He thought back to being in Cole’s cell. He wondered if it would have been a better idea, after all, to simply squeeze the life out of the asshole.
But he hadn’t. He’d let Cole get in his head, saying that shit that wasn’t true.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” Rusty was saying.
Avery snapped his attention back to the conversation. He didn’t want to think about that Cole Randall shit. “Rusty, I think you need to come out with those kids.”
“No,” Rusty said. “I can’t. My sisters are in here. My mother. Too many other people I care about. I couldn’t leave them. I don’t know what he’d do to them. Sometimes, when Jimmy gets angry, he hurts people.”
“Well, take your mother and sisters with you. Convince them all to come out.”
“They won’t do that. They’ll do what Jimmy says. It’s what we all do.”
The man sounded so hopeless and frightened. Avery couldn’t quite fathom it. His relationship with his own father was strained—well, nonexistent. But that was because Avery had killed his mother and brother on his first full moon. Four or five neighbors had been over for a dinner party, and Avery had gotten them as well. His father had only been spared because of a business trip. Avery wasn’t sure who his father blamed more for the whole incident, himself or Avery. Anyway, they hadn’t spoken in over ten years.
He’d been angry with his father. Hurt by him. And he’d even agreed with his father’s idea that Avery was a monster.
But he’d never been afraid of his own father. Not in the way that Rusty was afraid.
Avery wished he knew what to say, how to convince Rusty to do the right thing. But he didn’t, so all he said was, “All right, well, let’s get those kids out. Tomorrow.”
* * *
Dana stood in the living room of Cole’s new apartment, which was only down the hallway from her own. She hugged herself. “I can’t believe he let you out.”
Cole had his hands in his pockets, smiling at her. He was devilishly pleased with himself. “It’s a deal, Dana. I help him get Jimmy, he lets me go.”
“But you’re… a murderer. We don’t let murderers go.”
He shrugged. “And yet.”
This couldn’t be happening. She didn’t think she could deal with Cole being so… accessible. She’d been convinced that she could keep away from him when he was locked down in that cell, but now, with him just down the hall, with thinking of him every five minutes…
That was going to be impossible.
Cole strode across the room, coming closer to her.
She ran for the door. “I need to go.”
He beat her there. He leaned up against the door, blocking her path. “Why? You were already on my cell block. You were obviously coming to see me. Why fight it?”
“I wasn’t coming to see you.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Oh, please, Dana.”
“I wasn’t. I was there to talk to Adam and Chase. I had a thought.” She searched his face. She didn’t want her thought to be true, but she felt like the evidence was obvious. She thought of Avery, laughing. It’s like you don’t know him at all. “One of the reasons we came here was to talk to them. We got a call that they’d been slamming themselves at their doors, yelling my name.”
Cole furrowed his brow. “That’s weird.”
“It’s very weird,” she said. “And I hadn’t thought about it, because of everything else that’s happened. What’s even weirder is that I was thinking about them. I never think about them, but right around the time they went nuts, I thought about them.”
He smirked. “You think you’re psychic, Dana?”
“No, I think I called them.”
He looked down at his hands, a wry smile climbing over his face.
“When we were mated, I was the alpha of your pack. And I had assumed that you started making a pack when you started killing those wolves. But you started earlier than that, didn’t you? Like in high school.”
Cole took a deep breath. “Honestly, Dana, I didn’t really know what I was doing at the time.”
“You did, you asshole. You knew exactly what you were doing. You made them your betas, and you forced them to shift. The Brockway Massacre is your fault.”
“What if it was?”
Oh god. He’d as good as admitted it, hadn’t he?
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
when Cole was seventeen…
Cole had the first conversation with Chase and Adam about his plan. It was after he’d been locked in the punishment room for four days, then been in bed, recovering. Because of that, he’d missed another week of school. He was getting behind in his classes. But he didn’t care, because he wasn’t going to be around for too much longer.
“I don’t know, man,” said Chase. “You sound so serious about this shit.”
“That’s because I am,” said Cole.
“We can’t kill people,” said Adam. “We’ll go to jail.”
“Not if we’re werewolves,” said Cole. “If we’re werewolves, we’d only be taken in to be rehabilitated.”
“Still, dude,” said Chase. “It’s a big thing.”
“We could pull it off, though,” said Cole. “Don’t you think we could?” He knew that was the way to get them on board. To challenge them.
Adam and Chase looked at him, but neither said anything.
“Come on,” said Cole. “Hypothetically, we could do this. Don’t you think?”
“Well, we’re not werewolves,” said Adam.
“We just have to get bitten, though,” said Cole. “I happen to know someone who could do that.” He didn’t tell them that he could do it himself.
“You do?” said Chase.
Cole nodded. “I do.”
Chase and Adam both exchanged a look.
“Well… hypothetically,” said Adam. “I mean, not saying I’d actually do it or anything.”
Cole smiled.
The whole thing had come to him while he was lying in bed, resting and recovering from being in the punishment room. He’d started thinking again about trying to get free from Jimmy, because he knew that he had to get away. And soon.
He wasn’t going to call someone anymore.
No. That wasn’t going to cut it.
At first he thought he’d bite someone.
He could probably do that if he could manage to shift on his own. Which he was pretty sure he could do. If Jimmy knew he was shifted, of course, Jimmy could make him shift back. But as long as he was away from Jimmy, then he could do that.
Then he’d find someone to bite. Immediately, lying there in the dark, he thought about biting Dana Gray.
He liked that idea a lot. Thinking about sinking werewolf teeth into her skin make him feel sweaty and excited under the covers in his bed. His cock thickened between his legs.
He wanted under Dana Gray’s skin.
He wanted inside Dana Gray. One way or the other, he wanted into her.
Maybe it was fucked up. He wasn’t sure he cared anymore. Things didn’t seem quite as simple as they had before the punishment room. They were muddier now—everything swimming into each other, colors swirling up.
But there were some things in sharp focus.
And Dana Gray was one of them.
He wanted her.
After he bit her, he and Dana would both get taken away by the SF, and they’d be werewolves together. And maybe, after a little bit of time, he and Dana could get to know each other. Maybe he’d get the chance to be with her.
Not to just bite her, but to really be with her. To get her to put his cock in her mouth.
His body twitched at the thought of it.
But then he realized that wasn’t going to work.
If he bit Dana, she’d be afraid of him. She’d blame him for turning her. She wouldn’t be inclined to make nice with him.
Well… he wasn’t sure. Maybe she would, and maybe she wouldn’t. He thought of the expression on her face as she had bobbed up and down on
Kyle’s cock. Maybe she’d—somehow—enjoy being bitten.
No.
That was crazy. Of course she wouldn’t enjoy it. No one enjoyed being bitten by a werewolf. And up until his little herb trip, Cole was pretty sure that he hadn’t ever thought he’d enjoy biting someone. But now…
Muddy. Swirling.
He wanted inside her. He wanted under her skin.
But maybe he shouldn’t be the one to bite her. Just in case. Because—while it would be mind blowing to sink teeth into her—he wanted her sexually more than he wanted to bite her. And if biting her meant she was always afraid of him…
Well, it was too much of a risk.
So, it would be better if another wolf did it.
It would be better if she thought they were both victims.
In the darkness, Cole smiled.
Now, with Adam and Chase, he whispered out his entire plan without once mentioning Dana. The guys didn’t need to know.
Chase laughed. “Oh, man, it would be sick if we did this for real.”
“We can’t do it for real,” said Adam, looking almost wistful.
“Why can’t we?” said Cole.
* * *
Dana glared at Cole.
He didn’t even have the decency to squirm. “Look, Dana, life at the farm with Jimmy had become unbearable for me. I had to get out of there. I knew that there was one way to do it, and that way was the SF. For them to come and take me away, though, some people had to die. And those fuckwads at our high school deserved it. They were all so self-righteous. If you could have heard the way that Kyle Lamar and his basketball buddies talked about you—”
“Bullshit, Cole. You want to go to the SF, you call them and turn yourself in. There are fucking toll free numbers for tips. People didn’t have to die.”
“Maybe not,” he said. “But this way was better.”
“Better?” She gaped at him. Then it dawned on her. “It was because of me.”
His lips curved into a smile.
“You did it because of me.”
“I wanted to know you. I thought that if we were together at the SF, then maybe you’d see me differently.”
She backed away, feeling ill.
“I couldn’t do it myself, because you’d hate me. So I needed Adam and Chase to do it.”
“You sentenced them to life locked up, all so that you could get to know me?”
“I didn’t know that would happen. I didn’t know it mattered if things were done on purpose. I thought they’d get rehabilitated too.”
“And the people… Cole, you killed so many people. All my friends.”
“They weren’t your friends. They were—”
“My mom.” A sob caught in her throat. “You killed my mom.”
Cole opened his mouth to say something, but a shadow crossed over his face. He looked down at the ground.
“She was there, you know. She was in the gym. I always felt guilty because I never even looked for her. I didn’t even think about her. I was so scared. I ran. I left her there to die.” Tears were flowing down her face now. “But you did it. You killed her.”
Cole still wouldn’t say anything. He stood there, blocking the door, staring at his shoes, and not saying a damned thing.
She shoved him. “What? Don’t you have glib retort for that?”
He swallowed. “I’m sorry.”
“Oh, fuck that,” she said through her tears. “You’re not sorry. I see how sorry you are about what you’ve done. Those people don’t mean anything to you, so you don’t fucking care.”
“Mothers mean something to me,” he said softly. “My mother almost died once. I saved her. I’m sorry that I didn’t save yours.” He moved away from the door.
She put a trembling hand on the knob. “You need to stay away from me, do you understand that? Stay away.” And she flung herself out into the hallway. She needed to put as much distance between the two of them as possible.
* * *
“You can’t make a deal with him,” Dana said. She was out of breath from running across the field to the gate where both Earl and Avery were standing. It was late afternoon and the sun hung heavy in the sky. “You have to lock him back up. You don’t understand what he is.”
Earl looked up. “Gray? You all right?”
“Deal?” said Avery. “What’s she talking about?”
Dana stopped moving. She’d been crying the whole drive over here, and tears were still spilling out of her eyes. She dashed them away, fury seizing her. “Lowell made a deal with Cole. He let him out so that Cole would help the SF get Jimmy.”
Avery’s eyes widened. “What?”
“Relax,” said Earl. “I didn’t make any deal with him.”
“But you let him out of his cell,” said Dana. “I saw that.”
Earl nodded. “Yes, for the time being he’s got free reign of headquarters and the area near the farm. And I told him that after he helps us get Jimmy off the farm, he’ll be free. But… I lied.”
“You lied?” said Dana.
“You really like making these fake deals, don’t you?” said Avery.
“Look, Randall could be an asset to us,” said Earl. “As long as he thinks that we’re holding up our end of the bargain, then he’ll do his part, and this whole mess will be wrapped up soon.”
“And then you’ll lock him back up?” said Dana.
“Of course,” said Earl.
She wasn’t sure what to say to that. On the one hand, it was sort of awful. Dealing dishonestly like that wasn’t something she thought the SF would do. On the other hand, she was positively disgusted by Cole, and she wanted him to suffer for all time. She crossed her arms over her chest.
“I have to admit,” said Earl. “I’m a bit confused. Brooks had led me to believe that you had a… fondness for Randall.”
“No,” she said. “No, not at all. He’s a monster, and he gets inside my head and makes me do things…” She clutched her head, turning around in a circle, thinking of all the times she’d been intimate with Cole, and all that time he’d been the man responsible for her mother’s death. It was too much. She thought a bomb was going to detonate in her brain. She stopped moving and faced off with Earl. “I hate him.”
“Hmm.” Earl got out a cigarette. “Well, I’d hoped that you’d be a help to us, actually. I’d hoped that you’d serve to… pacify him.”
She was confused. “What?”
“Well, Brooks told me that you and Randall had a bond. Randall assured me that he wouldn’t run off because he wanted to be close to you. So, I assumed that if Randall was ‘free,’ your presence and company would serve to distract him enough that he would never suspect that the deal wasn’t real.”
She bit down on her lip. “Oh.”
“Hey,” said Brooks. “You can’t expect her to be near him if she doesn’t want to.”
Earl shrugged. “Like I said, I was under the impression Gray wanted to. I saw the way the two of you were eyeing each other in the hallway earlier. I could have sworn you weren’t looking at him like he was a… what did you call him? A monster?”
She squared her shoulders. “Well, he is. And I hate him. But I don’t want him to get away either. If you need me to be a distraction, I can do that.” And inside, a tiny part of her was relieved, because that part of her wanted to be near Cole right now. Damned stupid alpha bond. She turned around and started to walk away.
“Hold on.” Avery came after her.
She kept walking. Avery hated her. He’d said so. For all she knew, he was only going to yell at her again.
His hand settled on her shoulder. “Gray, wait.”
She stopped. “What?” She sniffled a little as she turned to him.
“You’re not okay. What happened?”
She rubbed her nose. “Oh, I just figured out why Chase and Adam were yelling my name. I called them.”
“Called them?”
“I inherited Cole’s pack, remember? They were part of it. They w
ere my betas.”
Avery wrinkled his eyebrows. “But if they were part of Cole’s pack, then that means…”
“He planned out the whole massacre, including me getting bitten, so that he and I could be together.” She grimaced. “He’s sick. He killed a gymnasium full of people so that he could ‘save’ me. Everything he’s done, it’s been about me somehow. He’s psycho, Brooks, and I’m his obsession.”
“And your mother,” said Avery quietly. “He’s responsible for your mother’s death.”
She nodded. “Yeah.”
He put his arms around her. “Shit, Gray. I’m sorry.”
She clung to him.
* * *
The children came as Rusty had promised. They came in the dark of the evening, all in their nightgowns, some clutching stuffed teddy bears, some sucking their thumbs. Some in the arms of older siblings. Some solemn. Some afraid.
But they came. They streamed out from the house under the cover of the darkness, sprinting across the lawn to the gate, where the SF team waited for them.
They recognized Dana.
One of the little girls ran straight for her and wrapped her tiny arms around Dana’s legs.
It made Dana’s heavy heart feel a little lighter.
The children were all confused and most were at least a little bit scared.
Dana helped them get to the big bus that they’d gotten to transport them. All of the children were going to a nearby group home, except a few of the older girls who might be able to shift. They’d be kept at headquarters in case Jimmy called them or tried to make them turn into wolves.
The kids didn’t want her to leave them, so she rode on the bus with them, and then she helped them all get settled in their new rooms. There were big rooms—five kids all together.
It was late, and a lot of the little ones were tired.
Dana tucked each one of them in.
But her heart broke a little bit when they asked about their mothers. She wasn’t sure what to say. She told them that they’d be together with their family again soon. But she wasn’t sure if that was the truth or not.
Bad Moon Rising (Cole and Dana) Page 24