Sinister Pretty (Alexa O'Brien Huntress Book 11)

by Trina M. Lee

  So badly I wanted to kill him, to shake the ever-loving shit out of him before tearing him limb from limb. Instead worry kept me rooted at Shaz’s side.

  “Why are they so disoriented?” I asked. “Did you ever stop to consider the side effects?”

  “Of course not,” Arys interjected. “They’re disposable to him.”

  Collins gave his head a frantic shake. “No, that’s not true. We chose them because we believed they could handle it. The disorientation is from a mild sedative. Their systems will process it quickly.”

  “Shaz. Hey, babe. Answer me. I need to know you’re ok.” I held his face and tried to make eye contact.

  He seemed to hear me yet remained unable to focus.

  I busied myself with his restraints.

  “You really shouldn’t do that,” Collins called out. “There’s no telling how they’ll react when the sedative wears off.”

  A growing fury assisted me as I freed first Shaz and then Dayne. The big Alpha wolf muttered something that I recognized as Hanna’s name.

  “Can I kill him now?” Arys held the wackjob scientist’s neck at a precarious angle, ready to snap it at my command.

  I held no doubt that the man had to die. Watching the pathetic worm shiver and shake made me sick. How could such a pitiful piece of crap have the balls to experiment on creatures who could slit his throat in an instant?

  “You don’t want to do that,” Collins sputtered, voice quavering. “If anything goes wrong, I may be the only one who can help. You’ll need me.”

  In a fit of temper, Arys flung Dr. Collins into a counter of various lab supplies. As he hit the floor, beakers and test tubes rained down around him.

  “If anything goes wrong, I’ll be the one doing experiments on you.” Arys prowled toward the fallen man. My wolf shone in his eyes. Retrieving a fluid-filled syringe from the counter, he pulled the safety cap off and bent down next to Collins, holding the needle to his face. “Let’s start now.”

  Was Collins right? Would we need him?

  I glanced from Shaz to Dayne, finding their energy erratic, the frequency abnormal. Something wasn’t right. The usually strong wolf vibe they each possessed had been altered. It felt like a puzzle with some of the pieces jammed into the wrong places.

  “You can’t fix anything, Collins,” I said. “You don’t even know what the hell you’re doing.” Suddenly overcome with fear for my white wolf, I needed the damn doctor to tell me something reassuring. “Do you have any idea what the outcome of this is going to be? Any idea at all?” I felt defeated, close to losing the man I loved with the softest parts of me, and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it.

  When he merely stared at me with wide eyes, I knew he was useless. “Kill him.”

  Arys didn’t need to be told twice. Tossing the syringe aside, he grabbed the frightened doctor by the front of his jacket and yanked him to his feet. My vamp seemed to consider tearing the guy’s throat out with his teeth, reconsidered, and snapped his neck.

  The woman screamed and scrambled to her feet, running for the door. Arys moved to go after her.

  I waved him off. “Let her go,” I said. “Maybe this will be a lesson to her.”

  Staring down at Shaz, I stroked a hand through his hair. Collins deserved a slow death. But death had claimed him either way. There would be no true justice for treating my wolf like a lab rat.

  As I gazed down at him, Shaz’s jade eyes opened wide, focusing in on me. He let out an agonized shout and flung his hands up. It took me several seconds to realize I was moving, tucking and rolling, flung across the room.

  But he had not touched me.

  I used the momentum of the roll to push to my feet. Absolutely flabbergasted, I pushed the hair out of my face and gaped at Shaz. It couldn’t be possible… Could it?

  Arys beat me to Shaz’s side, where our wolf struggled into a sitting position. Arys reached for him, but Shaz threw up a hand to ward him off. The resulting energy wave knocked Arys back, causing him to almost trip on Collins’s body.

  “Shaz? Calm down, ok. We have to get you out of here.” I approached him, slow and wary.

  He sat on the table, chest heaving. His eyes were wide, bloodshot, and all wolf. Baring fangs at us, he glanced around in confusion.

  “I can’t fucking believe it.” Shaking his head, Arys remained at a distance. It took a lot to throw the cocky vampire off his stride. This had done it.

  I couldn’t believe it either. This was all kinds of wrong. So much borrowed power couldn’t possibly come without repercussions.

  “Shaz,” I tried again, bracing for another blow. “It’s me. Lex. I’m here. Let me help you.”

  “Lex,” he repeated, his brow creased in puzzlement. “What’s going on?”

  The words stuck in my throat. I had to force them out. “I don’t know. The FPA, they did something to you. We need to get you home so we can figure this out.”

  Shaz shook his head as if trying to dislodge an unwelcome visitor from his brain. He clenched his hands into fists and pressed them to his eyes. He trembled as a power that didn’t belong to him racked his mind and body.

  Suddenly he reached for me. A strange, fragmented energy leaped from his fingertips to strike me. Ready for it this time, I shielded against it. He snatched his hands back and clasped them tight.

  “What did they do to me?” His strangled groan became a growl. “Oh God, it hurts. It hurts so fucking bad. Do you feel that? It’s like a pounding bass beat smashing my skull into a million fucking pieces.”

  Arys and I exchanged a look. I reached out with my mind to get a sense of the environment. The building teemed with energy. From the lights overhead to the ghostly occupants and a variety of living and undead creatures battling it out in another wing, there was no shortage of energy sources and varying frequencies.

  Over the years, I’d learned to filter the onslaught of energy that surrounded me all the time. My abilities had started in childhood and gradually evolved, giving me time to adapt. Shaz had had it thrust on him, immediate and uninvited.

  “It’s energy,” I said, crushed by the sudden weight of terror. “You can feel it because they transfused you with my blood. It’s my power, Shaz. And it’s making you its bitch.” Stifling a worried sob, I looked to Arys for help. Overwhelmed by the sheer critical weight of the situation, I simply didn’t know what to do.

  Arys wore a tight, neutral expression, an emotionless mask meant to hide what he felt. Yet he couldn’t hide the panic lurking in his midnight gaze. He was as terrified as I was.

  On the next table over, Dayne stirred, then sat up so fast he tumbled right onto the floor. He came up with a snarl and promptly slammed a fist into the table. It crumpled beneath his hand. An angry shout followed as he grabbed the heavy steel table and threw it across the lab where it smashed against the wall. Dayne’s ice-blue stare traveled over us before he turned away to target the counter laden with lab supplies.

  Shaz grabbed his head and cried out in response to the enraged energy flowing from Dayne. Watching the Doghead Alpha Hulk-smash the lab, I tried to piece together what was going on. He didn’t seem to have the same reaction to my blood Shaz had.

  “Dayne.”

  Calling his name made him stop mid-smash. Slowly he turned to face me, upper lip lifted in a snarl. “Took you long enough,” he seethed. “What in the goddamn hell did they do to me?”

  “We’re still trying to figure that out,” Arys said, positioning himself protectively in front of Shaz and me. “It would be helpful if you could tell us what you remember.”

  Ignoring Arys, Dayne turned to a wall shelf laden with glassware and testing equipment. With little effort, he toppled the entire thing. “Where’s my wife?”

  “She’s here, somewhere. And we will find her, but you have to control yourself.” I couldn’t figure out why the two were reacting so differently to my blood. Although right then I was glad Dayne didn’t have telekinetic abilities.

  He sp
un to face us as if seeking something else to destroy. “What did they do to me? I feel like I’ve been mainlining Red Bull. Or speed. Something fucked up. Like, if I don’t spend this energy, I’m going to explode.”

  Oh, fuck. “Try to keep your shit together. Hanna needs you back in one piece.”

  I glanced frantically from one wolf to the other. Reeling from the shock of what I’d just witnessed, I struggled to stay calm. I had to keep my power dampened for Shaz.

  He hopped down off the table, and his legs buckled. When Arys grabbed his arm, Shaz shrieked, throwing Arys off. “Please, don’t touch me,” Shaz pleaded, every word agony. “It’s unbearable.”

  I understood. Arys oozed power without even trying.

  Without having to be told, Arys cloaked his energy, dulling the effect, though pain darted across his face.

  I couldn’t help Shaz up either. Reaching for him caused that same tortured reaction.

  Dayne snatched a heavy microscope from a cupboard and twisted it like a pretzel. “What’s his deal?”

  “Same as you,” I said. “Just a different reaction. Apparently.”

  Shaz sagged against the table as he pulled himself up. The strain in his life force was palpable. He gritted his teeth so hard I could hear the grinding like it was inside my own head.

  “What in the hell is that?” he gasped, clutching the metal with clawed fingertips.

  I searched our surroundings, sensing for whatever it was he felt. Right away, I felt the cool power of the undead. “Vampire.”

  Right on cue Briggs burst into the lab. Disheveled and blood spattered, clothing torn and fists clenched, I’d never seen him so badass. Much to my dismay, I caught myself feeling a little pride at having made a creature so intense.

  “O’Brien,” he barked, taking in the trashed lab and the dead Dr. Collins. “What in the good goddamn did you do to my lab?”

  “Your lab?” I questioned, a brow raised in skeptic wonder. “I don’t know much about how the FPA operates, but I’m pretty sure you don’t have a hope in hell of getting your job back here.”

  Briggs scrubbed a hand over his face, rubbing his chin in quiet contemplation. His dark gaze assessed Dayne before lingering on Shaz. “You’re as thick as Winston. When you all came in here, ripping up the place and killing Federal agents, I came to stop you, to save whomever I could. Even though I sadly couldn’t save poor Maggie, I kept the building standing. I’m a hero. At least, I will be in the version the head office hears.” Total psycho or evil genius, Briggs stood there smirking at me, clearly believing himself to be a genius.

  “What about the video footage?” I countered, cursing myself for not just killing him and leaving him dead.

  “Andy’s already pieced together enough to back up my claim. That’s the beauty of editing.” Sauntering over to Dayne, Briggs snatched the twisted chunk of metal from his hand and shook it in his face. “You’ve destroyed government property. Do you realize that’s a felony?”

  Arys gave me a look that needed no interpretation.

  Yeah, I knew. I’d fucked up by turning Briggs. However, Arys had also turned someone he shouldn’t have. Time would tell who’d made the bigger mistake.

  “Do you realize that I don’t give a shit?” Dayne’s wolf rose up to stare out at Briggs. “I’m a tax-paying citizen who was abducted and experimented on against my will. You can take your damaged property and shove it up your ass.”

  Briggs eyed the snarly werewolf with a bemused grin. “Noted. I doubt you’ll retain that sense of entitled outrage when you discover what’s left of your pack. Spoiler alert. Not much.”

  I winced, hating Briggs for being so cold and crass. A wolf’s pack was their family. Dayne didn’t deserve to find out like this, from such a supreme asshole.

  “I’m not taking the fall for this shit, Briggs.” Jumping in, I tried to keep Dayne from questioning Briggs further. I needed to get him out of here and reunited with his wife. “None of this is on me. Winston is responsible for what happened here tonight. And you. You both brought us to this point with your sick need to pick us apart and use us in your mad science.”

  Shaz held tight to the table, his fingers tightening as Briggs ambled over to him. With each step that brought the Fed closer, Shaz’s claws scratched the metal, creating an ear-piercing squeal.

  Curiosity cracked Briggs’s tough guy expression. He regarded Shaz not as a person, a living being with thoughts and feelings, but as something to be deconstructed and studied. Briggs itched to know the results of his twisted work.

  Coming to our wolf’s aid, Arys raised a hand, fingers crackling with blue and gold. “That’s close enough.”

  “And you got your vengeance, didn’t you?” Hands raised in feigned surrender, Briggs took a few steps back. “So let’s negotiate. You work for me, and I don’t pin everything on you.”

  Arys laughed, incredulous. “You think you have room to threaten or negotiate? Buddy, you belong to Alexa now. She owns you. Like a pet.”

  Briggs tried to fight it, but his gaze strayed to the place where my blood stained the floor, still dripping from the tubes I’d wrenched from the wolves. He was trying hard to maintain his hardass Fed persona, but things had changed. Like it or not, he was different now.

  “Like hell she does.” Animosity surrounded Briggs like a cloud.

  Shaz crumpled in pain. A trickle of blood from his nose jumpstarted my undead heart with a crash of adrenaline. That was never a good sign. Seeing a pack member in need, Dayne moved to help him.

  “Show him,” Arys hissed.

  Any exchange of power would only cripple Shaz further. Instead of lashing out psychically, I kept it simple. Dragging a claw over my wrist, I watched the blood well up.

  Briggs watched too. “I won’t be your slave, O’Brien. Use everything you’ve got in your bag of tricks. I’m not the idiot you think I am. Do you really think I didn’t put a contingency plan in place?” Pupils dilated, Briggs gravitated toward me, feet moving even as he lipped off.

  I extended my bloody wrist, inviting him to take it.

  He didn’t want to. Glowering and cursing, he still took it and ran his tongue over the gash.

  The only satisfaction I got from his mouth on my skin was knowing I had him right where I wanted him. “And what is your contingency plan?” I asked with a gentle push of erotic energy. Making my sister’s lover crave me should not have brought a smile to my face. But it did.

  Briggs jerked back, ashamed and angry. Swiping a hand over his mouth, he spat, “I have agents in Las Vegas ready to sniper Kale Sinclair the moment I give them the signal.”

  It was like having cold water splashed in my face. I blinked a few times, fighting to appear emotionless. There were too many sets of eyes on me. “Is that so?” I laughed, but it sounded as forced as it felt. “If you think it would just be that easy, you don’t know Kale Sinclair.”

  Briggs managed an arrogant expression despite the forced lust in his eyes. “Maybe not. But it only takes one shot to the heart. Are you willing to take the risk?”

  “Are you?” I shot back. “Don’t forget that you die the same way, Briggs.”

  “Yes, well, should I die or go missing for longer than three days, the hit is put into play. Do what you will, O’Brien. My life is linked to Sinclair’s.” Smirking as he licked the last of my blood from his lips, Briggs succeeded in becoming enemy number one on my list.

  My mind raced. Could I manipulate him into calling off the hit? It would take time and effort, neither of which I had right then. Much as it killed me to do nothing, Shaz had to come first.

  Arys watched me with a knowing expression that made me feel persecuted. Putting a hit on Kale had probably just given Briggs points in Arys’s book.

  “What if Alexa isn’t the one to kill you?” This from Shaz, who spoke with ragged breaths. “Pretty sure a lot of people want a piece of you, asshole.”

  Briggs studied Shaz’s bleeding nose and pained frown. Intrigue made his face somethi
ng I wanted to hit more than usual. “Well then, I guess she’ll be working extra hard to ensure nobody takes me out. I’ve already died once, and I’m not too keen on doing that again any time soon. I’ve got work to do.”

  “You’re a pathetic piece of shit.” Dayne offered his uninvited opinion. “Hiding behind a badge and a title doesn’t make you anything more.”

  Briggs was just so self assured, fearing nothing from Dayne or any of us for that matter. Because now he had me right where he wanted me, caught between a rock and a hard place.

  “Pretty sure it does,” he said. “Hey, I can be a reasonable guy. I’ll gladly let you all leave peacefully, as long as O’Brien is willing to strike a deal and agree to work with me.”

  “Why would you still want that?” Arys asked with suspicion. “You are your own weapon now. What do you need her for?”

  Agent Briggs would not be deterred. Nothing had changed his desire to have control over me, to wield me as a weapon, like he’d always wanted since I was a teen. “Vampires are a dime a dozen. She, however, is a rarity that would make a valuable asset to our organization.” Addressing me with his next remark, Briggs said, “So when would you like to discuss the terms of our new arrangement? I promise you, Winston will be blamed for everything that took place tonight and no harm will come to Kale Sinclair. Like I said, I’m reasonable. We can come to a compromise of sorts.”

  Arys regarded me with a look of sheer stubbornness. He wanted me to tell Briggs to shove it up his ass.

  And I wanted to. Oh God, how I wanted to.

  “We can talk once Shaz heals.” I glowered at him. “Now leave us alone before I decide your death is more important than Kale’s life.”

  I stood there feeling helpless and infuriated. Winston had been right. As long as I loved, all the power in the world didn’t mean shit.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  “Lex, you know I see you as a sister, so I’m not afraid to tell you that I really want to punch you in the face.” True to her passive-aggressive nature, Kylarai leaned in uncomfortably close, hands clenched into fists.