Shadowmated, p.9
Shadowmated, page 9
“Better than snowed in,” Orion answered, his gaze almost meeting mine in one of the mirrors before skittering away.
“Yes,” Maya agreed, “a snowstorm would be tricky during a Texas summer.”
My internal emptiness made the siblings’ banter less amusing than it would otherwise have been. Or perhaps I’d just run out of patience. Either way, I broke into their conversation. “We could try to climb out…”
“No,” Orion and Maya countered together.
“Too dangerous,” Orion added on his own this time.
“Not unless it’s necessary,” Maya agreed.
“…Or,” I continued, ignoring their objections, “you could take the stairs. You have Celeste’s keycard and the backup tracking device.”
“On it,” Maya was all business now. “I assume you want me to plant the tracker and retreat since Hailey will be guarding Celeste alone?”
“Yes,” I agreed. Hailey could handle solo protection duty. Still, better not to test that fact.
While I was worrying about my sister, Orion was doling out over-protective instructions to a sibling of his own. “Pull up my number so I’m easy to call if you run into trouble,” he demanded. “You won’t have backup, but Elspeth and I can find a way to get there if necessary.”
“I’m not the younger sibling,” Maya groused, but I knew she’d obey him. After all, Orion was her alpha. And I could taste the tug of their pack bond, their joint urge to hunt, filling the confined space of the elevator car.
The taste twisted emptiness inside me, rekindling feelings I’d only recently managed to sublimate. Was it merely air-conditioning that turned my extremities into ice blocks? No. It was the knowledge that I was completely alone…
Then Orion’s warm hands enclosed my cold fingers. He chaffed my digits between his palms, forcing my focus onto the physicality of the friction. “The tattoos are being manipulative,” he observed, “but this is good. We need to talk.”
“Talk?” All I could seem to do was stare at his lips. Why were they so far from mine? Why were only our hands touching?
“The Big Misunderstanding is my least favorite romance trope,” Orion continued, as if my one-word mumble had been a coherent answer. “So I’ll say it again even though I’ve said it before. I’m not giving you space because of a lack of attraction. Our physical connection is undeniable. But our commitment needs to be based on more than that.”
I swallowed and managed to get multiple words out this time even though they felt like saw blades in my throat. “Because I chose you for the wrong reasons last time. Because I broke a pack bond last night and this thing”—I waved my hands between us—“is trying to fill in the void.”
Orion nodded as if he really did understand how the emptiness kept trying to push me to form a new connection without thinking the repercussions through first. Then he shuffled a little closer until our knees just barely touched.
When had we sunk down to kneel on the floor rather than standing facing the doors that weren’t going to open anytime soon? I tried to clear my mind with very little luck.
“That and because I know my own weaknesses,” Orion answered, his earnestness as sweet as his aroma of cactus flowers. “I’m afraid of losing you,” he admitted, “which makes me want to force a bond before you’re ready. Have you ever planted a fruit tree?”
Despite the intensity of the moment, I smiled. With Orion, conversations often circled back around to gardening. Since fruit trees felt less loaded than the previous topic, I shook my head and waited for him to elaborate.
“When you set out a new sapling in your orchard,” he rumbled, “it doesn’t quite know what to do with itself. It might bloom right away, but the nursery staff inevitably cut away roots when they dug it up. So the tree’s foundation isn’t strong enough to support fruiting.”
“You’re saying I’m a newly planted apple tree?”
Orion shrugged. “I just know that pinching off blooms the first year or two is the right move there. It won’t hurt us to pinch off a few blooms.”
I got what he was saying, but the yearning inside me felt far more imperative. We were already touching. It would be so easy to rekindle the matebrand, to wake up the remaining tattoos and tap into something powerful…
“Did I ever tell you my mother was a sex worker?”
The subject change dragged me back into the real world just as Orion had intended it to. I shook my head, rethinking the story he’d told me about his ungrounded childhood. “Was that why your alpha didn’t give you and Maya a real home after your mother died?”
“No, that’s why he let our mother stay in the first place. I was never granted permission to call Chief Wells father, but I do share half his DNA.”
My eyebrows drew together. “That means…” Perhaps the yearning was messing with my thought processes even more than I’d considered. Because I’d already known that Chief Wells was Donovan’s father. This new information meant Donovan and Orion were half-brothers rather than merely close friends. And since Maya was Orion’s sister…
“Maya was born before our mother met Chief Wells. Her father…” Orion shook his head. “Unknown. But not Donovan’s father.”
Well, that was a relief. And also—
“Then Maya could be my blood sister.” The words came out before I had time to think them through. But they tasted right on my tongue. After all, the poem hadn’t definitively said my sister would be the one doing the betraying. It had just wrapped her existence up inside the prophecy. And if someone was my sister, I’d far rather it be Maya than Gabi.
On the other hand, if Maya was forecast to be compelled against her will…now seemed like a very likely moment for that to happen.
“She’s alone in enemy territory,” I started, tamping down emptiness as blood began pounding in my eardrums.
Orion was already on his feet, pulling me to mine before eying the ceiling tiles. “Looks like we’re about to change this stuck-in-an-elevator trope from romance to action-adventure after all.”
Climbing up an elevator shaft had been one of my lessons as a teenager, one Celeste hadn’t been invited to take part in. At the time, I’d thought I was going to die as Gabi critiqued my form yet offered no assistance. Now, I was more sure of myself and I also had Orion by my side.
So it was easier than I expected to settle my brain as we scoped out the pitch-black elevator shaft from the edge of the opening we’d hoisted ourselves out of. Dim lighting shone up through the gap where a ceiling tile had rested, casting eerie shadows on Orion’s face while the oily scent of lubricant cut through his signature aroma. But his eyes sparkled as he considered the ledge roughly eight feet above us, visible through the darkness only because of our shifter eyes.
“Lucky break,” I murmured, noticing the same thing he had. The insides of elevator shafts were usually smooth, but whoever designed this one must have wanted to make it easier for maintenance workers to navigate. So they’d added a ledge just large enough for someone to stand on at the base of each door leading to a hall.
“I’ll give you a boost,” Orion suggested, gaze flicking to the gap between the elevator car and the wall. He was obviously doing the same math I was. The first one up would have the safer go of it, guided by a partner. The second one…well, if they didn’t make the solo leap, it would be a long way down.
“No,” I countered. “I wouldn’t be able to pull you up after me.” And that was the only way out—for both of us to make it onto the ledge, to pry the door open, then to find a stairwell.
I half expected Orion to go alpha and refuse to allow me to take on the more dangerous role. Instead, he nodded. “You boost me then.”
As he spoke, Orion was already shedding clothes, handing over each garment so I could tie it around my waist or tuck it about my person. He clearly intended to cross the distance in lupine form, which made sense even though his claws would have just as much trouble gaining traction on the metal as Ari’s had swiveling onto that ledge back in Prince’s territory.
In other words, Orion was about to take a very real risk. Still, it was hard to remain focused on the upcoming danger when the warm fabric he passed over smelled like him. Like cactus flowers and the heat of the desert.
Perhaps that’s why his next words didn’t reawaken the emptiness inside me even though he referred directly to my packless state. “You were a lone wolf before Vega. How did you handle it then?”
“I had Celeste and Gabi.” The fact I had neither now, not really, hung in the air between us. Gabi had never actually been a friend, while Celeste and I were no longer quite what we’d been.
Rather than providing trite condolences, Orion shifted, the electricity rolling off him like, yet unlike, what had sparked from the elevator keypad just before it ground to a halt. For my part, I stuck out a knee, opening my arms and preparing myself. Orion’s claws would be sharp and I didn’t want him to notice my pain when he made contact. Knowing him, he’d pull back if I flinched, and that could make him miss the ledge…
I was breathing too fast, terrified for a different reason than I’d been when climbing my first elevator shaft with Gabi. Then, I’d been scared of falling. Now, I was scared Orion might do so. Would do so if I couldn’t maintain my equanimity as he turned my body into a staircase.
Pain is only pain, I told myself, bracing for claws as Orion backed up then ran toward me.
Only, Orion must have somehow managed to shift his hands and feet just the tiniest bit human. Because his paws were as soft as a cat’s when they struck my leg, my chest, my shoulder…
Then he was perched on the ledge above me. First as a wolf, then as a man. He appeared to be feeling around for a handhold, or rather a foothold. Whatever he ended up looping his legs through, it enabled him to dangle his entire upper body over the emptiness.
I wanted to tell him to be careful, but I wanted more to get him away from the drop. So I readied myself to leap up, to grab his hands…
…and his phone vibrated where I’d stashed it in my pocket. I took it out, glanced at the screen, then bit my lip.
“It’s Maya,” I told the alpha dangling upside down above me.
He drew himself upright without using his hands. “Answer it.”
I was already swiping. Only, it wasn’t his sister—my sister?—whose voice came through the speakers. Instead, it was a male voice, the words so muffled I couldn’t make out his identity.
“Put down your weapons.”
“I don’t have any weapons.” That was Maya, also muffled. It sounded like she’d placed the call while her phone was stashed about her person, layers of clothing blocking sound waves.
Something smacked against her cell phone. Then a different male voice observed, “She’s clear.”
If I had to guess, Maya had just been patted down. The cell phone must have been ignored since it wasn’t immediately dangerous…or at least so her captors thought.
“A wolf,” continued the original voice, “doesn’t travel alone with no defenses.”
It was the way he said wolf that clued me in to his identity. He’d twisted the word so many times when referring to my own nature. When referring to what he knew was his biological daughter’s hidden nature.
My teeth sharpened inside my mouth and it was all I could do not to growl. Even from eight feet away, I could smell Orion’s identical reaction.
Because Maya had been captured by the very man I’d been raised to consider a father. Julius LeBlanc.
Chapter 15
“You really think my alpha won’t track me?” Maya said, snapping me and Orion out of the protective rage that had momentarily consumed us.
Track. She was telling us that the backup device we’d intended to plant in Gabi’s work shoes was still on her person. In other words, even if Maya was taken far enough away so Orion couldn’t use the pack bond to find her, we could simply open the app on his phone and figure out where she’d gone.
Assuming Julius didn’t seize that phone while we listened and realize what Maya was up to. My finger hovered over the end-call button, held back from tapping only by the grunt of pain that emerged from the speakers.
I didn’t know Maya well enough to identify the cry as hers, but Orion’s reaction confirmed my guesswork. He began prying at the doors to the hallway with his bare hands…no, with hands that ended in lupine claws. A sliver of light shone through the crack, then disappeared as he jolted, lost his balance, wobbled over inky blackness…
He was going to fall. I clenched my fist around the microphone, hoping that was enough to keep Maya’s captors from hearing as I called up to him. “Orion!”
For an endless moment, he swayed over darkness. Then his hand shot out and closed around a cable running up one side of the elevator shaft. Head bowed, he spoke to his own feet, feet that were once again grounded on the ledge. “I lost Maya from the pack bond.”
Which is when the elevator dinged beneath me. “Penthouse,” the robotic voice inside informed nobody.
Could we hope the programming was merely waking back up and remembering its original destination? Unlikely after such an extended outage. No, Julius intended to use the elevator to move Maya, which presented a whole slew of problems. Not least of which was anyone on the roof of the elevator getting smooshed at the end of the ride.
Beneath my feet, the car began moving. The ascent started slow, lifting me closer to the ledge Orion had worked so hard to get to. And he reached out his hand toward me, offering to assist my balance as I stepped across the gap to join him. That would deal with the smooshing problem at least.
But I couldn’t take the step. Right now, Julius assumed Maya’s backup had no clue she’d been taken. If the elevator arrived at Gabi’s apartment lacking a ceiling panel, she’d be searched, the tracker removed, her safety compromised.
No, we needed the element of surprise at our disposal. Especially if Maya was unconscious or…
I refused to finish that thought. Instead, I forced myself to end the phone call that had gone eerily silent. Then I hopped down into the car, unsurprised when the thud of heavier feet on the ceiling suggested Orion had undone all of our earlier work and joined me.
“Ambush from inside the elevator?” he asked, his upper body angling down through the opening.
I shook my head while punching every button on the keypad. “Too many weapons at their disposal. Too few at ours.”
The better move would be forcing Julius into the more ambushable stairwell, or at least keeping his guard down so we could strike later. Stopping the elevator was an integral step in making either of those eventualities happen. Unfortunately, my efforts with the keypad were having no effect.
No surprise since Gabi had smugly informed me years ago that penthouse access superseded calls to all other levels.
Giving up, I began struggling to hoist the ceiling panel up through the gap it had come out of, using only one hand since I was reluctant to release the phone just in case I was wrong and Maya was able to place another call. If we couldn’t stop the elevator, we needed it to arrive empty and apparently undamaged…
Then Orion was beside me. He turned the unwieldy panel at a diagonal and tossed it through the hole in the ceiling. Which left me trying not to notice how many floors had already flown past.
Twenty. Twenty-one. Twenty-two. There were mere seconds left. I had to accept that Maya wasn’t calling. That the uncertainty of her survival couldn’t impact my current actions.
Emptiness tried to curl inside me, but I swallowed it down while dropping the phone back into my pocket. Tried to act like a wolf who lived only in the moment as I accepted Orion’s leg up before helping him fit the ceiling tile back into place.
Now it truly was pitch dark in the elevator shaft. The distance above us was unknown, air whipping past my face and the mental image of steel girders at the top impossible to ignore.
Recklessness tugged at me. Maya was in danger. Maya might be my sister. We needed to do something…
There was a sweet spot between acting like a wolf and foregoing all planning. So I used the phone’s flashlight mode to illuminate the walls surging past but I didn’t bother looking up. There’d be time. There had to be.
“Two ledges from now,” I warned Orion, giving him time to work his head around what I was suggesting but no time to argue. “If we’re fast, there’s space to push ourselves flat against the inner door and let the elevator pass.”
“Good thing we had a very light lunch,” Orion rumbled, taking my hand in his.
There was no hesitation as we stepped off into darkness together. For one split second, though, I thought the elevator was going to grab onto the clothing I’d tucked around myself and forgotten to secure. But Orion’s arm pushed me flat against the cool metal of the door to the hallway. He’d placed himself between me and danger, the slow rise and fall of his breathing as palpable against my back as the whoosh of the elevator as it flew by.
Then it was gone. Orion released me and began prying at the door that steadfastly refused to open. Above us, the wheeze of the elevator slowing was followed by the whoosh of doors and the tap of boots on metal as someone—Julius?—stepped inside.
Not just Julius. There were at least three sets of feet up there. Did one set belong to Maya, or had she been slung over a shoulder? I refused to think she might have been left behind, blood pooling around her as she lay on the floor of Gabi’s apartment, dying or already dead.
The elevator inched down then picked up speed. It flew past us with Orion’s body still shielding mine, then dropped deeper and deeper into the well of darkness.
“You think it went all the way to the garage level?” Orion rumbled after the sound had faded.
I’d been counting seconds. Doing math in my head. I nodded. “I think so.”
Without further commentary, Orion pulled up the tracking app on his cell phone. At first, it told us nothing since the map only boasted horizontal axes, no way of displaying the vertical.
