My beast still thrashed with a hungry fervor. It wanted me to shift and eat Connor whole. Dog didn’t taste very good, but it would be better than this—better than watching the man who’d betrayed his friend.
I didn’t ask the idiot why he’d done it. Alvin manipulated his pack into doing exactly what he wanted. He wouldn’t settle for anything less than submission from them. That was no excuse for Connor’s behavior, though.
When all was said and done, I hoped that they expelled him from the pack. When Alvin was dead and in the ground, I hoped Connor got thrown into the deepest pits of the earth for being the spineless weakling he was. For a man who’d risked his life for Ness barely a day and a half ago, he infuriated me.
Ness
How many days had passed?I slept on and off because there was little else to do. Without my hound to stand guard, I found my will to fight bleeding away. My anger at Connor faded. The pack that I’d wanted to protect so badly never truly cared about me. They were worms at Alvin’s feet.
I never should have put my faith in any of them.
Oh well, this all had to come to an end eventually. Right?
My anger flared, hot and sharp. It wasn’t at the pack, but at myself. I was better than this. There were so many other reasons to live, like iced hazelnut mochas and hot dragon men. I grabbed ahold of that indignation and held it tight so that it might warm me in this damp basement.
I didn’t want to die yet. My life had been a stretch of miserable years. There should have been so many more ahead of me. I had a chance yet to grasp the kind of future that I wanted for myself.
For fuck’s sake, I was going to bang that dragon man if it was the last thing I did. Men like him, incredibly hot and protective, didn’t come along all that often. I wanted to know what his lips tasted like before my life came to an end. I would feel his hands all over my body before I let anyone take me out of this world.
I held my hand up over my face and wondered if the cursed cuffs blocked the bond between Ryder and me. As I tilted my hand back and forth, I noticed a pale glow beneath my skin. It rippled like the clouds before a lightning strike.
So, the bond wasn’t completely dead. I’d discovered that the bond didn’t grant us any kind of communication the night we tried to break it. I wished, though, that I could send an SOS down the line to Ryder. I didn’t like the idea of waiting for him to rescue me, but I was tired and out of hope.
All I had left was this anger like a flame that guttered in the wind. I held on tight to it and tried to let it fill me. Was this the end? How could I let Alvin win without a fight?
The idea of weakly submitting to Alvin’s tyranny gave me the motivation to sit up. The cursed cuff slid down the pipe with an annoying clatter. I grinned and hoped that someone upstairs heard it. I rattled it several more times, just to savor the idea that I had to be inconveniencing someone.
I flexed the hand that bore the lightning mark. Ryder had to be on his way. Like he would let me do anything on my own. He’d followed me to Cerri’s the night before. When he woke and realized I wasn’t there again, he would find me.
Until then, I had to do more than survive. I looked to the mallet leaning against the far wall. It was about seven feet out of reach. Scanning the boxes and storage totes, I couldn’t find anything that would give me the reach I needed. I had to get these cuffs off, first.
Without my hound, I couldn’t shift and slip out of the cuffs. That meant I would have to get the other cuff off the pipe first. I didn’t know how easy it would be to break the pipe. I’d tried several times already. Once again, my missing hound hindered me. My shifter strength failed me without her present.
“Ooh, I have an idea,” I whispered.
I peeled the thin mattress up and grabbed one of the rusted springs from beneath. It didn’t want to give, at first, but the cot was old and falling apart. The spring snapped at a rusted bend and came free. I wondered what dump they’d dragged this out of.
After straightening the piece of metal, I jammed one end of it into the keyhole of my cuff. It hit an invisible barrier and ricocheted off. The metal spring scraped along the cuff, much to my disappointment.
“Stupid witch, thinking of everything.” I clenched my fist around the metal spring.
Though I wanted to give up, I eyed the other cuff. The runes didn’t move with an unnatural liveliness the way they did around my wrist. I shrugged and made a second attempt with the keyhole of the other cuff. Much to my surprise, the spring slid into the keyhole without any resistance.
The cuff popped open and slid free of the pipe. I glared at the inconvenience and wondered if the witch had planned for this. I felt like she had left the second keyhole unhexed on purpose. She was playing a game that I did not understand, but I was grateful for the assistance even if it was a nuisance.
The cuff dangled from my wrist. I hated being separated from my hound, but I couldn’t let it deter me from trying to escape. I peered up at the narrow windows above. If I sucked in my stomach, I might be able to slide out them, but I was wary of getting stuck halfway through. It seemed to me that the windows might have been smaller than usual.
I glanced back at the cot and up at the windows. Had that cot been there all along? I didn’t want to think on it too long, but this was my chance to find the skeletons in Alvin’s closet. My stomach churned as I wondered who Alvin had kept down here.
Before I opened any of the boxes or totes, I grabbed the mallet against the far wall. It was heavy in my hand. If it was down here, then I got the sense that Alvin hadn’t kept anyone in his basement for a while. Maybe he’d been too distracted by my presence in his pack.
I hadn’t put much thought into what Alvin might have to hide. All this time, I’d been determined to air his dirty laundry, but I hadn’t considered what that might mean. Why couldn’t it be something simple like tax evasion or money laundering? Why did these clues point to something much darker?
As I reached for the first box, I glanced at the door at the top of the stairs. When it didn’t move, I pried the box open. Inside was a tangled mess of Christmas lights. After pawing through it, I decided there wasn’t anything inside that would tell me anything. I grabbed a nearby tote and tugged the lid free. Once again, I found nothing.
I wished I had my hound. If I could smell anything other than mold and mildew, then maybe this would be easier. I had an uncomfortable feeling that I would smell rot.
The doorknob rattled. My heart lurched. I tucked the mallet behind the cot and tossed myself down onto the mattress before the door opened. At the last second, I remembered to hide the cuff behind the cot, as well.