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29
The sound of footsteps jarred me from my sleep, but I didn’t turn to look for the source. The basement was still dark, the light off after Dillon had retreated upstairs into the house. I couldn’t tell how long I’d been asleep, but my mind had cleared enough that it had to have been long enough for me to get through at least one REM cycle.
Keeping my eyes closed, I kept my breathing even. The light over my head switched on, and a low throaty chuckle echoed through the room.
“I know you’re not asleep,” Claudette said, standing outside my cell.
“I didn’t say I was asleep,” I muttered.
“Snarky as you’re mother I see.”
I rolled my eyes and shifted onto my back. “I wouldn’t know. I haven’t met her.”
“Now you see, I don’t believe that for a second,” she said, tapping her nails along what I guessed where the bars between us. “I think she came to you and gave you something. Something that I want.”
“And that would be?” I asked, though I had a feeling I already knew what she was talking about. It was the one thing Alice said would give me the power to take her down. Selene’s talisman.
“A necklace that belongs to me. Your mother stole it from me, and I’d like it back.”
“The only mother I’ve ever known is Veronica. I’ve never met Selene Beaumont,” I said.
“And yet you know she is your mother.”
I rolled my eyes for the second time. “My father left me a letter after he died that told me her name. I’ve never met the woman. I didn’t know she existed until about a week ago. Whatever it is you want, I don’t have it.”
“I don’t believe you, but after what I witnessed upstairs, I know torturing you will do nothing to get me what I want. You’ve lost hope.”
“I don’t have what you want,” I said, again letting my eyes drift closed again.
Claudette chuckled, and another voice grunted in a strangled cry of pain. My eyes flew open, and I sat up to see her standing in the center of the hall with Jamie kneeling at her side. His face was red, the veins in his neck bulging like he couldn’t breathe. His hands were braced on the floor, his back arched.
“Stop!” I snapped, shooting to my feet, pulling at my chains. “You’re killing him.”
Claudette smiled, and Jamie relaxed. His head dropping, as he took a deep shuddering breath. “Where is the talisman?”
“I told you,” I spat at her. “I don’t have it.”
“Wrong answer.” She extended her hand in the direction of Jamie’s head and he cried out grabbing at his ears. Blood poured from his nose, and I watched in horror as his eyes rolled back, and he dropped to the ground, seizing out of control.
“No, no, stop it. Stop it. Please.” I screamed, pulling harder and harder at my chains. “Stop it.”
“Then give me the talisman.”
“I don’t have it!” I sobbed, watching more blood pour from Jamie’s nose. “Please, stop. Please. I don’t have it. I don’t have it.”
“Stop lying!” Claudette shouted, slamming her hands against the bars.
“I’m not,” I roared at her. My wolf that had retreated from the silver, came rushing to the surface. My eyes changed, and I felt the burning tingle as the change rippled over my arms. My hands began to transform, and as the bright light of the change washed over me, I shook free of my bindings and launched myself at the bars, snarling at the top of my lungs.
My paws scraped against the silver cage, and I bit in her direction, sending her stumbling back. Claudette’s brown eyes went wide, and murderous.
“Change back, you little bitch, change back and tell me where the talisman is. I will kill him. I will.”
Jamie began screaming in pain, writhing on the ground, but it only made me angrier. I stretched my claws, snapped at her, anything, all in the name of getting at her throat, but the bars were too close together.
“Change!” Claudette howled. “Give me the talisman and I will end this for you. I will set things right. Just give me what I want.”
I backed away from the bars, bared down ready to charge at the door to the cell again, but before I could move a dark shape appeared in the stairwell.
