Page 54 of Married into the Mob
“I’m not falling for it.” Stefan sneered at Odell.
“I’m cold.” He wrapped his arms around his huge jacket, and he reminded me of a cartoon character. “You pair don’t feel thecold, but thanks to Hunter knocking down the damned door, it’s freezing in here.”
One second. Stefan’s concentration was diverted for maybe less than that. Not enough time for a human to overpower a man with shifter abilities. But my mate fumbled in his pocket, his hands shaking, and dear gods, the gun fired, leaving a ragged hole in his jacket.
I was distracted but my trigger finger was not, and I shot at the same time. My mate’s bullet hit Stefan in the knee, mine in the shoulder.
He screamed, his gun firing into the wall beside Odell, and he collapsed. Blood gushed from both wounds as my mate flung himself into my arms, tears flooding my shirt. I whispered how brave he was, how he’d saved my life and that the danger, all of it, was over.
That was a white lie or a big fat fib, because how did Draven fit into this and were those Stefan’s men in the alley? There were so many questions and few answers.
I couldn’t take a chance that Stefan’s shifter healing abilities—assuming he had any—extended to severe injuries.
Stefan was writhing on the floor, and I kicked his weapon out of his reach. After sitting Odell down, I yanked a curtain off the rail and tied Stefan to a chair. I added an electric cable and wrapped it around him. That would do until I found rope, maybe in the basement, but he was doubled up in agony, and I doubted he’d have the strength to break free.
My mate clamped his hands over his ears and asked if we could give Stefan something for the pain. But unless the guy had a pharmacy in his bathroom, there was nothing I could do.
I could put him out of his pain permanently, but I needed answers. The family, the pack, the shifter council, we needed the story so we could weed out anyone who had betrayed us and our community. My wolf was peeved he didn’t get to rip Stefan toshreds, but the family and the pack’s needs to know came before the ultimate punishment.
I staunched the blood from Stefan’s wounds and bandaged them which was more than he deserved.
Now that we’d captured him, I called Flint, and in a few sentences brought him up to speed. He and Ranger and some of our men were already in the cars before I finished talking.
Both my wolf and I were filled with gratitude for what Odell had done, and I wanted to get him out of this house and back to my place or anywhere he wanted to go. The other side of the world if that was what he requested.
Ranger arrived with Flint and three of our men. Uncle Arnie also accompanied them. He was such a dear and perhaps him being here was more for my mate. He’d been the one to bridge the shifter and human world with both my brothers-in-law.
“You thought he was human but had been around shifters,” my uncle mused. “None of us recognized him as a latent shifter. Maybe we need to go to college and take Shifter Traits 101.”
That’s not a thing,I explained to my beast before he could butt in and ask me.
“He fooled all of us.”
“Can someone explain what’s going on?” Odell wanted to be filled in, and we shifters were talking in code.
“Stefan was born into a wolf shifter family, but he is latent. He doesn’t have a beast inside him, or if he does, they can’t communicate or shift,” Ranger explained. “But he has some shifter abilities.”
“But where’s Draven? This isn’t over until we find him.“ He said we, not you.
“From what we’d always understood, Draven’s omega dad left after the Silverbacks were quashed and took his son with him. How he and his uncle came up with this scenario is still a mystery,” Ranger explained.
“This was revenge that had been festering inside Stefan forever,” Flint said over his shoulder as he went into the other room.
“But how did none of you know Stefan before?” Odell asked.
Hunter shrugged. “His omega father was the Alpha’s first mate, and because of his latency, he didn’t live with the pack.”
There was a huge unanswered question that couldn’t be avoided. “The seer. Who is the seer?” I wanted to meet the person who’d sussed out that Odell was my fated mate. He’d worked for Stefan. I refused to believe it was Draven.
“We’ll get it out of Stefan,” Ranger assured me.
Flint said he’d wake every member of the shifter council up and give them an abbreviated version of what had happened so they’d reverse the banishment. “The details can come later.”
Odell swayed, and I caught him before he fell. “Time for us to go.”
My mate leaned into me, not pulling away. “But what will happen to him?”
“Take Stefan to a safe house, we’ll question him,” Ranger told our men.
