Mated Girl (Wolf Girl #4)(12)

He nodded. “Sort of. Justice system was taking too long for my wife’s liking.”
That sounded familiar.
“When my wife and I got news from the local authorities that they’d found our sweet sixteen-year-old daughter’s body on vampire land in a shallow ditch with a bunch of holes in her arms and completely drained of blood…” The knuckles in his one hand popped as he made a fist. “We pressed charges, but they said it could take up to a year to find the killer. Magic City Police don’t care about Ithaki. Some lowly vampire, they said it probably was. I knew that wasn’t true. The queen had been poking around here once she got word of my daughter and her power. Even offered to pay us for her.”
Sage gasped. “Pay you!”
He nodded. “Under the guise that it was some fancy private education, but I could smell the hunger on her when she looked at my sweet girl.” His eyes glistened with moisture in the sunlight and my heart ached for him. If it were possible to hate this bitter queen any more, I did. I wanted her wiped from this earth.
“So, your wife is … gone?” Sage asked.
We were too far into the story to stop now. I needed to know everything. I set the broken teacup pieces on the table and returned to my seat as he nodded his thanks to me.
“Varilla was a fearsome warrior. When she heard about our daughter, she stopped sleeping. One night, I found her gone, bed empty and a note saying she wouldn’t rest until the queen was dead.”
Oh shit.
Sage reached out and grasped my hand and squeezed.
“I ran all night, used every magical power I had to get into the Vampire City walls and to where the queen’s castle was, but I was too late. My wife was dead, the queen wasn’t even in town, but my wife had killed a dozen of her guards before they took her down. They arrested me for trespassing and attempted murder of a monarch.”
Holy shit.
His wife and daughter all gone within a week…
“I’m so sorry,” I told him, my voice breaking.
He leaned inward. “I begged them to kill me, but the queen ordered that I live my life without the two women I love as my punishment.”
Evil woman.
“So why even break out? I mean … you didn’t really have anyone to come home to?” Sage said, and then winced at her wording. “I mean, that’s not what I meant. I—”
He waved her off with his good hand. “No, you’re right. I came back for those.” He pointed to the wall of perfectly manicured flowers. “My wife loved few things as much as she loved me and our daughter, and those roses are one of them. She spent hours out here. I couldn’t bear the thought of them dying too. Something she put so much of her life into.”
A tear slipped from my eye and trailed down my cheek before I could blink it back. It was the saddest thing I’d ever heard, and yet … kind of beautiful. He’d let the house go, but he’d kept up the flowers.
“They’re beautiful flowers,” I told him. “And if it makes you feel any better, I plan on killing Queen Drake very, very soon.”
I was dead serious and he appraised me with one raised eyebrow.
“So it’s true. What her son did? That whole family is evil. Tainted,” he hissed. “It would make me feel a whole hell of a lot better if you’d mail me her ashes once she was dead. That way I could mix them with clay and make a urinal out of them, piss on it every day.”
I burst into laughter; Sage did the same beside me. He grinned. And that was that. We all had something in common. That damn queen was going to die if it was the last thing I did.
He waved me off. “Well, you all better get going. I’ll get the rest of the maps and then you can be on your way.”
I nodded. He was a nice man. I’d totally underestimated him.
He returned a few minutes later with a stack of maps in his arms. “These are copies. You can have them.”
I thanked him, before slipping the ring off my finger and handing him the one physical memory of my marriage to Sawyer that I had left. “Thanks for your help,” I told him.
He stared at the ring, pausing. “I really do need this. Otherwise, I’d—”
I waved him off, looking at his broken-down house and sad life. “Don’t worry. Sawyer can get me another.” I smiled.
It was a half-truth. Yes Sawyer could get me another ring. It wouldn’t be the same one, with all the beautiful memories, but it didn’t matter. A deal was a deal, and I wanted Seam to have a good life after all that he’d been through.
He closed his hand around it and nodded. “Well, alright then. Be safe and good luck.”
“Keep your eye on the mailbox.” I winked, which caused him to grin.
He walked us out through the house, but when we stood in the doorway about to go, his arm snaked out and he pulled me near him. “There will come a time in this daring escape when you have to ask yourself how badly you want to get him out.” Then his gaze fell to the long scar at the end of his sawed-off hand. “Sacrifices may have to be made.”
I swallowed hard and nodded. Message received. I just hoped it wouldn’t come to that.
When Sage and I reached the horses at the bottom of the hill, I looked up at the crumbling old house.
“That was not how I expected it to go,” I told her.
She nodded. “He was … kinda sweet.”
He was just a grieving dad and husband trying to get back to his wife’s dying roses in time.
“Demi, I know you’re going to try to protect me and say no, but if you think it’s possible for your wolf to…” She shivered a little. “…join my body, then I want to try that. I want to save my cousin.”