AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“You know something is off with Mikalis,” Octavius said. “Information you used so he didn’t make Eric disappear. You know he’s not what he appears to be and neither is Saint. Neither am I. I’m not your enemy. I never was. I’m going to let you go.” He pointed at the warehouse door. “You’ll go back to wherever the new base is, and you’re going to stop Raiden. I am not the traitor you’re looking for. He is.”
Zaine sighed and stared at the floor. “Why don’t you tell Mikalis all this?”
Octavius glanced at Saint. Now was as good a time as any to tell them the truth. He nodded, and Octavius continued. “Mikalis believes we’re together, so he thinks Saint has told me his secrets.”
“Has he?”
Octavius swallowed and glanced over at Saint. “No,” he lied. “I’m working with Saint because, if I hadn’t partnered with him, I’d already be dust.”
All right, so he wasn’t telling the Brotherhood the truth. Well, at least Saint knew where he stood. Octavius was usinghim. And once he got his happy-ever-after back with the Brotherhood, he’d throw Saint under a semitruck. What had Saint expected from the Brotherhood? Certainly not a friend.
Maybe he’d been wrong about Octavius. Perhaps the little wolf had fooled him all along.
“And what does he get out of this?” Zaine tilted his head toward Saint and smirked. “Your blood?”
Saint was done here. They’d never listen to him. He’d been a fool to think he had a chance when they barely listened to Octavius, one of their own.
He turned on his heel and left the warehouse but didn’t go far. He listened to their murmering voices, just in case the Viking got any ideas about attacking Octavius again.
He waited by the chopper and watched dawn break over the surrounding treetops. Somewhere in all of this, he’d assumed he and Octavius were a team. Their own Brotherhood, of sorts. He was a damned fool.
He knew better than to get attached.
CHAPTER19
Octavius
All was going as planned.Zaine was listening, although whether he did anything with the information was still undetermined. At least, the plan had appeared to be working. Then Saint had walked out.
“Go back to New York, and look deeper at Raiden,” Octavius told Zaine. “He’s clever. It won’t be easy. But you have to do this—not for me, but for the Brotherhood. Because if I’m right, then Raiden is the biggest threat to the Brotherhood since… well, since Saint.”
Zaine stood, and Octavius tensed for another attack. “You get one chance,” he said. “That’s it.”
“That’s all I ask.”
“All right. I’m good to go? Your nyk isn’t going to go feral on me?”
“Go right ahead.” Octavius watched him head for the doors. “Saint could easily have killed you. He’s not the nyk you think he is.”
Zaine showed Octavius his middle finger and shoved through the door. Octavius waited a few moments, taking stock of the conversation. It felt like progress. They might pull this off.
By the time Octavius made it outside, Zaine was gone, but Saint loitered nearby. He paced in front of the chopper and didn’t look over. He’d needed blood and was in pain from another beating, but Octavius figured meeting up with the Brotherhood again was the real cause of his disquiet.
“We should get back to Jay,” Saint said.
“We’re just going to leave the chopper here?”
“Can’t risk any of the Brotherhood seeing it take off.” He took a running jump at the fence, landed on the other side, and marched off into the woods.
Octavius glanced around the yard. He didn’t think Zaine would follow them, not when he knew Saint could tear into him, but they should double back around a few times to lose any tails.
He followed Saint into the woods and caught up with his heavy strides. He didn’t know him well, but something was wrong. Saint kept his head down and marched ahead, bristling with tension.
Octavius had only had a few months of being ostracized. Saint had had multiple centuries behind bars, during which nobody had cared enough to open his cell door and listen to him. They’d all toed Mikalis’s line of never discussing who was locked in Room 3B, obeying his orders without question.
“It must be hard, seeing them again,” Octavius said. “They’re stubborn, I know, but they aren’t all bad—”
Saint’s growl cut him off. He stomped through the brush. “Don’t defend them,” he said. “They don’t deserve it.”
