Adan
When we reached the bottom of the stairs, I pulled Conner through the dark stone hallway, heading toward his father’s cell. Oddly enough, it was quiet. Darius wasn’t yelling and screaming, as usual. He must have grown hoarse.
I laughed at the thought.
When we approached the heavy wooden door of his cell, the Zeke and Joe were standing at attention outside. “Guards, open the door.”
“Aye!” they both yelled in unison.
But when they opened it, no one was there.
A huge smile spread across Conner’s face.
The whole attack was a diversion.
“Where is your father?” I demanded, shaking Conner with both hands.
He shrugged. “How should I know? I’m just glad he got out safely.”
“At the expense of half your Pack!” I backhanded him hard across the face.
Conner scoffed, his eyes wide. “Hey, at least it saved my father. Without him, there is no Pack.”
“Well, you’re right about that because you sure aren’t fit to be the Alpha.” I shoved him toward Nikoa. “Hold him and make sure he doesn’t escape.”
“With pleasure.” Nikoa grabbed both of Conner’s arms, gritting his teeth as he looked into his eyes. “You’re damn lucky I’m not the Alpha of this Pack. If you’d have pulled that stunt at my Pack, I would have lined you up beside your men and killed you in the courtyard.”
Conner gulped but didn’t say a word.
I scoffed, shaking my head. “I just might yet.” Storming out the cell doors, I looked both ways but saw nothing.
I grabbed the guards by the throat and pinned them both against the stone wall. “Where did Darius go?”
“What?” Joe, one of the guards, asked, his eyes wide. “I have no idea what you’re talking about! Darius was in there yelling this morning!”
“How long ago was it that he stopped yelling?” I asked Zeke, the other guard.
“Not long ago!” he gasped, his eyes wide.
“And you didn’t check on him?” My voice bellowed throughout the hallway.
“We did this morning!” Joe yelled. “I thought he’d given up yelling or had worn himself out!”
Zeke shrugged, unaffected by my hands squeezing his throat. “I was just glad for the peace and quiet.”
“Well, he’s gone!” I yelled, squeezing their throats even tighter. “Did you see or hear anything?”
“Alpha Cole, I swear I saw nothing!” Zeke replied, his eyes wide. Although they weren’t quite warriors yet, both Zeke and Joe were strong young guards working their way up to become great warriors. I let them go. “You had better hope I find him. That is, if you both still want to become warriors.”
“Aye!” they both yelled in unison, nodding their heads.
Just then, Gordon, one of Brenna’s guards, ran down the hallway headed right toward me.
“What is it, man?” I asked, fearing the worst.
“The Queen’s Guards, Cory and Harper, are dead,” he said. “Truth is with their bodies now.”
“And the Queen?” My heart stopped. If anything happened to Brenna….
“Gone.”
Seeing nothing but red, I yanked Conner away from Nikoa and pulled him over to the wall. Then I wrapped one of the chains around his neck as he gasped. “You’d better start talking now before I pull your head off with this chain.”
“Adan.” Mason calmly tilted his head to the side, a smile lighting his lips. “That’s the information I have for you.” He shrugged, his voice singsong. “If you’d have killed me, you would have never seen Brenna alive again.”
I chained Conner to the wall myself, shackling his arms and legs. “You will stay here until I return for you.”
I turned to Mason, gritting my teeth.
Mason pulled away from Nikoa, giving him a dirty look before turning to me. “Will you spare my life?”
I took a step forward. “If anything has happened to Brenna, you shall pay with your life.”
He stared at me for a long moment. “Agreed.”
“Now, tell me what you know.”
“And you will let me live?”
I let out a long, slow breath. “I will think about it.”
He shrugged. “Then I can’t help you.”
“Do not play games with me, Mason!” I drew my sword and held it to his throat. “If you don’t tell me what you know now, then I have no use for you.”
I reared back my sword, ready to strike, when he held up his hands. “Stop, stop! I’ll tell you what you want to know!”
“Who has her?”
“Fletcher.”
My heart sank, unable to believe what I was hearing. “What? How?”
“He’s not as human as you thought.”
I thought for a moment and then nodded. “Tell me everything and I will spare your life.”
***
Brenna
“I brought her here as you asked! Now, pay me what you promised!” Willow paced back and forth in the basement of the Eastern Canyon Resort, where Fletcher had kept me in a cage before he sold me to Adan. My arms and legs were shackled against the wall, and the silver wristband subduing my magic was still wrapped tightly around my wrist.
I looked around, and beautiful women of all nationalities and races were in cages. Some were half delirious. Some were sleeping. Clearly, all were heavily drugged or sedated, waiting to be sold.
“Let me out of here!” A beautiful woman with messy blonde hair screamed, trying to get to her feet, but a guard standing nearby hit the side of her cage with a small wooden bat.
“Settle down in there!” he smirked. “Don’t worry. We’ll let you out after you fetch a nice price for the boss.” He nodded to a man in a white coat standing nearby—the onsite doctor—and he walked over with two men, brandishing a syringe.
“No!” the woman yelled, flailing her arms as they pinned her to the floor and shot her up again. “No….” A moment later, her arms fell limp as she lay on the floor of the cage.
“When Adan finds me, you’re a dead man!” I yelled in Fletcher’s face, determined to rescue these women if it was the last thing I did. Thinking back, I should have come way before now. “You’re insane if you think you’ll get away with this!”
“I have for a very long time.” He chuckled as he stepped closer, running his fingertips over my cheek. I was still dressed in my silk gown with spaghetti straps, which left nothing for the imagination. “If I had my choice, I’d keep you as my mistress and hide you, but no matter. Where I’m sending you, Adan will never find you.”
Willow jerked her head toward me. “You have your prize now. Give me what you promised-- control over all the covens.”
My head snapped toward Fletcher. “You’re a witch?”
He casually lifted one shoulder. “It’s actually called a wizard, but yes.” He laughed, motioning around him with his arm. “Actually, I’m the Grand Wizard and all of the covens in America are under my control.”
I glanced toward Willow. “But I thought you were the Witch Supreme!” I scoffed, shaking my head. “That means that you control the covens.”
“Just the ones in the east, not in the nation.”
“Why, you greedy, little....” I leaned forward as far as my chains would let me. “You sold out Magenta!”
“You bitch!” A second later, Willow zoomed toward me from across the room, reared back her hand, and let it fly across my face. My head fell backward, hitting the stone wall I was chained to. “I never did such a thing! I would never sell her out! But you, on the other hand, deserve everything you get for what you and your precious Alpha did to Magenta!”
“I did nothing to her!”
“You used her!”
“Adan and I loved her.”
She gripped my chin hard. “Well, so did I.”
Just then, Darius walked in rubbing his wrists, flanked by two men. A sinister smile spread across his face as he walked purposefully toward me and roughly grabbed my face, forcing me to look into his eyes. “I’m going to feed you to my wolves. First, they will have their way with you, and then I’ll string you up in the courtyard of my Compound and beat you to death for what you did to my Mate! Then just before you die, I’ll rip out your spine just as you did Marcia’!”
“You’ll never get away with this!”
He laughed without humor. “I already have.”