Page 48 of To Hunt A Wolf
“What the hell’d you just say?” he demands warily.
“You’ll find out in six months,” I say sweetly.
He pulls his hand back like he’s going to hit me. Before he can, someone else reaches over and presses tape across my mouth.
Assholes,I scream with my eyes.
“That’s better,” the guy with the tape grunts, eyes narrowed as he backs away.
When they’re done, they secure me to a metal rack mounted to the van’s interior. Then they slam the door shut.
Outside, I can still hear their muffled voices.
“What is the damned point of all this?” one of the men asks. “If she’s this big of a threat, we shouldn’t bring her back.”
“She’s a liability if left alone,” Levi says.
“Then fucking kill her, and be done with it.” Pretty sure that’s the guy with the busted nose. Asshole.
Rather than answering him with words, there’s a grunt and then a thud.
Everyone else goes silent for a long moment.
“Get him up and in the other van,” Levi says. “Burnett, you take him and your team. Gregario, you’re with me. You have your orders. Follow them. And don’t question me again.”
There’s a chorus of “yes, sirs” and then boots on gravel as everyone moves away. Up front, the van doors open, and Levi and another masked asshole get in. The masked asshole drives. Levi doesn’t bother to look back at me as we pull onto the road and head for wherever the fuck they’re taking me.
I don’t know what Levi’s up to, but it’s clear he isn’t who I thought he was.
Not even close.
Levi’s the monster here. And I’m officially the thing I’ve spent my entire life trying to avoid: I’m the damsel in distress.
ChapterEleven
Iwake up tied to a chair in a dark room that smells like Levi, and I decide right away that, no matter how much they torture me, the scent will be the worst part of this entire experience.
Pine and spice fill my nostrils, stronger with every inhale.
It’s Levi—and he’s everywhere.
For a wild moment, I let myself wonder if they aren’t piping it in through a vent somewhere as part of some psychological torture method.
The air is damp, and beneath the scent of my scorned mate is the unmistakable musk of raw earth. I’m underground. Or close to it.
No windows.
And the zip ties around my wrists and ankles have been refastened even tighter than before.
At least, they removed the duct tape.
The fact that I slept through it being ripped off worries me more than anything else. Drugs. Somewhere along the way, I’ve obviously been dosed. The last thing I remember is being tossed into the back of a van and then—nothing. I search within and am relieved to find my wolf still here. They haven’t muted her, which gives me a shred of hope.
A hope that dulls with every new thought.
My mother has gone to kill Thiago. If she succeeds, Kari might die too. And I’m stuck in this underground room, forgotten, while the world burns down around me.
No one knows where I am. Not my mother. Not Tripp. And the list of people who might care, much less rescue me, starts and ends with those two people.
