Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 87848 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87848 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
“Why would that be of concern to us?”
“A man was carried off in the night then disemboweled in the town square, his chest opened for the vultures who made their meal in the early morning light. I am told it was a disturbing scene for all those who viewed it.”
Antoine’s version of events certainly is dramatic, but that is how these stories go. Every retelling will add some embellishment. The vultures are a nice touch.
I draw in a deep breath. I knew this was going to come up.
“If it is not overstepping to make the assumption, your little bride has a talent for dispensing a very primal form of justice, Maître.”
I draw in another breath. Breathing has very much become something I must manually control in this moment in which I seem to control nothing else.
“It is not overstepping. I do not like disrespect, but I do not deny that there is a chance she could be involved.”
I do not like that I am effectively lying to my pack. I do not want them to know what happened, but it seems they have already put two and two together and come up with a bloody corpse.
I can avoid the matter no longer, and so I summon Beatrix to the office. We need to discuss this one way or another. It may as well be here and now.
She comes looking sheepish. The irony is not lost on me as she looks up under her lashes at me. I know she is guilty as sin. She knows I know. Antoine knows. I would say there are cubs in the pack who already know. The question is what charade of justice and discipline will play out here. Killing humans is deeply taboo, for obvious reasons.
“Beatrix, you killed a man last night,” I say.
She smiles, looking almost proud. Antoine’s brows rise as he takes in this expression of hers. He will remember this and add it to the story, I am sure. So much for a tearful, repentant mate.
“Yes,” she says.
“I want to know why.”
The smile slips away, and her eyes go flat the way they do when she has no intention of talking. This vault of hers is the thing that most frustrates me. In moments like these she seems entirely impenetrable.
“Thank you, Antoine,” I say. “I will handle this.”
“Yes, Maître,” he says, bowing out of the room.
“Beatrix, you have to stop doing that.”
“Stop doing what? Murder?”
“No. You have to stop going inside and locking yourself away. There is nothing you have to hide from me. I need you to understand that. You cannot disappoint me, or anger me, no matter what you do.”
“That’s not true,” she says immediately. “There are plenty of things I could do if I wanted to make you angry.”
“Do you? Want to make me angry?”
She doesn’t answer that. She just looks at me with that impenetrable expression, half-blank, half-ominous. There is power in this young woman. She is young, but what she draws on is ageless. The energy in the room does not emanate from her alone. I can feel her unknown ancestry with us so keenly I can practically smell it.
“You can’t publicly kill people in the village,” I say. “It will cause terror among the people.”
“Good. I want them to be afraid. If they are hurting others, I want them to stop. I want them to know that there is a consequence. Not something that might happen once they die, but something that will happen to them here and now, something that will take everything from them.”
“What did the damn man do that warranted a public mauling and execution?”
“He wanted to take a waitress against her will. He was talking about it in the tavern. I decided to kill him.”
I try to hide my reaction, and fail. I am deeply impressed. I like where this impulse comes from. I like how strong she is, and how obsessed she is with bringing justice. Most I know are eager to offload that responsibility to anybody else. It is a very good trait for an alpha’s mate, or it would be if it could be tamed into something a little more civilized.
I try a new tactic, impressing on her the very real stakes I do not think she has considered, even under a hail of gunfire.
“You could be hurt. We could both have been killed.”
She gives a little shrug. “If it happens, it happens. I’m sorry you were involved. I didn’t know you were there. But I don’t care what happens to me.”
“I need you to be safe,” I tell her. “I did not wait all my life to meet you, to finally love you, to lose you in a matter of weeks because you don’t think your life has value unless you are protecting someone else.”
“What are you? A therapist?”