who would endanger his daughter.
It left me with an odd, conflicting viewpoint of the man and no conclusions.
Jeffrey finally hung up and tossed the phone back. “They’ll call you back with a time and place,” he said, still smiling.
Heath smiled back. Then, in a lightning-fast move, he pulled a gun out and fired.
Jeffrey fell, the silver and heat burning skin, the bullet in his brain killing him.
“Traitor,” Heath said softly. “They want to play dirty? I’ve been trying to avoid it, but fine, I can play dirty.” He was angry.
No, furious. I could smell it boiling the air around him, adding an acidic note to the room.
He looked over his wolves, ignoring me completely. “My daughter is not a fucking pawn!” he roared. He began to pace, touching the cellphone to his chin. “When they give us the information, we are going in with a small force. It’ll be me, Jacky—who will take custody of Carey—and a few others. Once Carey is in your care, Jacky, you’re going to get her out of there. My group will take down anyone who wants to fight.”
“I can fight,” I said softly. “I would really even the odds, actually.”
“It would destroy your attempt at an impartial image.”
“I’m sure at some point one of them is going to threaten her or something. I’ll play it by ear.” I was feeling a little bloodthirsty, to be honest. Getting Carey back and safe was close, and the wolves who took her? They were going to submit or die soon enough. And I’ll get to pay them back for fucking killing me. Assholes.
“Fine.” Heath waved at me, dismissive. I took it as my sign to start walking away, done with the entire conversation until they needed me, but he grabbed me before I could get away. “Stay. I want you to hear everything.”
“I feel the need to remind you that I don’t take orders from you,” I said softly, leaning over. “And it would do my kind a disservice to stay on your order.”
“I would very much appreciate if you stayed and helped make the basic plans to rescue my daughter and end the civil war gripping Dallas,” he said, a small smile forming.
“Much better. I can do that.” I turned back to the wolves and crossed my arms. “We are going to remember that I’m not some military commander, right?”
“But you are a predator,” he pointed out. “And predators know how to hunt.”
I couldn’t disagree with him, but I was still growing accustomed to being that predator. It was one thing to acknowledge that I was. It was another to use it.
They talked for what felt like hours, until I sat on the floor even while they all remained standing. I didn’t move or talk, just listened to them argue out who might be the best in a small team that would be for ‘protecting Carey,’ when we all knew I would be the one with that job.
They also made theories about things we couldn’t possibly know. Would we learn who the leaders of the traitors were? How many wolves would they bring to this to potentially see Heath die?
No one had any idea what the answers were.
Finally, I yawned too loud for any of them to miss. I checked the time and noticed it was damn near midnight and stood back up.
“Hey, where can I sleep?” I asked. “There’s nothing else to be done until they contact us. Even I’m smart enough to figure that out, and you’ve all started talking about things I have truly no business in, like what to do after the traitors have been squashed.” I was tired, and being dismissive was the only way I could think of getting out of there. I was plagued with worry, had been for what felt like days, even if I had only met the Alpha that afternoon. I needed a break from it all. Just one night.
He offered an arm. I eyeballed it, curling a lip.
“I’m from a vastly different time than the one you are,” I said, pushing his arm back to him. “I’m sure it’s polite to offer to walk women around and hold them, but I’ll pass this time around.”
“Fine,” he said, chuckling. “I’ll show you, come on.”
I followed him out of the main room and back to the office section. He opened a door near the large office space I had used all day and showed me in. I saw a few cots laid out and nodded.
“Thanks, but I