Outlaw (Wolves of Royal Paynes #4) - Kiki Burrelli Page 0,6

die because of it, though.

Sitka shadow-hopped, using the flashlight on Storri's shoulder to land directly in front of him, where he wrapped his arms around his brother and braced himself for the whip's razor edge.

The shadow arm at my chest jerked as if in surprise, letting up just enough for me to slip to the ground. I bounded across the room before ever fully standing, but as I jumped to attempt to intercept the danger and take it into my own skin, I realized there was no need. The whip pulled back sharply, as though recalled with haste before the weapon dropped limply to the ground.

The black plumes didn't clear as much as they separated, revealing a short man with shaggy blond hair, one blue eye, and one black eye. The man wasn't looking at me, but at the nephilim. His face filled with confused, enraged wonder.

The black plumes shrank to about the size of a winter scarf and wrapped around the man's neck.

All the while I stared, incapable of blinking, of breathing, of doing anything that would take away the image in front of me. I'd seen him so many times, in so many places. He was there, eating at the table when we ate and in the operations room when we did research. He sat on my shoulder every second of every day and I had to blink, breathe—I had to be sure.

"Quinlan?"

He looked at me. Quinlan looked at me. His eyes focused on my face, and he tilted his head to the side. I wasn't dreaming. I'd never dream a Quinlan in clothes so filthy. Or in a place so horrible. This was real life. Somehow, my Quinlan was here.

He took a step toward me, the wonder from before turning into rage and fear. "You're not real," he spat.

That was his voice… but it wasn't. "Quin?"

His twilight eyes flashed open, and he lunged forward, fingers out like claws as the black plumes grew and hummed, making the room shake so hard debris fell from the ceiling. And in the middle of it all was Quinlan, screeching at me like I was the devil under his bed. "You're not real! You're not real! YOU'RE NOT REAL!"

Quinlan fell. He'd screamed himself unconscious.

2

Diesel

Quinlan fell into my arms, his weight nothing more than a suggestion of mass. I still fell to my knees.

From my peripheral vision, I watched the shadow arm holding down Faust shrink away, drawing closer to Quinlan's skin. Sliding between my hands and Quin's body, the shadow smoothed over him like a protective shell. He was still in my arms, but it was like his body was draped in a thick sheet. I snarled, my fingernails extending to claws. The only thing keeping me from slicing my way through was that I didn't know if cutting the smoke would hurt Quinlan.

Frustration locked my muscles in place. I had Quinlan in my arms, and I couldn't even touch him. This wasn't a dream; it was a nightmare.

"Is it him?"

"Are you sure it is?"

Huntley and Jagger loomed over me, Sitka wedged protectively between them despite the fact they were the ones to get knocked out by the…

"What is that stuff? Hit my face like a brick."

"Was Quinlan controlling it?"

Their questions were like flies pinging against my head. I wanted to bat them away, but that would mean loosening my hold on Quinlan, and even though I wasn't touching him, I was holding him. He was alive. In Pierce's fucked-up mansion.

The same Pierce who had acted devastated when he found out our former pack was dead, that Quinlan was dead. Pierce had sat right across from me, playing like he was tortured by the news. All the while he knew where Quin was. He had him here doing fuck knew what.

I growled, managing to funnel my roar into that single rumbling sound like shoving a tsunami's worth of water through a straw.

"C'mon," Knox said, groggily, but conscious. "We need to fucking regroup and…" He let his eyes land for the briefest second on Quinlan, hanging in my arms. "Figure out what the fuck is going on here."

"He was terrified." Jazz stared, unblinking at Quinlan as he spoke. "When he saw you. He was…"

"Frantic," Storri gasped.

"This is your Quinlan?" Sitka slipped out from between his mates and crouched down, lifting the metal whip from where Quin had dropped it on the ground. Sitka eyed the weapon. Now that it wasn't whipping through the air, I noticed the thing was homemade, held together