Wolf's Hunger (Mafia Monsters #5) - Atlas Rose Page 0,78
on inside, and the scent of a male lingered in the air, a male that guarded her like she was a prisoner.
She is ours, my beast warned. Kill them, tear them apart.
I closed my eyes for a heartbeat as that urgency grew. “No,” I whispered to the beast. “We do that, and we’ll be running forever.”
I opened my eyes, gripped the top of the bricks, and as silent as the night, leaped over and into the backyard. I couldn’t feel her, not like I should be able to, couldn’t sense that darkness in her, couldn’t smell her goddamn scent. I scanned the outside of the building, my gaze lingering on a bedroom window before it stopped.
Her bedroom. I was sure of it.
But the room was dark, and there was no life inside. I pressed my fingers to the glass and focused. Two…no, three agents, moving around in the house. Talking. I strained to hear.
“Harlan is just a little too interested in her, if you know what I mean,” one of them said.
Another chuckled. “He pants around her like she’s a goddamn bitch in heat.”
A low, savage hiss spilled from the back of my throat. Was this why the change in her? That…goddamn Harlan? Was he turning her against us? Feeding her fucking lies? Making her bend to his will?
The scrape of a shoe wrenched me back to the moment. I jerked my gaze toward the sound as another agent pushed his hand through the gap in the fence and unlocked the gate.
I was already moving, stepping backwards into the shadows as the gate opened and the agent walked in. One fast, silent leap, and I hit the ground on the other side of the brick wall and hunkered down.
But my mind was racing. Imagining all the fucking things Harlan was doing to her.
My beast pushed toward the surface, driving his claws into me as I knelt behind the wall. He wanted blood…and he wanted Harlan. Before this night was through, he just might get both.
24
The office was dark and empty when I flicked on the overhead lights and headed for my desk. My steps were slow, and my feet were heavy, almost as heavy as my heart. The first grumble of thunder from an approaching storm came as I pulled out my chair and sat at my desk.
For a second, I couldn’t move, just listened to that rumble above and stared at my darkened monitor.
Dangerous, just how we like it, Chaos whispered in the back of my mind. Her voice was so close now. So close, I could barely feel anything at all. Just her. Just Chaos and the sickening desperation of what I was about to do.
Get to work now…
I closed my eyes. She let me in, let me have control, but only to do what she needed me to do.
Ruth, she whispered in my head. We need the files on Ruth.
“No.” The word tore free with a shake of my head. My fingers froze, hovering above the keyboard. “I can’t do that.”
Can and will…
“You know what this will do to them,” I whispered as a shudder coursed through me. “I can’t hurt them, not like that.”
The Wolves, Chaos whispered. Or the Vampires…you choose.
Our thoughts collided. She became me, and I was left in the darkness.
A merciless Unseelie darkness that held nothing but rage and despair.
My hands moved on their own, firing up my computer and logging in. That grumble overhead grew bolder before the first flash of searing white light filled the widows. I took no notice, knowing that savagery spilled from Chaos, inside me. She was a whirlwind…no, a tornado, whipping and slashing, growing with every minute I sat there.
It’d been an hour since I'd left Church in the Hunting Ground. An hour since this battle raged inside me, and slowly, I felt my hold on reality slipping.
My fingers typed, dragging up file after file. Before I knew it, I was hunched over the keyboard, my fingers flying at a dangerous pace as I collected file after file. I opened the database we kept on the Immortals, researching as much as I could on all the major players.
Elithien.
Caedes.
Phantom.
Finis.
The Inner Circle in its entirety.
There wasn’t much I could find. But by the time I'd finished my fourth cup of coffee and the thunder had grown deafening within the steel gray sky, there was noise drifting from the hallway behind me.
A crack of thunder sounded right over the building as a startled voice cried out, followed by retreating footsteps.