Page 86 of Mortal Blood
“I’ll speak to my matealone,” Cole said, his eyes darkening as he glared at the enforcer.
“Don’t push your luck, Bryant.”
“You’re breaking the law,Enforcer.So get the fuck out before I make sure every pack in the country hears about it. Your bosses will hand you over for pack justice faster than you can blink.Myjustice.”
Brennan narrowed his eyes, but I could see the fear lurking in them. He grunted something, glared at Cole one last time, and then I was alone with my mate.
I made to lurch to my feet and pain lanced through my side. I sagged in my chair with a pained hiss, and he was by my side in an instant.
“Cali, princess. Are you okay? What did those fuckers do to you?”
“It’s nothing.”
He crouched beside me and lifted my shirt a fraction. His jaw clenched so tightly I could hear his teeth grinding together.
“That’s not nothing. I’m going to rip them apart.”
He was already halfway to his feet before I remembered that would be a bad thing.
“Fight later. Tell me what’s happening with my mom.” I searched his face anxiously, trying to read the news from it. “Did you find her?”
He sank back into his crouch with a soft sigh. “Not yet. I’m sorry. But we’ll keep looking.”
“What’s going on? Did anyone see her leave? No-one here will tell me anything!”
He pressed his lips together like he was debating how much to tell me.
“Don’t you dare,” I ground out. “Don’t you dare even think about holding back. I need to know, Cole. All of it.”
He nodded. “There was a raid.”
“A raid?” And despite my insistence, the cold creeping up my spine told me I didn’t want to know what he was going to say next.
“The Black Wind pack,” he said, and my stomach fell. Kallan’s pack. “They led a full-scale attack. Four of our pack are dead, dozens more injured.”
My hands jerked in the cuffs. “Oh, my God. Cole…”
His expression was haunted, and he could barely bring himself to meet my eye.
“I’m sorry, Cali. If I’d challenged my father sooner, I could have prevented this. Your mom would still be safe.”
“No. None of that shit. This is not your fault, Cole, and you willnotbeat yourself up over it.”
He opened his mouth, but I shook my head, not giving him chance to speak. “This was your father. This was Kallan’s pack. This wasnotyou, do you understand me? You are not responsible for other people’s decisions.”
I wished I could reach out and comfort him, but the stupid cuffs denied me even that much.
“I’m going to find her,” he said, shaking his head and his melancholy with it. “I promise. You just need to worry about you now.”
Like that was going to happen. I wasn’t the one who was important here. “Did anyone see if they took her? Maybe she got scared by the fighting and ran off.”
My hope died in the second he spent holding my eye. “I scouted the whole area myself. I couldn’t pick up her scent.”
“Maybe it was masked by the others. All the fighting, and—”
And this was the man who’d scented a fae I’d barely been able to see, and been able to tell him apart from every single fae in the academy.
Fuck.
