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The door was locked, but the corridor was busy. Footsteps passed, heavy booted ones then soft barefoot ones. The latter intrigued me, so even though I didn’t expect to be answered I called out anyway.
“Hello?”
The footsteps paused. For a moment, I thought they’d continue away from me. Instead, I caught a whiff of sex and perfume as someone female pressed up against the outside of my door.
“The alpha said you weren’t to be bothered.”
“But I stopped you,” I reassured her. “You didn’t approach me.” Then, before she could think up an argument, I attempted to tug at her sense of hospitality. “Could you possibly track down my luggage? I suspect Troy didn’t know where to take my suitcase....”
The female voice turned regretful. “I’m afraid I’d need the alpha’s permission to do that.”
Frustrating but expected. I changed tacks. “Do you have a key to my room?”
“The alpha...”
She didn’t have to finish her sentence. Didn’t get to either, because the light went out above my head.
The woman squeaked and retreated, footsteps slapping frantically. While she fled, I fumbled in search of backup illumination.
But there was no switch by the door. No bedside lamp. Just one overhead bulb that was on then off.
Shedding my dress, I shifted to wolf form. I’d expected lupine eyes to make the expanse penetrable. But the room was still pitch dark. No light leaked in through cracks around the door.
So perhaps the entire compound had a mandatory bedtime? One that affected even the hallway lights? What if someone needed to get up and use the bathroom while the rest of us slept?
Sniffing through the pitch blackness, I discovered the solution to that problem. A tiny half bath, not really big enough to be called a room, branched off the edge of my cell. Just a nook with a sink and toilet. No door. One towel rack.
The guys whose scent infused the space had left behind a bar of soap—used—and a grimy towel. Did they live out of suitcases to have been able to pack up so quickly? Get rotated through rooms without any say-so in the matter? I shivered but kept sniffing, hunting for something I could use to escape.
I found the one possible tool—a phone—by following converging scent trails. The beds, door, and bathroom had seen the most use, but one corner of the room was also frequented. Shifting to human form, I felt along the wall with my hands. Something fell when I touched it, banging painfully against my knee.
I only realized I’d been struck by the receiver of an old-fashioned telephone when a question emerged at knee-height. “What do you need?”
This was a female voice, but she sounded nothing like the submissive women I’d met so far within the McCallister compound. Instead, she seemed vaguely annoyed at being interrupted. I fumbled for the receiver. “Who is this?” I asked.
“Jasmine. And you’re Athena. I don’t have all night. Can we get to the point?”
Jasmine was a switch-board operator it seemed, even though I couldn’t see why we needed one in this digital age. Especially not one who was borderline rude.
Still, I stated the obvious. “I want to make a call.”
Jasmine’s voice turned cagey. “Who do you wish to speak with?”
I rattled off the number I’d memorized from Tank’s business card.
A pause. Then: “An outside number?”
“Let me guess. You have to ask your alpha.”
And...she laughed at me. “No. I don’t have to ask my alpha. I can tell you right now I won’t connect you. Don’t bother me again.”
***
SINCE THE DOOR WAS locked from the outside but could open at any moment, I shifted to wolf form and settled down against the barrier. And, thanks to my wolf, I slept, even though I was trapped in a tiny cinderblock room with no means of egress. Slept until the overhead light flicked on and my stomach started rumbling. Then I yawned, shifted, pulled on yesterday’s dress....and my door opened without benefit of a knock.
A woman stood in the open doorway, a bundle of fabric in her arms. She could have been the woman who’d offered me clothes last night or someone entirely different. Still, I was pretty sure she wasn’t Jasmine when she opened her mouth.
“The alpha requested you join him for breakfast.”
She didn’t offer her name, so I didn’t ask for one. Instead, I took a step toward the door, noting as I did so that a good night’s sleep had finally taken the twinge out of my ankle. “Perfect.”
The route to semi-freedom was open, even though there was a male standing guard outside it. That was a step up from the previous night when my nose suggested there had been no one close enough to hear me if I yelled.
But I didn’t make it to the hall after all. Because the woman sidestepped to block the exit, failing to budge as I advanced on her.
“You’ll need to change first.” As if on cue, the door closed, locking us back into the bedroom. “Here.” She handed over a bundle of fabric that did, indeed, seem large enough to cover an entire person, unlike the sad excuse for a dress I currently had on.
But when I shook out the silky fabric, I winced. “Uh uh.”
She leaned closer, peering at what I was holding. “What’s wrong?” Her head cocked.
“This?” I held up fishnet stockings and a thong in one hand. “I’m not wearing this in public.”
“There’s a robe.” The woman used long fingernails to pluck the rest of the fabric out of my arms. The silky garment that had made up most of the bundle turned out to be a coverup that was only borderline too sexy to be worn outside the boudoir. “No one will look at you in the halls anyway,” she continued. “They know you’re the alpha’s property.”
I most certainly wasn’t the alpha’s property. I was someone with two and a half days left to gather photographs and deal with Marina before returning to something that felt more important than a mere job. Regardless of my attachment to a group that was due to disassemble in half a week, I had no intention of staying put.
“I’ll go to breakfast in what I have on.” I kept my voice firm, taking one more step forward until I was just past the lupine comfort zone.
Up until this point, the woman had acted like a normal person, albeit a slightly dense one. But now her eyes fell to the floor, her tone turning into that of a submissive wolf being forced to stand up to someone stronger than herself. “I’m afraid that’s not possible.”
I felt like a bully. Still, I wasn’t about to back down. “Then Rowan will have to do without the pleasure of my company.”
We stood there for a solid moment before the woman risked a glance upward. Her face was pinched. “The alpha won’t like that.”
I hoped not liking my answer wouldn’t blow back on her. But this was the woman’s pack, not mine. I wasn’t about to start playing by Rowan’s rules.
“Too bad,” I answered.
And something flashed in her eyes. Something I couldn’t quite make sense of.
Then she shrugged and turned away from me. Knocked on the door and was let out by the guard, leaving without looking back.
***
DOLLING MYSELF UP SO I could eat with Rowan was, apparently, my only option for breakfast. Because the door remained closed after that for what must have been hours, until a woman—a different one, possibly?—showed up with another offer of clothes.
The selection this time was skimpier than the first time. There wasn’t even a robe to cover it. Just underwear and frippery.
“No,” I said simply, sending the clothes bearer away.
After that, I appeared to be forgotten. Even the corridor turned silent, no footsteps or voices for what felt like an eternity. Finally, a bustle of activity prompted me to press my ear against the door. This time, I intended to make a break for it. Surprise the clothes bearer as she came in, then use her as a hostage to get myself out.
But no one came. And after fifteen minutes of activity, the hall went silent. Ten seconds later, the lights went out.
It had been a full day since I’d eaten, my wolf reminded me. No wonder she stole my body as the room plunged into darkness.
Our stomach clenched painfully. So I didn’t argue when she snapped up a skittery insect, swallowing it down legs and all. She sniffed for a while after that without further success, then scrabbled at the faucet until the water streamed out.
She didn’t drink though. I’d done that already in human form. Instead, she splattered liquid all over the floor.
Which made no sense...until it did. Spilled water attracted additional insects. I couldn’t see what kind they were in the darkness, a fact for which I was profoundly grateful. But I couldn’t block out the minutes during which my wolf hunted, listening for the tiny scritch of legs on concrete. We swallowed enough bugs to take the edge off our hunger, then we fell asleep once again pressed up against the door.
“It’s Monday,” I guessed when the lights came on a second time, my body human albeit clad in a dress that had been stretched out of proportion by a night spent four-legged. If the lights followed a usual day/night cycle, then I had multiple items on my agenda for the next few hours. I needed to call my bank and make sure Marina’s zeroes had been accurate so the check I’d given the Highlands secretary wouldn’t bounce. Monday was also when my stepfather expected a cash infusion. And, tomorrow, Lupe expected us back at camp.
I pounded on the door rather than waiting for someone to show up with clothes I had no intention of wearing. Passing footsteps hesitated then kept on walking. I picked up the phone but no operator answered. There wasn’t even a dial tone.
Within half an hour, silence enfolded the hallway just like it had done yesterday. The door didn’t respond to my attempts to batter it open. There was no window to crawl through. Nothing with which to pick the lock.
In fact, this room seemed newer than I’d realized on first inspection. The cinderblock walls boasted no loose mortar. There were no handy cracks to pry apart.
Soft footsteps intruded upon my consideration of the construction timeline. A woman with no guard behind her? I suspected I could take a lone woman without the element of surprise, so I didn’t hide behind the door the way I’d intended to. Instead, I straightened my dress and pasted a smile on my face.
The woman who entered winced when she looked at me. Maybe my smile was more of a grimace? Or maybe it was the wildness of my hair and eyes.
Either way, she gestured for me to follow her out into the hallway. “No mandatory clothing change?” I asked, and she merely shook her head mutely. “Where are we going?” I prodded.
I almost thought she wasn’t going to answer, which was fine. Because we were no longer down in the barracks area. We’d climbed a set of stairs and started down a hallway with actual paint on the walls rather than bare cinderblock.
But my guide did answer. Glancing at me sideways, she spoke very softly. “You have a visitor. Tall, dark”—her face twisted—“but not handsome.”
The doors along this hall weren’t metal fire doors, impervious to all but a battering ram. They were instead polished hardwood with fancy doorknobs. As old and stylish as the downstairs was ugly and new.
I barely paid attention, though. Because I knew who fit that description.
My guide opened a door into a sunlit study. After days cooped up in the dank basement, light streaming through the windows and colorful trees outside should have swallowed all of my attention.
Instead, I had eyes for only one person. The man lounging in a padded armchair. To me, he was beyond handsome. He was beautiful.
My cheeks stretched with the force of my gladness. “Tank.”