The plan was to drive the family through the city in a convoy of three cars. Reece and Javi would be in the front. Nico would be in the center with Hugh riding shotgun and the family cowering in the back of a large SUV with tinted windows. Cole would take up the rear.
Nico wished that Cole didn't take these kinds of risks on himself, but he couldn't tell the alpha what to do. He was in deep enough shit as it was.
Something pricked the back of his neck. His wolf surged forward with a snarl of warning trapped in his throat.
One moment, everything was fine, and then chaos erupted.
The scent of magic bloomed everywhere, and all of the werewolves around him began to yell as a swarm of wolves attacked them.
But no, that wasn't right. At first, Nico thought it was the Iron Runner pack, that they had figured out the plan and were clawing the family back. Then one wolf got near him, and Nico saw it was made of shadow. When he tried to fight it, it dissolved into nothingness. His fist passed through the creature's throat where he'd aimed for a killing blow, meeting air cold enough toburn his knuckles. The shadow reformed behind him with teeth that felt real enough when they grazed his shoulder.
Illusions. Magic. Coven.
Fuck!
Cole was calling out orders while Kathleen, David, and the boys were screaming and the other betas were trying to fight off monsters that they couldn't touch but seemed more than capable of inflicting damage upon them.
Javi's shoulder was already bleeding from nasty looking claw marks, red soaking his shirt, and Hugh was limping as he swung at empty air that kept biting back.
One of the boys made a run for it, and a moment later, his brother followed. It didn't take more than a heartbeat for the parents to go running after them, back onto Iron Runner territory.
Nico was tempted to chase, but what help could he be? He couldn't protect all of them by himself, especially not on enemy pack territory.
Then a woman screamed.
Not Kathleen. No. A much more familiar, much more dear voice.
Elise.
The sound was a staggering blow, making bile rise in his throat as his wolf demanded he run straight for their terrified mate.
The rational part of his mind knew it wasn't her. Or if it was, it was because she was in on whatever this attack was.
But his wolf was close to the surface in the chaos, and his wolf had only one desire: protect their mate.
Nico couldn't hold himself back. He rushed around the corner, chasing the woman's screams down deeper and deeper into an alley that was surrounded with shadows. His breathcame hard and fast, vision narrowing to a tunnel focused only on reaching her.
The screams seemed to be the same distance away, no matter how far he ran, until he ended up standing under a streetlight, and an unfamiliar witch stepped out onto the alley in front of him. She was taller than Elise, with a cruel smile that twisted her features into something predatory.
She held a ball of magic in her hand and grinned, and Nico tried to back up, but something held him in place as if concrete had swallowed up his shoes, and there were invisible chains around his shoulders.
He strained against the binding, but the magical restraints only tightened, cutting into his chest until each breath was a struggle. Fucking magic.
"Hey, asshole," the woman said, "catch," and she threw the magic at him, and everything went black.
Later, he came to.
He had no idea how long it had been, but now he was sitting, and it felt like he was inside. He opened his eyes to see the cement walls of an unfinished basement. The air was damp and smelled of mildew. A naked light bulb hung from the ceiling and made the whitewashed brick unnaturally bright. He could feel rope around his legs and his hands tying him to an uncomfortably hard chair.
His eyes confirmed that the rope was real this time, though he couldn't guarantee that no magic was involved. He struggled against the ropes, but it did no good.
He tried to cry for help, but there was a gag in his mouth. He tasted dirt and soap and tried not to think of just how disgusting a rag could be.
Nico was captured. Trapped by witches.
And he didn't know how he was going to get out of this mess.
Chapter
