Page 3 of Pistols & Peonies

“Go!” I choke.

She hesitates as I thrash in the enforcer’s grip, but between my bum shoulder and his superior size and strength, it’s pointless. He’s got me locked down tight.

“Go!” I scream at Char again, and the raw edge of fear in my voice must knock something loose inside her, because she actually listens this time. Her golden hair whips in the wind as she spins around and takes off, her silhouette disappearing into the dark.

“Gotcha,” the enforcer snarls in my ear, followed by the sharp jab of a needle piercing my skin. Pain sears through my limbs, sharp and bright. Wolfsbane.

My muscles seize instantly. My wolf, usually hot and bristling under my skin, retreats so fast it feels like falling down a well. I immediately feel empty. Hollow. Wrong.

I try to shout, to fight, but all that comes out is a strangled croak. The enforcer releases his grip and my knees buckle, the world tilting. I hit the ground hard. A boot slams into my ribs, hands wrench my arms behind my back and zip-tie my wrists together. My vision darkens at the edges, closing in.

Then I’m being dragged across the ground, gravel scraping my skin and tearing at my clothes. The world tilts again as I’m hauled over a shoulder like a sack of trash, the enforcer’s grip bruising my ribs. He carries me toward a waiting van and hurls me inside, where I hit the metal plating hard enough to knock the breath from my lungs.

Two others are already in the back of the van– a girl curled in on herself, sobbing, and a man slumped against the wall, eyes glassy and unfocused.

The enforcer leans in over me, breath sour and close. “Not so brave now, are you bitch?”

I scramble back, trying to kick him despite the way I’m bound. He only laughs as he straightens, one hand already reaching for the door.

“Where the fuck are you taking us?” I rasp, voice shredded.

He smiles at me, dead-eyed. “Interrogation. You’re all traitors now.”

Then the door slams shut, plunging me into darkness.

CHAPTER 2

Kane

I hate the bunker.

Nothing good ever happens down here. It’s reserved for imprisonment, interrogation, and the fast-track sentencing of pack criminals whose fates are already decided the moment they’re brought in.

I walk the main corridor with Frazier, a rookie whose only redeeming quality is that he usually keeps his head down and his mouth shut. Unfortunately, he’s doing neither right now, the sound of his voice grating on my nerves as he struggles to keep pace with me.

“Thirty-two detained,” he rattles off, scrolling through the report on his tablet to bring me up to speed on the rebel raid. “Eight with priors, headed straight for the Reaper Block, and four minors have been released to their parents’ custody. The remaining twenty are awaiting sentencing.”

I just grunt in response, not breaking stride. The bunker hums around us with buzzing fluorescents, sweating concrete, and recycled air that tastes like metal and mold. Alpha Gage likes everything about the pack immaculate and presentable, which is why things like this are kept underground.

He doesn’t want to make examples of these types of offenders. He wants to pretend they don’t exist.

We round the corner into the holding area, my boots hitting the scuffed concrete with the measured, unhurried cadence of someone who’s walked this path too many times to count. I’ve been at this for twenty years– started as an entry-level grunt when I was eighteen, gradually working my way up until I became Commander. I now outrank everyone in this godforsaken building except Alpha himself, though I’m not sure whether it’s an honor or a curse.

A row of detainees lines the right-hand wall of the corridor, heads down and shoulders hunched. A few dare to look up at me with hollow defiance. Most don’t.

Toward the front of the line, a raven-haired girl brazenly glares in my direction. Her face is half-shadowed by the hood of her sweatshirt, but her eyes– ice blue and gleaming with mirth– punch through the dim. When our gazes lock, she doesn’t look away. On the contrary, hers sharpens as if she’s sighting down a barrel. Like she’s daring me to be the one to back down and break eye contact.

No chance of that.

I catalog her automatically. Early twenties, about five-foot-nine, slender build, striking features. She’s not merely attractive; she’s stunning in a way that’s impossible to look away from. Something about that stare of hers gives rise to an unfamiliar prickle beneath my skin, my wolf stirring restlessly. Still, I don’t break stride or eye contact, those sharp baby blues tracking me until I turn into the next corridor.

“She’s trouble,” Frazier mutters, flicking me a sideways glance.

I keep walking, my face remaining a practiced, blank mask. “They all are. Why else would they be here?”

“Right,” he murmurs, tucking his tablet under his arm before rushing ahead to open the door to the reckoning room.

I breeze through, and he follows at my heels. The room itself isn’t anything special– white walls, concrete floor, and an elevated platform at the rear that holds Alpha’s seat. Stark and impersonal, designed to strip every wolf who enters down to nothing but their mistakes.