The man pressed the barrel of the gun into my side, using his coat to hide it as he dragged me down the stairs and into the street. He kept his voice low but his cruel words chilled me to the bone. “Make a scene, bitch, and I’ll shoot you here in the street. Got it?”
I should have screamed. I knew I should have. But my brain didn’t seem to be connected to anything anymore. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. My arms and legs felt numb until I stumbled and staggered, carried onward only by the gunman’s momentum.
He shoved me toward a car and I braced my foot on the side. I had to fight. Dodge would have wanted me to fight. My vision blurred with tears. He couldn’t be gone. He couldn’t be dead. I would see him again, I would have the chance to tell him how I felt. That I loved him. That I needed him. That I was a coward for hiding behind the strangeness of his world as a reason to not put myself out there, to risk my feelings. He’d risked everything for me.
Even his life.
A sob twisted free and I shoved back against the gunman, not caring if he shot me. Maybe someone would see the struggle and call the police or could find Evershaw or Deirdre or someone. Anyone.
I clenched my jaw but took a deep breath, ready to scream for help, when a second man unfolded himself from the back of the car, loomed over me, and swung a dark, heavy object at my head. I braced for the pain. It came with an explosion of bright lights behind my eyelids, and a sudden rushing noise that dragged me into nothingness.
Chapter 31
Dodge
Aheavy fucking weight sat on his chest. Dodge thought it might have been Cricket, since the jackass tried to periodically smother him in his sleep. Dodge tried to shove him off but fire ignited in his muscles, following closely by lightning bolts of agony, and something pinned him down. He groaned, searching for a reason. What the fuck happened?
His thoughts splintered and he drifted, then got yanked back to consciousness by a stake through his heart. He groaned and tried to figure out what happened. He wasn’t in the desert or jungle, he wasn’t being yelled at or tortured. It had to be something else. Dodge seized the last memory he could find. Something about Silas being stuck as a wolf. Escaping the house. Charging after...
Persephone.
Persephone.
He roared and lurched upright to sit, swinging his arms with rage, and tried to shove to his feet. Something happened to him. A knock on the door, something suspicious about the man who spoke, something about the detective sending him. A loud noise and flashes of light.
He still struggled with the fog in his memory when something grabbed him and forced him back into a prone position. A gruff voice barked from directly over him. “Dodge, it’s Rafe O’Shea. You’ve been shot. Three to the chest. We’re trying to stop the bleeding. Evershaw is on his way. You need to lie still and let us help you.”
Dodge clenched his jaw as more voices and movements and bright lights intruded on what little concentration he had. “Persephone. Where.”
O’Shea didn’t answer. He gave orders to someone else and more pressure landed on Dodge’s chest. Someone moved him to the side to shove something lumpy under his back, trying to put pressure on the exit wounds. He remembered doing that for other guys in much worse conditions. His mind drifted to worse places, intense firefights, car accidents while pursuing bad guys and charging through the jungle. Confronting the worst of the worst. He’d survived all that. Endured. Avoided major injuries.
And then... the moment he needed to protect his mate, to save her life, he failed.
He ground his teeth and his heels dug into the floor as another bright flare of agony ripped through him. More voices. More movement. Someone talking about an ambulance and blood transfusions.
Dodge managed to grab the front of O’shea’s shirt as the wolf alpha moved next to him, and dragged him close enough to growl. “Persephone.Where.”
He didn’t want her to see him like that, bloody and weak. But he needed to know she was okay. She had to be fine. The world was a cruel place but surely he’d done enough to earn time with his mate. She couldn’t have been taken from him. His heart cracked and splintered when O’Shea didn’t answer immediately.
Dodge tightened his grip and glared at the other man, baring his teeth in the clearest threat he could manage. “Where.”
O’Shea’s lips thinned into nothing, and his eyes flashed gold at Dodge’s challenge. “They took her. She’s gone.”
Dodge howled, the sound ripped from his throat. It wasn’t a noise a human was meant to make, but he had no other way to express how his world collapsed around him.
She was gone. He’d failed her.
Dodge snarled and released O’Shea, trying to claw his way upright so he could find her. He had to find her.
They shouted at him and bodies landed across him, trying to pin him, but Dodge didn’t care. He had a mission. It didn’t matter if he died. He had to save Persephone.
More boots in the hall. Shouting. Then Evershaw’s face loomed over him, his gold eyes flashing with lightning, and the alpha’s will rolled through Dodge and stole what remained of his strength.
Dodge howled again, furious with the alpha for stealing his vengeance, and fought Evershaw’s hold as much as he could. Everything slowed down until the only thing he saw was the alpha’s damn face. Dodge heard nothing but the sounds of deep water all around him. He groaned and forced sound through his clenched jaw. “Persephone.”
“I know, mate,” Evershaw said. “We’re looking. We’re on it. Stay still, you fucking lunatic. You’re no use to her dead.”
Dodge didn’t believe him. He’d already failed her. He clawed at consciousness as Evershaw leaned into the pack link and the rest of the room faded away. Dodge’s wolf fought to get free, to get to the surface so they could hunt down the bastards that hurt their mate. Hadtakentheir mate. Threatened her. Tried to kill him.
