“What do you mean you want to return to working in the gallery?”
His father didn’t sound pleased, as expected, but there was nothing Dean could do about it. He searched his mind for words that would appease the man, but inwardly sighed and settled for what his father could at least possibly accept.
Logic.
“I feel like my task there isn’t done yet, and I want to finish it. I want to help the others clean the ring up for good and make sure everyone involved is accounted for. There are still some human bounty hunters caged there, and we would need to coordinate with the police without jeopardizing our secret.”
A disapproving expression crossed the elder’s face, and he slowly stood up from the chair he was sitting on. Dean Williams II was in touch with nature and often preferred outdoors, but that didn’t prevent him from having a lush cabin separate from the tribe, where he could enjoy a warm fireplace and a bottle of wine or two.
That bottle was in his hand right now, and Dean was trying to work out how to get it from the man without offending him. But it looked like he wouldn’t be returning to Indigo’s side anytime soon, especially when it looked like the elder was preparing to give him the lecture of a lifetime.
Dean inwardly sighed, missing her already.
“We have men to finish it up. The other tribes will help, because everyone wants this cleared and out of our lives so we can all move forward. You don’t have to be there. This is your home.”
“I know,” Dean replied. “But I want to supervise it. There’s plenty of time to return here and make a home after.”
That used to be Dean’s goal—to finish his tasks up on the temporary home he’d been forced to live in and to come back here quickly when he was called. But somehow, it didn’t appeal to him as much as it used to, and he could feel a certain restlessness that wasn’t there before.
And he knew why.
“But your rightful place is here, vying for elder position,” the elder said. “We need to prepare you to be by my side as I rise to further power—the one our kind deserves.”
“We already have power.” Dean tilted his head, remembering Sean’s words again. “And we still have trouble.”
He wondered if his father could help him investigate, or if his father would continue burying their people’s sins in the ground.
“What trouble?” the older man scoffed. He opened the bottle of wine and poured two glasses, handing one to Dean. “We just need to burn those betrayers. I will not tolerate them using my name in their transactions and get away with it. They need to pay for it.”
Dean’s hand stopped halfway through picking up the glass as he felt his mind freeze. He eyed the older man quietly.
“When you say you want power, father, did you mean equality?”
A gleam came in the man’s eyes, hidden quickly. “We’ll discuss that. Drink your wine.” The tone was almost insistent, something he hadn’t heard in his years talking to his father. Usually, it was only calm.
“What’s in the wine, father? Is it something that will kill me?”
Surprise flitted in the older man’s eyes, and he lifted his own glass. “Would I poison myself?”
Dean shook his head, his mind working a mile a minute to piece the information together.
No, his father wouldn’t kill himself. But he was the one who called Dean here to offer that wine, even before Dean thought to ask a bottle from the older man.
His father also didn’t know about his name being in the email exchange, because Dean hadn’t mentioned that in the trial—had specifically made sure to omit it as it didn’t have any real bearing to the actual concern. But now, dread was sinking to the bottom of Dean’s stomach as the suspicion hit him clear.
Refusing to believe it, Dean placed the full glass on the table, watching the older man’s eyes follow it. Dean took a step backward, affecting a casual nod.
“I have somewhere to go. I’ll pass on the wine for now. Goodnight, father.”
He made a move to turn around—and as expected, his father spoke.
“Not so fast, young man. Where are you going?”
“I’m just going to see to the fairies and vampires. I believe they’ve already been released in the marketplace.”
“I don’t hear you saying the hag.”
“Hag-witch,” Dean corrected softly.
A displeased look crossed the elder’s face before it cleared. “Drink your wine and stay for a bit.”
“Why? What did you have planned?”
There was long silence following his question before the older man finally sighed. He put his own glass beside Dean’s. The man didn’t answer, and the dread in Dean’s stomach urged him to say the words that he knew he might regret.
But it needed to be said.
“Sean was right. There was a higher-up involved here, and it wasn’t him.”
“What on shifter’s world are you talking about?”
“It was you. You’re the higher-up who orchestrated all this.”
“Me?” the elder echoed. “Whatever makes you say so?”
“Sean wasn’t powerful enough to orchestrate everything.”
“And me?”
Dean looked his father in the eye. “I didn’t tell anyone about your name being in the emails.”
The next bout of silence was almost ominous, as realization reflected in the older man’s eyes. They turned hard in the next instant as his lips pressed together.
“I suppose you didn’t.”
Dean’s gaze turned hard as well. “What did you do it for? Who else is involved?”
The elder sat back in the chair as if bracing himself. But when Dean didn’t attack, he eventually relaxed. “Our tribe needs to be higher than where it is right now. It’s appalling to know that everyone can be elder now so easily…and even before that, that the even distribution of power between all elders is not deserved.”
The lion shifter that Dean choked on the boat…his words flashed in Dean’s mind.
“And who else is involved?”
“No one. I work alone.”
“With black witches.”
“Some.”
“And that lion shifter…he was cursing you on purpose to deflect the blame.”
Dean’s father smiled. “I suppose. I told them to be clever.”
Dean tilted his head. “And you signed the email with your own name to further confuse people.”
“Yes. I’m smarter than that, couldn’t possibly sign it under my name, so it will make them understand that it couldn’t have been me.”
It was all so organized, making Dean’s mind reel. But he kept the cool persona on like he wasn’t bothered by it. “That’s brilliant.”
Again, surprise flitted in the older man’s gaze, and he eyed Dean in an assessing manner. “So you’re not mad?”
“I’m not mad,” Dean said truthfully.
Just disappointed.
Just frustrated.
“Join my side. We’ll do this together. That’s why I wanted you here. You’re the only one I need by my side.”
He nodded at his father. “I’ll think about it.”
Dean turned around, his hand reaching for the doorknob. His hair stood on end.
Then he was diving down the floor and shifting his hands into claws just as the first swipe came for his shoulder and almost tore his arm off. There was a soft growl behind him, followed by another swipe.
Dean rolled his body, missing it by an inch. Then it was his own claws lengthening and sliding slightly into his father’s stomach, who jumped to attack…and hadn’t expected his own son to turn on him.
The older man pushed his own claws into Dean’s stomach, and the pain that hit Dean had him gritting his teeth. Logic came that he needed to kill this man who’d become greedy for power, but his heart didn’t want to follow him.
A different kind of pain entered him, centered at his heart. He couldn’t push himself to sink his claws further in.
But his father didn’t have the same guilt.
The elder slid his claws deeper into Dean’s stomach, lengthening them to the point that they became long knives. He didn’t shift.
“You wanted to burn everyone, including our people, just to cover yourself up,” Dean growled.
“It would have been easier to just drink the sleeping wine for us to avoid all this,” the elder sighed. “But you just had to be stubborn about it. Then again, you should have just stayed out of it completely. I wanted you kept in the dark for as long as I could. I’m sorry it has to come to this.”
“You’re going to kill your own son? Just like you let those black witches get away with killing Dana?”
Regret filled his father’s eyes at the mention of his daughter. “It wasn’t supposed to happen. They offered to revive her after I found them. But the opportunity was too great, and I bargained to have them help me in my quest for power instead.”
“Is that what the hunting was for? Taking people’s body parts? Killing innocents?”
“The quest for power comes with a price, son. And if I can get rid of other creatures and appease the black witches to provide for their experiments, then so be it. The wealth involved made those bounty hunters loyal to me.”
Despair turned to fury at the lengths his father had gone to just to ensure everything was in place. The claws sank deeper into him, telling him what lengths his father would keep going to.
“And Sean?”
“He’ll take the blame for everything. As he should, for meddling.” Impatience gleamed in the elder’s eyes. “We’re talking too much. I’d rather keep this short. I have an appointment.”
The way he said it made it sound like he was having a boardroom meeting instead of killing his own son—his only son. Dean forced his own claws into his father’s skin, watching the older man grimace. But Dean refused to shift.
And Dean Williams II did.
Dean watched him shift, grief pouring in that his own father had done everything. He pushed with all his strength, managed to roll and jump back. The elder’s now-lion form jumped in his direction, too fast for Dean to shift anymore. Claws were out to kill.
The door crashed open, and a blur hit the elder and made him crash against the wall instead. Dean stared as another lion form wrestled with his father, the sounds from his throat familiar and filled with rage.
He half-shifted to man form, and Sean’s eyes met Dean’s urgently. Dean scrambled up to help, but the other was shaking his head.
“Go!” he roared. “They’re attacking! No one’s safe!”
Dean’s mind latched on to that, and he was running for the broken door. Outside, screams were heard—screams that he didn’t notice earlier but were growing louder than ever.
They were screams of horror.
A certain feeling filled the air and almost choked him with how much it reeked of malice, and he almost staggered back. But he could see shifters running about, children falling and choking before they lost their breaths. Suffocating thoughts entered his mind, and he knew it could only mean one thing.
The black witches had invaded, as Dean’s father had planned.
“Go!” Sean practically screamed. “Xian freed me and the others need help.”
Indigo.
Fear clamped his heart and squeezed it tight.
They would be going after her first.
Dean nodded.
Then he was shifting to his full lion form and running out as fast as he could.