Chapter Nine
Ratchet held the marble between his thumb and forefinger, staring hard at it. It was perfect. A throwaway like everything else he found, but he saw value in it. The thing was emerald green and faceted inside like a jewel. Or… just like Marlee’s eyes. He’d used his shirt to polish it to a shine.
Skittles cleared his throat from the driver’s seat as the truck rumbled down a narrow alley way on the industrial side of Memphis. Ratchet was anxious to finish work. They only had two more stops to make before they called it a day. The construction bin on the new wing of the casino needed dumping, and some barrels behind one of Bastian The Bastard’s warehouses.
Then he could bring Marlee the gift he’d found her.
Leaving her this morning hadn’t been easy even with his mom promising to keep an eye on her. She was fast asleep, and he’d stayed awake most of the night just watching her, catching a few Zs here and there. She’d had nightmares again, if her whimpers were anything to go by. And so many times, he’d reached for her, wanting to hold her so she’d know she was safe. But he’d made a promise to keep his hands to himself. And he did.
When she’s ready you’ll know.
The voice inside him was growing stronger, his instincts returning little by little. And it didn’t resemble his sick animal at all. Every minute since finding Marlee, he grew stronger. Less sick inside. It was too early to say if he was healing or not. Maybe he’d just felt bad for so long anything better seemed like a miracle.
“You feel different today,” Skittles said, his words barely louder than the radio that was screaming Papa Roach from the speakers.
Ratchet shot him a scowl. “Different how?”
Skittles turned down a new alley and brought the truck to a stop, clicking the radio off. At the back, Monster jump down from the ladder and started dumping the barrels in the bin.
“Better,” Skittles murmured, watching in the rearview mirror. “Less sick. Is there something you need to tell me?”
Ratchet tucked the marble in his pocket and stared out the window. “Nope.”
“If you’ve found a way to heal, I need to know.”
“Just having a less shitty day I guess. Happens sometimes.”
“Bullshit. There are no good days and you know it.”
Ratchet reached for the door handle. He needed to help Monster.
“You need to think of the clan. We’re getting worse. No end to this in sight. You know how long I’ve been looking for a way. If something doesn’t happen soon, Felix will be dead. Either because his human part can’t cope or because one of our enemies has killed him.”
Ratchet snapped his gaze around. “You say that like it’s a bad thing. Maybe he needs to die.”
Skittles’ eyes narrowed to slits.
“You know what he’s done. The lives he’s ruined. He’s no better than the fathers.”
“None of us are,” Skittles snapped. “Just because we haven’t bred females yet, doesn’t mean we aren’t monsters.”
Ratchet thought of the female in his bed. Was that where they were headed? Was he going to breed her and ruin her life like so many others had done. Was that what his instinct was telling him to do?
No. Never harm her.
No. The thing inside wouldn’t let him. He could trust it. It wasn’t dark like his cat had been. It was bright. If he could see it, he knew it would be blinding. And last night as he’d watched Marlee sleep, it grew so strong in his chest it burned. Hot inside him, like nothing he’d ever felt.
Somehow, he knew the thing would incinerate him if he stepped in the wrong direction.
The healing beast… the new beast… it would protect Marlee. From him. From anyone.
Which confirmed what Ratchet had been thinking over as the night hours stretched on.
Marlee was his mate.
He was hers.
Except… not him. The thing inside him.
Ours, it whispered. She is ours.
I can’t have her, he thought back at it. I’m shit. I don’t deserve her.
But she deserves you.
Ratchet went still inside at the beast’s words. Not because he agreed, but because he could see what the thing meant. Marlee needed someone who could keep her safe from her past, safe from whoever might be after her. Someone who could provide a haven for her while she healed. Someone who would respect her boundaries and would take her no as law.
And by fuck… he was that person.
Seemed crazy as fucking hell, but it was true.
“All I’m saying is,” Skittles continued. “If you know something, you owe it to your clan to share.”
Ratchet glared at his brother. “I don’t owe this clan shit. Neither do you. They already took it all out of our backs. I’ve already paid anything I owe in scars.”
Skittles fumed, a denial on his lips, but Ratchet didn’t let him make it.
“Malcom had it right, you know. And Gash. We called them traitors, but it was only because we didn’t understand. There is someone out there who can fix us. When you find it, you’ll see. It will rewrite everything you know. Rewrite your fucking DNA. Just like it did with them.”
That’s what was happening to him, wasn’t it? The beast didn’t feel familiar because it was new. Whatever he’d been before wasn’t just healing. It was transforming.
Skittles stared hard at him. “How. Do. You. Know?”
Ratchet let out a ruthless laugh and stared out the windshield.
“Did you find yours?” Skittles whispered the question like saying it out loud would send him straight to hell.
Ratchet set his jaw so tight he thought it could crack.
Skittles dug in the pocket of his flannel shirt, producing the photo he’d shown him in the lounge and shoving it toward him. “Is she one of these?”
“Even if I did, even if she was… why the fuck would I ever tell you?”
“Goddamn it,” Skittles growled, pressing the photo inches from Ratchet’s nose. “Look at this picture and tell me if one of them is yours.”
Ratchet didn’t look at the photo. He stared at his brother. The way his eyes were bugged out and desperate. The way the vein at his temple flicked. The way his skin flushed, muting color in his tattoos.
“Why would I trust you that much?”
“Because one of them is mine,” Skittles snarled, “and I have to find her. I have to find her now, before something horrible happens to her.”
Shiiiiiiit.
Ratchet’s chest went numb.
He snatched the picture from Skittles’ grip, staring at it hard.
“Which one?”
“I’d never fucking give that away.”
Ratchet smirked to cover up all the oh shit raging inside him. “Smart. Felix know?”
“No one knows. And no one better find out. I will take what’s left of your skin if you tell a soul.”
He let the threat roll off his back. Skittles, the bastard, had just given him his biggest vulnerability. If Ratchet wanted, he could have him by the short hairs.
But he didn’t want that.
Which was new. Not wanting to have power over his brother.
“How do you know something hasn’t already happened to her?”
“I don’t,” Skittles rasped. “So if you know something, Ratchet, you’d better fucking tell me now.”
Shit. He couldn’t reveal his mate. It was too dangerous. Even if Skittles was in the same desperate position. Ratchet couldn’t risk anyone knowing about Marlee. But especially the Alley Cat second in command. What if the cat was lying?
“I can’t help you—”
The passenger door to the cab swung open and Monster’s snarling scarred up face took up the opening.
“You gonna get out here and help me dump this shit or what, asshole?”
Ratchet couldn’t make his mouth work.
Monster’s eyes dropped to the photo. Frowning, he ripped it from Ratchet’s grasp and brought it right up to his face. “What’s this?”
“Ratchet was just about to tell me where that picture came from,” Skittles shot off.
“I fucking told you. I don’t know.” It wasn’t a lie.
“I can read you, shithead. I know you’re hiding something.”
“Just because you found a female that catches your eye doesn’t mean—”
A burst of fury filled the cab and Skittles’ eyes seemed to glow. It was so familiar, the way his animal used to look but different.
And Ratchet reacted, the burning beast inside him rearing up as if to fight. As if he could even pull it forth from his body.
Skittles must have come to the same conclusion because nothing else happened. They just snarled, chest rumbling with unsatisfied growls.
“I…” Monster’s voice sounded hollow. Empty. And it brought the attention back to him. “I know where this is.”
Ratchet swung his gaze around to the scarred up brother. He looked like he’d taken a hit. Like the fucking devil had his heart in his fist. He shook, the hand holding the picture rattling like a leaf in the wind.
Monster cursed, backing away from the truck door. He walked five steps and turned, like he couldn’t decide what his body was supposed to do. Skittles was out of the cab and around the other side before Ratchet had jumped from the passenger seat.
“I know… I know… fuck, this is…”
But before either of them could ask what he meant, his hand—the one holding the photo—burst into flames.
Monster dropped the flimsy piece of paper and Ratchet watched in horror as it fluttered to the ground, the corner of it already on fire.
“Fuck.” Skittles ran forward, stomping it out as if it was his actual woman and not just a picture of her.
“Shit!” Monster’s eyes peeled wide, all the whites showing, as he stared at his burning hand like it was foreign.
“What the hell?” Ratchet eased forward. The brother was acting like the fire didn’t hurt. “Monster?”
Frowning hard, Monster turned his hand palm up. The flame followed him, engulfing his entire hand. Still, he just watched it, seeming as confused as Ratchet felt. He squeezed his fingers into a fist, turning the fire into a ball. It didn’t consume him. No blistering. No burning. And it didn’t spread.
“It’s like…” Ratchet couldn’t make the words come.
“Malcom,” Skittles finished.
When the clan hunted him down to make him pay for being a traitor, he’d mated and healed. Fully shifter. But his animal was nothing like the cougar he’d been when he was one of the Alley Cats. He was changed. His animal was made of fire. The body of a lion with a mane of flames. Could spit it from his mouth, and never burn.
The way Monster’s hand didn’t burn.
“You fucking piece of shit,” Skittles spat. “You’ve been hiding this, haven’t you? You have your animal back, like Malcom, and you never said a thing. While the rest of us rot away, you said nothing.”
Ratchet couldn’t blame Monster for making that choice. He was making it himself. Marlee was changing him, and he was hiding it. Damn right, he was. Until he was strong enough to protect her from the others.
Shit, the only time an Alley Cat looked out for the whole was when it benefitted him. Brotherhood was only on paper, not in the heart. And loyalty was to power not the powerless.
Monster’s glare snapped to Skittles. “I would never,” he growled. “Your fucking picture did this. Not me. Brought fire to my hand.”
“Bullshit.”
Monster fumed. “You’ll be taking that accusation back, candy ass. Or I’ll be taking it out of your back.”
And Monster would have the right. You couldn’t just falsely accuse your brother of treason without consequences.
But Monster’s words seemed to make the flame fade. The brutality in his eyes, the revenge on his heaving breath as he glared at Skittles… within seconds, the fire was gone as if had never been. As if they’d all imagined it. No soot. No smoke.
The only evidence that it had happened at all was the charred corner of the picture Skittles gripped between his fingers.
“How did you do it?” Skittles demanded. “How did you call fire out? Can you shift?”
“No. There’s no animal inside. It’s fucking dead. Just like yours. Just like everyone’s.”
Ratchet stared between them. Because his wasn’t. There was something inside him. Something called forward by Marlee. He couldn’t know what it was or if it would ever amount to what Malcom had, but he wasn’t letting it fade away.
“The… the picture,” Monster huffed. “The female in the picture. She did this.”
Skittles frowned. “How?”
“She… I… they…”
“Which girl?” Skittles stomped forward, shoving the photo in Monster’s face.
The breath seemed to stall in Monster’s chest as he stared at the photo again. Ratchet stared at it too.
“Her,” Monster breathed, pointing one shaking finger to a woman with ratted blond hair.
And the way he said it caught Ratchet around the throat. Her. How many times had the voice whispered that word to him when he looked at Marlee. Her, her, her.
Skittles’ shoulders eased and he stared hard at Monster. “She yours?”
Monster shook his head, opening his mouth to answer, but nothing came out. He narrowed his eyes at the girl in the photo.
“Say it,” Skittles demanded, but his voice had lost any threat. It sounded all off. Almost… scared, but Ratchet knew better.
Unless this was really happening. He remembered the fear he felt when he found Marlee in the shed.
“Yes,” Monster gritted. “Fuck. Yes. She’s mine. And I know where she is.”
Shit.
“Where?” Skittles crowded Monster. The two of them were a fucking spark away from brawling.
Monster pressed his lips together, refusing.
“You have to tell me.”
“Why? So you can use her against me?” Monster roared. “Whatever the fuck she just did to me, was none of my doing. Now I can’t even say out loud that she’s nothing. Whatever is moving inside won’t let me. And you want me to tell you what I know? Here’s what I know. She’s a vulnerability. And Alley Cats can’t have vulnerabilities.”
“What if she’s not?” Ratchet blurted.
Both brothers turned their shrewd gazes on him, and the voice inside growled in warning.
Careful.
“What if she’s not a vulnerability? What if she makes you stronger?”
“How could she?” Monster asked, but Ratchet could see the wheels turning in Skittles’ mind. He’d already been thinking along the same lines.
“You couldn’t hold a ball of fire before seeing her. I’d say that’s progress. What if it’s like with Malcom, and she can heal you?”
Monster’s mouth did a shrug, twisting his scarred chin. “Even more of a reason to keep her secret. Felix would never let one of us become more powerful than him.”
True, but it was already happening. How could Felix ever stop it? Whatever power he held over the clan now was just leftover fear from before.
Ratchet shrugged. “So… what? You know how to find your female. The Sorcera said the only way to break the spell is to have a change of heart. To learn to love. What will you do, Monster?”
He straightened his shoulders, jutting his chin out stubbornly. “Nothing. I’m broken. No female is going to change that.”
“Well, fuck you,” Skittles snapped. “I promised the clan I would find a way to heal us. And I’m going to try.” He poked his finger at a dark-skinned female with big eyes. “This one’s mine. Tell me how to find her.”
Monster’s whole demeanor changed as he looked from the picture to Skittles and back.
“What kind of game are you playing?”
“No game,” Skittles ground out. “Her. Something inside whispered it when you saw yours, right? Tell me I’m wrong.”
Monster already gave that away without even trying, but he kept quiet. Ratchet held his breath. Had all three of them really found the answer to their curse? He didn’t believe in coincidences. If it was true… this was fate.
“You’re going fucking apeshit inside because you don’t know if she’s all right. You want to sniff her out like the cats of old would have done. Find her and put her under your protection even though you don’t have an animal to make you strong.”
Monster’s chest chugged for breath.
“Two seconds. That’s all it took.” Skittles low voice rattled the air. “Two blinks. Two heartbeats, and you were altered enough you’d die for her. And you don’t even fucking know her.”
Ratchet could feel his eyes were huge. His throat was like a cactus swallowing cotton.
“How do you know that?” Monster hissed.
“Because,” Skittles growled. “I’m living it. Somehow, some way… we are in the same fucking boat, brother. Now what are we going to do about it?”
A million emotions flashed over Monster’s face. Hope and determination, defeat and fury. Suspicion, cycling back to hope, cycling back to defeat until his expression melted back into nothing.
“Nothing,” he said, reiterating what his face spoke. “We do nothing.”
“How can you say that?”
“Because. We are powerless.”
Skittles shook his head, opening his mouth to argue but Monster stopped him.
“Take a closer look at that picture.”
“The hell are you talking about? I’ve been staring at it for two days now.”
“Look. Closer.”
Ratchet peered over his shoulder trying to see whatever Monster was talking about. He blurred out the girls and focused on other pieces of the setting. And when he saw it, there in the foreground, just a hint of an object he’d seen a thousand times before… his entire world started spinning.
“There,” he rumbled, pointing to the edge of the photo, near where Monster had burned it.
The faint glow of a silver skull too close to the camera. It was the top of a walking cane. The kind you imagined a pimp might own just for show, or to beat his girls with. But the owner of this one was no pimp. He was practically a fucking god. The Lord of Memphis.
Bastian Marx.
Bastian the Bastard as Ratchet liked to think of him.
Human through and through, but cunning enough to have all the shifters in Memphis pressed tight under his thumb. He owned half of the city and every one of the casinos. He ran drugs, guns, whatever could make him a buck. And he used everybody he came in contact with. Both the Junkyard Dogs pack and the Alley Cats had done his dirty work for years.
They learned early on not to ask questions. The cats disposed of his trash… no matter what was in it. The dogs worked deep security, guarding Bastian’s most important players.
Skittles squinted at the skull, shaking his head. “No way. That can’t be what I think it is.”
But he couldn’t deny it. Not really. Bastian’s skull had a specific detail that the one in the photo mirrored. The left eye—just like his own in real life—was blacked out with a patch.
“Shit,” Skittles spat. “Fuck. Bastian has our females.”
Ratchet struggled for air. Bastian had hurt Marlee. He’d starved her. Drugged her. Made her scared. Took her from her family and kept her locked away for ten fucking years.
Anger coursed through his veins, diluting his blood. He wanted revenge. Wanted to rip the human to pieces and scatter him over the Mississippi River for what he’d done.
And the worst part? The fucking worst part?
He worked for the man. Had helped make all his shitty deeds possible. He’d contributed to Bastian’s empire. Like all the cats. Turned a blind eye for a little money. Or just because he could.
But if he’d known… if Ratchet had known the man was kidnapping and holding females, he would’ve…
No.
He would’ve done shit to stop him. That was the fucking truth of it.
Felix had held women at the warehouse plenty of times and Ratchet had never lifted a claw to stop it. The fathers before them had done even worse, and no one blinked. The Alley Cats didn’t stand up for the hurting. They didn’t do what was right. They took advantage. They harmed. And nothing would have changed that.
Except a curse, the voice inside whispered. You’re changing. Already changed. They will too.
For the first time ever, Ratchet didn’t begrudge what the witches did to them. Instead, he realized it was necessary. The cats had been a threat to their people, the Ouachita clan. But worse than that, they’d threated their brother’s mate. Threatened Gash’s pregnant female. The Sorcera had done what it took to protect her.
Ratchet wished to god they had some fucking Sorcera of their own right about now.
Monster ran a hand through his hair. “Maybe we could talk to Malcom. See if he’ll help us get them free. We show up with him, no one could tell us no.”
Ratchet shook his head. “Malcom will eat you before you can even get the first word out. Remember what he said?”
“If we come around again, no warning,” Skittles murmured. “He burns us to a crisp. And if we die, there would be no one to help our females. At least with us alive… there’s a chance. It might take years before we find a way to get them.” He stared up at Monster, fury rolling off him. “But we will get them.”
Monster set his jaw so hard his teeth cracked. His fists clenched. His eyes blazed hot.
“In the meantime, we work for the bastard, knowing he has what’s ours? You telling Felix? We doing this as a clan?”
Skittles stepped close to Monster, staring into his churning gaze. “We tell no one. We watch. We wait. And when the time comes… we fucking pounce.”
Ratchet planned to be around when the moment came. Because he was getting revenge for his woman, for the things she’d endured. He had a lot of making up to do for his part, for knowing Bastian was evil and never doing a thing to stop him when he had the power to do so.
Start by loving her. Repair the damage done to her heart.
Ratchet didn’t know how to love. Didn’t know how to fix something as delicate as Marlee. But when he got home, he was going to try.