Animal Instinct

by Noelle N

  "He's in a lot of pictures." I sat back down and pulled my knees to my chest. "Always with you or Malthus or both. I know you think of him as your best friend because you've known him since you were kids. But so has Malthus," I added, pointing to several other pictures where it was just Adrian and Malthus in the photographs. "Adrian's the Beta, but considering there was no initiation during your reign, because you automatically took over as Alpha from Claudius, we don't actually know if Adrian was ever properly initiated during Claudius's reign. Dimitri says that if we can find a ring somewhere in Adrian's home or about his person then it might be a definitive clue. But even if he's not working with or for Malthus, you should be careful because his loyalties may have never been with you in the first place."

  Jed paused as he mentally warred with some internal conflict within him. Then he pulled out his phone to type a quick message across the screen before showing it to me.

  Adrian has a chain around his neck that he's worn for a long time now.

  The ring might be on it.

  My heart began to pound in my chest as I read his words. "So if we can find a way to get a look at it, maybe – " I trailed off when Jed set his phone back down and picked up one of the pictures that had only Adrian and Malthus in it. When I saw the conflicted look on Jed's face, I swallowed and felt my heart twist. "I know you're torn between trusting me and trusting Adrian – "

  "I trust you," he said unexpectedly, his voice quiet. He was no longer looking at the photograph and instead held my gaze squarely.

  " – which means you don't trust him," I murmured, wondering why I didn't feel any better about it now knowing that Jed didn't. I loved that he trusted me without a doubt. Hated that I had to ruin the trust he had in the few people he actually trusted to begin with.

  Jed made no response, except to reach over and pick up another picture that had him and Adrian in it this time. For a while, he simply stared at the photographs, hesitation and anger and sadness and disappointment warring in his expression. He looked so lost, felt so lost that my heart clenched.

  He'd already lost Spike. Lance was captured. And now Adrian had most likely been working against him the whole time.

  Without thinking much about it, I closed the gap between us and wound my arms around his neck. He instinctively leaned into me, burying his face against my neck and shutting his eyes as I threaded my fingertips through his hair. "I'm sorry I told you this," I said softly, shifting so that I could press my lips fleetingly to his forehead before continuing, "I know I planted that seed of doubt against your best friend and I know how difficult it must be for you to hear this. But I just don't want you to get hurt again."

  Jed simply wound his arms around me in response and held on tight.

  * * *

  Walking to the diner had never felt so tiresome before.

  A part of me still wondered, still wanted to give Adrian the benefit of the doubt, still wanted my eyes to un-see what I already had seen. But Jed was adamant on sifting out the rogue from the pack because everyone's lives were in danger the longer he stayed here. Finding out the truth once and for all would put things to an end.

  So he was heading to the diner where he knew Adrian was, his strides long and purposeful, a grim look on his face until he realised that I was lagging some way behind. I was still nervously wringing my hands when he snagged me by the wrist with his long fingers and gently tugged me forward so that I was beside him.

  "Will you be safe?" I blurted, when he waited for me expectantly to voice my thoughts. He quirked an eyebrow in evident amusement, a ghost of a smirk twitching on his lips, and I rolled my eyes at him. "I'm just worried for you. You know I can feel your emotions, right? I know how worried you are."

  His expression softened and he took a quick step forward to press his lips to my forehead. I felt my heart stutter, the heat of his lips both scorching and comforting all at once, but it was gone all too soon. He seemed to sense that his gesture had reassured me, because he tugged gently on my hand again to urge me forward, and I didn't hesitate to follow him.

  When we reached the doorway, he cast a quick glance at me and I swiftly schooled my expression into the most normal one I could muster. His lips tilted up in a faint, approving smile before he stepped into the diner, propping one hand against the glass door to hold it open for me. Stepping into the diner was no different from the other times we'd entered the place together – greetings from the other pack members, a blend of 'Alpha' and 'Luna' thrown into the mix that Jed simply gave several nods in acknowledgement to, while I went along with my usual and greeted them with a sunny smile on my face.

  True enough, Adrian was seated in one of the usual booths that he and Jed and the rest of the best fighters of the pack generally occupied. After waving an arbitrary greeting our way, he went back to the discussion he was having with Brutus and Vaughn. Katya, Jade, and about five others were at that table too, but Bianca, to my surprise, was not there.

  Instead, she was seated at the counter, sipping on a strawberry milkshake and tapping her red nails against the tabletop in arbitrary beats as she blissfully ignored the stink-eye that Lorraine was giving her. She noticed us entering the diner and her lips curled up in a slow smirk when she saw me. I smiled back at her, but Jed simply shot her a stony glare, which she reciprocated by smirking even wider.

  "You found my brother yet?" asked Lorraine sharply, her voice slicing through the general chatter of the place. She was staring at Jed through narrowed eyes as she stood behind the counter, her arms folded across her chest.

  "So now you realise he's your brother," drawled Bianca, as everyone else fell silent. "Where was this wonderful sense of awareness when you were charging through the foray last night?"

  "Go to hell," snarled Lorraine, almost lunging at Bianca were it not for the warning hand that one of the customers held out to stop her.

  "Oh, I will," Bianca returned serenely, taking a deliberately long sip of her milkshake before continuing, "I'm sure there's a place there for me, although judging by the way you've been acting I'm beginning to think we might very well be neighbours down there."

  Lorraine was seething and she was looking this close to snapping altogether. Deciding that we already had enough on our hands, Jed nudged me towards the counter. I knew he had a plan in mind – he wanted to observe Adrian for awhile to see if he could pick up on any abnormalities in his behaviour; so I didn't question it. So I went to the counter, while he headed to the booth. That gesture alone was enough for everyone else to turn back to whatever they were doing, and the overall chatter resumed.

  Lorraine was glaring mutinously at me when I reached the counter, her features defiant, but I met her gaze squarely. "I'm very sorry Spike died," I said quietly, "and I'm sorry that Lance was captured. But Jed will do everything he can to get him back. You have my word."

  For a moment or two, I could've sworn I saw a flicker of guilt and utter sadness in her eyes. But it was over in a flash and she pressed her lips down in a tight line before pushing past me to head into the kitchen, letting the door swing shut behind her.

  Several people had clearly overheard us, but only Bianca dared to meet my gaze, her lips lifted in an audacious smirk. "Well, well, well, seems like someone's finally having the spine to put on that metaphorical tiara and act like a proper Luna."

  "Hello to you too," I said wryly and stepped behind the counter so that I could refill the coffee for the other customers. Then I finally got to her and held up the pot. "Coffee?"

  "No, thanks." Bianca waved a dismissive hand at me and took another long sip of her milkshake. Her eyes were still fixed on me in an inquisitive gleam. "There's something different about you today – "

  I stared at her in confusion, but her gaze swiftly narrowed, her eyes suddenly fixing on my neck.

  " – I'm guessing that sickening little love-bite has everything to do with it." She shot me a disgusted look when I began to blush. I'd already made sure that my hair covered the most of the mark, but
Bianca's gaze was sharp and she didn't seem to miss anything. "You're positively glowing. It's quite repulsive, honestly."

  Without so much as a warning, she leaned forward and pinched me swiftly on the arm. I let out a yelp that was more from surprise than pain, and almost dropped the coffee pot. But Bianca didn't even notice. Instead, she threw a quick glance over her shoulder to where Jed was. He was already looking our way; the expression on his face dark as he glared at her furiously, and if looks could kill, Bianca would've been six-feet under by now.

  Instead, being Bianca, she didn't turn a hair and simply smirked as she turned back to face me. "Ah, so the connection works."

  I rolled my eyes at her, even though I was vaguely amused by what she'd done. That was definitely one way to test the connection. "That's why you pinched me?"

  "I mean, I could've killed you but I don't think Jedediah would ever let that slide."

  I was about to respond when my phone vibrated with a new text and I slipped it out of my pocket. Jed had sent me a message; it was brief, short and had absolutely nothing to do with Bianca but everything to do with Adrian.

  Do it.

  I glanced up to look at him from across the diner, only to realise that he was already looking right at me. He gave the barest hint of a nod before turning back to the conversation, one that seemed dominated by Brutus and Adrian.

  Right then, I thought as I dragged in a deep breath, my fingers tightening on the coffee pot. Time to test a theory.

  Stepping away from the counter and leaving Bianca still seated there, I went back around it and made a swift beeline for Jed's table, the coffee pot still in my hand. Nothing suspicious about that. Lorraine and I always went round refilling cups for the customers and I'd always made it a point to serve Jed's table during my shifts.

  There were far too many people seated at the small booth and Adrian and Brutus had dragged chairs over to sit at the table. Jed was in the seat next to Adrian, and he looked entirely calm, listening in to the conversation with the perfect mask of indifference he'd always assumed around them. All I could see, however, was that gleam of metal around Adrian's neck – a chain that I'd never noticed on him before, but only because I was never looking for it.

  Katya was the first to notice me, and she immediately raised her mug. "Luna," she greeted cheerfully; while Vaughn, ever the gentleman that he was, took the pot from me to help with the refilling.

  With the coffee safely out of reach, I didn't hesitate. Reaching out, I grabbed the back of Adrian's chain and tugged.

  In the blink of an eye, Adrian's hand had clamped around my wrist in a vice-like grip and he'd turned his head to face me, a frightening calmness in his eyes. "Luna." His voice was pleasant, but it was impossible to miss the knife's edge in it. "What're you doing?"

  I caught a movement from the corner of my eye and simply smiled. "Just letting Jed get a look at your ring."

  "What – "

  But the rest of his sentence never left his lips, because Jed had reached forward, caught the other end of his chain and yanked roughly on it. Adrian quickly spun back around, but Jed had already caught it between his fingers.

  A silver ring with two green stripes.

  It was one thing to suspect it. Another to confirm it altogether. The latter actually hurt, because I knew Adrian, I trusted him as Jed's Beta and liked him as one of my closest friends, only to find out that our trust had been misplaced from the very beginning.

  For a split second, the entire place was deathly silent. Then Jed reacted, swiftly twisting his hand around the chain so that the metal was tightened around Adrian's neck, before yanking the man up by the chain and shoving him roughly against the nearest wall.

  Everyone else was stunned by Jed's actions, but Brutus and Katya and several others at the table were already getting up, the looks on their faces guarded and wary. I blocked them all out and focused instead on Adrian, who was blinking rapidly from the collision, seemingly thrown for a loop by Jed's actions.

  I exchanged a quick glance with Jed, and it was impossible to miss the flicker of hurt that glimpsed his eyes now that Adrian's betrayal had been confirmed. Taking a deep breath, I looked at Adrian, who now seemed to have come to grasp with the situation and was looking at us with a deadly gleam in his eyes, a ghost of a grin playing on his lips.

  "We knew you were one of them," I said quietly, forcing myself to meet his gaze. It was a difficult thing to do – the Adrian I knew was always warm and loyal; this one was a cold, calculating traitor. "Which one are you?"

  Adrian was entirely still for a moment, but when Jed's hand tightened around his chain, he finally spoke. "Azazel," he drawled, his smirk widening as his gaze travelled from me to Jed. "At your service."

  26

  KNIFE

  Adrian was Azazel.

  How had we not seen it coming? Perhaps we were so caught up in the fact that Mattheus was Malthus, Claudius was Orcus, Diego was Dimitri that we hadn't even realised that there was another of the syndicate on Titan land. But Jed's mother was right – Titan was home to the syndicate all along.

  Keep your friends close, enemies closer, they say. And Jed had done just that.

  His jaw was clenched in anger as he stared at Azazel now, fingers curled so tightly around the chain that his knuckles were almost white. Everyone around us was silent, an equal blend of wariness and shock surrounding us. Azazel's friends, in particular, the ones who'd worked with him and respected him were all looking extremely betrayed, while Bianca was coolly watching the proceedings from her seat by the counter. But all I could focus on at that moment was how Azazel was beginning to curl in on himself in a frighteningly familiar way, his posture entirely defensive as he tried to pull away from Jed.

  "Adrian – Azazel." My voice sliced through the tension and his dark eyes immediately snapped over to me. I swallowed at how predatory he looked all of a sudden and forced myself to meet his gaze. "Don't shift."

  "I'd listen," he mused calmly. "But you're forgetting one very important thing." Without warning, he raised an arm to elbow Jed square in the chest, the impact momentarily throwing Jed back a few steps, amidst surprised gasps and the occasional angry mutter from the others surrounding us. He fixed his gaze on me, his eyes almost obsidian as the corner of his lips tugged up in a wicked grin. "You're not my Luna."

  Then he shifted.

  Bones cracking, fur sifting, limbs stretching – until he was that same brown wolf I'd seen the night of Spike's funeral. It was instinct that made me take a quick step back, my fingers flying to the chain on my neck as I searched for the silver blade within my pendant. But I didn't have to. Because just as Azazel lunged at me, a mass of black fur rammed at him from the side, knocking him right off course.

  I hadn't even realised that Jed had shifted during the time elapsed, but he was tackling Azazel to the ground, his larger form looming over the latter as he bared his teeth at him. There wasn't a doubt that Azazel was one of the best fighters that Titan had, and I saw it now, the way he snapped threateningly at Jed before twisting out of the way, circling Jed in a manner that put him on the offense, Jed's posture entirely defensive as he stood rigidly, green eyes sharp as he anticipated for Azazel's next move.

  Pandemonium had broken out at the sight of the fight, and in the background, I heard several people begin to shift, only for Vaughn to stop them just in time. It was never a good idea to intervene in a fight this vicious. There were shouts and yells as people got up from their seats to get a closer glimpse of the fight, several older and younger ones evacuating the premises while others were dragged out of the way to prevent more collateral damage.

  I was all but frozen to the spot, too confused and shocked by the turn of events to even comprehend it, but a hand snuck out at the last second to pull me out of the way when Jed and Azazel came a little too close.

  It was Lorraine. She kept her gaze firmly averted from me when I threw a grateful glance at her, but I was instantly reminded of the first time she'd pulled me
out of a fight when a couple of rogues had first trespassed into the diner months ago. She'd kept me safe and it was no different now, in spite of all the tragedies that had occurred since then.

  "We should help," Katya was saying to Brutus, as she stared at the wolves worriedly. Her concerns weren't unwarranted for. Jed was on the evasive track, ducking and twisting aside every time Azazel tried to launch an attack, and the latter was growing more daring by the second. "Alpha's pulling his punches and it's giving Beta the upper-hand."

  "Not Beta," replied Brutus sharply. "Azazel. And unless Alpha gives us the indication, we're not shifting."

  A sudden move from Azazel took everyone by surprise, an unforeseen manoeuvre that had Jed flinching back to defend himself when Azazel lunged forward, jaws open to sink his teeth into Jed's neck. Amidst horrified gasps, Brutus, Katya and Vaughn were already bracing themselves to shift whenever necessary.

  But it wasn't. With a swift, deft move, Jed feigned a swerve to the right, leaving his back exposed once again. But when Azazel attempted to make another attack, Jed spun round just as quickly and pinned him to the floor. Growling, Jed stood with one of his front legs clamped down on Azazel's throat, until the latter was all but gasping for breath, futilely struggling to pull away.

  Jed lowered his head, teeth bared and fangs sharp like knives, but the moment I realised he was about to kill Azazel by tearing out his throat, the same way he had with all those wolves he'd killed before, I immediately took a step forward.

  "Jed."

  My voice was barely audible but it was like hitting an off-switch. Jed stopped growling abruptly, blinking just once before he lifted his head to look at me. A flicker of awareness glimpsed his bright green eyes and he stilled, keeping one paw firmly pressed down on Azazel's throat until I shook my head in the subtlest movement.