Page 1 of Exiled Heir

ChapterOne

The second time they came for me, I was ready.

I lay halfway between the door and the heavy bracket attaching my chains to the wall. Luckily, when they’d built their makeshift torture chamber, neither of them had used a stud finder because despite its heft, I’d been able to wrench it nearly free from the wall. As long as I was far enough away from it, they wouldn’t look too close and wonder if it was supposed to be bent at that angle before I had my hands around their throats.

When the metal door creaked open, I’d been waiting on the floor for long enough that the cold concrete had leached the warmth from my skin, leaving me feeling numb and slow. I’d have to hope that I was fast enough, even when my muscles were cramping from the chill. Whatever they’d drugged me with left me with an itch burning under my skin, like I was halfway through a shift and someone had poured cayenne pepper on my raw flesh.

With my eyes closed, playing dead, my nose and ears told me where they were.

Tweedledee—not his real name, but I didn’t really care what his real name was when he had me chained in the back room of a bar—smelled like he hadn’t finished shaking himself off before tucking himself back into his pants. Urine and cheap alcohol were an unpleasant cologne. Apparently, he was all too eager to spend the money the bounty on my head would net him.

Tweedledum smelled like cigarettes but not much else. Of the two, he was the smarter one.

“See?” Tweedledee slurred. “He’s still out cold.”

“I leave for anhour, and you go to get yourself a drink?” Tweedledum’s voice rose. He sniffed, but he didn’t have a wolf’s nose. “Are you high?”

“No.” Tweedledee shifted uncomfortably, and I heard footsteps as Tweedledum approached his accomplice. I almost felt for Tweedledee. He had the teeth of an addict. I had noticed that when I had sat down at the bar, but right now, the only thing he was under the influence of was the cheapest beer on tap.

“Youare. I can’t believe you got drunk and high when we have—”

I cracked my eyes open, took a wild guess that they were close enough, and launched myself at them.

At first, everything went according to plan. My speed and momentum made the chain scream, and the bracket attaching it to the wall began to give. My fingers were almost touching them, their eyes wide, one pair bloodshot, one pair shocked.

But my wolf wouldn’t come.

My wolf wouldn’t come.The itch under my skinburned, but still, I couldn’tshift.

Somehow, I was stuck in my human form, no wolf fur, no claws, no supernatural strength. My terror kicked my heart into high gear, the moment of hesitation just long enough to be a mistake.

Tweedledum raised a gun and fired.

An electrical current that could take down a grizzly bear shot through me. It wasn’t a gun; it was a Taser with all the safety settings taken off.

I fell to the floor, convulsing. Every muscle tightened, and I was pretty sure I cracked a molar my jaw seized so tight.

“Oh my god, Jed, you’re killing him.” But Tweedledee didn’t sound horrified. He sounded amazed. I felt all my sympathy for him evaporate when I realized he wanted in on the murder-the-werewolf action.

With one last burst of electricity, the wires released, and I lay on the ground, too dazed to do more than stare up, blankly, at the white ceiling above. It was stained from smoke and water damage, and there were droplets of blood that hadn’t been cleaned off it.

Electricity buzzed through me, my heartbeat loud in my ears and the smell of my burned flesh curling into my nostrils. I didn’t need to see it to know that the metal probes had seared my flesh where they’d hit. Add a side of potatoes and I’d do a good impression of a rib eye steak left too long on the grill.

“Get the chains,” Tweedledum said. “He’s going to be here in half an hour.”

“He’s going towhat? He’s coming all the way from Los Santos?” Tweedledee’s voice went high. “Oh my god. Oh mygod, Jed.”

“Get. The. Chains.” Tweedledum shook his head. Then I saw him approach me, standing over my face. He drew another weapon out of his jean jacket.

This one was most definitely a gun. He waved it in front of my face, then pointed it straight at my brain. “Silver. We know exactly what you are, and weareprepared to handle you.”

I stared at him for a long moment, my eyes tracing the harsh lines of the gun, the promise of it. This was not a weapon that was made for showing off in front of your friends. It was something straight out of a military campaign.

Despite the danger, I almost wanted to laugh. I could not believe I had been captured by two werewolf hunters who were such complete idiots.

“Silver?” I slurred.

The fact that I couldn’t use some of my face muscles meant that the word came out more frightened than I intended it to.