Forget About Midnight (Alexa O'Brien, Huntress #9)

The wolf was fully in control when I turned back and leaped on Shaz with exuberant joy. With paws planted against his chest, I pasted him against the side of the car and showered him with wet wolf kisses.

Shaz grabbed a handful of my fur and kissed the side of my muzzle. “What the hell’s going on? Are you ok?”

Unable to voice my issues, I pawed at the car for him to let me in. Then in my head I said to Arys, ‘Call Shaz. I need you to bridge this little communication gap for us.’

As wolves Shaz and I could communicate with a look, a touch, a twitch of the ears. In our current forms, there was a bit of a barrier. I clambered into the back seat when Shaz opened the car door for me. Seconds later his phone began to ring. He got into the driver’s seat and answered it.

I relayed to Arys that I needed Shaz to get Jez over here with a change of clothes for me. The three of us were going to wait for Briggs to leave and tail him home. He’d been working all night. Surely he’d be headed home soon. That motherfucker was mine. Soon after that he would be Shya’s.

Shaz put Arys on speakerphone and listened as he repeated everything I told him in my head. He turned to look at me where I sat awkwardly in the small backseat.

“Are you sure about this, Lex?” Shaz asked. “I mean, I’m game, but this could be dangerous.”

“Briggs just threw her out in the sun to burn,” Arys said, his voice coming loud from the speakerphone. “I’d be there to help you if I could, but it’s time to deal with him. Nothing seems to get through to this man. He’s either fearless, stupid, or both. But he’s got to be stopped.”

Shaz regarded me with a mix of anger at what Briggs had done and awe at the fact that I was sitting there unblemished. “The wolf saved you,” he breathed in disbelief.

‘Ask Shaz if he’s up for this. He’s been here all night.’ There was no hiding the shame I felt at that realization from Arys. I fought hard to keep from thinking about what Falon and I did. This was not the time for either of them to find out. I knew they would, but I would face that nightmare when it was time.

Arys and Shaz talked while I sat there watching out the window for any sign of Briggs leaving the FPA building. After they hung up, Shaz called Jez and told her to meet us as soon as possible. Then we waited.

Shaz kept reaching back to stroke my head. I poked it between the front seats and nuzzled him. Being wolf felt exactly like what I needed. It was overdue. My psyche had suffered. Even now I worried that I wouldn’t be able to shift back. And I worried deep down in a place I would not touch lest Arys see it, that my vampire side had led me to do too many things for which there was no absolution.

‘What happened in there, Alexa?’ Arys’s voice in my head was both a comfort and a concern.

‘Briggs took my blood. He locked me up. Then he threw me outside in the sun.’ Yeah, that was the short form version. It was the best he was going to get out of me right then.

Arys’s presence in my head meant I could feel what he felt. So I knew he was certain I was leaving something out on purpose. Knowing better than to press it, he didn’t. I couldn’t help but think that part of him already knew.

“I couldn’t shake this feeling that I had to stay,” Shaz said, pulling my focus outward. “I almost left, but I couldn’t. Something kept me here.”

His hand was warm on my face as he stroked my nose and gave an affectionate tug on my ear. Closing my eyes, I leaned into his touch with a sigh. The wolf didn’t think in full thoughts, but the sense of content love was prominent.

‘That wolf is going to love you forever, no matter what you do. You know that, right?’ Arys said it in a way that told me this had recently been discussed between them.

‘You guys have been spending a lot of time together, huh?’ It was a good thing. The more I thought about it, the more sense it made.

Arys found some humor in my acceptance of the new level their weird relationship had reached. ‘We share something. It used to divide us, but now it brings us together.’

I eyed the bite mark Shaz wore. My mark. ‘Yes. But just how close together is it bringing you? Be careful, Arys. Don’t push him to a place he doesn’t want to go.’

‘He came to me, Alexa. Of his own free will. It was you he wanted, but he settled for me.’ There was no remorse in Arys. He wasn’t sorry, not that I expected him to be. We’d been down this road before.

‘You loved it.’ It wasn’t an accusation. I just knew that it was the kind of thing that would get Arys going. I wished I’d been there to see it.

‘I wish you’d been there too,’ he said. ‘That’s how it should be. The three of us. It still can be.’

He sounded so sure. It still baffled me that Arys was so willing to embrace what Shaz and I shared. They were both far better than I would have been in either of their positions.

‘I’m not so sure about that anymore.’ I thought, more to myself than to Arys.