Dark Lies: Chapter 17

Savannah

By the time we got back to Magic Side, my despair had turned to numbness.

Although I’d been pretending nothing was happening, the truth was that I was no longer that naïve girl from Wisconsin. I’d become a werewolf and a killer and had made my bed with criminals. I could command shadows and darkness, and I could summon a knife from thin air that would tear out your soul.

Despite what Jaxson had said, there was no doubt I was a monster. Something dark inside of me was growing every day. Something that wasn’t my wolf, and that wasn’t my magic.

Maybe it was just me. The real me—the part that hated my parents for dying and wanted to strangle every one of the bastards who’d ever laid their hands on me.

I wrapped my arms tighter around Jaxson’s waist just to have something solid to cling to as the daze took hold and the city streets passed by.

Finally, Jaxson’s bike rolled to a stop in front of Savage Body, and I looked up in surprise.

“Your car’s done,” Jax said.

My heart leapt as I caught sight of my Gran Fury sitting in the front lot, freshly washed. I eagerly slipped off the bike and hurried over.

The rear wheel had been replaced, and the bullet holes had been patched and painted. I let my fingers drag along the restored side of the vehicle and trunk, savoring the moment. I could almost feel the magic tingling beneath my fingertips.

My father’s magic.

A sense of limitless freedom rushed through me like wind on a warm summer’s day. And the darkness that had consumed me on the ride back from the bar evaporated.

Footsteps approached from behind, and I turned to face Jaxson.

“Everything in order?” he asked.

More than ever.

I nodded. “Yes. Thanks.”

I hoped he could sense my gratitude because words couldn’t explain what my Fury meant to me.

“Good,” Jax said laconically, and crossed his arms. He looked like an absolute hunk in his biker jacket. Tall. Strong. Confident.

His signature mixed with the intoxicating scent of his sweat, and I drank it in as a comfortable silence stretched between us. Comfortable, that is, until I became aware of it.

Aw, shit, was I staring?

Heat crept across my neck, and I suddenly felt hot, sweaty, and grimy. I hadn’t seen myself in a mirror, but I was betting my face was covered with blood and bruises and my hair was wild and wind tangled from the road. Add to that the stink of exhaust, blood, and perspiration, and I probably seemed like one hell of a catch.

I awkwardly gestured to the car. “I’m going pay you back. I owe you a lot of hours at the bar for this.”

An indecipherable smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, and he shrugged. “As you wish. But not tonight—I certainly have had enough of bars for today.”

I let out a deep breath. “Tell me about it.”

Sam strode over. “I, unfortunately, have bar duty tonight. But before you two get lost staring at each other’s eyeballs, I want to know what the plan is.”

My cheeks burned, and I glanced away.

Jaxson, always the confident one, was totally unperturbed. “Well, it appears that Dragan is back, and he’s possessed Lucius Grayling. That, or Grayling is trying to use Dragan’s old network for power—but given what we know, I’m going to bet he’s possessed.”

“So how do we stop a ghost?” I asked.

“Instead of killing him, we’ll have to capture him,” Jaxson said.

Sam checked her phone. “Sounds like he’ll be at the rally on Monday night with all his minions. If we can catch him there, along with a bunch of his drug-crazed cultists, we could potentially knock out the threat to Savy in one fell swoop.”

“What do you think they’re up to?” I asked.

Jaxson’s face darkened. “I don’t know, but we need to find out before we go in, guns blazing.”

A slow, sinking feeling of trepidation weighed down on me. “I think it’s time I talked to my aunt.”

Jaxson’s eyebrows rose.

“She killed him the first time,” I explained, “and she and Uncle Pete went off looking for more information. If anyone knows, it’ll be her.”

“Or my father,” Jaxson said flatly. His voice was level but dripping with an emotion I couldn’t quite place. Resentment? Frustration? Wariness?

Whatever was there, at least he wasn’t going to have to tell his father he was a wolf.

Of the two questions I needed to ask Laurel, I knew which terrified me more, and it wasn’t, What’s Dragan up to?

It was, Was I born a werewolf—and why didn’t you tell me?

Half an hour later, I pushed through the front door of the LaSalles’ house and dropped my car keys in the brass bowl by the door. I’d quickly changed out of my biker clothes and washed most of the magic dye out, so my hair was almost back to its normal color.

My sweaty hands were practically shaking, and I wiped them on my jeans as I reevaluated my plan. Maybe I’d wait to ask Aunt Laurel about being a werewolf until after we’d sorted things out with Dragan. And although I wanted to know what she knew about my mom, the potential fallout could be catastrophic.

Things were too up in the air. It was best to wait.

Better to rip the band-aid off, Wolfie murmured in my mind.

Easy for you to say. You don’t have to look her in the eyes.

“Savannah, is that you?” My aunt whipped her head out of the kitchen and smiled. The smell of cinnamon and butter wafted down the hall. Cinnamon cookies.

At times, she could be positively warm and domestic. But I’d seen her other side—one as hard as iron. A woman who could command demons and disintegrate monsters with a single flick of her wrist.

“Welcome home,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady.

“It’s good to be home.” My aunt pulled me into a warm embrace, and I awkwardly wrapped my arms around her.

A part of me wanted to just get it done with, to scream, I’m a werewolf! Did you know?

I knew she was hiding something from me, but I couldn’t believe she knew the truth. She’d welcomed me into her home—why would she have done that if she knew what I was? Any time someone mentioned werewolves or the Laurents, I could feel the heat of her hatred, like standing next to an open fire.

The odds were fifty-fifty that she’d lose her shit and kick me to the curb or chain me in silver.

We’ll claw her eyes out first, my wolf said defiantly.

Laurel handed me a heaping plate of warm cookies. “Take these into the drawing room. I’ll be right there. We should talk.”

Oh, yes, we should.

I set the cookies on the coffee table and took a seat on the antique couch. Laurel swept in with two steaming mugs of milky tea. She handed one to me and sat. “Casey tells me that you didn’t come home last night.”

I nearly choked out my half-eaten cookie. That snitch!

Not that it mattered. I was going to have to tell her. I wiped my mouth. “I was attacked, and I stayed the night with a friend.”

The mug froze halfway to her lips, and I could see the fire in her eyes. “Attacked? By whom? Are you okay? Should I call in Uncle Pete? And why, for the sake of the gods, didn’t you come back here where it was safe?”

I reeled from the impact of the rapid-fire questions, though I recovered quickly. I had answers to all of them except the last.

“I’m okay. It was a bunch of werewolf bikers.”

She leapt to her feet, and magic crackled around her. “Werewolves? The Dockside pack? I told you not to get involved with them or Jaxson Laurent.”

“No!” I snapped—more harshly than I should have, seeing as all she wanted was to protect me. “Jaxson and his people chased them off. The jerks who jumped me were part of a biker gang, and I think they work for Dragan.”

My aunt went ashen as she slowly sat. “Dragan…”

“The bikers were supposed to hand me over to the leader of one of the Michigan packs, who’s suddenly calling himself the Dragon or Dragan. I think he’s possessed, just like Kahanov was. And he’s up to something.”

Her eyes were wide. “What?”

“We don’t know,” I said matter-of-factly between overflowing mouthfuls of cookie. “Whatever it is, it involves me and a bunch of cultists with tattoos of a two-headed wolf. So my question is, what did you and Uncle Pete find out on your trip, and what was Dragan up to before you disintegrated him?”

My aunt let out a sigh and ran her hands through her hair. “This is very bad. Dragan…Dragan was a monster. Part sorcerer and part wolf. He had access to forbidden magic—and it seems he has unfinished business.”

“Why did you hunt him down?”

“I was called in to help solve a string of murders. He left his victims in the middle of pentagrams inscribed with sorcerous runes. It was all part of a ritual we didn’t understand, but the werewolves seemed to know about it. Something about releasing an ancient evil, though they wouldn’t tell us what.”

The Dark Wolf God.

My skin prickled as a cold draft moved through the room.

Laurel looked me in the eyes and continued, “Your uncle and I are afraid he’s trying to do so again—except this time, he intends to use you as a sacrifice.”

“What about the cultists? Or the two-headed wolf tattoo? What do you know about those?”

“Little. Dragan had cultists to help with his rituals back then, which scaled up and became more elaborate with time. Your uncle and I returned to the place we killed him, an ancient graveyard in what was Czechoslovakia. He’d collected a dozen people to sacrifice and murdered six by the time we killed him.”

“Why go there?”

“I wanted to know why he was able to come back and possess Kahanov. Ghosts are rare, and with the spell I used to disintegrate him, returning shouldn’t have been possible.” She looked down at her hands. “I still don’t know why or how he came back.”

‘You and the Laurents worked together to bring him down?”

Laurel tensed and snapped her head up. “Yes, but it was a mistake. If that’s what you have in mind, hanging out with Jaxson Laurent, you can forget it. He’ll betray you the same way they betrayed us in the end.”

I sat on my hands to pin them in place. “What happened?”

My aunt’s eyes burned, and iron replaced the bitterness in her voice. “Nothing that can ever be changed.”

Her words were final, and silence filled the space. A silence that begged for a question and was leading me there, step by step.

I took in a shaky breath. “So why is Dragan after me?”

Laurel shuddered, and the fire in her eyes disappeared, dowsed with sorrow. “To inflict revenge on our family for killing him, I suspect.”

My voice approached a whisper. “But Casey hasn’t been attacked. Your own son. Wouldn’t Dragan attack him first?”

She looked away, toward the hall and stairs that led to Casey’s room. “Perhaps he thought you were an easier target—though thankfully, you’ve proven him wrong on that.”

I dug my fingers into my jeans and fought down my trepidation.

“Do you think that maybe it’s not because of who I am, but what I am? What my mother was?”

Her pupils shrank to laser points, though a fake smile hung on her face. “What do you mean, dear?”

Before I knew her, I would have been fooled. But not now. I’d lived with Laurel for weeks, and I’d learned a few of her tells and tics. I could smell the fear that her lie would be uncovered.

I knew that she knew.

Narrowing my eyes, I slowly set my mug down. “Let’s cut the bullshit, Laurel. Tell me the truth, starting with my mother. I know what she was.”

Way to rip the band-aid off.

Laurel flinched. “Excuse me?”

“A werewolf.” I paused, watching the shock roll off her like heat waves above hot asphalt. “She and Dad left because she was pregnant with me, but you already knew that.”

“How—who told you this?” Anger flashed through her eyes, and I sensed her alarm. Defensiveness. Fear. Shock.

“I had my suspicions, but then I found a letter that my dad had written to you. Did you know about me?”

“I don’t understand.” Laurel had stopped breathing, and her eyes turned glassy. “Did something happen to you?”

Her confusion mixed with anxiety, making a heady aroma that burned my nostrils. But it was the underlying hint of affirmation that made me sick to my stomach. She’d known all along.

“Happen to me? No, I was born this way. But my family was too disgusted by what I was, so my parents fled and lied to me my whole life. You’re just as guilty as they were for keeping this from me.”

Laurel’s face had turned pale. “Born this way?”

Her voice rang with the horror of a truth she knew but couldn’t accept.

I slowly extended my claws as I held back tears. “Born. A. Werewolf. Except I didn’t turn into one until I came here to Magic Side.”

For an infinite moment, Laurel stared at my hands in shock. Then she bolted to her feet and pushed back the chair as she staggered away. “How? This isn’t possible.”

“I’m not sure I understand your question. My mom was a werewolf, and I’m a werewolf. I grow fangs and fur and run on four legs.”

And eat rabbits and bacon, my wolf added, snickering.

With her eyes wide and unfocused, my aunt began to quake and clutched the wall for support. “It’s not possible…we bound your wolf. It shouldn’t be possible…”

My head spun as I took in her words. “Bound my wolf?”

Laurel looked at my claws in terror and then wrung her hands. “It’s okay. It will be okay. We can do it again. Your mother and father aren’t here, but I can teach Pete and Casey.”

Oh, my God.

The world around me twisted and warped like it had been demented by a carnival mirror.

She did this to me? And my parents helped?

Laurel approached tentatively. “Don’t worry, Savannah. I can fix this—”

I bolted out of my seat and maneuvered to the far side of the room. “What do you mean, fix this?”

She pressed her hands to her mouth. “You must be so scared. But don’t worry, I can make it go away.”

My wolf surged in my chest, and my fangs sprang out. Traitorous bitch! She’d bind me again?

Confusion and desperation spun in my mind as I tried to maintain control of my wolf.

She could make it go away.

At first, all I had wanted was to make it go away. When I’d thought I was a werewolf because Billy or Kahanov had infected me. But this was different.

I was born a wolf. Wolfborn. And Wolfie was a part of me now.

A part that I hadn’t wanted. But in that moment, staring down my aunt, I knew I couldn’t give her up. That I’d never give her up.

You’d better not! Wolfie growled, still raging and fighting for release.

I backed away from my aunt, who’d betrayed me, who’d lied to me, who’d help tear out a part of my soul.

“Savannah,” she said, reaching out. “Don’t be afraid. I can help.”

My wolf tore at me from within, and hair burst along my arms.

“I don’t want your help!” I snarled in a feral voice that made my aunt’s eyes go wide. “I want to know why you lied to me! Why you did this—why my parents did this!”

Laurel paused and looked at me with terror and confusion. “To protect you. Your parents and I bound your wolf with a spell to keep that half of you a secret. We wanted you to lead a normal life.”

“A normal life?” I scoffed. “Never knowing who I was or what I was capable of? A life without magic? A life with only half a soul? Did you hate what I was that much?”

Betrayal sank its bloody fangs into me, and a sob lodged in my throat.

“None of us ever hated you.” Laurel’s eyes brimmed with sorrow and determination.

“Not my grandfather?”

She froze, and I could sense her panic. “He wasn’t the reason.”

“Then what was?” I growled. “What was so important that you took that half from me without ever telling me the truth?”

My skin itched and tingled, and I could sense a shift coming on.

“You were born just after Dragan died—”

Horror took me as the room spun. I cried in pain as the shift began—as who I was began to melt away into something else.

Dragan. Had they worried I was going to be like him? A monster? Was that the truth?

Were they right?

I howled and charged for the door of the drawing room, but Laurel flicked her hand, and it slammed closed.

“You can’t leave, Savannah. It’s not safe. I can help turn you back.”

“I don’t want to turn back!” I screamed. “I want to be who I am!”

I hadn’t fully shifted yet, and I struggled for control. I needed hands to get out of this damned house.

Someone pounded on the door and started shouting. Casey? Panic seized my mind. If he came in and found me as a wolf, would he shoot me on sight?

I summoned every ounce of willpower to keep the shift from taking over, but I could barely think with my wolf raging in my chest. I jiggled the doorknob, but the door was stuck. “Let me out!”

“I can’t let you leave,” Laurel said calmly. “It’s not safe. Not with Dragan out there. This may be the reason he’s after you. Please calm down. You need to stay here with your family.”

White-hot rage flashed through me like a thunderclap, and my body trembled. “You’re going to lock me up? Like you did my wolf?”

Laurel began to cast a spell, and terror clutched my mind.

Was she going to bind me right now?

I tried to channel my magic into the door, but it became a vortex, swirling inside me. Dark shadows moved across the wooden floor, coalescing at my feet. My body jerked, and a cry of pain tore itself from my throat as the shadows poured into me and then exploded out in the form of a black wolf. I threw my arms wide, and the shadow creature lunged forward, tackling Laurel and surrounding her with darkness.

My aunt screamed and crashed to the ground, desperately fighting at the shadows.

Abject horror filled my mind as I stood paralyzed.

An explosion knocked me to the floor as a burst of flames blew the door off its hinges. Casey stormed in, fireballs in both hands. He looked between Laurel and me. “What the fuck is going on?”

“Casey, don’t let her leave!” my aunt shouted as she struggled with the shadows.

She did this to you, a voice said in my mind. Not my voice or my wolf’s, but one that I vaguely recognized. An avalanche of rage drowned out any reason I might have mustered. “No!”

I would burn this fucking house to the ground.

Suddenly, Casey was shaking me. “Savannah, stop!”

I twisted free as his shouts reeled me back to reality.

Laurel was crawling to her feet, and streaks of blood—claw marks—marred her skin. What had I done? Horror hit me like a sledgehammer, and I stumbled back with a gasp. The shadows engulfing Laurel evaporated as Casey ran forward and cradled her. He glared at me. “What have you done?”

Shock and terror cut across his face as his eyes fixated on my hands. On my claws.

On what I had done with my magic, to my aunt.

Stabbing agony settled in my chest, and I tried to speak, but no words came out. Instead, I turned and fled.