Wolf's Capture (7 page)

“Do what? Kill the guards? I can’t.”

“Why not? I thought you just said you could.”

“Sure, if there were any rodents nearby. There’s nothing left for me to use in a pretty large radius except for a few insects and spiders.”

“Why should I believe you?”

“You’re right, you shouldn’t. Good night. Sweet dreams. Don’t let the bed bugs bite.” Her giggle didn’t reassure at all.

Good night? As if he’d sleep. If there was one thing he’d learned in that tropical prison he’d spent two weeks in was the rats weren’t picky when it came to food. And they liked bare toes.

He still had a hard time sleeping without his boots on. Unbidden, his naked feet shuffled closer together, and he squatted lower on them, alert to even the slightest tickle of an approaching rodent invasion.

When several minutes went by with nothing spoken, he thought about striking up another conversation, but judging by the evenness of her breath, she slept.

So much for her not trusting me.
Or was this a case of not fearing?

Maybe I should join Kyle in his quest to restore his bad-ass reputation.

Layla couldn’t help but giggle after her jest about bed bugs. She was only half kidding. She could get them to bite, just not easily. Their tiny flickers of existence were hard to hold and control. But even if she used a bedbug one at a time, she could still cause damage. There was just one problem. There were none left.

Apart from a few small spiders, the only living creature in proximity was a man. A wolf. A threat to her body if the master was serious about him mating with her.

Such a dangerous cellmate, especially since if he made an attempt to seduce she wasn’t sure she’d resist.

The cage had seemed small before when it held just her. Add in a six-foot-plus man who wore only jeans, a sculpted torso, and shaggy, streaked dark brown and blond hair? It was stifling and warm.

Oh
so
warm.

The flush of it tingled along her nerve endings. Hyper aware of him, and every nuance of his presence, only served to deepen the sensation.

Despite her inexperience, she knew what it meant.

Desire throbbed between her legs, incited by need and lusty thoughts for the man sharing her space. The unexpected attraction might have proved easier to deal with if not for the master’s twisted demand.
He wants me to allow this stranger to bed me.
The handsome, virile man who prowled their confined space, the grace of his stealthy perusal fascinating to watch. It did nothing to diminish the heat within her.

How easy to allow herself to give in to her body’s curiosity.

But in doing so, she would be willingly doing something the master wanted.

Help him?

Ha. Never. Which meant she would have to do anything she could to ensure she remained chaste. She would fight, like she always did. She might lose, but she would never give in easily.

That was assuming she had to fend off the wolf. The master’s command seemed to have not mattered an iota to Brody. He showed not even the slightest interest in her. Which, in an odd twist, miffed her.

He could pretend, at least, a little interest.

And with that thought, she set her mini minion with eight legs to spy on him where he crouched and let herself sleep. She knew better than to deprive herself.

When she awoke the next day, the sudden glare of the lights illuminating a shocking wake-up call, she noted that he’d indeed spent the night crouched, watching and waiting.

“Morning,” she said as she stretched.

Through the hank of hair on his forehead, he perused her. He grunted in reply.

“Aren’t you a ray of sunshine?” she said, rolling free of her blankets to stand.

“Being a prisoner will do that to a man.”

“Great. Not only am I stuck with you for the moment, but you’re a grumpy puss.”

“Wolf.”

“Whatever. Mind plugging your ears while I attend to business.”

“You’re going to pee?” He sounded so shocked.

“Yes. And brush my teeth. Is that a problem?”

“But I’m here.”

“So I noticed. Hence the request.”

“Woman don’t pee around men.”

How she wished that were true. “I have to go, and I see no reason to hold it in to protect your delicate sensibilities.”

“Delicate?”

“Yes, delicate. This is not a five-star hotel. Heck, on the scale of prisons, I don’t know if it even ranks a one. Which means, no walls, which means you get to hear and see it all. So get used to it. If it’s any consolation, I imagine you will have to tinkle as well at some point. I promise to not watch when you do.”

“I’ll escape before then.”

As Layla sat on the throne, her cheeks burning despite her brave words, she murmured, “Good luck with that.”

He’d thankfully already averted his gaze and now clapped his hands over his ears as she took care of her pressing bladder. He even hummed. She wondered what he’d do when her second order of business decided it needed tending. She’d gotten used to a lack of privacy over the years, but there was ugly, leering guards and cameras, and then there was handsome hunk in a cage with her.

Nothing screamed romance like seeing and hearing a woman pee.

Good thing I’m not planning seduction then.

Once she brushed her teeth, she returned to sit cross-legged on her bed. As if that were a sign, he finally rose to his feet and did his own version of a morning stretch.

She should have looked away. Pretended interest in a wall.

Yeah, that didn’t happen.

One glimpse of rippling flesh as he pulled his arms over his head, to the front, back, and she was mesmerized.

“Good thing there’s no flies left, or you’d catch some,” he remarked as he caught her staring.

She snapped her mouth shut. “Sorry. As you might have noticed, the entertainment level is kind of low, so anything new is kind of fascinating. Even you.” She tried to make it sound disparaging, but he smirked, too easily reading the lie.

“So what do you do all day?” he asked, still stretching his limbs.

“Depends on if the master is having a villain day or not.”

“A villain what?”

“Some days, the master likes to take me out of the cage, and he’ll have me set a group of animals on a task. Usually something nefarious. I call those villain days.”

“And when you’re not on a task for him?”

She shrugged. “Not much. I read. Insult the guards. Plot escape.”

His gaze caught hers. “Plot? What about executing an escape?”

“Like I’ve said. I’ve tried. So far, that hasn’t worked out so well for me.” Or else she wouldn’t be at number fifty-seven.

“Then perhaps it’s a good thing we’ve been placed together.”

Before she could reply, the sound of feet stomping down the stairs caught their attention. Breakfast time.

Familiar with the routine, Layla didn’t bother moving from her bed, but Brody did. He loomed a few inches from the bars.

“Move back, dog,” said the tall, skinny one, his usual sneer stretching his thin lips.

“And if I don’t?” Still belligerent.

Layla held in a sigh as Brody was sent to his knees, his collar activated, long enough for the guard to shove the MRE rations through the bars.

The silver foil packet didn’t excite her. She now knew why astronauts were so skinny. Their food sucked.

As she ate the uninspiring mash of fake eggs, chunks of simulated bacon, and other factory-created ingredients thrown together to make an unappetizing scrambled mess, she noted Brody didn’t bother with his. He seemed more intent on other things this morning.

With his broad back turned—displaying even more of his muscular upper body—he paced the outline of the cage, examining it from the floor where the bars sank in to cement to the ceiling where those same bars were welded across the top. An escape-proof prison.

And home sweet home.

“You can’t get out,” she stated.

He didn’t bother to turn to face her as he replied. “Perhaps you can’t. But every prison has a flaw. It’s just a matter of finding it.”

“You speak from experience?”

“I do actually.” He peered over his shoulder at her from his crouched position by the sink. Hair flopped over his brow while more of it stuck out wildly, mussed and beckoning fingers to comb through it. So sexy.

She diverted her thoughts with another mouthful of icky mush. When he didn’t elaborate on his experience, she asked, “Why were you in prison?”

“Wrong place. Wrong time. Happens a lot in my line of work.”

“Did you escape, or were you rescued?”

“Most of the time I escaped. Usually within days or weeks. There was only one prison that took me a while. My captor in that case was real good at keeping my kind chained. But in the end, he couldn’t hold me, or my brothers.”

“Your whole family was there?”

“Military brothers is what I should have said. I consider them family. Once you’ve stared down death with a guy, then charged at it snarling, you kind of forge a bond. That type of thing sticks with you. It’s a thing that goes beyond friendship.”

“I wouldn’t know. I’m always alone.”

“Always?”

The conversation veered uncomfortably close to a place she preferred not to visit. In order to remain positive and strong, there were certain emotions she preferred not to examine too closely. Loneliness was one of them. She yanked the direction of their conversation back to what he was doing, which was lifting her bedding as she washed her hands at the sink. He checked the floor beneath it.

“It’s all concrete. No hidden trap doors. I told you, I’ve looked and found nothing. But if you want to waste some time, suit yourself,” she said as she dried her hands on her gown.

No reply as he finished his examination of the cell. He also ignored her, not once glancing her way, which for some reason needled.

I should be happy he’s ignoring me.
After all, she didn’t want to have to fend against any advances, or have him accuse her of working voluntarily for the master.

So ignoring was good.

No, it’s not.
She’d not had this much interaction with someone in ages.

He spun suddenly and, brows drawn, asked, “How come you can’t order the guards to let you go? Because, let’s be honest here, Joe Seal and Tom Walrus aren’t the sharpest tools in the shed. You said your power works in extreme situations against the weak. Wouldn’t this count?”

If the situation were less serious, she might have giggled at his names of the morning shift guards. “It’s not life or death. So no. It doesn’t. And when I manage to convince one to help me out of the goodness of their heart, they end up dying.”

“Dying how?”

She wrinkled her nose. “It’s kind of gruesome. They all carry around some kind of poison in their tooth. Somehow, I don’t know how, as soon as they so much as think of releasing me, crunch, they pop the pill, and seconds later they’re foaming at the mouth and hitting the ground.”

“That is unusual. And you’re not the one compelling them to do it?”

She shook her head.

“Okay, then here’s another question. If you can get them to self destruct by begging them to set you free, why not decimate his army and get out of here?” He didn’t ask in jest, but all seriousness.

She saw no harm in answering. He’d soon learn the master had all the bases covered, which was why she’d been working on escape fifty-seven for so long now. “He usually never sends in more than a few at a time, and each time I accidentally cause their demise, I go days without food or water. Since starving myself serves no purpose, I stopped.”

She’d tried only a few times because even if they were abetting in holding her prisoner, it wasn’t the lackeys’ fault they couldn’t escape the clutches of the psycho master.

“Deprivation. A tool of a true sadist,” Brody muttered. “Interesting.”

For some reason his cool analysis angered her. “How is that interesting?” she snapped. “Try more like horrifying. The master is a sick psycho who kidnapped me a few years ago, killed my father, and holds me prisoner. Oh and now wants to impregnate me by a stranger, to do who knows what to my baby. My tale is a lot of things, but interesting isn’t one of them.” She practically yelled the last part at him, angry at his casual dismissal of the situation—
my life
.

“Calm down, sweetheart. I didn’t mean to diss your treatment. I’m just reconnoitering. As I find out more and more, I’m able to build a profile of this master person. Know thine enemy. Best piece of advice ever.”

Layla knew the enemy, but had yet to see how that helped her. “All I know is he needs to die.” Straight and to the point. Why bother hiding it? The master might watch and listen—when she didn’t fuck with his spy equipment—but he already knew of her hatred.

“Never doubt I’m working on his demise. What does he look like by the way? No one we’ve talked to ever seems to have a clear recollection.”

The mystery question. “No one remembers because he doesn’t allow it. Most of the time, he wears a hood over his head. No one ever sees his face. And if anyone has, they’re not talking. I’m not sure what magic he has, but whatever it is, part of it involves people being unable to describe him.”

“Even you?”

“Even me.” Nor could she control the master at all, even when he managed to terrify her. Going at the master’s mind was like hitting a steel wall. Impenetrable. But she still liked to hammer at it just to irritate him.

“How long have you been his prisoner?”

“A while. And before him, there were others.”

“Others?” His query held an inquisitive note.

“Oh yes. I’ve spent quite a few years of my life as somebody’s property. He’s just the newest and longest-running master I’ve ever had. The ones who survived owning me ended up selling me because I proved difficult.”

“Couldn’t you escape?”

She rolled her eyes. “I did. Many times. Freedom doesn’t last long when you wear a tracker.”

“You’ve been chipped?”

She nodded.

“Damn.” His eyes held a measure of pity, and she turned away.

Keep the pity for someone else.
Yes, her life, make that un-life, sucked, but giving up would never make it better. Only by trying could she keep hope alive. “It’s made escapes more of a challenge.”