Chapter 23

ARION

I lock the door behind Violet, and I cut my eyes across the room as Damien drops his illusion.

He doesn’t really give anything away with his expressionless face. I go over the conversation in my head, but Violet unknowingly held to her word in the presence of another, and said nothing too detailed to give away my secret.

Damien and I both swing our gazes to the beta I have penciled to the wall now that he’s released the illusion. And by penciled to the wall, I mean I’ve stabbed two-hundred-and-forty-three slightly long pencils into key places on his body to pin him there. He’s on his tiptoes, and if he steps down, they’ll all snap and we’ll have to start all over again.

“They still need a few more inches of length for this process to be less tedious. It wouldn’t hurt them to be a little stronger, too. Still superior craftsman ship, though,” I say as I lift up the pencils that haven’t spilled off the desk.

I almost lost my mind when I got my hands on the maddening little gypsy.

Damien goes to take a seat, eyes distant like he’s lost in thought, as he runs a hand over his jaw. I focus my attention on Anthony, who has sweated quite a bit. I’m glad Violet has no true sense of smell—she couldn’t have missed his stench.

“Anthony, I’m sorry you had to see all that,” I go on.

“S-s….okay,” he whimpers, trying to remain perfectly still because it hurts less than moving around on those pencils.

He held himself up so well while I went to pay Emit a quick visit and collected Damien for his…abilities with the fairer sex when getting one to talk.

“Not really, no. It’s not,” Damien chimes in, never glancing at us as he remains lost in thought, but also effectively here with us as well.

Eh. I was going to kill him anyhow. I’ve seen quite a lot no one knows I’ve seen, after all. It’s fun to make them paranoid now that I start cleaning house with information no one knows how I’ve acquired.

“I wish I could say I’m sorry about this part,” I tell him with a cruel smile.

His eyes widen seconds after I’ve jammed the stack of pencils deep inside his chest.

“I’m giving Shera a raise if she finds me longer pencils of the same quality,” I decide when Anthony’s wheezes exhaust at last and he tenses as he tries to remain upright until his last breath.

Going limp, he collapses to the ground, sending a wave of snapping pencil sounds into the room.

“They have the perfect snap to them, if you know what I mean,” I add as I turn and start wiping my hands on the towel.

“Do you wish to call Emit, or should I?” Damien asks very quietly, even though he shoots me a look that makes me think he’s playing along with something.

I know that look, because he usually plays along to see if he can determine my angle.

“It’d be best to hear it from you, I’m sure. I doubt he’d appreciate me telling him his harem of wolves are saying too many things to Violet,” I answer idly, lifting the leg of Anthony and dragging him across the room.

But I pause near the door, my spine prickling.

“Omegas rarely talk,” Damien points out as I drop Anthony’s leg and quickly move to my phone.

“Unless they feel really threatened and need a stronger alpha to attach themselves to.”

“Violet is no alpha,” he states through a derisive snort…even though there’s a detachment to his tone.

“She doesn’t have to be an alpha when she has four alphas protecting her, and she fished for that information specifically.”

“That whole show could have gone differently if she didn’t need you, but you’re the vampire alpha; you’re needed the most to protect those other omegas if this is vampire related,” he says in that same tone he uses when he’s playing along.

I pretend not to notice, since I don’t know what he’s thinking and he usually lets his guard down enough for me to figure it out if I play along with him playing along.

Emit answers his call before I add another layer of complexity to my thoughts.

“This had better be more productive than our last encounter, or I’m hanging up. I’m not doing friendly chitchat—”

“What if those recently deceased omegas knew too much? What if only one needed to die because the others said too much to that one, but they didn’t want anyone knowing which one that is?” I ask in interruption as I flip Damien off, since I have no idea why he’s being such a bloody cunt the day after he popped an ages-old cork.

He should be in a much more amicable mood. Maybe he did it wrong.

Emit goes quiet for a second, and Damien sits up as his brow furrows, since clearly we weren’t thinking the same things at all.

“You’re saying Fay was the target,” Emit states quietly.

“Yes, because she had a secret minor pack—”

“It wasn’t secret. She informed me just last—”

“If you say last week, which was just before your beta meeting, where you may or may not have brought it up in casual conversation, I’ll take it to mean I’m correct on this matter and your wolves were killed in house. It’ll negate future claims of vampires being mixed up in this case.”

There are several long minutes of complete silence, not even any breaths.

“Those packs were just for runs and for social inclusion,” Emit says in a weak attempt to shed doubt, though I already hear the denial slipping.

“Check your wolves, alpha. It seems they’re running wild and killing for secrets. You should worry yourself with what secrets they wanted to ensure never left a threatened omega’s lips to her alpha.”

I hang up, staring idly at dead Anthony. Pity. I had a few more betas I wanted to pencil to the wall for this inquiry and accidentally kill.

“Your skills will no longer be needed today,” I tell Damien as the sun starts to set. “This matter is closed on my side. No farther investigation needed,” I add as I drag Anthony out into the hallway and snap my fingers at one of the interns.

Said ratty intern looks positively terrified.

“I don’t want to eat you. I just need you to take him and drain him for me. No sense in wasting all that beta blood when I’ve been starved for a century.”

I’m positive the stench of piss fills the air as I turn to leave. He better not have pissed on my new rug.

I start to shut the door, when Damien barges by me.

“Do I want to know why you’re running?” I call to his back as he leaps over the balcony.

“Fay would have told everything to her omega pack, and any wolf would know that.” His gaze flicks over his shoulder. “And we just decided Violet is their new alpha.”

I shouldn’t be in any sort of hurry. No wolf would be that stupid. Certainly not on the first day back for the omegas.

I listen as Damien talks to Emit on the phone on the way to his vehicle, and I follow close behind him, forcing myself to be slow. Violet should be answering her phone, but it just goes to her voicemail when I try to call.

The phones are working today, despite the worsening weather. She’s not been gone all that long.

Is she just ignoring me? She really is young, so it’s possible she’d be playing a game that way.

“Is Violet with your omegas?” Damien asks Emit.

“Lemon has decided it’s best for them to move in with Violet, and I—”

The line goes dead in the next instant.

“He’s just figured out the same thing, and he’s apparently in a fucking hurry to get there,” I say with a nod as an unexpected knot forms in my throat.

No one would be that stupid. Couldn’t be that stupid. We’re ridiculous for considering wolves to be this brazen. There’s not a single threat to Violet at all. We’re complicating things and overthinking them.

I leave Damien behind when I do get in a hurry.

Chapter 24

VIOLET

“It’s a personal letter. You’re not supposed to read it,” I hear Lemon hissing.

“It was balled up in her drawer like trash. How was I supposed to know?” Tiara is answering.

“It was in her drawer!”

“You’re back!” Mary says loudly on a nervous laugh, her eyes widening on mine. Then her nose wrinkles. “With vampire all over you…”

“With Arion all over her,” Lemon says as she starts sniffing around my neck, tickling me.

“Told ya! I like your style,” Tiara says with a firm nod. “There’s nothing wrong with vampire sex.”

“But Arion?” Lemon snaps.

“Arion would slaughter a legion of people for vengeance if she was killed with his scent on her,” Mary assures her, which…definitely does not make me feel assured about anything other than the fact he’s certifiably insane and I’m still attracted to him.

I’m not sure what’s wrong with me.

“I went to get clarification,” I answer dismissively.

“Clarification on what?”

My eyes pass over the wrinkled, open letter from Anna that Leiza quickly tries to cover when she sees me looking at it. I just exhale while shaking my head.

“I’m still not sure if I have a definitive answer, but the bottom line is that as long as Arion needs me for whatever game he’s playing, you’re safe. And for now, he needs me.”

“What about later?” Lemon asks.

“Later is yet to be determined.” I lift the letter as Ingrid pops out of nowhere and puts a drink in my hand.

“Why are you reading my personal—”

Tiara lets off a sharp growl, and suddenly all five girls burst out in fur, wolves surrounding me in my kitchen, seconds before my door is kicked open.

My glass tumbles to the ground, shattering, as two men in masks come out of nowhere.

“Get to Emit’s. Now!” I shout at Leiza as I rush toward the two men, threads flying across the room around me.

I never fight first, but this time I have no choice, because there are others who can die and can’t do anything to really protect themselves.

The threads grapple both men, and I see Leiza exhale in relief, before following the rest of the omegas out, racing away.

I rush over, ripping the mask off the first restrained guy, seeing his face distorted as a snout starts to form.

A screech escapes me as I stumble back, skipping step one and getting ready for step two, trying to dig my silver Van Helsing knife out of the holster on my ankle.

I never make it quite that far, because something slams into the back of my head so hard that the light speckles for just another blink—

Chapter 25

EMIT

My head pounds as my eyes struggle to open. I’m dizzy and disoriented, blinking slowly to blurry images around me as a familiar voice rises to my ears.

“Too long we’ve watched as the vampire alphas stepped on our wolf alphas!”