AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She’d been sprayed with wolfsbane and stabbed by silver. Even with her shifter healing, she needed time to recover. I’d been on my way back to her room when something hard smashed against my head. I’d stumbled, and the water pitcher had skittered in a puddle across the floor. A minute later, I felt a sting and then the cold injection of fluid into my neck.
My wolf and I had wanted to battle it out, but before I could even contemplate shifting, my body had seized and stiffened into a rigid position. My limbs weren’t cooperating with me, and I hit the floor hard as I blacked out. As darkness consumed me, my last thought was of my beautiful mate and her safety.
Growling now, I staggered to my feet, taking extra care not to grab the bars for support. The silver wasn’t safe for me to touch and could cause irreparable harm. I was already a walking bruise, and I suspected healthcare wasn’t included with the accommodations here.
My shoulder pulsed with painful awareness. The wound from the silver bullet Mrs. Marrow shot at me had obviously reopened when I was unconscious. Looking down, I saw a pool of blood spreading across my shirt and darkening the cell floor. Apparently, I’d been bleeding for a while. Dried blood flaked off my chest and the edges of the wound where fresh blood still oozed slightly.
I lifted my opposite hand to inspect the wound. It wasn’t a steady pour, just a small flow. It had clotted enough for now, but it wouldn’t take much to reopen the wound again, especially if I had to battle my way out of here. Which I planned to do at the very first opportunity.
Controlling my anger at getting caught and taken by hunters wasn’t easy. My thoughts continually turned to Tori and her whereabouts.
It took some time before my senses cleared enough to take in the details of my surroundings and work out an escape plan. I got no farther than the cell directly beside mine. Because when I turned to look, I spotted Diana Bogford sprawled on the floor. I moved as close as I dared without touching the silver.
Keeping my voice to a low whisper because I didn’t want to draw attention if anyone happened to be listening, I called out, “Diana? Diana?”
Her cheeks were a healthy color, but her breathing was shallow. She was lying unconscious on the cold concrete. The cruel bastards hadn’t even given her a blanket.
I was desperately worried about Tori’s absence, but seeing Diana here, a woman who was a maternal figure to both Tori and me, flipped something else inside me. I was enraged. More so because I couldn’t get to her, couldn’t check on her, couldn’t save her.
“Diana, wake up. Can you hear me? Diana?” This time, my voice was a little louder, a little firmer.
“She’s alive, Ridge,” a soft voice whispered behind me. “She’s just heavily drugged because she was being extra combative with the hunters and kept causing a ruckus.”
I didn’t register whose voice it was because I couldn’t stop looking at Diana, fear churning in my gut as I tried to see if her chest was rising and falling. I didn’t know what kind of drugs they’d given her or if her system could handle it.
When I could finally look away, I swiveled my head to the cell across from mine. Audrey Greenthorne was sitting on the concrete in the middle of her cell, her back hunched, her shoulders curled in, and her arms hugging her knees.
Her usually perfect makeup was smeared around her eyes in a raccoon-like mask, and her clothes were wrinkled and torn. On a normal day, Audrey wore her clothes like armor—she was always so put together. Here, she seemed so small and defenseless. Seeing her like this was odd, and it worried me.
“Audrey?” I whispered, and then the self-loathing set in and took over. I was the alpha, yet I had no idea how many shifters from my pack had been taken. I hadn’t done anything to protect them, hadn’t set up safeguards or a way to keep track of them.
Then I noticed Zander Elkins standing in the cell next to Audrey, glaring at me.
Okay. So that meant four of us that I knew of. Dread coated my stomach. Were there more?
“If I was the alpha, no fucking way would a hunter have been able to get the jump on me,” Zander crowed. “And sure as fuck not on two poor, helpless females under my protection.”
I wasn’t surehelplesswas fair, but Zander’s words were like daggers twisting in my gut.
I opened my mouth, ready to have my say, but Audrey beat me to it. She stood and returned his glare, her nostrils flaring.
“First off, no one has ever described me aspoor.” That was true. Audrey was healthy, strong, and rich. Not poor in any sense. “Second, I’m pretty sure we’re allhelplessin this situation, including you, Elkins.” True enough, although I hated it. “And third, if you think for one minute you’d be a better alpha than Ridge, why are you locked up here? You were also caught.”
She arched a well-groomed brow at Zander, which shut him down. He was nothing but the town drunk, so nothing he said carried any weight with me. I wasn’t going to waste time harping on anything he had to say.
After sparing another glance at Diana’s unconscious form, I looked at the other two, trying to assess the situation. “Are either of you hurt?”
They shook their heads.
Audrey sighed as she sank back down to the floor. “I’ve been awake for a while, but I can’t figure out where we are or what they have planned for us. The hunters are waiting for something, but obviously, they only see us as animals.” She nodded to the cage bars that split the large room into four separate cells. A walkway ran through the middle of the room with two cages on either side, leading from the only door I assumed led to the exit.
The door opened, and through the silver bars, we watched as two beefy hunters in full tactical gear—tattoos inked on their wrists, the rest hidden by sleeves—and equipment came into the room. Built like redwood trees, they sneered at us while they rested their hands on the top of their belts, pulling off the consummate asshole pose to emphasize their imposing size. They were acting like they had nothing to worry about, being around a group of shifters.
I snarled, wondering how confident these assholes would be if we weren’t secured behind silver bars. I bet their display would have been a lot less cocky.
My wolf and I struggled to hold back the rage that fueled us when one of those pieces of shit looked Audrey up and down.It was the taller, blond hunter. He licked his lips as he approached Audrey and gave her a lecherous wink. My stomach rolled.
“If you’re not ready to talk yet, we’ll gladly take you to an interrogation room where we can get started on the real fun—making monsters cry.”
