by Lisa Childs
Dwight shuffled his feet again and caught himself from falling when the blow would have dropped a human. He just shook his head, as if shaking off an insignificant slap. “I’m not the reason Kate’s getting hurt. You are.”
Just as he had suspected, this man definitely knew the secrets Kate wanted so desperately to learn. Or had she already figured everything out?
She suspected what Warrick was. Did she also have suspicions about the Secret Vampire Society? He wouldn’t doubt it; she was that good a detective. And she had seen too much—too much of that secret underground surgical room.
“You’ve hurt Kate before,” Warrick reminded the man.
Her ex flinched, as if he actually felt remorse. “We’re not talking about the past. We’re talking about the danger that Kate’s in now. Because of you.”
Warrick narrowed his eyes and studied this man who wasn’t just a man or a detective. He was something else entirely—maybe a member of another pack. Because of his obsession with his ex, he could be the biggest threat to Kate’s safety. “Where were you when she was attacked?”
“Not where I needed to be,” Dwight replied with a glance up at the fourth-floor apartment, “to protect her from whatever one of you mangy animals attacked her last night.”
“So you know…”
“That you’re a freakin’ werewolf?” He curled his lip in revulsion, and Warrick caught a glimpse of fangs. “Everyone in the Secret Vampire Society has been warned about you and the other members of your pack that are in Zantrax.”
“You’re one of the vampires.” That explained his strength. “The first time she was attacked in the alley behind Club Underground, it could have been you.” Protecting that damn secret society of theirs.
Dwight flinched. “The bandage on her forehead. Someone hit her in the head?”
“Yes.”
“I—I wouldn’t have done that,” he said.
“But you have attacked her before.” Warrick swung again, and it was as if Dwight wanted to be hit because he didn’t dodge the blow—just took it to his chin. So that his lip split and swelled.
He wiped away the blood with his tongue and admitted, “I hurt Kate in the past. Back when I was first turned into one of the society after getting bitten during a bust. I didn’t know how to deal with all her questions and suspicions without putting her in danger.”
Anger and revulsion coursed through Warrick. “So your way of dealing with her questions was to beat her?” He wanted to do more than hit the vampire detective now; he wanted to rip him apart.
“She’s a stubborn woman and smart,” Dwight told him what he already knew. “It was the only way to get her to back off.”
“You wanted her to leave you,” Warrick realized.
“I had to hurt her in order to protect her,” the detective explained. “I wanted to keep her alive. What about you? Do you care enough about Kate to let her go to protect her?”
He had tried. He had tried so many times to walk away from her. But he kept coming back. He told himself it was to protect her. But maybe it was just because he was too damn selfish to let her go.
*
“I’m not going to hurt you,” the man assured Kate, his arms lifted as if to prove he had no weapons.
But Kate already knew that a man didn’t need a weapon to hurt a woman—especially if he wasn’t just a man. She edged closer to the bed, to where she had left her holster and her gun before rushing out after Warrick last night.
“Who are you?” Maybe she should have asked what he was although she suspected he would evade her question just like Warrick had. And Paige. And Ben. And Dwight…
They all knew. Why wouldn’t they tell her? Was it that awful—that unimaginable?
She was afraid that it was. And if she knew, she would never be safe again. But she wasn’t safe now. And she had always believed that knowledge was power. They all had the power, and she was weak.
“My name is Reagan James,” the man answered her.
“James? So you are related to Warrick?” She wasn’t surprised—not with how alike they looked.
“I’m his brother.”
She was surprised now—so much so that she gasped. “But he said you killed his father. That would have been your father, too.”
Poor Warrick. No wonder he was so angry. But he was also conflicted; that was probably why he hadn’t reported to authorities what this man had done. He was his brother.
Despite Warrick’s claim that he had witnessed the murder, she waited for Reagan James to deny the allegation—to claim his innocence as most criminals did.
Instead, he nodded again but grimly, his jaw clenched so tightly that a muscle twitched in his unshaven cheek.
His honesty shocked her. If only the perps that she arrested were as honest… But then he knew there was an eyewitness to his crime. His own brother.
“I had my reasons,” he said.
“Self-defense?” Their father sounded as if he had been a horrible man.
Reagan shook his head this time. “Father never would have hurt me.”
Realization dawned, sickening her, as she suddenly understood why a man would kill his father. To protect someone else he loved.
That she loved, too.
“You did it for Warrick then?” She stepped closer, forgetting that he might be dangerous—uncaring that he was a killer—if he’d done it for his brother’s sake. “He was in danger?”
Reagan was back to nodding. “Yes, and he’s still in danger.”
“You’re going to hurt him?” Warrick was a witness to the man’s crime. Did he intend to eliminate him? But if he’d committed the crime in order to protect him…
“I don’t want to hurt him,” Reagan said.
But they both knew that Warrick might not give him a choice.
It wouldn’t matter if he was only acting out of self-preservation—she would stop Reagan from hurting Warrick, just like she had tried the night she’d shot him here in her bedroom.
But her bullets hadn’t stopped him any more effectively than they had his brother.
“I’m not the threat,” Reagan insisted. “But he won’t let me explain anything to him. He won’t let me warn him, so I’m going to warn you.”
She shivered, her blood chilling over receiving yet another warning. But this one worried her more— because it was for Warrick.
“I may not see him again,” she said, the words echoing hollowly in her hurting heart. “I told him not to come back until he was ready to tell me the truth about himself.”
Reagan sighed. “He can’t tell you the truth.”
“He just won’t,” she said, frustration and bitterness welling in her aching heart.
“No, he can’t,” Reagan insisted and with brotherly pride added, “Warrick takes the rules very seriously and follows them.”
“What rules?” She knew he didn’t care about the law or he wouldn’t be so hell-bent on his vigilante justice.
Reagan’s jaw clenched again then he replied, “My father’s rules.”
What kind of man had their father been? If he was the monster Kate was beginning to suspect he was, why was Warrick so devoted to him?
“That’s why he’s trying to kill you?” she asked.
Sadness and regret darkened Reagan’s topaz eyes. “My father would have ordered my death.”
“But your father is dead.” Had the man been so powerful that he was able to manipulate his survivors from the grave?
Reagan explained, “There’s a new leader to enforce his rules.”
“Leader of what? I don’t understand…” But she was afraid that she was beginning to; that she knew why Warrick and this man had survived her gunshots and why Warrick had a wound where she’d shot that creature that hadn’t been a dog but hadn’t been…
She was beginning to understand.
And Reagan must have realized that she had because he nodded in reply to her unspoken question. “I can’t tell you, either. But I can make sure that
you’re prepared.”
“I told you that he might not come back,” she reminded him and herself. “And if he doesn’t I won’t be able to warn him for you.”
“You’re in danger, too,” he said, gesturing toward her bandaged arms and the fading bruise and scar on her forehead. “You need protection.”
“I can take care of myself.” She reached for her gun but the holster was empty.
“Looking for this?” he asked, holding up her Glock. The metal glinted in the darkness.
The clock in the living room began to toll the chimes for the approach of midnight.
“You are dangerous,” Kate murmured. Warrick had been right to warn her against this man. He had manipulated her into believing him—into trusting him. And he’d had her weapon the entire time.
She lifted her hands—as she had that night against her feral attacker—as if she could fend off a bullet. She wasn’t like him and Warrick; if someone shot her in the heart, she wouldn’t survive her wounds. Her mind whirred with fear as she tried to think of how to overpower him, but he was even bigger than Warrick.
Warrick…
She’d told him to leave. If only she’d had him stay with her…
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’m not going to fire it.”
But she kept her hands raised, unwilling to trust him again. She should have heeded Warrick’s warning.
“I will not shoot a gun again,” he said, shuddering as he handled the weapon. “I’m only going to load it for you.” He opened his palm to bullets that gleamed much more brightly than the metal of the gun.
“I have bullets,” she assured him. In fact, she was pretty sure it was loaded now. Her weapon was always loaded and ready to go.
He emptied her cartridge, dropping her ammunition onto the floor. Each bullet pinged as it struck the hardwood and rolled away.
Panic filled her. He hadn’t just taken her gun; he was taking her ammunition, too. Even if she managed to get it back from him somehow…
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Preparing you.” He loaded the gun with those shiny bullets.
“What are they?”
“Silver.” The gun loaded, he held it out to her—the handle pointed toward her, the barrel pointed toward his chest. “This is the only real way to protect yourself.”
“I don’t understand…”
The clock chimed again.
“I think you do,” he said. “And I’m sorry that you learned the secret.”
“You told her?” Warrick asked, his deep voice gruff with shock. He stepped through the window she hadn’t realized was open until she shivered with cold. But maybe it was the anger and rage in his voice that chilled her more than the night breeze.
Warrick stalked toward his brother—his muscular body vibrating with that anger. “Why the hell would you do that?” he demanded to know. “You’ve just ordered her death!”
“She already knew,” Reagan said. “She was attacked by one of the pack—she knows what it was.”
“It was you! You attacked her!” Warrick shouted the accusation. But then his voice lowered and cracked with emotion when he asked, “Why do you have to take away everything and everyone I care about?”
But just as Reagan had said, Warrick didn’t give his brother a chance to explain or defend himself. Murderous rage gleaming in his eyes, he launched himself at Reagan.
But this wasn’t a fight between two men. For one, Reagan wasn’t really fighting back—just as he hadn’t that night in the alley. And for another, something strange began to happen with every chime of her clock. Kate’s heart pounded furiously as she watched—fear and shock overwhelming her.
The men began to change—their limbs and faces contorting into different dimensions. Their clothes tore, their expanding muscles and shape shredding the material. They didn’t stop—even as their bodies changed. They rolled around the floor; Warrick swinging what was once a fist that turned into something else.
A claw?
Reagan deflected the blow but instead of lifting an arm—it had become a leg.
Kate covered her mouth, holding in a scream of terror at what she was witnessing. The fight was horrible enough, but it grew worse when the men turned from men into beasts. She trembled as they growled and snarled and snapped at each other—reminding her of her own attack the night before.
Pain throbbed in her arms; she knew what it felt like for those teeth to tear flesh. She knew—intimately—the pain they were inflicting on each other.
She found her voice and screamed, “Stop!”
But they continued to grapple, clawing at each other. Maybe Reagan was only trying to stop Warrick—or maybe he had gone on the attack, too. She still wasn’t sure she could trust him. She only knew that she couldn’t stand by and watch him hurt the man she loved.
Blood was everywhere. It dripped from teeth and wounds, staining silver and raven pelts red, spilling onto her floor—spattering her walls. She had to stop them.
And Reagan had given her the means. She lifted the weapon. But her hands trembled—not from her injuries but with doubt. If she could believe Reagan, neither of them would survive one of these bullets. With as much as they looked alike as humans, they looked more alike as beasts. She couldn’t tell who was who—or what was what.
She couldn’t risk shooting Warrick with one of those silver bullets his brother had loaded into her gun. Maybe that had been his plan all along—that she killed Warrick for him.
She couldn’t risk it; she couldn’t risk Warrick’s life. She lowered her weapon and screamed again, “Stop!”
Sirens wailed in the distance. One of the wolves scrambled up off the floor and vaulted through that open window. The other lay on the hardwood, bleeding profusely. He was changed, but from the look of pain and concern and something else—something deeper—in his topaz gaze, she was able to recognize him.
Alarm clutched her heart. “Warrick!”
*
He hadn’t intended to come back to her apartment. It wasn’t as if he could give her the answers she had demanded from him earlier. But when he’d gone back to the abandoned bank, he had found Uncle Stefan waiting for him. His uncle had picked up Reagan’s scent for him, and Warrick had followed his brother’s trail back to Kate.
Why would the son of a bitch not leave her alone? Because Reagan knew—as everyone did—that Warrick cared about her. Too much.
That was why Warrick needed to come back—to make sure that she was okay. Not to tell her what she wanted to know. But she had learned his secret now.
Reagan had told her.
Warrick might have been able to claim his brother had lied to her. But then she’d watched them change before her own eyes. She wasn’t drugged. She wasn’t concussed. She wouldn’t doubt what she had witnessed with her own eyes—just like Warrick couldn’t doubt that his brother had killed their father. Because he’d seen it himself.
If he’d only held on to his temper…
But the thought of Kate being attacked had incensed him. He’d wanted to tear Reagan apart when he should have shoved him out the window and gone with him. But the clock had already been chiming; they’d already started to change.
The sirens grew louder. Kate might not be the only one to see him like this if he didn’t leave now. He tried to stand up, but his brother’s teeth had torn the flesh of his shoulder, which was already weak from earlier injuries. From the bullets Kate had fired into him. He growled at the pain that radiated from his wound throughout his battered body.
Kate gasped, her eyes wide with fear as she leaned over him.
He had frightened her again. “I won’t hurt you,” he promised. “I would never hurt you.”
Not purposely. But he had hurt her—because he hadn’t left her alone. Instead, he’d acted on his attraction to her. And he’d fallen for her.
She gasped. “You can talk.”
“I’m still me,” he said. Born a werewolf, it was all he’d ever known. It wa
s two parts of him—the human and the wolf—that made him whole, that made him who he was. Would she ever be able to understand and accept that?
Would she ever consider changing herself? It would be the only way he could save her now.
“You didn’t say anything in the alley that night,” she reminded him. “And I shot you.” She reached toward his shoulder now. Blood oozed from the wound and spread across the fur on his chest. “Reagan reopened your injury.”
The pain increased despite the gentleness of Kate’s fingers as she examined him. Consciousness began to fade, everything was turning black. He couldn’t see her now. He couldn’t see if Reagan was still here or if he’d fled the room.
Warrick could see nothing of the present; he could see only the future. If he left Kate unprotected, she would be too vulnerable. That was why he had come back to her—to keep her safe. But he was too weak—just as his father had called him when he’d lost Sylvia to Reagan.
Now he might lose Kate to him, too. Not as a mate but as a meal for his brother. He had to stay awake, had to rally his strength to protect her, but oblivion beckoned, sucking him into the black beyond.
Chapter 13
Blood stained the rolled asphalt roofing of the building where Reagan had taken sentry. He spit again, trying to get his brother’s blood out of his mouth. But he could still taste the metallic flavor of it.
And it sickened him, making his stomach roil.
He couldn’t understand his cousins who’d gone rogue—who had enjoyed carnage. He shuddered in revulsion.
But he was more disgusted with himself than with what they’d done. How could he have attacked Warrick like that—in his weak spot—his wounded shoulder? Maybe he was the monster his brother thought he was.
But Warrick had been so enraged that he hadn’t heard the sirens. It was bad enough that Kate had seen them in their changed form—but then she’d already seen Warrick like that once. She’d also seen that other member of the pack—the one who’d attacked her.
But whoever had been approaching her apartment with sirens wailing hadn’t needed to see Reagan and Warrick in that form. Enough people were already in danger.