Wolf Rain (Psy-Changeling Trinity #3)(108)

Boxes sat neatly stacked on metal shelving against the walls, while a small hovercrane stood silent in one corner and more prosaic forklifts in another. A large number of pallets were stacked on the floor not far in front of her, blocking her view of what lay beyond. The only light came from wide horizontal windows high up near the peaked roof.

Whenever Renault spoke, his voice echoed in the cavernous space.

The walls had to be either soundproofed or the warehouse isolated, because she couldn’t hear anything from the outside. She’d also been very loud when they teleported in, and he hadn’t seemed to care. At the time, he’d been focused on tying her to the chair he’d hauled out of what looked to be a back office, while using telekinetic strength to immobilize her.

His mind couldn’t break into hers, but it had snapped shut around her like the deadly jaws of a great white shark. That skill of his he’d honed too well for her to counter—Memory had told herself not to panic, that she was no longer a child without resources. She’d spent hours with Sascha and Amara, had learned plenty of tricks.

And she was no longer alone in the world. Alexei would come for her.

Renault’s split focus on containing her on both the psychic and physical planes was probably why he hadn’t noticed her go rigid, her heart stopping for a brilliant, blinding moment of beauty that had claws pricking from inside her skin and fur brushing her senses.

Alexei. That was Alexei.

Her golden wolf had initiated the mating bond and Memory had accepted—of course she’d accepted. She’d never had any intention of rebuffing him should he ever reach out to her. But it wasn’t meant to be this way—she was terribly afraid that he’d regret their connection afterward, but in that searing moment when he’d reached for her, all she’d felt was incandescent joy.

Mine, Alexei’s mine. And she was his.

“The ropes aren’t that tight,” Renault snapped when she stayed stiff, fighting not to betray her joy. “Stop the theatrics.” He walked over and, with a smile he’d learned to fake, cupped her face. “It’s time for us to get reacquainted.” His eyes gleamed, his tongue flicking out to wet his upper lip.

An addict waiting for his fix.

Fear threatened to close a hand around Memory’s throat. But she had Alexei inside her and she wasn’t the Memory who’d walked out of the cage nearly four weeks ago. She was the Memory with glittery shoes given to her by a wolf who thought she had the heart of a lioness, and she was the Memory who practiced with a high-functioning psychopath day after day.

Amara, at 9.9 on the Gradient and icily rational with it, was more proficient at attempting to breach Memory’s shields than Renault. And Memory had learned to block Amara. So though the contact with Renault burned her, though the howling black hole of his nothingness tried to suck her under, she held firm. “You are not going to feed from me ever again.”

Letting out a terrible scream, he slapped both hands to her face, so hard that her ears rang. She blinked back the sting, set her jaw, and raised an eyebrow. “Losing control already? Tut tut.”

He released her with a violent jerk, began to pace the room again. Every few minutes, he’d return, touch her, try to enter her mind—and fail. And fail. And fail. Memory didn’t celebrate, not with Renault’s eyes bulging and his mental stabs increasingly erratic. Unstable as he’d become, he could kill her in a single burst of rage.

She also had another problem: the psychic watchdogs left by the Arrows should’ve alerted the squad to her disappearance in the PsyNet, her mind swallowed by another. That no one had responded to her disappearance told her a chilling truth.

“How did you move me on the Net?” A Psy’s location in the PsyNet wasn’t altered by temporary moves in physical location—only if the shift was meant to be permanent would the mind move its anchor point.

Renault gave a strange, jagged laugh that raised the tiny hairs on the back of her neck. She’d never heard him laugh before—even in his sickest pleasure, he’d been cool and calm. “Don’t you know, little girl?”

“No,” Memory said, willing to play along with his delusions if it would gain her room to beat him and escape, gain her mate time to find her. Her golden wolf had lost too many people; she would not let Alexei lose her, too. “You know I never had the usual training.”

He hugged his arms around his body as he walked back and forth, back and forth, rocking slightly all the while. “No, you had my training.” A satisfied smile. “I was in your mind long before you found your new friends.” The last word was hissed out. “Where are those friends now? Hmm?”

Memory frowned inwardly, suddenly realizing that Alexei must’ve contacted the Arrows. One of those Arrows was a born teleporter. Yet she remained alone with Renault. “I don’t understand what you did.” She forced a tremor in her voice. “Why has no one come for me?” Even as she spoke, the mating bond surged inside her, Alexei’s love for her a storm.

Never again, not even in the darkest, deepest hole, would she be isolated and alone, she thought fiercely. But Renault didn’t know that, didn’t know the beauty of a bond that wasn’t Psy but changeling. A bond he hadn’t been able to prevent even though he’d imprisoned her mind.

It was too primal, too beautiful, far beyond his comprehension.