by Layla Nash
"Thanks." Ivy yawned and snuggled closer, hugging his arm to her chest. "That's not my name, you know."
"Oh?" Edgar wanted to turn toward her, to hold her tightly to his chest and cover her with his scent, but didn't dare move. It sounded like she was in that half-awake, half-dreaming place where nothing hurt and everything would be okay. "Then what's your name?"
"Isobel Victoria," she murmured, and a hint of pain crossed her face. "They're my initials. IV. They shortened it to Ivy."
"They? Who's they?" Edgar leaned close enough to kiss her forehead, inhaling from her hair. God help him, he might be lost. He might be in a great deal of trouble with this one. His lion, and his heart, didn't know how to deal with love anymore. He was too out of practice.
"The bad guys. The doctors." She looked pained again, then shook her head as if to banish the thought. "He's the last one. Once he's gone, I can move on."
"Good." Edgar pulled the comforter up and over them both, wanting her to be snug and warm, and adjusted the pillows around them. "He'll be gone soon."
She smiled as her breathing deepened and he knew she slept. Edgar didn't, staring up at the ceiling, and hoped with every ounce of his being that she wasn't talking about the same bad guys who'd hurt Atticus's mate Sophia. Just the possibility that she'd been through something similar to Sophia, held against her will and experimented on, drove his lion into a frenzy. And it sounded like Ivy remembered it all. He closed his eyes and counted her breaths in the near silence. If there was only one bad guy left, she would have the entire Chase pride behind her to finish the bastard off.
Chapter 7
I woke when the cotton-covered mountain beside me moved and cool air rushed under the sheets to prickle my skin. I froze, both panic and relief surging in my chest, as a man untangled himself from me — from me! — and the sheets, and my cheeks heated. The night before came back in pieces — being dozy with pain and exhaustion, finally feeling safe, talking in whispers in the darkness. At least my back didn't hurt anymore, even though my chest ached with embarrassment.
Edgar sat on the edge of the mattress and yawned, rubbing his jaw, then smiled at me as he got to his feet. "I'll order breakfast. Anything in particular you want?"
I shook my head, unable to speak through the mortification. Imagine asking him to stay and talk with me, then snuggling right up to him like I knew him. Like he knew me and wanted me to paw all over him. Edgar yawned again and shuffled out of the room, shutting the door quietly behind him, and I covered my face with the sheets. Holy crap.
And part of me knew the embarrassment was more from having never slept next to a man before, rather than asking this particular man to stay with me. Waking up with him had been nice, if surprising, and I wouldn't mind repeating it. I couldn't remember having nightmares, other than the one before he climbed into the bed, and I wondered if maybe Edgar was the reason I could finally sleep. I shook it off and forced myself out of bed so I could use the facilities and check the wounds on my back.
By the time I finished and washed my hands, assured that my back had scarred over and wouldn't bother me more, Edgar had returned to the room. He pressed a cup of hot coffee into my hands as he moved around the room, purpose in every line of his body. I accepted the mug and kept out of his way, standing at the wall next to the bathroom. Edgar gathered up a few things and tossed them towards a duffel bag near the door, then glanced up at me. "You feeling better? Sleep okay?"
I nodded, using a sip of hot coffee to delay having to answer, and finally said, "Yes, thank you."
I felt unbearably shy as the handsome man smiled and offered a clean t-shirt and jeans. "I borrowed these from Eloise for you, if you want to change. You're welcome to wear my shorts as long as you like, of course, but we'll be in the car and out and about more today. Eloise thought you'd want real clothes."
"Thanks." I took the jeans and checked the size, relieved that apparently Eloise also had hips and an ass, and gestured at the bathroom. "I'll just change."
"Take your time." Edgar nodded at the door. "I'll be out there. No rush, but we're supposed to leave for the city in about an hour."
I frowned at the clothes, distracted, but looked up as he slid through the door. "Edgar?"
"Yes?" And his smile broadened.
Heat rose in my cheeks; it was the first time I'd said his name. "Thank you. Really."
"You are most welcome." He even winked, and then the door closed and he disappeared.
I fled to the shower and took the hottest shower of my life, standing under the stream and staring at the dingy tile as I tried to figure out what the hell I was going to do. I'd been close to figuring out where Markus Keller hid, had chased him all the way to the city, until the pack found me and thought I was a lone wolf crossing their territory. I couldn't let Keller escape. He was the last of the bastards responsible for the medical experiments and my imprisonment for over five years. And Keller was the ringleader, the bankroll and the brains behind the whole scheme. He was the one who walked through the labs and the cells where they kept us, he was the one who cajoled the kids into cooperating or ordered the doctors to sedate us. He was the one who said when someone was more trouble than it was worth to keep feeding them. He brought in the new prisoners.
I hated him. Hated his face. Hated everything about him. I'd collected newspaper clippings and online articles about him, scouring them for information on where he lived. After the way things ended at the facility, he became extremely private, or so they reported. And rightly so, since some of his experiments escaped. He was entirely human and he'd tortured a load of shifter kids into near-psychopathy. Then the kids escaped. He was right to be afraid.
But no one else had found him. Not yet. Until me. Until three weeks earlier when I got the final clue — the headquarters address of his pharmaceutical company. I planned to haunt the headquarters and the parking garage and the restaurants nearby. I had plenty of time. I would find him and finish him. As long as Edgar Chase didn't distract me from Keller.
I jolted back to reality as the water cooled, and rinsed my hair quickly before ducking out of the shower and drying off with some of the sandpaper towels. I'd wasted about twenty minutes in the bathroom, daydreaming about killing Keller, so I rolled my hair into a bun and got dressed as quickly as possible. And then I faced the door to the other room, where Edgar waited.
The smell of food gave me enough courage to open the door and slide into the living room; my stomach rumbled and growled, and Edgar glanced up from a newspaper as I walked in. Four massive trays of food covered a long coffee table, laden with every type of breakfast and brunch food imaginable. He frowned at the spread and gestured for me to take a seat on the couch next to the armchair he'd claimed. "Sit. More coffee?"
I managed to nod, still feeling off-balance at being the sole recipient of his attention, and stared at the spread of food. I felt almost light-headed. Edgar handed me a fresh cup of coffee and a plate, and started to fill the plate with eggs and waffles and bacon as he spoke. "We're leaving in about forty minutes, headed back to the city. Most of the women decided to stay for a few days, so we'll have a couple of the ladies in the car with us. When we get back to the mansion, we can plan the next steps for finding that guy you're looking for."
The food tasted like ash in my mouth and I almost choked on a forkful of eggs. "What?"
"The bad guy you're after." He frowned as he dropped a couple of sausages onto his plate, rolling one up in a pancake before taking a bite. He raised his pale eyebrows at me. "I called my investigator, he's ready to meet tomorrow morning. He's a good guy, very capable. I need to catch up with him on a few other issues we're working on together, but there will be plenty of time for you to bring up anything you want him to work on."
My heart caught in my throat. I didn't entirely remember telling him about Keller, or exactly what I'd said, but there wasn't any other way for him to know. I broke a piece of bacon into little bits, suddenly not that hungry. "Is he expensive?"
When I shook my head, he settled back in the armchair, reading the world news section and periodically making another pig-in-the-blanket out of a pancake and sausage. The silence felt comfortable more than anything, and without the full force of his personality on me, I could focus on the plate in front of me. Even though my thoughts raced, trying to figure out what I could and couldn't tell him about Keller before I jeopardized my vengeance, I emptied and filled and emptied my plate again. When I finally sat back with a groan, stuffed with food up to my nose, Edgar smiled at the newspaper and handed me a section. "We've got a few minutes yet."
He exuded calm, totally un-rushed and unconcerned, at peace. His demeanor slowed my heartrate and the anxiety that gripped me, stilled the tremble in my hands. Edgar didn't seem in any hurry as his phone rang a few minutes later; he glanced at it, then answered without looking away from the paper. "Yeah, Benedict? Okay. We'll be out front."
I braced myself for leaving the safety of the suite and his undivided attention, suddenly uncertain about whether I wanted to leave. He felt like an oasis of calm, and just outside that suite waited a maelstrom of anger and anxiety and complications. Stress and obligations. I held my breath, staring at the food that still remained. It seemed a shame to leave it all.
A knock at the door made me jump, and Edgar squeezed my shoulder as he went to answer it. The giant bear of a man seemed vaguely familiar; he grinned when he saw me and walked into the room after shaking Edgar's hand. "Good morning, Ivy. How are you feeling?"
"Good, thanks." I wobbled to my feet, offering a hand as well. "I'm sorry, I don't remember your name?"
He pressed my fingers delicately, as if he feared breaking me, and winked. "I don't think I had time to introduce myself before Edgar went into beast mode and we got distracted. I'm Barrett Kaiser, but most everyone calls me Kaiser. It's nice to see you again."
"Nice to meet you," I managed to say, for some reason blushing as he smiled. He took up a lot more space than Edgar did, even though Edgar was no shrinking violet, but managed to edge past me to study the coffee table.
He raised his eyebrows and gestured at the food. "Are you finished eating? Want to take anything for the road?"
"No, I'm stuffed. Thanks." I looked up as Edgar reappeared from the bedroom, carrying his duffel bag, and shoved my hands in my pockets. "Where did they leave my bag?"
"Just over there," he said, and nodded at the closet near the door. "Dig in, Kaiser, we're done. Finish it off. We'll see you back at the house?"
The big man waved him off, all his attention on the piles of food as he started mowing through a substantial quiche lorraine, and Edgar smiled as he held out his arm to me. "Ready?"
Relief at holding my own suitcase, filled with my files and research, gave me the courage to slip my hand into the crook of his elbow, and Edgar held his arm close to his side so my fingers stayed warm as we walked through the resort. In the lobby, I flushed at the stares of the men and women who greeted Edgar, including a few men who looked a great deal like him, and tried not to trip over my own feet.
An enormous SUV idled in the drive, right next to the doors, and the skinny guy from the night before opened the passenger door for me. "Hey there. You've got shotgun."
Edgar gave him a dark look. "If you ride with me, Benedict, you keep your mouth shut. Got it?"
The skinny guy affected a wounded look, clearly offended. "Edgar, brother, I'm hurt. We have a lot to talk about."
"No, we don't." Edgar smiled at me as he nodded at the truck. "Climb in, the heat's on. You'll get cold out here. We have a couple others riding with us, so it'll be just a minute." He continued to argue with his brother as they went to put the suitcases in the back, but I caught only snatches of the conversation.
The result, at least, was clear — skinny Benedict waited in the lobby with a sour look on his face as Edgar and a giant bruiser escorted three women through the lobby and out to the car. I recognized a few of them from the blurry memories of the holding area, and smiled tentatively as they loaded into the back of the SUV. Edgar got in the driver's seat and fiddled with the radio and heat controls. He picked up a handheld radio from the cupholder and adjusted the knobs, then clicked the button a few times. "Logan, how do you copy?"
"Good copy," a voice crackled through the radio. "We're ten minutes behind you."
"Got it." Edgar put the radio down and smiled at me. "Ready?"
I nodded, but sank a little lower in the seat as I felt a couple of the women staring at me. Wondering, maybe, how I ended up in the front seat and why I hadn't stayed in the same rooms with them. Maybe wondering if I'd already shacked up with Edgar. I gnawed on my lower lip as I stared out the window and the SUV pulled away from the resort. I said a silent prayer that I would never see that place again, that maybe lightning would strike it and burn it to the ground that evening.
Edgar didn't seem like the talkative type in general, but he had to sense the growing tension of the women in the car. Maybe no one told them what he told me. Maybe they'd been in the dark since being freed the day before. I debated starting that conversation, opening up the lines of communication, but that might mean establishing a relationship with the women. I didn't have time for that. I couldn't risk becoming a leader or responsible for them in any way. Obviously Edgar and his friends had a sense of responsibility for caring for them, so there really wasn't any reason for me to get involved. I drew my legs up on the seat and hugged my knees to my chest, resting my chin on my knee as I pondered.
Before I could decide what to do, Edgar cleared his throat and glanced in the rearview mirror. "I don't know how much they told you, but we're headed to my family's house outside the city. You're welcome to stay there as long as you like. We've got plenty of room. The Council wants to speak with each of you about where you came from and where you'd like to go, but the decision is yours. You're welcome to join the existing packs or prides, or even start your own."
"What Council? What's being done with the ones who put us in the Auction?"
"The Alphas Council. It's all the alphas from around the city. They got together several months ago to resolve common issues and threats to the shifters in the city. It's a good thing, for the most part, once all the egos are set aside."
One of the women, sitting in the far back, made a rude noise. "How do they all fit in the same room, with all that ego?"
I bit my lip to keep from smiling. Edgar managed to keep a straight face. "It's a large room. And they'll be meeting later this afternoon to figure out what to do with the Auction organizers as well as the men who put you all into it. You'll be asked for a statement and recommendation. Since you all have a blood feud claim against whoever tried to sell you, you could demand their death and the Council would execute it."
Silence reigned. I swallowed a knot in my throat. Edgar had already executed the alpha and two betas who'd tried to sell me. The third beta had apparently not been at the Auction, had disappeared back into his pack as if innocent of any wrongdoing. I gritted my teeth and considered adding him to my list of things to do. I'd only just pared it down to the one name, it seemed like a step back to add someone new. I jumped when Edgar reached over and caught my hand, squeezing it, and I flushed. Or maybe I could just let this one go. The alpha was gone, the tall beta as well, and they were the ones who'd taken joy in imprisoning me. In selling me.
One of the girls in the back, the youngest of them all and barely eighteen if she was a day, played with her hair and fidgeted in her seat. "So we don't have to go back to the pack? If we don't want to? And you won't tell them?"
Edgar glanced at her in the mirror and I held my breath. The girl sounded so young, so afraid. I remembered her as being inconsolable, shaking to
the point she nearly vomited in the holding area, and none of the other women could comfort her. I hoped she found safety and comfort somewhere, whether with Edgar's family or another pack that would shelter her until she could stand on her own. I'd known a few girls like her, and still worried about what became of them.
Edgar's hands flexed on the steering wheel, but his voice came out gentle and kind. "You don't have to go anywhere you don't want to, and you don't have to see anyone you don't want to. We won't say a word about you to anyone. If you want your old pack to think you disappeared after the Auction, we're happy to let them think that. If you only want to contact a few people, we can help with that, too."
Some of the tension left her and she leaned back in the seat. "Good." She sighed, and it seemed like only a moment before she slept.
The rest of the ride was mostly silent, the quiet broken by the crackle of Edgar's radio as we grew closer to the city. His brothers drove SUVs behind us, and I wondered why Edgar led the convoy. He wasn't the alpha, although he probably could have been if he chose — but I sensed that family was more important to him than power. And that warmed my heart until I looked over at him and smiled, and didn't even realize it until he glanced at me and smiled back.
I blushed so much I almost opened the window so the cold air could drive the heat from my cheeks. I needed to keep it together.
I'd barely recovered my equilibrium by the time he pulled up to a massive wrought iron gate and a long, tree-lined drive. He typed a code into a small panel and the gate slowly rattled open. I held my breath as we drove up to the largest house I'd ever seen in real life — it truly was a mansion. Edgar pulled into a giant circular drive and parked the car, but I couldn't move even after he killed the engine and got out. It had to be at least four stories tall, and had multiple wings with a two-level wraparound porch. My heart sank. I was in over my head with these guys. No wonder Edgar didn't bother to put a price to the investigator; money didn't matter to him.