by Laken Cane
I could hope.
I raced through the house, looking for a bedroom, and I found some women’s clothing in one of the closets. A t-shirt, a long, black coat, and a pair of pants that were two sizes too large. They were also too short, but my boots had survived the shift. I’d tuck the pantlegs into them, and maybe…
Maybe no one would notice I was no longer wearing my own clothes.
In a few short minutes, I was fully dressed and both Lucy and Rick were stirring. My energy had dwindled, changing instead into an exhaustion so deep that I wasn’t sure I could get up off the floor. It was going to take me awhile to get used to the insane and massive transformations.
And we still weren’t done. Not by a long shot. I rushed to the kitchen and dampened some towels, then hurried back to lift Lucy’s shirt and press the towels to her cut. I had a feeling that whatever was going on inside her would be much worse than the cut I’d given her to save her life.
I brushed her hair back. “Luce? Are you okay?” I didn’t glance at the detective when I heard him groan and get to his feet, but from the corner of my eye I saw him sway and put a hand against the wall to steady himself. “How are you doing, Rick?”
“I’ll be all right. Lucy?”
“I cut her, and she needs to see a doctor. There’ll be too many questions if I call 911—but she can heal in the—in Shadowfield’s clinic. The doctor who treated me will take care of her.”
“What’s going on in that place?” But he didn’t sound like he really wanted to know. Just like with the Pocket, any community that minded its own business and didn’t bleed outside their boundaries would not be looked at too hard by law enforcement.
Lucy’s eyelids fluttered and finally, she opened her eyes. “He saw Marcy Davenport in a basement prison,” she said immediately, her voice soft but strong. She struggled to sit up, her hand holding the towels against her ribs, and I put an arm along her back and helped her. “The man who’s holding her built three cells down there. Marcy isn’t the only girl he has taken.” She shuddered and blinked rapidly to keep tears from spilling. “But she’s the only one still alive. The others are buried in his back yard.”
“Where, Lucy,” the detective asked. I was just noticing that he wasn’t wearing his radio, and I understood at once that because of what had happened with Beth, he was likely taking a few days off.
He’d call in for backup once we found Marcy’s location, and would tell them he’d found her because of an anonymous tip, just like he always did. Tonight, the Pocket was going to be in serious upheaval and overrun with law enforcement and news vans. It wasn’t often anyone braved the town, but when they did, they made sure there were enough of them to scare the residents and gangs into behaving. Still, there would be trouble.
“Tall house,” Lucy said, “with a purple door.”
I glanced at Rick as he blew out a hard breath and put his hand to the back of his head. He wasn’t doing well, and likely had one hell of a concussion, but he’d see this thing through. He wouldn’t leave until the young girl had been found and rescued.
“Lucy,” I said gently, “we’re going to need more than that.” Falton was a small village, true, but that didn’t mean a purple door wasn’t going to be difficult to find. Unless…
I stood abruptly. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Rick frowned and started toward me. “What?”
“I’m going to find someone who lives here and ask him which house has a purple door,” I told him.
“You are not going out there alone,” he said, crossing his arms, and that was the moment I knew he hadn’t seen my wolf. Or if he had, he’d believe it was a figment of his concussed imagination, especially since we’d just been talking about wolves.
I smiled at him, but my lip trembled. “I’ll be okay, Rick. I’ll be back with an address. You know how strong I am.”
“You’re not stronger than a group of men or a gun,” he said grimly. “I’ll go find someone.”
“Wait,” Lucy said, before we could get into an argument about who was going to go kick someone’s ass until they told us about a purple door. “Iroquois. I saw Iroquois.”
The detective and I stared at each other, our brows knitted. Then his eyes cleared and he reached for his cell phone. “Hang on.” He tapped on his screen a few times, then gave me a smile that was both rare and startling. “It’s a street name. I doubt there’s more than one purple door on Iroquois.” He began to swipe and tap his phone screen and while he searched for the house, I turned my attention to Lucy.
“I’m sorry I had to cut you,” I told her.
She closed her eyes, flinching as she pressed the towel to her bleeding ribs. “I know you had to, Kait. I’m shocked I didn’t get hurt a lot worse.”
“Yeah,” I said a little grimly. “So am I. When you’ve been patched up and are feeling better, we’re going to sit down and have a long talk.”
But she lifted her chin. “I’m part of the team, and a necessary one. I wasn’t given my gift for no reason, though I have to admit that until I met you and Rick, I wanted to just ignore it all. But now, I can help, Kait. I can finally help. You understand?”
I really did. I sighed. “Okay.”
Her eyes widened. “Just like that?”
I grinned. “You put yourself in extreme danger to save a girl’s life. So yes. Just like that.”
She took my hand. “I don’t remember anything about getting cut. I was lost inside the demon’s mind.” Her eyes were steady, and I didn’t detect a lie in her words. Miraculously, it appeared as though neither she nor the detective had seen my wolf. Then she frowned. “Why are you wearing different clothes?”
“Found it,” Rick interrupted. “The owner’s name is Lee Martin.”
I got to my feet, relieved I didn’t have to think up a lie to tell her. “Show me.”
“I’ll call for back up and send them to the address. I can be there in less than ten minutes if I don’t get stopped.” He hesitated. “Wait here with Lucy.”
Neither Rick nor Lucy was strong enough to walk to Iroquois. His eyes wouldn’t quite focus, he was deathly pale, and Lucy was still bleeding. They both needed medical care—but the detective had to get to the house where Marcy was being held. I needed to be with him. I made up my mind and turned to Lucy. “I’m going to call some friends. They’ll come get you and take you to Shadowfield.”
She nodded even as Rick began to argue. “You can’t bring people into this town, Kait,” he growled.
“The police will be here in droves by the time my guys arrive,” I told him, calm and determined. “No one will fuck with them. I promise. They’ll get her out, and I can go to the house with you.”
“She’s right,” Lucy told him. “Don’t argue, Detective. Call it in. Both of you.” She pulled the towel away from her ribs and showed us her wound. “I’ve stopped bleeding. And Kait, as soon as they’ve patched me up, I’ll go home to Ash. He has to be wondering where we are.”
The cut looked wicked, angry and red and still seeping, and the flesh around it was bruised, but she really would be okay, as bad as she looked.
I gave her a nod, relieved. “Thanks, Lucy.”
I walked into the kitchen to make my call, and Rick began murmuring into his cell phone. In less than fifteen minutes, the awful town of Falton was going to blow up with activity. And the detective and I absolutely had to get inside the house before it did. Marcy’s abductor needed to be caught unaware.
I called the alpha.
He answered almost immediately, and the sound of his dark, soft voice caused me to forget, for a second, how to speak. I took a breath. “I need help, Jared.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
My alpha hadn’t hesitated when I’d told him where I was and what I needed. I didn’t ask him how he was, because I knew he would have healed, and he wouldn’t have appreciated me bringing up my attack on him.
But just before I disconnected the call, I whispered, “I’m not a de
mon, Alpha.”
He’d hung up without another word.
Rick and I slipped through the night to Iroquois Street without too much trouble, though several times someone’s dog barked or snarled as we sneaked by. Apparently dogs barking wasn’t unusual, because not once did a homeowner come to see what the commotion was about.
I resisted the urge to try to free them all.
“How are you doing, Detective?” I murmured, as we finally walked up Iroquois.
“I’m fine.” But his voice was gruff, and he carried himself so stiffly and carefully that I knew he wasn’t exactly fine. He’d gotten thrown into a wall by a demon. Of course he wasn’t “fine,” but he couldn’t walk away from his job, off duty or not. “How long before the demon comes back?”
“I don’t know. But the longer he’s here, the weaker he becomes, so I have a feeling he’s going to escalate pretty quickly.”
He only sighed.
“You don’t happen to have a protein bar on you, do you?” I asked. “I’m starving.”
He snorted. “Next time we have to fight evil together I’ll be sure to bring along some food.”
Then we were standing in front of the house with the purple door, and we fell into silence as we studied it. The porch light was on, and a tiny camera was attached to the wall beside the door.
“He’s going to have security alarms, more cameras, and motion sensors,” I murmured.
“At the very least,” he agreed.
“What are we doing, Rick?”
“We should wait for backup. You shouldn’t even be here. If I—”
But he cut off whatever he’d been about to say when a bright light high on Martin’s house came abruptly on, spotlighting the two of us.
“Shit,” I whispered. The man inside was likely already aware we were there, and we had no time. For all I knew he had a plan in place in case of discovery. He might kill the girl. My heart pounded in my chest, and without another word, I sprinted toward the house.
I heard Rick bite off a curse, then he started after me. He didn’t follow me, though—he ran around the side of the house and to the back. If Martin tried to escape through the back door, the detective would be waiting.
In the distance, I heard the first sirens wailing. Help was coming.
I grabbed a heavy, hideous gargoyle statue off the stoop and slammed it against the window, and barely felt glass shards scraping my flesh as I went in. I was surprised that smashing the window hadn’t set off the security alarm, but more than likely, Martin had taken pains to make sure no attention would be drawn to him or his house.
I wasn’t being careful or quiet—we were past that now. I raced through a small, dark, and uncluttered living room, intent upon finding the basement stairs, and though I half expected it, when I came face to face with Martin—and his gun—I was just a little surprised.
He was a small man, slender and unremarkable with short, dark hair, maybe fifty years old. He looked completely…average. There was nothing about him that suggested he might abduct, torture, and kill women.
In the semidarkness, his face was shadowed, but his scent was overwhelming to my wolf’s nose. I could smell the rot inside him. He was dying, and he probably didn’t even know it.
“Who are you?” he asked, his voice low and somehow greasy. “Why are you in my home?”
“You have a girl in your basement,” I said, noting the way his nostrils flared and his eyes widened. “In about five minutes, this town is going to be crawling with cops. It’s over, Martin. Drop the gun.”
He licked his lips. “How did you know?”
He didn’t sound particularly scared, merely curious. He’d likely prepared for this eventuality—or maybe he was just incapable of feeling anything but the pleasure of hurting a helpless person. My fingers brushed the handle of my sheathed blade. “Drop the gun, Martin.”
He took a step forward, gun aimed squarely at my chest. “Just tell me. Who are you? How are you here? I must know.”
“Drop the gun. Last chance.” I seriously didn’t want to kill the asshole. I mean, I did, but I didn’t want the mess that would bring. I wanted to stay out of the public eye, and this case was about to go very high profile.
He sighed. “Everyone wants to keep their secrets. I understand.”
Then he shot me.
At first I felt nothing but pressure and numbness, but then it felt like someone had set my shoulder on fire. I lunged at him, but that’s as far as I got before the detective rushed the bastard and slammed his gun against Martin’s temple so hard the killer simply…crumpled. Silently and almost gently, he dropped to the floor.
Rick pulled his cuffs and restrained him, then hurried to me. I held up my right hand, but since I’d been shot in the left shoulder, I didn’t move that arm much. “I’m okay. We need to find the girl.”
But suddenly, it was as though the night outside exploded with noise—sirens wailing, engines roaring, and then, gunshots and shouts and screams. Law enforcement and the EMTs had arrived, and the gangs of the Pocket were taking offence.
Then someone began pounding on the front door.
“Handle them,” I said, as I ran to find the basement. “Let them know I’m in the basement with the victim.”
“Kait—”
But I held my hand over the gunshot wound—a wound my body was already working to heal—and ran toward the back of the house. I found the basement door twenty seconds later. It was latched, but required no key and I wasn’t forced to kick the door in.
He’d been sure that she wasn’t going to climb the stairs and escape, so he hadn’t even bothered securing the latch. I jerked the door open so hard it slammed against the wall, and then I rushed down the stairs.
They weren’t creepy, wooden stairs that led down into total darkness. They were carpeted and clean, and there was a light switch at the landing. I flipped it on, then ran down the stairs. “Marcy,” I called. “My name is Kait Silver. You’re safe.” If she could hear me, I wanted to reassure her that I wasn’t her tormentor.
I leaped down the stairs, turned the corner, and slammed into something that felt like a brick wall and for a second, I was blind. My sight was suddenly there and I understood that I hadn’t slammed into anything—someone was beating me in the face and head with what was maybe a heavy iron pipe.
A man.
Martin wasn’t working alone in the abductions. He had a friend, and that friend was currently trying his best to kill me. I felt something pop inside my head, heard something crack, maybe my ribs, my nose, something. Everything hurt and my world was chaotic and I couldn’t seem to get my feet under me.
The basement was full of disorienting sights and sounds—buzzes and whistles, I thought—and excruciatingly bright lights that flashed so fast I could barely follow them.
“Calm down, Princess. Use your noodle, girl. On your feet. Fuck them up. Fuck them up, Kait.”
I closed my eyes, slowed my breathing, and got to my knees. I felt the pipe coming, felt the air from it, and I shot my hand up and grabbed it. I swung and felt the blow land, and my aim was true. He fell, my attacker, but that wasn’t good enough. I lifted the pipe and hit him again, and again, and again.
I would have beat him until there was nothing left of him, I think. I had no intention of stopping. Each blow I landed seemed to grow the rage until there was nothing but death, not inside my mind. I would kill him.
But someone grabbed me from behind, and his alpha scent slipped into my brain and kept me from turning to kill him, too, and he whispered, “Kaity. I’ve got you.”
Still, I could not calm. I was sobbing, but hadn’t been aware of it, and my face was broken. I should shift and heal, give the pain to the wolf, I should do something…
Only I couldn’t seem to move past the agony.
Then I became aware that the noise had stopped. The flashing lights had stopped. There was one light bulb hanging from the ceiling, and it spotlighted the torture chamber Martin and his fri
end had rigged up.
And I heard crying.
The helplessness in that droning cry was what brought me all the way back. Jared held my arms, his face a mask of emptiness so huge that I knew he was feeling everything. Horror lit his eyes as he looked from me to the girl in the cage, and then abruptly, the basement was flooded with men. Cops.
They grabbed Jared and yelled at him as they forced him to the floor, and it was only when I screamed at Rick to stop them, that my alpha had helped me—though I had no idea how he’d gotten into the house without being stopped—that he told them Jared was with us. I would thank him for that lie later. I would also consider what it had meant that I’d told him and everyone else in the room that Jared was “my alpha,” but right now, there was only the girl.
Rick rushed to me. “Kait,” he murmured. “My God, Kait. Let me help you.”
I frowned at him, unsure what he meant, but it didn’t really matter. I wasn’t the one who needed help. The girl in the cage was.
She shrank back against the wall of her cell, her arms over her head, curled into a tight ball. I yanked off my coat and hit the switch on the wall beside the cell door, and when the door unlocked I didn’t hesitate.
I knew the cops were thinking of stopping me, but Rick made sure they left me alone. I had to get the girl out. She didn’t even fight me. She’d been down there too long to have any fight left, and she would have learned early on that struggling would only make it worse.
I draped my coat over her bare body and said the same thing to her that had been said to me by those who meant to help me. “I’ve got you. I’ve got you, Marcy.”
She shoved herself against me and buried her face against my chest, then wrapped her arms around my neck so tightly it hurt, but I didn’t care at all. She was tiny. Five feet, at the most, maybe a hundred pounds. I lifted her into my strong wolf arms and carried her from her prison.
When they tried to take her from me she screamed and fought so violently that they finally backed off, surrounded us, and helped me up the stairs—and when we emerged from the house, I was shocked at the number of people waiting.