Outlaw (Wolves of Royal Paynes #4) - Kiki Burrelli Page 0,61

if you make one wrong move, just know, even at full power, you couldn't kill us all before we ripped you apart."

I pulled Quinlan's chair closer to mine, watching the other pack members file in, look up, freeze, and then stumble forward. The doctor, Siobhan, and Jamie remained with the babies in the panic room, listening through the monitoring system. The others took their seats, filling the chairs around the table in the meeting room from the back up.

Claus sat at the head of the table. A position he'd immediately taken and that seemed to please him greatly. He folded his red, clawed hands on the table and beamed at each entering body, flashing sharp, silver teeth, including large canines that resembled fangs.

When all had entered, Claus gave a sweeping, summer camp wave. "Hi, new faces. I'm Claus."

"Hi, Cl…" Storri started to respond loudly, but when he noticed no one else talking, he sat back, finishing with a whisper. "…Claus."

Claus gave Storri a grin so cocky, Faust growled and dropped his arm over his mate's shoulders.

Claus rotated his index fingers around each other as he spoke. "So, should I just start from the beginning? Or does someone else want to do the recap?"

Quinlan leaned forward, speaking like a racehorse hearing a starting pistol. "Claus is my half-brother, so he says, but I feel like it's true. Pierce somehow filled this place with the same gas he used to pump into my room. We went to sleep. He made us see dreams, though I don't know why he would've done that instead of just knocking us out and coming in."

"The effects wore off quickly after the gas was cleared," Faust said. "He would've had to have been fast to apprehend you all."

Claus lifted his fist to his face like he was a gameshow host speaking into a mic. "Ding. Ding. Ding. However, you didn't make the bonus round. Pierceypoo has been using something that is tearing him apart from the inside. His body can't handle it, and it's starting to show. The poor guy looked all banged up. He couldn't have carried you in that state—why else would he have devil's powder? That shit is not cheap, and getting it couldn't have been easy. You could sell your soul and the soul of everyone you knew and still not afford a pinch of it."

Quinlan rubbed his chest. "Why? What's it made of?"

"Shavings collected from the devil's horns." Claus looked to Hallie, sitting closest to him on the right side. "He likes to keep 'em pointy."

"The devil? The actual devil?" Quinlan didn't sound scared as much as he did shocked.

"The one and only. The powder can hurt demons. A king such as I wouldn't be so affected, but you can see why it's such a rare item. Demons hoard it, and the devil isn't in a habit of arming his followers with weapons that could destroy each other."

"You all sound pleasant," Quinlan quipped, making Jazz gasp and reach for Quinlan like he thought Claus would attack him. "But why did it hurt me? And my wraiths?"

Hearing themselves being mentioned, the wraiths glided up from Dog's side and hung over Quin's shoulders.

Claus looked to the ceiling like he was praying. "Oh dear lord, give me the patience to educated my wayward brother. Put the blocks together, bro. The powder hurts demons. The powder hurt you. You are…"

"No fucking way," Quinlan seethed and shoved back from the table. His wraiths expanded, looking more like black wings that cast a shadow over the room before hugging around him like a pod.

"Did he say, brother?" Sitka whispered.

"Why else would I call you demonling?" Claus asked, still sitting.

Quinlan's wraiths burst apart revealing a gaze that was only eerie because now both eyes were black. "This isn't funny."

Despite there being no window open on this floor, a strong draft circled the room, continuing back around instead of going out the door. The wind circled again, around and around, picking up the lightest items in the room, flower petals, bits of paper, and what looked like a chunk of lasagna from dinner a few nights ago.

The spinner rapidly grew into a full-blown tornado that nearly lifted the pack from their seats.

Though I wanted to hug and console him, I stayed near, but didn't attempt to touch him. Enough guilt streamed from me, the shifters in the room frowned. I'd pushed that moment when we'd returned to our old pack lands out of mind. There wasn't anything wrong with my