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Granny!
“Is she okay?” I bolted upright in bed, wincing slightly as the movement tugged at my still healing wound. “Granny, is she all right?”
The two men shared a look, and an unease grew in the pit of my stomach. Did they think I killed her?
“She’s in critical condition in the ICU at the hospital,” the doctor reassured me. “It’s where you should be with the wound you sustained, but my well-meaning advice sometimes goes unheeded.”
A mocking snort left my throat. “You’re just upset you can’t pin me with suicide for this one.”
The good doctor didn’t appear amused by my statement.
“If it makes you feel better,” he sighed, “I’m not the one who ordered that.”
“Then—”
The door to the room swung open, the wood banging against the concrete wall. “I am.”
If the devil took human form, it would be this man.
His tall, muscular frame was covered in tattoos and scars. His strong jaw was set tightly as his blue eyes fixed on me. They were hard as steel and filled with a sorrowing depth. He stared down at me as he strode into the room, his booted footsteps heavy on the concrete floor. He was sex and sin personified. A fallen angel whose soul was blackest night.
My wolf became restless beneath my skin, and I could sense her pacing in my mind. She recognized this man.
Shift. The word echoed in my mind, rattling around, dredging up memories. He’d been there. At Granny’s. My wolf had felt the power of his command when he had ordered us to shift back into our human form.
Why hadn’t we listened? His order had held all the power of an alpha, yet my wolf had shoved it off as if it were nothing but a pleasant request.
His ice-cold-tundra eyes flicked to the doctor, and he jerked his head toward it. A silent command. The doctor nodded, giving me a small nod in farewell before walking from the room. The door clicked shut behind him, leaving me in the cold concreteroom alone with one man who looked at me as if I were the world and another who probably wanted to rip my throat out.
“Freya Morgan, twenty-one years old. No record of your birth. No social security number, credit cards, or even a job. It’s like you’re a ghost.”
“Wolf,” Hunter warned in a low voice. Was he protecting me against his own alpha? Why? He didn’t know me from Adam, and for all he knew, I was the one who’d attacked granny.
“If I’m a ghost, how do you know my name?” I questioned. “Granny was the only one who knew my name, and I doubt she told you.”
Wolf smirked. “A little birdy told me,” he mocked.
“You should get better birds then,” I told him. “They’re not very good, if that’s all they could dig up.”
His smirked deepened. It was the look of a man who knew something and didn’t want to gloat about it. Not that I didn’t think he wouldn’t gloat. He seemed like the kind of man to hold it above someone’s head.
“You think yours was the only name I got?” he asked. “Mary Bennett. Leah Moretti. Susan Claw. Haley Dorchester. Those names good enough for you?”
“How do you know those names?” I breathed, my heart pounding in my chest. Their screams reemerged in my mind. Begging. Pleading.
“The same way I got yours.” He drew a folder from his back pocket, where it had been curled up like an old newspaper used as a fly swatter. He tossed it on my lap, the photos falling out, revealing my pack members’ smiling faces. With a shaky hand, I picked them up, my fingers dancing across each of their faces. They looked so happy to be chosen, believing that their fortune had turned, and they would be honored by the pack and High Council.
Instead, they were slaughtered.
My cheeks were wet as tears slid from my eyes. How many more women like them were raped and sacrificed? And for what? Youth? I’d been thinking about it for a while now. My mind had grown clearer in Haven. The fog I had lived under my entire life had dissipated, and I’d begun to wonder what the purpose was. There had to be more to it than just a simple ritual of youth. Why us? Why did they only choose five and why us? There had to be something about us specifically. It couldn’t have just been random. What was it about the five of us that made us right for the ritual? There was nothing special about me. Why would they have chosen me? Why would they have chosen Susan?
Something didn’t add up.
“Where did you get these?” Each picture was attached to a form that outlined our names, dates of birth, blood types, and parentage. Except that couldn’t be right.
“You ever seen this before?” Wolf held up another photo. It was the logo I’d seen in the newspaper about the feed company.
“Just in a newspaper at the café,” I admitted truthfully. Wolf nodded, seeming to believe me. Not that I was lying. I didn’t remember seeing the logo anywhere else, but that didn’t mean I didn’t have an inkling that I had. I just had to figure out where it was.
