Chapter 19

Chapter Nineteen

RELIC

Lowering my head, my leather vest in my jaw, I tore through the forest towards the spots I’d left Fern.

I’d tried to call her again, but still, no answer. Lothar said she hadn’t been back to the clubhouse, and there was no fresh scent from her back at her store or in her apartment.

No one had seen or heard from her since I had been summoned to Hell. For me, it had been close to four hours, but for Fern, it had been four fucking days.

My brothers howled in the distance, they were close. I snarled around the leather in my mouth as I broke through the trees and shifted. I didn’t know what I expected to find. Days had passed since I’d stood in this spot with Fern, but her scent still remained. With our sense of smell, I could pick up a scent from over a week ago, sometimes longer. Yeah, my female still lingered in the air, but it was different from when I’d left her; now, it was mixed with her fear.

Lothar and Jagger bounded into the small clearing, Loth carrying what I’d asked him to bring in his mouth.

“Still getting nothing?” I asked as they shifted.

Jag shook his head. “Tracking’s not working. She’s behind some kind of ward—something that’s strong enough to block our powers.”

I growled. Yeah, I’d figured that out for myself, but I still had to try. “Give it to me?”

Loth tossed me Fern’s shirt. I pressed it to my face, dragging in her honeysuckle scent, the stronger her scent, the easier to track her. I closed my eyes, let my powers pulse through me, and searched, but I couldn’t see her. No sign. Hounds tracked by scent, yes, but we didn’t need to keep our noses to the ground. Once we had a scent, we saw exactly where our prey was in our mind’s eye, and when I took in Fern’s scent, there was nothing. Just darkness, a blank space where Fern should be. “Fuck,” I snarled.

“She say anything about who’s after her?” Loth asked.

“Not one fucking thing.” My beast’s voice was blending with my voice now, making it sound distorted. “She was opening up to me slowly. I was getting her to open up to me, and then Lucifer …” I roared, spun to the tree behind me and slammed my fist into it.

“Are you mated?” Loth asked. “With the connection, you might be able to—”

“No. She wasn’t ready.” I shoved my fingers through my hair. “She doesn’t even fucking know I’m her mate.”

“We’ll find her,” Lothar said, expression hard. “Whatever it takes. You’ve waited too fucking long to find her. You’re not losing her this way. No fucking way.”

I lifted my chin, even as the beast rippled under my skin, contorting my shoulders and vibrating through my chest. I couldn’t speak anymore, lost to my rage now—the beast had my throat, full control of my vocal cords now, so I let him lead, and tilted my head back, scenting the air.

My lips peeled back on a growl as I dropped to the ground, breathing her in. She’d been standing a little in front of me. She’d turned away while she talked, sharing more of her past with me, hiding her eyes while she did it. She tried to conceal what bringing those memories to the forefront did to her, but I’d heard it in her voice—

“I got your scent and Fern’s,” Loth said.

I breathed deeper and rose when I picked up something else. “What the fuck is that?”

Lothar breathed deeply as well and turned, striding to the edge of the track. “They stood there. Male. Demon, but it smells fucking weird.”

“I know this scent,” I said.

When I’d been outside Fern’s store, it had been distant at the time, unimportant, but I knew without a doubt that this was the same. I followed it down the track, and the beast vibrated through my chest. They’d been together, Fern and whoever that scent belonged to. They’d taken her.

My brothers surrounded me, and closing our eyes, we focused on the new scent.

Fuck yes. My mind lit up, showing me the way, leading us right to him.

I was going to tear him to shreds. I was going to make him scream.

With a vicious growl, I shifted and tore through the forest, my brothers right behind me. We made it back to the edge of the forest in record time. Quickly dressing, we got on our bikes and sped away from the city.

The ride felt like an eternity, and the whole way, my mind threw images at me, one after the other, of what was happening to her. My heart was thumping hard, and my blood rushed through my veins while the beast rumbled and snarled, constantly vibrating with rage in my chest.

We finally rolled up to a building an hour later. It was in the middle of nowhere and a similar distance, give or take, from a couple of other bigger towns. The faded sign on the wall said, “Maple Grove Age Care Facility.” Going by the washed-out and chipped paint, the broken windows, and the burned-out left wing of the building, it’d been abandoned a while ago. Turning off my bike, I swung off and strode to the front door. With every breath, my chest expanded, and my urge to shift was harder to resist.

“How you wanna do this?” Loth asked me.

I lifted my foot, about to kick in the front door, desperate to get to Fern, but Jagger grabbed my shoulder, shoving me back. I jerked from his hold, and the alpha’s second closed in.

“We go in there hot, she could get hurt. You need to get those new fucking emotions under control and play this smart.”

He was right, of course, but, fuck, it was hard. The rage felt like a wildfire rushing through me, burning off the hard exterior and exposing all of those new and confusing emotions.

Lothar grabbed the door handle, and his biceps jerked, the veins in his forearm popping. “Warded, but it’s weak.” He gritted his teeth and twisted the door handle, shattering the lock.

I pushed forward, and every muscle in my body jerked, spasming, as I breached the ward and rushed through. Lothar was right; it was weak, but for anyone else, this would be impenetrable. Whoever this witch was had not been keeping up their wards regularly. Or maybe they were just that fucking arrogant that they thought no one would find them.

The main entrance was dark, but I could see a few flickering lights ahead. Tilting back my head, I breathed deep, and my nerve endings, my blood, fucking lit up like I’d been struck by lightning. Whatever had been blocking her wasn’t working here because it didn’t need to.

“She’s here. I can smell her blood.”

Beside me, Lothar bared his teeth, the rage rolling off him, almost as volatile as mine.

“We need to assess the situation before we kill—you hear me?” Jagger said. “Whatever this place is, something is not fucking right. The darkness here is thick, fucking heavy.”

I grunted, but if Fern was hurt, I was going to kill anything that moved, consequences be damned. I rushed ahead, Lothar and Jag keeping pace, letting me follow Fern’s scent, letting it guide me to her. I didn’t need my powers to find her in this place. Her scent was heavy, but it was bitter in a way I’d never smelled on her before. Something was wrong—something really fucking bad had happened—and it was taking all my control not to kick every wall down.

“That smell, like chemicals. The same scent was in that building we tracked Faron to,” Jag said.

He was right, it was, but all I could focus on was my female. We made our way down one hall and then another.

“Hear that?” Loth said, tilting his head to the side. “Whispering.”

Until then, all I’d been able to hear was my blood rushing through my fucking ears. I forced myself to listen, to tune in—the sound of a low, roughened voice reached me. He was saying evil, sick fucking shit, and I knew instantly who he was directing that fucked-up shit to.

I broke into a run, barreling down the hall and turning into the next. There was a set of doors ahead of me. She was in there. My Fern was in there.

It was hard, but I made myself stop, and instead of busting the doors down, I eased them open as quietly as I could—

The beast lurched forward, snapping beneath my skin, while every muscle in my body contracted and every nerve ending went fucking haywire. Red rage filled my vision as I took in the scene.

Nothing could have prepared me for what was in front of me.

Fern was strapped to a gurney—naked, with a large and raw wound on her stomach and blood coating her chin. She was surrounded by sleeping creatures, the kind I’d never seen before—deformed, stitched together from mismatched body parts—their fucked-up bodies littering the floor. Only one was still awake, and he stood beside her, so close that she’d feel his breath on her skin. Her eyes were closed, her skin flushed and coated with sweat, and she was shaking uncontrollably.

Jag and Loth froze beside me, their rage as hot as mine, like a blast of hellfire.

On silent feet, I moved up behind the fucked-up creature as quietly as I could, and grabbed it, one hand covering its mouth, and twisted, snapping his neck with the other. It went limp, and I lowered him to the floor quietly. Stepping over it, I gently touched Fern’s fevered face. Her eyes snapped open, locking with me, but there was no acknowledgment, no recognition. There was just … nothing.

What have they done to you, baby?

I pressed my finger to my lips, telling her not to make a sound, as I slid off my vest and covered her with it. She’d been through enough; I didn’t want her to see what was about to happen next.

“Eyes closed, Tink,” I whispered.

“Kill them all,” Jag said low.

Whatever these creatures were, they weren’t the brains behind whatever this was. They were a fucked-up army created by a sick piece of shit. Loth and Jag shifted, tearing into them, but I stayed in my human form—well, as best as I could because Fern was scared enough as it was, but my poison-tipped claws had burst from the ends of my fingers, my face had distorted, and my mouth was now elongated and full of vicious teeth. I tore the creatures apart, firing my power at them and sending them across the room to smash against the wall, taking out creature after creature, until the place was strewn with blood and body parts.

Jag took off out the door to search the rest of the building, and Loth stood guard at the door as I got to work on Fern’s restraints. My fucking hands shook as I undid the ones at her ankles. I moved back up, and she was utterly motionless. She did nothing, said nothing.

“Fern?” I said in a garbled voice around my elongated jaw and fangs because I was seriously struggling to pull the beast back. “Tink, I’m here.”

* * *

FERN

It was a fever dream or a trick. I blinked, trying to clear my vision, but black spots danced at the corners of my eyes.

Grady was playing games with me.

I wasn’t going to fall for it. The monster had Relic’s eyes, but the distorted face had a mouth full of sharp teeth. I stayed completely still, waiting, biding my time. The creatures weren’t allowed to touch me, but this one’s fingers had grazed my skin, and now he was removing my bindings. I didn’t want its fucking hands on me. I didn’t want anyone’s fucking hands on me. Only Relic. Only ever Relic.

That wasn’t him; it couldn’t be. I was seeing things, seeing what I wanted to see.

He worked on the straps around my wrists, and as soon as they were free, I exploded off the bed. My weak legs immediately gave out, and I fell to the floor. The darkness at the corners of my vision got worse, and the smell of putrid blood filled my nose. Gasping and panting, I scrambled across the wet concrete floor over things—disgusting things I couldn’t properly make out. I reached the wall and pressed my back to it, lifting my hands out in front of me.

“The Chemist w-will kill you if you touch me. You aren’t allowed to touch me,” I said, my speech fucked up without my teeth, and more blood oozed down my chin.

A rumbling sound rolled through the room, and my wild, swinging hands hit something, somebody.

“Stay back,” I screamed. As I did, something charged through me, like I was being plugged into an electrical socket, like a dead engine struggling to turn over, suddenly setting off sparks, before dying again.

The rumbling was closer, but I couldn’t hear it over the ringing in my ears and the pounding of my heart. My body was burning up; the virus had set in.

One minute, I was pressed against the wall; the next, I was hauled off the ground.

“No! Don’t you fucking touch me!” I fought as hard as I could, but they were restraining my arms and my kicking legs.

With no other way to fight, I reared back and tried to sink my fangs into firm flesh. Again and again, I tried, then whimpered, because my fangs were fucking gone. I was pulled back suddenly, and a moment later, my face was pressed back to that same spot. The scent of blood filled my lungs. I groaned, my tongue darting out, tasting, sliding along a deep slice. The blood was fresh, rich—warm. Not cold and putrid. My starving body ignited, the demon inside me roaring to the surface. Instead of trying to get away, I wrapped my arms and legs around the massive body pressed against me and lapped at the heavy, pulsing vein. It was throbbing and oozing blood, and I sucked hard.

Digging my nails into skin and muscle to hold on tight, I drew deeply on the thick vein, gulping down the fragrant, rich blood, letting it fill me and revive me.

I hadn’t eaten at all, and I had only been given a few sips of water since I’d been brought back here. I was so hungry that there was no stopping me. I was jostled, but no one tried to pull me away or shove me off. So, I fed greedily, until my limbs grew warm. I was so weak from my fever that when the adrenaline subsided, I couldn’t hang on anymore. My arms fell away, and I braced to hit the concrete floor … but I didn’t.

That was when I realized the solid arms and big hands that had been restraining me were cradling me gently—one arm under my butt, supporting me, the other now at the back of my head, keeping me at that throat, helping me feed now that I was too weak to do it myself.

Now that the ravenous hunger had subsided, a familiar scent filled my senses, and as I feebly sucked, the taste on my tongue finally registered. I blinked several times, and the black shadows in my vision receded. I knew that muscled throat. I knew the runes tattooed on that massive shoulder.

No. This had to be a dream. I’d passed out, and I was still tied down on that gurney, surrounded by monsters.

But even as I told myself that, I whimpered, clawing, trying to hang on to him, to the dream, the delirium. It couldn’t be true, yet I was terrified he’d let me go, that this mirage would vanish, that I’d wake and find myself back in that hell.

But I was positive I felt the weight and smelled the comforting scent of worn leather against my back, that I could feel the heat of Relic’s skin against mine.

The hand, still at the back of my head, applied soft pressure, and warm breath ruffled my hair. “I got you, baby.”

I shivered as that hand moved to the back of my neck, and a comforting, rough-skinned thumb slid along my jaw.

“I will murder whoever did this to you, Tinker Bell, with my bare fucking hands. I will tear their heart out and bring it to you, sweetness. I will lay it at your feet. I promise you that.”

I was jostled again, something soft and warm coming around me.

“Get the door open,” my Relic dream growled, and I was shifted before I was sitting across his lap.

Gods, this felt so real. I forced myself to blink again. My sight came and went. I was in a truck. I found the strength to tilt my head back, and a pair of gorgeous golden eyes locked on mine.

My Relic dream cupped my face. “I’m so sorry, baby. I’m so sorry it took me so fucking long to get to you.”

My limbs felt like they were weighted down by bricks, but I somehow managed to drag my hand out of the blanket wrapped around me and pressed it to his bare chest. His heart pounded against my palm, and his eyelashes fluttered. I let his warmth soak through me, through the blanket, through my skin, into my bones.

“Relic?” I choked out.

“Yeah, Tink, it’s me.”

Not a dream. Not a mirage. He was here.

Oh gods, he’s real .

He’d come for me.

“Who did this to you, baby? Tell me who I need to kill,” he growled.

I couldn’t say his name, not yet. My mouth refused to form the words.

“Hold me tighter,” I said instead. “I need you to hold me tighter.”

His arms curled around me even more firmly, trapping me against him, like a warm, violent, protective cocoon.

Right then, at that moment, I was safe.

I let my eyes drift closed, and consciousness slipped away.