Half Truths (A Helheim Wolf Pack Tale) (18 page)

She pushed
through the door onto her floor. Rounding the corner, she stopped abruptly; her
eyes instantly narrowing to slits as she took in the scene in front of her. The
front door of her apartment was slightly ajar; muted light spilling out from
the crack it made.

Flattening
herself against the paper-thin hallway wall, she inched closer to the doorway
until she was standing next to it. Indi inhaled deeply, attempting to pick up a
scent like Rhett had tried to teach her to do. But there was nothing
recognisable about the person. She couldn’t even tell if it was human or not.
She heard a voice—a male voice—curse softly.

Sliding her
phone from her pocket, she contemplated texting Rhett to let him know she
needed help. After staring at the screen for a long time, she slid it back into
her pocket. She wouldn’t run back to him so quickly. She could take care of
this herself—she’d lived her entire life without Rhett before, so why should
she rely so heavily on him now?

Nudging the door
with her foot, she waited for the intruder to notice and come to investigate.
But they never did, which either meant they weren’t particularly observant, or
they were setting a trap. Indi knelt down, pulling her dagger from the holster
she kept at her ankle; the only habit she couldn’t shake from her former human
life.

Letting a small
breath out and rolling her neck, she pushed into her apartment, slamming the
door shut behind her and barracking herself in with the intruder.

He was younger
than she thought he’d be. His dark hair danced blue in the light, his eyes
slipping colours from green to yellow fast enough to make her queasy. Wolf. Her
eyes roved his body for weapons quickly. He was as unarmed as a werewolf would
ever be and he looked nervous about it.

She relaxed her
arms at her sides, making a show of the dagger. ‘Who are you?’ she demanded.

The guy didn’t
reply, only edged further away from her. His eyes were wide with fear, his
breathing coming out in shallow pants.

‘Who are you?’
she growled again, taking calculated steps towards him, drawing him closer to
the bathroom, trying to herd him into a corner he couldn’t possibly get free
from. He backed up again, his back hitting the edge of the broken window. His
eyes were morphing wildly now, not staying one colour for more than a few
seconds before slipping back. When he didn’t answer her again, she tried a
different tact. ‘Why are you here? Has somebody sent you?’

He grimaced
suddenly, pulling his hand free from where he’d clutched at the broken window
frame. An intoxicating smell enveloped the room, calling to the darker side of
Indi. Her hunger reared. Her vision changed from the whole colour spectrum to
just one: red. It was just like it had been with Rhett the day before. But
unlike with Rhett the day before, there wasn’t a voice telling her not to harm
him. This voice—this voracious need—told her to take what she wanted. The smell
of his blood called to her, lured her. She felt her fangs punch through her
jaw, anticipation making them vibrate in time with his thudding pulse.

Hungrily, she
took a step towards him and he froze. His breath stopped going in and out of
his lungs, he even stopped blinking. She was on him before he could scream; her
teeth finding his carotid like a man rediscovering the curves of his lover’s
body after a long separation. His blood poured into her mouth; warm and slick
and sweet.

Mouthful after
exquisite mouthful slid down her throat. The hole where her hunger constantly
ate at her was slowly being filled with his blood; being plugged up by it. Her
tongue was coated with the sweet tang of his blood as she took another deep
pull from his vein.

It felt like
eternity that she held him against her body, feeding from his throat. Honestly,
she didn’t give a fuck how long she’d been standing there. She would happily do
it for the rest of her unnatural life if she had to.

Her happy moment
shattered suddenly when someone appeared in her apartment. Her nostrils flared,
a growl vibrating through her chest. Indi clutched the man closer to her chest,
turning around to see who had interrupted her meal. There was a man standing in
her doorway looking between her and the man she was feeding on. The cat of her
anger growled, but something at the back of her mind dimly reminded her of who
he was.

Rhett.

She disengaged
her fangs instantly, letting the wolf drop from her hands.

Indi blinked
rapidly a few times; the true colour of her world coming back within seconds.
Her head was spinning. She cleared her throat. ‘Rhett,’ she said softly. She
felt the warm trickle of blood running down her chin. She swiped it away
quickly.

‘Who is he?’ he
asked with a hard edge to his voice. If she didn’t know any better she would
have said Rhett sounded … jealous.

Indi glanced
down at the guy who was still breathing shallowly.  ‘I don’t know. I found him
in my apartment when I came home.’

Rhett’s eyes
narrowed to slits. ‘I dropped you home hours ago. Where have you been?’

‘Just out,’ she
replied sharply.

Rhett’s face
reddened, looking like he wanted to say something more, but stopped himself.
Instead, he strolled into the room with a forced nonchalance, crouching down to
turn the guy over. The puncture marks in his neck were still oozing blood
slowly, and Indi had to look away before she bent down to lick it away.

‘He’s a wolf,’
Rhett said.

‘I know.’ His
blood tasted different to the human blood she’d been drinking. ‘He’s not one of
yours, is he?’

‘No. He’s a
Dragos wolf.’

‘What’s he doing
in my apartment?’ she asked, sitting down heavily onto her couch.

 Rhett’s jaw
tightened. ‘I don’t know. He didn’t tell you anything?’

She shook her
head. ‘No.’ Indi watched Rhett take his pulse. ‘What are we supposed to do with
him?’

‘I’ll take him
to the boundary of our pack lines and leave him there. He’s lucky he wasn’t
killed.’

‘Do you think
this break-in and the one yesterday are linked?’ The muscle in Rhett’s jaw
jumped. ‘It is, isn’t it?’

Rhett looked
away, slinging the downed wolf over his shoulder like he weighed nothing at
all. ‘No.’

She stood up to
stand in his way. ‘Don’t fucking lie to me. It is, isn’t it?’

Rhett stared
down at her with his bicoloured eyes. And he sighed, resigned. ‘Yeah, they’re
linked. It was a Dragos wolf who broke in last night too, not a vampire.’

Why didn’t Rhett
think she could handle whatever he had to tell her? ‘You lied to me.’ Her voice
was a cool, crawling anger. ‘Why?’

‘I thought I
could keep control of the situation. I didn’t think they’d try again.’

‘Try
what
again?’ Indi asked, her voice darkening.

He sighed again,
dropping the unconscious wolf onto the ground roughly. ‘I didn’t tell you this
before because I didn’t want you to worry about this as well as the
transformation and Beth and our—’ he stopped suddenly, shaking his head and
scrubbing his hands down his face. ‘The alpha of the Dragos pack wants you for
his own.’

‘Why?’

‘Technically you
were found within their territory, but you settled in Hell, so you are well
within the Helheim territorial border. A couple of weeks ago, Marcus came to
the farmhouse to demand you back. I told him to shove it. He retaliated by
kidnapping my alpha’s mate. We don’t know where she is right now, and the only
way we can get her back without causing a war is to trade her for someone
else.’

‘Who?’

Rhett’s gaze
floored her. ‘It’s you. Marcus wants you for the release of Eaton.’

Indi felt her
world shiver. She was responsible for his alpha’s mate’s capture. Guilt, once
again, crashed into her, threatening to knock her feet out from under her. The
groan of the Dragos wolf cut through the silence that had filled the room. 
Rhett bent and punched the guy in the face. ‘Indi, I have to get rid of him,
but I won’t leave you alone.’

‘I’ll be fine,’
she replied hollowly. Being alone was just what she needed right now anyway.

‘No. You won’t.
What if they send another one for you?’

‘I’ll be fine,’
she repeated again. Rhett was watching her, anguish hardening his features.

‘Goddamnit Indi!
I’m not leaving you alone anymore. I’ve nearly lost you twice before. If this
fucker,’ he turned and kicked the downed wolf, ‘wasn’t a newly Bitten wolf, he
would have taken you. I won’t let them have another chance!’ he roared.

Anger thickened
Indi’s blood suddenly—inexplicably. ‘And then what, Rhett? Keep running? It’s
not a solution.’

‘I want you to
come live with me. Come back to the pack house with me.’

‘Are you telling
me or asking me?’

Rhett’s features
softened. ‘Asking you, Ind. I would never force you to do something you didn’t
want to do. But if you don’t want to come with me, I’m sure my alpha will
understand when I move in here with you.’

‘You can’t move
in here with me!’

‘Why not?’ asked
Rhett.

‘This place is a
hovel. I live here because I don’t have another choice, but you do Rhett.’

He took a step
closer to her, making her heart pound erratically in her chest. Rhett’s lips
curved into a smile like he knew. ‘I don’t care what the place is like as long
as you’re with me. Your safety is all that matters.’

He took her
hands even though she resisted and placed them over his heart. ‘You feel that
Indi?’ he asked, his voice rumbling through his chest. She could feel his
strong heart beating beneath her finger tips, sending electricity through her
body. ‘My heart beats for you Indi. It always will. I wasn’t meant to walk this
earth without you.’

Her eyes roved
over the apartment she always thought of as a septic wound. It wasn’t like she
was leaving a place she actually liked.

‘Please Indi. I
want you closer to me. I can protect you better.’

‘Where will I
sleep?’

‘Wherever you
want. You can sleep in my room, or you can have your own room. Whatever you
want Indi, just come with me. I can look after you.’

She stared into
his slipping eyes, and nodded. ‘Okay. Give me five minutes to pack.’

Rhett smiled at
her widely. ‘I’ll put him in the car. Five minutes, okay?’

‘Five minutes.’

Rhett left with
the Dragos wolf slung over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Indi wandered
around her apartment wondering what to take—if anything. In the end, she
grabbed a large, plastic garbage bag—since she didn’t have a suitcase—and
filled it with her clothing and her toiletries. Exactly five minutes later, she
was leaving her apartment behind, riding in Rhett’s Jetta to dispose of a body
before going to the pack house.

The farmhouse was huge. It loomed
out of the earth, staking its claim on the rolling hills and sprawling forest
around it just by being there. It should have been the other way around.

‘What is that?’
Indi asked, rubbing her hands up her freezing arms.

Rhett glanced at
her. ‘What’s what?’

‘I feel like I’m
suffocating.’

He nodded. ‘Pack
magic. You can feel our pack magic.’

Indi looked back
through the windshield again. All the lights were on, movement behind the
curtains telling her there were a lot of wolves at home.

‘How many people
live here?’

‘Seven,
including me.’

‘And you’re sure
your alpha won’t mind?’

He shook his
head. ‘He asked you to come. He wants to keep you safe just as much as I do.’

Rhett parked the
Jetta; running around the front of the car to open her door for her before she
could. Indi felt the sweeping cold twisting around her legs as the door opened,
but she didn’t care. All she could concentrate on was the group of males now
standing on the front porch. They ranged in height, but there were none shorter
than five foot eight. The width of their shoulders intimidated the hell out of
her, but there was no way she’d admit it. As she looked over the wolves she’d
be living with, she only recognised one: Vaile.

His
platinum-blond fade cut was shorter than when she’d last seen it, but the
severe look he always seemed to wear was right in place. His grey eyes were
hard, matching the set of his jaw and mouth.

‘Indi?’ Rhett
asked. She tore her gaze from Vaile. ‘Come on.’ He held out a hand to her,
lifting her from the car and holding her close to his body. They approached the
front porch slowly, Indi setting the pace. The tallest man there by a few
inches stepped forward, and she knew he was the alpha.

They stopped at
the bottom of the stairs. ‘Indi,’ Rhett said softly into her ear, ‘this is
Antain, the alpha of the Helheim pack and my uncle.’

Indi’s eyes
widened. ‘You didn’t tell me he was your uncle.’

Rhett shrugged,
taking her hand and leading her up the stairs. Antain held out his hand to her.

‘Indi, it’s very
nice to meet you,’ Antain said with a rolling cadence that instantly put Indi
at ease. She slid her hand into his and they shook.

‘It’s nice to
meet you too.’

Antain’s gaze
travelled to Rhett. ‘Bring her inside. Colton, get her bag.’

A tall man with
blond hair and black eyes stepped forward, grinning at Indi as he passed. She
didn’t smile back.

‘Please,’ Antain
said softly, showing her the way into the house. With a squeeze on the hand
from Rhett, she walked in through the open doorway. Her eyes drank in the
details of the house. There was a utilitarian staircase directly in front of
her. To her right there was a living room filled with old furniture that
somehow made it cosy, not rundown like her place had been. Beyond the staircase
was a white door, but Indi could only guess what was on the other side of it.
And to her right, there was a room with a large oak door left slightly ajar.