Unbroken (Dark Moon Shifters #3)

by Bella Jacobs

  It still looks bad, but from this angle I notice something else about her injury, with implications she clearly assumes I’m too stupid to understand.

  Or maybe she’s lumped me into that group that underestimates her until it’s too late. But this isn’t my first gunshot wound. Or my first double-cross. And Wren taught me not to underestimate scrawny girls with pretty smiles.

  “Guess I should shift so I can start healing up.” Clover looks up at me, bottom lip pushing into a pout. “But I’ll be tired after, you know. A healing shift wipes me out. It would probably be better if we both just sleep here tonight, and then you can let me talk you into accepting my excellent tracking help in the morning.”

  I fake a long, contemplative sigh, shaking my head slowly. “Okay, we stay here tonight.” I lift a hand, cutting her off before she can start celebrating. “But we play tomorrow by ear. I still think you should go home.”

  “And I think you’re not going to be sorry for letting me stay,” she says as she gently shrugs off her jacket and reaches for the bottom of her tank top.

  I turn, giving her privacy to undress and shift, silently hoping she’s right.

  If my hunch is on the money, then Clover isn’t who she’s pretending to be. But that’s even more reason to keep her around.

  Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer—at least until you find out what the hell they’re up to. Then you can put them wherever you want, preferably a place where they’ll regret being lying sacks of shit.

  Chapter 9

  Kite

  Not Dead is usually a good thing.

  But right now, Not Dead is a disturbing fucking mystery, one that makes my skin crawl every time one of the Kin Born guards cruises by our cell.

  They should have shot us on sight. Dust and I are known members of the Resistance, leaders who have been on the Kin Born’s hit list for years. The fact that they took us fairly peacefully, delivered us to a decently outfitted cell with two twin beds, a sink, and a toilet with a privacy partition and have left us to our own devices for over twenty-four hours is troubling.

  I’m dying to ask Dust what the hell he thinks is going on, but Dust is out cold. He got mouthy with the guard who brought our lunch this afternoon, and the cowardly fuck decided to slam Dust’s head into the bars. He’s been unconscious ever since.

  Griffins are usually a hell of a lot more durable, but after his near-death experience a few days ago, a knock on the head was enough to put him down.

  But he’s still breathing, his heart’s beating, slow and steady, and the lump on his skull—though the size of my fist—doesn’t seem to be putting undue pressure on his brain. When I rest my fingers lightly on his temples, I sense some nasty shit squirming around in his subconscious, assuring me he’s not having sweet dreams, but he isn’t in acute physical pain. When he wakes up, he should be all right.

  Assuming they don’t kill us first.

  Why haven’t they killed us already? That’s the question I keep coming back to, no matter how many times I pace back and forth across this cell.

  We have to get out of here before whoever’s in charge gets back. That’s the only thing that makes sense—we must have been captured by lower-ranking flunkies who are waiting for their boss to decide we aren’t worth interrogating and deliver the kill order. Or maybe the boss will decide to torture us first, see if he can’t drag something useful out of us before ending our lives.

  In the old days, if I’d had a Silence tablet, I’d be obligated to take it—to make myself dead before I could give away the location of Resistance headquarters or the identities of any of my fellow operatives—but this isn’t the old days, and almost everyone I know who served the Resistance is already dead. The only thing I might know that could be of any use to the Kin Born would be a heads-up on Wren, Cree, or Luke’s whereabouts, information I will never give, no matter what they do to me.

  I just hope the others are all still okay.

  Especially Creedence. Since the bus station, I’ve tried to contact him at least a dozen times without success. But that doesn’t mean I won’t try again.

  Pacing to the small, barred window at the back of the cell, I place my hands on the wall and close my eyes, reaching out along the lines that bind me to Wren and the others. But I can’t feel her as strongly anymore—she’s moving away from me, making me hope she’s aware of the danger and on the run. The energy from the others is also faint, murkier than it was before. I don’t know if that’s due to a loss of proximity to Wren or a sign that Luke and Creedence are in trouble, but Dust is barely three feet away and the connection to him isn’t great, either.

  We’re being fucking ripped apart and there’s nothing I can do about it.

  Letting my hands drop from the wall, I cross back to stand beside Dust’s bed, watching over my unconscious friend while I pray for an opening. A way out of this cage.

  But even if we could get out of our cell, the chances of escaping without the Kin Born shooting us dead are miniscule. The tramp of marching soldiers brings home how much they outnumber us, as a squad of about twenty foot-soldiers clomp into view outside the bars and turn to face us as one mindless, hate-filled unit. Their chins notch up and their shoulders roll back, coming to attention while a less syncopated pair of footsteps clicks down the hall.

  And then he steps into view, the man I thought I’d never see again, the man I was sure was dead.

  I certainly wished for his death, so many times I’d naively assumed my wish had come true.

  But I should have known better.

  My father is many things, but easy to kill isn’t one of them.

  “Son, we’ve got a lot to catch up on.” Killian smiles, his face creasing in all the same places mine creases and his hairline swooping down in the center just like mine. The fact that we look so much alike makes me even sicker. Angrier.

  “Go to hell,” I snap. “I’ve got nothing to say to you.”

  “Then you can listen,” he says, propping his hands on his hips, emphasizing the broad stretch of his shoulders. He’s still a big, powerfully built guy, but he’s not the ten-foot tall monster of my childhood. If I can get out of here, I can take him down. With my bare hands, if necessary.

  “You’re alive,” he says. “If you want to stay alive, you’ll listen to your old man and play nice.”

  “Fuck you,” I spit.

  Killian shrugs. “All right. Take the night. Think on it. But when we get to the crossing, you’ll have two choices—break your mate bond and join us, or die however Atlas chooses to end you. Out of respect for your girl, he’s having you brought in alive. If I were you, I’d prepare to play nice.” He smiles again, hard and slow. “But then, I was never stupid enough to try to be a hero.”

  I have no idea if breaking my mate bond is even possible—I’ve never heard of anything like that—but it doesn’t matter. I won’t turn my back on Wren or the promises I’ve made to her. I’ll die first, and my old man should know that.

  But he’s never known me. Never even bothered to try, a fact I’m going to use against him the first chance I get.

  Chapter 10

  Creedence

  Days pass. Weeks, maybe.

  Or it could be only hours. I lose all sense of time, drifting in and out of fever dreams so terrifying I come out of them screaming, my throat raw and full of salt, only to sink back below the surface of my own mind the moment I close my eyes.

  I don’t remember leaving the store or the journey to wherever I am now. I blinked out on a bloody carpet and woke up throbbing in pain on the floor of an earthen cell, the only light a sliver of sun slanting in through a tiny window near the ceiling, watery and pale and almost immediately devoured by the gloom. I can barely see my hand in front of my face, but I don’t need to see to know my gunshot wounds are infected—the tenderness and swelling around the wounds is horrific, grotesque—and the fever is even worse.

  I’m burning up, sweltering, every drop of moisture in me evaporating
in the fire, leaving nothing left to live on.

  The first few times I open my eyes, I almost immediately close them again, unable to bear consciousness for more than a few minutes at a time. There isn’t much to look at, anyway. There are four hard-packed dirt walls, the window, the edge of the filthy pallet I lie on, and a hatch in the ceiling, through which I assume I was dropped.

  There is no door.

  There is no toilet. If I had anything left in me to piss or shit out, I’d be reduced to squatting in a corner and burying it in the dirt.

  But, lucky me, I’m beyond such mundane bodily functions. I’m dancing on the razor’s edge between life and death, capable of only what’s absolutely necessary to survival. I breathe, I roll to my right side when the pain grows too unbearable on my left, I think of Wren and how much I love her, how much I want to be there when she beats Atlas.

  I don’t know if she caught the vision I sent rushing down the invisible line between us before I blacked out. I don’t know if she’s even still alive, but if she is, I have to believe she’ll win, no matter what. She’s no fool, my Slim. She’s honest and thoughtful and kind, but she knows when to take the gloves off and teach her enemies what a bad idea it is to fuck with her or her people.

  She fought like an animal at the compound, all claws and fire, no holding back.

  Now, if she can learn to lie as well as she’s learned to fight…

  If only I could see her one more time, I could teach her all my tricks. I spent half my childhood pretending to be someone I wasn’t. As the children of two world-class con artists, my sister and I learned to play our parts, play along, play the game until it was time to collect our winnings and hit the road.

  If Wren were here with me right now, I would advise her to tell the truth as often as possible. The more truth you pin to a lie, the more you look like a sheep instead of a wolf in sheep’s clothing. I would tell her to talk less, listen more, and find a way to love the con just enough.

  Enough to be believable, without becoming a believer.

  If you’re not careful, it’s easy to get lost in lies. Lies can feel so good. Lies are control in a world full of chaos, a pretend so much prettier than the reality you’ve costumed. And they go right on feeling that way until the day you wake up and realize they’ve eaten you alive, from the inside out, and only the lie is left.

  Eaten alive…

  I am being eaten alive, devoured by fire, cell by cell.

  The fourth or fifth time my eyes creak open, the dark is complete. Impenetrable. But I stare anyway, searching for the things that float through the blackness if you gaze into it long enough. I wait for hallucinations of better times or for Death’s face, gaunt and resigned, to emerge from the velvet night.

  Instead, something punches a hole in the dark. The hatch in the ceiling slowly opens, letting in a beam of fluorescent light that stakes its claim on the dirt floor, scattering the beetles out for a midnight stroll. Next, a bucket is lowered down on a string.

  A bucket with things inside it…

  Things like a plastic bottle filled with water.

  My heart jerks hard in my chest before my wounded lung reminds it that we’re in no shape to get excited. I lie panting, recovering from the explosion of hope for a count of five before I can roll off my pallet. Crawling isn’t an option—I’m too wrecked in too many places—but rolling I can do. I can flop onto my belly, onto my back, onto my belly again, wincing, grunting, suffering, but getting there. To the water.

  God, water. It’s the sexiest, sweetest thing I’ve ever seen. I want it like I wanted Wren in the cave, when she was under me for the first time, wet and hot and begging me to take her.

  I finally make it to the pool of light and snatch the bottle out of the bucket with a clawed hand, my soul crying out in agony when I sense how light it is. It’s only half full, maybe not even half, a fact that would bring tears to my eyes if I weren’t so damned dehydrated. I twist off the lid and fit it to my lips, trying to go slow, but as soon as the first blissful drops hit my tongue, I gulp it, quick and greedy, my throat so raw it hurts on the way down.

  But it hurts so fucking good.

  Eyes squeezed shut, I drop my forehead to rest on the hand wrapped around the bottle, fighting a sob. The mix of relief and the desperate need for more threatens to break me in a way the pain and isolation haven’t.

  I’m so fucked up, so lost in wishing I could turn back time and drink those two beautiful inches of water all over again, that I don’t realize there’s a person watching me until she says, “I’m sorry there wasn’t more. You have to start slowly, or you’ll bring it back up.”

  My heart jerks, but this time it doesn’t stop after one hopeful lurch. It pulses harder, faster, celebrating the sound of that sweet voice I was afraid I’d never hear again.

  Rolling onto my back, I look up to see Wren peering over the edge of the porthole. She’s wearing an old-fashioned nightgown with lace up to her chin, her hair in two long braids on either side of her face. “There’s a liquid antibiotic in the bottom of the bucket. You should take it while there’s light and you can find it. I’ll have to shut this soon.”

  Keeping my eyes on hers, I fumble one hand into the bucket, pulling out a tiny plastic bottle full of red.

  “I got you the cherry flavor,” she says, lips quirking on one side. “I thought you’d like that better than strawberry or orange.”

  “Cherry’s good.” I twist off the top and drink the syrupy medicine down in two gulps. It isn’t water, but the sugar hits my bloodstream like that first cup of coffee, making my eyes widen and my thoughts cut sharp.

  Wren is here, in this place where Atlas’s men brought me after they shot me full of holes. She’s here and she’s free to run around in her nightdress dispensing medicine to her wounded mate.

  She got my message. She saw what I did when I looked into the future hoping for a miracle and saw an image of Wren merging into Atlas and back out again.

  “I’m sorry you’ve suffered,” she says, the cool note in her voice making me hope harder, pray I’m right. “From now on, you’ll have food, water, and medicine. I promise.”

  “Until you get me out?” I rasp.

  “No. I can’t do that.” She gives a weary shake of her head, as if it’s truly killing her to break this news to me. “I’m sorry, Cree, but this has to end. Us. Our bond. I made a promise.”

  “And what about the promises you made to me?” I demand, playing the spurned lover with as much passion as I can muster. I don’t know who’s listening, but I’m certain someone is. Probably the Big Someone, the Head Cheese himself, the monster who rules this cell and everything above and below it.

  “I hate that it has to be like this,” Wren says, tears filling her eyes. “But sometimes, in order to shape the future, we have to leave the past behind. But I will never forget you, and I’ll do what I can to make you comfortable. He understands, now, that mercy is nonnegotiable.”

  “He?” I narrow my eyes. “Then you did it. You’re his whore.”

  She winces. “Don’t say that. You don’t understand.”

  “I understand just fine, Slim,” I snap. “I saw it. Saw this. I always knew there was a chance you’d pick the wrong side.”

  Fire sparks in her eyes. “It’s not like that, Creedence. It’s so much more complicated than right and wrong or playing sides. I have to look at the big picture. I have to choose the path that does the greatest good for the largest number of people. And if you think this is easy for me, you can think again. But I’m going to do it. I have to. The survival of our planet and everything on it depends on me, and this is the only right thing for them.”

  “You could have fought him,” I say, struggling to keep my eyes open now that the sugar rush is wearing off. “We all could have fought. We were ready.”

  Wren’s brow furrows in a mixture of pity and compassion. “But we weren’t, Cree. We weren’t ready. Not by a long shot. Atlas is more powerful than we ever imagined. We
would have died. I’m lucky that he spared me and has agreed to work for a compromise that fits both his vision and mine. It could have been so much worse.”

  I want to ask how the hell that’s going to work—how do a woman devoted to peace and mercy, and a monster who eats his wives and tortures people for fun meet in the middle?—but I’m too bone weary to move my lips. There must have been something in the medicine, something other than an antibiotic.

  Opium, maybe, since I’m suddenly feeling no pain.

  I’m floating, flying, so close to passing out that I have to dig my finger into one of the wounds on my side to stay awake.

  I suck in an agonized breath as pain electrifies my nerve-endings and my eyes fly open. I don’t waste a moment of consciousness, quickly telling Wren, “You’re a fool. You should kill yourself. Now, before he can use you to ruin it all.”

  Tears spill down her cheeks, her eyes filled with so much regret that I start to wonder if maybe I’ve had it all wrong. Maybe she isn’t in on the joke. Maybe this isn’t all play-acting for the monster hidden in the shadows.

  Maybe Wren has truly given herself over to Atlas, swallowed his lies hook, line, and sinker, like a good little fish.

  Before I can think of how to test her, a coded way to find out if we’re on the same page without alerting the Head Douchebag, she pulls the hatch up and over, dropping it into place.

  Just like that, I’m back in the dark.

  But I know one thing I didn’t before—Wren is alive. Wren is alive and close. As long as those two things are true, not all is lost.

  Chapter 11

  Scarlett

  They say you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone, but since the day I was welcomed into Fairy, into a castle made of starlight, I’ve known exactly what I had.