by Kat Bellamy
“Because this isn’t going to work!”
The silence that fell over the room made the pulsing rock from downstairs seem like a mocking backtrack. Colt swallowed hard, too much of a coward to look Jason in the eye. He knew if he did, he’d lose whatever courage or sanity had finally given him the strength to say those words.
“Don’t,” Jason gritted out. “Don’t do this, Colt. Don’t shut me out again and don’t say something you’re going to regret.”
“The only thing I regret is that it took this long to accept reality.”
“What reality? That we love each other? That I love you and I’m never going to stop, no matter how much you try to push me away?” he demanded. “I don’t know what this is that you’ve gotten yourself into, Colt. I don’t know if these people have something on you, I don’t know if it’s what happened with Chuck or if it’s drugs. God knows that doctor friend of yours has a spotty record in that regard, but —“
“It’s not them,” Colt growled. “It’s you. It’s you and it’s me and it’s us. This whole relationship is built on a friendship that doesn’t even make sense. I’m not a fucking junkie, I’m just finally sober enough to realize that there is no future between you and me that ends with, ‘and they lived happily ever after.’”
“Then what was this?” Jason asked, tears streaking his face.
Colt swallowed the regret building in his throat. “I guess this was goodbye.”
“Fuck you, Colt.”
It was the first time Jason had ever said those words to him when he wasn’t joking, but Colt knew he deserved far worse. “I’m sorry.” It was all he could say and mean, even though he knew it wasn’t enough. It was only fair, because as long as he stayed with Jason, as long as he had to keep the world he belonged in separate from the man who made up the only world he wanted to live in, nothing he gave Jason would ever be enough. His love sure as hell wasn’t.
Chapter 32
The only thing that gave Colt the strength to leave Jason in the worst possible way was knowing it was the only way he could guarantee that the man he loved wouldn’t get caught up in any of the fallout of what he was about to do.
Miles Brown had killed Liam Carver, and Colt was willing to bet his life that Stan and Susan had no fucking idea. If the Moreaus found out on their own, they were going to come down hard on the whole family. He had to warn Susan.
When Colt arrived at the Brown family home, all the lights were out and Susan’s car was missing from the driveway. The dog didn’t bark its head off like it usually did when he showed up. He knocked anyway, and even though he probably should have been, he wasn’t prepared at all for Miles to answer the door.
“Hey there, Colt. What can I do for you?”
Colt paused for a moment to consider whether or not he wanted to call Miles out then and there. Subtlety and compliance had gotten him nowhere, so he decided he might as well. He shoved Miles forward, stalking into the room.
The other ghoul staggered and reached for the blade at his side. “What the fu—“
Colt slammed him into the wall by the throat. He snarled threateningly in Miles’ face and took pleasure in the fear and realization in the older ghoul’s eyes as the fledgling’s strength surpassed his own.
“You killed Carver.” It wasn’t a question. Colt just wanted him to know why he was fucked.
“Someone had to,” Miles snapped.
“Your brother is sitting in jail because your sorry ass decided to take out the goddamn DA in front of a crowd of witnesses. Do you want the Assembly to wipe us all out, or are you just that much of an idiot?”
“The Moreaus have run this place into the ground already,” Miles growled, straining in Colt’s grasp. “I’m just helping the process along.”
Miles’ leg came up swiftly and he kicked Colt hard enough in the stomach that he staggered back and lost his grip on Miles’ neck. The other ghoul took him down and Colt managed to put a hand up to block his throat so that Miles’ fangs tore into his wrist instead of his neck as he shifted.
The adrenaline rushing through Colt’s veins forced his own shift, and he felt his claws lengthen as his second set of teeth broke through. There was something different this time. When he caught a glimpse at his arms as he strained to fend Miles off, the darkness in his veins had spread all the way up his arm and his skin had turned as gray and cold as stone. Every bone in his face seemed to break at once, even though Miles had yet to land a punch. He felt his nose elongate into a grotesque, lightly furred muzzle, and the bones in his spine shifted painfully until Colt could feel knife-like protrusions splitting through his skin from the base of his neck all the way down to his tailbone.
Even Miles seemed taken aback. “You’re a lupine?” he breathed in equal parts awe and horror. Colt stared down at his elongated fingers that tapered down to white bone as sharp and pointed as steel blades. It wasn’t just the physical change that came over him. It felt like every part of himself that he knew and recognized was being packed up and pushed far back to make room for a rage of such magnitude he barely recognized the emotion.
Miles scrambled back, cowering away from Colt as the Alpha rose to his full height. He felt taller than he should have been. Nothing looked right. It was all a bit too far away, too far below. But none of it mattered quite as much as the scent that had suddenly captivated him. It was almost sickly sweet, but it was undeniably alluring like nothing he had ever experienced before. The beast raised his head and sniffed the air before realizing the source of the scent was right in front of him.
Ghoul flesh had always been noxious, and although Colt had built up something of a tolerance to the stuff Evelyn gave him, it had never come close to being appetizing. And yet, all he could think about was tearing into the living flesh before him, making a meal of the man he’d only meant to interrogate.
Before Colt could follow his gruesome intent through to action, the sound of a woman’s cry filled the room, shrill with terror. He spun around and found Ronnie and Susan staring at him in differing states of horror. She had dropped the grocery bag in her arms and sauce had splashed all over the floorboards.
It wasn’t the prospect of being found out that scared Colt the most. It was how much he wanted them. He lunged and Ronnie pushed his mother out of the way with a cry of fear, but Colt kept running past them, tearing through the open door. He had to get away. In his agitated state, he couldn’t think clearly enough to remember how he’d ever come back from a shift, let alone one so grotesquely transformative, but he knew he had to get as far away from them as possible before he killed and ate the very people he’d sworn to protect.
Chapter 33
Colt ran until he didn’t know where he was anymore and then kept on running. He was surrounded by trees and Rhode Island wasn’t a big enough state for him to be confident that he was even still within its borders, but at least he was sure that if he did turn on someone, it wouldn’t be Susan or Ronnie.
He was just barely himself enough to realize that leaving them alone with Miles probably wasn’t much better. Looking back, he wondered if Miles’ betrayal had been what Ronnie was trying to tell him about.
Colt knelt by the water, stopping only because wearing himself out had done nothing to restore what was left of his humanity. He caught a glimpse of the water and regretted it immediately. The first few times he’d shifted, he had been grotesque but recognizably human. Now, he really did look more like a wolf than a man. A werewolf, at any rate. The fine gray hair that had covered his body when he first shifted had become a coat that gave his monstrous features a decidedly lupine appearance. His ears were elongated and tapered to sharp, elven points, and his eyes were no longer black, but as dark and crimson as blood.
In the back of his mind, Colt had always feared that Jason wasn’t as off-base about the “wolf monster” that had killed his brother as everyone thought. Now he knew, only the thing that had killed Luca wasn’t mythical. It was the same damn thing he was. A variant ghoul that
fed on its own kind for power and donned human skin by day.
Maybe it was the guilt or maybe Colt had finally just run out of energy, but his claws began to recede first, then his fur. Within the hour, his eyes looked normal in his reflection and with no small amount of pain, his face was recognizable as human once more.
Running on fumes, Colt wandered aimlessly until he found a road. He didn’t bother trying to hitch a ride because he knew he looked like a mess with his tattered clothes, but a truck stopped anyway and he got in. He was only half-aware of the fact that the older driver was trying to make conversation, but the man gave up after a few minutes, mumbling something dismissive about “nutcases.”
When the truck stopped at a gas station Colt recognized, he headed in the direction of his apartment. He’d lost his phone during his fight with Miles and he needed to call Susan to at least attempt to explain. Surely Miles would have told them his secret by then, and no telling what they thought. He just wasn’t sure the truth of how and why he’d actually become an Alpha was much better.
Colt had barely made it through the front door before someone grabbed him from behind and shoved a thick piece of metal into his mouth. His sharp second set of teeth started to come down, but the metal gave enough resistance that he felt a few of them crack, sending mind numbing pain through his skull. They retreated back into his gums, but the pain lingered, making his last root canal feel like nothing in comparison. He snarled and thrashed, but now that he actually wanted to shift, he was too exhausted to do so.
Two others came around him, forcing him to his knees as they pinned his arms behind his back and bound them with more leather restraints. Colt managed to ram one of the guards with his shoulder, but the others had him pinned, slamming his face into the carpet. He felt a thick needle stab his jugular and hot, prickly warmth spread all throughout his body before he stopped feeling anything at all. His vision remained intact as he lay on the floor, paralyzed, like a screen that remains lit for a moment after its plug is pulled while the power drains. It was enough time for him to see one of the other ghouls in his apartment tearing through his cupboards to pull out the pasta box where he kept Evelyn’s “supplies.”
“Nasty,” the man muttered as he turned the box over and a shower of dehydrated ghoul meat fell down over the counter.
So Miles had turned him in. Colt wouldn’t let himself believe that Susan and Ronnie had gone along with it, no matter how confused and betrayed they probably felt. That left only the possibility that they were in every bit as much danger as he feared, but even the surge of panic the realization sent through him wasn’t enough to keep him awake for long.
When Colt woke up, he was aware of his face pressed against a cold, unforgiving surface that felt like stone. The entire left side of his body was still numb as sensation returned to his right side, but he wasn’t sure if that was because his awkward position had cut off his circulation or because of whatever he’d been poisoned with.
With some considerable effort, Colt managed to get his eyes open. The familiar scent of women’s perfume filled his nostrils along with the scent of his own dried blood. His bottom lip stung, indicating that he’d split it open when his kidnappers had tossed him on the stone, but he couldn’t reach it with his tongue thanks to the metal bit in his mouth. Not that he’d had high hopes of a friendly awakening.
As he started to come to, Colt became aware of the sounds of people talking all around him. The conversation was casual and almost jovial, but it was muffled, as if the speakers’ mouths were covered. He finally managed to lift his head to look around since his arms were still bound, which made it impossible to get to his knees. Twelve hooded figures were seated in chairs spread out in equal distance around a circle and he was at the center. Most of the figures wore dark ashen robes, but there were two slighter voyeurs who wore robes of dark crimson.
Colt’s gaze fell on the one and he realized why that perfume smelled so familiar. Evelyn might have been wearing the same eerily blank white mask as the others gathered around her, but those legs were unmistakable. She raised a finger to the lips on her mask as the others continued to argue about something.
The ringing in Colt’s ears had subsided enough for him to realize they were talking about him. About eating him, specifically.
“I’m just not sure it’s a tradition we need to bring back,” said a man in a deep baritone voice. “Eating someone alive, it’s so…”
“Ghoulish?” another man offered in a snarky tone. His voice was vaguely familiar, like Colt had heard it once or twice in passing. He was seated next to Evelyn and the casual way his hand draped over her thigh suggested that he was none other than Vincent Moreau, or else destined to face the man’s wrath.
“Common,” the other ghoul replied, clearly offended. Even in his robe, Colt could tell he was a big guy and he sounded well past forty. If he was a ghoul, he was probably closer to pushing eighty.
“This one is a special case,” Evelyn said in her usual sultry tone. Colt could feel her watching him as he struggled to his knees. “When Miles told me of his indiscretions, I knew he’d make a fitting tribute. If we don’t make an example out of him, it’ll be a sign of weakness on behalf of the entire family.”
A few of the others at the circle murmured in agreement.
“And since when does this bitch speak for the family?” The other red-clad ghoul demanded from across the circle. “I don’t recall anyone putting a ring on her finger.”
“It’s alright, Charlotte. I know they did things differently, back in your day,” Evelyn said sweetly.
If Colt had retained any doubts that ghouls were as petty as humans, the Moreau family erased them. The bit in his mouth was making him drool and rendering it impossible for him to speak, which he was sure Evelyn was counting on. Not that they would believe Colt if he did find a way to out her role in his transformation into an Alpha.
Had she planned this all along? Why go to all the trouble of sneaking him ghoul flesh and all the fuss about him being her ‘champion’ if she was only going to let him get served up on a silver platter to her boyfriend’s family?
“Let’s get on with it,” the older ghoul said impatiently. When he rose from his high-backed throne, the others followed suit. For a moment, none of them moved at all. Then, Colt heard it. The sound of bone crunching, flesh tearing. They were shifting.
Colt staggered to his feet, fueled by adrenaline and terror. He looked around as the twelve ghouls lowered their hoods and removed their stony white masks. Other than Evelyn, they were all Alphas, but it became clear that some were variants as well. The older female was the least recognizable as an Alpha. The only difference between her and any other ghoul Colt had seen shift was the fact that her claws were longer and her eyes were blood red rather than black. Vincent looked much closer to the way Colt had during his first full Alpha shift with gray-black fur covering his arms and most of his face. Another lupine, just as Susan had said. There were three more lupines as far as Colt could tell. Their noses and mouths had elongated into snarling muzzles, but it was the largest ghoul in the room that drew Colt’s attention.
The ghoul’s skin had turned from a tawny beige to stone white, and his eyes were blood red like the others’. A specter.
He was so royally fucked.
“Wait,” Evelyn said, holding up her hand. The other ghouls turned to face her. Even during a shift, her features were still feminine and delicate. False advertising at its finest. “If we’re doing things the old school way, it’s only fair to allow the ladies to go first.”
The older female ghoul eyed Colt and seemed to be considering it. “Well, it is proper.”
“Fine,” Vincent said, rolling his eyes. “Just leave his head intact. I want him to suffer.”
Evelyn and the other woman stepped forward and Colt backed away, putting all of his spite into the glare he was giving Evelyn. The smirk on her face as she sidled up to him left no doubt that she was finding it all so amusing. She moved b
ehind him, brushing the hairs away from the back of his neck as the other woman’s needlelike teeth lengthened and she bit into his arm with a gluttonous snarl.
Colt’s first scream was muffled by the bit, and he let out another as Evelyn bit into the hollow of his shoulder. Her favorite cut, if what Colt had stumbled upon in the alley was any indication. Through the pain, he was barely aware of the feeling of something hard and cold being pressed into his palm as Evelyn pushed her soft curves up against his back. Colt grasped the object and realized it was the blade of a knife. As Evelyn’s teeth sank in deeper, cutting far into his muscle and sinew, Colt summoned his strength and turned the blade in his hand to start sawing at his restraints.
“Alright, that’s enough,” Vincent said, walking over. “Let the rest of us have a turn.”
Colt could hardly think straight through the agony of being eaten alive, and the entire time he was working at his restraints, there was a voice in the back of his mind chanting, You deserve it. You deserve the pain you’ve dealt to others.
At least the pain and adrenaline had given him the fuel he needed to shift. Not that it would do him much good if he couldn’t get his restraints off.
The leather broke and the blade dug into Colt’s palm just as Vincent and three others came to join the women. He tore off the gag and let out a furious roar. One moment, Evelyn’s teeth were embedded deep in his flesh and the next, she was across the room, her eyes shining with excitement and blood staining her full lips.
The agony of shifting bled into the pain of the ghouls’ teeth and Colt let out a guttural snarl as he swept his arm at the woman who was still feasting on him and flung her across the room. He wasted no time turning to attack the next nearest ghoul, ripping out the portly man’s throat before the gray fur had all come in on his own flesh.
Cries of war and alarm sounded throughout the room and Colt had four ghouls on him at once. Vincent was barking orders to have him subdued, but it was clear that none of the elite ghouls were accustomed to dinner that fought back.