Hector
He stopped short in his dash across the room toward Rachel as she reached down and unmasked the man who had caused so much trouble for him and others.
“No,” he breathed, stunned. “It can’t be.”
The shifter lying on the ground was in no condition to answer, but that didn’t stop Hector from yelling at him.
“How could you have done this to us?” He rubbed his face with one bloodied hand, trying to wrap his brain around what he was saying. “You killed Corvin!” he screamed, even as Rachel came up to him and wrapped him in a hug.
Hector was momentarily distracted as the warm, tender body of his mate pressed up against him and he allowed himself to give her a kiss, made hot and hard by the events of the evening. Rachel pulled back from him with fire in her eyes. He was going to have her later, once everything was settled, and he let his face tell her that.
There was a bang from the doorway. He spun, putting Rachel behind him in case he needed to fight again, but he relaxed as Gray came into the room. Not even the revelation of who was on the floor could change his opinion on Gray.
“About time,” he muttered.
“Sorry,” Gray scowled. “I tried looking for Martin and then had to get someone else to fill in.”
Hector nodded. “That’s because he wasn’t there.”
Gray looked confused. “What?”
He stepped aside, pulling Rachel with him so that Gray could see who was sprawled across the ground behind him, just now starting to gather his senses.
“You weaselly sonofabitch!” Gray roared as he strode across the open space, picked Martin up, and slammed him into the ground.
Hard. Bones broke on contact and Hector intervened to prevent his friend and boss from beating the other shifter to death right then and there, even though his instincts told him to do just that. Martin didn’t deserve life. Not after the pathetic, vile, treasonous acts he’d committed. Death was all he deserved, but first he needed answers.
“I want to know why,” he growled at Gray, restraining the other shifter. “What caused all of this?”
Martin coughed from the ground, then made a low pained moan.
“Nobody gives a fuck that you’re hurt,” Hector said, turning and stomping on the shifter’s ankle as he tried to rise. “Stay down.”
Martin rolled backward in agony, until he came up against Rachel’s leg. She kicked him in the head. Hector didn’t even try to stop her. He did, however, lean down, grab Martin by the collar, and pull him into a sitting position until their faces were but inches apart.
“It’s time you started talking,” he growled. “Otherwise the pain you feel right now will seem like heaven in comparison to what we’ll do. Understood?”
Martin nodded weakly, blood running down his chin from where a boot had split his lip wide open. “Yeah,” he said tiredly.
“Why? Why do all this?” Gray asked, fury simmering in his voice as he looked down from above them.
“Nothing…” Martin winced as the action of speaking hurt him. “Nothing personal.”
Hector’s jaw dropped open. “Nothing…personal?!” he yelled into the other shifter’s face. “How the fuck can you say it’s nothing personal? You set me up, and you killed Corvin.”
Martin started to shrug, then stopped when one shoulder wouldn’t respond, but his face conveyed the same disinterested emotion. “Was just circumstance. Didn’t matter who it was. Needed to get the next one out of the way.”
“The next one? What are you talking about?” Gray snarled.
“Gotta…move up,” Martin wheezed. “One rung at a time.”
Hector shook his head in disbelief. “Seriously? This was a power play for you? In an attempt to what…not be the junior guard?”
Martin laughed. He actually laughed. So Hector slammed his head into the concrete floor. Twice.
“This isn’t funny,” he said, his voice deathly cold. “Not at all.”
Martin’s eyes blinked rapidly for some time until he could focus them again.
“Now, explain,” he repeated once it seemed that Martin could understand them again.
“Think bigger,” Martin said hoarsely as Hector squeezed tighter around his neck, anger getting the better of him. “Work my way up. Senior guard. Ambassador. Then back to Cadia,” he burbled, laughing some more as blood ran down his chin.
“Unbelievable,” Hector said in disgust. “You killed someone who had exactly nothing to do with you, simply to try and advance yourself?”
Martin didn’t reply. It seemed he was done speaking for the night. Not that it mattered anymore; between him and Gray they didn’t need anything else. They had all the proof they needed. It must have been Martin then that jumped him outside the embassy earlier. He looked down at his rebroken arm. It was going to hurt like a bitch to set. That was for later though.
“What do we do with him?” he asked, looking up at Gray.
Murder looked back at him.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought you were going to say,” he replied. “But that would be too quick for him.”
Gray’s eyes tracked from Martin to Hector. “What did you have in mind?” he asked evilly.
“An eye for an eye.”
There was a moment of confusion, and then Gray got it. He grinned.
“What are you two talking about?” Rachel asked, looking back and forth.
“He dies,” Hector said simply. “No matter where he goes, what he’s done is enough to warrant death. We were simply discussing the…finer points, of how it would be done.”
Rachel shivered, but then her hands tracked down her sides and out and around her swollen stomach. Distaste coalesced into hatred, and she practically spat her answer.
“Burn the motherfucker.”
Martin’s eyes went wide, but he was in no shape to resist, let alone escape. In quick order the pair had him trussed up to one of the pillars between which Hector and he had fought.
“How do we start a fire?” Hector asked. “And will this burn?”
“I take back my earlier statement,” Rachel said. “I…I spoke in anger. I’m not sure I want his death on my hands.”
Hector nodded. “I understand. But even if we take him back, he will be punished by death. That’s unavoidable. But we don’t have to sink to his level. We can make it quick and painless.”
Even Gray nodded at that. “Yeah. Let’s be better than him.”
Rachel breathed a sigh of relief, and Hector felt something similar rush through him. Burning Martin alive was what he deserved, but it wasn’t something he could give to him.
“I…” he said to Gray, lifting his maimed arm.
“Take your mate,” Gray said in understanding. “I’ll handle this.”
He nodded in appreciation to his friend, bumped fists, and then collected Rachel, linking his good right arm with her left and escorting her from the warehouse.
“Are you all right?” he asked as they walked out under the night sky.
“I am now,” she said, leaning in to him. “I am now.”
Behind them there was a loud crack, followed by silence.
Beautiful, beautiful silence.