Silas looked around at his pack mates. They had brought Jasper and Brendan as back up even though Dean was sure they didn’t need it. Malachi had insisted on coming along. Something about a ‘bad feeling.’ Silas suspected the healer just wanted to spend more time with his lovers. He could relate to that.
The three of them were giggling and laughing in the back of the van, as if they were on a flipping day-trip. Which was proving Silas’s suspicions to be true.
Dean pulled the van over to the side of a deserted, nondescript road. They were here. The cabin would be just out of sight, up ahead.
“Malachi, stay in the van,” ordered Silas as he hopped out.
The healer didn’t know the first thing about fighting and was as sweet and innocent as they came. Silas would like to keep him that way. If the guy didn’t talk and Silas had to torture him, Malachi didn’t need to see that. Unless Silas needed the healer to patch the guy up so he could be questioned some more. Then Malachi’s innocence would have to be sacrificed. The healer had asked to tag along, after all. Silas wasn’t a saint.
Together, he, Dean, Brendan, and Jasper knew what they were doing. Without having to discuss it, they all spread out to approach the cabin from different angles, surrounding their prey. Teamwork was so useful sometimes. Silas felt that he could definitely continue to get used to it.
Dean headed for the front door. He would be the first one to approach. Silas loved that his mate acted like such a true alpha, without even thinking about it. It was purely instinctual for Dean. Undeniable proof that he was a good man, down to his very bones.
Silas stiffened as his magic tingled along his body, telling him what it sensed.
“Hunters. Eight of them. Trap!”sent Silas frantically down the mate bond, but even as he did, he saw through the bond that Dean was opening the front door.
A gunshot rang out, startling the birds from the trees.
Silas was running towards the sound without conscious thought. He burst into the cabin at the same time Brendan and Jasper did. He walked through the door, the betas exploded through different windows.
Dean was on the floor. The acrid scent of a silver bullet filled the air. Silas sent a blast of fury at the gun and it melted into a puddle of goo. The two hunters in the room stared at them in pale-faced horror before turning tail and fleeing.
Silas’s mind felt numb, frozen. He watched as Brendan and Jasper looked down at Dean lying on the floor in a growing pool of blood. Silas watched the betas’ faces grow pale and their eyes wide.
“Go get them!” Silas hissed, gesturing at the direction the two hunters had fled.
The betas rushed off after the hunters. Silas didn’t know where the other six hunters were and he didn’t care. Jasper and Brendan could deal with them.
Suddenly, Silas’s body unfroze and could move again, but his thoughts still felt like treacle. He ran to Dean’s side, fell to his knees, and cradled his mate’s head in his lap.
“Dean?” he said softly, as if the alpha was sleeping.
Dean’s face was pale, his eyes nearly closed, but not quite. The slit of dazzling green-gold Silas could see was already dull. He did not look like he was sleeping.
Somehow Silas reached for his phone, some distant part of his mind operated it and called Malachi. Even though part of him knew it was pointless.
“Here, now!” a voice choked with pain begged. Silas was surprised to realize it was his own.
He stared down at Dean. He stared at the wound. A silver bullet through the heart. Silas bent his head and kissed his mate’s already cooling lips. Their last kiss.
“No, no, no, no, no, no, no!” someone was wailing inside Silas’s mind, or was he saying that out loud? Silas’s wolf was howling and howling. So much grief, so much loss, so much pain. He couldn’t think, couldn’t move. The mating mark on his neck burned. No, it was like ice. So frozen and so cold it felt like a burn.
Malachi was there, his hands over Dean’s heart, pouring magic into him. But Silas knew death. He was a necromancer. He could feel death like other people felt warmth and cold. Dean was gone. The only thing in his arms was a dead body. He sobbed and let out a howl. The healer’s eyes met his, full of pain, sympathy, and tears.
Silas looked back down at Dean, as if hoping this time his eyes and other senses would tell him something different. That Dean was just hurt, but okay, that he had just panicked.
This couldn’t be their final moment, the closing bracket of everything they had shared together. Like some sick symmetry, memories of their first moment flowed through Silas. He felt again, as if he were reliving it, strong hands on him, pulling him away from George Westlake. The touch had been firm, assured, yet gentle as possible. The heat from those as yet unknown hands had burned throughout his whole body.
His wolf hadn’t objected at all to being dragged out onto the landing and forced to his knees. His wolf had always known. Silas vividly recalled looking up and setting eyes on Dean for the first time. Seeing those wonderful green-gold eyes and that stunning tawny hair. Silas’s heart had flipped over and his stomach had filled with butterflies. As they still did, every time he looked at Dean.
The memory faded, and Silas looked down at Dean lying so very still. It had started with Silas on his knees. It was almost poetic that it was ending that way.
No. Thought Silas suddenly, with an icy clarity. What was the fucking point in being a necromancer if you were just going to sit there and cry after the love of your life died in your arms? No. Dean didn’t get to leave him. He would not allow it. He couldn’t let it happen.
Silas closed his eyes, stepped into the veil and chased after Dean. He was going to bring him back. Or follow him. Either way, he was not coming back without his mate.
Chapter sixteen
