*Maddox*
My wolf’s paws tear up the ground as I run as fast as I can toward the castle. When I had seen that it was going to take a long time for us to get anyone to help us fix the car, I’d decided to take off for home in my wolf form, against my guards’ and driver’s better judgment.
But I just have a feeling in my gut that there is something wrong. It isn’t something I can explain, not easily anyway.
I run all the way back to the castle. It takes hours, and by the time I get there, the sun is setting. I use the mind-link to call Beta Seth out to meet me in the courtyard with some clothes so that I can shift and get dressed. As soon as I see him coming toward me, using the mind-link, I ask him, “Is everything okay in the castle?”
I see Seth’s forehead crinkle. “Yeah, everything’s fine,” he answers with his human voice. I can’t talk because I’m still in my wolf form, but he sees no reason to use the mind-link, obviously. “Why do you ask? What’s going on?”
We walk behind a tree so that I’m out of sight of the castle. Nudity doesn’t really bother me for the most part, but if someone like Zabrina is watching, I see no reason to entice her.
I’m still breathing heavily as I shift into my human form and pull on the clothes that Seth has brought me. I shove my feet into the tennis shoes he’s dropped on the ground for me and then turn to address him. “The car broke down about twenty miles out of Willow Village,” I explain to him. “So I decided to run back here. I have a bad feeling, Seth.”
He arches an eyebrow at me. “Everything is just fine, I’m telling you. I’ve been busy all day, but nothing has happened. No one has stabbed anyone or anything.”
As we begin to walk back to the castle, I look up at the window where I swear I’d seen movement that morning as the car was pulling away.
Rebecca’s room.
Rebecca’s window.
Rebecca.
No, it couldn’t have been her. Still, ever since I’d seen that form that morning, I’d had a feeling that something ominous was about to befall us.
I try not to let Seth know how concerned I am. But I have to ask. “Have you seen Isla recently?”
He makes a face at me. “Yeah, a few hours ago. She came to see if I’d heard from you.”
I swallow hard and consider using the mind-link to call out to her now. I don’t, though. It seems desperate, and I don’t want her to know that I’ve been thinking of her all day.
We walk inside the castle, and Seth begins to tell me about all of the work I’ve missed. I don’t want to hear it. I ignore him until he asks me a direct question. “What do you think about sending them forty-five cases instead of the usual forty?”
I have no idea what the fuck he’s talking about. Cases of what to who? “Sure,” I say. I don’t give a damn what he does.
Heading down the hallway toward my room, not actually going there, I try to seem nonchalant, but Seth calls me out on it. “Are you going to shower and come to work? I’ve missed a lot today.”
I turn and narrow my eyes at him. “I thought that’s what I had a Beta for? To work for me in my absence.”
He takes a step back. “Yeah, sure, but… there’s a lot of stuff I’m not privy to, and I have no idea what you were doing. So it didn’t get done.”
I shrug. “It’ll get done tomorrow, then.”
“But… Green pack is still making threats.”
“And I’m sure they’ll still be making threats tomorrow.” I turn around and walk away from him, hearing him let out an annoyed sigh.
I see Isla’s room in the distance. I will get there before I get to my own, but I immediately notice that there are no guards outside of the door.
This is strange…. “Seth? Where are Private Wylie and Private Parker?” I ask, using the mind-link.
“I assume they’re outside of Isla’s door. Unless they switched out with another set of guards.”
“No one is outside of Isla’s door,” I tell him.
He is quiet for a moment, but then he says, “Well, I’m sure it’s nothing.”
“Yeah,” I say. But I am not so sure.
I push the door open. It’s unlocked. Not a good sign….
Walking into her antechamber, I hear the sound of pacing footsteps on the other side of her bedroom door. I pray it’s her, but I do not smell her.
I smell Poppy.
Without knocking, I push the door open to find the maid, wringing her hands, as she walks back and forth in front of the bed, wearing the carpet out.
“Your Majesty,” she says, dropping her head.
I don’t have time for that nonsense. “Where is Isla?” I ask her.
Poppy shakes her head. “I don’t know for sure… but she left this note.”
She hands me a piece of paper that is allegedly in Isla’s handwriting. I’ve never seen it, but it’s not as neat as I would’ve thought. All it says is, “Went out. Be back soon.”
“Strange,” I murmur. “When did you see her last?”
She shakes her head. “About… three hours ago, I think. I had to go help Amanda and Mrs. Dixon with something.”
“With what?” I’m not sure it matters, but I ask anyway.
“Miss Zabrina’s room was a mess,” she explains. “They asked me to help pick it up. She’d thrown all of her gowns on the floor and wanted them rehung.” She looks exasperated. I can feel that in my bones.
Nodding, I say, “Where are the guards?”
“That’s the other thing,” Poppy says. “They weren’t here when I got back. I went to ask Beta Seth about it, about an hour ago, but he said he was too busy to help me. I tried to tell him I was worried about Isla, but he said she’d be fine.”
“So… did you tell him you couldn’t find her?” I ask.
She shakes her head. “I tried. But he wouldn’t listen. Can you try the mind-link? Since you’re the king, she’ll have to let you into her mind.”
Poppy was right—Isla could ignore anyone else’s mind-link requests from her own pack, but not mine. I tried sending her a message. “Isla? Isla?” There was no response. That meant she had to be too far away from me to hear me. But how was that possible? A hundred miles away from the castle? No….
Unless she was asleep.
“Did you reach her?” Poppy asks.
“No,” I tell her, trying to think of an alternative. “All right,” I say, taking in a deep breath and blowing it out. “What did Isla do today?”
“We went to the village. We went shopping, and she bought you a gift, but I don’t see that either. And then we came back here, and we sat around for a bit before I went to help Amanda, and she stayed here.”
I ran a hand through my hair. None of this made any sense.
Was it possible that Isla thought that I’d be back already, so she went to my room to give me the gift?
I didn’t know, but I was willing to go over there and find out. “Let me go check my room,” I tell her. Perhaps she’d gone in there and fallen asleep. That would explain the lack of mind-link.
“I did that,” she says, and I narrow my gaze at her. “I mean, I went and knocked on the door, but it’s locked, and no one who has a key would check for me. And Mrs. Dixon was busy.”
“Mrs. Dixon?” I repeated. “She shouldn’t have a key to my room. Only my head maid, Agatha, my butler, Mr. Thompson, and Beta Seth have a key to my room.” Mrs. Dixon is new to her post. Perhaps one day, I will give her a key, but not now.
“Right,” Poppy says, and she makes a face that tells me there’s something I don’t know. But I’m not asking right now.
I head to my room, aware that I don’t have a key with me either. I don’t usually lock my door anyway, but if I’d taken one with me that morning, it was in the clothes I’d left behind at the car.
“Seth, meet me at my room,” I tell him. I can practically hear him sighing in my head.
I go there, Poppy on my heels, and knock on the door, hoping that Isla will answer.
She doesn’t.
A few moments later, Seth is there. “Yes, sir?” he asks in an annoyed tone.
“The key?” I say.
“It’s locked?” Seth is confused.
“No. I just enjoy standing in the hallway staring at my chamber door,” I explain, not able to help the sarcasm.
Seth fusses at me but then pulls the key out of his pocket. His keychain is massive, much like the one I’m supposed to carry around is. He unlocks the door, and I step inside. I do wonder if anyone has messed with my own special key, but that’s back at the car on my keychain.
So whatever I saw this morning couldn’t have possibly been due to someone sneaking in here before it was locked.
I walk inside, and it’s clear that Isla isn’t here.
“Can I go?” Seth asks.
I turn and glare at him. “No.”
Looking around the room, I see nothing amiss. The room is perfectly tidied as it always is.
It’s Poppy who makes the discovery, the squeal from her throat alerting me that something is the matter.
Walking over to where she is standing, by my nightstand, I look down.
A piece of paper sits on the little table. I can tell at first glance that it is the same color as the paper that Poppy had found in Isla’s room.
With a deep breath, I pick it up and begin to read.
“Dear Maddox,
I am so sorry, but I had to go. I didn’t think it was fair of my family to demand me to continue to stay here after they’d been paid by my Alpha, as I’m sure they have been by now. Since they care nothing about me and the fact that you are raping me on a nightly basis, I have decided to go. Don’t try to find me. I don’t love you. I think you are awful. Every word I’ve ever said that you might’ve taken as affectionate is a lie. I am not your property anymore as I have found my true fated mate, Private Parker, and the two of us have taken off together.
Isla.”
I stare at the paper for a long time, reading it again before crumpling it and tossing it on the floor. None of it makes any sense! Raping her? Does she really feel that way? I sink down onto the bed. Had she just been waiting this whole time for me to leave so she could run?
“She couldn’t have left this letter,” Poppy says.
“Why not?” I can’t even look up at her.
“Because… if she did, she’d still be in range of your mind-link, Alpha. She couldn’t run fast enough in three hours to get over a hundred miles from here.”
She had a point.
But then… something else occurred to me. “Unless she was in a vehicle.”
“A vehicle?” Seth asks. “No, she wouldn’t have access to a vehicle.”
“Maybe they stole it,” I say. “Maybe Private Parker is good at hot-wiring engines.”
“Private Parker?” Seth repeats. His narrowed eyebrows come apart at about the same time I make another connection as well.
Standing up, I say, “We need to find Private Wylie.”