I wondered just how creative they might get to see it done.
Knox was waiting in the driver’s seat of the car, his body thrumming with magic. His eyes were still glowing, and I wondered how long it would take before his wolf would take a back seat to the man. I moved to climb in beside him, but Foust gently pushed me aside, casting me a look of warning.
“Tread lightly, Piper,” Brunton said as he opened the back door for me.
Kat jumped in and cozied up next to Jagger, who’d gotten in on the opposite side. I filed in after her and Brunton followed, slamming the door shut behind him. The six of us sat there for a minute in silence.
“What now?” Foust asked Knox. He made a point not to look directly at his alpha, especially when Knox snapped his attention to him, eyes blazing.
“We go home. We send the bloodsuckers to pick up those traitorous little shits, and then we go back to the Ether.” His voice was clipped and harsh and devoid of any of its normal warmth.
“Understood,” Foust replied. He pulled out his phone and sent a message to someone—likely the ‘bloodsuckers’—then put it away.
Silence reigned yet again.
Kat leaned into my ear and whispered, “I want you to steer clear of him when we return. Nod if you understand.”
I nodded once and looked up to find Knox glaring at me in the rearview mirror.
“Is it secret time?” he asked, blowing through a red light because he refused to look away.
“No,” I said with a smile. “Kat just suggested that I give you some space when we get home, which makes sense. You need some rest, unless you want me to heal you—”
“I don’t need you to heal anything,” he growled. Brunton edged forward in the seat, and Kat put her hand on my knee in warning.
“Of course you don’t,” I replied in the same placating tone I’d used with Merc when he’d been under Kingston’s control—the one I’d adopted for years to defuse situations in order to survive. “I just thought it might speed things along.”
“Or do something else entirely,” he muttered to himself. He leveled his eyes on the traffic in front of him, and I sat there, holding my breath, hoping that was the end of it. And it was for the rest of the ride home. The only words uttered were the ones Knox rambled quietly to himself. I caught very few, but the tone was still angry.
The rest of us kept our mouths shut.
When we arrived at the mansion, I couldn’t get out of the vehicle fast enough. I bolted for the entrance and hammered in the code so hard my fingers hurt. I needed to get to Merc and let him know what had happened before Knox opened his mouth and started a war with the vampire king. Any progress the two of them had made would be lost in an instant. Merc was already concerned about Knox’s overtaking of the New York pack. Whatever had happened to him that night—whoever he’d become—would certainly do nothing to assuage Merc’s fear. If anything, it’d be the nail in the coffin.
My not-so-subtle, panicked entrance was loud enough to wake the dead—pun not intended—and I soon found Jase and Dean rushing down the steps to greet me.
“Foust sent us a message to pick up the New York pack,” Jase said.
“We were just getting ready to leave,” Dean added. “What happened?”
I shook my head and pointed for them to go back the way they’d come. The look on my face must have been explanation enough, because they turned around and climbed the stairs, waiting for me at the top.
The others entered the mansion as I caught up to the brothers and took them by their arms to lead them down the hall. “Where’s Merc?” I whispered, picking up the pace.
For once, neither of them bothered to interrogate first and move second. Instead, they stormed down the hall toward the vamp in question’s room. I decided to forego the formality of knocking and barged right in. Merc turned and quirked a brow at me, his cell phone to his ear.
“Keep me apprised of her progress,” he said, then hung up. Dean closed the door and locked it, then ushered me deeper into Merc’s suite.
“Something’s up,” he said. “Tell him, Piper.”
I scrunched my face and looked up at Dean. “Thanks for the intro, but I think I’ve got this.”
“Got what?” Merc asked.
“That’s what we’d like to know,” Jase replied.
“Well, if someone would let me talk, you would.” The three of them looked at me expectantly, and I jumped right in, doing all I could to keep my voice low. “Our meeting was a shitshow—everything went to hell the second we walked in.”
“I feared that might happen,” Merc said, as though the words escaped him without thought.
“I think the pack had a plan, and Knox walked right into it—made it worse, even.”
Merc quirked his brow. “How so?”
“What seemed to be their strongest wolf challenged him right off, and the others looked like they knew that would happen—like they’d discussed how to take Knox out. But it only escalated after Knox said he wouldn’t kill any of them. Whenever he’d put one down, another was right there, ready to take his place. They just kept coming...” I shuddered at the image of him, bloodied and beaten, calling the next opponent forward.
“Why the fuck would Knox do that?” Dean asked, genuine shock in his voice.
“To avoid taking on their power,” Merc replied. “Please continue, Piper.”
“I don’t even remember how many he fought before things got really dicey. Kat and Brunton told me I couldn’t interfere or his life would be forfeit, so I just stood back and watched until it became clear that he wouldn’t last much longer. I don’t know what I planned to do, but I rushed through the pack toward the shitty little fight circle they’d made, ready to do something. Someone stopped me, and I screamed his name. Whatever he saw when he looked at me...something changed inside him. The fight turned on a dime, and then—”
“Then what?” Jase asked, though it seemed like he already knew the answer.
“He snapped the guy’s neck.” A sound in the hall drew our attention, but it quieted as quickly as it had come, so I continued. “There was this…this surge of magic and power unlike anything I’ve ever felt, and Knox’s reaction to it was primal. His eyes flared like beacons and he howled…and then, one by one, he took down the challengers he’d rendered unconscious from the beginning. It was as if he were possessed by something—like it wasn’t him at all, just this feral being bent on killing.”
The brothers’ expressions were grim.
“Where is he now?” Merc asked, headed for the door.
“We just got home—that’s why I’m here.” I jumped in front of him just as his hand reached the knob. “He’s still not himself yet, Merc. Kat said he’d come out of it—that the rush of what had happened would subside—but in the car…” I trailed off, not sure how to put into words what I’d seen in Knox. Anger? Paranoia? Or something far worse that I didn’t dare say out loud because words had power and I didn’t wish to fuel whatever magic had taken over the new alpha of NYC?
“Kat told you what you needed to hear to keep you safe,” Merc said, pinning me in place with a cold stare, “and for that, I am thankful. But I need to see him now—see what the transfer of power has done to him.” He turned the knob and brushed me aside with the door as it opened. I turned to chase after him and ran right into his back.