Savage Revenge (22 page)

“You’re awake.”

Even though her eyelids felt heavy, Sage struggled to open them as the concerned male voice registered.

Finally her lashes lifted enough for her to get a glimpse of Nate behind the wheel of a car.

They were moving quickly, smoothly, and it took a moment to realize they were driving. Everything that had happened before getting knocked out flitted through her mind.

“Where are we?” she croaked out, and struggled to sit up. “And you’re okay? I thought—”

“I’m fine. I regained control of the…” he paused. “Situation. And before you can ask, yes your brother and formerly intended mate are fine. Or, well, they’re alive.”

The hard set of his jaw, and the way his gaze never left the road hinted at the anger brewing just below the surface. Fear rippled through her.

“Did you hurt them?”

“I sure as fuck didn’t ask them nicely to leave me alone, Sage.”

Meaning they’d probably gotten roughed up a bit. How the hell had Nate alone taken on two large men and come out ahead?

And, actually, another thorough glance over Nathan showed the jeans he now wore were probably her brother’s.

She swung her gaze around the car, but they were completely alone.

“What happened to the Donovans? Is this their car?”

He didn’t answer immediately, instead maneuvered the car onto the highway.

“This is
a
car, that’s all you need to know. That, and the Donovans are safe.”

Ambiguous answers. He didn’t trust her. Not like he should’ve after she’d led him straight into a trap. The realization slammed into her and her heart clenched. God, she wished she could get into his head right now.

Wait. Maybe she could. He’d certainly been able to do it to her easily enough. They were mated now—which was another completely
oh shit
notion.

She tried to silence her thoughts and reached out with her mind, trying to reach his, and encountered the equivalent of a big brick wall.

“Why can’t I hear your thoughts?”

“Because I’m blocking them.”

“How do you even do that?” she demanded with frustration. “You can hear mine.”

“You were always terrible at hiding your thoughts, Sage. Now that we’re mated you’re like a movie screen in my head.”

Oh, wasn’t that reassuring. A growl of irritation built in her throat and she turned to stare out the window.

“I didn’t ask for this. I didn’t ask you to mate with me,” she ranted. “What the hell were you thinking? Did you do it to specifically get into my head? Was that the whole reason you marked me?”

He gave a harsh laugh. “Of course not. I was driven to. You can’t deny that we have a connection. We figured that out pretty quick.”

“It’s irrelevant. I was never yours to decide to mate with. You know how it works. I was promised to—”

“A beta.” He cast her another coolly appraising glance. “And because I’m an alpha I can overrule that decision and claim you for myself.”

“But my brother ordered—”

“He’s not your alpha anymore.” His words were hard, cold and deliberate. “I’m your alpha. Your mate. And you’d better start wrapping your mind around that, Sage.”

“Wrap my mind around it? It’s not like you gave me a choice in any of this.” She trembled with anger.

“You never were going to
have
a choice. Whether you were mated with me or that guy built like a semi. And you can’t deny you felt the pull to mate with me as much as I did to you. It first became apparent when we slept together. Can you deny it?”

She couldn’t at all and wouldn’t even try. Yes, she’d felt it in the moment where she’d wanted him to bite her neck. She’d lost her heart to him ridiculously quick. Which wasn’t fair. Sometimes fate deserved to be kicked in the crotch.

“You’re right,” she agreed after a moment. “I did begin to suspect you were my mate. Suspected what was between us went beyond lust, but how could I acknowledge it? Believe it? Because now I’m mated to a man wanted for murder. Several murders.”

His gaze swung to her. “So you’ve changed your mind again and believe I’m guilty now? Why?”

She held his gaze. “Surveillance video. I saw you.” 

For a moment longer he stared at her, and then swung his attention back to the road.

Silence. Until he swerved the car off to the shoulder and threw it in park.

“What video?”

“I don’t know,” she said uneasily. “It looked like some kind of street camera or something. It was shot from probably twenty feet in the air. They said it was surveillance.”

He shook his head. “No. There’s no Goddamn security cameras in that neighborhood.”

“But there had to be—”

“Someone was there. Somebody filmed the whole damn thing and didn’t lift a finger to help. Did the video move at all? Pan out over the town? Or was it shot straight on?”

“I really can’t remember. I just remember…”

“What did you see? Did you see me killing people, Sage?”

“I saw you—it was you, Nate.” Her voice broke. “Running through the village in wolf form as those terrified people fled screaming.”

Unease flickered in his eyes. As if he might be doubting his own innocence now.

“And you saw me kill them?”

She paused, reflecting back on the video. “Well no. Not on screen, I didn’t see you catch any of them. Or kill them. Except—”

“Except what?”

“Alicia.” She glanced at him through her lashes, almost sick with the violence of the killing. “The video shows you killing her.”

He didn’t say anything. Made no attempt to deny it. Her stomach roiled and she pressed her knuckles to her mouth.

“You told me you didn’t kill anyone.”

“No.” He gave a vehement shake of his head. “You asked me if I killed
all
those people, and I said no.”

“So you skirted around the truth,” she muttered bitterly. “But you did kill your fiancée.”

“Yes.”

She’d seen the video, but hearing him admit it so calmly doubled her nausea.

Her brother had been trying to protect her—as harsh as his methods were. If she were a stronger person, she would’ve held it together. Wouldn’t have given any sign that she was leading him into a trap.

But Nate was right. Her emotions were just as readable as the books she wrote, and now it might have cost more lives than had already been lost. Not just his fiancée’s pack, but also potentially those women along the west coast who were turning up dead.

“Turn yourself in, Nate,” she pleaded. “It would be better for everyone if you just surrendered peacefully.”

She grasped the door handle, half tempted to try and slip out of the car. Maybe wave down another passing vehicle.

But just as quickly as the idea was in her head, Nate was pulling back onto the highway.

Shit. There he went reading her damn mind again.

“I didn’t kill them. I’m sure the video is pretty damning, but I didn’t kill them.”

“You told me there are moments you can’t remember. What if you did it then? What if the drug made you—”

“You told me to trust myself, and I do. I fought the effects of the drug. I swear to you, Sage, I was set up. Yes, I killed Alicia, but it was only to protect a child.”

“A child?” Her mind locked on part of the video, and hope sprang to life inside her. “There was a child in the video.”

“Tell me what you saw. Everything you remember.”

“He was crying. Screaming. Alicia was near him.”

“Because she was about to kill him,” he finished grimly.

Sage reran the image of the video in her head and tried to see it the way he described. It actually worked. There was nothing to indicate either way whether Alicia had been trying to save the child or harm him.

“Who gave you the video?”

“Jocelyn. She was actually there.”

His gaze swung to her. “Where?”

“At my brother’s.”

“She was there? You spoke with her?”

“Yes. She and another man had brought the video to my brother.”

“I’ll try and get the video.”

“How? More violence? What will this solve? You need to surrender.”

“Dammit,
I’m not guilty
.”

She flinched as he slammed his fist into the steering wheel.

Tears blurred her eyes and she bit her lip to hold them back. She had to get away from him. He still believed himself to be innocent—and maybe he was. She didn’t know what to believe anymore. She just knew he would fight until the death to try and prove himself innocent.

Which might be the exact damn outcome if she didn’t convince him to surrender.

Her thoughts scattered at the sound of squealing tires. A car shot past them on the left-hand side, but instead of passing, it swerved to block both lanes, before the red brake lights flared as he came to a stop.

Nate had to slam on the brakes and swerve to the right onto the shoulder to avoid hitting him.

“Who the fuck is this ass clown?” Nate growled.

The man stepped from the car and strode toward them, gun raised.

Frank
. Recognition flared and Sage reached for the handle again. The man who’d been with Jocelyn at her brother’s house had somehow managed to find them.

And the gun he was leveling at them as he pounded on her window sent the hair on her arm rising.

“Let the woman go.” Frank’s shout was calm and firm.

Her heart rose to her throat and she slid a glance to the lock on the door. It was locked, but the car was old enough that clearly the locks weren’t automatic.

“Turn yourself in, Nate. Please,” she pleaded in a low, guttural voice. “I don’t want Frank to shoot you and he looks a little trigger happy.”

“You know this guy?” He shot her a disbelieving look. “Is he in your brother’s pack?”

If she admitted Frank had come with Jocelyn, Nate might just get so irate he’d try and run the man over. And then Frank would shoot him—if he survived.

Either way, there was about to be bloodshed.

Which left her no choice except one. One that made her so nauseous with guilt she couldn’t swallow past the lump in her throat.

Don’t think, just go,
her mind urged.

Grabbing the door handle, she yanked it open and threw herself out of the car.

“Sage,
don’t
—”

She stumbled back as Nate cursed and caught her shirt, but she twisted just enough where she slid right from his fingers and out of the car.

Chapter Twenty

Frank caught her elbow and eased her away from the car and toward his. “You’re safe now, Miss Whelan.”

With the headlights reflecting on them, she couldn’t see Nate behind the wheel. She tried to search his mind. His thoughts weren’t clear, but the emotions he made no attempt to hide.

Disbelief. Frustration. Fury. Betrayal…

I’m sorry, Nate. I’m so scared. If I didn’t leave, I was afraid he would do something extreme. I couldn’t risk that.

“Don’t hurt him,” she whispered. 

“I don’t plan to hurt him,” Frank murmured, still holding her arm as he walked them backward toward his car. “Not yet anyway.”

His gun never left Nate. He gestured for her to get in his car.

With her heart heavy, it took a moment for the veiled threat in his words, but by then she was already in the car with the door shut.

She twisted in her seat, watching to see if he’d approach Nate again.

Crap. What had she done? What if he—

Frank jumped into the driver’s side of the car and slammed the door. “Let’s get you out of here.”

Oh thank God. He wasn’t going to hurt Nate. Which meant his primary plan had been to rescue her.

Relief slid through, even as the ache in her heart grew.

He put the car in drive and slammed on the gas. The car lurched forward as he spun them back into the lane and raced down the highway.

Sage rushed to buckle up, and made a quick glance into the passenger mirror. Nate was following them. Not that she was surprised.

This was his chance to flip a U-turn and try to escape if he wanted. Instead he was following them. Why? What was he doing? Was he trying to get her back?

Well, you
are
his mate.

She tried to read his thoughts and hit a wall now. He was blocking her. He was way too damn good at that.

“Did you notify the P.I.A. of our location?” The words were thick with guilt as she shot Frank a quick glance.

“Those who need to know, know.”

Well that was a bit of an odd response. Maybe her brother had sent him—maybe he’d been nearby her house and had seen the entire attack go down.

“Thank you,” she said hesitantly. “For helping me.”

“You’re quite welcome, Sage.”

He turned to stare at her, and for a moment there was something in his hazel eyes that sent a chill of unexplainable fear through her.

Breaking his stare, she glanced out the window and hoped she hadn’t just made a big mistake. Even if her heart agreed with Nate that she’d betrayed him.

Another glance showed that Nate still followed them.

The car she was in slowed, and she frowned when Frank turned off onto a small back road. Why? What could possibly be out here in the darkness of the isolated road?

Were they meeting someone? That seemed…unlikely. The unease that had been inside her spread.

She lifted her gaze to the side rearview window again and looked for the headlights of Nate’s car on the main road.

Don’t leave me
.
I didn’t think I had a choice but to go, I couldn’t see you get hurt.
She sent the mental plea, hoping he would hear it.

There was no response. She could sense his mental brick wall up again.

The realization made her stomach drop and a heaviness filled her heart. She’d made the wrong choice by getting into this car, she knew it instinctively now. But the sight of a gun directed at Nate had pushed her into the rash, split second decision to leave with Frank.

Even though in shifter form Nate was no doubt deadly, it was hard to fight a bullet. And she had no doubt Frank would’ve shot Nate if he’d felt it necessary.

In the rearview, she saw the headlights of his car approach the turn off.