Chad woke up to a splitting headache and little lights dancing in front of his eyes. He blinked, feeling woozy, and tried to bring his hand up to the back of his head to see why it was hurting so much.
But his hands were bound.
For a second he was annoyed with Peter, wondering what the hell he had done now, but then his mind cleared and he remembered what had happened. He’d followed the directions on his phone to the address supplied by the people who had taken his mother, and on walking inside someone had bashed him over the head with a… Chad had no idea. But it must have been heavy and very, very hard.
“You’re awake.”
Chad looked up, surprised to see a petit beta woman standing in front of him with a gun pointed at his chest. The expression on her face was manic, her eyes opened too wide, and Chad felt a stab of fear. She looked like a crazy person.
“Who are you?” Chad asked, sitting up. He blinked down at his bound hands, startled to see what an amateur job it was. The ropes were tied all wrong, and Chad knew he’d be able to free himself in a matter of minutes if he really tried.
Not that he’d try with a gun pointed at him at point blank range.
“Peter Tank claimed you,” the woman said, the words mumbled and low like she didn’t care if Chad heard them or not. “He loves you. He has to!”
Chad wondered what the fuck was going on, but then it all clicked into place. This must be Karen Pen, the woman whose brother Peter had killed twelve years ago.
“Are my parents all right?” Chad asked, even though he now strongly suspected that he’d been tricked. Karen had probably never had his parents, nor had she probably been monitoring his phone.
He felt so stupid.
“They’re fine,” she said, the gun trembling in her hand. Chad worried she was going to fire it by accident. “My people let them go when you came.”
Her people. Sure.
“What do you want, Karen?” Chad asked. He somehow didn’t think it had anything to do with the merger between T.I. and Light Energy. If she wanted revenge, Chad wasn’t going to let her use him to get it. He’d die before he let her hurt Peter.
“How do you know my name?” Karen asked, taking a step back. She looked spooked.
“Just a guess,” Chad said. He had to stay calm. Karen was looking more and more unhinged, and he did not want to end up with a bullet in his chest.
“Peter took my brother, so I’m going to take you,” Karen said. The words were too loud and hysterical, like she was trying to convince herself to carry out her plan.
Chad swallowed. Peter wasn’t the one in danger. Karen didn’t want to kill him—she wanted him to feel what she had felt.
“Can you put the gun down, please?” Chad said, keeping his voice calm and trying to keep the alpha out of his voice. Who knew what Karen would do if she thought he was trying to influence her?
“No!” Karen screamed, shaking the gun at him and taking a step forward. “He killed Jacob! He deserves to pay!”
Chad gauged the distance between them, but she was out of reach. If he tried to free himself she’d have plenty of time to shoot him before he succeeded.
“My mom is going to be so sad if you murder me,” Chad said, holding his hands up in front of his chest defensively. If she did shoot him he’d rather the bullet lodge in his arm than in his heart. “And my dad, too. He just recovered from a heart attack a few months ago. A shock like this could kill him.”
Karen’s determined expression wavered, and Chad hoped that he was getting through to her. It was obvious she wanted revenge, but he didn’t think she was a killer. It was one thing to want Peter to experience the same loss that she had felt, but quite another to murder someone to make it happen.
“Peter Tank killed my brother. He deserves to pay.” The words were desperate.
“I’m sorry for your loss.” Karen lowered her gun an inch, tears in her eyes, and Chad continued. “I really don’t want to die. Please just let me go and we can forget all about this. I promise I won’t tell anyone.”
“No one?” Karen asked, her voice wavering. Chad shook his head.
“No one.” He confirmed. “I understand why—"
The gun went off. The shot rang out like a crack of thunder, and for a second Chad wondered where he’d been hit. Then he looked up and saw Karen slumping to the floor. There was a single red hole in her forehead, and behind her a spray of blood and brains covered the floor.
It wasn’t her gun that had gone off.
The front door opened and Merchant walked inside, holstering his weapon under his coat as he walked in and looked around the room. He looked completely in control, and utterly unfazed by what he had just done.
