Wyatt needed me. Roan was depending on me.
I couldn’t let them down. Crying out, I grabbed the beam again, and ripped it off the door, pulling at it with all my strength.
I fell down on the floor, just as my jaguar jumped against the door from the other side.
The door completely flew out of its hinges, shattering into a million pieces, as my jaguar jumped right into me, right back to where she’d always belonged.
I exited my mind palace and focused back on the twisting hallways in which Mannix had hidden Wyatt. A roar bellowed up from deep inside of me, from a pit in my belly I wasn’t aware existed, sounding very much like a jaguar.
Faster, faster. I pushed my legs, pushed my arms, pushed my entire body to the extreme.
Thoughts of revenge for the people Mannix killed, for kidnapping Wyatt, for torturing Roan drove me forward, pushed me to the edge.
The thought of Roan brought forth another roar from the back of my throat. Anger coursed through me like a tsunami. If he was somehow still alive, then his fate depended on me too.
We are one, my jaguar said.
I roared again, and this time, whatever human sound had remained in it was gone, replaced by a deep, guttural growl.
My jaguar and I were back together, two halves of one whole.
And as I roared, as that animal sound escaped from my body, spasms racked through it, too, an immense, excruciating pain.
I wanted to scream, but all that came out were more growls.
As I swung my arms, I saw my hands pass by, only they were no longer hands. They were transforming, fur growing on top of skin. Long claws appeared where once my nails had been.
Wyatt was close. I could smell him clearly now.
I turned another corner. My arms had completely changed into a jaguar’s fur coat, powerful legs, and clawed paws now.
At the end of this hallway was a door. A steel door.
My body knew what I had to do before my mind caught up—a first. I relied on instincts older than myself, an animal instinct older than time itself.
With a howl that racked through my entire body, I no longer ran, but jumped forward, landing on all fours.
And then, I didn’t run anymore.
I flew.
I was so fast my paws barely touched the ground as I raced through that hallway, right at that door.
Growling with everything I had in me, I jumped at the door, and slammed right into it with my entire bodyweight.
The door gave out. It was torn off its hinges and fell flat on the floor.
In front of me, in the cramped room tied to a chair, was Wyatt, the blindfold still over his eyes.
I didn’t have time to shift back and untie him.
With my teeth, I grabbed the rope tying him to the chair and pulled it hard, dragging him along, chair and all. In two yanks of my head, I’d tossed him outside the room. The chair broke as it crashed onto the floor.
Then, I heard a click.
With lightning-fast reflexes, I jumped out of the room, throwing my large animal body on top of Wyatt’s as the room behind me exploded.
Chapter Forty-Two
I awoke to the smell of smoke. Coughing, I struggled to sit up. The smoke was everywhere, filling my nostrils, filling my lungs. I couldn’t see, and my throat burned so much.
I’d shifted back to my human form, but my entire body hurt. My back was a mattress of agony, riddled with tiny wounds. My ears rang as if a bomb had exploded…
Which it had.
Wyatt.
I rolled over and looked at Wyatt. He was lying on the floor, unconscious, still wrapped in the rope, but it was no longer tying him up. His breathing was hard and labored, but at least he was breathing.
I started unwrapping the rope. My hands were raw and bloody, and hurt like hell while I tried to pry Wyatt loose. Tears spilled from my eyes.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I whispered through the tears. Finally, the ropes let go, and he slumped on the floor, still unconscious.
I grabbed Wyatt’s arm and pulled him up. It cost me all my strength, and I nearly collapsed, but I put his arm over my shoulder and dragged him forward.
Each step was torment. I should shift, but I didn’t know if I had it in me anymore, if I could summon the energy to shift a second time.
Step by step, we moved through the hallway, each step racking my body with pain. This was what Armageddon felt like, what it felt like to have faced probable death.
But I was alive, and so was Wyatt. We’d made it. Now all we had to do was find a way out of this tunnel, and we’d be free. I didn’t even want to consider the possibility of Mannix turning up again—all I could focus on was getting Wyatt and me out of there.
Wyatt started waking up. He coughed and gestured for me to set him down so he could catch his breath. I did, putting him against the wall. The smoke was annoying, but it wouldn’t hurt us—it was just residue from the bomb going off, infiltrating our lungs but otherwise harmless.
Wyatt panted. “I’m… Are we alive?”
“We are.”
I cried again now, but this time, tears of joy. Despite the pain, despite the torment I was going through, I reached forward and put my arms around him, hugging him. He hugged me back, crying, too.
My jaguar growled softly as she started licking her wounds.
“How touching.”
Mannix’s shape appeared through the smoke, and seconds later, he was more than a shape—I could see all his features, and the sight of him almost made me sick.
“Marisol. You did it.” How proud he looked of me. As if I’d done what he’d expected all along. As if I was a student who’d just received an A on a paper.
“Leave me alone. Leave us both alone. I played your stupid game, and I won.”
“You won?” Mannix smirked. “No, no, my love. We won.”
I got up from the floor where I’d slumped down to hug Wyatt and faced Mannix, my back straightened, my chin high.
All I wanted to do was tear him apart. Hurt him the way he’d hurt me.
Destroy him.
“I saw you shift into a jaguar. I put cameras here especially so I could see. And you know what? It was magnificent.” He seemed to relish the memory of me shifting for the first time. “I didn’t doubt you at all. I didn’t doubt for a second you didn’t have it in you.”
“I almost died!” I screamed at him, approaching him, fury driving me forward. “I almost died, and so did Wyatt!”
“But you didn’t. Both of you lived. And you became this magnificent creature. So strong. So powerful. So fierce.”
Mannix’s gaze grew softer as he looked at me. “You told me you couldn’t shift. You told me how it bothered you, how much it pained you. All I wanted to do was help you.”
“Help me?” I yelled at him. “How the hell did you help me? You almost killed me!”
My jaguar bared her teeth, ready to kill him whenever I allowed her to.
“But I knew you wouldn’t die. You see, Marisol…” Those piercing blue eyes captured mine again, his gaze so deep and touching I couldn’t look away, no matter how much I despised him. “I believed in you all along. I knew you had it in you. I knew you’d shift, that you only needed the right motivation.”
“I hate you.” I shook my head, realizing the words were true as I spoke them. “I loved you once. And now I hate you. You made me hate you.”
“Hate and love are very close. And a love like ours, that doesn’t go away. I’ve showed you now what you truly are. How strong you truly are. How smart you truly are. No one in the world, no matter what they say or do, no matter how much they try to defame you, no one in the world will ever take that away from you.”
I stepped right in front of him, balling my hands into fists because I was sure that if I wouldn’t, I would hit him. “You didn’t help me at all,” I said in a low, threatening voice. “You tried to break me. You tried to hurt me. But I beat you and your stupid games.” I shook my head. “You d
idn’t show me anything. I didn’t shift because of you. I did it for my family, for my friends. For myself. Not for you.”
“Self-confidence,” Mannix said, not swayed by my statement at all. “I always thought you lacked that, even though I could never understand why. But now, it seems you’ve found it.” He seemed even prouder after stating this. “Now, I must go, though. A bomb like that going off and ten police officers overhead—it won’t be long before they find their way to the basement. Thankfully, Waynard Academy has many secret passages.”
“I’m not letting you go this time,” I said in a threatening tone. “I’m bringing you in, so they can charge you and try you for your crimes.”
I meant it. I would rather die than let him escape again.
Mannix threw his head back and laughed as if I’d told the funniest joke in history. “You will let me go, my dearest. How will you force me to come with you?”
“I’m a jaguar now. I can force you.”
And with that, my jaguar let out a roar that mixed with my own scream. The transformation went a lot easier this time than previously. My limbs elongated, my facial features changed into those of the big cat, fur grew over the skin of my arms and legs, and seconds later, I shifted into a jaguar.
Without hesitation, I pounced on top of Mannix, claws colliding with skin. He shifted as we fell, and by the time we hit the ground, a wolf was staring back at me.
I lifted my paw and brought it back down, my claws slicing into his fur. He howled in pain.
Then, I bit him in the shoulder, using the most powerful weapon a jaguar had to use. I bit down as hard as I could, ripping off flesh when I pulled back.
He moaned in pain, and shifted back into his human form, as I towered over him, panting from anger.
“Oh, you’ll want this one.” Mannix smirked. “If you take the tunnel to your left, you’ll find Roan Black there, safe and unharmed. Well, besides being declawed on one hand, that is, but you can blame Reyna Felton for that, not me.”
To my surprise, he laughed. Despite blood dripping off his shoulder, and claw marks ripping up his clothes, and me having the upper hand, he laughed. “By the time you’ve killed me,” he said, his eyes narrowed and staring into mine, “Roan Black will be long dead. See, I have one more surprise up my sleeve. Remember that venom I paralyzed Reyna Felton with? Well, it’s quite harmless in smaller doses, except for the paralyzing effects, but in larger quantities, it has the tendency to paralyze one’s heart. A slow, quite agonizing death.”
I stood frozen to the ground as each word slipped in but didn’t fully register, didn’t want to register. This hellish ordeal wasn’t over yet.
“Right now, your dear friend Roan Black is attached to a rather nifty device that constantly pours a new doze of tranquilizer into his veins, further down in one of these hallways. He doesn’t have much time left,” Mannix said as he glanced at his watch. “So, love, it seems you have another choice to make. Waste time fighting me, or save your precious Roan.”
Of all the impossible choices he’d given me today, this was the most impossible one.
I wanted to destroy him. I wanted to fight him. My entire body trembled from the adrenaline, from the need to hurt him. But if what he was saying was true, then every minute I spent here was a minute that could potentially end Roan’s life.
“So, what’s it going to be, Marisol?” Mannix asked. “Vengeance? Or love?”
Whatever choice I made, the other outcome would always haunt me. Yet, despite my need to stop Mannix, to have him brought to justice, I couldn’t do that if it cost me Roan. I couldn’t risk Roan’s life for it. Roan was more important than bringing justice to a villain. He was more important than…
Well, than anything really.
“Go.” The word came out hoarse, a whisper. I didn’t even recognize the voice as my own until a few seconds later.
Mannix titled his head at me, for the first time since he’d dragged me into these underground chambers, seemingly surprised at my response.
“That is your choice?” he asked again as if he couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t quite believe it myself either. All my instincts told me to fight him, bring him down. He’d risked the lives of over fifty people today. If he did that again and next time I wasn’t smart enough or wasn’t strong enough, people could die because of me. He was the most dangerous individual I’d ever met. I ought to stop him for the greater good. For the sake of all the clans, of all the shifters.
But if that came at the expense of Roan’s life, I couldn’t do it.
“Yes,” I said. My voice didn’t even waver; I sounded stronger now, more determined than ever.
Mannix shook his head, disbelief written all over his face. Then, his expression changed and his trademark smirk was back in place. “Until our next game, love,” Mannix said before he turned around, shifted, and jumped into the smoke-filled hallway in one swift motion.
I didn’t watch him leave. Instead, I turned to Wyatt, who coughed violently from on the floor. “Go, go,” Wyatt said in between two coughs. “Save Roan. I’ll catch up.”
He didn’t need to tell me twice.
Chapter Forty-Three
It seemed to take a lifetime to run through the tunnel on my left, but in reality, it probably took about two minutes. Two minutes, however, was more than enough for Mannix to sneak out of the secret underground passages, even sneak out of the school and maybe even catch a plane and head back to Paris or wherever the hell he was planning on going next.
I had to let him go. Out of love. Love had once again forced me to make a horrible, bad decision. But this time, it hadn’t been love for Mannix that had pushed me toward that decision, but love for Roan.
“Roan!” I yelled his name as I ran through the hallway toward him. An open door appeared at the end of the corridor, with light sneaking out from the room beyond.
As I ran toward my best friend, I understood a basic truth about myself.
For all the horrible things Mannix had done, he’d made me realize that no matter how much I thought we were alike at first, and no matter how he could push my buttons in way no one else could, we were very different, too.
I was miles away from other people. Basic human interactions, I could barely comprehend. Star constellations, ancient cyphers, invisible messages, that was who I was, who Mannix was.
And there was no one else quite like us. Two sides of one coin. Twisted, entwined together, but not the way I had once thought we were. I once thought that was love, but it had turned out to be something far more sinister.
Because despite our similarities, there was a stark difference. I could love. I could feel. When I thought of Roan in danger, my heart just about jumped out of my skin. Mannix claimed to feel love, but he didn’t really love, he didn’t really feel.
In a way, Mannix’s terrible plan had liberated me. Before this, I thought I was so similar to him that we were destined to be together. Now I knew for a fact that I was nothing like him.
All he was, was an evil twin, some kind of shadow version of myself. In my mind, I no longer classified him as the man I’d once loved.
I classified him as my arch nemesis.
I raced through the open door and stopped dead in my tracks when I saw Roan. He lay on the floor, his arm tied to an IV bag on a pole. Liquid dripped into his veins through an IV line. He looked pale, sweat dripping down his forehead, and he was unconscious.
Tears prickled in my eyes. I rushed toward him. “Roan,” I whispered, but he didn’t move. He looked in bad shape, dark circles under his once-vibrant eyes. He’d lost a lot of weight, too.
How long had it been since he’d seen daylight?
My jaguar pushed her head against him, trying to wake him up.
His jaguar is still there, she said in my mind. But he’s very weak.
Roan’s left hand was bandaged… I didn’t even want to think what Reyna had done to him there.
His clothes were torn, but so were mine and Wyatt’s. Wyatt
’s from the explosion, mine from the explosion and shifting. My sleeves and the legs of my pants were ripped up.
“Roan, I’m here.” I grabbed the IV line sticking into his skin, slipped it free carefully, freeing him from the tranquilizing poison that had rendered him unconscious. Once it had come off, I pressed on the wound to stop it from bleeding.
He slumped forward into my open arms. “Roan,” I whispered again as I held him against me. “I’m here. I’m here.” Tears rolled down my cheeks as I rocked back and forth with him still in my arms. “I’m here. I’m sorry I didn’t realize earlier. I’m sorry I didn’t look for you earlier.”
He still didn’t wake up. I heard his heart beat, but it was very slow and very quiet.
“Roan, please wake up.” I hugged him tighter. “Please. I don’t want to lose you. I can’t lose you.”
Meanwhile, the door opened a little farther, revealing Wyatt. He was holding on to the wall for support, dragging himself forward. His gaze traveled to Roan, and concern flashed across his features.
I struggled to keep my voice steady. “Roan,” I said as I focused on him again. “Roan, please don’t leave me. I need you. I…I love you.”
My jaguar blinked in surprise at my confession.
Roan stirred slightly, but didn’t wake up yet. Slowly, as the minutes ticked by, he seemed to wake up. He opened his eyes and looked right at me, but he didn’t seem to see me at first.
“Marisol?” He grunted eventually.
“Yes, yes, it’s me.” I cried again now, tears of joy this time, as I hugged him closer and pulled him toward me. “It’s me. You’ll be okay now. You’ll be okay.”
Chapter Forty-Four
I sat on a bench, wrapped in a blanket, sipping a cup of hot cocoa. Roan sat next to me, doing the same. A medic had arrived earlier to take care of his hand, and now it was neatly bandaged up, not the crude type of bandage he’d had on earlier.
“I don’t know what to say,” Roan said to me. “Besides thank you.”
“You don’t have to thank me.” I wanted to put my hand on his, but I didn’t dare to, so I wrapped my hands around the cup of cocoa instead. “I’m sorry I didn’t figure out sooner that you were missing. I thought that…” I shrugged. “Well, I thought you didn’t want to talk to me anymore after what happened, so I didn’t try to get in touch. I should’ve, though.”
A Study In Shifters Page 25