Snarls and gunfire erupted in the room around him, but Michael’s vision narrowed to the pale grey wolf in front of him, circling and snarling as it prepared to attack.
Michael leapt, teeth bared, slamming into Thomas’s side and sending them both skidding across the floor. He bit down on Thomas’s back end, fangs scraping bone as Thomas kicked him hard in his injured shoulder, both wolves crying out in pain and jumping apart.
Michael limped a little, fighting against the pain, but Thomas was worse off, blood trickling from the wound on his back at an alarming rate. Michael was an alpha. It’d take more than a gunshot and a well-aimed kick to put him down.
Thomas growled, teeth bared, as he hobbled back and forth, preparing for another attack. No matter what he’d done, he was pack, Michael’s pack, or he had been, and now that he was injured, the alpha in him still urged him to protect. As misguided as their loyalty was, Simon had led them to this. It was his leadership that moulded their thinking, and Michael didn’t want to kill him if there was another way.
Shifting back, he walked closer until only about ten feet separated them. “Submit, and the new council will show leniency. I know you think Simon’s right, that his beliefs are what we should be striving to follow, but he’s a bitter man corrupted by hate and power. Don’t follow him down that path.” When Thomas stared back at him, as though considering, Michael took a step closer. “Tonight will see a new chapter in our history, with a joint—”
Thomas charged at him, fangs bared and aimed for Michael’s throat. But he was a fraction too slow, his injury costing him valuable seconds, and Michael dodged to the side, shifted into his wolf form, and attacked.
His teeth connected with soft fur, sinking into the flesh underneath and ending his life before Thomas knew what had hit him. He fell to the floor with a pained whimper, the only sound before he lay motionless at Michael’s feet.
As though he’d been lost in his own world, the fighting around him came back full force and he had no time for guilt or regrets.
With a roar that filled the entire room, he leapt back into the fray. The time for mercy was over.
This needed to end.
* * *
“Where are Michael and the others?”Simon roared, frustration making his face flushed and his hands clench. “I know you know. We can keep at this all fucking day.”
Pain was Isaac’s constant companion, the throbbing in his jaw making his head ache and his vision swim, but he forced out a laugh, blood dripping from his mouth and onto the floor. “You keep asking me the same questions and getting the same fucking answer. You know what that makes you?”
Simon stared at him as though Isaac was the insane one.
“An idiot.” Isaac grinned and got a punch to the face for his troubles.
His head snapped to the side. Pain like knives stabbing his jaw threatened to take him under again. Only Simon grabbing his hair and yanking his head up kept him conscious. Isaac caught movement out of the corner of his eye as Paul began to stir.
Simon hadn’t noticed, too busy going on a rant about traitors and punishment. Isaac zoned out as he watched Paul’s eyes open and take in the scene around him.
When his gaze settled on the fangs littering the floor under Isaac’s chair, he pushed himself to his feet. “What have you done?” Paul whispered, making Simon’s head snap round to face him. He gestured to the blood pooling on the floor. “You were supposed to question him, not... not...” It was like he couldn’t find the words to describe what he was seeing. “This.”
Simon turned fully to look at him. “What did you think I was going to do after we administered the serum? Ask him nicely?”
Isaac turned to Paul, confused. “You said the council authorised the use of full interrogation techniques.”
“Because he told me to say that,” Paul said. “To scare you. They gave him permission to question you.” He stared at Simon. “He’s an alpha.”
“He’s a traitor,” Simon yelled. “And this is how we deal with them. It’s how you’ve dealt with them in the past, so don’t suddenly act all high and mighty.”
Paul flinched. “You’ve got no proof. We never found any at Mothecombe?”
“Proof?” Simon pulled his phone out of his back pocket. “I’ll show you fucking proof and then you can pull the next lot of teeth out. Because he’s going to talk if I—” His eyes went wide as he stared at the screen. “No.” He sounded a mix of horrified and enraged.
Paul frowned, then hurriedly pulled out his own phone, expression matching Simon’s for a second until he started to laugh, a touch hysterical and disbelieving. “I guess you won’t need to look for Michael anymore.” He waved his phone in the air, and Isaac caught sight of the screen filled with messages. “You know he’ll be on his way here. He’s probably already in the building.” He glanced at Isaac, gaze calculating. “And you’ve got something of his.”
Simon frowned as he turned back to Isaac, expression slowly morphing into one of unease, the first sign of uncertainty Isaac had seen him show. “Well, there’ll be nothing left for him to find.”
Isaac pulled against his restraints, adrenaline surging through him eclipsing the pain, but the cuffs sapped his strength and nothing he did would set him free.
Simon cracked his neck and reached for the knife he had strapped to his thigh.
Isaac struggled harder, but nothing fucking helped, and it took him a moment to comprehend that Paul had run across the room, planting himself in front of Isaac’s chair. “Stop.”
“Seriously, what the fuck is your problem lately?” Simon stared at him, mouth set in an angry line. He stabbed his knife in Isaac’s direction. “He wants to let humans rule over us again. The very fucking ones who killed your parents, or have you conveniently forgotten?”
