Don’t be in pain, I think, staring him in the eyes over the glint of the blade. Whatever happens, don’t be in pain over me. Just be with Ana, and draw, and go on your runs, and maybe think of me sometimes when you eat peanut butter, but don’t be in—
“Misery,” Serena’s voice interrupts my thoughts. And then she says something else, something garbled and nonsensical that my brain takes a second to untangle. The enforcers look at each other, equally confused. Father frowns. Owen tilts his head, curious.
But she’s not speaking in tongues. There are real words.
“He’s wrong.” That’s what Serena said. In our secret alphabet.
Without looking away from Lowe, I ask, “About what?”
“About whether I can shift.”
I don’t immediately understand. But the corner of my eye catches a burst of movement. Her hand. No—her fingers.
Suddenly, her nails are long.
Unnaturally long.
Newly long.
I take a deep breath, mind racing. “Very well, Father,” I say. I hold Lowe’s gaze, hoping he’ll get this. “Since you’re going to have to kill me, if I may have some last words with my mate.”
I swallow. Lowe’s several steps away from me, and his eyes are . . . It’s impossible to describe them. Not with words.
“Lowe. You are the best thing that ever happened to me. And I would never ask you to put Ana before me.” My voice is little more than a whisper. “And if you ever put someone else before her, I’d love you a little less. But when you see her next, since I probably won’t, will you give her a message from me? Tell her that she’s as annoying as Sparkles. And that . . . that thing she isn’t able to do? She shouldn’t be sad about it. Because she’ll grow into it. And she’ll definitely be able to do it by the time she’s twenty-five or so.”
Lowe stares at me, confused—until the meaning clicks for him. His eyes dart from mine to Serena’s, and I wish I had time to savor how incredibly wrong, and fucked up, and just odd this is: the two people who make up my entire universe, meeting under these ridiculous circumstances.
I hope one day the three of us will be able to laugh about this moment. I hope this is not the end. I hope that even if I’m not around, the two of them will be there for each other. I hope, I hope, I hope.
Serena nods.
Lowe nods.
Understanding runs through them like a current.
“Now,” Lowe whispers.
All of a sudden, Owen steps forward. In a lightning-quick moment, Lowe’s restraints are undone, and his body begins to shift. Contort. Merge and turn and transform. I turn to look at Serena and find that she’s doing the same—the perfect, blindsiding distraction that none of the guards saw coming. Nor Vania. Nor Father.
“What are you—” he only has the time to say.
Because two large, majestic white wolves fill the room. The noise of tearing flesh rises above the screams, and I watch the two people I love the most hold absolutely nothing back.
CHAPTER 29
There are many matters to settle, and his pack needs him more than ever, but he cannot concentrate on anything but her. He understands why some Alphas take vows of celibacy and renounce love.
She distracts him. His feelings for her, they distract him.
There is something I’ll never, ever let myself live down, not until the day I kick the bucket, not until the moment I vanish into the nothingness of matter: in my weeks of living with the Weres, it never occurred to me to wonder where their clothes went when they shifted to wolf form.
It’s so, so stupid of me.
And in the aftermath of the scariest night of my life, sitting in the Nest’s stairwell, with Gabi treating the puncture wound Father’s knife cut into the flesh of my collarbone, I simply cannot let go of it.
“Did you think they’d transform with us? Sartorially?” Alex leans against the handrail. He’s sticking around for no reason other than to mock me. Or maybe he’s genuinely interested—I cannot tell. All I know is, I miss when he was terrified of me. “You thought that the end result would be a wolf in a little sweater vest and a bow tie? Just to be clear, is that what you expected?”
“I don’t know what I expected. But Serena’s top was all tattered and stuck around her neck, and I’m just saying that it was disturbing to watch a pink shirt dangle from her while her teeth sank into Vania’s throat.” I rub my face with my palms, hoping to unsee the past two hours. When I look up again, Ludwig and Cal and another handful of seconds are walking down the hallway to Father’s office. They stop in front of us, and . . .
We all know they were interrogating Mick. I wonder if it still looks like the Aster in there: purple and green blood splattered all over the walls. The most gruesome of flowers, finger-painted by the world’s creepiest child.
“Is she still talking about the clothes?” Ludwig asks.
Alex nods with a deep sigh. Gabi bites back a smile.
“I just want to know what the hell she was thinking would happen to them,” Cal mutters.
“I didn’t think,” I say. Defensively.
“Obviously,” Alex mutters.
“Shouldn’t you be intimidated by me? Also, what are you doing here?” This must be the most Weres in Vampyre territory ever.
“It was determined that an IT expert might be of use, and frankly, you lost all of your intimidation points.”
“I can still drink you dry, nerd.”
Owen arrives to interrupt our bickering. “Are you done here, Misery? I need you with me for a moment.”
I follow him down the staircase with one last glare at Alex, mostly in silence. Owen got a bit beaten up during the fight: his black eye is courtesy of Vania, or maybe that auburn-haired guard who escorted him in. From the way he carries himself, I suspect his entire right side is bruised, too. When we turn into a dark hallway and are out of earshot, I ask quietly, “Are you okay?”
“I should ask you that.”
I mull it. “I’d feel better if I could speak to Serena.”
“She’s with the ginger. The girl, not the guy.”
“Juno. I know.”
“Apparently, she doesn’t quite have the whole turning-into-a-beast-and-then-back-into-a-person thing down, and she’s still working on controlling her . . . I don’t fucking know, wolfy impulses. Red took her for a run to—”
“I know,” I repeat. I’m still worried. “And it’s not ‘turn.’?”
“What do you mean?”
“The Weres prefer the term ‘shift.’?”
He gives me an appalled glance, like I’m a first-row nerd yelling Teacher, pick me! and then stops in front of a closed door. “I saw your face when I stepped into the office. You thought I was going to screw you over, didn’t you?”
I resist the temptation to avert my gaze. “You did come in holding my husband captive.”
“That was his idea. I called him about an hour after you guys drove away—we were finally able to get footage of the break-in in Serena’s apartment.”
So that’s why Lowe left after we . . . better not think about that. “Let me guess—it was Mick.”
He nods. “I showed Lowe the recordings, and he immediately recognized him. Misery, he freaked the fuck out.”
“Yeah, Mick and Lowe go way back—”
“No, he freaked out because he knew that you were with Mick. I thought your boy toy was a pretty even-tempered guy, but he’s actually bloodcurdling.”
I don’t bother to deny it. “And what did you do?”
“The Weres were still monitoring the governor to see what his next step would be, and he made a call to Father. At that point, it became clear that they were collaborating on something, and that Mick was aiding them. Lowe told me to call Father and lie—the story was that once you and Mick disappeared, Lowe contacted me to find you because he thought I might be willing to help, and instead I took him captive. You’ve seen the rest.” He squints at me. “Again, it was his idea.”
“I didn’t say anything—”
“I’m not going to screw you over, Misery.”
I nod, feeling almost close to my twin. It’s long forgotten, but familiar. “Neither will I.”
“Very well, then.” He points at the door. “You ready?” He doesn’t say what’s inside, but I already know.