Brooks.
There’s nothing left of the man who acted friendly until he was behind closed doors. The man who made me believe I was working at an institution that actually helped its patients.
He looks like death, and I’m sure he smells like it too.
Her face goes through many different emotions, but the one that stands out most is…concern?
“Why…” Her eyes dart around the room. Is she worried about him? That doesn’t make any sense. He’s horrible. He experimented on omegas for years. My brows furrow, and I’m about to ask her what’s wrong—but then she speaks. “Why thefuckdoes he have a bed?”
My eyes widen. Oh.
“Yeah, what the hell?” Hayden agrees with conviction, but when I glance at him, he gives me a“I don’t fucking know”look.
Brooks has taken notice of us now, his broken expression tightening with fear. Even though some sort of satisfaction goes through me at the sight, I have to keep my head. I’m the only one down here not heavily influenced by instinct.
“Siren, even prisoners in jail have beds,” I say gently. And really, it isn’t anything more than that. A flimsy aluminum frame and a thin coil-spring mattress.
“Well he’s not in jail, is he?” she snaps, her breathing growing quicker by the second. “He’s bein’ held prisoner by the fuckin’ mafia. He’s experimented on gods knows how many innocent women, he let fuckin’ BanesworthabuseHelaena, he sent me to the Cathedral, he tried to sever mine and Hayden’s bond, he injected me with medications to torture me, and he shouldn’t havethe comfort of a bed!”
Her last words come out a near shriek, her eyes wild with the need for justice.
Having all his crimes laid out like that, and knowing that’s only the ones we’re aware of…I can definitely see where she’s coming from.
Kole’s eyes go dark as he snarls. “Then he will no longer have a bed.”
There’s a sense of finality that takes over the bond as I basically sit back and watch it unfold.
I frown. “Kole—”
Hayden moves over to the control panel on the opposite wall, pressing the button that says “Enter Code.”
Sam stares at the keypad that pops out of the door. “Does anyone actuallyhavethe code?”
I try to ignore the way my gut turns at the sight of Brooks scrambling into the corner of the bed, covering his head with his arms.
“Are we really doing this?” I ask, looking around the area at my pack. It only takes everyone snarling at me to make me realize how stupid my question was. “Nevermind,” I mutter, quickly going to the keypad. I try to remember the number Declan entered when he questioned the rat in the next cell over.
“Seven-three-oh-nine,” Sam says the numbers out loud as I enter them, but then the light turns red.
“There must be a different code for each cell,” I muse. “Well, looks like we’ll just have to—”
A voice crackles through a speaker in the ceiling. “The code is two-six-one-five-three.”
Jo’s head whips around to the camera in the corner of the room. “Aidan?”
The speaker crackles again. “Just ask for it next time so I don’t get a security alert. And…keep him alive. You still need him for your plan.” With that, the speaker turns back off, and then Sam is hastily entering the code.
“What are you going to do?” My eyes go wide as the door slides open. I know Aidan reminded them not to kill him, but if Kole loses control, it’ll ruin everything.
My worries are briefly quieted when Sam storms in, grabbing Brooks by the collar and holding him against the wall.
“Kole,” he barks, and in the next instant, Kole is striding into the room.
“Way ahead of you,” the Russian giant growls before he reaches the bed and rips the mattress off the frame. His chest rumbles with fury as he rips it in half with his bare hands.
Damn. I’m really glad he’s only alittlemanic and completely on our side.
He flings the pieces of mattress out of the cell, the lumps of stuffing hitting the wall in the hallway. Jo wrinkles her nose at the scent but quickly switches to watching with a hardened gaze as Kole lifts the metal frame off the floor and startsbendingit.
