He knew my name? Why? How?
If he knew me, then…this wasn’t random. My abduction had a purpose.
I–
Panic flooded through me as I remembered.
I was on my way to see Will. Will was in trouble. I needed to get out of here. Will trusted me enough to tell me he needed my help alone and I–
He sat and my thoughts stalled. His elbow landed lightly on the top of the desk and he rested his chin atop his palm.
“You won’t be escaping, Ms. Blakeley.” He grinned. “To be honest, I didn’t think it would be so easy to catch you, considering your lineage.”
My…
Lineage.
He meant my parents. Or, more specifically, Alpha Animiya Blakeley.
That’s who he was talking about. My other mother, Miyra wasn’t as, well, she wasn’t a fighter. But she was a Norcell. They were the leading pack of all shifters. They had been for years.
Still, Animiya Blakeley was practically famous, but not in the kind of way where you’d want to meet her. She was like an untouchable legendary hero, type of person. She was the one people talked about, but were careful not to do something to upset her and end up on her bad side. It was like the way people knew of criminals, famous but not in a way that they’d ever plan to meet up with them. My mom wasn’t a criminal, it was just a similar kind of existence with her fame.
She was a hero.
A real hero.
And… she could kill you in two seconds flat, if she so desired. She could break all of your bones, without using her powers, but if she did use them, you wouldn’t have bones… you’d have shards of bones. Shattered bones.
She was that powerful.
One look in her eyes and you could end up halfway across the world without any knowledge of her existence or how you got there.
She was a threat, if you threatened her.
But she was also kind, though that wasn’t the side most people knew about. Just our pack. Just our people. Our friends…
Family.
Well, mostly.
This guy wasn’t referring to kind, though. And he wasn’t kidding around. He knew my full name. He knew my Mom. He knew…
Everything?
Why though? Why take the daughter of one of the most terrifying and powerful wolf shifters on the continent?
What could he ever hope to gain from that?
He’d just end up dead.
That is… if Mom found me… wherever this place existed.
I gulped.
The gun. Was I bait so that he could kill whoever it was I was supposed to lure here? Did he really think he could kill Mom, even if he had a gun?
“Why am I here?”
He laughed. I made a disgusted face before I could stop myself. That was like a stereotypical evil villain laugh. Was that his normal one or was he doing it on purpose?
Well, either way, it didn’t make me feel better. Him laughing at my question… was embarrassing. I felt dumb. Stupid. Like I was supposed to know what was happening, but I didn’t. I didn’t even know who he was, let alone any of his motives.
I could feel my hands getting cold while the rest of me got uncomfortably warm. Sweating kind of warm. Anxious and sweating kind of warm.
Why is he still laughing?
Why… why would anyone laugh this long at that question?
Should I already know the answer? Was it that obvious? Or is it how I said it?
Isn’t that what you say in this kind of situation?
I curled my hands into fists despite the pain from straining against the ropes, just to try and stop the shaking.
He stood, stepping around the desk and closer.
Closer.
Closer.
Uncomfortably close.
Ugh.
He crouched down, right in front of my chair and tilted his head.
“You got my note.”
The words I least expected to hear.
Note?
This was about a note?
The heck?
A freaking note?
“Huh?”
Wait.
His note. He said his.
What note?
“I didn’t get a note from you.”
I didn’t even know this guy’s name, let alone got a note from him. Much less, respond to it. That was I liked to call ‘mail from strangers’. I threw that crap out. That stuff had abductions and manipulation written all over it… not that I got any of those anyway. But if I did, I would.
“If you hadn’t, you wouldn’t be here right now.”
He reached a hand into his pocket and I froze, somehow expecting it to be another gun or weapon of some kind. Heck, even silver, despite the fact that silver would burn him too, as he was a wolf shifter like me.
Ugh. Like me.
Bleh.
I wanted no association with him. I didn’t even want to be put in the same species as him.
A letter was in his hand.
Immediately, ignoring my better judgement, I tried to reach for it upon seeing familiar handwriting on it. The rope held me back, but he made a tsk noise and shook his free index finger at me.
As I watched, his face grew darker and I grew stiller. The air seemed to get colder by the second, and goosebumps rose up on my arms even as I felt sickly warm.
He waved the letter in the air and stood back to his full height. He towered over me, making me out to be an ant under his boot. Small. Defenseless.
“You got my note.”
He smiled, his mouth growing ever wider as I worked through my confusion, fear suddenly gripping me.
“You… but Will–”
“Yes. And no.”
“What are you answering?” I growled out. “I didn’t finish my questions aloud.”
“You didn’t need to.”
I glared at him.
I had been foolish, hadn’t I? I sneered at the man in front of me, putting on my brave face when I felt most terrified. He would regret this. Somehow.
For some reason, my mind took this moment to remind me of all the terrible things I had done and said. I had told Jane that letters were stupid, yet I couldn’t wait to get one from him. Yes, unbeknownst to her, I actually enjoyed getting letters. God forbid I enjoy letters.
I just had a hard time being vulnerable, about... well, anything. Everything? Except when it came to Will. He was the only exception it seemed. He’d seen me cry. He’d just stumbled upon me the one time when we were just kids. Sure, he’d been surprised. But then, he’d just sat there, in the silence and held his hand out to me. I’d grabbed it tentatively. He squeezed it lightly.
Eventually, he pulled me to my feet and hugged me for a minute before walking off.
He’d never told anyone. I hadn’t made him promise. I hadn’t asked it of him, yet it was like he knew I needed it.
A letter from him was like a letter from an angel.
Now, this man, had the letter that was written to me by Will… and he claimed that he’d written it – that it was his note.
How?
How was that even possible?
It wasn’t.
So, why even try to make such a claim?
Will was in trouble… and I’d found myself in trouble before I could reach him.
He reached forward to caress my cheek with his hand and I flinched back away from him, turning my head out of his reach. I heard his noise of displeasure but ignored it. I didn’t even look at him.
“William Blackstone,” he cooed ever so softly. “He didn’t write this.”
My gaze snapped back to his.
What?
“And this? This is just one copy. He’ll find the other one. So yes, he is in trouble, just not yet. And not at the specified location.”
Not in trouble… yet?
A copy?
Will didn’t…
As it all came into focus, I felt rage fill me. How dare he.
“What? Why are you doing this?” I asked. “What do you want with Will? What do I have to do with it?”
“A new age.” The man walked back to the desk, the letter still in his hand. He turned back to me once he reached the place he desired to be. “I’m doing this to give us a restart, of sorts. Everything I need, he has,” he told me, in what I suspected he thought was a soothing tone. It wasn’t. “And everything he wants…”
Even if his voice made me feel everything else besides content or calm, his words stuck with me, swirling in my mind.
Everything Will wants? Wants? Will wants… what exactly?
How would he know what Will wants?
I almost said it, but I refrained from doing so, keeping my mouth shut, holding my breath, holding back a tremble which threatened to manifest on my lips. He tilted his head like he was trying to be an adorable puppy or something. It clearly didn’t work. Everything he did was just plain creepy.
“Everything… is right here.”
He gestured to the room. This shabby… room? That was everything Will wanted? Doubtful. It was literally the most ridiculous thing I’d ever heard.
Who the hell would want this place?
Definitely not Will.
He'd want a t-shirt before he'd want this.
“Huh?”
To say I was confused, was an understatement. To say I didn’t feel comfortable being confused in this guy’s presence… well, it went way beyond that. I felt like he was doing the equivalent of dangling food in front of a starving dog who couldn’t reach it. He’d bring it closer, then pull back, over and over, just a hair closer than the last time, ripping the hope from the poor dog who kept fighting for more, only to get starved and die.
I was the dog.
I didn’t want to be a dog in this scenario.
Heck the scenario itself bordered on the line of crazy.
To hell with what Will wanted at the moment – I wanted to get out of here and never see this guy again!
But first, since I couldn’t exactly escape… I wanted to know what the heck was going on and why he felt the need to talk in riddles around me. Maybe it was just his way of talking. Maybe he was taunting me on purpose to make me feel weaker.
Who knew?
But I cared.
Then, slowly, he reached down and grabbed a second paper, folded crisply like the other letter had been, and raised them both up for me to see. He waved the new one, a smirk on his lips.
“This? Was his. He wrote this one.”
“What?” I asked it before I could stop myself. I wasn’t ever good at keeping my mouth shut, no matter the words that wanted to tumble out. “I don’t understand. Why would he write you?” I spit out. This man was out of his mind. “I don’t even know who you are! And Will? What would he want that’s here, in this rundown building? What could you possibly have that he’d want?!”
I wanted to hit a nerve. I wanted him to feel backed into a corner. But it didn’t take. He just smiled, just laughed harder, stepping back around the desk.
“You’ve forgotten something, something very important to you.”
Good god. Cryptic riddles again.
Gross.
Just spit it out.
Annoyed, I shrugged my shoulders.
“What do you mean by that?”
“I mean, that I had my son make you forget.” He leaned closer to me. I could smell his breath. It was rancid. I could puke. “And it pains dear William so.”
“What? What did you do?” I held back on the last question that threatened to spill from my mouth. I held back as the silence continued. It was like he knew. I felt myself whisper it more than heard it. “Why does it hurt him?”
“Just a brief moment.”
“A moment? And I was with Will?”
He nodded.
But… What could I have forgotten? With Will? I forgot a memory from when I was with Will? Why? Why was it important that I forget it?
“That’s the only way to push his buttons.”
“What? Push his buttons? How? WHY?!”
First, he tells me I fell right into his trap.
Then, he spews nonsense about having something Will wants.
Oh, and then, he has Will’s original letter, not the fake one.
After that, he decides to tell me that he forced me to forget something and that something hurts Will?
What was this guy on?
Ugh.
He leaned even closer, right into the last line of defense of my personal bubble. I didn’t want to see that his teeth were yellow, that brushing his teeth wasn’t important to him. He obviously hadn’t done it in a while. Ugh. The smell got worse. I wanted to gag, but I held back, continuing to glare at him.
“You.”
It was all he said at first. But the follow-up to his words brought back the chill to my whole body.
“He’ll come for his dear friend, won’t he?”
I blanched.
“You’re saying…I’m what he’s going to come here for? That… that you wrote the letter I got and made it look like he was the one who sent it… and then he’ll…”
He had a gun. This guy had a gun.
If I was bait, and he wanted Will to come here…
It meant he wanted to hurt him.
I was being used to bring harm to Will.
The nauseous feeling that hit me now was totally different from before. This was internal. This was in my mind, not my nose. I couldn't speak, my throat clogged with invisible and undeniable fear.
“Ah.” He clicked his tongue and pulled back. “I almost forgot. You had another question.” His hands slammed down on the armrests, startling me into jumping in my seat. “My name.”
The second he said that, like he was going to tell me his name, I suddenly had the urge to not know, to do anything to not know who it was keeping me captive here. But I already knew, deep down. I’d heard his name before.
This was...
This was that guy.
Him.
Anyone but him…
“It’s Myrus,” he told me.
Sometimes, it was a real pain being right.
A knot swelled tighter in my throat and I blinked, trying to keep tears from falling from my eyes.
Yeah.
I’d heard that name before.
A lot of what he told me… was now starting to make more sense than I liked.
“And if you don’t know that name, though it looks like you do, I’m after the Blackstone blood. But it’s gotta be pure. It appears it has to be untainted by a bond.” He paused, and I was back to being confused. What the heck did untainted mean? “Dear Will’s sister was too hard to catch, his father was too hard to kill, and so now it’s his turn. If this doesn’t work out, I’ll have to take more extreme measures, and a lot more people will get hurt. Everyone you know… will end up dead.”
“Wha…Wh…”
He stood up tall, waving the first letter again, the one I had, the one he claimed he sent me.
“This is not what he sent you.”
He tossed it to the floor where it was unfolded, and the words I read told me it was the exact letter that had drawn me away from home. My gaze drifted over to the other one as he brought it closer to my face, his thumb and index finger holding only the top corner of the paper, letting the letter slowly unfold itself.
“He sent you this, the contents of which, only I and him know. Here, be privy to the knowledge.”
Unfolded, and now spread wide before me, I unconsciously leaned forward, scanning the top lines.
My name was right there at the top.
And then…
As I saw the familiar handwriting, felt the hesitation and emotion carried through his words, my heart ached. If only I was reading this at home, if only I wasn’t here with–
As I scanned farther down the page, my horror grew. Tears started to rise in my eyes and I couldn’t stop them as they started to fall, burring my vision. My eyes continued to just scan those few sentences in the middle of the page, over and over and over again.
Oh god.
How…
How could I have been so stupid?
How had I not known?
If I’d just… if I hadn’t…
Regret seeped into my heart as the tears ran rivers down my face.
“This.”
He pulled the letter back and I whimpered as the words were taken out of my sight. It made him smile as he watched me.
Myrus.
I wanted to curse that name, now and forever.
He grabbed my chin in his free hand, tilting my head up as he brought his down until we were just inches apart. His eyes were that of a predator with his prey in sight. His smile grew.
“This is why he’ll come.”
He let go and my head drooped down with the rest of me as I cried.
It didn’t take a genius… to know he was right.
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