Chapter 114 - I will find her

HADRIAN

“Let me go with you,” Emma says, her fingers are coated in my blood and I tug her towards the kitchen.

Alex is somewhere out there and she knows everything. She has the power to reveal my identity and destroy all of this. Finding her is crucial, but I won’t put Emma in more danger.

“That’s not necessary.” I hold my fingers in the stream of the water flowing from the faucet. I wait until the water is warm, but not scolding.

“I will find her,” I tell her again and kiss her head. Her scent is calming and I linger for a moment.

I hold a piece of cloth under the stream until the fabric is completely soaked. Her fingers tremble in my hand as I clean them from the bloodstains.

My Emma is stressed and fear is evident in her blue eyes. “What if you’re too late?”

“I think we would have noticed by now if that was the case.”

There haven't been any pitchforks and torches. Or silver arrows and daggers in this case. The night is quiet and there’s no commotion outside.

Emma takes the cloth from my hands and cleans the blood from my chest. She follows the trail of blood to my abdomen and I grit my teeth at her touch. Now is not the time to lose my head over primal desires.

“We have to get back,” Lucas says as he peers into the kitchen.

I nod at him and intend to move away but two arms wrap around my waist and hold me in place. Emma doesn’t look at me as she presses her face into my chest. “Be careful.”

Lucas rolls his eyes, mutters his annoyance and leaves the kitchen.

His complaints don’t affect me, because my mate is holding me and initiating contact. I run my fingers through her long white locks and hold one arm tightly around her back.

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I follow Lucas back to the house and into the living room. There’s no sign of the two men. Dex has many men around town who will do his bidding. The two nameless men are easily replaced.

The seats are back upright and at their rightful spot at the table. The cards and stacks of chips are gone. Only the scent of smoke and whiskey lingers.

Dex is pouring the amber liquor into an empty tumbler with one hand and places a cigarette in his mouth with the other. The flare of rage he showed earlier is gone.

He raises a eyebrow when he takes in my bare torso and a sly smirk tugs at his mouth. There’s curiosity in his eyes as he looks between me and Lucas. I let him think what he wants.

“Anything worth mentioning?” He asks with a grin and he replaces the cigarette with the tumbler of whiskey.

Lucas shrugs his shoulders with an ease that has me surprised. “Not really.”

There is no fear in him after what happened. I wonder if he can sense something. Lucas pulls a beer from the fridge and takes a seat on the sofa.

I have no intention to linger downstairs. I made a promise to my mate and I’m determined to keep it. I need to find Alex before she decides to divulge my identity to others.

I turn toward the stairs but Dex stops me with a hand on my shoulder. His eyes move down my arms. “Your wounds are healing quite nicely. You barely see the scars.”

The wounds were slow to heal and took weeks to close, but spending one night in the embrace of my mate has healed them completely. The scars that are left are the ones of silver and my body is scattered with it. I give him a careful nod and try to sense what conclusions he’s going to make.

“You can always cover them up with a tattoo if you want, I know someone.”

Dex removes his hand and places the tumbler on the table. He removes his own shirt and reveals his back. “One mutant got me, so I thought I should commemorate.”

Claw marks run through the drawing of a wolf head. The drawing is a composition of different shades of gray. The eyes are black and the details on the teeth are sharp. The scars are highlighted even if the real ones have almost faded.

“Is that a mermaid?” Lucas asks from the sofa and points the bottle towards him.

Dex lifts his arm as he shows the mermaid wrapped around his torso. “Yeah, her tail goes along the side.”

The mermaid covers a significant part of his skin. Color is added to the drawing. The scales are edged with vibrant shades of blue, purple and green. The mermaid is surrounded by dozens of other creatures and I sense a theme. The mermaid is the only one with color in it.

I notice that most of his tattoos cover an abundance of scars. I’m pretty sure that Dex has more scars than me. I’ve never seen someone this mangled and still be alive. That includes every werewolf I know.

The tattoos hide the scars well, but make me wonder how he got them in the first place.

“That’s amazing,” Lucas says in appreciation. “Who’s your guy, we’re thinking of getting a tattoo as well.”

I direct my scowl towards Lucas. I never actually agreed to anything.

Dex chuckles. “I will ask her if she can make some time for you.” His lightheartedness is back.

Lucas keeps talking about his idead and I use their distraction and move upstairs. There is no sign of Alex recently visiting the house. No lingering of her scent.

I change into a new shirt and climb out of the window. I ignore the urge to go to Emma’s window instead and curl around her. With Kelsey knowing and Alex not being in the house I can practically taste the opportunity.

My feet soundlessly sink into the grass. I’m careful not to land in front of the window and I make my way around the house through the alley. I pick up her trail and follow it into the dark forest.

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Alex is clever, I will have to give her that. I begin to suspect that she knows more about werewolves than she lets on. Especially when I reach the same point and figure out that I ran a big circle around the abandoned factory.

I even have to catch my breath at the miles I’ve crossed in the past hours. If I could’ve shifted then I would’ve figured this out way sooner.

I move back into the dark forest and start my way back to the town. I will have to start my search again from the beginning. The sun is rising and the light shines in my eyes as it beams through the trees.

A figure moves through the beam of light. The only thing I can see is the dark outline in contrast to the light.

I lift my hand to block the sun from my eyes. The outline is female and for a moment I think it’s Alex.

The woman slowly moves towards me. She has one arm around her waist and her legs are unsteady as she walks. The woman is young with long brown hair. Everything about her is dirty, her clothes, her skin and her hair.

It is only when she gets closer that I sense a wolf, a weak one.

“Help me.” Her voice is barely a whisper. The woman collapses to the ground and I quickly close the distance.

She's passed out, but still alive. Her breathing and heartbeat are weak. Through the dirt, I can see that she wears regular clothes. She’s no soldiers, so she's not part of Zeno’s troops.

Who is she and maybe even more important, what is she doing here?