Chapter Forty–One

CHAPTER FORTY–ONE

I t was just after dawn when Mayhem pushed his chair back from the kitchen table so he could cross his legs and drum a beat on his thigh. Between him and Mahrci, there was a half-eaten pecan pie, three plates smeared with pie streaks and melted vanilla ice cream, and three cups with a quarter of an inch of cold coffee in the bottom of them.

Crawie, who he’d totally fallen in love with, had gone to bed about twenty minutes ago.

And yes, it had been the best chicken pot pie he’d ever had.

Too bad his stomach was grinding like everything had been spoiled.

“So you see,” Mahrci concluded, “this is very messy. The whole thing.”

Mayhem stopped tapping his fingertips and rubbed his eyes. He never got headaches. He had one now. A real humdinger.

“Let me get this straight,” he heard himself say. “Your sire is about to declare war on both the Black Dagger Brotherhood and Wrath, the great Blind King. He, ah, he has a consortium of aristocrats behind him, and you think—you think they’re arming themselves and preparing for an insurrection that will topple the throne and elect your father as some kind of president?”

“Yes.” She took a deep breath. “I started to get suspicious about a year ago, when he began pushing me to be with Remis and get mated. He’d never particularly cared one way or the other about me or who I was with—and I’ve always known why.”

“Why,” he prompted.

“I think my mahmen was already pregnant with me, by someone else, when they got mated. She was very beautiful, a perfect status symbol for a male who was on the rise, and if I’d been a boy, maybe things might have been different. Her later dying on the birthing bed with their blooded son had not been part of Whestmorel’s plan, and I think he only kept me as potential leverage for later. On my side, I knew I didn’t belong anywhere in the world, and I had no one but Crawie, so I always tried to stay in his good graces. One night, about a month ago . . . I overheard him and Remis talking about buying guns? And then this male named Broadius started coming around our house.”

She shook her head. “My father knew if Remis mated me, the male was locked in. He does this to people. That’s why he had Apex install all those cameras. He’s pulling the aristocrats together for a meeting at the Adirondack house, and he’s going to record everything so he can make sure there are no cracks in the consortium. If he has these males on tape prepared to commit treason? He’s got them for life. They try to get out and all he has to do is threaten to expose them.”

Mayhem frowned. “Is Apex . . . involved in all this shit?”

“I don’t know. You’d have to ask him. He’s been my father’s head of security for about two years now. I mean, I’m on the periphery and I found out about it. I’d find it hard to believe that male doesn’t know and isn’t working on all of it.”

His first thought was that that wasn’t the Apex he knew. Overthrowing the fucking King? Come on. But it had been a long time since he’d seen the guy. Maybe things had changed.

Also, how close had they been anyway?

“Apex does the legitimate security,” she tacked on. “Remis is the other side, in spite of how he tries to make himself look like a gentlemale. That’s why I worry about you.”

“Yeah, he’s still not a problem.” Mayhem sat back again because he didn’t know what the hell to do with himself. “And you tried to tip off the Brotherhood?”

“Yes. I asked Crawie—and I probably shouldn’t have—to sneak these papers to them. I had her go to the Audience House on a pretense and leave them behind.” The female looked down at the pie. “My father’s forgotten about her. He has no idea I’ve been supporting her all these years or that I bought this house. He has no clue where I am now—and he’s not going to care. The idea that somebody like me could take down somebody like him? Unfathomable.”

“What are the papers you turned in?”

“I found them in the trash. They were supposed to have been shredded. I think they’re contributions for weapons, but my father isn’t dumb. The data is blinded—so I don’t know who the people are, and really I’m just guessing it all has something to do with the payments for guns that they were talking about.” She drew her dark hair back. Let it fall down on her shoulders. “And I just wanted to signal the Brotherhood about my sire somehow so I made up this page of numbers. As I told you, I’ve always liked puzzles and stuff—it’s the Wheel of Fortune, right? Anyway, I figured someone over there would be smart enough to decode the name.”

A sudden surge of aggression had his fangs tingling. “And Remis and your father don’t suspect you?”

There was a long silence, and he knew she was trying to keep her emotions in check. So he reached out and took her hand.

“No, I’ve never mattered enough to be considered a threat to them,” she said roughly. “I broke up with Remis and then told Crawie to take the papers to the Audience House. I went up to Camp Ghreylke just long enough to make sure she was okay, that nothing came of her going to the Brotherhood. I figured I could call my father and Remis to me if something went wrong. If I’m in trouble, fine. Her, I will always protect.”

“Then Apex and I arrived.”

“And into the belly of the beast we all went.”

“Jesus,” he said, not for the first time. “So that was why Apex didn’t tell me shit about the job. It’s a fucking treason plot.”

With a feeling of dread, he put a hand into his ass pocket and took out the burner phone he used. But what kind of conversation could he have with the guy?

“You’re calling Apex?” she said.

“I need to know.” He held up the phone. “I gotta see what he says—and then I’m going to the Brotherhood. I’m not going to be involved in this kind of shady shit, no fucking way. And I ultimately control those security feeds. I can give them access.”

“You can’t tell Apex—or even the Brotherhood—where you are. I’m sorry, but I don’t know who to trust.”

“Oh, I’ll keep my location a secret.” He cleared his throat. “I’m not sure I can trust him, either.”

As he hit send on the male’s number, he got a series of rings. And then the anonymous voicemail. He ended the call.

“He didn’t pick up.”

Mahrci shook her head. “I’m sorry. Maybe he’s . . .”

“All along he refused to tell me anything about what we were doing—”

His phone started ringing, and he immediately answered. “What the fuck is going on.”

There was a chuckle. “Mayhem? Is that your name?”

Rising to his feet, he said, “Remis? What the fuck are you doing?”

“Looking for you. I mean, I found someone. But he’s not you—although he is remarkably loyal to you. You can’t believe what I’ve been doing to him, and he still won’t tell me where you are—”

Mayhem pegged Mahrci with hard eyes and put his forefinger to his lips, all shhhh.

“—no matter what I do to him.”

“You want me.” Mayhem stalked around the kitchen, his fangs fully descending. “You can have me. Leave Apex alone.”

“Well, at this point, there isn’t much left of him, soooooo—”

“I’ll come to you. At nightfall. But if he’s dead—”

“What are you going to do,” the male cut in with a bored tone.

“I’m going to disappear on you. And where’s the fun in that? Don’t hurt him anymore or you don’t get me.”

Mayhem ended the call and collapsed back down into his chair.

“Oh, my God,” Mahrci said. “What’s—”

Hopping back up to his feet, he ran down into the basement, where their duffle bags were. Rummaging through his own, he found his personal laptop, the one that he’d encrypted so completely that it might as well be in outer fucking space.

Signing in, he accessed the program controlling all those security units he and Apex had installed. The other male’s instructions had been clear: The feeds were supposed to go to three different places, Apex’s number and two others he hadn’t recognized, at least one of which had to be Whestmorel’s.

But thanks to a back door he’d created, he’d added a secret fourth, his own. Because . . . well, maybe his sniff test had been a little whiffy—

“Oh, fuck,” he breathed as he looked at the live feed from the great room.

“What is it,” Mahrci said as she came around the corner.

“Stop,” he ordered in a voice that cracked. “I don’t want you to see this—”

She fucked him right off and looked over his shoulder at the screen . . . at the picture of Apex tied to a chair, his face so bloody, the only way he could be ID’d was from his clothes.

“Oh, God,” she moaned as she wrenched away.

Mayhem slapped the laptop closed. “I’m going to fucking kill Remis. I’m going to fucking kill him at nightfall.”

“I’m coming with you—”

“The fuck you are—”

“I know the secret way in.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “And you’re going to want the element of surprise. There were four males in the background, and the last thing you need is for them to kill him because they know you’re in the house.”

Tragically, she was right.

And between one blink and the next, all Mayhem could see were those animal heads, staring down at his old friend.

With their vacant glass eyes.