by Leah Kent
Chapter Two
As much as Gabriel hated to admit it, Finneus was right. The Liston pride, for as close as Gabriel held it to his heart, had not all been in accord with his decision to take Victoria in as his Queen. The Bond Gabriel felt with her could not be disputed, but its presence could only be affirmed by his word. There was no test, no substance, no aura to prove its existence to those outside of the relationship, and as the Bond had never been shared with a mortal before, they were right to call its authenticity into question. But it meant that Gabriel could not ask them for help. Alone and defenseless, Victoria would be easy prey. If anyone knew that she was on her own things would get messy fast. He had to be the one to find her, and he had to do so quickly. Even if she was infuriated, he'd make her understand. This couldn't be the end; Gabriel would not allow her to slip away from him over a glaring misunderstanding and lack of foresight on his part.
But where was he to start looking?
The scent signatures of the city were numerous and overwhelming. Humans left their mark wherever they went, and for a young lion the smells were troubling and unavoidable. Over time all shifters came to regard it as little more than white noise, picking out the rarer scents of fellow shifters from amongst the crowd but rarely ever noticing the clusters of human scents it overlay. Now Gabriel was tasked with sorting through the barrage of smells to locate the one he needed, and the task proved as difficult as finding a piece of golden string amongst a bail of hay; every now and then he'd find traces of her glimmering amongst the drivel, but before he could secure the scent it slipped away amongst the others. Frustration set in. How was he supposed to find her when she didn't want to be found?
Gabriel left no stone unturned. He had paced around Finneus' grounds until he was sure the neighbors thought he was crazy. Amongst the smells of the suburbs he'd found her — Victoria's scent led from the basement and to the street, but from there it was lost. She must have taken off in a vehicle, but to where he had no idea.
And so Gabriel began his search. He visited the parks they'd explored together, and the restaurants they loved. He moved through the busy city streets he knew she favored, and put his nose to work near the Masquerade they had once visited together. There was no trace of her.
When night fell and options were growing thin, Gabriel even ventured past the boundaries that separated the Liston and Leroux pride to investigate the motels that Victoria had used when they'd first met. The place reeked of lion, but there was no hint of Victoria to be found.
She was gone.
As he returned into Liston territory, Gabriel's phone went off. The vibrations shocked him, but after a quick start his hand darted into his pocket to pull out the offending device. The message wasn't from Victoria, but from Finneus.
Finn (11:02PM): she came home.
Three simple words, and yet how they made his heart beat. Gabriel hit Finn's name and called him, not content to wait on the written word. The phone rang twice before Finneus answered.
"Gabriel?"
"It's me," Gabriel reassured him. "She's home, Finn? How long has it been?"
The hard feelings between them were momentarily forgotten; all Gabriel cared for was that Victoria was safe and that she was willing to give him a second chance.
"She literally just got out of the car. I'm on my way to intercept her on her way up the driveway, bring her into the main house and get her settled. Is that what you want?"
"Of course it's what I want!" Gabriel bit back. Well, maybe not all of the malice between them was laid to rest. He closed his eyes and pushed his anger aside, determined to treat Finn with respect. "Get her settled. Tell her I'll be there to talk with her. If she doesn't want to see me, try to convince her it's for the best. Tell her I'm not going to force her to stay with me or do anything she doesn't want to do."
A silence stretched between them, and Gabriel could nearly feel Finn wanting to speak, but hesitating. When he did get the words out they were slow and sincere, laced with concern.
"You really do love her, don't you?" Finn asked. There was no pause before Gabriel replied.
"With everything I have."
Something changed between them. Once more Finneus hesitated, but this time it was not as long a wait before he found the strength to speak.
"I'll make sure she stays. You'll get your chance to make your case; I've done a good enough job at presenting the counterargument."
"I'll be there soon."
There was barely time for Gabriel to hear Finneus reply with a goodbye before he'd hung up. Getting home and getting to her was top priority, and as far as Gabriel was concerned there was no time to waste.
The burning orange hues of the streetlights blurred and bled as the cab took off through the night. Gabriel looked out the window, but his mind was elsewhere. Finn had betrayed him, had told Victoria that she were in danger were she to stay with him. Partially it was true, but Gabriel knew that the facts had been embellished to better suit Finneus' goals. Victoria was not the Queen the pride wanted, but she was Gabriel's mate and soul partner. There was only so much that Gabriel would sacrifice for his pride, and the love of his life was not one of them.
When the cab let him out outside of Finneus' property, Gabriel approached the main house with determination. He'd waged war overseas, had been in the heart of battle and engaged with the enemy, and had been shot at, and yet this encounter had his blood pumping like no other. Life and death matters were black and white — either you made it out with your life or you died. This was different. In this moment there were too many nuances to guarantee the outcome. Gabriel had fought for his life, but he knew that even if he fought flawlessly to get Victoria to stay, there was no guarantee that would happen.
Finneus had left the front door unlocked. The front room was dark, but from where he stood Gabriel could make light out in the kitchen. Victoria's scent was present, clear and undiluted by the passage of time — but so was the scent of blood. Gabriel's heart jumped into his throat, and without missing a beat he ran for her.
"Gabriel," Finneus' voice warned as he approached, "stay calm. Everything is under control."
But even as Gabriel rounded the corner, he knew it wasn't. The closer he drew the more distorted Victoria's scent began to smell, the scent of blood masking it. When his eyes adjusted to the light, Gabriel saw her. Slumped over Finn's kitchen stool so that she rested upon the island, the back of her shirt in tatters and stained red with her blood, sat Victoria. Deep gashed ran vertically down her back, and Gabriel recognized them instantly. They were wounds from a lion's paw — a lioness, by the looks of it. The space between the tracts was tighter, suggesting a smaller paw. If there was a trace of the shifter's scent left on Victoria, Gabriel would hunt her down and rip into her just as she'd ripped into his beloved. But revenge would have to wait. Before Gabriel jumped to her defence, he had to make sure that Victoria was going to recover.
"V," he breathed, moving to her side. One of his hands dwarfed hers and squeezed. Slowly she raised her head, looking up at him. Exhaustion dragged her eyelids down, defeat and humiliation plain on her face. As she moved to look up at him he caught the scent of her tears and noticed how her blue eyes swam amongst puffy red instead of white. Still, she did not sob or lose control upon meeting his gaze. Gabriel's Queen was strong even in her defeat, and he felt so proud of her.
"I need your help," she told him. The words wobbled, but her tone did not break. She spoke quickly to compensate, letting the words tumble from her lips before they had time to register and trigger any more emotion. "I know I left that message to you telling you to never see me again, and that it's terrible of me to come crawling back like this, but I don't know who else to turn to."
"Slow down. It's okay. We can talk about us later. First we need to talk about you to make sure you're okay." After all of the anguish he'd gone through, Gabriel bore no ill will towards her. Whatever issues they had were problems to overcome, not dead ends.
"But Gabriel," and
this time Victoria's words did shake with tears, "they took my parents. That I'm okay doesn't matter at all when they're still... Still..."
And with the last of her strength depleted, Victoria began to weep. The sound was raw and ugly, and her body convulsed with each racking breath. For each sob that shuddered out from between her lips, the more Gabriel's anger inflamed. To despise Victoria as an unfit ruler was one matter, but dragging her parents into this in order to hurt her went beyond cruelty. Innocent lives were on the line, and if Gabriel discovered it was one of his own who was responsible, she would never tread upon Liston territory again.
"Where are your parents being held?" Gabriel asked. Finneus, who was across the room filling a basin with warm water in his spotless sink, looked up at the question.
"Gabriel—"
"They're being held in the basement of their house, in the suburbs. I was there too until I managed to escape, but it wasn't safe for my parents to follow. I left them." Victoria had pulled herself together enough to respond, but Gabriel could hear the tears dammed poorly behind the front she put on. She had cut Finneus off, but Gabriel could tell the man was itching to speak.
"I'm going to go get them out," Gabriel insisted. "They're going to walk out of this, V. You have my word."
"Gabriel—" another attempt by Finn was cut off.
"Why are you being so nice to me after what I did to you?" Victoria asked. Her eyes, glistening with tears, were doe-like and confused. "Gabriel, I broke up with you. I... I did it in a really cowardly way, too. I don't deserve this from you, not after the terrible thing I did."
Maybe she was right. By all rights he should have felt bitter and spiteful towards her. Years spent serving his country had left him with strong morals and an intolerance for bullshit. But for every piece of armor, there was a flaw — and Victoria was his.
"Victoria." It was so rare that he said his name that it felt foreign on this tongue. The utterance caught Victoria's attention, and she refocused. "I love you."
The lion soldier, a royal born shifter who would have much rather follow than led, found himself inspired to greatness by this timid, uncertain mortal girl. When she started to cry again, this time from guilt and regret rather than fear, Gabriel knew that it was true. Sometimes those who shared The Bond did not fall in love, leading partnerships more like best friends than anything else. Gabriel wasn't willing to think of Victoria as only a friend. The tears she shed stung at his soul like vicious wasps, and her smile brightened the night and brought him joy like nothing else.
Love.
And as Victoria turned her body towards him and wrapped her arms around his neck, clutching herself tight against his chest as she sobbed with remorse over her recent actions, he knew that she felt it as well.
"Gabriel," Finneus managed to say at last, "before you mount your steed and take off into the night like the white knight you are, I need to tell you some things."
But Gabriel already knew what Finneus had to say. When Victoria had turned and pressed herself to him, the scent of lion rose to greet his nostrils. Lewis Leroux and another lion's scent, a stranger to his nose, mingled.
"The Lerouxs," Gabriel said, looking over Victoria's shoulder and locking gazes with Finn. There was a narrowed way about Finneus' eyes that suggested that anger bubbled within him. It was rare that the logical lion let his emotions get the better of him on a visible scale, and Gabriel knew what it meant.
"Lewis has orchestrated this whole mess," Finneus told Gabriel solemnly. "He was the one who laid down the evidence before me to suggest that Victoria was engaged in an affair, and I have no doubt in retrospect that it was a strategic move on his part to have me be the one to drive you both apart. He knew that nothing he said or did to you would make you leave Victoria, but he knew what I am capable of and played that advantage to break your trust."
Everything that Finneus said made sense. Gabriel held Victoria that much more tightly.
"Why not just target me to smear my name?" Gabriel asked. “Why drag innocent people into this? Victoria’s parents are suffering. And now, Victoria as well.”
"I still haven't figured that out yet," Finn replied. His tone was frosted, the aggression in it unmasked. "But what I do know is that there is one thing that I hate more than anything else."
"Being lied to," Gabriel responded. He raised a hand to stroke Victoria's hair, keeping her head where it was as she let all of her emotions out. He needed her to fortify herself, and having a good cry was going to help.
"And being used. And God help you if you mix the two of them together."
Finneus brought the basin of warm water to the table, and Gabriel could smell the Epsom salt within it.
"The Liston pride has been peaceful for years — I have been advocating peace for as long as I can remember as advisor to your father at my father's side and as your friend — but I think the tides are changing. Lewis told me that he thought no other lion more capable of ruling from the shadows than me, but shadows are way of life for the Leroux pride. As Listons we embrace the sun."
"What are you saying?" Gabriel asked. Victoria had started to settle down, but she still clung to him with need. He would not let her go just yet.
"I'm saying that you and I are going to work together to get the revenge we both deserve. Lewis has shown us that he isn't interested in merging the prides. It's time we stopped fostering imaginary relationships and began weeding out those that wish us harm."
Finneus had always stuck to the books and been on the straight and narrow. The beliefs he now espoused struck Gabriel by surprise. His coolly logical friend was allowing himself to be directed by his emotion; the tides really were changing.
"Then you're with me in this?" Gabriel asked. For their wrongdoings the Leroux pride would be punished; he'd see to it.
"All the way," Finneus promised him. "Brother."
The grin they shared left Gabriel feeling like everything would be alright. For the first time since he'd left his rank in the army, he felt as though he belonged. The King and his advisor, finally fighting for the same thing.
"So tell me what we need to do," Gabriel said, "and I'll get it done."
"Well, you see—"
There was so much left to do, and so little time left to do it in.
Chapter Three
"Lewis," Jessica whined, fixing him with her narrowed brown eyes, "you said that when you got here, we'd have our fun. You arrived three hours ago now. What gives? You know I don't like waiting."
She'd been camped in the house with Peter almost all day, dealing with the old fogies and waiting for Victoria to arrive. Lewis had said she'd show up, and so she had. Each time Peter had hunted at her side to take each of the Wilde family members down had provided a thrill, but the real excitement came from finishing the deep and taking care of the evidence.
"We will continue to wait," Lewis told her, voice stern, "until we know what has happened. Either Victoria has kept to herself and is planning a way to help her parents escape, or she has returned to the Might King of the Liston pride. If the former holds true, we will recapture her and finish the deed before she has time to escape again. If the latter is true... Well. We'll have to see what happens."
Peter had retired upstairs to catch some sleep; he'd said that the events of that day had worn him out, and he needed some time to recover. Before he'd gone, he'd taken a butcher's knife from the kitchen to protect him from lions. The coward. Jessica was glad to let him go. The pig-headed idiot had served his purpose, but she was quickly growing tired of him. Since he was a mortal she had to watch her mouth around him, and trying to explain away the appearance of the lioness in the kitchen had been work enough. He'd accepted that it was an apparition, a side effect of the stress of home invasion and potential murder, and so he'd trudged up the stairs and left her and Lewis in peace to discuss matters frankly.
But as the third historical documentary in as many hours played, Jessica was tired of listening to Lewis at all. Maybe he was King,
and maybe he was her brother, but right now she couldn't bear the unjustified wait.
"And so what? The Listons have always been about peace and harmony and righteousness. If she runs to Gabriel, they're going to come with pacifist offerings and make sure that we mind our Ps and Qs until the ordeal blows over and things go back to normal."
"This time is different," Lewis said firmly. "Didn't you smell it?"
Jessica raised a slender brow and crossed her arms, staring him down. Lewis had his eyes fixed on the television, watching the choppy black and white images from times long passed.
"Smell what?"
"Smell Victoria. Her scent has changed. She's pregnant."
A small silence passed between them, the dry narrator from the documentary the only one who dared to speak. Jessica felt dread curl inside of her chest, and she crossed her arms as if to hug herself while trying to keep her expression haughty and unconcerned.