Chapter 395
I turned and walked back through the sliding doors into the freezing storm. The rain soaked through my clothes instantly, but I barely felt it. I pulled out my phone and dialed the one number I knew would answer.
Azalea picked up on the second ring. “Adella! Thank the Goddess. Are you okay? Did you see him?”
“No. They’ve locked me out,” I said, my voice hardening into steel. “I’m going to war, Azalea. Bring me my armor — something that screams Luna, not victim. And bring a car to the front of the hospital. Now.”
“I’m on my way,” she said without hesitation.
I ended the call and looked across the street. The neon sign of The Nightingale flickered in the darkness, waiting for me.
Azalea’s sleek black SUV idled at the curb, a beacon in the freezing storm. I slipped into the backseat, immediately shedding my soaked jacket for the tailored crimson trench coat she had brought me. It wasn’t just clothing — it was armor.
“Drive,” I told her, my voice steady. “But keep it slow.”
As the SUV pulled away from the Blackwood Medical Center, a sudden shift in the wind carried a scent that made my wolfless instincts flare with raw, primal revulsion. The foul, swampy stench of Braydon Hyde, mixed with a sickeningly sweet, synthetic imitation of my own scent.
I cracked the tinted window, my eyes scanning the street. Inside a dimly lit café directly across from the hospital, I spotted him. Braydon was leaning over a small table, his hand clamped viciously around the wrist of a woman whose face was hidden beneath a pulled-up hood.
I strained my ears through the drumming rain, focusing intensely until their muffled voices finally pierced the distance.
“I can’t do this anymore, Braydon,” the woman whimpered, her voice trembling. “The disguise is exhausting. I’m terrified. I just want my money so I can leave.”
Braydon’s charming façade vanished, replaced by a mask of pure, psychotic obsession. He slammed her arm against the table. “You don’t leave until I say so, Suki. You will keep playing Adella until her mate-bond is ashes.”
He shoved his phone screen into her face. “Look at this. Beta Duncan Whitaker completely bought your performance at the dinner. He just posted the ancient rune of betrayal on the Pack’s private forum. The entire inner circle wants her dead. You did perfectly. Now do not fail me.”
Suki sobbed, nodding frantically. Braydon released her and tapped his earpiece. “The dove is moving. Follow her car. Keep her contained.”
I rolled the window up, my blood running cold. “Azalea,” I said quietly. “We have a tail. Lose them, then drop me at The Nightingale.”
Twenty minutes later, having shaken Braydon’s thugs through the labyrinth of downtown alleys, I pushed open the glass doors of The Nightingale Diner. The harsh fluorescent lights and the smell of stale grease assaulted my senses.
Dr. Liam Barber sat in a corner booth upholstered in dark red vinyl, a medical journal and a sugar dispenser pushed to one side. I slid into the seat across from him.
“Take me to Dallas.”