Authors: Bec McMaster
Reaching back, she cupped a hand over his, their fingers interlocking. This time, it was she who begged for the connection, she who was desperate to find something else within this.
A harsh groan broke over his lips, and his hips shuddered. Riley wrapped her other hand in the sheet, her greedy body clutching his hard as he came. They both cried out, the sound mingling in the air. Then he was collapsing over her, breathing hard, sweat slicking both of them.
Wade withdrew, and she felt it keenly. Every muscle within her was bruised and pulsing. Riley took a shaky breath and loosened her hand from the sheet.
“I don’t think I can move,” she whispered. “So much for my getaway.”
Hands helped her stand, then Wade picked her up and rested her bottom on the bed.
“I won’t,” he gasped, his forehead pressed to hers. Sweat dripped down his face, the sinews in his arms standing out as he held her tightly. “I won’t do this, not even for you. This is all I have to live for.”
Riley shook her head. “That’s not true. It’s all you’ve
lived
for. There’s a world of difference.”
He shuddered, eyes clenched hard as if to fight the words. “Kidnapping you was the worst decision I've ever made.”
“Liar.” She kissed his lips gently, nuzzled at his mouth. Her fingertips rasped over the stubble on his jaw as she stroked it.
A breathless laugh as he kissed her back. “Yes, it was.” He drew back, eyes clouded with indecision. “Yes,” he repeated firmly. “It was.”
Yanking his jeans back over his hips, he did each button up with exquisite slowness. Riley hopped down off the examination table, feeling suddenly vulnerable. His expression hardened with each button, as though she’d stripped him bare, and he was slowly putting his armor back into place. Searching for her panties, she found them and stepped into them. The jeans were another matter. They were tight, and her thighs were bruised with their lovemaking.
The rustle of fabric was the only sound. Her anger built slowly. He’d made it clear she wasn’t enough, that his quest for vengeance was more important than she was.
Gathering her hair, she knotted it back at the base of her scalp with harsh movements. “So it was only one last fuck you wanted?” She’d tried for blasé, but there was an edge to her words that she couldn’t quite help.
Wade looked at her, his eyes hooded and flat. No emotion. Completely unreadable. “Doesn’t a condemned man get one last meal?”
“Damn it!” Riley couldn’t hold it in any longer. Punching her fists down against her body, she glared at him. “It doesn’t have to be like that. You could come with me. Run away. Just the two of us.”
Wade’s shoulders stiffened. “You’re going to stay with me?” Incredulous words. “Out there in the desert?”
Riley raked a hand back through her hair. “I don’t know. I just know I don’t have a place here.”
“Yes, you do.” The words were blunt.
Riley sucked in an angry breath. “Fuck you. You
and
McClain!” She jerked her shirt down and straightened it. “I don’t know why I bother.” She yanked the backpack up over her shoulder. “Do what you want. Goodbye.”
Turning on her heel, she started for the door. She got two steps before he grabbed her around the wrist. She was spun around, Wade stepping close, his body hot, hard and stiff with tension.
“Do you think this is easy?” he snarled. “I’ve spent eight fucking years hunting McClain down. I’ve finally got him in my sights. I finally get a chance at him. And you want me to give it up?”
Riley looked down at his hand. At the tenuous link between them. “What then? Once he’s dead?”
“I go after Colton. And Cane.”
“And then?”
Silence. Wade vibrated with fury, the silver ring around his pupils expanding. “There is no ‘then,’” he choked out.
Riley met his gaze. “You didn’t come here to kill them, did you? You came here to die.”
His mouth twisted. “Them first.”
She shook her head wordlessly. “That’s a shit dream to live for.”
“I don’t exactly get a chance at the family and wife bullshit anymore,” he snapped.
“You could.”
Wade stared her down. “No,” he said succinctly. “I can’t. I won’t. I’d spare any woman that burden, and as for children….” His eyes hardened. “
No
.” The last whisper tore her to pieces.
Riley’s heart hammered in her ears. He wouldn’t come. Not for her. But there was still a chance at this. Her last gambit. One he’d never see coming.
“Is that what your wife thought?” she asked. “Or your daughter? That they were better off without you?”
“I didn’t take the time to ask.” Cold eyes, cold voice. He retreated into himself at her words, as if she’d stabbed him with them.
“So how do you know they’re all right?” she pressed. “How do you know they
were
better off without you?”
Turning around, he yanked his shirt back over his head, dragging it down over that honeyed skin. “I walked away, Riley, but I didn’t abandon them. I sent money back, regular-like, through a man I knew. He let me know if they wanted for something.”
“And do you still send money back?” Riley took a step toward him, shaking her head. He didn’t know. Her heart clenched, like someone had closed a fist around it.
“Yes.”
“Recently?”
Wade stilled, his head turning so he could look at her. “Why?”
“Just answer the question.”
“Yes,” he bit out. “I still send money back. She was my wife, I owed her that. And my daughter….” He frowned, a harsh glint of silver light spreading through his gaze. “How’d you know I had a daughter? I never mentioned her to you. I never mentioned any children.”
A bitter hand to play, but she played it. Anything to save his life. Reaching down, she dragged the little doll he’d carved out of her bag and solemnly handed it to him.
Wade looked down, his thumb smoothing over the rough-hewn carving. A desperate longing flickered across his face, then he banished it. “So?” he asked. “I get bored out there on the trail. Ain’t much company, darlin’. I taught myself to carve. Doesn’t mean shit.”
“I wasn’t finished,” she replied. Gently, she lifted Greta from the bag.
Wade’s eyes locked on the doll. The color drained out of his face, and he snatched at it. “Where’d you get this?” Looking up, he stepped forward, into her space, fury blazing in those silvery-blue eyes. “Where the fuck did you find this?”
Riley steeled herself, adrenalin pumping through her veins. His rage beat at her skin, tempting her to step back, to cower, but she’d dealt this hand. Time to deal with the consequences.
“I met a little girl,” she told him. “In the gardens. Her name is Lily—”
At the name, he flinched. “Lily,” he repeated hoarsely. Disbelief scoured the rage from his face. “No,” he whispered. “No, you’re lying.”
“She’s McClain’s ward,” Riley said. “Told me her daddy died when she was two. He got taken by the wargs, out by the Rim.” Taking his hand, she peered earnestly up into his face. “Why would I lie? How would I even know such things?”
He searched for a plausible answer… and found nothing. She watched each thought chase itself across his face, desperate for this to be some lie, some game of hers.
“Abbie?” The broken word was a plea.
Riley slowly shook her head. “Reivers,” she said, as gently as she could. “McClain heard about it when it was too late – seems he kept an eye on your family too. He got there just in time to save Lily. He’s been looking after her ever since.”
“No.
No
,” he whispered, the whites of his eyes showing. “That bastard.” A flush of silver-grey in his irises. “He did this,” he said hoarsely, looking past her –
through
her – as if she no longer existed. “If it weren’t for him I would have been there. I would have—”
Riley caught his arm, swallowing hard. This wasn’t going precisely the way she’d planned. “I’m sorry, Wade. I shouldn’t have—”
His head shot up, gaze turning with unerring focus toward the door. Something murderous crossed his face, an expression she’d never want to see turned on her.
“McClain!” he bellowed, revealing slightly elongated teeth. His eyes were no longer human.
“Wade,” she warned, taking hold of his wrist. “Don’t do this—”
The door slammed open, McClain staggering inside. Wade bared his teeth in a hiss and shoved her behind him. “You son of a bitch.” He stepped forward, fingernails lengthening into claws. “My wife died because of you.”
McClain’s gaze locked on her. Narrowed. “Riley, get out.”
“He won’t hurt me.”
“Do as you’re damned well told!” McClain snapped, stepping forward.
His men fanned out behind him, reaching for the pistols holstered at their waists. New soldiers, she realized grimly. Not the ones she’d rendered unconscious earlier.
“Couldn’t wait until morning?” McClain taunted him.
And that was enough. Whatever had held Wade back no longer restrained him.
“You fucking bastard!” Wade launched at McClain, plowing a fist into his gut. His other hand went for McClain’s throat, shoving him against the wall, his claws out and digging into the strained tendons. “You selfish fucking prick, you killed her! If I’d been there, if none of this had happened, I could have saved her. My daughter wouldn’t have had to watch her mother die!”
Rage burned in his eyes. Riley yanked at his arm, trying to find some trace of humanity in him. And failing.
“Wade!” she yelled. “Let him go!”
Someone grabbed her from behind and dragged her away. Riley kicked and swore, her gaze locked on the two men. Wade yanked his fist back and bellowed. Rivulets of blood traced down McClain’s throat as his claws dug deeper.
“Stand… back!” McClain snapped hoarsely to his men. He grabbed Wade by the wrist and forced Wade’s grip to slacken. Their eyes met, McClain’s grim, and… full of guilt?
Wade screamed and smashed him across the face with his fist. McClain went down, and the two guards grabbed for Wade. He spun and hurled one into the wall with a sickening crack. The other wrapped his arms around Wade’s chest from behind, locking his arms to his side, yet he jerked back with an elbow to the guard’s face, then yanked him over his shoulder in a body slam. The guard hit the floor hard, the breath whooshing out of him. Wade met McClain’s eyes, then slashed the guard’s bare skin with his claws.
“No!” Riley screamed, slumping against the man holding her. She stared in horror at Wade, then slowly down at the man on the floor. The man slapped a hand to his bleeding throat. Shallow wounds. Barely deep enough to cut.
But deep enough to condemn the guard to his own fate.
McClain looked up, his face tightening with fury. He launched himself off the floor, hitting Wade at waist height. The pair of them staggered back into the wall – and through it.
Riley yanked at the restraining grip. “Let me go, let me go!” She dug her fingers into the nerve below the soldier’s thumb and he yelped, letting her go.
There was nothing she could do for the injured man. The wounds wouldn’t harm him, and no medicine on this ravaged earth could stop the curse from taking hold. Even now, the veins around the slash marks were darkening, each tracery like a fine road map in his skin.
Riley staggered to the wall and peered through the hole. The two men wrestled on the ground, Wade gaining the upper hand. His arm drew back, fist poised to deliver a massive blow.
Suddenly, she was shoved out of the way. Falling to her knees, she saw the soldier who’d held her leap through, shotgun lifted high. A sharp crack, and then a grunt. She scrambled back to the hole, watching in horror as Wade fell to the ground like a sack of wheat. The soldier turned his shotgun around and pumped it, aiming directly at the back of his head.
“Don’t,” McClain rasped, sitting up with a hand held out in restraint. “Stand down.”
His eyes locked on Riley’s, bleak and dull with grief. “Tell me there’s anything human left,” he demanded.
She thought of the pain in Wade’s eyes as she’d told him of his wife and daughter, the way he touched her so gently when he kissed her, the hunger in him to be touched. “Maybe I see something you don’t.”
McClain shoved himself to his feet. Glanced down at the fallen form beside him.
“I’ll give him his chance. Tomorrow. At dawn,” he said bleakly. “Even though the bastard doesn’t deserve it.”
He jerked his head toward her as if she no longer existed in his eyes. “Dennis, make sure Riley goes to her room, and see that she stays there this time.” He glared at her. “Even if you have to use a dart gun on her.”
R
ILEY PRESSED HER
knees tightly together, her hands clenched between them. The mood of the crowd was electric, pressing in on her from all sides. People laughed, smiled, made jokes. Children scampered across the stands, like this was a holiday.
Only she felt like someone had wrapped a hand around her intestines. The urge to throw up was strong.
This is my fault. All my fault.
If I hadn’t told Wade about Lily, he would have been calm. He wouldn’t have tried to kill McClain then. Or the guard.
She stared miserably into the square. One of McClain’s guards leaned against the rail next to her, his presence clear. He was there to stop her from doing anything more.
The Square was just that, a whole heap of wooden bleachers that surrounded a smooth gravel core. Someone had set up wire caging to protect the crowd for the day’s purpose, but the arena could be used for anything – speeches, meetings, even celebrations.
And today, blood would stain the red sands.
Someone slid into the seat beside her and Riley flinched, her nerves rubbed raw. Eden’s tense expression swam into view.
“What are you doing?” Riley murmured. “Where’s Lily?”
Eden had promised the little girl wouldn’t have to see this.
“She’s being watched,” Eden replied, shooting her a tense look. Her shoulders were stiff. “I had to be here. I have to… I have to make sure he’s okay.”
McClain.
Riley nodded, turning her eyes back to the arena. “There’s no way…?”
“I tried to talk to him last night,” Eden replied quietly, knowing what she was asking. “Adam can forgive a lot of things, but Wade deliberately clawed up Cole.” She shook her head. “He won’t back down. Not this time.”
And neither would Wade.
The crowd suddenly roared as McClain appeared, flanked by a trio of guards. Clad in his typical black denim jeans and a black shirt rolled up the elbows, he strode with purpose through the gap in the crowd. Someone hauled the chain-link fence open and he strode through, leaving the guards behind.
“Kill the warg!” an old woman screamed behind Riley.
“Come on, Adam!” another girl cried.
Dragging his hat off his head, he tossed it without aplomb to one of his guards and raked a hand through his sweat-dampened hair. There was no vanity to the movement – there never had been – but Riley caught enough sighs in the crowd to understand his place in the community here. McClain might be focused solely on his purpose, but he looked like a hero –a god – to his people.
There was a knife sheathed at his hip. Just one, the edge wicked-sharp. The bile in Riley’s throat rose at the sight, and she looked away. What could she do? She was guarded, and on the wrong side of the fence. Events had spiraled out of control, and she had no hope of reeling them back in.
Or did she?
Unable to sit and watch, she surged to her feet, toward the fence. “McClain!”
Despite the roar of the crowd, and the number of women calling his name, his gaze turned implacably to hers. His hard mouth thinned, and he hesitated on the balls of his feet before pushing off toward her.
“Don’t,” she pleaded. “Don’t do this.”
Up close, he didn’t look so god-like. He looked tired, fine white lines webbing the corners of his eyes. Scraping a hand over his mouth, he surveyed the crowd. Anything not to meet her eyes. “I don’t want to do this, Riley. You know that. But he crossed the line, and I can’t forgive that. If I ever thought there was anything worth saving, then he took that hope away.” His gaze cut to hers, locking on with an intensity that shivered through her. “This needs to end. Now. Before more innocents get hurt.”
“And Cole?”
A haunted expression crossed his face. “In the warg cage. It was… a long night.”
Riley understood. “Did you get any sleep?” she whispered.
A long, slow look, as if wondering how much he trusted her. “Why does it matter to you? You made your choice.”
The words bit like barbed wire. “Adam….” If only she’d come to know him before. To see this side of him, before Wade eclipsed her thoughts. Grief bubbled in her chest. McClain was a hard man, but she was starting to see the walls he hid behind.
“I don’t think there was ever a choice,” she said helplessly. “Not a conscious one, at least. And it doesn’t have to be like this.”
“He made his choices.” McClain’s voice turned hard, and he took a step back.
“Wait!” Riley grabbed onto the silver-coated wires, her heart in her throat. McClain hesitated, and she said quickly, “This is my fault. I told him about Lily – about Abbie. I thought it might give him something to live for, but I was wrong. I’m the reason Wade lost his temper.”
“He’s a grown man, Riley.”
“I know that,” she said through clenched teeth. “I’m not absolving him. He made a stupid choice. A horrible, hurtful choice—”
“And Cole is the one who’ll pay for it,” McClain snapped. “He doesn’t deserve this, Riley. He was an innocent. He’s got a goddamned mother and sister to support.”
Riley tipped her chin up. “Kinda ironic, isn’t it?”
McClain shut his mouth, his lip curling. Their eyes met, then he shoved away from the fence, giving her his back.
Riley clenched her fist and smashed it against her thigh.
Stupid
. Saying something like that was never going to get her anywhere.
Turning around, she eyed the vicious crowd. The sight only made homesickness rear in her heart. At Haven, there’d never been a spectacle like this. Wargs were taken out back and shot. She could understand, after all of the loved ones people lost, how they’d want to see some of their own gotten back, but the fascination with this duel seemed somehow sickening.
Or maybe that was because she couldn’t see Wade as a monster anymore.
Eden watched her with a sympathetic expression. “You don’t have to be here, Riley.”
Riley took her seat, her shoulders hunched. “I don’t want to watch, but I have to.”
“I know.” Eden breathed out slowly. “Trust me, I know.”
Riley reached down and slid her hand through the other woman’s. No matter what happened today, one of them would be left reeling. Or maybe both, she thought. This wasn’t a win-win situation for either of them. “I wish this didn’t have to happen.”
Eden squeezed her hand back. “Yeah.”
The crowd suddenly erupted into a frenzy. Riley’s head jerked up. Wade had been shoved into the arena, his feet bare, his jeans still torn at the knees. He looked just as tired as McClain did, heavy manacles hanging from his wrists. Silver-coated wire mesh covered his hands, keeping him from clawing anyone else. Riley could see the blood and raw flesh from where the wire had cut and burned him. A necessary precaution, but a cruel one.
She could barely see. Men and women were jumping up and down, shaking at the wire mesh of the fence. If there were no fence she half-suspected the crowd would go after him themselves.
Riley swallowed hard, tasting bile, and Eden squeezed her fingers in sympathy.
McClain lifted his arms, gesturing for everyone to settle. It could have been a dramatic moment, but he took no advantage of it. From the hard look on his face, he wasn’t looking forward to this.
A pair of guards stepped forward with keys. One of them held a shotgun to the back of Wade’s head, and the other nervously fumbled with Wade’s manacles. He looked bored, his gaze raking the crowd as though McClain weren’t even there.
Looking for someone?
Riley stilled as their eyes met. She couldn’t breathe all of a sudden, shrinking back against the seat. The night seemed to have aged him. His gaze flickered to her right, then back again, and she knew what he was looking for.
Slowly, she gave her head a tiny shake.
The manacles fell away, and the guards scrambled back toward the safety of the gate. Wade let out a soft sigh, visible through the softening of his shoulders. “Thank you,” he mouthed to her. As he looked away, she thought he was done with her. But he gave McClain a hungry, lingering look then glanced back, rubbing at the raw marks on his wrist.
It was as though he didn’t know what to say or do.
This is what you wanted
, she wanted to scream, sitting stiffly on her bench. She couldn’t look away. Neither could he. Thought raced across his face, in the way he opened his mouth as if to say something before thinking better of it.
Finally, he shrugged, as if there wasn’t anything to say to her. “Look after her,”
he mouthed
.
“Please.”
Look after Lily. Riley straightened, her heart pounding in her chest. What the hell did that mean?
“Most of the time, we don’t offer anything more than an execution. You’re here because I owe a debt to you,” McClain called. “Do you have anything to say?”
Riley held her breath, and felt the crowd doing the same. Was McClain crazy? All Wade had to do was say one little sentence. Tell the crowd who’d clawed him up, and then this would be turmoil.
Wade eyed the crowd, his black hair tangling over his eyes. With his dark looks and bleak expression, he looked hard and mean. Dried blood crusted his skin, and his shirt was torn in so many places she could see the ripple of his abdomen.
“No,” he said finally. “No more games. Let’s get this over with.”
Riley let out the breath she’d been holding, her heart sinking.
He sounded tired.
C
laws out
.
Lucius ignored the hiss of the crowd as he crouched low, trying to turn all his focus to McClain. This was the moment he’d spent eight years trying to get to. Why the hell did he suddenly want it over with?
Exhaustion stained him. McClain looked tired too, though no doubt for different reasons. McClain unsheathed his blade, the wicked ten-inch hunting knife strapped to his thigh, and settled into an aggressive stance. Waiting.
This was the man who’d taken his family away. Luc’s lungs tightened at the thought. For a man who tried not to feel anything, the day before had been a mess of emotion. He’d walked away from Abbie to spare her – or maybe to spare himself. That hurt was an old one, but the news of her loss had torn pieces in him he’d thought he didn’t feel. Guilt had kept him awake for long hours. If he’d been there, he could have saved her.
He could have saved Lily from seeing that.
As much as he wanted to hate the man in front of him, he found there was nothing left in him. Grief had burned him dry, left him hollow. And if he was honest with himself, as he rarely was, a part of him knew exactly whose fault Abbie’s death had been.
If I hadn’t walked away
….
Whose fault was it? McClain’s for betraying him? Or his own, for not trusting his wife to love the monster he’d become?
He didn’t like the answer to that.
You never did
, the devil on his shoulder whispered.
But it was easier to blame someone else
.
A long night. A lot of thinking. A
lifetime
of thinking.
He was tired of it.
“Come on,” McClain snapped, shifting the knife from hand to hand and leaving himself open just enough to invite attack.
Revenge.
A shitty thing to live for
….
Lucius stepped forward, moving woodenly. He knew Riley was watching. He could feel her gaze on his skin, drilling into the back of his head. The crowd might as well not have been there, but he was hyper-aware of her. One quick glimpse burned her image into his brain – stiff-bodied, her lips thin, her blonde hair scraped back into a tight ponytail as she stared at him.
And for the first time in a long time, he knew there’d been something to live for. Something other than the mire his life had become.
Too late for that
…. It was too late the moment he’d jammed his claws into that kid, and then looked down to realize what he’d done.
Luc’s gaze narrowed on McClain. So he wanted to play defense, did he? Baring his teeth in a smile, Luc stepped forward, wondering how McClain would deal with the settlement’s questions if Luc scratched him.
Sunlight gleamed off the blade and Luc watched it warily, half-hypnotized by the movement.
“Come on,” McClain snarled. “This is the only chance you’ll ever get.”
So be it.
He danced under McClain’s guard, going straight for the throat. McClain’s eyes narrowed, and he swung out of the way, lashing out with the knife. It scored across Luc’s forearm, the pain shooting through him, and yet strangely distant.
He couldn’t seem to keep his mind focused. As he staggered past McClain, blood spattering across the sands, he saw Riley on her feet, her fists clenched at her sides, and her face pale. The crowd roared its pleasure.
Boots shuffled on the sand behind him. Too late, he turned. The knife darted like a stream of silver in the sunlight, straight for his chest. Luc blocked McClain’s wrist, forcing the strike high over his elbow. Curling his other hand into a fist, he followed through with a punch.
McClain’s head snapped back to the collective “ooh” of the crowd. McClain staggered back, gathering his feet, and shaking his head. It was the best chance Luc had, but somehow he lost it. The image of that kid’s shocked face as Luc had slashed his throat flashed through his mind.
Blood trickled from a cut on McClain’s lip. His eyes narrowed and he shifted his grip on the hilt, crouching low. Both of them had drawn blood now.
Luc had dreamed of this fight for years, playing each blow over in his mind, thinking about McClain’s weaknesses and strengths. In his imagination, he’d been brutally focused, waiting only for the right opportunity before he could finally end this. He’d anticipated victory, the chance to stand over McClain’s body with the weight lifted off his shoulders as he smiled. Instead, he felt hollow.
Each movement seemed to come from outside him. He felt as though he was watching as his hand lashed out, claws raking through McClain’s shirt and catching nothing but fabric. Then the knife was in the center of his vision, the razor edge of it kissing his cheek with white fire. There was a chance for it to cut deeper, but Luc rolled his shoulder and threw the other man off him.