Before the Queen could answer, Tyler strode to my side. “And she will also be allowed ten bodyguards. To ensure you intend to honor your agreement about her safety fully.”
The Queen’s eyes dilated to full black, her incisors dropping in an instant. There was a horrible hissing as she shrieked, “How dare you question my honor!” The power in the room rose to a suffocating degree and my hand shot to my throat.
My father calmly stepped in front of her and bellowed, “Enough!”
The Queen came up short, still hissing, her fingernails curved to hideously sharp points. Her skin slipping again. Man, I was never going to get used to that.
“Eudoxia”—my father was an inch away from attacking—“you come too close in your threats.”
The Queen trembled with fury. She struggled to tamp it all down. She’d pushed her power too far, now she risked losing her prize. “I will not … I will not tolerate being called without honor in my own home.”
The vampires in the room started to hiss, crowding themselves in behind the wolves. Everyone was on edge.
“Eudoxia, you fool no one,” my father snarled. “It’s very clear to all of us standing here you want my daughter, for some reason I don’t quite understand. But rest assured, henceforth I will make it my greatest quest to find out.” His eyes flashed a brilliant violet. “Understand this now, my daughter is not yours to take. I will never let her go without a fight. We have been forced into an agreement at this time, but the terms she has already brought forth will stand, and in addition, you will hire ten of my wolves as your … guards,” he spat, “and personally guarantee their safety. Make no mistake, Eudoxia, by the time my daughter arrives back here to fulfill her oath to you, she will be full Pack. And she will be protected as such.”
The Queen’s eyes had returned to their normal silver glow, but her incisors stayed put. “Five,” she snarled through her fangs.
My father started to respond, but I interjected quickly, “Five! I agree to five wolves, a werefox, and a witch. Well, a minor witch. If this is going to play out like a job, I want my team.” I added for good measure, “That’s my final offer. Take it or leave it.”
The Queen snapped her furious glare to me, her long canines so white they stood out like ivory knives against her red lips.
“It is done.” Before any of us could react, she swept up the dais. “My vampires will begin the hunt at nightfall. They will first go to the mountains to ascertain Selene’s trail. Expect them at your door in two eves from this day. Be prepared to leave then.” I didn’t want to ask how she knew where my door was. “Now swear an oath to me, little wolf girl.” Her lips spread into a hideous smile, her teeth ridiculously long and sharp, her eyes flashing danger.
Am I really going to do this? “I swear to … ” I recited everything we agreed on carefully, and for good measure I threw in, “And if your two vamps kill my mate, or any other vampire tries to for that matter, my oath to you will be considered forfeit. And I will come back and kill you instead.” Then before she could interject, I added, “This is my Oath of Honor. I give it freely to Eudoxia, the Queen of the Vampires.”
From the screams following us out, it seemed my end of the bargain wasn’t looking so bad after all.
24
Hank was missing. It was the only piece of news I’d received since we’d emerged from the vamp hold. No one knew what had happened to him. My father had decided to give him space to grieve his son before he ordered him found.
Hopefully that would happen before Hank came for me in the middle of the night, hell-bent on revenge for his son’s demise. It wasn’t a stretch to assume Hank knew what his son had been doing, and keeping that kind of information from his Alpha carried a hefty punishment, if not death. But I had enough to worry about without adding Hank into the mix.
After a plane ride home, the wolves dispersed. Tyler and I headed back to my apartment in a cab, my father and James back to the Safe House. We would meet in the morning to come up with a plan.
I’d snagged a T-shirt and some sweatpants at a boutique in the New Orleans airport, so I was presentable enough. I couldn’t help my smell, however, even though I’d given myself a half-assed rinse in the restroom. Luckily, the cab’s greasy takeout stench masked any of my unpleasantness for the time being.
I laid my head back against the headrest and shut my eyes. I was tired and hungry. “So Danny’s been staying at my place, right?” I asked.
Tyler stretched out his legs, jostling me a little. “Yep. He was injured during the attack, broke a few ribs, gushing head wound, so Dad put him at your place to look after things. He was pissed he couldn’t come along.”
I raked my hands through my hair and tried to energize myself. So many things needed my attention I didn’t have the pleasure of curling up and going to sleep. The manhunt for Rourke would take resources and he was my first priority. “God, it feels like I’ve been gone for at least two months, and it’s only been a day and a half,” I said. “I should’ve called Nick when we reached the airport. I was just too tired.”
“Nick was put in charge of the Safe House while we were gone. He’s been updated regularly. He wanted to meet us at the airport, but I told him we were fine.” Tyler cleared his voice, which got my attention.
“What?” I asked.
“Well, there’s been …” He paused for a long second. “… Well, I guess you could say there’ve been some issues concerning that cop Ray Hart. Nick’s sort of been forced to… cover for your absence again.”
My head snapped off the headrest so quickly I had to brace my hands on the seat in front of me to stop my momentum. “What did you just say?” When he didn’t answer immediately, I shot a fist into his shoulder. “Come on! What are you talking about? What issues with Ray?”
“It seems he’s gone missing,” my brother said carefully, glancing out the window, not meeting my eyes.
“What do you mean, missing?”
“It means,” Tyler grumbled, turning toward me, “he clocked in at work yesterday and was scheduled to come by your apartment first thing in the morning, and wasn’t seen again. When he didn’t show up at the end of his shift, they tracked his car … to your lot. Nobody knows what happened to him.”
“Nobody human, you mean?” I said, my voice low and angry. “Why wasn’t I informed of this before right now? You know how this is going to look—they’ll be all over my ass now. I can’t just waltz back into my apartment, into my life, completely clueless. There could be a whole SWAT team waiting to arrest me.”
“I didn’t tell you on the plane because there wasn’t a damn thing you could’ve done about it. Plus, you were too busy trying to convince me not to help you as a Selective, remember?”
I gave him a searing look. “Well, what did Danny say? If he’s been at the apartment this whole time, he must’ve seen Ray.” I lowered my voice. “You didn’t tell Danny to …”
“No.” Tyler shook his head. “There haven’t been any official orders about what to do about the cop yet. But there will be at some point. That man is a nuisance.”
“What did Danny say?” I urged.
“That’s the problem,” Tyler said. “I haven’t exactly been able to get a hold of him in the last twenty-four hours.”
“What?”
“He’s not answering his phone.”
I rocked my head backward and closed my eyes. “Tyler, you have got to be kidding me. And you haven’t told any of this to Dad either?”
“No, I haven’t. Dad has more than enough to deal with right now. Plus, this is a minor issue.”
“Minor?” I lowered my voice because the cabbie had started to glance back at us in the rearview mirror. “A detective is missing. The very same detective who wants a chunk of my soul. If a fully competent wolf doesn’t answer his phone, that equals B-I-G trouble—trouble I don’t need right now.” I whined at the end, but I couldn’t help it.
Before Tyler could answer, the cabbie stopped in front of my building. I peered out the window, eyeing the
