Her gun was in the chair near the door. She’d put it there after she followed Aidan inside. She’d foolishly thought she wouldn’t need a weapon in his bedroom. Now the gun was too far out of her reach.
Aidan’s fingers slid over her cheek once more. “There’s poison in that wine glass.”
What? What?
“I’ll come back, and you won’t drink it.”
“Hell, no, I’m not drinking poison!” She grabbed his shirt with her right hand. “And if you think you’re leaving me like this—”
He already had. Before she could even blink, he was at the door and Jane was holding nothing. “Aidan!”
“Trust,” he said. “Give it to me this one time.” He looked…sad.
He should be sad. She’d give him plenty to be sad about. “This isn’t how partnerships work,” Jane yelled at him.
He turned away.
“This isn’t how relationships work!”
He hesitated.
“I did trust you!” Jane shouted. “Then you cuffed me! You brought me poison! What in the hell is going on?”
Aidan looked back at her. “I will do everything to keep you safe.”
Holding her prisoner wasn’t some kind of safety thing.
“I…need you,” Aidan confessed. “More than I realized. More than—” He broke off. “I will be back, I swear it. I’ll always come back for you.”
Then he shut the door. Locked it. She saw the lock turn. “No!” Jane yanked on the cuff, frantic. “No, Aidan, get your furry ass back in here! You can’t do this to me! No!” With every yell, she pulled harder and harder on that cuff. But it didn’t break. It didn’t give.
And Aidan didn’t come back.
Always come back my ass.
***
“No, Aidan, get your furry ass back in here! You can’t do this to me! No!”
Aidan froze just outside of his bedroom, Jane’s yells seeming to echo around him. Paris strode down the hallway toward him, his movements a bit slower than normal because he was still healing.
Silver could be such a bitch.
“So that’s her?” Paris asked as he drew closer. “I must say, she’s got a rather healthy set of lungs on her.”
“Aidan!” Jane bellowed.
Paris inhaled. “You’re wearing her scent like armor.”
“I want everyone to know where I stand.” There could be no doubt.
Paris nodded. “And I stand with you. You know that.”
He did.
Garrison strode back toward them. The guy was sweating. “They—they’re all outside.”
Because it was midnight. A wolf’s time. Aidan tossed the handcuff keys to Garrison. “You watch from up here. When it’s decided…”
Garrison gave a grim nod. “I will remember my vow.”
To protect her.
Then it was done.
Aidan strode away even as Jane called for him. His insides felt as if they were fucking shredding with every single step that he took, but Aidan kept going. An alpha never hesitated.
Never ran from any battle that waited.
Soon he was outside. The clouds had passed away, and the sky was filled with a million stars. This far from the city, the stars always shined their brightest.
Other wolves waited outside. Fifty. Sixty. They’d come from far and wide for this night.
Vivian watched from the left. She’d been correct when she told him that word had spread. Someone had made sure the wolves were riled up.
They’d formed a circle. Aidan went to the middle of the circle. He braced his feet apart, kept his arms at his sides. And he waited.
They would all detect her scent. He’d made love to her because he needed her. But also so that these wolves would know exactly where he stood.
With her.
“She has to be stopped!” Someone yelled out.
Some dumb fool.
“She’ll turn! She’ll attack us—we know what happened before!”
There were murmurs from the crowd. Agreements. Nods.
They were working themselves up to a fury. But who had started this fury? Who had begun to stir the beasts?
“She is the enemy!” Another werewolf yelled.
The circle was closing in on him.
Aidan smiled and he let his claws come out. “Which asshole is gonna be first?”
***
She could hear howls. Screams. Terrible roars.
Jane stopped yanking on her handcuffs and her gaze flew to the window. What in the hell was going on out there?
A blood-chilling scream split the air.
Oh, hell, that was not good. She yanked harder on the cuffs. Dammit! Dam—
The bookshelf to her right swung inward. It moved so suddenly that Jane let out a shocked cry. The thing had seriously just swung out like some old school secret passage, all Scooby-Doo style. Now that it was open, Jane could see inside to a narrow corridor. And—Annette was there. Rushing out toward Jane.
“Am I in the Twilight Zone?” Jane demanded. It sure felt that way.
Annette reached her. “You’re about to be in the dead zone.” She pointed to the liquid that looked way too much like wine. “You can’t drink that. It’s a Sleeper’s Spell.”
Aidan had told her it was poison.
“You get more than two sips down you, and you will never wake up.” Annette frowned down at the cuffs. “That’s how they’re going to end you. Not a violent death. You just go to sleep, all nice and easy, and suddenly, you aren’t a problem for the werewolves any longer.”
But Aidan had told her not to drink it. If he wanted her to slip into some easy death, then why tell her to stay away from the poison?
“Where are the keys?” Annette cried out as she glanced around frantically.
“If I had them,” Jane retorted, “don’t you think I would have used them by now?” Her wrist was bleeding because she’d been yanking so hard on the cuffs. “Do some of your magic mumbo jumbo and make them break!”
“It doesn’t work like that,” Annette fired back at her. But her voice was a whisper—and Jane’s had been, too.
Jane cast a desperate glance toward the door. Was anyone out there? “Look for something I can use to pick the lock. Like…a writing pen, a nail file, a hair bobby pin—”
Annette handed her a bobby pin.
Relief nearly made Jane dizzy. “That will totally be our magic trick.” Because she’d seen a fellow officer accidentally get locked in cuffs before—a really bad Christmas party one year—and the guy had popped out of them with his wife’s bobby pin. Jane had watched his movements closely, and she’d even got him to show her later how he’d done the escape routine.
So she maybe had an escape artist issue. Houdini had always been her favorite magician.
A few twists of her fingers, a desperate push to reach just the right spot, and that cuff sprang open. “Voila,” she muttered.
Annette grabbed her wrist. “Come on, we need to get the hell out of here.” She tugged Jane toward the bookshelf.
But Jane stopped.
Annette spun around and stared at her as if she were crazy. “They are going to kill you! I saw it in my mirror. You’re going to die, so I have to get you out of here, now!”
The howls and screams were still coming from below. She had to go and look…
Jane hurried toward the window. Her hip bumped into the table there, sending the wine glass bobbing a bit. She stared through the glass and saw a giant circle of men and women down below. That circle was tight and…
Were there bodies on the ground?
“Werewolves get freaking crazy!” Annette told her as she pulled on Jane’s hand again. “When the beasts take over, you can’t stop them. Hurry. They had me locked up, too, but the fools got distracted by the fight. I got loose and found my way to you.”
She’d just found that secret passage? By chance? Like Jane believed that bull.
“I had a vision of this place,” Annette told her, her voice w
as still hushed. “A vision of you. I knew I had to save you! You can change things. Nothing has to end the way they plan!”
The circle of bodies parted just a bit and Jane saw—
Aidan.
He was right in the middle of that throng. Bloody and fighting, slashing out with his claws as if his very life depended on the battle.
Maybe it does.
Jane inched ever closer to the window. The wine glass bobbed again. Bobbed and fell over, shattering. Wine soaked the floor.
So much for being quiet.
The door flew open. Garrison was there, staring in shock at her and Annette. “What—how did she get in here?”
Annette turned and ran for the open bookshelf/passage.
Jane ran, too—right toward Garrison. She grabbed his shirt. “What is happening down there?”
He clamped his lips together.
“Why are they fighting? Why are they all attacking Aidan?”
His Adam’s apple bobbed. “Not…all.”
It had certainly looked as if they were all attacking to her.
“It’s…It’s a Blood Battle. Any who want to challenge the alpha can have a turn…he has to face them all, until none are standing.”
That circle had been huge. “Why do they all want to challenge him?”
Once more, his lips clamped together.
She shook him. “Why?”
“You!”
It had been the answer she feared.
“Word has spread about you! They want you dead. Only, in an, um, preferably non-violent way.”
The poisoned wine. Aidan’s orders not to drink.
“If he dies, then…so do you. Pack law.” He exhaled again. “He marked you, claimed you. And he went to the Blood Battle with your scent on him. If he wins, then you will always be protected from the werewolves. If he loses…”
She could figure this out for herself. With a sinking heart, Jane said, “He dies.”
“You both die.” But Garrison shook his head. “Only I’m not supposed to let that happen. Graham and I were going to take you out the secret exit. I don’t know how that Voodoo Queen found out about it…”
Jane let him go and grabbed her gun. She checked it real quick. Yep, the silver bullets were ready to go.
Then she tried to push past Garrison. The guy proved stronger than she’d anticipated, though, as he jumped in the doorway, blocking her. “You can’t go down there!”
“Watch me.”
“He can’t protect you and fight them all! Why the hell do you think he locked you up? To keep you safe!”
She shook her head. “I’m not the kind of girl who lets someone else fight her battles.” Jane stared into his eyes. “Since I saved you, I figure you owe me. So how about moving that werewolf ass.”
“Shit.” He moved.
She brushed past him and then—
He was following her.
Jane looked back, frowning.
“I’ve got your back, detective,” he muttered, looking all determined. “The way I figure it, you and I both have the same enemy.”
Thane.
“He took what we love, and one day, we will make him pay.”
They came to the top of the spiral staircase.
“And I will do my absolute best to keep you safe out there,” he said as they ran down the steps. “But just be warned, werewolves fight dirty.”
The howls and screams were louder.
“So do I,” Jane told him grimly. They burst outside.
At first, the werewolves kept fighting. Jane saw Captain Vivian Harris. The woman started running toward her.
A few of the others glanced Jane’s way, frowning.
But the main focus stayed on Aidan. Aidan—who was kicking ass and not bothering with names as he took down werewolf after werewolf. He was bleeding and bruised but positively lethal as he battled.
A battle for her.
That was oddly sexy. Way fierce, too. But entirely too dangerous. The last thing she wanted was her werewolf dying for her.
“Stop!” Jane yelled.
The wolves didn’t stop.
So she lifted her gun and fired.
Chapter Seventeen
The roar of that bullet echoed around Aidan. His beast was ready to full-on shift. Ready to go for every throat he saw. Ready to have a fucking river of blood around him because these fools would not hurt what was his.
They would never touch Jane.
Jane.
“I said…” Jane’s voice rang out. “Stop!”
The attack had stopped, for a stunned moment. The werewolves—those who’d been attacking still had their claws out—turned toward her in surprise. And Jane just walked right through the center of the pack.
His muscles strained, jerked. His scent was on her, so no one would be foolish enough to touch her. They’d better not be. I will rip them apart.
“I figure none of you jerks can kill me right now,” Jane suddenly said as she placed her body right in front of Aidan’s. “Because if you did, then I’d die all violent-like, and that’s what you want to prevent, right? That’s why you’re having this blood fest? ‘Cause you want me to be put down? Poisoned? A death that’s all nice and easy?”
No, it won’t happen.
“You can’t attack me right now because then I might turn into some kind of super monster. So you’re stuck.” She laughed at them. “But guess what? I can attack. I’ve got silver bullets in this gun just waiting to find their way into some unlucky werewolf hearts. Anyone who makes a move at Aidan again is going to get one of those bullets. Because you don’t hurt him, got it?”
She was protecting him? Him?
That was…
Jane.
“I might be pissed as hell at this wolf but—” She looked back at him, seemed confused and muttered, “But he’s mine.”
Always. Did she have any clue what she was doing? Probably not. A human wouldn’t understand a werewolf bond. Wouldn’t know that she’d just made a public declaration linking them.
He knew.
So did a few of the others who suddenly backed away.
He felt Paris at his back. His friend had been there the entire time. Fighting off any attackers who’d tried to jump Aidan from behind. A Blood Battle was supposed to be fair. Come at your attacker from the front, but not everyone wanted to play by those rules.
So Paris had been making sure those assholes were taken down.
“Told you she wouldn’t be captive for long,” Paris murmured.
“Who the hell is he?” Jane said and she lifted her weapon toward Paris.
“My best friend.” Aidan made sure he stood between Paris and Jane’s gun. “Paris. And, like me, he’d protect you until death.”
“Can we all stop talking about death?” Jane’s voice was nearly a shout.
No, they probably couldn’t.
“Pleasure,” Paris said. “Though I wish we’d met at a different time.”
A time when he wasn’t fighting his own pack.
Vivian walked among the wounded. So far, none were dead. He hadn’t been trying to kill them, just incapacitate them.
Garrison stumbled to Jane’s side, and he turned, glaring at the crowd. “Everybody, stay back!”
There were snarls. Glares. But no one else attacked, not yet.
“I get that you all think I’m some kind of threat,” Jane said, her words carrying easily. “Trust me, I get it. But I am not your enemy. And Aidan—he’s definitely not. He’s your alpha. He protects the pack. Why would any of you even think that he’d ever do anything to hurt you all?”
Because someone had been planting the seeds of doubt in their minds. Someone had been working to make them believe that Aidan shouldn’t be in charge.
But it wasn’t the wolves he’d faced that night. They were weak. They had their fucking emotions on their sleeves. No, it was someone else…
Before Aidan could say another word, a new scent reached him. The scent of blood and death
. The scent of…vampires.
Not just one. It seemed as if a virtual army of vamps were coming their way.
And the other werewolves had scented them now, too. There were sharp cries of distress. The flash of more claws and then those werewolves surged past Jane and Aidan. As one, they turned to face the paved road that led to the werewolf mansion, and those wolves—the same wolves who’d been lining up to attack Aidan before—now formed a solid wall blocking him and Jane off from the vampires who were coming their way.
“Um, what just happened?” Jane asked, confusion rich in her voice.
“A new threat,” he told her. “One that their beasts can’t ignore.” One that his couldn’t ignore. When a vamp gets close, the primal instinct kicks in. Kill. He wrapped his hand around the nape of her neck and brought her in close, then he kissed her. Hard and deep. My Mary Jane. “Vamps are coming this way.”
“Vamps?”
“Coming in fast and coming in hard.” He would shift fully for this battle. He’d held back with his pack. He would show no mercy to the vampires. His beast wouldn’t let him. “You have one job to do—”
“Actually, if vamps are attacking, I think I have several.”
“They’re coming for you. Stay the fuck alive, got it? That’s your job. Do it, for me.” He kissed her again, because he had to do it. “I won’t lose you. I can’t.”
Her left hand locked around his neck before he could pull away from her. “Careful, wolf,” Jane murmured. “Talk like that will make me think that you’re starting to care.”
“I do care.” No starting about it. She’d gotten to him, and, soon enough, they’d both have to deal with the consequences of that shit. But for now… “Get back in the mansion.”
“Uh, how about I watch your ass? And your pack’s back?”
The vamps were already there. He whirled around and saw the vampires collide with the line of werewolves. Blood and claws, teeth and battle. Death.
What had Annette told him?
Betrayal. Blood. Death. Yeah, he had it all that night.
His beast took over. Aidan lunged forward. His hands flew out, and when they hit down, they were powerful paws. The change burned through him, ripping away his humanity and leaving only his beast. He could attack better in this form. Could hunt, could kill, so easily.