by Kayla Wolf
Chapter 13 – Lachlan
Patrol was uneventful. After the altercations a few nights ago, it seemed that the wolves had retreated from the peninsula—at least for now. There were no new sightings of campsites, no evidence that the wolves were still on the peninsula, but Lachlan didn’t trust them to have given up so easily. And neither did Harvey. The guy had been pulling double shifts, patrolling every inch of the peninsula by himself, clearly furious that harm had come to his friends as a result of the wolf pack. Lachlan had to speak quite sharply to him to get him to calm down a little, and he extracted—with some difficulty—a promise that he’d try to take it easy and get some rest the following day.
”You’re no use to anyone if you run yourself into the ground,” Lachlan said to him. They were on foot at the northernmost part of their territory, close to where the peninsula joined the mainland, and there was a mutinous look in Harvey’s eyes that made Lachlan worry about his safety.
”There are wolves trying to mess with us. With our people—our family. They beat you up, Lachlan! You said it yourself—they’d have killed you if they hadn’t underestimated you in a fight.”
”I know. I’m as worried as you are. But you’re not keeping us safe if you’re so sleep-deprived and exhausted that you can’t function, you know? Let us take some of the slack.”
Harvey sighed. “I am pretty tired, I guess. Fine. If it’ll shut you up, I’ll take tomorrow off patrol.”
”And construction.”
”I’ll be bored!” Harvey protested. “How am I supposed to spend a whole day—”
”Go to the beach! Take a walk in the woods! It’s Emerson’s day off today, he’s going birdwatching. Be more like Emerson.”
”Never thought I’d hear you say that,” Harvey grumbled. “Next thing you’ll be telling me to be more like James and go chasing women every weekend—”
”Definitely not,” Lachlan said sharply, thinking of the conversation he’d had with Serena earlier that morning. “He’s been giving us a bad name.”
”What, with Serena? Yeah, he’s struck out hard with her, hasn’t he?”
”What do you mean? Was he trying it on for real?”
”Yeah, definitely. But she wasn’t having a bar of it.” Harvey shot him a sideways glance, suspicion suddenly clear on his face. “Why are you so interested in James’s bullshit all of a sudden? Is something going on with you and Serena?”
Lachlan hesitated—but he’d never been very good at lying to his friends. Harvey’s face lit up with a combination of amusement and scandal. “Lachlan! She’s your employee!”
”I know! She just… I don’t know. It just sort of—happened.”
”She’s a wolf,” Harvey added, wrinkling his nose. “Are you sure?”
”She’s—half-wolf,” Lachlan pointed out.
”Well, Delilah’s half dragon, and she’s one of us.”
”Serena grew up with humans. She’s not like this pack, I know it.”
Harvey looked doubtful, but he shrugged, clearly not interested in having an argument. “I trust you to know what you’re doing, dude. But—is it really smart to get involved with Delilah’s nanny? What happens when you break it off?”
”When?” Lachlan said, raising an eyebrow. “Or if?”
Harvey whistled. “That serious, hey? You haven’t started believing in all that soulmate guff, have you?”
Lachlan hesitated. The six of them had had a lot of arguments about soulmates over the years. James, predictably, was dead against the idea that anyone had some predestined partner waiting for them out there somewhere. Harvey and Daniel tended to agree. Emerson was a staunch believer in the concept, and was patiently awaiting the arrival of his own soulmate—and Bryce, a man of few words, wouldn’t say whether he believed in soulmates or not. Lachlan had usually moderated the arguments instead of taking sides—it was a sensitive issue for him, what with the situation with Delilah’s mother, so the guys rarely asked him what his opinion was. But now Harvey was peering across at him, his sharp blue eyes narrowed in scrutiny.
”You have,” he said, eyes widening. “You think she’s your soulmate.”
”I don’t know! It’s too early to know stuff like that—”
”You do! Unbelievable. I never thought we’d lose you to superstition like that.” Harvey shook his head in mock consternation. “Well, I hope you know what you’re doing, buddy. I trust your judgment, you know that. And she’s a nice girl.”
”She’s better than nice,” Lachlan said sharply. But before he could say anything more in Serena’s defense, he realized they were back at Harvey’s car, having done a full circle of the area. The sun was already low in the sky—he realized with a start that they’d been patrolling all day. “We’d better head back, hey? It’ll be getting dark soon.”
“I’ll drop you home,” Harvey said, gesturing for him to get into the car. They didn’t talk about Serena or soulmates on the trip back—something Lachlan was grateful for. It was still all so new… a part of him was honestly frightened of jinxing it. As though if he thought too much about it, Serena would disappear in a puff of smoke or something. It was a dumb idea, but still… he was too excited about what was happening with her to get too rational about his superstitions. He couldn’t believe he was giving serious thought to the concept of soulmates. He’d sworn off the idea years ago after everything with Sarah had fallen apart. But now, thinking about Serena, her bright silver eyes, the way she laughed, how he’d felt spending time with her and Delilah…
Speaking of which. He frowned as Harvey pulled up to his house. No sign of his car—Serena and Delilah weren’t back yet, it seemed. But hadn’t they just been heading out for the grocery store? They should have been back hours ago, even if they’d gotten a late start. Could they have headed down to the beach or something? He waved goodbye to Harvey and headed inside… and his concern deepened when he found Emerson, not Serena, sitting on the couch.
”Hey, man. What’s going on?”
”Daddy!”
Well, that was part of the mystery solved—Delilah came barreling down the hallway with her favorite toy horse clutched in her fist. She offered it to him—a sign of great favor—and he scooped her into his arms, giving Emerson a concerned look.
”We seen birds!” Delilah informed him brightly. Emerson nodded, but he looked worried.
”Delilah was throwing one of her famous tantrums this morning,” he told Lachlan in a low voice. “Serena couldn’t get her into the car, so I offered to take her birdwatching while she got the groceries. We were going to meet back here. That was this morning. She’s three or four hours late, at this point.”
Worry settled into Lachlan’s stomach. “She didn’t say she was going anywhere else?”
”Not at all. Just the groceries then straight back home, that’s what she said. I stayed with this one,” he added, nodding at Delilah. “But it doesn’t seem like Serena to disappear like that.”
Lachlan felt ice gripping his heart. What if his worst fears had come true? What if Serena had felt overwhelmed by what they’d shared the night before—what if she was gone now, already halfway home to Montana and determined to never see him again? No. It couldn’t be. He couldn’t accept that that had happened—not after Sarah. There had to be another explanation. He handed Delilah to Emerson and pulled his phone out of his pocket, frowning at its empty display—no calls from her, no texts. Had she been angry with him for leaving her this morning without saying goodbye, perhaps? He just hadn’t wanted to wake her—she’d looked so peaceful, lying there in the morning light…
He hit dial on her contact—then sighed deeply when he heard a buzzing in response. Sure enough, there was her phone, sitting on the kitchen counter where she usually put it when she was helping Delilah with her breakfast.
”She didn’t take her phone,” Emerson said—helpfully, but a little late. “I did try calling her.”
Well, that probably ruled out the possibility that she’d left them�
� nobody would leave town without their phone, not in this day and age. But the rest of the possibilities weren’t great. Lachlan gnawed on his lower lip, full of concern and not sure where to start.
”Emerson, can I borrow your car? I’m gonna head for the grocery store, see if anyone’s seen her.”
”Good plan,” Emerson said. He reached into his pocket and tossed Lachlan the keys.
”Delilah—”
”Let me look after her. We’ve had a pretty cool day so far,” the tall guy said, grinning down at the toddler who was sitting happily in his lap, waving her toy horse solemnly in the air. “Let’s keep the party going. I’ll keep my phone on,” he added, giving Lachlan a serious look. “If you need us, just give me a call, and I’ll get the guys, okay?”
Lachlan nodded, grateful for his friend’s support as he headed outside. It was only a few minutes’ walk to Emerson’s place, but he ran it anyway—it felt good to move faster. It almost made up for how long it had been since Serena had gone missing… the long hours in which anything could have happened…
Don’t be silly, he told himself firmly as he got into Emerson’s car, the keys jangling in his hand. There are a hundred explanations for her absence that have nothing to do with anything horrible… maybe the car broke down, maybe she got a flat tire and couldn’t call anyone, maybe she got caught up talking to someone in town… he refused to let himself panic until he’d exhausted all the options. As he drove up the road that led to the mainland, he scanned both sides of it, hoping against hope to see a broken down car with an irritated wolf sitting in the front seat… but he knew from patrolling all day that she wasn’t likely to be here.
He drove a lot faster than he should have and reached the grocery store just as night was falling. They weren’t quite closed yet—they opened late some nights to let people get their shopping done after work—and the parking lot was still half full of cars. Including—Lachlan’s heart sank—a familiar truck, parked close to the entrance. It was his truck… but there was no sign of Serena. He headed over anyway, peering through the windows, and realized to his surprise that the back seat had two bags of groceries sitting in it. So she’d gotten here and done her shopping… then what? Disappeared off the face of the planet?
There was a tired-looking woman in a uniform leaving the grocery store, and he hurried over to her, recognizing her as one of the check-out girls who’d been there for a long time.
”Hey—sorry to bother you. Did you serve a woman with red hair and silver eyes today? She’s new in town, usually comes in with a toddler—”
”Oh, Serena? Yeah, she was here grabbing her groceries today. She’s your nanny, right?” The girl smiled. “Cute baby. She didn’t have her with her today, though.”
”No, my daughter was with her uncle,” Lachlan said. “Did you happen to see where Serena went after? It’s just—her car’s still in the parking lot with the groceries in the back, and she never came home… I’m a little worried.”
”She just grabbed her stuff and left.” The girl frowned. “Oh, I think I saw her helping an old guy with a table—he was dragging it towards this huge old white van, and she went to help him. Maybe she went with him to help him unload it at the other end too? He seemed pretty decrepit to be moving such big furniture. No idea why he’d buy something like that.”
Lachlan frowned. It did sound like Serena, helping out a stranger in need… but something about the whole situation was ringing alarm bells in his mind. She wouldn’t have let herself be home so late—not with Delilah to look after. Not without any way of contacting people to make sure everything was okay. Something was wrong here—something was very, very wrong. “Did you know the old guy?”
”I hadn’t seen him before. But there are a bunch of new people in town for the summer. I assumed he was one of those.”
”Thanks for your help,” Lachlan said, giving the girl a genuine smile despite his worry. She nodded, heading off to her own car, and he frowned, pulling his phone out of his pocket. An old man with a van… well, that was easy enough to check up on. What the girl had said about the guy being new in town set off a lot of alarm bells, though. What if he was one of the wolves? What if Serena had gone with him—but it hadn’t been voluntary? What if he’d taken her against her will?
”Emerson? Something’s wrong. I can’t find Serena—her car’s here, and so are the groceries, but she’s gone. And one of the clerks from the store said they saw her helping a guy with some furniture.”
He heard a sharp intake of breath on the other end of the line—somehow, knowing that Emerson had come to the same conclusion as he had made him all the more certain that something terrible was happening.
”I’ll call the guys,” Emerson said in a low voice. “We’ll come up and meet you. Did the clerk give you a description of the van?”
”Yeah. Big white van. There can’t be many in town. We’ll start the search here.”
“Is it worth getting in touch with the human police?”
Lachlan hesitated, torn. The problem with asking the police to help was that they often had questions for the people asking for help… questions that could be pretty hard to answer. Dragons never did especially well when it came to human record-keeping. He looked like a mortal man in his thirties, but his birthday—if it had even been registered with humans—would put him well into the triple digits. It was the kind of thing that raised suspicions and caused more trouble than it was worth.
Besides, the six of them had led pretty wild lives in the decades before they’d settled down on the peninsula. The last thing they needed was one of their number to get arrested. That could bring the whole settlement into question. Lachlan sighed. As much as he’d have appreciated the extra manpower, it was best to leave the human police out of it.
”I don’t think so,” he told Emerson, steeling himself for a long night. “This kind of thing, we handle as shifters.”
They put a few more plans in place before they hung up—Emerson would marshal the guys to split up and start searching for the van, while Lachlan asked around the area of the grocery store to see if anyone had seen it go by. In a town this small, a big white van would hopefully be at least a little remarkable. It helped to have a plan, but he could still feel the worry chewing on his stomach like an angry animal. Wherever Serena was, she was alone, and scared, and possibly hurt. He just hoped that she knew, somehow, that he was coming to get her.
And that he’d utterly destroy any obstacle that tried to stand between them.
Chapter 14 – Serena
Her heart pounding, Serena tried to stay calm as she crouched in the back of the van. It was impossible to keep track of the twists and turns it was taking—even if she’d had a good mind for directions, she barely knew the town outside of the grocery store, so she had no idea where she was being taken. In pitch darkness, too, it was hard to keep track of time. She did her best to count, but with her heart pounding with panic and her mind racing with ideas of escape—or fear of what was about to happen to her—it was hard to keep track. Her best guess was that the drive lasted about half an hour, maybe more—which, given how fast it seemed the van was going, could put her anywhere within twenty miles of the grocery store.
Would Lachlan be able to find her, she wondered? She felt sick thinking about it. He’d be on patrol all day… it was likely he wouldn’t realize she was missing until he got back to the house, and even then, how long would it take him to retrace where she was going? What if he thought she’d left for good, and didn’t bother following her? No—no, she’d left her phone, she tried to tell herself, fighting down the clawing panic that was rising in her chest. He’d know that meant she’d intended to come back. Emerson would tell him what had happened, where she’d gone—they’d figure it out. They’d come for her. She just had to be strong until then.
The only small mercy in all of this was that little Delilah wasn’t with her. She shuddered to think what would have happened if she’d had Delilah along for the ride.
Would she have popped the little girl in the car while she helped the old man? Or would he have grabbed the toddler, too? What kind of a thing was this? Why had he locked her in the van? What was the purpose? She had no money to speak of, no family who’d be able to get any… and it wasn’t as though she was dressed particularly ostentatiously. What had made this guy decide to kidnap her?
The obvious answer was too horrible to think about, and she bit her lip as she heard the driver’s side door open. He was about to pull her out of the van. Would she be able to make a run for it? But to her dismay, the footsteps she heard outside kept going, and she was left alone in the back of the van. What was he doing? Getting rope to tie her up with? Where had he brought her? She was desperate to see outside of the pitch dark box she was trapped in… but at the same time, she was terrified to confront her captor.
After what felt like an eternity, she heard footsteps again—but these were heavier, faster than the old man’s. There was a clattering of the doors being unlocked, and suddenly the back of the van was flooded with light—she shut her eyes reflexively, accustomed as she was to the pitch darkness. Before she even opened them, she detected a strangely familiar smell… the smell of cheap cologne. Where had she smelled that before? Was it someone in the settlement?
”Hello, Serena.”
A horrible wave of recognition rushed over her as she heard the low, male voice—and sure enough, when she opened her eyes, there he stood. The man who’d come up to them in the grocery store, who’d asked so many probing questions. The man with red hair and a pair of black sunglasses… but he wasn’t wearing the sunglasses now, and the cologne wasn’t as strong as it had been the day before. She blinked furiously, trying to get her eyes to adjust, wanting to see as much of his face as possible in case she needed to describe him for the police later—but those thoughts disappeared in a rush when she looked into his eyes.