Page 27 of Exiled Heir

“You can’t explain it without breaking the mage pinkie promise,” I said. “Right.”

Dipping his chin, Cade nodded. “It would defeat the purpose if I find the killer but get banished from my own house.”

“Yeah, getting kicked out for letting dirty townies into your rich-boy tree house would really be terrible. You know what else would be bad? If you get killed.” I smirked, and Cade rolled his eyes. “I’ll start asking around. I shake some trees, and we see what rotten apples fall out. Meanwhile, you make a big deal about how powerful I am, how strong. What a great guy I am. How lucky you were that we met and you took me tomuseums.”

“Have you really never been to a museum? They’re in every city.Thousandsof people go to them every day.” Cade shook his head in exasperation.

I hid my smile by pulling down the corners of my lips. “Either my shaking or your baiting is going to lure them out into the open. Then we just pull their mask off like a Scooby Doo villain. Voilà, it was the rich banker the whole time.”

“You think it will be that simple?” Cade asked. He snorted softly, and I couldn’t read his blue eyes. I couldn’t tell if he thought my plan was too simple and would inevitably fail or if he needed the reassurance that we’d be able to pull this off.

“Listen, there was one job I had to drag myself halfway across Los Santos, leaving a bloody trail that even a human could follow. The assassin didn’t even think to look for a trap, because who could survive two high-caliber bullets to the torso? Trust me, figuring out who in your house is out to get you can’t be any harder than that.” I raised my eyebrows. “Once we figure out who it is, then we’re the ones who set the trap.”

Cade looked me over, his eyes lingering on my chest. “Two high-caliber bullets?”

“I know what I’m doing,” I promised.

“You’d better. Although do try to keep the bloody trails to a minimum. I like the carpets. They’re Persian and expensive to replace.” Cade reached out, hesitating before laying his hand on my chest, as though he could feel the old injury.

“More like here,” I murmured. Hesitantly, I put my hand on top of his and moved it down lower, to the place on my stomach I’d remembered clutching, blood sluggishly pulsing between my fingers.

When someone knocked on the door, he jerked his hand away, and I was left holding my stomach again, still feeling the echo of the injury.

“Prince Bartlett, your presence is requested.” The voice on the other side of the door sounded nervous. “Urgently?”

“No. I’m busy.” Cade exhaled, closing his eyes.

“Cade,” a second voice shouted. “Get your ass out here, or I’m coming in to get you.”

ChapterTen

Cade swore, rolling his eyes up to the ceiling. “We have to go. I don’t think whoever is behind the assassination attempts will attack us right now, but if they do, you can shift into your wolf form. I can protect myself; your concern should be your own safety.”

My stomach dropped out. I couldn’t shift, and he didn’t know.

“Who’s going to pay me five hundred thousand dollars if you’re dead?” I said pointedly.

“Oh, well, in that case, go ahead and save my life first. Put yourself in the middle of a magecraft fight.” When someone pounded on the door again, Cade turned toward it, his head jerking with irritation. Waving his hand, I saw three slices of tattoo reach toward the door before Cade spoke. “Isaac! Give us a minute! We have to get dressed!”

A new voice came through, softer, but I could hear the smile in it. “Take your time. We’ll be in the formal dining room.”

The tattoos fell from the door, slithering up Cade’s fingers and freezing on his forearm. There must be a way to break the silencing spell, like a magical intercom. “We’d better go quickly before Isaac starts destroying furniture.”

Cade turned back to the closet, and I swallowed. He was also relying on me—he wastrustingme to keep him safe—and I hadn’t been truthful with him about what I could do.

“Wait.” I counted two breaths, buying myself time as Cade turned, a frown between his brows. “There’s something I have to tell you.”

When I didn’t say anything else, Cade rolled his wrist, gesturing with his fingers. “My cousin is not the most patient man. He was being serious when he said that his next step was to break down the door.”

“I can’t shift.” The words felt wrong in my mouth, no matter how true I knew they were. My mother had always said being a werewolf wasn’t about your shift. It wasn’t about the wolf you could bring out, how big it was, how strong. Being a werewolf was who you were. It was your pack name. It was the smell of the wilds burrowing itself into your brain.

But there was no arguing that a werewolf who couldn’t shift wasn’t much protection. Declan wouldn’t have kept me around if I hadn’t been able to shift when I needed to.

“I saw you fight that wolf,” Cade said. But his eyes were moving back and forth over me, as though he was just now realizing that I had fought JD while fully human. “You can’t shift?”

“Temporarily.” I kept my answer short because I had to believe it was only temporary. There was no way this could be a permanent change, someone stripping me of the part of myself that made sense, of the piece of me that was still part of my family, no matter how dead they were.

“How? What happened?” Cade crossed his arms in front of his chest, frowning down at my bare feet before dragging his eyes up over the rest of my body.