Slade sits beside me on the right, relaxed in his chair as if Adrian isn’t even a blip on his radar to be concerned over. “The fact that you’d speak to Sabrina in such a manner is reprehensible by anyone’s standards. Yet I’m sure that her fathers especially wouldn’t be pleased if they were to hear that you speak to their daughter with such blatant disrespect.”
Adrian’s jaw ticks before he schools his features into a practiced mask. “I’m sure they’d forgive me when they realized that she was only masquerading as their daughter.”
There it is.
I don’t even have to fake my confusion, cocking my head slightly. “What are you talking about? You’re the one that went tattling to them that I exist; I didn’t have a damn clue. And I’m obviously not trying to use them for some ulterior motive. I’ve never met them, or even spoken to them before. This is allyouthat made the declaration and tried to ship me off to their doorstep, you hypocrite.”
His nostrils flare as he pulls his wounded hand off the table, cradling it in his lap and pressing his shirt against it to staunch the bleeding until his healing kicks in. “You know exactly what I’m talking about, SabrinaLaroque,” he sneers. “The first time I saw you and each time until now, you smelled human. Your leg was ravaged days after you were attacked to the point that you couldn’t even stand on your own. You. Couldn’t. Heal. Now you suddenly smell like one of us, yet you’ve never shifted?”
His eyes bore into mine, attempting to laser my face off with his seething hatred. When I don’t react, his eyes narrow for a moment before they widen ever so slightly. The tell is there and gone in a flash, so quickly I’d have missed it if we weren’t caught in the staring match. A prickling sensation travels down my arms, and my heartburn returns with a vengeance, the tell-tale sign of my wolf rising in time with my unease.
I bet his skin would shred like paper beneath my claws. No resistance, like his blood’s as desperate to be freed from its prison as I am to see it pouring out onto the table, watch it drip down to the floor in a steady, rhythmic beat.
He shakes his head and scoffs in disgust, snapping me out of the daydream that snuck up on me. “You’re a watered-down version of us; enough traits that you can mark someone and con your way through our world if you play your cards right, but not nearly impressive enough to be fought over. Why else do you think everyone’s trying to get you out of the way?”
Ouch. My poor, fragile, girly feelings. What ever shall I do now that a random guy told me that he doesn’t want me besides fall apart and beg him for validation?
Bo’s hand tightens on the back of my chair, but Cin and Kaige start laughing; full on, stomach-clutching laughter. Damian rests his elbow on the table and his chin on his palm, staring at our guest with amusement dancing in his eyes like they’re all in on some joke that makes Adrian appear incredibly stupid for this declaration. Slade and Reid are impassive, assessing everything stoically, and Hunter’s back at his post on the wall, a silent vigil. It leaves Adrian completely surrounded by the eight of us, and he’s acting boldly enough that he clearly has some contingency plan in place that gives him the confidence to do so. Hell, Kaige could siphon from him without even making contact, and there’s no way Adrian doesn’t know that, since he’s sowellinformed.
“Ah, so you were one of the people hovering around my apartment that week, keeping me out of the way,” I toss out in an attempt of confirmation, but his wording seems too creepily accurate for him not to have been watching more closely than we realized. “It’s been driving me crazy, so I have to ask. How were you planning on getting me out if Ihadeaten the drugged food with these guys watching the building?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” A second later, a slow, smug smile twists the corner of his lips. “But deflecting only confirms that I’m right, that there’s something seriously defective with your wolf. No wonder Annika was hiding you; imagine what men would do to a female that wasn’t mate material, but available. If you can’t be auctioned off, your value’s no better than what a human girl could offer our kind.”
Don’t punch him in the balls, expression on lock down. Think of the end game.
Cinjin snorts, but I can feel the feral energy radiating off of him from here. “Hardly. Deflecting means that we think it’s hilarious you think a single person in this room answers to you or owes you a fucking explanation. You’ve gotten pretty big for your britches if you think anything to do with her includes you in any way. It’s between us, these jackasses, I suppose, and the Slaughters, who I’m sure already plan to run a DNA test on her when we get out there.”
Kaige folds his arms behind his head and rocks back in his chair. “You’re not even part of the Slaughter’s pack. You’re a middleman running around behind the back of your own alpha to try and, what? Get a bigger cut of the deals you help broker on the sly? You tipped them off about Sabrina looking like their mate; you seriously think that means they’re going to show you any favoritism after they have her and her mother back? I, for one, can’t wait to watch all of this blow up in your face.”
A broad grin spreads across Cin’s face. “Maybe if you’re lucky, instead of killing you for double crossing them, they’ll buy you a Rolex as a token of appreciation and send you off on your merry way.”
“More like a gold star sticker sheet and a pat on the head if you’re lucky,” Damian snorts. “But I wouldn’t hold my breath on ever claiming a finder’s fee, much less a place in their inner circle.”
Mottled red patches appear on his neck, but he bites his tongue, mind racing a mile a minute to look at the situation from every angle he can think of. I watch as he subtly scans the room, everyone’s faces, filing it all away. And all the while, I watch him unabashedly, reveling in the way he’s starting to squirm as it becomes clear that he’s missing a pertinent piece of information and can’t seem to figure it out.
“So why did you call me here to meet you, then?” he seethes, unable to conceal his anger and choosing to lean into it instead.
Reid holds a single finger up, interjecting, “How would you know that she’s never shifted?”
Adrian’s anger stops cold in his tracks, the color rapidly fading from his complexion.
That’d be it then. If he’s been watching us, that means he likely saw the guys shift, has footage that he thinks he can hold over our heads to ensure he walks out of here in one piece. Blackmail is a solid fallback plan, honestly, and I’m slightly impressed that he was able to pull it off.
Hunter whistles low. “Hope your will’s in order, you suicidal bastard.” Catching his eye, I attempt to convey my confusion, to which he raises an eyebrow. But despite his light tone, there isn’t an ounce of genuine amusement in those dark green eyes now, only the promise of murder. “If he’s that confident you’ve never shifted, he’s not just watching the yard. Means he has eyes inside the house, too.”
I hear the words, but it takes a few tense seconds as I process them before they sink in, let alone accept them. Because if Hunter’s right, that means Adrian not only has recorded evidence of the guys shifting, he hassex tapes.I’ll admit, that’s some solid fucking leverage if Reid and I weren’t capable of doing something about it now that we know.
“Yeah, I can see how my fathers are going to appreciate knowing you were rubbing one out to their daughter getting railed when you claimed to be helping them. They’ll probably take back your gold sticker and everything now, so sucks to be you.”
Internally, I’m screaming, and I’m sure all of the guys are picturing every way they’re going to eviscerate him the second he’s no longer useful to us. Outwardly, I act unaffected; completely and utterly unperturbed. Not like Iwanthim to leak footage of me getting tag-teamed, but I have full confidence in Slade’s lawyer handling things if it comes to that, and the rest of the guys to make Adrian wish he was never born. So I embrace my inner wolf and smile, making it seem like we’re already three steps ahead of him.
If I don’t show an ounce of fear in the face of his contingency plan, it doesn’t make it a fail safe anymore, it makes it a failure.
No need to pass my other half the reins or fight to retain them; we have the same goal, and that entails playing the long game to ensure total destruction, and maximum impact. Cinjin was right. The mercy of death isn’t nearly as appealing as the thought of all of the ways we can watch him suffer.
Adrian shifts in his seat, and Bo chuckles, the sound more dark than humorous. “Yeah, I’d stop recording too if I was incriminating myself.”
Reid glares daggers at Adrian before shoving his chair back. Holding his hand out expectantly, he waits until Adrian passes over his phone and inputs the password that gives him remote access to our security system’s feed before storming out of the room. I’m not sure what Adrian’s capable of anymore after pulling this off, so I’m going to run on the assumption he already knows it means Reid will be using the connection to gain access to his server and scrubbing everything off of it, likely leaving some nasty presents on his home software. I doubt he’ll risk touching anything from that system anymore to be safe, but if nothing else, it’ll make Reid feel a little better, at least.
