Razed, p.23
Razed, page 23
I left shortly after Bodhi, but returned an hour later and set about installing the home security system I picked up at a local electronic store. A handful of YouTube videos later, and I managed to install contact sensors at all the ground level windows, both doors, motion detectors in the basement and second floor hallway, and two cameras positioned to cover the exterior side and back of the home.
Darkness descended by the time I sat down at the kitchen table. I logged into the system with my phone to check the camera feed, but my eyes kept going back to the ring box. Pandora levels of curiosity made my fingers itch to open the velvet container. At least it would only release curses upon Bodhi’s family, and not the whole of the world.
What had Blanca’s reaction been to his proposal? For that matter, what about Pilar’s? I couldn’t imagine the thought of a werewolf being stepmother to her child sat easy with her.
With great effort, I returned my attention to my phone’s screen. Viewing the live feed, I headed back outside and adjusted the angle of the cameras until I saw the view I wanted. Nothing I installed that night would prevent a werewolf from breaking and entering again, but it would alert the police and myself if he decided to return.
Back in the kitchen feeling slightly less violated and extremely accomplished, I traded my phone for the box. I gasped when I flipped up the lid. I expected something simple, understated, and elegant. A direct reflection of Bodhi’s style. The ring propped up inside succeeded in the last element beautifully, but there was nothing simple or understated about the multiple diamonds cut and set on the band to imitate the crescent and half-moons, set on either side of the full center one.
I slipped the ring out of the box and onto my finger. A perfect fit. The reason behind all the questions Arsinoë asked a few months back became crystal clear. I rested my hand on the table while I stared at my new jewelry. It looked beautiful. Odd and out of place, but beautiful. Not the perfect proposal by a long shot, and not exactly a happy occasion either. I sat in the kitchen of one of the people I would have shared the news with but couldn’t.
I placed the ring back in the box and set it in the middle of the table. Tilting my head back, I wiped more tears away. A romantic in her core, Gisselle would have loved the symbolism. She never married or took another mate because, she already experienced the greatest love of her life.
“No one can compare to your uncle Friedrich,” she would say whenever I asked if she thought about settling down with one of her lovers.
I rested my forehead on the warm wooden tabletop. What started as a dull ache in my side an hour ago, spread through the whole of my body. I wanted to soak in a tub of hot water, but exposing the wound to that much prolonged moisture wouldn’t do it any favors. Nope. A soak would have to wait for at least another week.
I shivered and breathed in cold air. The sudden shift in temperature caused me to bolt upright in the chair. I intended to whirl around and face the door. Assuming someone, or something had opened it to create the sudden shift from warm to cold.
Gisselle’s disfigured ghost sitting in the chair across the table, staring at me, ceased all movement. We locked eyes. My right leg bounced my knee up and down at the speed of a terrified rabbit. My left thumb and forefinger squeezed the fatty part of my right hand. The pain I caused myself was the only way I managed to keep my eyes fixed on her disfigured face.
Gisselle’s lips moved and sound left her mouth, but just as before, I couldn’t understand what I now knew to be dead speech.
“Gisselle.” It took me several tries to find my own voice. “I...”
My aunt raised her right hand, pointed it at me, thumped her fingers against her chest, and then pointed at me again.
“I don’t understand.”
Point, thump, point. Point, thump, point.
“Your heart?” I asked. “My heart?
She repeated the gesture over and over again. On the end of the fourth round of her pointing to me, I touched the spot she pointed to. Under my sweater, my fingers brushed the last thing Gisselle gave me. I looked down as I pulled the pendant out from under my clothing.
“Is this...” my words trailed off.
When I looked up, Gisselle’s ghost had disappeared.
18 – Beto
My desk rumbled.
The incoming text message vibrating my phone provided a welcome distraction from staring at the computer screen. I pinched the bridge of my nose and leaned back in my chair. All the alibis provided by the pack checked out, and those without solid ones didn’t seem worth pursuing. Lourdes and her partner would, in order to keep everything above board, but I didn’t expect them to uncover anything.
The murders and the attack on Ace were the work of an outsider, or outsiders. Someone with a grudge against one, or all. A grudge deep enough to want to kill multiple generations.
After rescuing my phone from under multiple papers and folders, I woke the screen. The photo Ace sent, an image of her face, coyly obscured by her left hand with the ring finger bejeweled, plastered what I imagined to be a ridiculous smile upon my face.
While painful to go through, my psyche felt lighter after the conversation from the previous night. The proverbial weight of our lopsided relationship lifted. Time would tell if she would live by her words, but I remained optimistic. I needed this relationship to work. Proof that it wasn’t me. That I wasn’t a two-time failure.
“Knock, knock.”
I looked up to see my PA standing in the doorway.
“Hey Colby.”
“You wanted a two-thirty reminder,” he said, and crossed the threshold. He eventually ended up in one of the chairs on the other side of my desk.
“Is it two-thirty already?” I answered my own question when I looked down at my watch.
“Time to go pick up your offspring,” he stated. “But before you do that, what’s this all about?” He asked and waved his hand in my general direction.
“What, you don’t recognize the look of me spinning my wheels?”
“I don’t mean this.” He gestured at the files on top of my desk. “I’m talking about this dimple revealing mega smile.”
The referenced expression, doubled in size without any assistance or approval from me.
“Look at you. Okay, you are in the middle of a double homicide investigation that has the entire city holding its collective breath, and you’re cheesing like you just found out you’re this year’s recipient of the ABA Medal.”
“Better.”
“Better? What’s better for a lawyer than being recognized by the American Bar Association?”
Unlocking my phone, I pulled up the photo Ace texted moments ago and displayed the screen to Colby. He reacted with a gasp, snatched the device from my hands, and zoomed in.
“That ring is gorgeous, but girlfriend needs to do something about those nails if she’s going to...” he paused mid-sentence for another sudden inhalation of breath.
“What?”
“You have to let Brianna, plan the wedding.”
“Who is Brianna?”
“My cousin. She is legit the best wedding planner in the whole of the United States, and because she’s my cousin she’ll give you the family discount which means you won’t need to black market a kidney to afford it. Though trust me she’s worth it. The last wedding Brianna did... Harry and Meghan who?”
I whistled. “That is high praise, but you know this will be my second wedding, right?”
“It was Meghan’s second wedding too.”
“I’m not a prince.”
He returned my phone and sat back in the chair. Crossing one leg over the other, he eyed me with a confidently raised eyebrow. “You’re her prince.”
“It’s not my decision, but I’ll pass the information along to Ace.”
“Fair. How about you let Brianna plan the engagement party? Once Ace sees how fabulous it turns out, she won’t be able to say no.”
“I get the feeling you’re not going to let me say no.”
“Nope,” he replied, beaming. “Being engaged looks good on you.”
“It feels good,” I paused and pulled in an unsteady breath. “And terrifying. Colby, I don’t know the first thing about being married to a lycanthrope.”
Colby flicked his hand dismissively. “And she doesn’t know the first thing about being married to a mundane. You’ll figure it out.”
“Right,” I agreed.
I looked at the photo again, concentrating on the face behind the ring. She was willing to try. We would make this work.
“I’m getting married, man.”
He grinned brightly at that and stood. “As much as I’d love to hear the deets of the proposal, you have a little one to pick up.”
“Right,” I confirmed with a nod and stood. “And thank you, for... the offer of your cousin, and for genuinely being excited.”
Colby winked, said, “My pleasure,” and left.
I gathered the papers and folders on my desk into some semblance of order before I shoved them into my satchel, followed by my laptop, followed by my leaving. On the elevator ride down, I allowed my mind to drift to a place I worked to keep it from all day.
Demons.
Ace’s revelation of their existence floored me more than I let on. If she hadn’t just told me she kept things from me because she feared my reaction, I probably would have reacted more. Demons terrified me. More than any other supernatural creature. Vampire, fae, cactus cats, yetis, and the like could have good and bad amongst their ranks, but were not truly evil in their core.
The same could not be said for demons.
I struggled with which scared me more. Knowing demons existed, or knowing Ace fought a murder of them. Did she secretly hunt them? Did they hunt her? Determined to track down the one that got away. She was convinced they had nothing to do with this. I didn’t share her conviction.
Contract murder didn’t require a face-to-face meeting. Not in this era of multiple video conference platforms, and not when burner phones were still a thing.
The elevator deposited me in the parking garage and muscle memory led me to my car while my thoughts became a kaleidoscope. My current debate centered around a decision to push Ace into revealing more about the fight in Hamburg now, or wait until I had proof to back my theory about the demons being behind the attacks.
My thoughts consumed me to the exclusion of everything, including the man leaning on the back fender of my car like it belonged to him. I looked up after I pressed the trunk release and found him staring at me.
Once we established eye contact, he straightened. His full height matched mine, and yet, my brain processed him staring down at me. I wanted to cower before him. Hell, I wanted to run back to the elevator and mash the button until it returned.
“Can I help you?” I frowned at him and hoped the disapproving facial expression disguised my vulnerability.
Cameras blanketed every floor of the garage, but cameras wouldn’t prevent him from ripping out my throat. I curled the fingers of one hand around the shoulder strap of my satchel, and shoved the other hand deep into my front pocket. Both disguised the trembling.
“Beto Dacal.”
With my name uttered as a statement, I opted to press my question instead of confirming his statement.
“I’ll ask again. Can I help you?”
His eyes left mine and looked over his right shoulder at the camera positioned on the beam. I didn’t remember shifting my focus to it, but I must have. When he turned back to face me, a smirk turned up the right corner of his mouth, but amusement died before it reached his electric blue eyes.
“Hoping the cavalry comes to your aid?”
“Do I need the cavalry?”
He chuffed and stepped closer. With the distance between us I mistook the bright blue for coloring, and not a hue aided by the brightness behind them. I recognized it. Not in him, but from Ace. The way her eyes sometimes glowed during sex, or sometimes when she woke first thing in the morning. According to her, it happened when her wolf was more alert. A statement that tracked since during Bella’s reception her eyes turned bright yellow first.
I didn’t recognize this man, but I knew a werewolf when one stared me down.
“If I wanted you dead, you wouldn’t have made it five steps off the elevator.”
“Did you just threaten an assistant district attorney?” I challenged.
I knew my mistake the moment I took the involuntary step back. A satisfactory smile perked his lips. Once my body initiated the response, retreating became rote. He advanced, and I back pedaled until the bumper of the car behind me greeted my legs.
“What do you want?” I demanded with all the bravado I could muster.
“You have balls.”
I flinched when he leaned in and sniffed me.
“Sort of.”
I swallowed. “If you didn’t come here to kill me, what did you come here for?”
“Perhaps I am testing your worthiness.”
“For what?”
“Kneel.”
The one word was enough to jar me from my fear, at least for a moment.
“Excuse me?”
He snarled deep in his throat. The sound rumbled through the garage. It washed over me until I could no longer stop the trembling from manifesting on a grand level. My shoulders shook. My entire body vibrated, and I dropped my eyes to the ground. The fear his presence inspired ate away at my confidence and eroded my composure with each passing second. His command repeated in my head. Thundering until I heard that one word and nothing else.
I had no recollection of moving but cold concrete greeted my knees.
His hand gripped the back of my head pushing it down while he yanked the collars of my clothing away, exposing the back of my neck. His nose touched my skin first. Trying to jerk away from him only caused him to tighten his grip on my head.
“Do not move again.” He ordered.
I wanted to move. I tried to do just that, but my body refused to obey. What had he done to me? Were the monitors for the cameras being watched? Did anyone even know to call the police?
His teeth pressed down on my skin at the back of my neck. Even then, the only movement my body offered was a flinch. It elicited a snarl.
“Don’t...” I didn’t want to beg but I couldn’t die in a parking building.
The pressure on my flesh left, but I continued breathing hard. I needed to make my body move. I repeated the command in my head and just as abruptly as I lost control of my limbs, that same control returned.
I looked up from where I knelt and found myself alone in the garage.
“How are you holding up?”
“I’m fine,” I lied.
Hours after the encounter, sitting in near darkness on the couch in my apartment, my hands still trembled. I fooled Pippa. Hiding my fear from my seven-year-old daughter presented no challenge at all. Fooling Ace was decidedly more difficult. Especially with her sitting less than three feet away from me on the couch we shared.
“Bullshit. You’re shaking.”
“And here I thought I was hiding it so well,” I replied.
I tried and failed to smile. I wanted to make light of things, but the fear of that vulnerability remained too close. Ace covered my right hand stretched across the back of the couch with hers. Did she sense my distress? Could she do that?
“It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Ace said. Her fingers stroked my hand, and then settled on top and squeezed. “From what you told me he’s not just a dominant, he’s an Alpha. A true Alpha.”
“Is there a difference?”
Ace nodded. “A true Alpha with a capital A is rare. Rarer than völvas. Like us, one must be born a werewolf to even have a shot at being an Alpha, and even then, it’s not guaranteed.”
“And they have abilities?” I questioned.
“They do.”
“I’m guessing it’s a safe bet one of them is mind control?”
“It’s a deeper violation than mind control. More like... like will control.”
“And that’s what he did to me?”
She nodded. I pulled my hand from under hers and stood. I needed to pace out the nervous energy or expel it through some other physical activity. Boxing. Running. Anything other than sitting still, watching Ace watching me with that sympathetic look in her eyes.
I settled for pouring two glasses of bourbon from the decanter on the portable bar.
“Have you ever met one?”
“No, but I’ve heard stories,” she said.
“What kind of stories?”
Ace took the glass I offered. After a few minutes of silence, she joined me where I stood by the closed balcony door. After midnight cast my neighborhood in mundane silence. I stared out at the shadows. How did the Alpha know where to find me? For all I knew, he could have been out there watching me. Watching us. I downed my drink and went back for a refill.
“When a human is attacked by a docile werewolf, there’s a five to ten percent chance the human will become infected and change at the next full moon. If it’s a dominant, that chance increases to around sixty percent.”
“I know the numbers,” I stated.
“If a human is attacked by an Alpha, it’s a hundred percent.”
“Wh-What?”
“Something in their saliva is a thousand times more potent.”
I walked back towards her but leaned against the arm of the couch instead of standing in front of any windows.
“What else can they do?” I asked.
“I could spend the rest of the night recanting the lore on them, but I don’t know what’s true, and what’s hype. I mean, some stories say that true Alphas are immortal.”
“Huh.”
I drained my glass for a second time, and stood for a refill. Ace offered hers instead.
“Have you told Lourdes?”
I shook my head. “I’ve only told you.”
“Don’t you think you should?”
“Maybe, I thought about—”
I jerked away from Ace when she leaned in, to sniff along my shoulder.
