Alpha (13 page)

“Faythe?”

Marc.
And Jace was in the cage beside him.

I forced my eyes open wider and smiled. “Surprise.”

M
y blood boiled, in spite of the below-freezing temperature, at the sight of Marc and Jace locked up in five-foot-tall animal cages. Like me, they'd been marched out of our cabin without coats, and in separate cages, they couldn't even huddle together for warmth. After less than two hours in the cold, they were both pale and shivering, and only warmed by the scorching rage clearly burning behind their eyes.

“How'd you get out?” Jace's teeth chattered as he stood hunched over, fingers curled around the steel-mesh sides of his cage.

“Through the window.” I nudged the guard in the back with his own gun. “Let them out.”

“I don't have those keys.” He started to turn, but stopped when I shoved him again.

I glanced around the shed and spotted an open, rusty toolbox in one corner, holding a hammer and an assortment of wrenches. “Get the hammer and knock the locks off. One blow each.” Because if anyone heard him, we wouldn't have time to waste with dainty little taps. “And if you even look like you're going to hit anything
other than those locks, I will shoot you in the back.” I couldn't kill as easily as Malone's men seemed to, but I could and would kill in defense of myself, or either of the men in the cages.

“What about Alex?” Marc asked, as the guard picked up the hammer and hesitated, probably trying to decide if I was serious about killing him.

“Come on!” I snapped at the guard, then glanced at Marc. “Alex is a victim of his own stupidity and arrogance.”

“He's dead?” Jace asked, his voice thick with a mix of regret and relief—they fought on opposing sides, but they shared a mother.

“Just unconscious. Same with the goon outside my window. Thus the rush.” I glared at the guard. “Do it. And if you have to take more than one swing, you're going to regret it.”

Finally he shrugged, and I took a step back as he swung at the lock on Marc's cage. The lock popped open, and I breathed a silent sigh of relief. I hadn't been sure that would work. “Take off the chain, then do the other one.”

The guard set his hammer on top of Marc's cage and unthreaded the chain as ordered. Still shivering, Marc stepped out of his pen as Malone's man moved on to free Jace.

“Here.” While the guard unwound the second chain, I pulled one of the guns from my waistband and handed it to Marc. “Just in case.”

When Jace was free, I handed him the cuffs, and he secured the guard's hands behind his back. “You want to put him in the cage?”

“Yeah, if either of the locks still work.”

“We should gag him, too, or he'll scream until someone shows up,” Jace said. He examined the locks while Marc scrounged for something to gag him with.

Unfortunately, both of the locks were smashed, but Marc found a roll of shop towels and a roll of duct tape in an old plastic crate. He gagged the guard and taped his ankles together, then shoved him into one of the cages. Jace wound the chain around the lock hasp and the bar. Without the padlock to hold it in place, the guard would probably eventually kick his way free, but with any luck, that wouldn't be anytime soon.

With the new prisoner as quiet and secure as we could make him, we stepped outside in spite of the cold, to keep from discussing the rest of our plans in front of him—another lesson learned from TV bad guys.

Behind the shed, out of sight from the lodge, I debriefed the guys. Figuratively. “Okay, we need to get rid of the guns before this new pile of shit hits the fan, although from the look of you both, I'd say finding a couple of coats is also a priority.” I would have handed over mine, but I wasn't sure which one to offer it to. And neither of them would have taken it, anyway.

“Yes, business is obviously pressing, but first of all…” Marc looked like he wanted to hug me, even if just for my warmth, but he wouldn't let himself. “Are you okay?”

I couldn't resist a little laugh. “For once, the double standard worked in my favor. I got a warm room, hot stew, and an idiot guard. You guys were the ones freezing your butts off in cages.”

“We're fine,” Jace insisted through clenched his teeth, probably to keep them from chattering. “You took out three of Cal's men by yourself?”

“Brains over brawn, baby.” I grinned. “If they ever stop underestimating me, I might actually feel challenged.”

Jace returned my grin. “Or dead.”

“So I guess this means we're moving against Malone sooner than expected?” Marc asked, arms crossed tightly over his chest for warmth, obviously unwilling to take part in the post-jailbreak levity.

“We have no other choice, unless you guys want to crawl back into those cages.”

Jace's grin faltered, but couldn't be completely extinguished. “Not even if you crawled in there with me.”

Marc gritted his teeth, but remained focused on the business at hand. “So…the guns. I'm guessing Malone's keeping them close. Probably in his bedroom.”

I shrugged. “Actually, I'm thinking they're in the shed behind his cabin. Alex said they're locked up, and to my knowledge, none of the bedrooms have locks.” At least, the ones in our cabin didn't.

“Alex told you about the guns?” Jace asked, through blue-tinted lips.

“Just that they have twenty of them, and brought ten here. But there are three fewer now.” Grinning, I pulled the second gun from my waistband and handed it to him.

Jace looked impressed, but he accepted the pistol hesitantly, no doubt remembering the recovery period from his last gunshot wound. “I don't know how to shoot.”

“Me, neither, but it makes a damn good threat, and I'm guessing that, up close, your aim doesn't have to be that good. Just make sure you know how to turn off the safety, or they'll figure out pretty quickly that you're bluffing.” While Jace turned the gun over in his hands,
I glanced at Marc, who remained stoic against the cold. “Okay, we need to get you guys warmed up and let Dad know we're out. Let's go through the woods.” That way we'd be out of sight, and blocked from the worst of the freezing wind.

“So, this is going to go down without backup…” Marc whispered, as we picked our way carefully through the woods. The guys had both Shifted their eyes, too—they were among the first of my Pride members to master the partial Shift—and seemed much more adept hiking in their human forms than I was in mine, even with their limbs surely half-numb from the cold.

“There's no time to call in the rest of our guys, much less the thunderbirds.” Who had to be contacted in person, thanks to their discourteous lack of a phone. And any other modern convenience beyond a few worn video cassettes and an old television for their children.

“We're all strong fighters,” Jace said. “And getting rid of the guns will help even the odds.”

But even if we managed that, war wasn't fought without casualties. We would lose someone. Maybe more than one someone. And that was not okay.

Fifteen minutes later, we peered between the trees at the back of our own cabin, listening and looking for anything out of the ordinary. If Malone knew we'd escaped, he'd have someone watching the cabin, and while we were more than ready to fight, we couldn't risk starting something big before we'd gotten rid of the guns and warned everyone else. And warmed Marc and Jace up.

“I think it's clear,” Jace said finally, and I nodded. I'd neither seen nor heard anything weird, and I knew every figure who'd passed by the window. But my father
hadn't been among them. Was he still at the lodge, unwilling to leave me there alone?

My heart ached in both gratitude and frustration, and I would have given just about anything for a cell phone at that moment, so I could fill him in.

“Let's go.” Marc stepped through the tree line, then ran for the back steps. Jace and I raced after him. By the time we got there, Marc was knocking on the door. “It's locked,” he explained, when I stopped on the step below him, uncomfortable standing exposed in the porch light.

The sheer curtain parted, and Teo Di Carlo's face appeared. His eyes nearly bugged out of his head when he recognized Marc in the porch light, then saw me behind him. He fumbled with the doorknob, and a moment later ushered us inside.

“Have I ever mentioned how much I love central heat?” Marc headed straight for the coffeepot, still dripping with fresh, hot caffeine.

“And roaring fireplaces…” Jace made a beeline for the stone hearth. “Anyone got marshmallows?”

“How the hell did you get out?” Teo closed and locked the door as people migrated into the kitchen, drawn by our voices.

Marc poured coffee into two mugs, then reached for the sugar. “Faythe broke us out.”

“And who broke you out?” Vic asked, arms crossed over his chest as he leaned against the kitchen wall. He was still mad, and evidently rescuing Marc didn't earn me any points in his favor, because I'd rescued Jace, too.

“What am I, helpless?” I grinned and accepted
the mug Marc handed me, but Vic only nodded in acknowledgment of my skills. “Where's my dad?”

“He's at the lodge, questioning Malone's every word to keep the council busy. We were just about to execute a jailbreak.”

“Yeah, I kind of have that covered.” I set my mug on the table and glanced around, trying to gather my thoughts. “Okay, Marc and Jace need food—something hot and heavy on the calories—and I need a phone.”

Vic fingered the phone in his pocket—the phone he was pointedly not offering me—while Teo pulled a glass pan of something hot, cheesy, and half-devoured from the oven.

“Here.” Brian Taylor handed me his cell, and I smiled at him in thanks. While the guys scooped big servings of baked pasta onto plates, I texted my dad to keep the other Alphas from overhearing our conversation.

It's F. We r out. @ the cabin.

A moment later, his reply came: On my way. And in spite of the circumstances, I spared a moment to be amused by the fact that my father knew how to text. Ethan had taught him, insisting that the new skill would come in handy. My heart ached with the realization that he wasn't around to brag about being right.

While Jace and Marc ate, I helped myself to a plateful of some vaguely Italian-looking combination of noodles, cheese, and tomato sauce, and had half of it scarfed before I noticed Vic scowling at us from the living room. Irritated now, I made eye contact and tossed my head toward the hall.

He nodded curtly and met me there, then followed me silently into the first bedroom we passed.

“Okay, get it over with,” I said, leaning against the closed door.

“Get what over with?”

“You're pissed at me, and everyone can see that, but our lives just might depend on each other in the next couple of hours. So grow a pair and say your peace, then get over it.”

His scowl only grew. “You slept with Jace.” It wasn't a question.

“Yes. And frankly, I don't have to justify that to you.” He started to object, but I cut him off. “Mostly because it's unjustifiable.” And suddenly I felt Ethan's absence stronger than I had since the day he'd died. I needed to talk to someone about Jace and Marc, and as awesome as my father's advice was, he was still my dad.

“Well, at least you recognize that.” He huffed, but looked half-mollified by my admission.

“Will you sit?”

Vic hesitated, then pulled a desk chair away from the wall and sank into it. I let my back slide down the door and sat with my knees pulled up to my chest, looking up at him, drowning in the overload of pain and conflict that came rushing back, now that we were out of immediate danger. “I'm lost, Vic. I don't know what I'm doing.”

He rolled his eyes. “And I thought this was going to be hard…. You just tell Jace thanks for the ride, you're sorry you've turned him into a panting puppy dog, but what happened was wrong and you can't live without Marc.”

Tears filled my eyes and I brushed them away before they could fall.

“Shit,” he whispered, and the chair groaned beneath
his shifting weight. “It's not that easy, is it?” I shook my head but refused to look up. “Do you love him?”

I nodded and wiped unshed tears on my sleeves. “I wish like hell that I didn't, but if wishes were raindrops, I'd already have drowned. The truth is that I can't stand the thought of losing either one of them.”

“Fuck.” Vic got up from the chair and sank to the ground a foot away. The distance he left between us said he still disapproved, but he'd put himself on my level, in full talk-it-out mode. “Marc knows it's serious?”

“Do you think he'd be this pissed if he didn't?”

“I think he'd have killed Jace already, if he didn't think he'd lose you for it.”

“I know.” I reached up to snatch a tissue from the desk on my right.

“You have to choose.”

“I
know
.”

“You have to choose Marc.”

I had no answer to that. I did have to choose Marc. But I had to choose Jace, too. Yet that wasn't an option. And I couldn't hover in decision purgatory much longer.

“I'm sorry, Vic. More sorry than you could ever imagine. I just want you to know that. And to know that this isn't some stupid rebellion. I would never risk what I have with Marc over something like that. This is real, and it's the hardest thing I've ever had to do, and it's torture for all three of us. And it's all my fault.”

“Well, you're right about that.” Another man who wouldn't sugarcoat things for me. “But I think Jace shares more than a little of the blame.”

I blinked to clear my vision and wiped the last of my tears on the tissue. “Is there anything you wouldn't have done for comfort after Sara died? If you were alone with
her best friend, and you'd both just lost a huge part of your lives, and you were both hurting so bad it felt like the pain would swallow you alive?”

“Faythe, I honestly don't know. But that doesn't excuse…”