Page 23 of The Goblin in the Sink Drain
“The pack has lost faith in their alpha. They no longer believe he has their best interests at heart. They already questioned his methods when he invested so many years rearing a child with no Sartori or wolf scent markers. His word made your relationship law, but enough of us knew the truth.” He growled as a familiar howl grew closer. “Now he’s turned an allied pride into pawns, sending them to abduct humans to force his daughter home. That show of weakness can’t be tolerated or accepted in an alpha.”
Laughter bubbled up in me, and the slip in my concentration gave him the advantage. He raked his claws across my nape, and blood poured warm down my spine. Had he been closer, I might have lost my head.
“This is a coup.” I should have seen it sooner. “You’ve waited a long time for this, haven’t you?”
Nine times out of ten a beta would go on to become the alpha of a pack. Rarely was the demotion from alpha made by choice. Alphas were either defeated in a challenge and forced out oftheir pack or killed in the challenge to cement the new alpha’s status.
“As soon as the Walshes arrived, led by that starry-eyed boy, I knew this was the time to act.”
Ahead of me, Fayne kept nimbly leaping, bringing us ever closer to Sloane.
I really hoped she knew what she was doing.
“You knew how Dad would react.” I did the math. “You just gave him a little push, helped him succumb to paranoia his prize would be stolen from him. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that you whispered the idea to recruit the Nelson pride in his ear.”
The time for chatting ended as I burst into the clearing where the sentinels all paused their tormenting of Sloane to crane their necks toward me. Fayne powered on ahead, but I had lost my slight advantage when we left the trees. On flat ground, Mercer’s longer legs ate up the distance between us.
“Stop her,” he commanded the sentinels. “Don’t let her get away.”
As the sentinels turned on me, hackles and fists rising, bloodlust roaring in their ears and snarls pouring from their mouths, I met Sloane’s eyes and tears flooded mine, blinding me.
“I’m so sorry,”I mouthed to her, doubtful she could see much through her matted fur.
Running wasn’t getting me anywhere. I had to turn and fight, to at least try to bring Mercer down. I spun aside, zigzagging to gain precious feet between us, then raised my silver claws. He hadn’t expected me to plant my feet, and I got in a solid swing that sliced open his face from his hairline to his jaw.
His answering snarls, the way his teeth elongated, made me wish my aim hadn’t been quite so good. He wouldn’t let a pathetic latent like me walk away after shaming him in front ofthe other sentinels. Not if I was right about his plans to rise to alpha, literally over my dead body.
Snapping out his hand, Mercer fisted my throat and lifted me off my feet. “Goodbye, Anie.”
Before he could crack my spine over his knee or gut me from neck to navel, Fayne launched herself at him.
Except she shifted midway and landed on him as averynaked woman in her sixties.
Shock caused Mercer to release his grip on me. He rocked back on his heels and gaped as she linked her arms behind his neck. Fayne plastered her sizeable chest to his bloody face, forcing him to motorboat her boobs to avoid suffocation.
Rían would never forgive me if I let something happen to his grandmother. I would never forgive myself. She had been nothing but kind to me. This made twice she had risked her life for mine.
Using her distraction, I skidded behind Mercer, slicing through his Achilles tendons. He hit his knees, baffled how he had gotten there, but he honed a hate-filled gaze on Fayne in the next instant.
Still on my side, I swung my leg high, kicking his head left while Fayne scrambled off him to his right.
That bought us a few seconds, but the wolves were closing in, and Dad’s howl sounded closer than ever.
“You really shouldn’t have hurt her.” Fayne took me by the hand, and we backed into the center of the clearing. “He’s not going to like that one bit.”
Mercer caught on before me, which I blamed on taking a boot to the head earlier, and he flipped his gaze skyward. I couldn’t afford to scan the clouds. I kept my gaze trained on the threat in front of me.
Pallor swept over Mercer’s face as a primal roar shook the heavens, painting a coy smile on Fayne’s lips.
A massive shadow fell across me, and wind kicked up, sending debris flying into my eyes.
Temporary blindness didn’t spare me from witnessing Dad burst into the clearing, his upper lip quivering and his ruff bristling like a lion’s mane. He ignored the incoming threat and bounded toward me with his teeth gleaming.
Fayne peeled away from me, planting herself between my father and me. I let her think she had done it, that she had saved me yet again. But I had seen my dad in all his moods, as both wolf and man, even if I hadn’t experienced the sharp bite of them myself until today.
I no longer believed he wanted to kill me. Mercer wouldn’t be in such a rush to finish the job if he did. Dad must need me for something else. That, or he simply refused to back down from the Walshes. But the alternative, that he wanted to punish me within an inch of my life, my flesh in his teeth, was worse.
Justice in his jaws was also a punishment I refused to let anyone else take for me.
