Dark Secrets (11 page)

Ella stopped in the middle of the hall and stared at the
wall as if she was seeing something else. Flaking paint. Chipped concrete.
Having had to chase through the abandoned rooms and halls of the decrepit
asylum Lizbeth had taken Hannah to and tortured her in, desperately searching
for Ella, I couldn’t blame her for the hesitation.

I grabbed Ella’s face and made her look at me. “Another
place, another time. Stay with me, babe.”

“I’m here.” She blew out a breath. “Let’s get in and get
out.”

Hannah slipped her hand into Ella’s and squeezed. “Turn left
down this hall, right down the second. The office we’re looking for will be the
third door on the right.”

I led the way, passing several rooms, the glass windows
reinforced with a layer of metal grates. When we made it to our destination, I
tried the knob and found it locked.

Shit.

“Use the keys,” Ella suggested.

“It’ll take too long.” I twisted the knob, letting loose
with the strength I held back, until the lock snapped. I pushed open the door and
winced at the squeak.

We filed in one at time, Hannah closing the door softly
behind us as much as it would with the broken handle. The office smelled of
stale coffee and something else, something sweet. I looked around the dark
interior, barely able to make out the large desk sitting in the middle of the
room. Thick file folders littered the surface. There was other clutter, office
stuff that reminded me of the set-up Richard had at our home growing up.

Pressed against the right wall, I made out four glossy
cabinets. Hannah reached for the light switch and I grabbed her wrist, stopping
her before she flipped it.

“It’ll draw too much attention. Keep it off,” I said.

I pulled out a flashlight and used the beam to direct her to
Ella, who pulled out a similar light.

“Here,” Ella said. “Take mine, I don’t need it.”

She nodded and followed Ella to a filing cabinet. I tried
mine only to find it locked. Frustration mounted. I was better suited to a
fight, not information gathering. Before I could wrench it open, Hannah stopped
me.

“If we are trying to stay inconspicuous, let me.”

She shone her light on the desk, the beam zeroing in on a
small black container of steel paperclips. She grabbed two, untwisted them and
came back to the lock.

“Since when can you pick locks?” Ella asked.

“Since forever. It’s not hard,” Hannah whispered, her words
hard to make out over the light she gripped between her teeth.

After a few seconds, the lock gave way with a soft click and
the cabinet slid open effortlessly. Impressive.

Ella and I exchanged a look. I shrugged and rifled through
file after file, looking for some kind of order. They were organized by a
numbering system that made zero sense to me.

“Oh my god, this is impossible,” Ella hissed, her fingers
doing a dance similar to mine through the documents. “It’s all mixed up.”

I pulled out a random folder and flipped through its
contents. A picture of a woman I’d never seen before was clipped to the front
page, a red X stamped over her face. Under her snapshot was another photo, one
of a demon with green skin and red, almost hypnotic eyes that nearly jumped off
the paper they appeared so vivid. I glanced at the scribbled notes and my
stomach curled with disgust.

Breeding unsuccessful. Genetics incompatible. Given serum
compound 31-B. Patient didn’t survive coupling.

I looked up and met Ella’s gaze. Hatred filled her eyes. She
too had an open folder in front of her and I wondered what the notes said. Or
maybe I didn’t want to know. I looked back to the files I’d barely glanced at. There
were hundreds of folders in these cabinets, thousands of horrors.

Who’d organized this?

Hannah reached for a folder, but Ella stopped her by placing
a hand on her forearm. She gave a subtle shake of her head. “Don’t.”

“Ella, you can’t shield me forever. I’m a big girl.”

Ella’s voice softened. “I know you are, but you don’t need
this shit in your head. Just trust me on this one, okay? Look through the stuff
on the desk, see if you can get any kind of names we can use. If all else
fails, we kidnap one of the doctors.”

At Hannah’s unwavering stare, I chimed in. “Names would be
good.” I snapped the folder shut and shoved it back into the cabinet before
reaching for another.

For the next thirty minutes, Ella and I searched through
folders, methodically looking at the photos and names. I’d stopped reading the
captions about fifty files ago. The notes were penned in different inks,
handwriting, and styles showing there were a variety of doctors on staff.

The cabinet I’d started in had nothing but patient files
with a red X, signifying they were deceased. Since my mother was alive, I didn’t
figure I’d find her in that cabinet and had quickly moved on.

In the fourth cabinet, bottom shelf, midway through, I found
what I was looking for. My heart stopped the second the folder fell open and a
familiar photo stared back at me.

Marianna Knox McGregor.

No X bisected the face that haunted my dreams. Her eyes were
as I remembered them. Big and beautiful—a deep chocolate color, the same shade
as Eli’s, as Lily’s used to be. Her nose was slender and her golden-brown hair
a mess of curls, an almost identical replica of my sister.

I forced myself to skip the notes written in different
handwriting than the rest I’d come across. It was a scrawl I’d recognize
anywhere. Richard. My blood went ice fucking cold, a direct contrast to the
heat I emanated. The motherfucker had been here, he’d taken notes—he’d taken
part. Richard had watched, silently documenting, as my mother was drugged,
raped and impregnated with me.

He’d then spent my entire life lying to me. All for what?
Rage simmered. I dropped my gaze lower and stared at the demon who’d sired me.

“No fucking way,” I muttered.

I knew who my father was.

“Micah, what is it? Did you find it?” Hannah asked.

I looked up from the photo I’d been staring at, one of a
girl I’d met at a training camp once when I’d been ten. Even though she was
aged in the photo, her riot of red corkscrew curls was unmistakable. Her death,
apparently, had been a lie.

I focused on Micah, on the way his eyes glowed bright enough
to encompass him in an eerie light. He looked up from the file he studied. I
barely had time take in the lines of tension bracketing his eyes before his
rage slammed into me, almost knocking me back.

“Micah?” It was hard to find my voice under the assault of
emotions.

I licked my lips and carefully closed the folder I’d been
looking at, setting it on top of the others I’d pulled out—survivors who’d been
released after they’d been given some kind of mind-erasing formula. I sank down
in front of Micah and cupped his cheek.

“Tell me.”

His skin was on fire, hotter than I’d ever felt it.

He spoke through clenched teeth. “He lied to me.”

I found I had to swallow, to catch my breath. “Richard?”

His clenched jaw was hard as a rock beneath the thumb I
swept across his face. The faint scent of sulfur filled my nose, the flames
inside him barely restrained. Beads of sweat curled from his temples and down
his jaw. His heartbeat thundered, speeding mine with it so I felt his anxiety
as if it were my own.

“Don’t.” He pulled my hand from his cheek and backed away
from me.

He stared at me, his nostrils flaring with each breath. The
touchable energy radiating from him quadrupled and I pressed a hand to my lower
stomach.

“Will someone please tell me what’s going on?” Hannah asked,
a panicked hitch making her words shrill.

My sister shifted from one foot to the other. If she had any
nails left on her right hand, I’d be surprised.

I rose from the ground. “Who lied to you? Talk to me.”

“Castro.” The demon’s name, spoken with lethal venom, had my
entire body jerking back in surprise.

“What?”

He curled his upper lip and shoved a folder against my
chest. The force of Micah’s thrust threw me off balance and I reflexively
grabbed hold of the file. Pure rage bombarded me, crept under my skin.

“He’s involved in this. He’s my father. He knew the entire
time!” Micah ran both of his hands through his hair and yanked on the strands. “He
made me promise to take her to him. Fucking fuck!”

I struggled to keep up with Micah’s words, to decipher what
they meant. Take who where? Who was “he”? I opened the file in a clumsy rush
and scanned the page, praying he’d misread something, that somehow the facts
were skewed. Under the picture of a pretty woman I vaguely recognized was a
photo of Castro’s face. His green-blue eyes mocking me.

Holy shit. So many things made sense now. Castro’s interest
in Micah. Why their eyes glowed the same way. Micah’s ability to project
emotion. His flaming palm.

Micah stalked a short, violent path into the middle of the
room, back to the cabinet. His rage was tangible, something so hot and fierce I
stepped in front of my sister to protect her from it. The air in the room
crackled with energy and I braced for whatever was coming. Micah moved almost
too quickly for me to see.

He wrapped his hands around the back of the large brown
leather chair, lifted it as if it weighed nothing and threw it across the room.
Pictures crashed to the floor in a spray of glass. As if the small destruction
hadn’t been enough, Micah flipped over the desk with a roar of pure,
heartbreaking frustration. Hannah let out a little squeak and pressed into my
back.

Chaos reigned as papers, pens and other office supplies flew
through the air. Micah slammed his fist into the wall, leaving gaping holes
that exposed the building’s inner workings. Shit, it was only a matter of time
before someone came to investigate the noise.

“That fucking bastard knew!” He picked up a broken lamp from
the floor and hurled it across the room. “He knew!”

Behind me, Hannah clutched the back of my jacket and
burrowed her head against me. I twisted my arm to hold her to me. Micah strode
to the metal filing cabinets and one at a time yanked them forward to send them
crashing to the ground. I flinched at each loud bang. Files and photos spilled
free, a graveyard of horrors.

Micah, fists clenched at his sides, turned and looked at me.
His eyes were glowing orbs of hatred and sorrow. His chest rose and fell with
each heaving breath he took. Before I could say anything, he turned and strode
for the door. Instead of bothering with the handle, he kicked it open and split
the wood in half. He hooked left and disappeared from sight, a trail of
writhing energy in his wake.

I stared into the empty doorway for long minutes until
Hannah, who’d I almost forgotten cowered behind me, put a gentle hand on my arm
and drew my attention.

“What do we do? Should we follow?” she asked in a voice that
trembled.

I wanted to give Micah the space he clearly needed, but I
also needed to protect him. Fighters made mistakes when they let emotions rule
their actions. It was one of my greatest weaknesses.

“Let’s go.”

I shoved the folder containing the information about Micah’s
mother—along with a few others for good measure—at Hannah and went for the
door. I didn’t need the mating bond to know where he was. The squeak of boots
scraping over linoleum, the echo of raised voices and the primal sound of
pounding flesh were clue enough.

“You sick motherfucking asshole. Tell me where she is.”
Micah’s voice had gone scary quiet, a hiss that hit my ears and prickled my
skin with unease.

I rounded the corner to find him with his hands around the
throat of an orderly, or maybe a doctor, dressed in white scrubs. Micah—face
twisted into a snarl—tightened his grip. He shoved the guy against the wall and
I cringed at the thudding sound of impact.

I phazed the distance to Micah and grabbed his wrist. I
hissed at the blistering heat, fighting my instincts to let go. The distant
sound of a commotion hammered my senses—voices, running footsteps and the
jangling of keys—and it was hard to tell which direction it was coming from.
One thing was certain, the plan to get in and get out no longer applied. That
had gone to hell when Micah decided the office needed redecorating. We had
minutes before we’d be surrounded.

“Micah, let him go,” I said and struggled to pry him away
from his prey.

He shoved me back, ripping his arm free from my hold. “Not
until he tells me where she is.”

Micah pressed his nose against the orderly’s and blew out an
angry breath. The man sputtered. From dark to darker, the man’s face turned
reddish-purple. His fear was a potent, ripe scent that spiced the air. The
thundering of his heart drew my fangs and I ruthlessly forced my bloodlust
away.

“Micah,” I snapped. “You’re going to crush his windpipe. He
can’t answer you with your hands wrapped around his throat.”

Micah dug in deeper and cocked his head to the side, almost
as if he was getting a better view of the life he slowly extinguished.

I softened my voice, hoped to hell he wasn’t beyond reason. “Micah.
If you kill him, you won’t forgive yourself. Let him go so he can tell us where
your mother is.”

My mate turned to regard me with cold indifference. Micah,
the man I’d fallen in love with, was nowhere to be found. Swirling rings of
color made his irises glow. More than that, there was something else in his
gaze, something dark and deadly. The predator—the demon—was in full control.

I licked my lips and tried again. “Let him go.”

I reached up and stroked his cheek, smoothing my fingers
over the defined muscles in his jaw that were slick with sweat, wondering if
this was the day he would do something he couldn’t come back from. I stepped
closer, desperate to save him from himself.

Micah’s nostrils flared and, one finger at a time, he let
go. The man, face purple, lips blue, throat red and welted with blisters,
dropped to the ground in a heap. Micah stepped back. The look on his face told
me he was seconds from rushing forward and kicking the shit out of the guy on
the floor.

I crouched and flashed my fangs at the hospital employee. He
scooted back, almost crawling up the wall in an effort to get away from me.
Nice to know I could still be scary, even if I was an emotional basket case.

“Marianna McGregor, tell me where to find her,” I demanded.

The man coughed and sputtered. He looked wildly around, as
if he expected someone to come rescue him at any second. His gaze locked onto
Hannah’s. Before he could utter a sound, I pinched a cheek between my thumb and
forefinger, making him focus on nothing but me.

We had a minute, two tops before the troops arrived. I would
not put my sister in that situation. So I did the only thing I could think of
to speed this discussion along. I reached between his legs, grabbed his nuts
and squeezed.

“Tell me where she is.”

He howled, a high-pitched wail, and scrambled, kicking his
legs. “Three, three-oh-eight. Upstairs. Up. Don’t kill me, please just don’t
kill me.”

I let go of the man’s junk, wiped my hands on my pants and
stood. “Who runs this place?”

“I don’t…know,” he stammered.

I narrowed my eyes and focused on him. Beads of sweat
peppered his forehead and plastered his light-brown hair to his skin. Words
trickled together, a whisper of noise I couldn’t quite make out. I strained to
decipher the message but it was like trying to scoot the can off the top shelf
with your finger. Pictures hit me, one after another. Micah’s mother, a
syringe. The redhead from the photo. Charts, endless lines of handwriting.
Richard…

“Ella!” Hannah said, and pulled on my arm, breaking my
concentration.

I blinked and the words floating through my subconscious
fell into a void, lost forever.

“What are you?” the orderly whispered, his pure
spine-numbing terror one of the most horrifying things I’d ever seen. Scary
because it was directed at me.

I let my sister pull me to the staircase Micah had already
started climbing. The pounding of rushing feet grew louder, the shouts more
pronounced. Not bothering with stealth, we raced up two flights of stairs until
we spilled out into a hallway.

Rooms lined either side of the long, undecorated corridor.
Each door had a painted number and a small window covered in bars. We stopped
in front of the room that housed Micah’s mother. Without even missing a beat,
Hannah dropped to her knees in front of the lock. She inserted the metal ends
of the paperclips into the keyhole.

“Hurry,” I urged.

I couldn’t make myself look through the window. Instead, I
peered down one side of the hallway, then the other, expecting a barrage of
armed men to burst into view at any moment. At my side, Micah stared on in
complete and utter silence. The roiling energy emanating from him made my skin
crawl.

“I’m trying,” she hissed and wiggled the clips.

The second the lock popped and Hannah opened the door, Micah
stepped into the room. Following closely, I ran into his back when he stopped
dead in his tracks. I moved to his side and followed his gaze to the lone chair
set next to a grate-covered window. In the plastic seat, a woman with curly
brown hair sat listlessly. A thin blue gown hung off her bony, sagged
shoulders.

“Mom?” Micah’s voice was cracking and raw, a tone that
resonated through me.

Marianna turned at the sound. Her face, so pale and gaunt,
looked like that of a ghost. The deep brown eyes I’d seen in the picture were
now dull and lifeless.

“Marianna?” Micah stepped closer in slow, measured steps.

His mother stared at him without an ounce of emotion. Not
relief. Not happiness. Nothing. She was a shell of a person, all the things
that made her, her wiped away by this institution.

Micah crouched in front of her. When he placed his hand on
her arm, she flinched at the touch and hugged her limb close to her body.

“Who-who are you?” she asked in a broken voice.

My blubbering heart cracked wide open.

“It’s me, Mom, Micah. I’m not here to hurt you.”

“I don’t,” her voice was raspy, as if she hadn’t spoken in a
while, “have any children.” She looked away from Micah and returned her gaze to
the barred window.

I chewed on my bottom lip, torn between wanting to slide my
hand up Micah’s arm and give him comfort, or going back downstairs and tearing
out the orderly’s throat.

Hannah approached quietly and knelt in front of Marianna. My
sister’s smile was gentle and reassuring—something neither Micah nor I was
capable of. She picked up Marianna’s frail hand and held it securely between
her own.

“Mrs. McGregor? Can I call you that?”

The older woman nodded.

“I’m Hannah. The man who just spoke is Micah and my sister,
who you haven’t met yet, is Ella. We’re here to take you home.”

“Home?” she asked.

“That’s right.” Hannah stood and helped Micah’s mother to
her feet.

Micah stood back, out of the way, with a murderous
expression on his face. Marianna turned in slow motion, as if the act of moving
was more than she could bear. She met my gaze and looked right through me as if
I didn’t exist. I gave her a small, reassuring smile, making sure to keep my
fangs tucked away so as not to frighten her.

“We don’t have much time, come now,” Hannah cooed.

Marianna clutched my sister’s hand and nodded as she shuffled
first one foot, then the other. Flimsy blue slippers covered her feet. The
pale, calf-length gown she wore would do shit to protect her from the elements.

I wrestled out of my leather jacket and met Hannah in the
middle of the room, putting it around Marianna’s shoulders. Hannah flashed me a
grateful smile, one I cherished.