“I can hear you,” Caleb said. “Superhearing, remember?”
“Sorry, Father.” Jude lowered his head and stepped aside as Caleb approached.
The welt across Caleb’s cheekbone had lessened some, but it was still a bright pink. He sneered in my direction, but then walked past me to Gabriel, who was held by only one guard now.
“I’m impressed,” Caleb said. “I set a trap for one nuisance and ended up with two. It’s fitting that you’ll see what I’m going to do here. Since ultimately, this all comes down to you and your pack.”
“What do you mean?” Gabriel asked.
Caleb’s crooked smile danced on his lips. “We both know Sirhan is dying. And when he does, I’ll be there for the challenging ceremony.”
“You’re not wolf enough to show up there alone,” Gabriel said. I could practically hear the bluff in his voice. “You weren’t even wolf enough to try to kill Sirhan yourself. You made your little friends do it, and they ended up killing Rachel in the process. The pack doesn’t forgive easily.”
“I’m more wolf than you,” Caleb said. “You sit up on your mountain, teaching werewolves to go against their nature, to be peaceful. Thanks to you, they won’t be ready for the fight I’m bringing their way. As you’ve seen, I’ve been recruiting my own pack. And my boys and me, we’re coming to that challenging ceremony, and we’re taking over. We’ve collected enough money to buy off the other challengers, and we’re strong enough to fight anyone else. I’ll spit on Sirhan’s corpse before they lower it into the ground. I’ll have everything that should have been mine years ago. And the best part is that you’ll just stand by and watch it all happen, won’t you?”
Gabriel didn’t answer. He just stared at Caleb, as if unmoved by his admission.
So my fear had been right? Caleb wanted to take over Sirhan’s pack, and Gabriel was going to do nothing to stop him? If Caleb was capable of practically overrunning the city with fear as the leader of the Shadow Kings, what would happen if he became the alpha of the strongest pack in the country?
It would be Gevaudon all over again.
Caleb’s eyes seemed to flash with satisfaction at Gabriel’s blank response. “Coward,” he said, and cuffed Gabriel across the forehead with his fist.
Gabriel grunted. His eyes rolled back in his head, and he went limp. His captor let go of him, and he crumpled to the ground. The Shadow Kings were apparently good at knocking people out with a single blow. I wondered if that was how they had pulled off so many crimes without eyewitnesses.
“Now, I just have one last thing to take care of.” Caleb turned around, smiling like a jackal, and approached Daniel. “I thought you were gone for good until Jude told me where to find you,” Caleb said to Daniel. “I was surprised you’d come back. Last I’d heard, you’d split town when I left with your mother. And then you just dropped off the map. I was hoping you were dead. I told your mother you were.”
Daniel almost flinched at the mention of his mother. It had been almost four years since she chose Caleb over him. “And where is she? I’m sure you have her on a leash around here somewhere.”
“I killed her.” Caleb pulled a short knife from a sheath on his belt. “With this.”
“What?” Daniel struggled to break free. He always said he didn’t have a real mother, but I knew he still cared about her.
“She kept bitching about wanting to come back for you. So I told her you were dead. But that only made her angrier. She wouldn’t shut up, so I stabbed her. I guess you can say it’s your fault she died.”
Daniel’s nostrils flared. “So if you didn’t want to find me then, why do you want me now? I assume this trap was set for me?”
“Quite right,” Caleb said. “I’m glad your friend told us where to find you. Saved me the trouble of doing it myself before the challenging ceremony. Thing is, I thought Jude looked familiar when Talbot brought him home to us. He’d been living on the streets like a stray. Most of my boys were. That’s the nice thing about desperate teenagers—they’re easy to dominate. You tell them they belong, and they’ll do pretty much anything you ask. But I didn’t realize who Jude was until one night he decided to entertain us with the story of how he became a werewolf. Seems his sister Grace and her boyfriend, Daniel, had something to do with it. You can imagine how much I enjoyed listening to his story from the balcony, and how badly I wanted to know more.
“He tried to run when he realized who I was and what I wanted. But then I helped him see we had something in common. We’d both been betrayed by our families. Sirhan would rather leave his pack in the hands of a coward like Gabriel than let me lead it the way it should be led. And Jude’s family chose the mutt next door over their own son. Once we saw eye to eye, it was only a matter of time before we set our trap.”
Caleb’s explanation still didn’t make sense. Why would he set such an elaborate trap just to see Daniel again? Why did he even care? He’d already replaced Daniel twenty times over with the boys in his pack. Why would he send Talbot to become friends with me, only to kidnap me later and leave a trail for Daniel? I didn’t know if these were the workings of a madman, or some genius plot I couldn’t comprehend.
“The thing about your friend’s story that baffled me,” Caleb said, standing right in front of Daniel, “is that he claims you’ve been cured. I didn’t think that was possible. I still don’t.”
In a lighting-quick movement, Caleb thrust the knife at Daniel. I screamed. The knife plunged into Daniel’s upper arm. Caleb pulled it out, and blood spurted from the wound. It slithered down Daniel’s arm.
Caleb dabbed at the cut with his fingers. Daniel winced. Caleb brought his bloodstained fingers to his nose and sniffed. I assumed he was testing it to see if it smelled like wolf’s blood or like a human’s—like Daniel had tested Jude’s blood when he found it on our porch, and that was how he knew Jude had been infected. Caleb’s eyes squinted with confusion. He tasted the blood with the tip of his tongue. I tried not to gag. His forehead creased, and he seemed even more confused. Then he beckoned Talbot to his side.
Talbot smelled the blood and shook his head. “I don’t understand, Father. I can’t tell what it smells like. What do you think this means?”
Caleb wiped the blood on Talbot’s flannel shirt. “It doesn’t matter,” he said. His voice sounded like he was trying to cover up his confusion. “Daniel was always going to die, either way. He won’t be around to mess up the ceremony. The girl will make the perfect weapon, if she’s as strong as you claim.”
Talbot’s eyes flicked in my direction. But then he nodded and stepped back to where he’d stood before.
Caleb came back over to me. He wrapped a hand around one of my wrists. Every instinct told me to hit him and run, but I was still held by two guys.
“The only problem with killing one’s wife is that it gets lonely without a mate,” Caleb said. “I think you’ll do nicely once we’ve turned you into a werewolf.”
“Don’t you touch her!” Daniel shouted. “I’m the one you hate. Kill me and let her go!”
“Oh, I’ll let her go all right. Once she turns into a wolf, she won’t be able to control herself. Then I’ll let her go in a room with you. And then when she’s done tearing you apart, I’ll let her go back home. Send a message to her precious pastor father for me.”
My heart slammed against my chest. That was Caleb’s plan? Turn me into a wolf and then get me to kill everyone I loved?
“What?” Jude suddenly stepped forward from beside the bedpost. “Father, you said Grace was just bait. You said—”
“And what do you think happens to bait, boy?” Caleb snarled. “It gets swallowed. And in this case, your sister is going to get swallowed by the wolf. And then she’ll be one of us.”
Jude looked at me and then at Caleb. I couldn’t read the expression on his face.
“Do you have a problem with that?” Caleb asked. “I can always let her at you along with Daniel.”
“No. Your plan is perfe
ct.” Jude ducked away like a dog anticipating being struck by his master.
I turned my gaze away from Jude. Just when I thought he was still my brother, he proved to be Caleb’s lapdog.
“I will never turn,” I said. My voice shook too much for it to be convincing, but I tried to hold my head high.
Yes, you will, the wolf whispered inside my head. There’s no escape from me.
“You will see in the morning, Grace Divine. My methods are quite persuasive. How do you think I came by so many of my boys? Jude and Talbot were rare finds: werewolves already.”
My heart suddenly sank for the boys in this warehouse. In this family. Some of them were obviously Gelals and Akhs, but most of them had probably been hapless teens, down on their luck—until Talbot and Caleb got their hands … or teeth … on them.
But my heart also sank for myself, and for Daniel, and for all of my family back home. If so many people had fallen to Caleb’s methods, how did I stand a chance?
Caleb made a gesture, and two of his boys picked up Gabriel’s limp body and headed for the door. Then Daniel and I were led toward the exit by our captors.
“Why don’t you just do it now?” Daniel asked.
“Because anticipation is the best part of the game. Feels just like Christmas Eve, don’t you think?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Abide with Me
DOWNSTAIRS
I couldn’t even bring myself to struggle as we were hauled off to a new prison. It seemed completely pointless, and listening to Daniel holler and curse as he tried to break free only made every ounce of hope inside of me vanish. Daniel might be slowly getting his powers back, but superhuman strength wasn’t fully developed yet.
They brought us to a dank, cold, windowless room. A storage room of some sort on the lower level of the warehouse. A single, dim fluorescent light buzzed and flickered above us. Caleb, or probably one of his boys, had made a couple of slight adjustments to the room—shackles attached to the walls by long, thick steel chains and heavy metal bolts in the concrete, and a security camera in the corner. The boys carrying Gabriel dumped his unconscious body at the far end of the room. They bound his legs and feet with the same kind of cording they’d used before on me. The shackles were apparently designed for Daniel and me, seeing as how our captors chained us by our wrists and ankles on opposite sides of the room.
“I’ll take the first watch outside the door,” Talbot said as he leaned through the doorway.
“I’ll stay with you,” one of the boys said, sounding eager to impress Talbot.
“Very well.”
Talbot gestured the boys out of the room. I looked up at him, but he closed the thick metal door behind them without even glancing at me. I’d noticed a keypad outside the door like the one at The Depot, and now I heard three distinct thumping noises as three heavy bolts locked into place. There was no doorknob. This door had been specifically designed to be impossible to break through.
I sank to the ground, shuddered, and let out a sob. My wrists felt almost too heavy to lift as I brought my shackled hands up to cover my face.
“Don’t.” Daniel tried to rush over to me, but the lead on his chains wasn’t long enough. He could make it only halfway across the room. He leaned forward as far as he could. “Don’t cry, Gracie. Don’t give up. We’ll find a way out of here. We’re going to escape. Even if we have to fight every last one of them.”
“But we’re nothing, Daniel. That’s like twenty against two. Gabriel won’t fight, and you’re just getting your powers back. We’re no match for them. They’ll turn me, and then I’ll kill you. And then if they send me home, what will stop me from destroying Baby James and everyone else?”
And the more selfish thought that I didn’t voice was that if everyone I loved was gone, there would be no one left to cure me—if the cure even existed. I’d be a monster for all eternity. A Death Dog at the beck and call of a madman.
“You just have to have faith, Grace. Believe in yourself. Don’t give up now.”
“But I have no more faith, Daniel. No more faith in myself. No more faith in God. He doesn’t care about me. He doesn’t care about us. It’s over. This is the end. Tomorrow I become a monster, and the rest of you die. And God doesn’t give a damn.”
“I don’t believe that. You think you’ve lost your faith, but I know you well enough to know that isn’t true. Deep down, you know you still believe. And I believe in you.”
“Then maybe you don’t know me as well as you think you do.”
“Yes, I do, Grace. And I know exactly what’s going on inside your head, because I’ve been there. That voice you hear—those terrible things that bombard you. Thoughts that make you think God doesn’t care about us. Those aren’t your thoughts. And they don’t come from God, either. They’re the wolf. The demon. The devil. It’s testing you. Tempting you. But if you can push those thoughts away, if you can reach beyond them, then you’ll find that there’s a true power deep inside of you, a power God has given you to fight the evil, that’s greater than anything you can even imagine. You found that power inside of you once.”
I shook my head. I didn’t know what power he was talking about. The speed, the strength, the agility, they all came from the wolf.
“The night you cured me,” Daniel said, “what were you feeling?”
Gabriel had asked me that same question before. I didn’t know why it mattered, but I did know the answer.
“Love,” I said. “I loved you enough to sacrifice everything for you. I wanted you to be cured no matter what it meant for me. I thought I’d lose my soul, but it was more important to me to save yours.”
“Then don’t tell me you aren’t strong enough, because that’s more strength than most people could ever dream of having. There is no greater gift, no greater power than that.”
“Than true love?”
“Yes. That’s the difference between them and us. We’re still capable of love. The wolf tries to destroy love, tries to push it out of your heart, tries to make you destroy everything that you care about. But if you can hold on to that love, and if you can hold on to your faith, then you are stronger than any monster out there. No outside power, no force, no evil can make you turn into the wolf as long as you hold on to that love.”
Daniel fell to his knees. His chains clanked against the floor. “I should have never stopped training you,” Daniel said. “I should have never stopped believing in your strength. I should have been there supporting you, teaching you the balance that you need. When my powers started to come back, it scared the hell out of me. I thought that meant the cure hadn’t worked—and I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want you to think you’d sacrificed everything for me and that it meant nothing.”
I moved toward Daniel, closing the distance between us. “But you could have told me. You can tell me anything. Just like I should have told you about Talbot.”
“I know, Grace. We were both being stupid. We should have trusted each other no matter what. But I was also scared that my powers coming back meant there’d be no cure for you, either. No safety net. That’s why I stopped training you when Gabriel told me to. And then I got so wrapped up in trying to find answers that I neglected you. I pulled away. But I shouldn’t have done that. I should have still taught you how to use your powers properly, so you wouldn’t have had to turn to someone like Talbot.” Daniel held up his shackled hands. “But I’m standing by you now. You and me. We’ll fight side by side, and no one will stop us. Nothing is going to tear us apart.”
I was kneeling in front of Daniel now, at the end of my own lead. I tried to cup his face with my hands, but I couldn’t reach him. There was no more give in the chains. Instead, I stared into his deep, dark eyes like I could get lost in them forever.
We weren’t going to walk out of here. There was no way the two of us could fight off these demons. No matter how much faith we had. But there was a way to keep the demon inside of me from winning.
I
’d been willing to trade my soul for Daniel once because it was the only way to save him. I’d been willing to become the monster for him. And I’d do it now if I thought it would save him again, but Caleb had other plans. He wanted me to turn into the monster so he could use me to destroy Daniel and my family—and I couldn’t allow that to happen. No, no matter what happened, I wasn’t going to turn. It’s better to die as Grace Divine than to live as a monster.
I leaned out as far as I could toward Daniel, and Daniel leaned out as far as he could toward me. Our lips could barely meet in the middle. I strained against my chains, feeling like my arms were about to dislocate from their sockets, but I gained another quarter of an inch. I pressed my lips against Daniel’s.
I didn’t care that Gabriel was unconscious at the end of the room, or that Talbot was outside the door. I didn’t care about the security camera in the corner. I kissed Daniel like it was the last time we’d ever kiss.
Because I knew it was.
In the morning, I would die to save the ones I loved.
LAST NIGHT
The next few hours stretched on into the longest night of my life—but it also felt like the shortest. It was the first time and last time Daniel and I would ever spend the night together, and we couldn’t even touch. The flickering fluorescent light burned out at some point, so Daniel and I just lay there side by side on the concrete in the dark, able to reach out to each other only with our voices. Sometimes we talked, and other times we fell completely silent, unsure if the other was sleeping until one of us asked a question.
We talked about everything. And nothing. From life’s burning questions to the most trivial sorts of things we could think of. At one point I asked Daniel about his portfolio for Trenton, which was due in only a couple of weeks. He described for me in detail how he’d sketched and mapped out a new design for headphones for one of his submissions.