Hi!

Another weekend (almost) over. I hope you had a great one! The motto of this chapter is clearly: trouble behind, trouble ahead.  :-)

I hope you like it. Let me know!

Lara

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Chapter 9

The apartment was quiet and felt alien to me. Naked walls and simple furniture. No familiarity. Nothing I could call 'home.'

Brown made me move into one of the apartments the Circle kept for out-of-town visitors - members of the Force and experts that were called in from somewhere else. Not something I agreed to readily. It was hard enough to convince my boss that it wasn't necessary to put me through the whole witness-protection-thing after what happened with the rogue witches, I couldn't flat out say no to that one.

Maybe I should have stood my ground and declined. It was in times like these that the loneliness set in. These were the moments in which I longed for my apartment - sitting down for a coffee with Laura, chatting, or maybe even having a small fight with Ryan. Not that they would have been in the apartment. Luckily, they were out of town. Somehow their parents got wind of what Ryan did, and the siblings had been summoned to their hometown. They were still staying with their pack and pretty much occupied with calming the waves.

It was only a matter of time until that was going to change. Occupied as they were, they were still demanding answers, answers I couldn't give. The day would come when I wouldn't be able to stop them from finding out what really happened. I knew that, and it scared the hell out of me.

I shook my head and went back to staring at the screen in front of me. I'd checked my mails first thing I woke up. The information I e-mailed to myself the night before was there, and the amount of data was stunning. Either the half-witches didn't know how much they handed over, or we had been played and all they gave us was down-to-earth-nonsense mixed with a few breadcrumbs of what looked like valuable information.

I frowned. I didn't see them manipulating the information in such a short time. Whatever they handed over, as far as I could see it was real.

Even though Chris Hayes quit working for the Circle a few years ago, the half-witches claimed that she still had contacts in the Forces. So far, I hadn't seen any proof of that. I went through e-mail conversations she had with important members of the human world - businessmen and big names among the rich and powerful. The more conversations I followed, the more I got the feeling she had been canvassing. The whole thing looked like one huge call for donations and support to me - all under the pretext of making society safer, from vamps mind you.

It wasn't until I opened documentation about Chris' finances and belongings that I got a greater insight into just what Hayes had been doing. It looked like in truth the Bloody Warden was far from being the only business venture Chris owned. Oh, and she had been careful, using aliases so that her name wouldn't be traceable. There were almost a dozen bars or restaurants the ex-Circle member secretly owned, or at least held a part-ownership in. And a majority of them were frequented by shape shifters.

I closed the lid of my laptop and stared out the window for a long moment. I had no idea what this all meant. I needed to take a look at the rest of the information, and for that I needed more time. I checked my watch. Time I didn't have.

I swore under my breath and headed out of my room. Sadly the half-witches weren't my only problem. There were other things that needed investigating.

And I was going to investigate, dammit. Fortifying myself with all the mental armor I had, I made my way downstairs. No matter what happened, I was eager to throw myself into the night and do something that involved action, the feel of muscles and sweat.

The street was an amalgam of movement and noise. Flashy lightshows and shrill neon signs penetrated through the darkness, blinking signals like leaves rustling in the wind. The onslaught of people hit me like a physical force grating against my nerves. They were different and yet all the same, voices shrill and loud. Staring at them felt like sitting on a spinning merry-go-round in fast forward.

I made my way to the back parking lot, which at least gave an illusion of peace and quiet. Fresh air hit my system and I drew a shaky breath, drinking in the night sky as if it was my first day out. Clouds wandered over the moon, patchy-dark and harsh. The darkness deepened, shadows elongating and exploding as lunar light faded.

I became aware of a presence behind my back, a sensation that only lasted a few seconds.

Apprehension came and went. Alexander had sent one of his flunkies to shadow me again. I was surprised to find that it was someone who actually had a pulse. Why the hell did Alexander send a human, when it was-

The sound of my cellphone ringing made me flinch. I straightened up, pretending I hadn't just been scared by my own ringtone, fished for it with the air of someone who was at ease. I looked at the screen, sighing. It was Blaze, my furry partner and soon to be ex.

"Blaze," I said in a clipped voice and started walking, scanning the street for the human flunky who sure as hell had to be hiding somewhere.

"Marrok is looking for you."

I stopped in the middle of the street. "What?"

"I said, Marrok is looking for you. Told me to pass the message," he said. I heard the anger and strain in his voice.

Before I could offer a snarky reply that showed just how much I thought about the message or the person it was about, another, deeper, voice cut through the line.

"And I also told him to tell you to hurry, or he will have to remain our guest for a little while longer," Marrok said. "Somehow it looks like he isn't enjoying our company, are you now, little wolf?"

I froze. Crap.

"Come here. Now," Marrok said.

Then the line went dead.

I stared at the hood of my green Ford unseeingly. Looked like my night was going to involve more than just muscles and a little sweat. I had a date with the leader of the Fade pack, and I just happened to know where to find him.

I threw a glance behind my shoulder. But before that I had to get rid of preening eyes. No way I could let Alexander know about this one.

* * *

The array of dented metal and rusty pieces of junk was just the way I remembered it. Cars aligned in irregular and random patterns - an homage to chaos theory and what most New Yorkers would call modern junk art. If you looked long enough you could see what it really was: a fortress.

I stared straight ahead at the chain-link fence, peering into the darkness. What lay behind was a gated community, and it was one of a kind. Abandoned apartment blocks that had long withered and crumbled past their best years. Not a hint of movement. If this really was the main gate to the shape shifter territory, it was poorly guarded this night. The thought was wrong on too many levels to be true.

My head whipped to the side. Motion. Noise.

Soft scraping of claws on hard surfaces. The scent of musk rose like a soft-winged melody, ripped into air with a wild power I had no name for. They were watching, staring at me from behind metal junk. Nameless pairs of eyes winked into existence, bright and glowing like a miniature night sky. Slowly, and with a graceful ease, they moved into the faint shafts of light from the broken street lamps behind me.

The shape shifters were coming out to play.

I faced the half-ring of hostile eyes and bodies, fisting my hands at my sides, when all I wanted to do was give in to what a voice inside of me was telling me to do. Turn around and run.

But I couldn't walk away from this.

"Anna Johnson, witch of the air," I said. I parroted Blaze's words from last time I was there. Maybe it would get me somewhere. "Marrok's expecting me," I added as an afterthought, letting my eyes roam over the shadowed forms.

"Took you long enough."

The voice was low, raspy. And it sounded familiar. A tower of a man in jeans stepped forward. A halo of curly blond hair framed his face, as if he was a freaking saint jacked up on anabolic drugs. He could have pulled of the human look, hadn't it been for the fact that his bare feet didn't make as much as a single sound on the cold asphalt. Or that he wasn't wearing shoes to begin with.

"Radulf," I said.

He jerked his head towards the entrance at the chain-link fence. "Come on. He's waiting."

I ignored the collective stares I got and followed Radulf into the compound.

I knew the outlines of the buildings, the cracked stairs and entrances that seemed to be crumbling under the power of a stranger's gaze alone. I'd seen the open fires in the side alleyways before. The inquisitive, hungry eyes behind shadows and the sounds of clawed feet striking pavement.

It took us longer than anticipated to get to the rundown building in the center of the compound, where Marrok had built up his own personal fortress. Judging from its appearance, it had been used as a town hall before.

I smelled it when we reached the stairs, way before we even entered the room on the first level. Musk, thick and heavy, a male scent that was more than that. It was power, alive and wild like the slow beginnings of a storm that couldn't be tamed.

We reached the end of the narrow corridor and rounded the corner. I stepped into the room behind Radulf. It was poorly lit, a yellowish glow of light coming from a solitary lamp in the back. A bunch of shape shifters was reclined on the floor in the right corner of the room, watching me.

My eyes latched onto Marrok, identifying him as the greatest threat and the most powerful among them. Marrok didn't get the title of Alpha just by coincidence. He earned it.

His light brown eyes were on me. There was a certain wildness in his gaze, in the way he slanted his head to the side when we entered. Big, heavy-muscled arms resting on the back of the torn couch, unmoving. Dressed in torn jeans and a red shirt, he could have fooled me into believing he was a member of one of the biker gangs that used to linger around in the bars of the Riverside.

But no. He had the kind of fierce look you only got through years out in the streets, places that scraped you to the bone just so you could survive, something harder and more ferocious any gang membership or spiked leather jackets could ever emanate.

Or maybe it hadn't been years in the streets, but in another kind of jungle altogether. Everything about him reminded me of a predator lying in wait to strike and tear into its prey.

I let myself be steered to the couch facing him and sat down, ignoring the fact that there were claw marks all over the fabric.

"You called, I came," I said. "Where's Blaze?"

He smiled sharply. "There are things we gotta talk about first, witch."

I stared at him. "I want to see Blaze first."

Marrok laughed and the sound rumbled through me like an avalanche of sharp pebbles. He nodded to Radulf, who had been standing behind me mutely. I heard scraps of movement, but ignored them. I'd be damned if I took my eyes off the Fade Pack's Alpha for longer than absolutely necessary.

"The little wolf's fine," Marrok said. "Nothing one turn won't fix. What's he to you anyway? You fucking him?"

I jerked at the f-word, staring at him wide eyed.

He laughed again. "Not then."

I pressed my lips shut. I wasn't going to advertise the fact that to me Blaze was more than a colleague. Somewhere along the way I started thinking of him as a friend. A good one, in fact.

A commotion behind had me turn around against my better judgment. I watched two shape shifters bring in a manacled, struggling shape.

His face was a mess of claw cuts, blood, and dirt. It took me two seconds to recognize Blaze, and it probably would have taken me longer, hadn't I recognized his hair. Someone had torn away the hair band he usually wore. The blond strands trailed down his shoulders and framed the side of his face. It made him look older.

He swore as soon as he saw me. "You came. Why the hell did you come?"

"Surprised, Fillin?" Marrok said, grinning.

Blaze wasn't even looking at the Alpha. Instead his brown eyes were boring into me. "You don't have to do this, Anna. Don't give this asshole an opening, or-"

One of the shape shifters holding him punched Blaze in the gut, and he sagged in their arms, wheezing.

"Stop it!" I felt my hands cramp into fists. My eyes went back to Marrok. "What do you want?"

Lifting a finger, he made a motion to the guards, who started dragging Blaze out of the room.

"Don't worry. He was just a means to get you here. This is between the two of us." Marrok leaned forward. "You still owe me a favor."