“I figured you would ask that, so I wanted us all to hear it.”
Doors to the right opened up and two Enforcers, faces hard, dragged in a blond man, blood caked into the golden strands of his hair and down the side of his face, into the room. He was shirtless, and his pants were barely hanging on. His flesh was a tapestry of cuts and bruises. Not that Romano gave a shit at all. That fucking pride had targeted his mate, and he wanted to know why.
“This is Bastion, the Leo of Viscount Pride’s brother,” Arturo explained.
Romano whistled. Arturo was never kind when he wanted information. Snatching Orion’s brother sent a message Kalinda was not to be touched.
“What did your brother get from selling out to the Council?”
Bastion spat on the ground. “Didn’t one of yours join Benedict? Who’s the sellout?”
One of the Enforcers raised a meaty fist and all of Bastion’s bravado leaked out of him in one sharp whimper.
“I won’t ask again,” Dominic warned.
“Mating rights and your land.”
Dominic stood, pulling his gun from his side. Bastion’s eyes widened until the whites were prominent, and he tried to put his hands in front of his face. The Enforcer’s hold on him prevented him from completing the action.
“Please,” he begged.
Just a mere step away, Dominic stopped and let his gun rest at his side. “My lands? If you joined the Council, they promised you mating rights to whom?”
Bastion swallowed. “We’d claim the mage, Kalinda, and the earth witch, Zoey.”
Romano was on his feet the instant Kalinda’s name was mentioned. Too fast for the eye to follow, Dominic lifted his gun and fired, blasting a hole in Bastion’s leg. Bastion jerked in shock and let out a scream of pain.
“Shift,” Dominic ordered, using his Alpha power. The air crackled, but Romano was so furious he barely felt the sharp little sparks. Bastion wailed but turned instantly, his lion springing free, snarling and sharp, black claws exposed. He crouched, ready to leap, but Dominic stopped him.
“Shift.”
Bastion’s scream filled the room. Shifting from lion to human had healed most of his injuries and the bullet wound was closed, pink flesh puckering. A longer stay in his lion form would heal it entirely, but Dominic was hot with rage and it made him cruel. He’d forced the lion to shift fast enough to heal the wound but hadn’t given his body a chance to push out the bullet. The residual pain from a forced shifting would be killer too.
Romano didn’t care about that either. Before he even thought about it, he pulled his gun and shot Bastion in the other leg. Dominic never missed a beat, forcing Bastion to shift from man to lion and back again.
“Those women are mated,” Arturo added, his voice deceptively lazy. “And one of them carries the heir of both the Moretti and Lombardi Packs.”
Bastion stuttered for a moment. “We weren’t told that. Only that doing this would elevate our place with the Council, and we’d be given high-level mages to give extra power to our bloodline.”
“Which one?” Romano wasn’t sure why he wanted to know, but he did. “Which one had you and your brother chosen?”
Bastion refused to answer, so Romano lifted his gun again. Bastion’s answer came out in a rush. “I was going to get the earth witch and my brother the other.”
Arturo shifted in his seat. “So the Council put you on Kalinda’s trail to capture her?”
“The one with the shop? Yes. We were to monitor her. My brother once passed by her shop while she and the other woman were in there. Her wards on the shop reacted to a vampire, but her scent still came through. We’d been told to smell for old magic. Once we did, it was reported to the Council and plans were made to take her.”
It didn’t make sense. Why would the Council go through all that trouble when they could have quietly taken her themselves? Benedict’s betrayal hadn’t become obvious by then, so how would they have even known in the first place? There were always more fucking questions than answers.
“What tipped the Council’s hand about her?”
“They didn’t tell us. We just had a job to do and take the girl so the Council would give us what we wanted. The wolves have ruled long enough. It’s our turn.”
“You say it in present tense like it’s going to happen,” Romano forced out through gritted teeth.
Bastion’s eyes glowed with anger. “My brother will never stop,” he sneered, still arrogant and clueless.
“Well, let’s send him a message to encourage him to make better choices, shall we?” Arturo’s words rolled out on a slow, deadly growl.
