Rufus stopped in front of one in particular. “This bastard.”
As Christophe and I approached, I peered at the name. Lupine Monroe.
“The oldest and most trusted werewolf on this damn council. Whatever Lupine says goes,” he sneered. “Not anymore.” Rufus looked at me with venom in his eyes. “You have no idea how easy he was to manipulate. All it took was a few years of reminding him how dangerous and lethal humans were to our kind for him to keep the policy of no intermarriages between humans and shifters in place.”
He chuckled as if proud. “Meanwhile, I worked with Pines to create a concoction that would strip those damn shifters of their abilities.”
“You’re a shifter. How could you do that to your kind?” I demanded while trying to shake loose of Christophe’s hold. He didn’t budge.
“I’m not like them,” Rufus seethed. “We…” He waved his hand between his body and Christophe’s. “Are not like those brainless morons who solve everything with might. Isn’t that right, Christophe?” he asked.
Christophe looked at me and then Rufus, nodding slightly.
“See? While your mate,” he spat, “and his ilk thinks fighting and brawn fix everything, we use our minds to manipulate and gain power. Take me, for instance, had your mate not killed both of my parents in Florida, I may not have realized my full potential. I wouldn’t have been able to relocate to the Northeast and reinvent myself. Tricking everyone to believe I was the lone wolf taken in by a wholesome pack who deserved a seat on the most powerful council of shifters in this country.”
He laughed as if proud.
I gasped. “Florida… you’re from that pack that captured Chael’s father.”
His eyes widened, and then a sinister smile passed over his face. “You’re smarter than you appear. Maybe I shouldn’t kill you right away. After all, you are a seer. You might come in handy like Pines. He was useful until he wasn’t. He was easy to manipulate too. A lone werewolf had killed his wife years ago, and he spent years of his life bitter and angry with shifters. It didn’t take much for him to get on board with my plan.”
He moved closer. “What would it take to get you on board?” He looked me up and down.
“Not a damn thing,” I said, looking him in the eye. “You might as well kill me now.”
His eyes narrowed on me. “We’ll see about that. Take her to the main balcony,” he told Christophe.
Chael’s brother did his bidding, pulling open a door that led to a staircase.
“Christophe, he’s crazy. You see that, right? You can’t do this.”
“Why not?” Christophe finally responded. “Because you think I’m supposed to do whatever my brother asks of me? Whatever the pack wants?” There was a bitterness in his voice.
“No,” I said, stumbling up the stairs as he pulled me by the arm. “But to kill them? You can’t possibly want them to die? You don’t want to hurt Chael.”
He snorted as we reached the top stair. “I don’t care about them.” There was anger in his voice, but he sounded more like an adolescent throwing a tantrum who had no sense of what he wanted more than an angry, bitter man.
“They’ve made my life miserable since I was born,” he said, dragging me to a wall with what looked like handcuffs mounted on them. “All they do is use me as an outlet for their fucking stress. They never took me seriously. I was always the plaything, the wolf who never fought back when they roughhoused and needed someone to make fun of. Do you know what it’s like to be an omega in that kind of pack?”
There was unmistakable pain in his rant. I doubted he heard it, but I did. I started to understand him better.
“Christophe, you don’t want to do this. You can express your grievances with the pack to them. Chael would listen to you.Iwill listen to you.”
“That’s the fucking problem,” he snarled while pushing me against the wall where the handcuffs hung. “They’ll listen to you when you’ve only been his mate for months. I’ve been a part of the pack for years, and no one listens to me. They never did, and they did the same thing to my birth father before me. The pack made his existence so miserable, he would come home and take it out on my mother and me. Do you know what it’s like to be beaten up at home and then teased and made the fool by your own pack?”
“Oh, Christophe.” I shook my head. “I’m so sorry. But I know what it’s like to feel rejected, to be the outsider looking in. It hurts. It hurts so bad. I know, but…” I swallowed, trying to find the right words. “The Nightwolfs, they’re better than that. I know they are.”
“How the hell would you know anything?” He insisted.
“Doesn’t Ms. Elsie bring you breakfast almost every day you don’t show up to eat?” I asked.
He pursed his lips, staring at me with nostrils flared.
“And what about Mike? Yeah, he roughhouses but didn’t he change your oil for you, no questions asked? I remember that because it was scorching that day, but he insisted, saying that it wasn’t safe for you to drive it until the oil got changed.”
Christophe’s gaze dropped, his eyelids lowering so I couldn’t make out his emotions. But I felt as if I were making some leeway.
“If they knew how you felt—”
