Unbound: Shifters Forever Worlds(21)

Two more innocents are going to die now, and it’s all my fault. They’re here to save me.

“What’s going on here?” Perry frowned, the downward V in his brows marring his handsome face.

“Can’t you see?” Sara turned toward Perry. “They’ve taken Glory captive. We have to help her.” Sara fumbled with the binds securing Glory’s hands.

“Hush, love.” Perry leaned down, put a hand out and pulled Sara to a stand next to him. “You really don’t understand what’s going on here.” He snaked his arm around Sara’s waist, pulling her close to his body.

Sara looked at him, her smile insipid and her gaze infatuated.

Sara and Perry?

Confusion rocked Glory.

What?

Glory’s head began to spin, but this time it wasn’t the tranq. She was the one who didn’t understand. Why did he call Sara love? Why were the shifters not attacking him?

“She’s not supposed to be here.” He scowled at Basil. “You and Abel should have handled this.”

“She killed Abel.”

“We agreed. She was not to see me.”

Sara’s eyes ping-ponged back and forth between Basil and Perry, her mouth agape.

Glory tried to process this new change of events. It was too much. What did Perry have to do with these shifters? They were the ones who killed her family and Dane’s uncle. How did Perry know them? Why’d he say she wasn’t supposed to see him?

“Perry?” Sara’s voice sounded like a little girl who’d lost her puppy. “What are you saying?”

“Nothing, dearest. We’ll be together just like we should be.”

“But Glory’s not going to be hurt, right? You promised. You said she didn’t want to be bonded to you anyway—”

Perry put his fingers over her lips in an intimate way that made Glory’s stomach turn — not from jealousy but from the deception being perpetrated.

Glory had thought Sara was slow, sure, but this… this trickery was too much.

“She killed my brother. She doesn’t deserve a swift death.”

“You and your brother are far from the professionals I thought you to be. How difficult can it be to take out a single female ivy shifter? It was a side job to augment the assignment you were here for.” Perry shook his head as if in disappointment. “Such a disgrace to rovers everywhere.” His glare took in the other three shifters. “I’d find a new leader if I were you.”

Basil ground his teeth so loudly, the sound was worse than nails on a chalkboard. His fists clenched at his side.

“Deal with it.” He gave Basil another dirty look. “Immediately. Or you can forget payment.”

“No, Perry.” Sara yanked on his sleeve. “You can’t do this. They can’t hurt Glory.”

“Everything will be fine. Don’t worry, love. I can’t break the agreement between her parents and mine. I can’t bring disgrace to my family or lose my position. I have a plan.”

Glory scoffed. “Your position is worth more than my life? Sara, don’t let this happen.”

“Don’t you trust me?” Perry asked Sara. “Aren’t we going to be happy? You’ll have my heirs. With her out of the way, you’re the next in line for her position within the Aleman family.”

“What position?” Glory screeched at him. “We aren’t royalty. We—”

Sara turned toward Glory, her face lit up “You don’t know what you’re talking about. Your parents never told you.” Sara’s smile was vapid. “You’re descended from royalty. As are my sister and I. And Perry needs to marry ivy royalty to keep his position. Luckily, he fell in love with me.” She ran her fingertips up his arm, then back down. “Right, Perry?”

Glory cringed. Her cousin had lost it.

“That’s right. I did.” He barely gave Sara a glance.

What’s his game?

He didn’t love Sara — that was obvious. What was this business about royalty though? She’d have to ask someone — but who? She had no friends in the ivy shifter world. “Does Mary know about this?”

Sara frowned. “Not yet. Perry doesn’t want to make it public yet. Don’t worry, Glory, Perry won’t let them kill you.”

Sure he won’t.

“Why kill me? Why not just have it annulled?” Glory flexed her hands, hoping to release the binds. “And what makes you think we’re royalty?”

“That’s not how it works,” Perry scoffed.

Sara scratched her head. “Didn’t your parents tell you? Before your father’s father was exiled, your family was next in line to rule the Irish ivies.”

Has she lost her mind?

Glory thought of all the stories her mother used to tell her about a young prince whose father had lost the crown. Bedtime stories, when she and her sister were young. Was there a measure of truth in her stories? She always stopped telling them when their father would come in to kiss them goodnight.

That can’t be.

And yet, it looked like it was.

“Then I don’t understand, if my father’s father was exiled… how is it that…” Her head ached from the effects of the tranq. Putting her thoughts together was difficult. She didn’t seem to be able to draw a line between two points.