Charming the Beast (Purgatory 3)

Then we are all f**ked.

And not in the good way.

***

By the time Connor returned to the Para Unit base, he was tired, pissed off, and more than ready to see Chloe. Every moment that he’d been gone, she’d been on his mind. He’d been out, searching for clues, but he kept thinking about her.

As a rule, he didn’t obsess over any woman. His father had been obsessed with his mother—a sick, twisted obsession because his old man had been a sick, twisted bastard. Connor had never gotten close to a woman—well, other than for the occasional f**k. Emotionally, hell no, he hadn’t let that weakness consume him.

After all, what woman wanted to be tied to a werewolf?

And…what if he was really as sick as his old man?

So he’d played it safe. Kept up the walls around him. No one had slipped past his guard, until her.

Chloe was always in his thoughts now. He felt as if she were consuming him. He wasn’t even sure when the woman had gotten to him. When she’d slept in his arms? When she’d stood by him in the middle of that slaughter of a shoot-out and refused to leave him?

No one else has stood by me that way.

He needed to see her. Right then.

He dropped off his weapons and immediately started marching to the containment area. His first priority was to make sure she was safe and—

“Ah, now how did I know you’d go to her first?” Eric stepped from the shadows. “As opposed to, you know, debriefing with your supervisor like you’re supposed to do after a mission? Does anyone care about protocol these days?”

He glared at Eric. Screw protocol. “I talked with you on the phone. Multiple times. I already told you everything I know.”

Eric sighed. “Yes, you did, but I didn’t tell you everything.” He was blocking the containment area. “I, uh, agreed that no one would hurt Chloe…”

The bastard. Connor got a sinking feeling in his gut and he lunged forward. He grabbed Eric’s shoulders and slammed the guy against the nearest wall. “What did you do?”

“I needed to see…how she’d react…to him.”

To him? To him? “Who?”

“You should ease your grip, I’m your supervisor—”

“Like I give a f**k!” He wasn’t some trained agent. He was a criminal who’d been forced into this twisted web and Eric knew that shit. “What did you do to her?”

“She’s unharmed.” Eric didn’t look even a little afraid. Annoyed, yes. Afraid? No. “She’s in containment. She’s just…not alone.”

Connor shook his head. “Tell me you didn’t—”

“David Vincent is in the cell next to her. I needed to see how she’d react to him. I needed to know if she’d been working with David. I was monitoring their conversation, listening for any clue that might give her away.”

He wanted to pound his fist into Eric’s face. “She has to be terrified,” he said. And he hated for her to be afraid. “It’s not good for her to be scared. When she’s scared, her scent…it gets different. Even stronger.”

“Yes, about that…I don’t smell anything near her. Neither does Holly and neither—”

“You’re not werewolves!” Connor shoved away from him. “And I’d already told you that she wasn’t lying. She wasn’t working with her father so she didn’t know David Vincent. She didn’t know anything about what the senator was doing—”

“How do you know that for certain?”

“Because she didn’t tuck her hair behind her left ear!” Connor exploded.

“Right.” Eric stared at him as if Connor had lost his mind. “That seals the deal. The woman is an angel. She didn’t tuck back her hair.”

He growled at the guy.

Eric raised his hands. “Easy. I might look human, but we know how deceptive appearances are,” Eric said flatly.

Connor already knew that Eric wasn’t human. He just didn’t know what the guy was.

“Before you go for my throat with fangs or claws, how about you come into the observation room with me and just see what’s happening in there, huh?”

His teeth were grinding together. “Fine,” Connor gritted out. “But then I’m getting her.”

“Someone sure seems to be getting attached to Chloe.” Eric cocked a brow. “Are you quite certain that intriguing scent you keep mentioning—are you certain it’s not working on you?”

It wasn’t her scent driving him crazy. Well, part of it was her scent. But mostly, it was just her.

So Connor didn’t answer the guy. He followed Eric into the observation room, though, and he stood behind the big window that looked out over the containment area. To those in containment, the window would look like a giant mirror. The prisoners couldn’t see him and Eric because the view just went one way.

Eric leaned forward and pressed a button. Suddenly, the sound-proofing in containment was gone and Connor could hear—

“You should probably thank me,” David Vincent said. He was pacing in his cell. Glaring at Chloe.

Connor really didn’t like that prick.

Chloe sat on the floor of her cell. Her knees were drawn up near her chest and she’d wrapped her arms around her legs. Her head was down. Her shoulders were hunched. She looked defeated. Afraid.

“I mean, who do you think gave your dad all that werewolf blood to use on you? It’s not like werewolves are willing test subjects, but I still made my pack give up those vials…for you.”

“I didn’t want the blood,” Chloe said, her voice soft.

“The hell you didn’t!” David shouted back at her. “You were stuck, caught in between two worlds. You wanted your beast to come out!”

“No.” Chloe’s head lifted. “How any times do I have to tell you? I just wanted to be human again, that was all.”

“I’m human!” David grabbed the bars of his cell. He seemed to yank on them with all of his strength. “Because of that damn djinn friend of yours—Olivia Maddox killed my wolf and she made me human!”

Olivia Maddox. Yes, Connor knew her. And, once upon a time not so long ago, Olivia had been a djinn—a genie. But as they’d all learned, wishes from a djinn were very twisted things. What a person truly wanted, well, he or she didn’t always get.

Not too long ago, David Vincent had been attacking Olivia’s lover, a vampire named Shane. David had been in werewolf form, and Olivia had made one wish…