“So you decided to drop my class, eh? I wonder whose idea…”
Lia’s entire body shivered in fear at the sound of Max’s cold voice from behind her.
“It just isn’t working out well…with my schedule and everything,” Lia lied. She normally didn’t like lying, which was partly why it was so difficult for her to continue living with Courtney and her father without telling them about her parents and their responsibility toward the bear shifters’ efforts at eradicating the wolf population.
“That sounds like quite a believable excuse,” Max said. “Too bad it’s not true.”
Lia swallowed hard and turned to face him, carefully attempting to map out an escape route, but the place was deserted and there was nowhere else to go. They were in the parking lot near the bus stop; Lia had been instructed to take the bus home so that Courtney could follow Eric to the cabin where they were going to be spending the weekend together. Now that she was there, though, it was clear what a mistake it had been to listen to her friend. She should have gotten a ride home with Kane.
“For a math teacher, you don’t really take variable into account, do you?” Lia asked, backing nervously toward the pay phone. She put her hands in her pockets, hoping to somehow fish her phone out and call Kane. He was on the other side of the building, but if she could reach him, then maybe…
“Variable? You forget, Lia, that I’m also a shifter. Shifters have a startling tendency to sniff out liars. It’s one of our best qualities.”
Max was walking slowly toward her, and the fear in her chest mounted nearly to panic. She wouldn’t be able to solve anything if her mind was swept away with fear, though. She pulled her phone out as she continued to back away from Max, and tried to quickly swipe to Kane’s name to dial for him.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Max asked, his eyes dark and chilling as he finally took a long stride forward, until he was almost close enough to touch her. “You’ve done enough to get in my way. It’s time you come with me.”
“No!” Lia exclaimed. She had just reached Kane’s name and allowed the phone to dial when Max shoved her forward, knocking the phone out of her hand. Pain suddenly coursed its way through her as Max’s hands bore down on the pressure points at the back of her neck and he shoved her forward and wrestled her inside a black van that was waiting out in the parking lot.
“Let me go!” Lia cried. “You’re going to regret this!”
“Oh, I don’t think I will,” Max said with a grin as he climbed into the van beside her, holding a knife to her back. “Rax, get driving!”
“Yeah, boss.”
“You piece of shit!” Lia exclaimed, clawing at the door. But it was locked, seemingly from the outside, and there was no way for her to get out. She was trapped, and there was nothing she could do about it.
“This the girl, huh?” Rax asked from the driver’s seat.
Lia didn’t like the tone of his voice. It had a different quality to it than most of the other wolf shifters had. Darker, grittier almost. As if he were rotten from the inside out.
“That’s right. The one supposedly engaged to Kane Desmond.”
“Desmond. What a joke.”
“Shut up!” Lia exclaimed. “Who do you guys think you are?”
“Why, your kidnappers, of course!” Max said, turning to face her with a jovial smile on his face. “I’m not sure what’s so difficult to figure out about that. Then again, you’re not exactly the best at putting two and two together, are you, Miss Sanders?”
Lia would have hit him if he hadn’t had a knife to her back, but it wouldn’t do Kane any good for her to get murdered in the back of a sketchy van because of her bad attitude. She was going to have to try to play it smart from then on out, otherwise who knew what might happen? Not just to herself, but to the citizens of Stonybrooke should the ominous Malishk Reform pass.
“I guess you would know,” Lia said with a halfhearted shrug. Maybe it would be wise to change tactics. If she could get information from Max about what they were planning, then maybe, once she got out of the mess she was in, she would be able to be of some use to him.
“Damn right, I would know,” Max said.
It was easy to get an egotistical shithead to talk, Lia realized. All she had to do was to tell him how great he was and the rest would follow. He was probably bursting to brag about his plan. To gloat in the face of the girl who had nearly helped Kane stop him.
“I mean, Kane is super smart and sexy, you know, but anybody could learn history. It takes a special kind of person to teach math.”
Max smirked, and Lia felt sick. He was enjoying all of this far too much for her to be comfortable with it. But what choice did she have? Kane needed all the help he could get, and if she could find a way to get Max disqualified from the running (as if kidnapping a student wouldn’t be bad enough) and learn more about the group he was a part of, then they would have a real chance at protecting Stonybrooke from whatever evil thing it was Max and his cronies were planning.
“Why do you teach math anyway?” Lia asked, hoping she could play into Max’s interpretation of her as a simple, stupid girl who couldn’t put two and two together. “It’s so boring.”
“It’s not boring to the people who understand it!” Max exclaimed. Rax laughed from the front seat.
“I’m with the girl,” he said. “Math sucks.”
“Just shut up and drive!” Max barked. “Nobody asked you. As for you, Lia, it’s students like you that make me hate my job. You nimrods come into class and expect to get it without getting engaged! I don’t know what’s worse about this generation! The council or the lovey dovey university letting all manner of riff-raff through its doors. A human in a shifter school. Who ever heard of such nonsense?!”
Lia was quiet for a moment before smiling at Max brightly. “Sorry. You know, I just have a thing for shifters. Especially, teachers.”
Max opened and closed his mouth, unsure of how to respond.
“Damn,” Rax laughed from the front seat. “Maybe you’ve got a shot there, prof!”
“Shut your mouth, damn you!” Max shouted. “I’m tired of your commentary. You only have one job here, Rax. Deliver me and the girl to the halfway point and then get yourself to the Malishk temple to let them know we’ve got the girl and Kane and his batch of merry men aren’t going to get anywhere with this election.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Rax said.
“Max and Rax,” Lia said with a bright laugh. “That’s kind of adorable. Did you do that on purpose?”
“They’re not our real names,” Rax confided. “They sound the same because we are one under Malishk.”
“Rax, I swear to God!”
“It’s not right to swear, Max.”
Lia watched the exchange, bemused, as Max turned a new shade of red beside her.
“It’s all right,” Lia said, touching Max’s shoulder lightly. “I won’t tell anyone.”
“Damn right you won’t,” Max grumbled, digging into one of his pockets and pulling out a zip tie. “And you won’t be touching anyone else either, you siren.”
“Siren?” Lia asked, biting back a laugh.
“Yes, siren. I know what you’re after, but you’re not going to get a damn word out of me about any of this. And Rax, if you don’t keep your fool mouth shut, I’m going to report you to the One.”
The tension in the van grew thick and Lia could tell that whoever the One was, they were very powerful. She was silent as Max roughly pulled her arms behind her back and bound them with the zip ties. When he was satisfied with his work, he turned to her with an evil glint in his dark eyes.
“I know you struggle a lot with putting things together, Lia, but in case you didn’t realize it, you’re in mortal danger. But lucky for us, we’re one body short of Malishk’s sacrifice. And you’re going to do nicely.”
“Sacrifice?” Lia breathed.
“That’s right, human,” Max said, his features suddenly contorting to reveal something downright terrifying. His skin turned a greasy black color as sprouts of thick fur began to grow in curly tufts. His eyes were a clear gold and they stared into her face hungrily.
“We’re going to enjoy this tremendously,” Max said with a low growl, before his face returned back to normal.
Lia looked away quickly, all the blood in her veins ice cold from what she had just witnessed. Whatever Max was, he wasn’t just a wolf shifter. And he wasn’t just a bear shifter either. But whether bear or wolf, one thing was certain. The man was utterly terrifying. She had to get out of there. And soon. Otherwise, she, and Stonybrooke, were going to be doomed.