Dawn Read online

  The man on the other side of the door was not familiar to her though they had been introduced. This one was the one they said was in charge of this prison, although they called it a boarding school. Anger radiated from him heavy enough to cause Dawn to instinctively cower. His teeth were clenched almost as tightly as his hands.

  The disgust in his voice evident as he told her, “I don’t know what in the hell you have done but you better accept you are here to stay. If you think for one minute this kind of childish antic is going to keep you from taking a mate then maybe the training you had at the other place didn’t take. I don’t for a minute care about wining and dining you or anyone else in here. You will mate and you will be fucking happy to have a mate. We could have left you out in the world for anyone to take. You ought to be fucking grateful you were saved and brought here with the others. Whatever it was you used to stink up the whole wing, and don’t fucking deny it was you the smell leads right back here, and you stand there holding a shirt over your nose, you can’t even stand the smell, hand it over, now!”

  Dawn looked at the man in disbelief. She had not left her room in days, they had even taken to bringing her food on a tray and sitting it outside her door. Why in the hell would he think she had done anything? Who would set her up?

  “I don’t have anything on me and by the way, fuck you!” Dawn slammed the door closed. This time when the door closed she locked it. She knew if he was determined to get in he could. But she had seen the way he swallowed when standing there and she knew he was fighting nausea. She didn’t think he would put one more minute of effort into sticking around and losing his dinner.

  “Fucking bitch, I hope you get as sick as all the males smelling this shit.”

  Okay, so someone set me up, but why? What do they hope to gain by leading the head honcho to my door flaming mad? Dawn looked around the room. The smell seemed a bit easier to take but she still wanted to gag. When she lowered the shirt from her face and threw it toward the clothes basket she froze. The basket was on the other side of the bed so she was facing toward the bed as the shirt left her hand. Swallowing hard she eased toward the bathroom behind her. She needed to think. Before she reached the bathroom she realized she had made a mistake. Turning back she crept toward the door. If she had to make a run for it she wanted to be by the door with it at least unlocked. She had no idea who or what was in her room but she did know, after what she saw, she was no longer alone.

  Chapter Four

  “Alright start talking. I saw your face just before you shifted.” Marcus snorted, “If I had not seen your face you would be leaving my territory under escort. But I did and I want an explanation.”

  “My face? I was surprised. I don’t like having someone creep up behind me. I apologize for temporarily losing control of my wolf. You can understand being in another Alpha’s territory with none of my pack to back me makes me a bit edgy right?”

  “I can understand that. I would imagine I would be the same way. However, we are not talking about something that might be, we are discussing what I saw. You are what, three hundred, four hundred years old? Alphas our age don’t temporarily lose control. You can say you are edgy because you have no one at your back, but edgy doesn’t explain a complete loss of color. Man, I was looking right at you. Your face lost all color and had a brief look of horror. Now I don’t think you have met our Kate before so you can’t have tangled with her, she hasn’t had the powers to tangle with anyone. And from my understanding that damn golden wolf of hers just rose at her mating for the first time. So what gives? You aren’t likely to get a partnership out of this pack after that display. Not threatening a female. So if you want to tell me what is going on so we can go forward with our plans trust me when I say it would be in your best interest.”

  Marcus took a quick moment to fill his two pack members in on the situation Trevor had presented to him. He knew Jaden had spent some time with members of Trevor’s pack and Jamie was younger and could give him his thoughts on the situation. The older members of the pack would probably vote favorably for a partnership based on the old ways.

  Trevor watched all three while weighing what he should and should not say. Over the years he had realized no one he spoke to remembered witches, but he did. The scars he carried would never let him forget witches existed. But this pack seemed not only to know about witches, they had a hybrid in their pack. He needed to tread carefully if he was to stay off the radar of the witches and find out what this pack knew.

  “The female took me by surprise. I have not known anyone to associate with witches for hundreds of years yet you have a young hybrid in your pack.”

  Marcus threw up his hand stopping the conversation. “Whoa, back the fuck up. You weren’t facing the door and you sure the fuck couldn’t see or tell she was a witch without seeing her. Hell man, her smell had not even had time to waft over to us for identification. So how bout we do this, you tell me what you know and I will give a bit more information. Your poker face is good, but not that damn good.”

  “What I know is that you have a hybrid in your pack and if the clans find out there is no place on Earth your pack can run to they will not find you. When they find you they will destroy you and all you hold dear.” Trevor, voice heavy with bitterness tapered off before he muttered, “they will find you.”

  “You seem to know a lot about something the rest of us, until recently, had forgotten all about. Or did those memories start trickling back into your head recently also?”

  “Mate, they never left.” Trevor looked down at the table before looking back up. He didn’t hide his expression this time. The other three men drew back at the look of devastated loss on his face. “You don’t know what you are dealing with having a hybrid in your pack. If, no when Miranda finds out, and she will, the very fires of hell will rain down on this pack and you will be lucky if any of your pack members come out alive. The ones she misses will wish they had died with the rest of the pack. You can’t escape her, you can’t hide from her, and you damn sure can’t hide that hybrid you have for very long. I tell you I came here with honest intentions. I will tell you another thing, those ten pack members I wanted to send you, had you accepted were going to bring my females with them. Better to bring a female to visit than have males from three different packs slowly visit in hopes eventually one might be her mate. But there is no power on the planet that will make me send a female to a pack with a hybrid. Not while Miranda lives. I don’t know if I want to send my males here, not after, no, just — I need some time to think and I need to talk to my pack.”

  Marcus sat back in his chair and looked at Jaden, eyebrows raised. We need to talk to Kate’s mom and dad. Someone has been holding out on us. See if you can get Casey to fly over and visit. She hasn’t much use for the clans and I am betting she and Trevor would make, wait, scratch that, he seems to hate witches. I want to know how he knew what Kate was before he even laid eyes on her. Fuck, what kind of problems has Craig brought to our door? I don’t think bringing Kate’s mom would be a good idea if that was the reception Kate received.

  “How did you get a hybrid in your pack?”

  “How did you know what she was before she got in the door good?”

  “Truthfully? She spoke. Her voice was, let’s just say it brought back memories of a time I would rather not relive.”

  “She spoke? You are telling me you shed your humanity based on her voice?” Marcus looked at Jaden then Jamie but both men just shrugged. They had no idea how Kate’s voice could have triggered the reaction they had witnessed.

  Trevor rotated his neck before laying both hands on the table. After studying his nails for a moment he looked back up at the men. He shook his head back and forth, “You have no idea what you have in your territory do you? Let me give you some advice and you take it for what it is worth. If Kate ever walks up behind you and starts talking, turn and make sure it is her. Always make sure you can see your little hybrid when she is talking. If ever you hear her behind yo
u, turn and make certain. Because one day, when you hear her voice and turn around, it won’t be her behind you. If that ever happens, pray. Cause running won’t save your life. Now, unless you want me to leave your territory and you feel like giving me a ride out of here I would appreciate you escorting me back to the cabin you put me up in for now. I need to think. This changes everything and frankly my instincts tell me to get the fuck back to Australia. My wolf on the other hand wants to stay. And you bloody well know what that shit means.”

  “Why?”

  “I wish I knew. If I knew maybe I could talk some sense into him. But he wants to stay. So for now, if you will have me, I would like to stay and try to figure out my next move.”

  Jaden? Jamie? Your thoughts?

  Hell bro, none of us reacted well to the little hybrid the first time the flames leapt up in her eyes and the wolf rose. Even her own mate tried to run, well crawl away from her. If her voice triggered the reaction from Trevor I would like to know more. We can’t find out if we send him away.

  I agree with Jaden. I would like to know why her voice triggered a centuries old shifter. He did not get that Alpha rank by being a coward. Kate is the descendant of a witch right? So whoever she sounds like must be up the family tree and clan. My guess, she has one bad-ass ancestor who follows Miranda and Trevor here has tangled with her in the past. I don’t think he came out the winner either. We have got to know more about these so-called clans. And why one voice would cause a wolf his age to lose his shit.

  “I will walk you to the cabin myself. Maybe on the way you can tell me a bit more about why your wolf insist on staying in a territory you clearly feel to be too dangerous to touch now.” Marcus stood up and waved his hand in dismissal to Jaden and Jamie before turning and leading Trevor out.

  Jaden, go talk to Conall and Sibeal. See if they know what caused Trevor to trigger from the sound of their daughter’s voice, no, shit, never mind. You know what, yeah go ahead and find out what you can. Tell them, if she hasn’t already, what happened in the cafe. Everything Trevor said to us, and see what they say. Watch Conall closely and listen to what he has to say. He has lied once about Miranda the second, he may lie about other things. I would like to believe he would tell the truth now that he is pack, but he has lied, or at least he must have believed it to be a lie. Sibeal must have lied also but you won’t be able to smell her lies. Shit, no, never mind. We have to get Trevor to give up more information before we confront them. If we don’t know the questions to ask they will just get evade the questions. I think they have done it already. Gammon doesn’t trust them and I don’t know that I do much now either. The oath should bind them, but with the witch ancestry and the true-mate bond I don’t know if the oath is enough. Fuck. The last thing we need is uncertainty in the pack oath. Just go back, both of you, and find something to do that doesn’t end up causing me to have a headache later. Keep this from the pack for now.

  Chapter Five

  “No, don’t open the door.”

  Dawn jumped when the whisper wafted from under her bed. She stood by the door, one hand on the knob, she had unlocked the door with her thumb when she heard the whisper. She knew someone was under the bed, the cover had moved and wasn’t hanging right. With her hand ready to turn the knob and flee she told the unknown person.

  “Come out from under the bed where I can see you and then I will decide what to do. I don’t know how you got in here, and I don’t care, but you can’t stay. I am sick of all you people.”

  She watched the small hand reach up and grab the edge of the bed. A small body soon followed. Dawn locked the door back without even realizing it as she gaped at the young girl. The incredibly repugnant smelling girl who could not be much over seven or eight. At least she knew where that god-awful smell was coming from even if she didn’t know why.

  “What, why, my god you reek. What have you done?” Dawn stared in incredulous disbelief at the child.

  “What I had to. Isn’t that what you are doing staying locked in your room? The other girls who from your group said you would be making escape plans. Were they wrong?”

  “But, holy cow girl you stink. What is that revolting smell?”

  “Look we don’t have much time. We can sit here and chit chat about something as trivial as the scents currently being processed by your olfactory receptor cells or we can plan our escape. By the way, if you are too concerned you will be happy to learn that since your olfactory receptor cells are not yet as sensitive as the males here you will be able to process the smells to a degree they will not bother you. All you need is patience. You can be patient yes? The older you are, the closer your wolf is to the surface, the more the smell will affect your body. Now since I have incapacitated all of the males currently in the building, which you will thank me for later, I believe we should make haste and leave. Have you had sufficient time to plan an escape? Have you a destination we can find the safety we need while we make more plans?”

  “I, yes I can be, no I…” Dawn stared with fascination at the little waif giving her instructions, she looked seven or so but she did not speak as though she was that young. “How old are you?”

  The girl gave a long-suffering sigh and stared at Dawn. “Really? Now as I said, we can sit here and chit-chat or we can leave. As you may have noticed I am a bit small for my age so I will not make it far on my own. I have elected you to be my temporary guardian until such a time as I can coordinate with others to take over that role. You are smart enough to do what I tell you right? Gods lets hope you are smarter than some of the others here.” With that the little girl motioned for Dawn to open the door.

  “Well don’t just stand there, follow me. The time window I created for this escape won’t last long.” The girl explained as she led Dawn down the hall and out of the building. Dawn noticed the hallways had splotches in places where someone or several someones had clearly gotten sick and they saw two males laying unconscious or dead as they made their way through the building. Every so often the girl would look down at the tablet in her hand and occasionally touch the screen.

  “I have disabled the security cameras, not all, just the ones critical to our escape, you can drive I assume. If not this escape will turn into a fiasco before we get out the gate, turn here. Now I won’t disable the gate security until we reach the gate itself at which time I will open it. I wasn’t able to get to those guards, and they are human so they will not be affected by the smell. Don’t worry though, they will not expect one of us to leave like this. I had to take care of the owner of the car in a more permanent manner, we can’t have them follow too soon. I hope you are not squeamish? No matter, if you are you can be sick later, after we get out of here. If you stop one more time to look at me—I swear you are going to blow this escape before we get out the gate. Now keep up and keep quiet.”

  The little girl led Dawn to a nondescript brown four-door car and motioned her to get in the driver’s seat. The little girl got in the passenger seat and immediately huddled down on the floorboard under an old blanket. Her muffled voice continued to give directions.

  “Okay, start the car and back out so you can head the way we came in to the parking lot and turn right when you get to the drive. Keep your speed under ten miles per hour and you will see a yellow post on the right before you reach the gate. Tell me the second the front of the car reaches that post. I will activate the gate which will then open and you will drive out. For the love of all you hold dear try to look normal. The guards should not even look up if all goes well.”

  Dawn took a moment to wonder how she was suppose to look normal when a tiny sprite of a female was in control of their escape and had apparently killed someone to get the get-away car. God only knew what she had done to all the males. But surprisingly everything went just as the small female said it would. A few minutes later they were outside the compound and driving down the highway.

  The little girl lifted the blanket and Dawn saw she was sitting cross-legged in the floorboard watching
her tablet.

  “You can get up in the seat now, we made it out. Do you, um, have any other directions you want to offer? Or maybe you could, I don’t know, explain a few things. Like your name, and how you just accomplished this masterful escape and what you did with the owner of this car and oh I don’t know, any nuggets of information would be appreciated.”

  “Shhh, we are not free by any stretch of the imagination. Once I lose range on the compound most of the devices will return to their control. The others will revert back after thirty minutes. Try to get some distance between us and them before that happens. Here, put this on.” The girl grabbed something off the passenger seat and blindly held it out in Dawn’s direction without ever taking her eyes from the tablet. Dawn saw she was being handed a plain brown baseball cap. Shrugging her shoulders she put it on and seeing the sunglasses hanging from the visor she put those on also.

  “You should see a road coming up on the right. Take that road. We are going to coddiwomple toward Santiago’s territory.”

  “I am sorry? We are going to what?” Dawn put her blinker on and slowed down. She could not stop sending looks of incredulous disbelief at the tiny girl sitting on the floorboard. “What are you? Who is Santiago? What is going on? Is this some elaborate trick?” Dawn tried to keep the panic from her voice. No need to let the crazy child on the floorboard think there was a problem. Must remember she had apparently killed someone already, possibly several someones. Not that the males did not need killing, they probably did. Dawn gave herself mental pep talk after mental pep talk to prevent hyperventilating. It was one thing to decide to start a plan that could have led to any number of deaths, it was another to be thrown smack dab into someone else’s escape that had apparently led to deaths already. This little girl and Kate would get along find if she could find Kate. Maybe she needed to find Allison, that was one bad-ass chick. Although, the flames in Kate’s eyes that last day did point to her being a bit more bad-ass than Allison. It was Kate after all who had killed Jonus.