bad news for gwyllgi, isn’t it?”

  Much like silver was a potent allergen to wargs.

  “How about you tell me, in exact detail, how Midas ended up in this state?”

  The segue wasn’t neat or tidy, and it left no room for argument. I had other things to do, the OPA to wrangle, and I couldn’t split hairs. If he wanted to keep gwyllgi trade secrets, I had to let him. I outlined the entire incident from
start to finish, and Abbott’s expression was carved in stone by the end.

  “Do you know what’s wrong?” I fisted my hand in Midas’s coat. “Can you fix him?”

  Abbott’s mouth fought him, his lips forming words he didn’t say, before settling on, “Yes.”

  “Yes you know, or yes you can fix him?”

  The guards moved in and lifted Midas off my lap then carried him away.

  That was not an answer, damn it.

  “You’ll give me updates, right?” Pins-and-needles pain stabbed me when I stood, my feet numb and legs awkward, and I flopped back down in defeat. “Abbott?”

  “I’ll call when I have news.”

  That’s what he said, but I told enough lies to recognize one when I heard it.

  I could invoke the courtship. That would get me answers. Maybe. Probably? But I didn’t want to throw my weight around on that front when I had no intentions of following through. Six weeks, okay. I could do that. I had faked worse for longer. But mating someone? Mating Midas? That was as likely as me roping the moon.

  Ambrose watched them go, stroking his chin. He didn’t offer any insights, and I was drawing a blank.

  I didn’t get why he cared. I could understand him protecting my body, but not my heart.

  My heart.

  No, no, no.

  Not heart. Heart made it sound like I loved Midas, and I didn’t. I…maybe liked him. Possibly wanted to nibble on him. But that was it. Hormones. Nice, safe physical attraction. Nothing higher than the belt was affected by him. Just the lady bits.

  With that settled, and Ambrose too sated to keep pestering me, I checked the status of the lobby.

  Now came the fun part.

  All by my lonesome, I cut my eyes in the direction Abbott had gone. I wasn’t waiting to see if they brought Midas back. That would be stupid, and a total waste of time I didn’t have with Bishop and Ford missing.

  Twisting my shirt around my finger, I called Linus, practicing what I would say in my head.

  “Hadley,” he answered, concern secondary to his welcome.

  “We’ve got a problem.” I explained about the roach, the raid, and our missing people. “Can I access HQ without Bishop?”

  “The sequences are automated for a reason.”