DAYNE
"You won't get away with this," the bloodied, enraged shifter currently tied to a dining room chair snarled. "Once Glynn realizes-"
Dayne straightened from his lean against the wall. "Please, do finish Keith. What will Glynn do?"
Although his voice was mild, betraying none of his simmering fury, the shifter they'd plucked off the street and stuffed in the trunk after a solid whack to the back of the head must have heard enough to keep his mouth shut.
In the long silence that followed, Dayne waited to see what the shifter would say. But when no more threats were forthcoming, Dayne nodded.
He crossed over to the shifter, and once he'd pulled a chair from under the dining table, spun it so he could sit astride it and rest his elbow on the back. "Now. You were saying something about how your alpha likes to drag Talis from her bed to beat her for no other reason than he's bored."
Keith leaned away, the scent of his fear tainting the air.
"Dayne…" Luka's voice was low with warning.
Dayne ignored him in favor of leaning closer to Keith. "I would really like to hear more about that. And whether any of the pack liked to get involved." His tone was friendly, but again, Keith seemed to recognize this was no innocent question.
"I never-"
Dayne raised his eyebrow. "So, you're saying you never… which suggests others did. Am I right?"
Keith didn't respond.
"Keith, I'm struggling to hold on to my patience here, but you're not making it easy. Are you trying to make me angry? Is that what you'd like?" Dayne asked in the same friendly tone.
Keith swallowed and shook his head. "No. I… no. I just don't know anything."
"I think you're wrong about that, Keith. I think there's a lot you know. Tell me what you never did. I'm very interested to know."
After a desperate glance in Luka's direction, Keith swallowed. "He would-"
"I'm assuming you mean Glynn? I'm going to need you to be clear about who you're talking about. Crystal."
Dayne didn't bother to tell the shifter it wouldn't matter how many times he darted helpless looks in Luka's direction. He was the alpha here. Keith would get no help from that quarter.
He wouldn't get help from anyone in this house since Dayne had sent the rest of the pack upstairs and told them not to interfere, no matter what they heard.
Not that any of his pack had complained even once. After what Glynn had done to Talis, he doubted anyone in his pack would be in any hurry to jump to the defense of anyone from the Merrick pack.
Keith nodded. "Yes. He liked to… he liked to get her up in the middle of the night."
Dayne waited for the shifter to continue, but when he didn't, he leaned close. "Patience is hanging by a thread, Keith. A thread." He held his finger and thumb close enough they nearly touched.
"He would-" At Dayne's raised eyebrow, Keith cleared his throat.
"Glynn would give her a five-minute head start."
Dayne stilled.
He wished he hadn't pressed this shifter to talk because this was going to end up going one way. He knew himself well enough to know it had been a bad idea.
All he had to be grateful about was at least he and Luka had focused their earlier questions on the layout of the house, the pack members he had to watch for, and other information they'd need to rescue Talis.
He should have stopped there.
This line of questioning was going to end nowhere good. Still, he had to know. Something compelled him to know more about Talis' life since she was so resistant to talking about any of it.
"A head start. Go on," Dayne forced himself to say calmly.
At the flash of naked fear in Keith's eyes, Dayne saw the shifter was smart enough not to trust that calm for a second. "Then the rest of the pack would chase her. It was a competition, like a game and the winner-"
"A game?" For a second calm deserted Dayne, and he took a moment to wrestle his growing rage back deep inside.
"Dayne?" Luka's voice warned him to walk away.
It was too late for that. Much too late.
"Don't interfere, Luka. Keith, please go on."
"Well, I never…"
"Yes. You've already said." For the first time since Dayne had started questioning Keith, he revealed a trickle of his rage.
"The pack would chase her, and whoever caught her would win a prize from the alpha," Keith ended in a rush.
"Tell me, what was it? A teddy bear? A goldfish? A cash prize? What?"
Keith shrugged. "I don't know, it was mostly only the Alpha or Abel who won."
Dayne forced himself to concentrate on something other than the rage sweeping through him at the thought of Talis, ripped from her sleep, running terrified, being hunted by her own pack.
God, no wonder she hadn't wanted to tell him anything.
And why was he getting the impression this was only the tip of the iceberg, and there were more, much more cruelties she'd suffered, not just at the hands of her alpha as he'd thought, but by all those around her as well.
They'd been her pack for fuck's sake.
They'd known her as a child. Had known her parents. Had she had no one she could count on in the pack? Not one friend?
"Abel?" Dayne asked.
"The beta. He's… I try to stay out his way."
Talis had said it was Abel spying through the window when they'd nearly had sex in the kitchen. The beta she'd said. The one with the cold, dead eyes outside the bank with Glynn.
It had to have been this same shifter who'd been creeping around their woods, who'd terrified Savannah enough to send her back to the farmhouse when she'd sworn never to spend one more night there.
"I see. And does this… Abel stay out of Talis' way?"
Keith's eyes darted away, and dread formed in Dayne's belly.
"No. No, he doesn't."
"Tell me what you know," Dayne's order was a lash and Keith flinched.
"He's always liked her. I think he went to the alpha and asked to mate with her, but Glynn always had plans for her to mate with an alpha so he could get something out of it since she wasn't good for anything else." Here Keith stopped, as if only just realizing what he'd said-and who he was saying it to. He gulped.
"Go on," Dayne murmured.
"Well, Alpha said no but Abel sometimes doesn't listen, and Alpha had to put a lock on the attic door to stop Abel from getting to Talis."
Dayne was silent, but behind him, he felt Luka stir for the first time.
"Are you telling me, Keith, that not only does your alpha lock Talis in the attic, but also that his beta has tried to force himself on her so often that instead of doing anything about it, he merely puts a lock on her door and calls it good?"
Keith aimed another desperate glance in Luka's direction. "I don't-"
"It's a yes or no question, Keith. Answer me. Has the beta tried to force himself on Talis?"
He shrugged as if it didn't concern him in the least. "Maybe."
Dayne stared at the shifter as disgust warred with fury.
Was this what all the rest of the pack were like? Were they all as indifferent and casual about Talis being beaten, tortured, and damn near raped?
"And was Abel alone in wanting to mate with Talis?" he asked.
Talis was beautiful. Just because she'd been a virgin at their mating, he didn't doubt for a second there hadn't been at least a couple of the wolves in her pack interested in her.
Likely the only reason she'd remained untouched was because of Glynn's plans to profit from mating her to a wealthy alpha.
Keith was silent.
"I'm not hearing you speaking," Dayne asked softly.
"He wasn't alone. Some of the others liked her, but they never... And sometimes, I'm sure I caught the Alpha-" Keith's mouth snapped shut.
But it was too late. Far too late. Dayne had already heard more, much more than he needed to hear. He leaned closer to the shifter. "You caught the Alpha doing what?"
Keith gulped. "Sometimes the way he used to watch her… when she wasn't looking, and when her wolf tried to kill him, I wonder if it hadn't been because he'd tried to-"
Dayne had no awareness of moving. Only at the feel of bones breaking beneath his hands did he realize what he'd done.
But he wasn't sorry. Not in the least.
The entire Merrick pack was diseased. No, Glynn had infected it with his own brand of cruelty and toxic poison. Not only that, he'd allowed it to flourish until there was nothing good left.
Over the years, Glynn had taken a healthy pack and destroyed it.
Dayne stood and turned away from the body of the shifter with the broken neck slumped in the chair.
Luka's expression was one Dayne had never seen on his face before. Naked fury made him barely recognizable.
"Get the pack together. We're going in tonight. Midnight. I refuse to leave my mate in that place for one fucking night longer," he snapped, and strode from the room.
"Yes, Dayne."