I turned then to face him in the ghost-glow of the LCD. He looked at me like he could drink me in through his eyes, raw and wild and still a little afraid.
“You think it’ll work?” I asked. My voice sounded smaller here, less like a hacker and more like a girl who had run out of options.
He bent down and kissed the top of my head. “If you’re running the show, it will. You’re the best of us.”
The words caught me off guard. I wanted to deflect, to laugh it off, but instead I just nodded and pressed my cheek into his palm. “I don’t want to lose anyone else,” I said, not even sure if he heard it.
He did. “We won’t,” he promised, but there was something in his voice that made it sound like a prayer, not a vow. Then, he handed me my phone. “You wanna make that phone call now?”
“Shit. I think I need to.”
Chapter 27
Wrecker
Ihanded Parker her phone. The thing felt heavier than it should in my palm. She took it with her thumb and index finger, delicate, surgical, as if it might detonate on touch. Her lips pressed together in a colorless line. She scrolled to Axel’s number, then paused. For one solid heartbeat, I thought she’d change her mind and throw the phone straight through the war room window. She didn’t. She called, and the line clicked to life with the sound of her own breathing, doubled by nerves and the phone’s shitty compression.
The call went to voicemail the first time, but on the second, he picked up. “Yeah?” Axel’s voice: nasal, impatient, even through the speaker. Parker took it off speaker and pressed it close, but I could still hear both sides of the conversation.
“Axel, it’s me.” Her voice was small, hollowed out with panic and fatigue. “Where the hell are you?”
“Why, you need money or something?” He tried for a laugh, but it came out like a crow choking on wire.
She took a breath that I could hear across the table. “No, I just—” A sob, raw and barely faked. “I came back. I tried to fix everything. It’s too late. The antidote wasn’t enough. Bronc—he’son a vent. Wrecker’s barely alive. They put us all on lockdown. Everyone thinks I’m the one who brought this down.”
“Gee, that’s rough,” he said, with the total lack of empathy of a man checking the weather for a city he’d never visit. “I told you not to go back there. Fucking told you, Parker. Iron Valor will always use you up.”
“It’s not like you gave me a choice.” Her anger was an undercurrent, just enough to make it real for him. “They said you stole from them. That you put me in this position. But I lied for you, Axel. I fucking lied for you, and now—” She coughed, wet and ugly, like she’d learned to do from the ward full of sick wolves. “Just tell me what you want. What Dagger wants.”
There was a shuffle on the line, like he’d moved to a quieter room. “You need to get out,” he said. His voice dropped to a whisper. “Look, they’re gonna finish you. Dagger is going full fucking psycho. Word is he wants to kill everyone, but you most of all, because they think you’re the one who took out Silas.”
I could see her jaw lock, the muscle twitching in her cheek. She didn’t say that she’d known Silas was dead, or that she was the one who put him down. She let Axel fill the silence with his own noise.
“You think Dagger gives a shit about you?” Parker asked, her voice rising. “He’s the one who sent you to steal in the first place. Or did you forget that?”
“Don’t put this on me,” Axel snapped, but he sounded more scared than mad now. “I did what I had to do. It was either that or end up in the river. You know how they play, Parker. No one survives long unless they’re useful. You gotta get out. I mean it.”
She pressed the phone so hard into her ear I could see the shell of it going white. “What are they planning?” She said, low and urgent. “Is it tonight?”
Axel hesitated. Then: “They want to hit the compound at dawn. They think the pack’s too weak to fight back. Dagger’s got a demon backing him now, too. And fucking vampires, but whoknows with those fuckers? All I know is, if you don’t leave Iron Valor territory, Dagger’s gonna string you up outside the club. For real. You need to go, Parker.”
She let herself break, just a little. “Where would I even go, Axel? You already burned every bridge we had. You’re with Greenbriar now, so I’m sure you don’t give a fuck, but there’s nothing left for me out there. Nothing.” She choked on it, and I wondered how much of the desperation was acting and how much was real.
“I never wanted this,” Axel said, and for a moment he sounded like a brother who cared, before the gambling, the debts. “But you picked the wrong side. You always do.”
She almost laughed. “I picked my family, asshole. You’re the one who left.”
Axel was silent a long moment. “Doesn’t matter. If you’re not out by dawn, you’re dead. Dagger’s got a death list, and you’re at the top. He’s calling himself Alpha now, by the way. Silas is gone, and nobody’s contesting it. That’s just how it is.”
“Fine,” she said. “When I hang up, I’ll be gone. You can tell Dagger you did your brotherly duty.” She paused, then in a softer voice: “Stay safe, Axel. If you can.”
He hung up without a word.
Parker stared at the phone, her thumb still hovering over the screen. I waited for her to break, or scream, or do anything that wasn’t just sit there and vibrate with rage. Instead, she set the phone down, picked up a pen, and scribbled something on the edge of the notepad: Dagger. Dawn. Possible demon help. Maybe vamps.
“You okay?” I asked, knowing it was a stupid question.
She didn’t look at me. “It worked. He bought every word.”
