Chapter 17

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Wade had parked on the street in Beacon Hill rather than the parking garage. He had a general idea of where Niall's territory was located from what Ella and Riordan had told him. Which meant he was fully ready to march over and break into Niall's home and have a look around. He had a nose for magical artifacts and magic in general these days—a skill that helped with the redistribution of wealth, in his opinion—and if Saoirse's skin was anywhere in Niall's home, Wade could find it.

That was the plan.

So of course, Lucien had to be a bastard and derail it.

A motorcycle roared up the cobblestone street and skidded to a stop next to where Wade was walking. Both riders were decked out in Kevlar leather riding pants and jackets. The woman perched behind the driver lifted the helmet's visor, and Carmen's distinctive red-pupiled eyes stared out at him. "If you're looking for Niall, he's not home."

"Is he dead? Tell me he's dead and I can ransack the place," Wade said, crossing his arms.

"What do you think?"

"I think Abby Boy is pissed about the attack, and you're both on daylight duty out of the selfishness of your undead and demonic hearts. Neither of you have ever passed up the opportunity to claim territory that isn't yours."

"The Manhattan Night Court always belonged to me," Lucien said, voice muffled a little through the motorcycle helmet. Unlike Carmen, he didn't raise his visor.

Wade opened his mouth to argue, but considering how that fight played out and ended with his freedom, he'd give Lucien that point. "Fine. I won't argue that, but I will argue everything else."

"You don't know what my Night Court owns."

"I know it's not going to own Boston. Something tells me Abby Boy won't like it if you try."

Carmen rested one elbow on Lucien's shoulder, propping up her helmeted head in one hand. "Niall went to ground last night. Biyu pulled background information on all the properties he owns in Boston, and we went hunting. We're willing to share if you're interested."

Wade was well aware of the skills of Lucien's best hacker. "How much is it going to cost me?"

"How much is your selkie's skin worth?" Lucien asked.

Wade worked his jaw, angry that they'd figured out his current weakness so quickly. "Not enough to bargain for things I don't own, but I'd be willing to pay for it."

It wasn't something he doubted Riordan would be happy about if he tried—him bargaining off territory that wasn't his to save the selkies. Every fight was always about territory when it came down to it. While Wade wouldn't act on behalf of the selkies or the Boston god pack, he'd certainly be willing to tear apart Niall's territory to find those things that didn't belong to the wannabe god.

"We'll never say no to money."

Wade sighed heavily. "Marek is going to be so pissed I'm funding terrorism, but sure, I'll bite. What exactly do I get in return?"

"The location where Niall keeps his hostages."

Wade took a step forward, letting his arms drop down to his sides. "You know where he's keeping Casey and Harper?"

"Yes."

"Do I want to know how you found out so quickly?" Wade narrowed his eyes. "You've been here longer than a few days, haven't you?"

"What I do isn't your business."

"Yeah, yeah, you're only in it for the money. Fine. How much for Casey and Harper's location? And by that, I mean where they're currently located, right now, for me to go rescue. None of this ‘you saw them last night, and they've been moved' business."

Carmen laughed. "Oh, you're learning to pick apart the details."

"Sage is a lawyer who works for the fae. Who do you think I learned it from?"

"A pity you learned it at all. The information will cost you one million dollars for each werewolf."

Wade winced but pulled out his phone. "You're that hard up for money?"

"No. We just like annoying your pack."

"Clearly."

Wade sent off another group text about the financial transaction he was about to do and then a separate one to Sage and Marek promising he'd babysit Lillian anytime they wanted to go out on a date as an apology for giving their accountant a headache. "Give me the routing number."

Doing business with Lucien always made Wade want a shower, and he resolved not to tell Ella what he was doing. Still, he got the information he needed once the money was transferred. Carmen's riding glove had a fingertip made with fabric that could track on a touchscreen. When she confirmed the money had been sent, she finally gave him something useful. "Niall owns a hotel downtown. One of those rebranded modern ones that he's putting the finishing touches on. It's slated to open in a few weeks for the height of summer season. Some of our vampires have seen him transporting one of the werecreatures there off and on."

"Casey, I'm guessing? You haven't seen Harper?"

"No, we haven't seen her."

"So you don't know she's there."

"You'll find out when you get there, won't you? But if Niall is keeping hostages, he'd do well to keep one under guard and under threat to keep the other in line. It's what we would do."

"Because hostage taking is such great business."

The corners of Carmen's eyes creased in a way that told Wade she was smirking at him. "It is for us."

Wade tilted his head, phone still in hand and banking app still accessible. "How much to have Biyu hack any security cameras at the hotel to make them go dark when I get there?"

At that, Carmen did laugh. "You have grown if you're thinking like Patrick."

"I'll take that as a compliment."

"It wasn't meant as one. We'll go half a million this time."

"Done."

If it meant he could do some casual breaking and entering without being on camera, so much the better. Wade transferred the additional funds and gave his phone number to Carmen.

"Biyu will call you when the security cameras are down," Carmen said.

Wade didn't question how she'd know when he arrived and just nodded. "Where is the hotel?"

Carmen rattled off the address and flipped down her visor, and then Lucien drove off with a window-rattling roar of his motorcycle. Wade didn't stick around, turning on his feet to run back to his car.

He still needed to find Saoirse's skin, but rescuing Casey and Harper was also something he had to do. And if he could get the pair of them out of Niall's clutches, then that was one less point of pressure for the supernatural and preternatural communities in Boston to worry about. It would also free up the Boston god pack to help the selkie clans fight against Niall.

So Wade made the choice to drive downtown rather than ransack Niall's home, following the GPS directions to the waterfront hotel in question. He parked a couple blocks away in a garage so he wouldn't have to worry about getting towed since he didn't know what was about to go down. All he knew was that if Casey and Harper were inside, he wasn't leaving without them.

He pulled on a baseball cap, stuck a pair of sunglasses on his nose, and started walking like he was a tourist out for a stroll. The hotel in question was easy enough to pick out once he got closer. The pier it sat on wasn't fenced off in any way, which probably meant construction was finished. Wade didn't see any heavy-duty equipment anywhere or construction workers, but the hotel was clearly not open yet. No taxis idled out front, no hotel workers manned the closed door, but the lights were on inside.

Wade clocked the numerous security cameras on the walk up. Before he could start to worry, his phone rang with an incoming call from an unknown number. He answered it, not slowing his stride. "Yeah?"

"The security cameras are down," Carmen said.

"Awesome. Never call me again."

Wade hung up, shoved his phone into his back pocket, and headed for the hotel's front doors. He didn't have a plan, exactly, other than to sniff out where Casey and Harper might be held inside. Magic was easy for him to detect, even if it didn't do anything to him. Hotels were public property though, which meant no threshold would stick, so all he'd have to worry about is whatever spells and wards Niall had set up inside that might make getting Casey and Harper out difficult and anyone on guard duty with guns or other kinds of weapons.

All of which he knew he could handle, even without his pack there with him.

Wade paused in front of the double doors, squinting through the glass at the empty but brightly lit lobby. He gripped one of the long door handles, braced his other hand against the adjacent door, and used his supernatural strength to yank it open, breaking the lock in the process. The glass cracked along the edges from the force of the pull but didn't shatter. Wade slipped inside, not sensing any magic yet in the immediate vicinity.

He breathed in deeply as he headed for the elevator bank, searching for the door that would lead to the stairwell people only ever really used in emergencies. His nostrils flared on his next breath, senses changing as he shifted mass ever so slightly. Everything became more —the lights were brighter, the colors more saturated, and the air smelled distinctly of the fae who had passed through, edged with that floral scent that spoke of magic.

And werecreatures.

"Bingo," he muttered.

Wade found the stairwell, and he slipped inside, not needing to break any locks this time. The hotel looked like it was eight stories high, probably restricted from going higher by the pier it was built on and to not interfere with other buildings' views. That still left eight floors that could contain any number of Niall's people and hopefully Casey and Harper.

He'd sniff them out.

Wade expanded his senses, parsing out the ones that didn't matter—bleach and cement and paint, ugh, so sharp—in favor of the almost floral scent that meant fae. It wasn't that they smelled like perfume but that they had an underlying woodsy, floral hint that lingered around them. He didn't know if it was because of their magic or what, but they were easy to pick out of a crowd, even without clocking their pointed ears and strange-colored hair and eyes. Almost as easy as the wet-fur smell of werecreatures.

Living in New York City, with its crush of people in Manhattan in particular, came with a plethora of scents. When Wade had first joined the pack, he'd gone for walks at Jono's behest, senses open, learning to differentiate and pick out particular scents and follow them to their origin. Enhanced senses weren't owned by one particular group, and dragons were very, very good at sniffing out magic and magical artifacts.

Like now.

No threshold would ever exist anywhere in the hotel's foundation, but that didn't mean someone couldn't cast magic in the area. Magic lingered in the air on the third floor, making his nose twitch. He also smelled the scent of werecreatures and blood, which pissed him off. It was never a good situation when people were bleeding.

Wade eyed the door on the third-floor landing for a moment before shrugging to himself. "What would Patrick do?"

Make a scene, which was exactly what Wade did.

He opened the door and waltzed into the hallway like he wasn't on a breaking-and-entering spree. He heard voices down the way and dialed up his hearing, his brain squeezing in the familiar way of translating language.

"—my turn to have some fun with the animal," a fae was saying in their language.

Wade bit back a growl and started to run rather than walk. He was pretty sure he tore through a couple of wards that felt like spiderwebs breaking across his body, but whatever magic they contained never touched him. One of them must have been some kind of alarm to notify its caster because when he reached the hotel room door in question, he didn't even need to knock. It was already opening.

"Oh, hey. Have you seen housekeeping? I need a spray bottle," Wade said.

The fae standing in the door stared at him with ugly orange eyes that widened. "How did you?—"

Wade didn't wait for the fae to finish speaking. He aimed an uppercut at the fae with all his strength—which was considerable when one was a dragon.

He tore the fae's head off with that punch, shattering bone and blood spraying through the air and staining his clothes as he shoved the door open and muscled past the falling body. He shook meaty bits off his hand and then had to dodge out of the way of another fae, nearly falling into the bathroom.

"Would you watch where you're going?" Wade shouted.

The fae reappeared in the doorway, magic crackling around their fingers. She was tall and icily beautiful, and Wade ruined everything about her when he roared out a fireball so hot it seared through her upper body in an instant. Wade was a fire dragon, and the fire he could produce even in human form was hotter than lava.

He stepped over the remains of that corpse and swung himself out of the bathroom and into the hotel room proper. Through the smell of charred flesh, the stinging scent of aconite finally hit his nose.

"She's not an animal," Wade snapped, glaring at the last remaining fae on guard duty.

They'd certainly treated Harper like one.

Someone had removed the bed, leaving an open space where Harper was chained to the wall by silver chains and cuffs. The carpet beneath her was stained with blood and would have to be replaced before the room was given to a guest. Her arms were covered in burns and whip marks, as was her torso that he could see through the shreds of her clothes, courtesy of the aconite-laced leather whip the fae standing near her held. The fae also held a gun, which was pointed at Wade.

"What are you?" the fae demanded, vibrant lime-green eyes wide in his face. His short hair was the same color, and paired with his brown skin, the whole look reminded Wade of a kiwi, just probably not as tasty.

"If I say your worst nightmare, is that too cliché?"

In answer, the fae pulled the trigger.

Wade shifted mass, bringing his scales to the forefront of his human form. The mass behind them he was prepared to shift into place would be enough to deflect the bullets. In full dragon form, regular bullets weren't even noticeable. It was missiles he'd have to watch out for, according to Reed, but Wade was a lot better these days at hiding from radar.

His scales were just in case any of the bullets got through the fire he spat at the fae. Jono always said to have a backup plan whenever he went into a fight. Jono always told Patrick the same thing, to which Patrick always quipped that Jono and the pack were his backup. Wade didn't have his pack with him, but he had all the teachings they'd given him over the last five years or so.

The fae went up in flames, and this time, the heat and smoke were enough to set off the sprinklers overhead. Water poured out in a spray as the fire alarm blared through the hotel in a piercing siren that had Wade immediately dialing down his hearing, because ow .

He hurried to Harper's side, kneeling next to her. She stared at him with badly bruised brown eyes, her dark hair matted in places from blood. "I need to touch you."

"Who are you?" she croaked.

"Wade, from the New York City god pack. Your dire found a workaround in the shitty bargain Niall forced on your pack. Can I touch you?"

Despite knowing they were running out of time, he kept his hands hovering over the aconite-laced silver shackles locked around her wrists that impeded her shifting. He didn't know what had been done to her beyond the obvious—being the unwilling punching bag for fae—but he wasn't about to trigger a breakdown with an unwanted touch.

Harper bared her teeth at him. Several were broken, and a couple in the front were gone completely. "Get me free."

Wade shifted a tiny bit more mass, and black talons erupted from his fingertips. Harper flinched, nostrils flaring. He gave her a tight smile, knowing everything about his true form was probably making her uncomfortable. "Sorry."

He carefully slid two talons between Harper's wrist and the cuff, not needing to exert much pressure to slice through the silver. Dragon strength helped with that, and he tossed the broken cuff aside before working to free Harper of the other. The moment she was free of them both, she scrambled away from the wall on shaky limbs, nearly face-planting on the carpet. Wade caught her, mindful of his hands, even if he couldn't be as mindful of her injuries as he'd like because he didn't know the full extent of them.

"We have to go. Can you shift?" he said as he shifted mass again to make his talons disappear. The scales covering his body sank back under his skin, giving no more hint of what he truly was.

"He'll kill Casey if I leave," Harper gasped out.

"I won't let him. Needing to help you both is why I came to Boston. Is Casey here?"

Harper shook her head. "Niall only brought him around to prove to Casey I was still alive. Casey was never held prisoner here."

Well, there went rescuing them both at the same time. "I'll look for him afterward, but you need to come with me. If you stay, you risk your pack."

Wade knew there was a chance he might not be able to keep that promise to her of getting Casey back. She had to know that too, but Harper proved why she was an alpha when she swore before saying, "Okay. Let's go. I can't shift though. Too much aconite poisoning."

That was never good. Wade took a second to pry the fire opal ring off his finger and put it on one of Harper's. "Fae magic, but the good kind. It'll keep you safe while I get us out of here."

She still shuddered, but he couldn't tell if that was her probably newfound aversion to fae magic or the fact he most likely jostled some injuries when he lifted her bridal style in his arms. He could see the magic wrapping around her, the scent of it reminding him of órlaith. He knew Harper wouldn't find it comforting, but Wade did.

The water pouring down on them was freezing. He stepped over the corpses and out of the hotel room, pitching them both down the hallway at a fast run that he hoped wouldn't hurt Harper too much. He pushed that bit of self through his aura that would make people look away, vision sparkling a little at the edges from a glow only he could see. It was a trick that helped him hide from radar when flying at night and could make people not see him in certain instances, whether in human or dragon form.

It wasn't completely foolproof. He couldn't force millions of people to not see him if he flew during the day, but in moments like this, it worked. They made it to the elevator bank when the doors to the stairwell there slammed open. Wade backpedaled and got him and Harper up against the wall as soundlessly as he could, holding his breath as soaked fae raced by with supernatural speed toward the hotel room, arguing with each other in their language.

Wade glanced down at Harper, seeing she was biting her split lip so hard the skin was white, and it was bleeding again as she tried to hold back an exclamation of pain. She smelled a little like fear and anger to his nose right then, which he couldn't blame her for.

After the last fae passed them, Wade moved to catch the closing door with his foot, shoving it back open so he could swing them around into the stairwell. The fire alarm hadn't stopped, and neither had the sprinklers. He honestly hoped all the water damage ruined the hotel. It would be too much to hope that the first responders would discover the room Harper had been held prisoner in. Wade knew the fae would probably use glamour to hide all the evidence of their wrongdoings, giving an illusion of a regular hotel room.

He wished they'd get caught, but if it took eating Niall to make him pay for what he did, then Wade would gladly take one for the team.

Harper was stiff in his arms by the time he made it to the ground floor, the jostling not helping her wounds any. He wanted to ask if there was anyone with her god pack who handled healing but bit back the question. They weren't in the clear yet.

Which was made abundantly apparent when he hauled open the door to the first-floor elevator bank and came face-to-face with a group of fae heading toward them, probably looking to head up the way they'd just come. The door opening meant they looked , and Wade knew it would be a fight to keep them from not seeing him.

So he took a deep breath and let out a roar full of fire that scorched the entire area in front of him—including all the fae. The magic in the ring flared up crystal-white around Harper, protecting her from the heat as Wade burned to ash everything around them. He heard someone shout from farther away, and he scowled, sharp teeth catching on his lips.

"Fuck it. Hold on," Wade warned.

He ran, the world blurring with the speed he put into his stride. The shield held, protecting them from the flying glass of the front doors that he crashed through to get outside. The fire department hadn't arrived yet, but the piercing sounds of sirens in the distance were getting closer. Police and the fire department were on their way, and he wanted to be anywhere else but on the hotel grounds.

Wade didn't stop running until he made it to the rental car a couple of blocks away, skidding to a stop in the garage so hard he ended up falling up against the side of the car from the sudden lack of motion. "Sorry, sorry!"

Harper grunted softly. "It's fine."

"You know, my alpha says the same thing when he's bleeding like you are, and none of us ever believe him." Harper managed a sound that might have been a chuckle, but it turned into a pained huff when Wade finally put her on her feet. She wobbled for a moment, breathing fast and hard as if she'd been the one running. Wade reached past her to grab the car door and open it for her. "Come on. I know a bunch of people who have missed you."

Harper flinched a little, but the relief that flowed across her face was something Wade understood. There was nothing like the feeling of being free.

He helped her into the car, got her buckled up, and then scrambled behind the steering wheel to start the engine. As much as he wanted to careen out of the parking garage and speed away, he knew that would only draw attention to them. So he didn't speed out of the parking garage, paid the ticket rather than bust through the gate, and pulled into the street. He was trying to connect his phone to the car's system while watching the road when Harper swiped it out of his hand.

"You don't know where you're going, do you?" she asked.

"If this was Manhattan, I would."

She side-eyed him with her bruised eyes while plugging in his phone. "You pack a lot of fire power. Literally."

"They deserved it. They probably deserved more, but I was in a hurry."

She tapped at the screen on the dash, her home already one of the top choices, considering Wade had been driving between that address, his hotel, and Riordan's home for the past few days. "Is my pack okay? Niall hasn't done anything to them?"

"Niall is a bastard, and he's pissed off a lot of people. He is currently being hunted by two master vampires and their Night Courts."

Harper stilled, fingers resting against the screen. "Two? Boston only has one."

"Yeah," Wade drawled, keeping his eyes on the road. "Lucien was taking a vacation and stopped by to say hi to Abby Boy. Niall thought that would be a good time to drop in for a visit, and guess what? The bastard made things worse for himself, which is a nice change of pace."

" Lucien is in Boston? The daywalker ?"

"Yup. And now you know why Niall's little hostile takeover got derailed." Wade glanced at her and shook his head at the concern he saw on her face. "Don't worry. My pack has dealt with Lucien before. He's not going to stick around, and I paid for all the information, not your pack."

Harper pressed her fingertips carefully to her forehead, as if she had a headache. "You paid Lucien for information?"

"Well, I paid him to get us an introduction to Abby Boy to ask that master vampire to go after Niall. Neither of them was interested until Niall attacked the Green Fairy."

Harper covered her face with both hands and groaned. "Niall is really going after everyone, isn't he? He wants Boston."

"Yeah. Anything I should know about that? Did you maybe overhear where he might be keeping Casey?"

Harper leaned back against the seat, paused to recline it as flat as it would go, and sighed as she stretched out. She was shorter than Wade, built tiny, reminding him of Emma in that way. "The fae think of us as animals. Niall talked around me, not at me, but not about anything I'd consider important. He did say that if I tried to escape, he'd feed Casey to a sea monster."

Wade tilted his head, Riordan's warning about a threat in the sea ringing through his mind. "Out in the bay? Lady Caith warned us there's something in the sea."

"That ice queen finally came out of her redbrick tower to help us mere mortals? I find that difficult to believe."

"We went to warn her about Niall and asked for help. She didn't really seem inclined to join the fight."

"We? You and Ella?"

"No, me and Riordan."

"Ah. Niall did mention he had a selkie's skin in his possession."

Wade immediately perked up at that. "I'm guessing it's too much to hope that he bragged about how he stole it and where he hid it?"

"Sorry. He only mentioned he had it. How's my pack?"

"Uh, good? Ella has kept them safe."

"You said she asked your pack for help?"

"Yeah, Niall forbade her and anyone else in the Boston god pack from asking for help from anyone within the city. He placed a geas on everyone so they can't talk about what he's done, but the loophole meant she could request aid from people outside Boston. So she did, and here I am."

"Thank you," Harper said after a moment, her voice quiet and full of emotion Wade pretended he couldn't smell.

"No thanks needed. It's what pack does."

She nodded before finally removing the ring he'd given her. "Here. This is yours."

Wade took it and put it back on. Conversation lapsed after that, and the silence stayed between them until Wade pulled up in front of Harper's home in the god pack territory. He'd barely put the car into park when the front door to the house slammed open and several blurs streaked outside. One of the blurs resolved itself into Ella, and she yanked open the passenger-side door so hard she shook the car.

"Hey, watch it!" Wade yelped. "This is a rental!"

Ella ignored him in favor of her alpha. " Harper !"

At least she unbuckled the seat belt rather than rip it off. Ella carefully gathered Harper into her arms and picked her up out of the car with supernatural strength. Her eyes were shining with tears, and Wade could see other god pack members leaving their homes down the street and hurrying toward them.

"Hey," Harper croaked, beaming at her pack as they crowded in close. "I missed you all."

Wade couldn't see her anymore, not in the crush of werecreatures gathering in the front yard. He leaned over the middle console and cleared his throat. "She needs some potions to reverse aconite poisoning. She won't be able to shift until it's cleared her system. Niall had her chained up in his hotel that hasn't opened yet."

The crowd of werecreatures parted until he could see Ella, who was still holding Harper, her eyes as watery as Harper's had been in the car. " Thank you."

"Do you have somewhere safe to go to ground with her until I can find Casey?"

"Yes."

"Good. Don't tell me."

Ella cracked a smile. "I thought you'd be with Riordan today."

"I was. I'm heading back there right now, and then I'll search for Casey. I think I know where he might be or at least where Niall might take him. If I'm right, then I need the selkies to help me."

"Is he being kept on the islands in the bay?"

"It's a possibility I need to check out. Right now, take care of your alpha."

Ella nodded, mouth firming. "We will. Call me when you need backup. You aren't going after Casey alone. Some of the pack has boats."

"You can't swim."

"We're better on land than the selkies, and if he's on any of the islands, we'll find him."

"Got it. I'll keep you updated."

One of the werecreatures closed the passenger door for him, and Wade unlocked the brakes and pulled into the street. He left the Boston god pack to their reunion with one of their alphas and added Riordan's address back into the GPS. Without Harper in the car, he drove a little faster, wanting to get back to Riordan's home to see if the selkies had left yet. He hadn't received a text from them about where they were going, but he hoped Riordan might take him up on the offer of a hotel room.

Wade was optimistic right up until he saw the curl of black smoke twisting through the sky.

"Oh no, no, no ," Wade said, stomach sinking.

It could be someone else's home on fire, but Wade was of the Patrick Collins school of thought that coincidences never happened.

He pressed down harder on the gas pedal, wanting to go faster but knowing he couldn't go too far above the speed limit and risk getting pulled over or accidentally hitting someone. The smoke grew larger in his field of vision as he drew closer to the residential area where Riordan lived. When he turned onto L Street, he could see farther down that police had blocked off the intersection at the corner where Maguire's Pub was located.

" Shit ."

L Street was narrow, and most of the parking was taken. There was one spot at the corner where plastic poles had been set up to discourage parking in the area. Directly behind it was a spot that Wade could fit in, but only if he ran over one of the poles.

He ran over the pole.

Wade pitched himself out of the car, ignoring the police officer who yelled at him to get back as he careened toward the corner.

"I live there!" Wade shouted, lying through his teeth.

He put on a burst of supernatural speed to evade the police officer, dialing his hearing up. Doing so enabled him to hear the Maguire siblings frantically arguing with EMS who were trying to look after them and—yeah, that was definitely Lady Caith. All of them had been corralled some distance from the burning house.

Wade skidded to a halt beside the group. "What the hell happened?"

Heads snapped around to look at him, but Saoirse was the first to speak, voice cracking when she did so. "They're in the trunk!"

No question about what she was talking about.

"Okay," Wade said. "Stay here."

" Wade —" Riordan said, reaching for him.

But he was already racing past them, dodging past firefighters who shouted at him to stop, and ran into the burning building.