by Lori Drake
Chris stepped back from her, a smirk on his lips. “You keep saying that. Go bark up someone else’s tree, would you? I’ve got enough shit to shovel.”
A growl reached his ears even as he turned his back to her, a very deliberate move to show what he thought of her as a threat. It was mostly show. He could handle himself, sure, but as a cop, she probably had more combat training than he did. But he trusted Jon to have his back, and his brother didn’t let him down. While Chris walked away toward the car, he heard Jon slip into lawyer mode. The words “harassment” and “restraining order” were prominently featured.
As he slid into the front seat of his car, Chris smiled to himself. It really was handy to have a lawyer in the family.
Only the presence of Gerald’s gun pressed to Ben’s back kept Joey’s feet moving in the direction Max pointed her. Her heart beat a little faster with each step. Cage. Had he really said cage? Basement was bad enough, but cage? There was no way she could let them put her in a cage.
“It’s going to be okay,” Max said quietly at her back, perhaps keying into the anxious energy her wolf was putting off. “I’ve got your back.”
“No offense, bud, but that’s not very comforting right now.”
“I know.” Max knew better than most how little love Joey had for enclosed spaces, despite their extremely limited acquaintance. But that was a whole other story. “It won’t be more than a few hours, at most. But I’ll do what I can to get you out sooner.”
No, his words weren’t comforting at all. Keeping her voice on an even keel was getting harder and harder as her breathing grew shorter. At this rate she was going to hyperventilate before they even got to the basement. “What do you have in mind?”
“Just trust me,” he replied as they trekked through the kitchen.
The basement door stood open, and Gerald marched Ben down there at gunpoint. Joey hesitated at the top of the creaky wooden stairs, looking down into the dimly lit room below. She couldn’t see much from that angle, not even a glimpse of the aforementioned cage. Max nudged her gently forward, but she dug in her heels.
Her wolf rose in panic, and Joey grabbed the doorframe with both hands. “No. No, I can’t!”
Max pried Joey loose from the doorframe and spun her around, gripping her arms gently but firmly. His eyes locked with hers. “Yes, you can.” His wolf rose behind his eyes, and his power rolled gently over her. “Listen to me, Joey. You’re one of the strongest women I’ve ever known. Owen’s a tool. Don’t let him win.”
She hated the whimper that escaped her with every fiber of her being. It wasn’t in her nature to cower, but the specter of looming imprisonment had gotten her all kinds of worked up. Fortunately, Max’s wolf’s energy had the soothing effect he intended. Her wolf settled down enough that she was able to draw a deep breath and swallow her panic.
“Okay.” The word was shaky, but she nodded to back it up. Max released her arms, and she turned back around and took another breath before starting down the stairs.
The stairs creaked and swayed alarmingly underfoot, like they were older than the house itself. Joey kept a hand on the railing and counted each step to distract herself from the distinct impression of the earth closing in on her. The air grew musty and thick with dust particles. Her nostrils tingled, and she held her breath in an effort not to sneeze. It didn’t work.
“Bless you,” Max said.
Joey said nothing, just looked around the basement as she descended. The cage was impossible to miss. It was a huge structure with thick metal bars, floor to ceiling, off to one side of the stairs. Her mouth went dry at the sight of it, but she couldn’t tear her eyes away. There was even a loop in the concrete floor with a pair of manacles attached to thick chain links.
“Why do you even have a cage down here?” Ben asked. “Is this someone’s kinky sex dungeon?”
Still behind Joey on the stairs, Max chuckled. “Nah, it’s for Gerald.”
Joey finally managed to pull her eyes from the specter of the cage, gazing at Gerald instead as she reached the foot of the stairs. The older wolf’s face remained stoic, so Joey couldn’t tell if Max was joking or not.
“Seriously?” she said.
Gerald tipped his chin in a slight nod.
“Yeah,” Max said, continuing as if the man in question weren’t standing right there. “He has problems reining in his wolf sometimes. I guess it used to get pretty bad, but he’s seemed pretty tame since I got here.”
Gerald bared his teeth at his packmate, but there was something feral about that not-quite-smile that sent a shiver down Joey’s spine. At least it made her forget the cage for a moment.
A tiny moment, because Gerald pushed Ben toward the cage with a faint growl. “Let’s get this done.”
Joey took a half step back instinctively, right into a solid wall of Max behind her. The walls seemed to close in. Her breath caught in her throat as her heart beat a rapid staccato against her rib cage. Her wolf scratched at her insides, howling for all she was worth. Her eyes darted around the room, but there was no way out besides the way she’d come in and the high, flat windows on one wall.
Max put a hand on her shoulder and leaned down to offer quiet reassurance. “The sooner we get this done, the sooner I can get you out.”
Joey’s lips barely moved as she whispered a soft reply: “I’m sorry.”
He made an inquisitive noise in his throat, leaning closer, and she lashed out with one hand, grabbing his wrist and taking a big step forward, spinning on the balls of her feet as she yanked, hard, on his wrist. His eyes widened in surprise as he stumbled forward, and she drove her hip against his, using his momentum to send him tumbling forward to land on his back on the concrete floor.
She was only dimly aware of a sudden flash of movement from Ben’s direction as she turned and bolted up the stairs. The gun went off, noisy as hell in the enclosed space. Joey’s ears rang as she made for the rectangle of light at the top of the steps, heart in her throat. But wherever the bullet ended up, it wasn’t in her.
A figure stepped into the doorway ahead, blocking the light from the kitchen. Joey stumbled to a halt a couple of steps down, growling as she made out Owen’s features cast half in shadow.
“Get out of my way,” she said. The words were a bit muffled, like she was underwater.
Owen’s lips moved, but his reply was lost on her. She rushed him, but he caught her by the arms and lifted her off her feet in what would’ve been an impressive show of strength if she’d weighed more than ninety-five pounds soaking wet. Joey squirmed in his grip and kicked out at him. Her foot connected with something soft, and he grimaced in pain, glared at her, and shoved her away from him as he let go.
Joey’s feet kicked in the open air as she experienced a few seconds of free fall before crashing into the stairs and tumbling end over end, hitting what felt like every rough-edged step on the way down. Her head cracked painfully against the concrete floor when she got to the bottom, where she sprawled half on the floor and half across Max.
The last thing she saw before she blacked out was Gerald standing over her brother’s prone form with the still-smoking gun in his hand.
22
By the time Chris’s phone finally rang, he was starting to worry that Joey’s day hadn’t gotten any better. Then again, it couldn’t have been much worse than his had been. He rose from the couch to take the call into his office, passing Adam the remote as he thumbed the screen to answer.
“There you are. How’d it go?”
“Is this Chris Martin?” The deep male voice on the other end of the phone was definitely not Joey’s.
Chris froze, frowning as he stood in front of the couch. His brain kicked into overdrive, imagining all the ways Joey’s day very well could have gone worse than his. “Yes. Who is this?”
“My name is Owen Clark. I’m the Alpha of the Wenatchee pack.”
Dread pooled in Chris’s stomach. “What happened?”
“Your representative
s have worn out their welcome. You have twenty-four hours to come get them.”
Chris blinked. Of all the scenarios spinning through his panicked mind, that hadn’t been one of them. “Wait, what?”
“I believe I made myself clear. Twenty-four hours.” Owen rattled off an address, then disconnected before Chris could get a word in edgewise.
Chris stood there holding his phone to his ear well after it beeped and went silent, trying to keep the address from escaping his mind while boggling over the strangeness of the call at the same time.
“Pen… I need a pen.”
Adam leaned over and fished a pen out of his laptop bag, which sat on the floor at the foot of the couch. He offered it to Chris in silence. Chris took it and wrote the address on his hand, for lack of something else to write it on.
“Why didn’t you use your phone?” Adam said, when Chris handed the pen back to him.
“What?”
“To make a note.”
“Oh. I guess that would’ve been a good idea.” Chris sank back onto the edge of the couch, unsure what to do first.
“Who was it?” Adam asked.
“The Wenatchee Alpha. Owen.”
The beta wolf lifted a brow. “You mean Lewis?”
“No, I mean…” Chris rubbed his forehead and tried to make sense of the discrepancy. “You’re right. Lewis Scott is supposed to be the Alpha.”
“Well, what’d he want?”
“He wants me to come get Joey. And Ben, I assume. Says they’ve worn out their welcome. And he had Joey’s phone.” He lifted his hand and looked down at the address he’d scribbled there.
Adam’s eyes widened, and he straightened in his seat. “Awkward. You gonna go?”
“I can’t not go.”
“Then why are you still sitting there?”
Chris put his head in his hands. “Because I’m under investigation and the cops asked me not to leave town.”
“Oooh. I get it.” Adam looked off toward the television, where the movie they’d been watching was still paused. “I can go, if you want.”
“I don’t think that’ll work. But thanks for offering.”
Adam blew out a relieved breath. “Whew. So, you’re going?” He turned off the television and climbed to his feet.
“I can’t not go,” Chris said again. There was always Sam, of course. But if there was any possibility at all that Joey was in danger, Chris would never forgive himself for not going personally. With luck, he’d be there and back without the cops even knowing he was gone. His decision made, he stood and headed for the door.
“What if it’s a trap?” Adam asked, lingering by the couch. “I mean, first Maria goes missing, then this not-the-Alpha guy calls from Joey’s phone claiming to be the Alpha…”
Chris shoved his feet into his running shoes, which still sat by the door where he’d left them earlier. “I’ll be careful. Just tell—” He stopped himself short of putting Lucy in charge, in light of their recent heart-to-heart. “Find Itsuo. Tell him what’s going on, and that I need him to stay close until I get back.” He snapped a picture of the address written on his hand and sent it to Adam’s phone, just in case. “This is where I’m going. If you don’t hear from me in six hours, send in the cavalry.”
“You got it, boss.”
Chris grabbed his coat as an afterthought and rushed out into the rainy night. As he sprinted across the squishy grass to his car, he wished he’d had the presence of mind to ask the caller if Joey was okay. Then again, the fellow hadn’t exactly given him much of a chance for Q&A. Once he got on the road, he reluctantly called Sam. Joey and Ben were his people too, so he figured he owed him at least a heads-up.
Sam listened quietly while Chris explained the situation, and in the quiet pause that followed Chris braced himself for judgment. But Sam just said, “Keep me apprised of the situation.”
Chris stared at the phone mounted to the dashboard in shock. “That’s it?”
“What do you want me to say? You seem to have the matter well in hand.”
“I… uh… Thanks.”
“Just bring them home, little brother. That’s all the thanks I need.”
Joey woke to darkness and her pulse throbbing in her head. She blinked her eyes open, squinting up into the dimness of a basement room lit only by the moonlight filtering in through its small frosted windows.
Bars obscured her view, and she sat bolt upright but regretted it immediately as a wave of nausea washed over her.
“Fuck,” she gasped, clutching at the concrete floor beneath her hands.
“Welcome back,” Ben said from somewhere nearby.
Relief held the nausea at bay for a moment. Joey turned her head slowly to find Ben sitting a few feet away, legs folded Indian style and hands on his knees. The image of him lying on the basement floor flashed before her eyes. She crawled over to him and threw her arms around him, nearly knocking him over.
“Thank god you’re okay!”
His hiss of pain suggested otherwise. She loosened her hold and pulled back swiftly, scanning him for injury as best she could in the darkness.
“What is it?”
He caught her hand and brought it to his abdomen, a few inches off-center. The sensitive pads of her fingers identified a hole in his shirt, which was damp and sticky.
“Went straight through,” he said.
“Shit!”
He chuckled, then coughed, his fingers tightening on hers. After a moment, the pain etched in his face eased somewhat. “That’s a good thing, little sister. Means I didn’t have to dig out the bullet to start healing. I don’t think it hit anything vital, and it’s already mostly stopped bleeding. I only lost consciousness for a few seconds. Long enough that I didn’t see how they knocked you out, but not long enough to miss out on being locked into this damn cage.”
“How long was I out?”
“Beats me. Maybe half an hour. How’s your head?”
“Fine,” she lied, reclaiming her hand and knee-walking over to the bars. Now that she was assured her brother was going to be okay, her thoughts turned back to their mutual predicament. Maybe she could bend the bars? She reached for them.
Ben clicked his tongue. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you. They’re silver-plated.”
Joey recoiled, putting a little more distance between herself and the bars. “Right. A silver-plated cage. Doesn’t everyone have one?” At least there was plenty of room to stand. She did, and began pacing back and forth like, well, the caged animal she was.
The sound of her footsteps echoing in the small room taunted her, reminding her just how small it was. She caught herself biting at her thumbnail and tucked both hands under her arms. She hadn’t bitten her nails since high school. Filthy habit.
Back and forth she went, until the sound of the door opening at the top of the stairs caught her attention. The overhead light came back on, and she blinked, temporarily blinded by the sudden brightness. The stairs creaked as someone descended, and Joey instinctively drew away from the bars while her eyes adjusted.
“Everything alright down here?” Owen crossed over to the cage at an unhurried pace, his thumbs hooked in the belt loops of his faded Levi’s. His gun was once more holstered at his hip.
Joey growled and surged forward, reaching through the bars to make a grab for the newly minted Alpha. He leaned back, easily evading her grasping hands, and she hissed as her bare arms came into contact with the silver-plated bars. It burned, like holding a hot curling iron against flesh.
She withdrew, but glared at Owen between the bars. “One of your flunkies shot my brother.”
Owen leaned to one side, peering around Joey into the cage. “He looks okay.”
Joey glanced over her shoulder. Ben’s eyes were closed again, his breathing shallow but steady as he sat there with his legs folded and his hands on his knees. There was quite a blossom of blood on his gray T-shirt. She went back to glaring at Owen. “He needs a doctor, or at least a first-aid kit. Gau
ze. Bandages. Alcohol. It’s filthy down here, you know.”
Owen smirked. “I’m sorry if the accommodations aren’t to your standards, milady. But I’ll have some supplies sent down. You won’t be here long, at any rate. Your Alpha is on his way.”
Joey was torn. On the one hand, the sooner Chris got here, the sooner she’d be out of this damn cage. On the other hand, she didn’t want to need him to ride to her rescue. It rankled. Her head throbbed again. “Great. Because, yeah, the accommodations are shit. And this is completely unnecessary. We were leaving.”
Owen folded his arms. “You had the chance, and you didn’t take it.”
The door at the top of the stairs opened and closed again. Joey flicked a glance toward the stairs as someone else descended. It was Caroline, carrying a tray with food and water.
Owen met her halfway across the floor and took the tray from her. “Thank you, Caroline. Be a dear and fetch some alcohol and bandages for our guests? They’ve had a small mishap.”
The older wolf glanced at the cage with a furrowed brow, but nodded. “Yes, Alpha.”
“If you'd call being shot a mishap,” Joey said.
Caroline’s eyes widened at this, and she made her way back up the steps with greater haste than she’d descended.
Owen brought the tray over and set it on the floor, then slid it carefully forward with the toe of his dusty boot until it kissed the base of the bars. Joey looked down at the tray like it was covered in vipers and shook her head, taking a step back. There was no way she was putting anything they offered her in her mouth.
“Not hungry?” Owen asked.
“No. So, what’s the deal with this cage, anyway? Max said Gerald has problems with his wolf?”
Owen scratched at his bearded jaw. “Occasionally. Haven’t needed it for a couple of years. Lewis has been working with him. Now… well, we’ll just have to see. Hopefully he doesn’t need it while you’re still in it.”