Page 29 of I Regret Nothing
“I know where you are going with this, and if you hurt her, I’ll hunt you down and end you.”
“That’s not it. Not even close. I know she’s not a fox shifter. They didn’t give her a blood test in processing. I have no idea what she is, but I have no intention of hurting her. She’s my mate.”
The line went totally silent before he let out this little chuckle.
“No, shit? Since you know she’s not a fox shifter, then I guess you know she’s not feeling a damned thing you are, and you’re going to have to earn it.”
Well, that was progress. He didn’t hang up in my face, call the warden, and get her transferred as far away from me as possible. I wasn’t stupid. I wasn’t about to have any type of physical relationship with her while she was in prison. It would be taking advantage as her CO. The power dynamic was off. We could do that when she got out and we were equals. And we would be. She would be my equal in everything, and I intended to spoil her rotten. I had seven years to fix this.
“Yeah, I get that, and I botched this up before I realized the truth.”
“You’d better grovel, man. Rei can hold a grudge better than anyone I know. She’s not totally unreasonable, but depending on how much you fucked up, you may need more than seven years to win her over.”
“I may have made an ass of myself when I realized she wasn’t a fox shifter like everyone thinks.”
“Big mistake. I told her to keep that secret no matter what she did. They didn’t figure that out during processing?”
“A lot of the staff here is lazy. We just took in another fox shifter a few days ago, so I’m guessing they just used the same spell on her cuffs.”
“You’re a guard there. Why didn’t you bring her back and have it corrected?”
“I should have. I know that, but I wanted her to show me what she really was because I honestly still have no idea. The only reason I still haven’t is because she’s in danger. It’s not just that witch Venus. The coven she stole from has a bounty on her head. I didn’t take the job, but they were paying enough that someone eventually will.”
I could only ever say something like that to another wolf who happened to be a criminal. He would understand it was a job, and it was nothing personal. He had to be good at what he did too if he wasn’t here in Silverhold.
“Would you have taken the job if she wasn’t your mate?”
“No. I only take jobs if people deserve it. Rei seems to have pissed off a lot of witches, but she doesn’t deserve to die for stealing.”
“Is Rei aware of the hit?”
“I haven’t told her. She’s got a lot on her plate getting used to prison, and that witch on the inside is up to something. I was hoping you could do something from the outside.”
“Kill an entire coven? I’d do it for her, but that particular coven is huge and well connected. Rei planned to get into their estate for months. She normally doesn’t leave a shred of proof behind, but that coven had many cats. They had a lot of double-sided tape everywhere to keep their pets from scratching. That’s the only reason she left that hair behind. All their cats were black, so a silver hair raised a lot of questions.”
Well, that answered a lot of questions, including how good a thief she was. It also raised a lot. Why was she caught in the parking lot of the museum biting a witch?
“What exactly happened at the museum?”
“Rei doesn’t know her family. We know what she is, but we’ve only made educated guesses about what kind. She thought she was a fox shifter when we met too. It was hard for her to be raised by humans. She wanted that amulet to contact her ancestors and get some answers about herself. I tried to talk her out of it, but she had a plan. When Rei plans something, it’s flawless. She could have stolen that amulet, and no one would have realized it until they saw the empty case. Rei saw Venus on the security cameras and improvised. Venus was the one that botched the theft and alerted the guards. Rei should have left instead of assaulting her in the parking lot, but she really wants those answers.”
“We chatted about her human parents. She told me a little about how hard it was when she realized she wasn’t like them. She had to keep it this big secret, and she was in a human high school too. She had no one to talk to about it.”
“Yes, I know. Her parents kept secrets about her too. She asked them about her birth parents several times, and they refused to tell her. I’ve tried to help her by digging into her adoption, but they redacted most of it, and it was like she didn’t exist. We both wanted the answers that amulet could have given. I didn’t want her doing it, but she could have done it if Venus didn’t show up. You can’t trust that witch. I agreed to take a job with her because she begged me, and she double-crossed me. I nearly got caught, and I had a whole Vampire clan after my ass because I thought I was stealing the item for them.”
See, that was why I worked alone. Killing people tended to be a solitary job unless they paid you to take out a sizeable group at once. I still didn’t take on a partner then. I just got creative. My old pack would make group kills, but there was so much drama with that. If someone didn’t pull their weight, everyone got fucked. And I wasn’t shocked it was a witch who had caused so much trouble with Hauser and Rei. Most witches and warlocks were perfectly lovely, but when they went wrong, they wentevil.
“Rei has pissed off a lot of witches. The witch gang in Silverhold isn’t that bad. Their high priestess keeps them in line, but I’ve watched this Venus making friends. I can’t throw her in solitary unless she does something. I’m thinking of making her dead if she keeps threatening my mate.”
“I don’t think anyone is going to weep if Venus dies. Venus has probably pissed off way more witches than Rei ever did. We’re talking blood feuds with several covens. If she ever wanted to stop being a free agent and join a coven again, I don’t know of a single one that would have her.”
“The only reason I hadn’t is that I didn’t want any more attention on Rei. Everyone at the prison knows Rei and Venus are enemies. If Venus ended up dead, even if nothing tied back to Rei, people would still blame her. I need a plan before I take out the witch, so it doesn’t come back on Rei.”
“Good. And I don’t think I need to tell you that you need to keep her away from the other shifters.”
“I gave her a job doing my paperwork. She’s with me during the day. I’m going to have to figure out something as to why she’s not going to the yard with the other shifters when we unlock their cuffs and let them shift or use their magic for an hour.”
“Listen to me, Faust. This is important. It’s not just her scent. When Rei turns into her fox, it’s not even remotely like a shifter change. She cannot go anywhere near that yard and be expected to change. Promise me.”
