Page 44 of Okay, I Regret a Little
My wolf clawed to the surface. Four? Was it more than just Wren? It had better not be that fucking sphinx and gargoyle because I couldn’t kill them either.
“Who?” I demanded.
“Faust, swear you won’t kill them?”
I ran my fingers through my hair and started pacing. I’d do anything for my mate. I’d die for her. But not killing anyone who was dividing her attention from me was asking a lot. She was it for me—the center of my world. But I’d never be the same to her with three other assholes in the picture.
Still, I didn’thaveto kill anyone technically. I’d still win in the end. Most people in here were serving life sentences. Rei would get out of here, and I’d be there to help her get over them. My wolf still wanted to go hunting, but I put him in the corner. We could do this without spilling a drop of blood. Part of the reason I wasn’t in here rotting with the rest of these inmates was that I knew sometimes it paid off not to kill.
“I won’t kill anyone, but if it’s the sphinx and the gargoyle, I’d be careful with that, Rei. I was the only guard in the mess hall that heard about their little prison business. I can respect how careful they’ve been running it because I didn’t know about it. And I know almost everything that goes on in here.
“I won’t shut them down because they seem to have standards about what they sneak in, and people in here might be criminals, but they deserve some pleasures. They will mess up eventually. One of the guards is going to take a harder look at the contraband we keep finding. The witches have already tried to overthrow them. The other gangs could follow suit. Make sure you don’t go down with them and get years added to your sentence.”
Rei shook her head and squared her shoulders.
“I’m not staying here any longer than I have to, Faust.”
Now that we settled that, I needed intel on my loose cannon of an ally, and I couldn’t exactly get her alone to ask. Rei was keeping a lot from me, and I knew the general opinion on rats in prison. I needed to know to keep both of them safe. Surely, she would understand that.
“Rei, did Wren start that riot? If so, how? The witches have gotten pretty bold and corrupt, and some things I overheard were insanely stupid, but that was Venus’s doing. The rest of them have all been here long enough not to announce that kind of shit to the entire prison.”
Rei bowed her head, and her long white hair fell in her face. She looked up and bit her lip.
“Promise you won’t get mad?”
“Just tell me, Rei.”
“You know my handcuffs don’t work, right? Wren needs her pound of flesh for Astrid. I suggested she try channeling me to see if she could do magic. I didn’t knowthatwas what she had planned, but it worked in the end. Everyone wants Venus dead now. It won’t be tied to me, and any witch left alive should drop the whole vendetta against me. All we need to worry about after that is the Aether Circle.”
I scratched my beard and stared at my mate. I was trying to get to know her, and I totally wasn’t okay with the strays she collected in here, but she was damned near perfect. I wished I could kiss her because I think my cock got a little stiff at her ruthless instincts.
“You sure you’ve never killed anyone before, Rei?”
“Is Brody dead?”
“Brody is a cockroach. He’s in a coma, but he’ll wake up and be stinking up the halls of this prison soon enough. The warden knows he slept with a witch and tried to kill you. I’m sure her little investigation will reveal it was just gossip, and they will make excuses about why the safety on his baton was off. Was that little exploding trick yours?”
“I don’t know the first thing about those batons. I knew it had way more electricity in it than it should, and Brody was chanting something. It was self-defense.”
“You don’t have to justify yourself to me, Rei. I saw what he was doing. If I had gotten to him before you did, I probably would have killed him myself.”
“Faust, please don’t expose yourself in here for me. I’m small, but I’m not helpless.”
I started laughing. Clearly not. I knew she could handle herself if she had a wolf for a mentor, but what powers were lurking behind those enormous violet eyes? She could turn into a fox, and she could control electricity. She was absolutely amazing and powerful.
“One day, when you’re more comfortable, we’re going to have to have a conversation about all the superpowers you have.”
This look flashed over Rei’s face. She wanted to tell me, but something was holding her back. She felt comfortable telling me she was into three other people, knowing full well wolves didn’t share, and my more homicidal instincts would kick in, but something was holding her back on that.
My theory that she was from another realm was seeming like a good one. She wasn’t Fae. Fae were back on Earth, and she definitely wasn’t one of them. She could be a demon, but I doubted it. They rarely came to Earth and, from what I knew, didn’t enjoy being summoned here.
Was Rei from a realm none of us knew about, and that was why she was so secretive about it?
