Seth had beentaken. He was probably scared and sad and maybe even hurting. Riley had needed to be there, stopping it. He’d needed to be killing whoever had touched him, not sitting in his mothers’ living room, debating exit strategies.
Particularly since they’d never decided on one.
They’d figure it out though.
Bite them. Tear them. Drain them dry, Riley’s voice chanted now.
Yes, Riley agreed.
Out loud, he reminded Wolfe, “If you wanted backup so badly, you could have brought Eric.”
“Eric does not risk his safety,” Wolfe said, his words clipped and impatient. “Not ever. Bring it up again and I’ll snap your neck and leave you to their experiments.”
Riley was almost tempted to take Wolfe up on it. Maybe they’d put him in the same room as Seth. At least then they’d be together, the search finally over.
But no, he was too close to give up now.
The hacker had found evidence of a newly occupied room in the facility’s records, one that was now on their feeding schedule.
A cell, he’d called it, actually. The word had burned its way into Riley’s veins, demanding retribution.
They’d put Seth in acell.
He and Wolfe were headed there while Violet occupied the front. She’d somehow wormed her way into the operation, mostly by way of following Riley to his moms’ house and demanding her part.
Riley and his moms had objected; Wolfe had overruled them. He clearly had no issue endangering the local humans, and Riley had been too antsy to act to waste time arguing the point. If Violet wanted to take the risk, so be it.
For their part, Riley’s moms had eyes at the main facility, in case the hacker’s intel was wrong and Seth was being held elsewhere. They’d make their way inside the second Wolfe or Riley gave word.
But Seth was here. Riley could sense it, even with no sign of him. He certainly couldn’tscenthim. There was no familiar, comforting orange-butter deliciousness in these halls—only stale,sterile air, saturated with cleaning chemicals and disinfectants and despair.
But Riley still knew.
Seth. Seth, Seth, Seth.
Riley and Wolfe ran down yet another set of stairs. It had barely been a minute since they’d broken in, but it felt like hours. In the distance, Riley could hear shouting, the panicked sound of humans stuck in one of the elevators. Good. He hoped they suffocated in there.
He and Wolfe stopped at the third level underground, second from the last in this facility. They ran down the hall, and Riley scanned the opening to every room he could see.
And there.
There.
Riley could see him, if only dimly. Seth was in a hospital gown, sitting on some rickety cot and looking frailer than he ever should. No. No, no, no. Riley’s warm, solid human mate should never look so cold and scared.
“Seth!” Riley called, banging on the clear barrier between them.
Seth looked up from where he’d been staring blankly down at his feet. He cocked his head, his eyes unfocused in the dark. “Hello? R-Riley?”
His voice was muffled, even with Riley’s enhanced hearing. His cell must have been soundproofed, at least to some extent.
“Tell the hacker to put the power back on,” Riley told Wolfe, his hand still on the barrier, as if he could reach through and touch Seth if he only wanted it badly enough. “Now.”
“You’re aware it will allowallthe doors to open. He couldn’t narrow it down.”
“I know.”
Wolfe peered down the hall. He had an embroidered pocket square tucked into his bespoke suit jacket, as if he was attending amatinee at the opera and not engaging in a rescue mission. “There could be dangerous creatures contained here. Hungry and enraged.”
