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“Does anyone else think that whole thing was just to tire us out for whatever Von has planned next?” Tate asked as he buttoned his tux. He tugged his lapel in frustration. “And why the fuck do we have to wear this shit? What the hell do we need to be dressed up for? It’s freaking me out.”
For once, I agreed with Tate. I doubted Von had planned a nice, leisurely date for us. Before I could voice my agreement, though, a knock at the door interrupted us. A witch and one of the fallen angels stood in the entryway.
“Everyone ready?” the witch asked.
“Apparently so,” Mika said as he finished tying his dress shoes.
“Good,” she said with a smile. “For the purposes of this next challenge, you will be brought down one by one.” She extended a hand. “Gavin, you’ll be coming first.”
The other alpha took one of his rare breaks from glaring at me to frown at the woman. “Me? Why?”
“Purely random. No worries. Come on, dear.”
Gavin’s brow furrowed. He looked like he wanted nothing more than to refuse, but he shuffled off after her down the hall. The bodyguard stayed put.
“Think we’re gonna run for it?” J.D. asked.
The fallen angel looked bored. “You can try.”
I wasn’t completely sure I could take the guy. The dude was like a walking wall of muscle. The others had zero chance unless they caught him by surprise, which wasn’t likely. We couldn’t really run, anyway. He’d been assigned here to prevent us from trying to catch a peek of where we were being taken.
Something didn’t feel right, and I didn’t like it.
Over the next ten minutes, the rest of us were escorted separately. Abel and I were the last two, and they called him before me, leaving me alone. Why was I last? Was thistrulyrandom? From my experience, not a damn thing on this show was random.
When Von Thornton himself came to retrieve me, it did nothing to assuage my fears. “Wyatt Rivers,” the vampire said in that grating, used-car salesman voice. “Are you ready?” A camera hovered over Von’s right shoulder.
“Better late than never. Gonna give me a hint?”
“Nice try, but no. You’ll all receive your special information once you’re together again.”
“So, we will be together? Why’d you separate us in the first place?”
“You’ll see,” he said as we started walking.
The guard’s footsteps thudded along behind us, reverberating through the halls. I followed Von to a set of stairs that led to a deeper level of the mansion. A basement, maybe? Whatever it was, I was sure I hadn’t been there yet.
Our walk ended at a set of ornate wooden and glass double doors. The glass glimmered with artificial frost, keeping me from seeing what lay beyond. From out of his jacket, Von extracted a small vial with a little rubber stopper. He pulled the cap and handed it to me.
“Drink that, and you’ll be free to head on in,” Von said.
I remembered Chelsey nearly dying from drinking something laced with wolfsbane. “That’s gonna be a hard pass for me. I’ve seen your taste in drinks, Von, and I’m not talking about blood.”
“Very clever, Wyatt,” Von said. “But rest assured, every contestant was given the same drink. No dangerous shenanigans in this vial. It’s simply a potion that will nullify your shifter sense of smell—nothing else. You’ll retain standard human senses, though.”
I narrowed my eyes. “So, I won’t be able to scent anyone? What are we doing? Orgy in the dark?”
Von swatted my chest. “You cad.” Then he smiled. “No, but I may jot that down as an idea for a future season. Go on, Wyatt. You’ll love what we have planned.”
There was no point in arguing. If I raised a huge stink, I’d only get held out of this challenge. Then what? Kira was probably in there, and I had to be with her. Whatever they had planned, I needed to keep her safe, and there was only one way to do that.
Before I could go through any more internal arguments, I downed the whole vial. The taste was bitter and almost alkaline, like drinking pool water mixed with baking soda. As I swallowed, my shifter senses vanished. Everything became a thousand percent less intense. I couldn’t even smell the blood on Von’s breath that I’d noticed only a moment before. If this was how humans scented things, it was incredibly boring. I didn’t know how they made it through the day.
“Good boy,” Von said. “Let’s proceed.”
Von unlatched the door and stepped inside. I followed, then froze in place. The dark gray walls were accented with gold and silver fixtures, and the ceiling was solid black with tiny lights randomly spread out to mimic the night sky. Massive chandeliers hung in each corner. The lighting was dim but not dark enough to obscure the rest of the room. All the others were mingling around a few cocktail tables as some of the staff walked through with trays for canapés and champagne flutes.
The whole thing jarred my mind. It took me back to the kind of high-class parties I’d been to when I was still part of the Second Pack. The wining and dining, golf, horse races, water polo, yachts—all the rich-people shit everyone in the upper packsloved.
