Page 79 of Bound

Me.

Topher was right. I’d been denying what I felt between us from the very start, holding back out of a fear of letting myself get hurt. Instead, I’d wound up hurting him.

“What are you saying?”

“Last one. We’re clear.” August and Vlad burst into the cell, dragging a male shapeshifter. He was tall, well over six feet and at least thirty pounds underweight. Startlingly bright hazel eyes stared out of a gaunt face marred by bruises. A pronounced limp suggested a leg fracture. The high silver content in the walls would have prevented him from healing despite his shifter blood.

“What’s your name?” I whispered, even though some part of me already knew, had known from the moment I’d seen those whiskey-amber eyes.

“Kieran,” he rasped. “Kieran Greer.”

River let his head thump back against the cell wall. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. Topher thinks he’s dead.”

My blood turned to ice in my veins. “What?”

“Brody just called in. Topher went after Phoenix. He couldn’t stop him.” River looked from me to Kieran. “He’s gone.”

14

Topher

WE’D STAGED THE RENDEZVOUS POINT in an alley half a mile from campus behind a row of dumpsters. We’d extracted more than twenty people from the hellhole of that vampire prison, some who looked like they’d been in there for weeks, others far longer. Naomi, Cal and I worked efficiently, checking vital signs, providing water, protein bars and blood bags, and designating which patients got prioritized for the first round of evac. It was what I was trained to do in a time of crisis, to shut out everything else in my head and treat the patient in front of me. But the moment the last SUV pulled away, grief slammed into me so hard my breath caught. All those families waiting at home, having no idea they were about to get the call they’d never stopped praying for. I glanced around the alley. In the back of River’s SUV, London bandaged the wounds of a shirtless Brody, the two of them arguing over something I couldn’t make out. The next time either of them looked up, I was gone.

I’d failed my brother. And I had one last chance to make it right.

Moonlight streamed through the tree canopy as I snuck back onto campus, slinking past police barricades in wolf form. The red and blue rack lights on a line of police cruisers flashed a fireworks display bright enough to illuminate the night sky all the way to the Capitol. Radios squawked out calls for additional units to be deployed. A SWAT helicopter buzzed the northern edge of campus, searing the pavement with a wide swath of piercing white light. I slipped by undetected, just another unwanted stray skulking through the shadows of downtown Austin. Law enforcement didn’t know who or what they were hunting for.

I did.

That particular vampiric signature was currently tracking east towards the interstate, ghosting like a shadow between the stately old buildings behind the clock tower. It pulled further away as flocks of black-winged grackles screamed in the trees overhead, drawing me to the edge of campus. I was nearly to the football stadium, just passing one of the ornate stone fountains backlit by soft amber lights, when I felt Caldwell scream through the bond.

Gasping, I shifted back to human form, curling with my back against the fountain. For the briefest of seconds, my resolve faltered. A gust of wind danced across the surface of the water, sending a fine mist spraying over my cheeks. My phone vibrated in my pocket. I didn’t pull it out. Didn’t want to see what it would say. I thought of that night almost a year ago, when West had stopped me from making the worst mistake of my life. Remembered the way the wind had whipped through my hair, carrying with it the scent of cinnamon and laundry detergent. Of him. A chill shivered up my spine. West roared at me through the bond. Apoplectic. Beyond all future bribing with onion rings.

I wished I could have explained that this wasn’t like the night we met. That more than anything in the world, I wanted to stay with him, forever. That it was because I so desperately wanted that future for us that I couldn’t allow the current state of things to continue, wouldn’t live every day for the rest of my life waiting for the text or call that he’d been taken from me, too.

One way or another, this ended tonight.

At the top of the hill, past the stadium, Phoenix waited for me beneath a massive live oak, a neatly manicured lawn sprawling out between us in a carpet of endless green. Cristof stood beside him.

“I have a proposition for you.” The vampire wore a dark blue button down and expensive looking jeans. “One that would end all hostilities between the Vampire Nation and your pack.”

My lip curled. “And what, we’re just supposed to look the other way while you terrorize our neighbors? I think I speak for all of us when I say you can take your proposal and shove it.”

Cristof nodded as if he’d been expecting this. “We have no wish to be at war. If you only knew the resources our scientists have committed over the last decade towards trying to create a synthetic blood we can tolerate. They’ve been working night and day to determine what it is about lycan blood that enables us to safely pass through sunlight after consuming it. We want to be able to live ordinary lives, free of the constant need to feed, free of being trapped in eternal night. You could help us.”

Something niggled at the back of my mind. “Kieran didn’t carry the genetic marker. He can’t sire varewolves.”

Cristof shook his head. “No.”

“So you disposed of him?”

“Your brother is still alive.”

I froze. “What?”

“He was attacked three days ago and badly injured. Because of the silver in the prison, his wounds didn’t heal properly. He lost too much blood. He hasn’t regained consciousness.” A beat. “We’re willing to release him to you, to your doctors.”

My heart pounded. “If I go with you, that is.”