“You should’ve minded your damn business,” he snarled.
“The residents at Creekview are my business,” I spat back.
His face reddened as he stood. I strained to stare up at him from my position on the concrete floor. I had since recognized the black walls and cement flooring. We were in Dr. Pines’s basement.
“And now you’ll die just like them.”
My body seized with fear, and I jerked my bound legs. “Untie me, you sicko!” I shouted.
He laughed maniacally. “In due time.” That sounded too close to a threat for my liking.
Pines walked away, and I noticed that the wolf that had been present was gone. I feared to look around the room to find out where it went, but movement ahead of me caught my attention.
Sera, who’d been quiet while Pines threatened me, looked me in the eyes and then darted her gaze down toward her body. I trailed her gaze and saw her hand lifted. She’d managed to unbind her wrists.
When I looked at her face again, she gestured with her head to something over my shoulder. I checked to see that Pines had his back to us before I twisted my neck and saw Sera’s bow and a pack of arrows rested on a metal shelf only about five feet behind me.
I looked toward Sera and then to Pines. He stood at a long metal table, his back still to us.
“You know…” he started, still not facing us. “It’s taken us years to get the right mix of human DNA, wolf DNA, and medications to complete what we’ve set out to do. All those old farts were useless. Their bodies were too decrepit to withstand the testing. But no one came looking for them, so I kept trying.”
He clucked his tongue and shook his head.
“But now we have real, viable specimens.”
While he ranted, I gave Sera the nod to let her know she had the all clear to free the rope shackles around her ankles. I kept my attention on Pines while he droned on about how he tricked the state and the administrators at the nursing homes where he worked. His lies granted him the ability to move residents in and out with little notice from anyone.
Anger coursed through me as he callously talked about nobody caring about the elderly, sick, and infirm.
Throughout his rant, Sera managed to untie her legs and gingerly rose to her feet. She held still as a statue, searching the room with her gaze. I supposed it was to look for the wolf that had been present moments earlier, but it was gone. She stepped over my body, and I felt her hands brush against mine.
She untied my hands. When she started for my ankles, I pushed her away and gestured toward the bow and arrow. Meanwhile, Pines continued his rant, naming the various residents he’d brought down to this room who didn’t make it out alive.
“Then I realized,” he said, spinning to face me. “Hey!” he yelled as he saw Sera.
“Fuck you,” I yelled and sat up to distract him while Sera set up her bow and arrow. Then I realized she was a shifter. I wondered why she hadn’t shifted into her wolf and torn through the ropes that bound our hands and feet.
“You’ll get everything you deserve,” I told Pines as I rose to my feet.
“Put those down,” he demanded at Sera, fear in his tone.
“I don’t think I will,” she replied and aimed at him as I went to stand beside her.
“Shoot him,” I demanded, wanting to end this so-called doctor.
“Not so fast,” another voice interrupted. This one was unfamiliar as it came down the stairs. The man emerged from the dark stairway, dressed in dark clothing with a mask covering his face. And he wasn’t alone.
Beside him was the red wolf from earlier and two others, both as vicious looking as the first.
The wolves approached us slowly, their teeth bared, drool dripping from their jowls. My legs shook so viciously that I had to brace my hand against the wall to keep from falling.
“Oh god,” I groaned when I finally took a good look toward the rest of the basement to find two long metal tables. They looked like those tables that coroners used for dead bodies. Each one of the tables held a body. One I recognized as Charlotte Rowe.
Her features were pale. So pale that she was almost a blue color, and I knew she was dead. The second table had a man lying on it, who didn’t look as pale, but his eyes were closed, and he was bare, his bottom half covered by a sheet.
Bile rose in my throat.
“You’re supposed to be a damn doctor,” I croaked. The wolves growled louder, but I ignored them. They hadn’t come closer since Sera had her arrow trained on them. “How could you?” I looked at Pines.
