Cade (28 page)

“I wouldn’t know,” Stephen said nonchalantly. “He’s with your father.”

“What?” Cade struggled to his feet and staggered to the bars, wrapping his hands around them to get closer to Stephen. Pain tore through his hands and he yelled at the agony of it as the silver seared his flesh. He snatched his hands away, the pain blinding him momentarily. Heat burned through his flesh, and up along his arms, in fiery succession. He swayed, his vision blurring and everything starting to black out.

He heard his name as if from far away, then Stephen was in the cage with him, catching Cade before he fell into the bars behind him.

“Shit.” Stephen’s anger fell away and, for a moment, he saw a flicker of his friend there. But Cade was reeling from the pain in his hands, and the thought of Phoenix with his father was too much to think about it. He shoved at him with as much might as he could muster. “Get the fuck off me,” Cade growled. “I get it you're pissed at me. I bloody do. But fuck, don’t take it out on Phoenix.”

Stephens’s expression hardened once again, and he stepped back, letting Cade go abruptly. “He said he was going to take the little half-breed with him. Show him how to be a proper
wolf
.”

“Why?” Cade demanded. “Why would you do that?” Of all the things, all of the choices, he could have done something else. He knew what Trevor’s ‘teaching Phoenix to be a
wolf’
meant. They’d fucking hunt him until he learnt to hunt right back. They’d fight him until he learnt to fight back. They’d snarl at him and snap and make him starve on the night of a full moon until he learnt that the only way he had a place was to take it. There was no submission in
wolves,
and to show it would mean many things, none of them good.

Gemma had woken, and she struggled into a sitting position. “Stephen, please. Don’t do this.”

Stephen locked Cade’s cage again, his expression inscrutable. “He’s gone already. Nothing I can do now.”

“He’ll kill him,” said Cade. “You know that, right? You know what he is going to do.”

“Shift with him, please,” Gemma begged. “Don’t take what we did out on him. It was me. It wasn’t Cade.” Tears welled in her eyes. “Please.”

“You both had me for a fucking idiot.” The fury was back, scorching them with its ferocity.

“We didn’t, Stephen ... and you’re not. He’s just a kid,” she sobbed. “I'm taking a potential—it’s all over. Please.”

A tick worked along his jaw and turned to glare at Cade. “Why did you have to do this, Cade? Fucking why?”

“It wasn’t on purpose.”

“It was. It was a choice. You could have said no, but you didn’t. You could have walked away. You were like my brother. She’s my sister.”

Sweat rolled down Cade’s back, the silver, the burning in his hands and his worry for Phoenix too much for his body to deal with simultaneously. He pictured Phoenix right now and what must be going on. Cursing the fucking room he was in. Silent and soundproof, it also seemed to be bond-proof, too—that part of him that felt Phoenix was silent. The room seemed to be making their bond blind, and it was impossible for Cade to reach him, to soothe and help him. God knows what would happen. “You didn’t have to do this to Phoenix,” he growled angrily.

“
You
did this to Phoenix. You. Do you know what will happen if you're both caught? If anyone finds out what you have both done? I don’t just lose my friend, I lose my sister, too. Because of your fucking act, I lose out. I lose everything. You are what I have—both of you.”

“You have dad,” Gemma said.

Stephen scoffed. “Do you really think so? He has a fighter and an heir. I do my part. I do what he says and what he wants. But inside … it’s not who I am.” He lifted his sleeve to show them his tattoo. It was dark and ran to a point that ended just at his hand, wrapping itself all around his arm, thick black lines disappearing under his sleeve. “Look at this.
Look
at it.”

Under the tattoo was what appeared to be a matrix of scars. They puckered his skin at places and where it could be seen on the flesh, silvery pink lines ran between. “Your tattoo?” Gemma had seen it a hundred times before.

“He ordered me to have skin grafts. Do you know how they fucking hurt? The skin grew back to this, but my scars were upsetting mum and so was my crazy talk. So I got it covered. I got everything covered. My arm and inside my head.” He jabbed a finger hard on his own temple as he spoke. “Do you know I hear voices in my head—like they're real? Do you both even realise that?”

Neither Gemma nor Cade spoke at his revelation.

“I hear them all the time. Worse when I am mad, and then I can't keep my walls up inside against them. I can't tell anyone or they’ll fucking lock me up or put me down like a lame animal. I’ll be the one fucked.”

“You won’t,” Gemma sobbed.

“I will, and you know it. Because to the Society, I am not normal.”

“Dad wouldn’t. He knows?”

Stephen gave an angry laugh. “Could you imagine that? Knowing he has a defective heir? He’d put me out himself.”

“You still have us,” Cade said.

“Do you know when I am around you two, the voices are quiet. It’s the only time I get peace.”

“What do you mean?” Gemma whispered.

“I don’t know. When I am with you both, it doesn’t matter what’s going on in my life. The voices stop.”

“Stephen …” Gemma reached for her brother through the bars.

“Don’t, Gemma,” he growled. “Don’t go there. Don’t pity me.” Stephen straightened, his eyes hardening once more, his face becoming expressionless and every damn mental wall going up around him. “Phoenix will be fine with your father,” he said coldly. “He is
wolf
. I am
tiger
.” He glanced at Gemma. “
Tigers
and
wolves
do not belong together.”

With that, he turned his back on them and left.

Chapter Thirty

No amount of glaring at the stairs was going to make Stephen come back down and change what he had said. No amount of swearing and yelling was going to fix anything, but Cade did both of them. He took long, deep breaths and yelled for Stephen to get himself back down there and to not do this to Phoenix. Gemma’s heart broke as she helplessly looked on from the confines of her own cage.

“Cade, please,” she begged him, tears running down her face. Her heart couldn’t take the feral howls as he lost it and called for his friend—her brother. Knowing that she had caused this tore her up inside. If she had just stayed away, just not gone to his house after that meeting, nothing would have happened. “Cade, please stop it. Please … I can't bear it.”

Cade yelled until there was nothing left, until his voice was hoarse.

“Cade. Look at me, please.”

He turned glazed eyes onto her, the silver playing havoc with his mind and senses.

“He isn’t there,” he rasped. Ugly, red burns marred the palms of his hands and his fingers, and it was evident that it was difficult to open his fingers fully. Gemma brought a hand to her mouth and stifled a cry at the sight of them.

“Who?”

“Phoenix.” Cade closed his eyes tight and fell to his knees. “I can't find him.”

“The bond?”

He nodded. “It’s like it is gone.” He took another shaky breath. “Maybe he is dead.”

“No,” Gemma said fiercely. She wouldn’t believe that. Her brother might be mad, but he wouldn’t … he wouldn’t let a boy die. “You’d have felt it if he had died, Cade. You know you would.”

When he looked back up at her, his eyes were the deep blue of his
wolf
. Shit, he was shifting. He was god damn shifting. Panic flooding her, she braced herself on her hands and knees and approached the bars as much as she could. His canines had started to come down, and she had to force herself not to completely lose it. If he shifted now, he would die—the collar would choke him.

“Cade, listen to me.”

He raised his head slowly, the pain on his face enough to steal her voice. A lump rose in her throat and she fought her tears. She had to be strong for him—she had to keep him alive. But it was his
wolf
looking out at her, the deep blue of those eyes, the sharpness. She needed to bring him back down, before he was too far gone and she lost him.

“Cade, you have to listen to me.” She used the tone and words he would use with Phoenix. “You can't shift.”

“I can't fight it,” he said faintly, falling back onto his cushion. Gemma stood up, fighting the wave of nausea that threatened—a protest at the sudden movement.

“You
can
fight it. You can. Come on. Breathe, in and out, like you tell Phoenix to do. Push the
wolf
down. You have to tell him he can't come. You’ll both die if he does. Keep him back, Cade.”

The collar around Cade’s throat, like her own, would spike with silver and crush their throats if they even managed to even partially shift, and then, of course, it would be too late to reverse it and if they were lucky, their necks would snap in the right way and kill them quickly. Stephen had somehow got his off when he had escaped the cage, and now she wished to god she’d pressed him for how he had got out. Sod the pain in his face each time she had asked—he had been here and he had got out. He, of his own accord, should have offered the information in case they were ever in the same predicament—which they now were. 

The moon was rising, its call enthralling and skin deep. It rolled like hot lava through her veins, luring her to shift. She pushed it down—it was a call home that she couldn’t answer, no matter how fiercely her
tiger
fought for it. “Cade.” A sob tore from her throat as she watched him roll onto his back, his body bowing and tensing as he fought the pull. His head kicked back and the tendons in his neck stood out in stark relief from the effort. 

His body started to shake, his hands twisting awkwardly, his
wolf
desperate for release.
Oh god, please. He couldn’t shift
. She couldn’t sit there and do nothing as she watched him die right in front of her. His eyes snapped to hers, feral, wild, his
wolf
clearly there. Frantic, Gemma turned onto her back and kicked at the gate of her cage with bare feet. As she slammed them against the silver, agony speared through her soles to every cell in her body. Like tiny fiery teeth, the silver bit at her flesh—but it didn’t stop her. She did it again and again, smashing her feet down harder each time to break the gate.

Cade let out a roar. “Stephen.” His voice was a growl now, deep and partly
wolf
.

“He can't hear you,” Gemma said, but Cade wasn’t listening. His voice loud with desperation, he surged up and wrapped his hands around the bars of his own cage with a howl that tore at her.

She sprang to her feet, wincing as her burnt feet touched the floor. “Cade,” she cried. “Let go of the bars.” She could hear the sound of his skin hissing against the silver, but still he held on, all rationality seeming to have dissipated. Gemma did the only thing she could think of—she reached between the bars and wrapped her hand around his forearm, pulling hard. Her body pressed against the bars, her clothes shielding her momentarily until the heat began to build up. Pain shot through her arm as it touched the side, and she gritted her teeth and suppressed her scream as she continued to try and yank Cade’s arm away. His grip was too strong, though, but the contact of her hand on his arm seemed to ground him a little.

He turned to look at her and slowly let go of the bars, his gaze then falling to his seared palms as if he had only just noticed them. She stared at him, weeping helplessly now as she clutched her own arm to herself. His skin had melted, the smell deep and acrid.

“I can’t fight,” he croaked eventually.

“You can—you have to. You're strong. Fight for me.”

He focused his gaze on Gemma and his breathing slowly started to calm, his
wolf
finally backing off. Gemma gave a small laugh of relief.

“Phoenix is going to die, isn’t he?” Cade said softly after a few minutes.

Gemma shook her head with certainty. “He’s strong. You’ve shown him how to take care of himself and how to shift. He’ll be fine, you’ll see.”

“He’s with my father.”

Gemma nodded. “He is. Stephen wouldn’t have done that if he thought your dad would kill him. You know that, right? He’s pissed at you and me, that’s all. But he’s still Stephen.”

“He hates me now.”

She knew with every fibre of her being that that wasn’t true. Cade had to know it deep down, as well. Because hate wouldn’t produce the reactions Stephen was giving. If he hated them, he’d have walked away and not bothered to speak at all, but that was not the case. Stephen was just angry. “Phoenix is strong. I promise he’ll be okay. We just need to be okay, too—he needs us in his life.”

Cade took in a shaky breath and nodded. Sweat beaded and rolled from his brow, his hair wet and sticking to his head. Gingerly, he sat down, resting his upturned hands on his lap. Closing his eyes he breathed deeply. “I feel the change under my skin and I can't even scratch it now.”

“I know,” she whispered, slowly dropping to her floor as well. The moon’s call was like a warmth over her skin, but not a comforting warmth. It was calling, pulling, urging her
tiger
to come out—it was like going home, and every lunar cycle, she welcomed the sensation. To deny it was one of the hardest things an
Other
could be asked to do. Her head fell back as the call came in thicker, deeper this time. “Oh god,” she breathed as fur prickled under her skin. She forced her eyes to remain open so that she wouldn’t be able to see her
tiger
.

“Open your eyes,” she said to Cade, wanting him to do the same. “Look at me, Cade.” If she could focus on him and get him to focus on her, then maybe she could fight inside herself. But her voice trembled as she spoke.

Cade opened his eyes slowly to look at her.

“We can do this together, okay?”

Warmth trickled from her nose and Gemma raised her hand to dab at it. It came away wet and red—her nose was bleeding, the pressure from containing her
tiger
under a full moon.

They sat facing each other, their gazes locked. Cade’s eyes flickered between the blue of the man and the deeper blue of his
wolf
. His canines hadn't retracted, and though he appeared calm now, Gemma knew full well they were both nowhere near out of danger yet.

Her own eyes were fighting with the shift, but still she kept them open. “This is where Phoenix is better,” she said, trying to reassure him. “He doesn’t feel the call. He has his
Human
side to help him. He doesn’t have to actually shift.”

Cade nodded slowly. “He should, though. He needs to prove he is part of the pack now.”

“Yes.” Gemma’s eyes drifted closed for a fraction of a second, but it was enough to see her
tiger
. She sat there, demanding, wanting,
needing
to come out. She forced her eyes open again and pressed her hand down on her burn. Pain shot up her arm, and she tried not to cry out with it. Her throat constricted as her body fought to shift. She reached up to claw at where the collar held her confined, gouging her flesh.

“Put your hands down.” Fear danced across Cade’s features. “Come on, Gemma. Look at me.”

She wanted to, but god it was so damn hard. Her eyes just wanted to shut. Her
tiger
wanted to turn her inside out and come into the world and answer nature’s call. It was wrong to deny it. The itch irritated her skin, and she stretched her arms out to the side and shouted in frustration. She couldn’t fight it anymore.
Oh god
. Her eyes snapped shut, and she knew she was falling. She could hear Cade’s voice off in the distance, but it was impossible to answer him. She tried—god, she really tried—but her own voice was so far away. She rolled to her side and forced her eyes open, her vision blurred. Cade was there, kneeling and speaking words she couldn’t distinguish. She clenched her teeth and fought her shift. The moon had to be up—it had to be close.

She reached out to Cade blindly, her arm flailing. Her hand brushed the bars and she hissed with pain, snatching her hand back.

Cade’s nose was bleeding now, too, his neck taut as he threw his head back and clutched at his own collar.

“Cade,” she cried out. “Cade.” She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t get any air. Seeing Cade’s shift begin made her own harder to fight—but damn it, she had to. She had to or they’d both die. Her breathing grew ragged as her airway began to be cut off. She tried to call Cade’s name again, but nothing came out.

She reached through the bars again, her desperation not letting her register the pain this time. Cade reached for her, and she wrapped her hand around his wrist. They held onto each other, both panting as the moon rose above them outside and called them home.