Phones rang. Both Veilluex and another man, one without a tattoo, put their phones to their ears. Veilleux cursed in French.
“Dutton?” Cordelia asked of the other man.
“That was Douglas. Gabriel is mobilizing, but not to come here. They’re using the spell. Sending Isobella back in time. Gabriel has called in backup. Half a dozen more Langeais wolves have shown up.”
“Do you have enough men, Veilluex?”
“We’ll make it work.” He gestured to her captors. “Lock her in ze attic. No one goes in or out. Dutton, you’re with me. If we stop zis Isobella going back in time, none of the Montagnes will pose a threat ever again.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Melinda stood in the dusty attic, the door locked and two guards posted outside. They had her laptop and her purse. She had a few boxes and a tiny window too high for her to reach. She also had these.
Melinda unclenched her hand and stared at the lighter and the tiny red pouch of…something. Grace. The woman from earlier. The one who Cordelia had manipulated into to doing who knew what by threatening her family. She’d stumbled into Melinda on the stairs, shoving it into her hand. “Burn it,” she’d whispered in her ear before apologizing to Melinda’s captors and moving on as though she’d not a care for her predicament at all.
Getting out of the attic was one thing. Getting past all Veilluex’s men was another. But it was a big house, and Melinda’s childhood had been a master class in hiding. If she could get her laptop and find somewhere to hide, she might have a decent chance of escape. Of hacking into their security system. Better yet, hacking into their Wi-Fi and finding a way to contact Pierre and Louis. She had to warn them this was a trap. Warn them Veilleux and some guy named Dutton were on their way to stop Isobella from going back in time. And she had to tell them they were right, and she’d been wrong about Cordelia. So wrong.
She peered into the pouch. Herbs? Something witchy? A potion? She resisted the urge to sniff the leaves. Melinda eyed the gap beneath the door. She’d need something to cover her face, and something burnable to make a fire, but it was worth a try.
Melinda opened one of the boxes.Old books. Perfect. She chose a cookbook with glossy pages and lay it open on the floor, close to the door, but not against it. When the guards opened the door, they wouldn’t knock her little fire over onto the timber floors. She wanted out of the attic, not to burn the whole house down with her in it.
From several brittle paperback crime novels, she tore pages and crumpled them up, placing them over the image of a crème brûlée. Probably another of Louis’ favorites. She added more pages to her little pile. If she got out of this alive, she could ask him. She’d want to ask him, and Pierre, more important things than that. Like, were they ever going to tell her it was them who’d sent the malware? Had it all been a lie? Had she meant anything to them at all?
She squeezed her eyes shut. It still hurt. Their betrayal. Melinda could understand why they’d tracked her. To get to Cordelia. But everything else that had happenedafterthey’d found her… How much ofthatwas a lie? Making tea together. Their nights spent in the big bed, the way they’d worshiped her body as though she were the most precious thing in the world.
Cordelia and the Veilleux guy seemed to think she was their mate. From a logical standpoint, it made sense. Would they have divulged they were werewolves to her had she not been? That wasn’t something you bandied about to just anyone. And Gabriel, telling her Pierre and Louis would have died for her that day in the warehouse? Thathadto mean something, right?
She’d never find out if she didn’t get the hell out of here.
She crumpled more pages until she had a decent sized pyre, then wrapped her coat around her face, covering her mouth and nose, and lit the pile. As the fire took hold, she sprinkled the contents of Grace’s little pouch onto the flames. With another cookbook, she fanned the smoke, pushing it under the door.
Melinda stepped back. The smoke now had a distinct smell, like…sage? Grace had given hersage? Was this some kind of joke? She was going to…what? Overpower two men with a cooking herb?
Her little fire flared as the attic door opened.
“Putain.” A tattooed man stared at her flames.
A second man pushed through the door, her open laptop in his hand.
Yes.
The cookbook was on fire now, and the room stank worse than a hippie gathering in the nineteen seventies. He helped his companion stomp it out, both of them breathing in lungfuls of smoke.
Melinda waited, holding her breath, her face covered. This had to work. She had to believe Grace wouldn’t have risked handing her something as benign as a common garden herb.
It started with a smile that turned into a chuckle. Then both men were laughing, one holding up his hand, staring at it as though he’d never seen it before. He touched the wall, her fire forgotten. He said something in French, and his friend stared in wonder, before raising his hand to the wall, too. Were they…tripping? She edged closer. Neither of them paid her any attention. She grasped the edge of her laptop, and he let her take it, too absorbed with what was happening with the wall. Nothing, as far as Melinda was concerned.
One of them turned, his glazed eyes looking right at her. She froze. He dropped to his haunches and with child-like abandon, he hopped about the room like a…like afrog. The one who had held her laptop giggled, then licked the dusty wall like it was a lollipop.
Thank you, Grace.
Skirting the smoke, tightening her coat around her face, Melinda backed out of the door, closed it behind her and locked the men in, their laughter the only sounds from within.
Now all she needed was a place to hide. Somewhere quiet where she’d remain undiscovered long enough to get a message out. Somehow.
* * * *
Through the windscreen, Pierre stared at the large manor house down the street. If he’d had any doubts they had the right place, Veilluex and a half-dozen men leaving in a black Escalade confirmed it. He’d checked their files on known Faucherians. All but one matched. It hadn’t taken Louis long to identify him as Dutton King. He’d had an idea where they were headed and he’d shot off a text to Gabriel. A single word.Incoming.
