My goal was to not give into Jaret, to ignore him, but of course my patience ran thin. He opened the back door and waved me in. What I really wanted to do was smack the leer off his face, but I was outnumbered. I had a feeling his wolves didn’t care whether I was a male or female; they’d make sure I was punished.
“Any day now,” he said.
From the tension in the air, they were expecting me to run. I never ran from a fight. Holding my head high, I slid into the middle seat and he joined me. There were two men up front, and two guys in the very back. I tried to clear my mind so Sebastian wouldn’t know how dire my situation was. The last thing I wanted was for him to do some insane rescue attempt.
Once we were on our way to wherever it was they were taking me, I turned my body toward the window, intentionally ignoring them.
“Tyla Rand . . . it’s such a pleasure to finally meet you,” Jaret said coolly.
I scoffed. “I bet.”
“It is. I kind of wish I’d found you first. We could’ve had lots of fun together.” He touched my shoulder and I growled, slapping his hand away. His eyes flashed and he smiled. “Yep, it should’ve been you. No wonder my father was determined to have you.”
“Your father was a sick bastard. I guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”
He burst out laughing. “I guess not. Don’t worry though, you’ll get to see just what I’m capable of. What makes it even better is that you’re mated to the one man I’ve been hunting for the past thirty years. Did you know he was the one who killed my father?”
I could still see Sebastian’s visions in my mind. He’d killed Vincent, but I had no clue why. Why had he been in California when he was supposed to be in Canada? And there was still the mystery of the red-haired girl.
“I didn’t know,” I answered honestly. “Sebastian wasn’t associated with my pack. His agenda was all his own.”
His eyes flared. “We would’ve won if it wasn’t for him. He’s going to pay for his actions.”
My blood boiled. “What about what you did? Your father’s the one who led the attack on my people over his greed.” I snorted in disgust. “If anyone deserves vengeance, it’s us. You’re the one who’s going to pay.”
“I don’t think so, sweetheart.” He moved closer, twirling one of my curls around his finger. Feeling him touch me made me sick. “You see,” he whispered in my ear, “I always get what I want. Wherever you are, Finn will follow. My men smelled him in the woods. If you tell me where he is, I’ll make your death as painless as possible.”
Everything inside of me trembled in rage. “Fuck off,” I spat.
His jaw clenched. “You might regret saying that come tonight. We’ll see how long you last.”
Heart pounding, I turned away from him and kept my gaze out the window. Fear crept its way up my spine and I hated myself for feeling it. I didn’t want to be afraid, but something about his words terrified me.
“I’m going to get you out of this,” Sebastian said. “Both you and Amelie.”
“How is she?”
“Not good. I can’t imagine what that fuckhead’s done to her. If he’s truly like his father, we’re dealing with a sociopath.”
“How do you know him?” I asked.
“I didn’t. I knew one of his mates.”
“The red-haired girl?”
More visions of her flashed through his mind. “She was special, Tyla, and he killed her. I had to make sure he paid for what he did.” And he did pay. I watched as he relived that night, showing me how he’d ripped Vincent apart, limb by limb.
But what really surprised me was what happened after. The battle was over, the rest of Vincent’s wolves had retreated, yet Sebastian stayed back to tend to my pack. Many of my people were dead, but there were several who were wounded, including Finn. He’d carried him to safety along with the others and sat with them through the night.
“When I knew they were healed, I left before they woke up. I didn’t recognize Finn until just now,” he said.
My eyes burned but I held back the tears. I didn’t want dipshit beside me to think I was crying because of him. “He’s alive because of you, Sebastian. We both are. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t be here. Vincent would’ve won.”
“And he’s not going to now. Whatever happens, I will get you out safe.”
“Not without you.”
***
We were in Virginia, headed deep into the woods. The driveway had to be at least a mile long, surrounded by nothing but trees. We’d finally caught up to the van Sebastian and Amelie were in and I breathed a sigh of relief. There was a man who let them out, but then another who bound their hands together. Amelie hissed in pain and Sebastian clenched his jaw. I opened the door, desperate to get to them.
Jaret grabbed my arm, his claws digging into my skin. “Not so fast, sweetheart. If you don’t want to see them in pain, all you have to do is tell me where Finn is.”
“I don’t know,” I shouted, feeling my own claws lengthen.
“Suit yourself.” He pulled me out of the car and dragged me over to Sebastian and Amelie. One of his men wrapped a rope around my wrists and it burned, my skin raw underneath. Wolfsbane. The rope was soaked in it. “Take them to the basement,” he commanded. “I’ll deal with them later.”
He stalked off and Amelie shouted after him, but he ignored her. The look of pain on her face made my heart break. Even though my skin was on fire, I leaned into Sebastian until one of the men pushed us apart.
“Walk,” he shouted. There were four men guarding us as we made our way toward the massive cabin. They were all gray wolves, most likely the survivors from the battle thirty years ago.
I breathed in as deep as I could go, hoping to sense other people around, but there was nothing. We were in the middle of nowhere. Sebastian was behind me, and Amelie was out in front, her shoulders hunched.
Instead of going to the main door of the cabin, we were led to one on the bottom floor, underneath the patio. It was dark inside, with cement floor and walls—exactly like the room Amelie had been kept in earlier.
“This can’t be happening,” Amelie gasped, glancing around the room. There was a small cot and a clock in the corner, the same one as before.
The man in front of her turned and smiled. “You’re more than welcome to stay here again. Unless you’d rather be with them?” he asked, nodding toward us.
Amelie turned her head and nodded. “Keep me with them.”
He burst out laughing. “Okay. Just so you know, their living accommodations are going to be a little . . . different.”
I could only imagine what he meant by that. The lights were bright as we walked through another room, and when he opened the door, I coughed. The room reeked of wolfsbane. There were plants in every corner of the room. We wouldn’t die from breathing in the fumes, but it would surely burn our lungs.
There was also the scent of blood. Splatters of it were on the floor and in the separate cages scattered around the room. They allowed enough room to stand and lie down on the floor, but that was it. All of them were empty except one. When the captive lifted his head, I gasped. It’d been thirty years since I’d seen him last, but he looked the same. He was one of Finn’s closest friends.
His eyes went wide and he jumped to his feet. “Tyla? Amelie?”
“Josef,” I whispered. The guy beside me pushed me into the cell next to him and locked the door while the others secured Sebastian and Amelie in theirs. Josef faced me from his cell and I latched onto the bars, hissing as my hands burned. The bars had been soaked in wolfsbane. “Okay! We get it already. Don’t you think you went a little overboard with the wolfsbane?”
They completely ignored me and walked out of the room, locking the door behind them.
Sebastian growled and touched the bars. “More like, afraid we’ll kill them.”
I turned to Josef. “What’s going on? How long have you been here?” His clothes were torn and dirty, and covered in blood. But it wasn’t his blood all over the floor.
“Only a day. Jaret’s men found me in Tennessee a couple of days after Finn left, asking me to come back to his pack. I was on my way to join him when I was ambushed and brought here. They’re trying to find him, but it looks like they found you instead.”
“More like me,” Amelie corrected.
He turned in her direction and sighed. “Where are your parents?”
Her eyes flashed. “Dead. They killed them. I’d called Tyla and told her we needed help, but all it did was drag her down with me.” She dropped her head, tears splashing on the concrete floor. “I’m so sorry, Tyla. I never meant to bring you into this.”
“It’s not your fault,” I murmured. “You didn’t know what was going on.”
“Does Finn even know?” Josef asked, glancing at us all before settling his gaze on mine. “When I talked to him, he said you were dead.”
“It was a lie my aunt and uncle had told him.”
Amelie’s brows furrowed when I looked at her. “You can’t be serious. Why in the hell would they do that? How did they even know Finn was alive? I thought he was dead!”
“He found them about twenty years ago. At that point, my mother told your parents to tell him I was dead. They knew if he found me, he’d want me to be his mate.”
Her gaze shifted to Sebastian. “And if that would’ve happened . . . you wouldn’t have met him.” She sighed and reached for the bars, but stopped short. “Tyla, I promise I didn’t know. I would never lie to you.”
I nodded. “I know, it’s okay. It all worked out in the end. Finn and I talked about it. He knows the truth now.”
“So you’ve seen him?” Josef asked.
“A couple of days ago, but I honestly don’t know where he’s at right now. If he can’t track Jaret’s wolves, there’s no way he’ll find us here.”
“He’ll find us,” Josef said, taking a seat on the floor. “One way or another, they’ll draw him in. They have the perfect bait.” He looked directly at me.