Page 41 of The Enemy to the Living
“We will scout out the twins’ location later tonight,” Vlad says. “The Huntsman has warned us not to face them again until we have adequate backup. Jeremiah and Paxton should arrive in a few days, so—”
His phone rings. The sound is shrill, and it makes Grant jump. I plate up my food as he answers and dig in as quickly as I can. I have a bad feeling about it.
The bad feeling gets worse when Vlad’s expression darkens. “No, I—Maurice? What are you saying?”
I look at Grant, who shrugs. Vlad growls and puts his phone on speaker, then places it on the counter between the three of us.
“You need to get over to the pack house, is what I’m saying,” Maurice barks down the line. It sounds as though he’s hurrying about, and I hear the distant rumble of Njáll’s voice in the background. “It’s a fucking shitshow.”
“What happened?” I ask. Grant grimaces, and I shrug. Yeah, my mouth might be full of food, but I haven’t eaten in a full day.
“Someone dumped a man outside Deacon’s pack house,” Maurice says. “We need to meet there.”
I meet Vlad’s confused frown with one of my own. “What does this have to do with the Hunt?” Vlad asks.
“Because,” Maurice says, carefully enunciating each syllable, “someone took this man’s wolf.”
Chapter Fourteen
Quinn
WhenIgettoMischief & Mayhem, no one is there. It startles me so much that when I step through the shadows and into the pub, I almost stumble at the lack of noise. The lights are up, the place looking surprisingly not dingy now that I can see all the corners.
No bartender either, so I stand in the middle of the room for a second, not really sure what to do.
I’m supposed to be fighting, aren’t I? That’s what the text from Celyn said. It’s the same as all the other texts he’s sent me before.
I wander through into the side room, the one where we fight, only that’s empty too. With the lights on, I can see the twins’ booth is lined with dark green vinyl, but I still don’t look over there for too long. Habit by now.
The fighters’ room is empty, too. It smells clean in a way it never does when we’re all in and out getting ready; there’s no sweat or pent-up aggression or blood.
When I walk back out into the main bar, one of the twins’ bodyguards is waiting for me. One of the two trolls, and I don’t know either of their names.
He looks me up and down and clearly isn’t impressed by what he sees. My stomach churns. What’s going on?
“C’mon,” he says gruffly. “Bosses want to see you in the office.”
No point in running. Running means sacrificing my wolf. And I’m not about to break the deal I made with them just because this is all… weird. So I follow him without complaint, eyes widening at the hidden door he pushes open and then the narrow corridor we walk down. His shoulders brush either side of it.
There’s another door at the end, and the troll opens it without hesitation. Faint music drifts out first, and when I breathe in, I pick up the scents of Celyn and Sorrel and…
Bryn?
The troll walks inside—he has to, no way I can squeeze past—and I stumble, tripping over my own feet at the sight before me.
Some office. It’s all dark wood panelling and green velvet, and a fire flickers away merrily just behind where Sorrel is sitting. Celyn stands next to the other armchair, and Bryn kneels between them, shirtless, arms bound behind his back.
I inhale the sharp, coppery scent of his blood.
“Glad you could join us so punctually,” Celyn says. “This meeting has proven to be quite urgent.”
Bryn cranes his neck to look at me. His expression crumbles and he shakes his head. “No,” he murmurs. “No, no…”
“I don’t understand,” I say, but my blood feels like ice in my veins. Obviously, something is horribly wrong, and I don’t know how to fix it.
“Seems you didn’t heed our warning, little wolf,” Sorrel says. He’s holding a glass of something—smells like brandy—and when he leans forward in his seat, his dark eyes glitter. “You’ve been dealing with the Hunt.”
“I haven’t—I haven’t told them—”
