by Kali Argent
“Okay, okay.” Flapping her hands around her face, Abby angled sideways, placing herself between Cade’s glower and Thea’s snarl. “Everyone put your dicks away.”
“I don’t—”
“Metaphorical, darling,” Abby interrupted. Patting her slender fingers against Thea’s elbow, she used her free hand to hoist up the oversized, white thermal sweater that bagged around her slender frame. “Now, as I was trying to say, there’s a garage out back, one of those big things that holds semi-trucks. Deke did say that this place was supposed to be bigger, care for more people.” She spared a casual glance at Cade before returning her attention to Thea. “If you two are finished glaring at each other, maybe it’s worth checking out.”
“Makes sense,” Zerrik agreed. “This place was here before the Purge, operational. The bunker would need to be hidden away from the masses.”
Dragging her narrowed gaze away from the human male, Thea checked over her shoulder, searching Zerrik’s face. “Underground?”
Replacing his sunglasses on the bridge of his aristocratic nose, Zerrik nodded. “That’s my guess.”
As a group, they made their way around the forsaken convenience store, and quietly, watchfully, crept across the back lot to the oversized garage. The orange, tin roof had faded to a muted, depressing yellow over the years, and the chain dangling from the open door had rusted with age and neglect.
A hundred yards from the entrance, Thea pulled up short, throwing her arm out to the side to halt Abby as well. “Stop,” she whispered, her nose and throat burning with the foul odor that emanated from the garage. “Go back. Everyone get back to the SUV.” Lifting her 9mm, she pointed it at the shadowed opening as she scissor-stepped back toward the abandoned store. “Now!” she shouted when no one moved.
Technically, Zerrik outranked her, but her senses were sharper, a fact they both knew and accepted. He never questioned her instincts, never tried to pull rank. Thankfully, this time proved no different. With a nod, Cade and Zerrik both raised their weapons, aiming the muzzles into the darkness beyond the massive sliding door. Following Thea’s lead, they kept his eyes trained on the garage as they backed away. They moved swiftly but cautiously, crossing the cracked and crumbling asphalt until they reached the edge of the covered island that housed the gas pumps.
“What happened?” His shoulders squared, Cade ushered Abby behind him as he released the magazine on his Glock, silently counted the number of copper-jacketed bullets, then slid it back into place. “What did you see?”
“It’s not what I saw.” Crossing the lot hadn’t dispelled the revolting scent. If anything, it seemed to grow stronger, slithering on the chilled breeze as it coiled around them. “It’s what I smelled.” It came from all sides now, surrounding them, saturating every inch of the parking lot. “It smelled like…like…”
“Death,” Zerrik supplied, his eyes flickering behind the polarized lenses, scanning the nearby trees and their multi-colored leaves. “It smells like death, and it’s getting closer.”
“We need to go,” Abby urged, curling both hands around Cade’s elbow to pull him toward the SUV. “We need to go right now.”
Thea didn’t consider herself a coward, didn’t spook easily, but she had to agree. “We have to warn the captain.”
“Deke can take care of himself,” Abby argued, still pulling on Cade’s arm.
Cade barely budged. “Yeah, he can, but if all goes as planned, he’s going to have civilians with him.”
“People who can’t protect themselves,” Abby relented, shaking back the golden sheet of hair from her heart-shaped face. “Whatever you plan to do, can we just hurry up and do it so we can get the hell out of here?”
The Coalition regulated all forms of communication, and some, like cell phones and Internet, they’d banned completely, except for private networks used to conduct government business. Thea didn’t have a marker, a pen, or even spray paint. Pushing back the sleeve of her black long-sleeved shirt, she stared down at her forearm, at the vein pulsing below the skin. With a string of curses muttered under her breath, she wordlessly pressed her gun into Abby’s shaking hands.
“It’s getting closer,” Zerrik warned, turning a slow circle, his breath even. “Something’s coming.”
Sliding a serrated hunting knife from the sheath on her belt, Thea rolled her wrist, turning the blade one way, then the other, focusing on the blue sky reflected in the metal.
“Everyone go. Get in the car, be ready to move.”
With that, she drew the tip of the blade from wrist to elbow, clenching her jaw as breath whistled through her teeth.
“Jesus Christ, Mendez!”
She sidestepped when Cade reached for her, and shook her head. “It’ll heal. Go.” Sliding two fingers through the crimson that swelled over the laceration, Thea used it to draw a crescent moon on the side of the white pillar that faced the highway. “I’m right behind you.”
* * * *
Blood roared in Thea’s ears, and pain exploded at the base of her skull. Pressing a hand to her right temple in an attempt to prevent her head from falling off her shoulders, she blinked her eyes open, groaning when the light aggravated the throbbing ache.
Dirt walls surrounded her on all sides, the clay carved and packed into a smooth, curving surface. Thick sand the color of blanched ash covered the ground beneath her, and ten feet above, closely spaced iron bars crisscrossed over the rounded opening. Beyond the metal grate, dark, angry clouds rolled over each other, their bellies filled with coming rain that blotted out all but the thinnest rays of sunlight.
Thea couldn’t think, couldn’t remember how she’d come to find herself held prisoner in a hole in the ground. It had been morning, sunny, and she’d been painting a message for Deke in her own blood outside of a truck stop off the interstate. Heavy and oppressive, the scent of death had spiraled around her, coming closer, growing thicker. Not the smell of dead bodies, of rotting flesh or oozing blood, but something darker, something far more frightening.
She’d finished her message—a crescent moon, it’s apex surrounded by four stars—then had added the letters “KC” below, telling Deke to meet them at the Revenant bunker in Kansas City. The cut on her arm had just started to heal, and she’d taken her first step toward the SUV when feral growls had erupted throughout the empty parking lot.
She had a hazy recollection of Zerrik and Cade running toward her, of both men yelling her name, then…nothing.
The storm rolling in made it nearly impossible to estimate the time of day, and the clay walls held little in the way of clues as to her location. Only eight feet or so in diameter, the pit was still too wide, the walls too smooth, to allow any kind of leverage. Even if she shifted, her claws had nothing to grip.
Pushing herself upright, Thea leaned back against the packed earth, rested her elbows on her bent knees, and stared up at the angry sky. A faint clink drew her attention for the first time to the chilled metal surrounding her neck. Mapping the shackle with her fingers, she curled her upper lip and snarled. Not only had she been attacked and kidnapped, but they’d collared her like a fucking pet.
Unable to break the heavy lock that held the shackle closed, she leaned back against the wall again and tried to focus, but it didn’t happen easily. The pain at the base of her skull traveled down into her neck and shoulders, and her eyes refused to focus properly. A sharp coppery taste filled her mouth, almost like blood, but with a bitter tinge of something chemical.
Stretching her arms out one at a time, then her legs, she checked for broken bones. Her limbs felt heavy, weighted, but otherwise, nothing hurt. If she’d sustained other injuries, they’d already healed. More concerning, it seemed her kidnappers had stripped her out of her uniform while she’d been unconscious, leaving her in nothing but a pair of black panties and a matching tank top. The realization left her cold in a way that had nothing to do with the outside temperatures.
“Zerrik?” Her voice came out in a hoarse rasp, her th
roat and mouth dry. “Zerrik?” she tried again, a little stronger this time. “Can you hear me?”
She saw no point in yelling. If the vampire was close, he’d hear her. If he’d managed to evade their attackers, it wouldn’t matter how loudly she screamed.
“Thea?” Zerrik’s voice filled her cell. “Where are you?”
He sounded close, much closer than she’d expected. “In a fucking hole in the ground. You?”
“Same.”
Wincing at the pain that still throbbed in her head, Thea crawled through the shifting sand to the other side of her circular prison. “The others?” she asked, leaning her forehead against the chilled dirt of the wall. “Did they get away? What the hell happened?”
“Werewolves happened.” The growl in his voice rumbled clearly through the layers of earth that separated them. “I don’t know what happened to Cade and Abby. I don’t even know how we got here—or where ‘here’ is, for that matter.”
Thea didn’t have an answer for him, so she asked another question instead. “What the fuck are these collars for?”
“No clue, but I have a bad feeling we’re about to find out.”
“Why do you say—” Cutting off, Thea shoved to her feet, pressing a hand to the wall to steady herself when she swayed. “Who’s there?” she demanded of the shadow that blotted out what little sun poured into her prison. “Who the hell are you?”
The grate that covered her cell opened with a loud screech of metal against metal, and the shadowy figure kicked his foot out, knocking a crude rope ladder down into her cell.
“Climb up,” a deep, masculine voice ordered. “Now.”
* * * *
Blood.
So much blood.
Prowling the circumference of his underground cell, Sergeant Rhys Lockwood rubbed his hands together, gripping and twisting until his fingers ached. Crimson stained his palms, his forearms. Dark, dried blood clung to him in thin lines down his neck and smeared across his chest. It caked under his fingernails. It seeped into the cracks that lined the skin of his knuckles.
Not his blood, never his own blood, and it wouldn’t wash away.
It never washed away.
The tarnished brass padlock clinked against the shackle around his neck with each step, ensuring he couldn’t remove the damning collar.
Another means of control.
Another form of manipulation.
Sand shifted beneath his feet as he paced, the ashen grains squeezing between his toes. At some point, he’d forgotten how long he’d been held captive. Months, but he couldn’t be sure how many. It had been cold when they’d taken him, bitterly cold, and there had been several inches of snow covering the ground. Then summer came and went, the days longer, hotter, and far more humid.
Now, crisp leaves in varying colors of red, gold, and orange rained from the sky, floating down through the grate of his earthen cage on a brisk wind. Rhys tilted his head back, staring up at the wisps of gray clouds that dotted the sky, and breathed deeply through his nose.
The world didn’t smell new anymore. No flowers or green grass, no scent of sweet fruit from the berry bushes. Even the air smelled different. It smelled like…autumn, and it brought to mind memories of family gatherings around a table laden with all of his favorite foods. He remembered his mother’s laughter, the way her mossy green eyes softened with warmth and kindness.
Everyone said he had her eyes.
He wondered if she’d be ashamed of him, if she’d be disappointed. Not the monster she’d become, but the loving, giving, beautiful mother he remembered. If that mother knew the things he’d done, it would break her heart.
Still stalking around his prison, Rhys fisted both hands in his long, uneven locks and pulled. She’d chastise him for the state of his hair. Even as a teenager, he’d kept it short and clean, styled it modestly. Now, the strands grew in uneven chunks that reached past his shoulders, and the once chestnut-colored tresses had darkened with blood and dirt.
Night was coming. He could feel it, a tingle that started at the back of his neck and rippled down his spine. His skin felt stretched, too stiff, as if it didn’t quite fit his body, and his gums ached, particularly around his canines. He’d once loved the night of the full moon, but after the Purge, he dreaded that time of the month, hated the constant battle for his sanity.
Since his imprisonment, he didn’t just dread the full moon—he feared it, feared the things he’d do once set loose from his cage. More people would come, more unwilling participants forced to compete in the pack’s macabre games. They didn’t know it yet, but by the time the hunt ended, the survivors would wish they’d died in the Gallows.
Death would be kinder.
A shadow passed over the opening of his cell, and the hinges creaked as the metal grate opened. Rhys didn’t bother to yell, nor did he prepare himself to fight. Neither would do any good. Standing in the center of the circular pit, he waited silently, completely still, for his captor to toss down the rope ladder.
The werewolf remained topside, watching Rhys climb out of his cell, then pointed toward the closest row of trees. “Alpha Chase has a job for you, but he wants you showered first. You have ten minutes.”
Rhys held his expression neutral, but on the inside, his stomach knotted, and bile rose in the back of his throat. Once a month, usually right before the full moon, the alpha would take him out of his box, clean him up, and parade him for the pack like a dancing monkey. Sometimes, they wanted him to sing. Other times, he was expected to fight the pack’s enforcers. Once, during the summer, the alpha had demanded he pick all the purple flowers—only the purple ones—from the field behind a lone cabin—while naked.
Mind games.
Manipulation.
Control.
“Full moon tomorrow night.” The enforcer’s golden-brown eyes danced with a wild light as he threaded his fingers through his blond hair. “We’ve got something special for you this time, pup. I think you’ll like it.”
Rhys doubted it. Every full moon, he prayed it would be his last, but he’d long since given up any hope of escape or release.
Instead, he prayed for death.
CHAPTER TWO
“Climb up.”
“Fuck yourself,” Thea responded. She didn’t know how many werewolves waited for her at the top of the frayed rope, and she’d be damned if she’d willing walk—or climb—into an ambush. “Where am I? What is this place?”
“Climb up,” the stranger repeated.
Pushing away from the wall, Thea folded her arms over her chest and glared up at the silhouette looming over the opening. In the next heartbeat, blinding pain exploded around her neck and spread throughout her body, effectively dropping her to her knees.
Her skin burned where the collar touched her, and the muscles in her back tightened and convulsed from the currents of electricity being pumped into her sinewy frame. Her jaw clenched, her teeth grinded together, and her chest constricted, making it difficult to breathe.
When the current faded and the pain subsided, Thea slumped forward, digging her fingers into the sand while she panted.
“Climb up,” the werewolf said once again, his tone flat and without inflection.
“Eat me, asshole.”
While she expected the shock this time, it did nothing to lessen the pain. Involuntarily, her eyes rolled back in her head, and her body stiffened until she toppled onto her side. Perspiration beaded across her brow and slicked her palms, and her stomach twisted and cramped, forcing her to bite back a wave of nausea.
Once the pulse of electricity dissipated, allowing her to draw air into her burning lungs, she pried her eyes open and struggled to her feet. Residual aftershocks sent quivers through her muscles, and her heart pounded too fast, too hard, but she refused to face her attacker on her knees.
Balling her hands into fists to hide their trembling, she stared up at her warden and smiled. “Is that the best you’ve got?”
She couldn’t see his fa
ce, but she had the distinct impression he was smiling at her. With her jaw set and her shoulders back, she braced herself, but the blinding pain didn’t come. Instead, a high-pitched scream filled with agony and terror echoed down into her cell, the voice all too familiar.
“Please!” Abby cried. “I did what you asked. Why—” Her plea ended in another painful scream.
“Climb up,” the male at the top of the rope ladder repeated.
This time, she could hear the satisfied smirk in his voice.
Thea could handle the pain, but she couldn’t be the cause of someone else’s, especially not a fragile, innocent human like Abby. Gritting her teeth, she grabbed the rung at eye level and stared up through the circular opening.
“Don’t hurt her.” It was a warning, not a request, and she hoped the asshole took it as such.
The ladder swayed, making her ascent jerky and difficult. Her body occasionally pulsed with aftershocks from the control collar, and it would take a few seconds for her hands to unclench so that she could move on to the next rung. After what felt like an extraordinary amount of time, but had probably taken less than a minute, she reached through the opening, her fingers clawing at the dying, yellow grass as she attempted to haul herself out of the hole.
Though cloudy and gray, the waning light of the day appeared much brighter topside than it had from inside her prison. Kneeling in the dry, prickly grass, she squinted, unwilling to move another step until she could see in more than shapes and blurry shadows.
Arrogant in his superiority, probably because of the collar she wore, the werewolf guard stood close at her side. Too close. With her eyes still adjusting to the glare, she sensed rather than saw the enforcer reach for her, his face coming closer, his hand outstretched toward her upper arm.
In a move too quick to combat, she jerked upright, ramming the back of her head into his nose, while simultaneously gripping the back of his right leg. Her claws extended, easily cutting through his tight jeans before severing the tendon at the back of his knee. Pain exploded in her head, and her body jerked and convulsed as volts of electricity coursed through her.