Becoming the Enigma (The Loup-Garou Series Book 2)

by Sheritta Bitikofer

  Katey’s lips quivered. With her free hand, she reached out for Forrest’s arms. He let out a low growl until they locked eyes and it was as if he had snapped out of a dream. The growl died in his throat and his mouth struggled to form the words.

  “Don’t worry,” she whispered. “You’re going to be fine. You’re going to have one hell of a story to tell Lily when we get home.”

  There wasn’t a flicker of recognition or understanding in his face, as if he hadn’t heard a word she said. Parker guided him away and back into the crowd as Katey’s heart squeezed with grief for her friend.

  “Where’s Dustin?” Katey called out to Darren in the other cell.

  “I’m here, Katey Kat,” came the familiar voice of her teacher. She smiled weakly as she saw him totter up and take a bit of meat from her hands. He began passing it out as Logan had done. Dark circles hung under his eyes, as did the others and he seemed more haggard and exhausted.

  “How are you doing?” Katey asked sympathetically.

  “I’m doing fine. I’m glad to see you’re okay though. We got worried when we didn’t find you among the ranks in here.”

  “I wish I was in there with everyone,” she groaned. “I’d rather be in there than out here with these vamps.”

  “Have they hurt you? Ouch!” Katey heard Logan cry out after the faint noise of sizzling flesh.

  She rushed over just in time to see him stagger back from the bars, holding his bare shoulder that had just gotten singed. It soon healed and Katey breathed a sigh of relief, glad that it wouldn’t be a serious injury.

  “No, they haven’t hurt me,” she replied. “They have no idea I’m one of you... Or at least half way... I feel so awful about last night, Logan,” Katey said burying her face in her hands out of embarrassment, ignoring the fact that her hands were wet with residue from the meat.

  “It’s all right. You’ll try again...” Logan’s voice trailed off, struggling to hold back the disappointment in his tone. “I wonder why they haven’t caught onto you yet.”

  “Probably because they don’t smell it on her,” another familiar voice rang from the mass of bodies in the cell. Darren walked up next to Logan, looking just as downcast as the rest of them.

  “What do you mean?” Katey asked.

  “When a loup-garou changes for the first time, that guarantees all the other perks, including a very distinctive scent that vampires can pick up on. Since you haven’t changed, you don’t have that scent yet. We can still tell what you are, but they can’t. And I agree with Logan. You were very close to changing the other night. We can try again.”

  “What about the silver?” she asked. “Is that weakness going to come along after I change, too?”

  She saw the answer in his eyes. No, she was supposed to be burned by the silver as easily as any of them but she was immune.

  Katey wanted to contest them both with her own dejected thoughts on the matter, but turned away to continue distributing food to the other cells. She appreciated their efforts to encourage her, but their situation was too precarious to think beyond a few hours from now. They needed to break out somehow, and her immunity to silver might have been the key to doing just that.

  When she came to the bars of the third cell, she saw more than a few familiar faces. John’s sons were near the front, waiting for their food. But beyond, she spotted a memorable head of dark hair and glaring eyes to match.

  “Erik? How did you get here?” Katey exclaimed, seeing him sitting on the floor in a puddle of filthy standing water that collected drippings from a leak in the ceiling above.

  His eyes lifted to her with the most pitiful and crestfallen expression she had ever seen on him. It contradicted everything she knew about Erik and his macho attitude. Then she saw Gregory walk up to the bars, drawing dangerously close to the silver as he passed by Noah and his brothers. She almost didn’t recognize him in the loincloth since she had last seen him in a suit, but the severe set of his mouth gave him away.

  “Because it’s his fault we’re in here,” said the rougarou alpha as he took some food from Katey and passed it to his inmates. Noah took the portions and passed them around in turn.

  “What are you talking about?” Katey questioned, her brows pinching in puzzlement.

  “My son foolishly made a deal with one of the vampire lords and disclosed the location of this year’s gathering.”

  Finally, she had someone to blame. Before, she had the suspicion that the loups-garous were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Now, she knew it was planned and coordinated for their ill. How could they have been betrayed by one of their own kind to their most hated enemy?

  “Why?” Katey snapped at Erik.

  Gregory took a step forward to answer, fury burning in his golden eyes. “He wanted to exact revenge on Logan to win you over. It proved to be our own undoing, too. We were captured about the same time that you were, but they cornered us at the airport as we were trying to leave. Erik never intended for you to be there. He tried to convince me not to come for the benefit lunch, but he didn’t tell me this was the reason.”

  His statement at the civic center made perfect sense. Erik was counting on Katey being left alone after Logan and the others were captured. He wanted her for himself and was willing to sentence all of them to a cruel and violent death, rather than try to win her fairly. She was right all along. He was nothing but a cheater.

  She turned to Erik, rage swelling within her, but she couldn’t hold onto it somehow. It was that shift in her personality she had noticed. Her wolf wanted her to forgive Erik. The old Katey would have crawled through the bars and tore him apart for what he had done to them all. This wasn’t only an attack on her or Logan, but on her pack and the loup-garou community as a whole. This was no minor offense, and yet, her hands were too slippery to hang onto a grudge.

  “I would say that it serves you right, but we’re all in the same boat. I’m not going to gloat.” Katey took a small handful of meat from the bucket and squatted down to Erik’s level, holding it out for him to take.

  At first, he seemed timid and unsure of himself. He looked up to his father who gave curt nod of approval. Erik lifted himself onto his hands and knees and approached the bars like a scared and wounded animal. He whispered a word of appreciation and slunk back to his puddle with the meat. There was no telling what kind of punishment Gregory had already inflicted upon his son, or what the others had done to him. Broken bones and slashed skin could heal, but a wounded spirit would take longer to recover.

  Katey walked around to every cell and emptied the entire bucket to those who came to get any food. Then she walked over to the chicken and tried to think of a way to distribute it. She trotted back over to Logan and Darren’s cell.

  “Are there any that are seriously weak or on borderline of breaking?”

  The gritty sound of claws scratching against stone came forward. Katey looked down and saw Ben in his black wolf form. He gazed up at her with wise, but suffering eyes and her heart bled for him.

  “He would be a start,” Logan commented, crouching down to hold Ben safely away from the bars, his arms wrapped around the neck and shoulders of the wolf to keep him still. Katey tore off a leg and offered it out to Ben, who greedily took hold of it with his big jaws and gnawed on it until he reached the marrow of the bone.

  “We have a few weak ones in here!” she heard Noah call out from the far cell. Katey ran to them with a wing and offered it out as they darted toward the back to distribute the food. Apparently, the loup-garou was too weak to come and get their food. Many more pleas arose from the different cells and Katey divided the chicken up in the fairest way until it was all gone.

  They were a long shot from satisfied, but it would have to do until they devised a way out of the castle and far away from the vamps. Her chest ached as she looked to the loups-garous, wishing with every drop of blood in her that she could have somehow saved them from this torture.

  Katey returned to the bars at L
ogan’s cell and saw him patiently sitting on the floor. Darren stood not far off and Ben lay next to him, still in his wolf form and chewing on the gristle of the bone until it splintered.

  “This was a brave thing you did, Katey,” Darren said.

  “I wish I could do more...” Her voice faltered and she swallowed hard, willing herself not to cry.

  “You’re doing what you can,” Logan replied with a tinge of regret to his tone. His eyes told how much he wished that he could have gotten closer to the bars to hold her.

  Katey examined the bars that separated them, judged the distance, and edged closer with a probing thought. She slipped her arm through, then her shoulder and sucked in her diaphragm, as she tried to squeeze herself between the bars. It was slightly painful and she was pretty sure she had dislocated a joint somewhere, but she managed to slide through and tumbled into Logan’s arms.

  They embraced each other tightly, the first they had shared in what seemed like an eternity. Katey buried her face into his soft skin and savored the feeling of completeness that only he could give. The fact that his skin was grimy and slick didn’t detract from the absolute bliss of hearing his heartbeat strong and true against her ear.

  “I missed you,” he whispered into her hair and she could almost taste the relief in his words.

  “I missed you, too,” Katey said. “I couldn’t stop thinking about you and everyone here the whole night.”

  Logan took her face in his hands and gave her a firm but loving kiss. When he pulled back, there was a slight look of confusion, but he seemed to let it slide.

  “What happened to you?” he asked, still holding her in his strong, but dirty arms.

  “They knocked me out when they were shooting at everyone last night. I woke up in a room in the castle and guess who I woke up to?”

  At this, Logan pushed Katey back and held her shoulders. Fear and rage was plain in his expression. “What do you mean ‘woke up to’?”

  “No, nothing like that,” Katey assured him quickly. “My old friend, Martel, the one I told you about, that was the president of the ballroom dance club at the school. He was sitting in a chair by the fireplace in the room I woke up in.”

  Darren took a step toward them and crouched down to meet their gazes. “Martel? I remember him. His parents died in a fire, right?”

  Katey related the whole story of Martel’s turning into a vamp, how he was in the room, and everything he had told her. When Katey went into detail about going out to dine and to the opera with Martel, Katey could see the anger rise in Logan’s golden eyes.

  “You went out on a date with him?” he growled.

  “I didn’t consider it a date. It was a bribe. He promised to get permission for me to see everyone if I went out with him, but I don’t think he ever intends to make good on that promise. I don’t even know why he asked me to go with him in the first place. I figured it was just to keep me busy or out of the castle for a little while or something.”

  There was no way Katey would tell him about the little comments Martel had made that caused her to believe that he had a crush on her when they went to school together. Talk of the kiss would surely send him into a savage rage and they couldn’t afford that in such close quarters.

  Logan seemed to calm down and pulled her back to encase her in his arms again. “As long as you’re safe now. How did you manage to find us and bring food, too?” he asked.

  Katey then told them about how Helga helped her find the kitchen and the door to the dungeon. “I wish I could do something for that girl. She can’t stay here much longer or they will kill her just like they killed her uncle.”

  “I don’t know what we can do if we’re still in here.”

  “Has anyone thought of changing and busting out?”

  “Yes,” replied Darren. “We did, but reasoned that it was too risky. There’s not much room to change in here and there’s no guarantee that we could take down those bars, even in our loup-garou forms. If a loup-garou is under enough pain, they could become vicious and then we would all be in danger.”

  Katey shuddered at the thought of the kind of damage a loup-garou could do when provoked. “I thought of trying to change, but I figured that would cause more problems than solving them,” Katey admitted.

  “And you’d be perfectly right, too,” Dustin called out from the next cell over.

  “Did they tell you what they intend to do?” Logan asked. Katey almost didn’t want to tell him, but his eyes pleaded for her to say it, no matter what it was. The whole dungeon had drawn into a hush to listen to what she had to say.

  “They’re going to put shock collars on you, turn you all loose on the mountain and hunt everyone down with those liquid silver bullets you told me about... They’re going to exterminate you.”

  Everyone who heard her had their own reactions. Some young ones began crying, some men took it very well, like Logan, and stayed strong and steady. Others tried to pretend they didn’t hear. Erik, especially, was hit hard by the news and Gregory began laying into him about how foolish he had been to associate with the vamps in the first place. He had cost them all their lives.

  “I’m sorry,” Katey whimpered burying her head in Logan’s chest, feeling more tears press at her eyelids. He held her tighter and petted her back to soothe her.

  She looked up to the windows at the other end of the room and saw sunlight was just beginning to chase away the evil night. The vampires would be going to sleep soon. “Did you get to eat anything?” Katey asked Logan. He shook his head. “You need to.” She had seen firsthand how his hunger affected him.

  “I can last a little while more without food,” he muttered, kissing the top of her head.

  “Don’t push yourself too much,” Katey said, nuzzling against his soiled skin. She didn’t care if it got her dirty too. She didn’t know how much longer they would have together like this and she intended to cherish every moment while she could.

  “Are you tired?” he asked. Katey gave him a little nod. Her eyelids had been heavy for nearly an hour, even though she had gotten plenty of sleep while unconscious in the bed chamber.

  Logan carefully swept her up into his arms and carried her deeper into the cell toward the back wall. Loups-garous parted ways for them and let them through without tripping over someone else or getting burned by the bars. He found a spot that was well hidden in a far corner of the cell and lowered her down so that he was leaning against the cool rock with Katey cradled in his lap.

  Logan wrapped his strong arms around her, shielding her from the chilly air. “You can rest as long as you need to. I’m right here. Nothing’s going to take you away from me,” he whispered to Katey so softly and sweetly that she almost believed him.

  The rest of the world melted away as she lay there with him. The other loups-garous weren’t there; the vamps upstairs weren’t there. Nothing else existed but Logan and her. As Katey drifted to sleep, she remembered her last thought being that she couldn’t wait to fall asleep in his arms every night and wake up to him holding her every morning once they were mated. If only they could find a way out of this hell, so they could have a chance at a future.

  26

  “Katey! Miss Katey!”

  The words reverberated against the dungeon walls, echoing so loudly in Katey’s skull that it jolted her from sleep. Logan’s strong arms were still securely wrapped around her and her hands reflexively reached out to hold him as her mind began to clear. Blue moonlight cascaded through the barred window on the other side of the room, letting her know that she had slept soundly all through the day and it was nighttime once again.

  She wished with all she had that what she had dreamed were real. In her sleep, they were all back home, basking in the bright sunshine around the gazebo behind the pack’s home. Birds twittered in the forest all around and there was nothing but peace in their world, as it should have been. There were no vampires, no threat of death looming over their heads.

  “Miss Katey, if you’re
down here please come out!”

  Katey recognized the voice as Helga’s. The maid’s fear pierced through the bodies of the loups-garous around her, slashing into her consciousness. Katey wanted to believe it was just her dream turning into a nightmare, but she knew that this nightmare was her reality. There was no wishing it away, no dream to chase it away. They were caught in the grasp of the vampire lords and unless she found a way to break them out, the loups-garous would be killed.

  “Miss Katey, we know you’re here.” Then came a male’s voice; old and feeble, and a little more than impatient. She didn’t recognize it.

  Katey glanced around to the loups-garous that turned their gazes toward her, and then she looked up to Logan for an answer. His eyes were calm and gentle, still gold as were everyone else’s. There wasn’t a hint of worry in his gaze, as if he knew that she would be safe. And as far as Katey was concerned, if she was with Logan, she would always be safe.

  “Stay here,” he whispered, carefully setting her down on the cold stone floor to push his way through the crowd to get to the bars. Katey hugged her plush robe tighter around her body and slipped her hands underneath her arms to warm her numb fingers.

  “Who are you asking for?” Logan said, a little too harshly. He was still cranky near starvation.

  “Ka... Katey, sir.” Helga sounded terrified, probably because she’d never had a loup-garou speak to her before.

  “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we’re all men and that sounds like a girl’s name.” Katey felt a string of dominance collect between the loups-garous, channeling it toward the intruders. “So, why don’t you just go back up those stairs to your masters, unless you intend to let us out.”

  The dominance from every alpha in the room flooded the air. Its energy buzzed in her bones. There was no way the humans couldn’t feel such threatening force. They were protecting Katey, she understood that much but there was something else in their united assault on the intruders that Katey sensed was more than a little malicious. It was downright murderous. It had to be the hunger, because - with the exception of Erik and Gregory - these loups-garous never harmed humans.