Mark leaned back in his leather chair and sipped his whiskey. The rich liquid warmed his spirit just as much as the blazing fireplace in front of him, the flames crackling in the late evening.
After a long run outside, searching for clues to a mystery that had eluded him for the better part of a decade, nothing settled his nerves like a solid drink and some time to think by the fire.
For most of that same decade, Mark had taken his drinks and time to think in solitude, but now he had a friend by his side.
Jake Baker swirled his glass of amber whiskey. "You still haven't ventured out to the city, huh?"
"No, too busy for that," Mark said. "These woods are dangerous. Sometimes I think my presence here is all that keeps them from devouring Marhan whole."
"I have no idea what you're talking about. Ever since you hired me, I haven't seen a single anomaly on all your fancy security cameras. Not a single hint of magic out of place, no creepy crawlers in the night, nada."
"They don't come so close to the house. They don't come south at all, actually. But in the north ..." Mark shook his head. "You would understand if you saw it, but it's better for you to stay here."
"After all these months, you're still a mystery to me, Mark."
He grinned. "I'm keen to keep it that way. Now, tell me about this new wife of yours. Ever since you married, I can tell you've been dying to talk more about her, but you've kept your mouth shut."
"You would know more about her if you came to the wedding," Jake countered.
Mark felt bad about missing his friend's wedding, but he couldn't leave his mansion and the secrets within unprotected. Even with his state-of-the-art security system, both through magical and technological means, that could all fall apart without the intervention of a reliable person.
"You're not bitter, are you?" Mark said.
"No." At last, Jake sipped his drink. "I know what you're doing here is important to you. But you've spent a decade in these woods and haven't once gone to the city? It's about time, don't you think? You would like Zoe. I want you two to meet."
"You're my only security guard, Jake. You're the only one I trust with the job."
"Sure, but it doesn't have to stay that way. I know lots of reliable guys who you could train, too, then you and I could go hit the town. Give you a chance to live a little."
Mark shook his head sadly, but he didn't speak his thoughts out loud: he lost his life a long time ago. Now the only thing that could satiate him was revenge. Maybe after he achieved that, he could consider making a new life for himself. Until then, this was how he had to live: single-focused.
"Don't you want a girl of your own?" Jake said.
The question had Mark downing the rest of his drink instead of answering. The burn of whiskey was nothing compared to the pain in his heart, the secrets he'd kept to himself ever since he built this mansion to hide them—and himself.
"I can't," Mark said.
"Oh yeah? And why not?" Jake smirked. "It's been so long since you last dated that you're scared of screwing it up, aren't you? Nah, you have nothing to worry about."
Mark sighed. "It's not that. Let's not talk about my relationship status."
"An eligible guy like you shouldn't stay alone forever. It's like you're punishing yourself, trapping yourself in a fancy prison."
A spark of rage ignited inside Mark. "And what if I am? Maybe after what I've done, I deserve to stay here alone."
Jake raised an eyebrow. "I'm sensing some progress here. Just for you, Mark, I'll take the role of therapist. Now come on, tell me what's going on with you."
Mark stood so he didn't have to look at Jake.
It'd been a long, long time since he talked about his past with anyone—actually, he'd never mentioned what happened to him out loud before.
No one but he himself knew the whole truth .
.. and why it was completely his fault that he landed out here in the woods alone, trapped in his own little hell.
Leaving his mind to run around his circles, trapping him in different torturous memories of blood and death.
He poured himself a drink. He downed it in one gulp. And then he poured another.
"Zoe is your mate, so you know what true love feels like," Mark said. "I knew love like that once, too. But a shifter only gets one mate. Once she's gone ... she's gone."
Mark remembered the day like it was yesterday. The day his pack tore itself apart.
"Mark ... I'm sorry, I didn't know."
"It was a long time ago. Maybe it shouldn't hurt as much as it still does ... but I can't help it."
"If she was your mate ... I can't imagine living without Zoe.
I don't know how you've survived ten years of that, all on your own.
" Jake's fiery eyes were filled with sympathy, but that wasn't the right emotion.
Jake shouldn't feel bad for Mark ... he should blame him, just like Mark blamed himself.
"It was my fault."
Jake placed his glass on the table beside him.
"I don't want to pry, but you've kept all this in for so long.
Maybe it's time you talked about it and found a way to move on.
You still have your whole life ahead of you.
Whatever guilt you're still holding onto . .. there's nothing you can do anymore."
"That's where you're wrong. The creatures that killed her are still out there."
"So that's what you search for every time you leave the house."
"It's a long story." Mark's feet itched to pace, but he kept himself still, only shifting to put his back to the fire and face Jake straight on. "I should start at the beginning—I should show you."
"Show me?"
Mark hadn't shown anyone what this mansion truly guarded. It wasn't his safety he was so concerned about ... but the treasure hidden in the vault below the structure.
"Come on. You'll see." He polished off the rest of his drink and led Jake through the winding halls of his mansion, through a secret door in the library.
"A long time ago," Mark said, "I was the Alpha of a pack of wolf shifters. We were incredibly tight-knit ... most of us grew up together. We were like brothers."
"Your mate, she was a part of your pack, then?" Jake asked as they walked down a winding set of stairs.
"She was my best friend's sister. I'd loved her for most of my life, but we were never in a relationship for long.
Back then, I thought it was manly to play like you didn't care.
" Mark laughed. "How wrong I was. Stupid.
I should have just married her and been done with it.
But now ... I live with that regret every day. "
"Mark, you still haven't told me what happened."
They came down the stairs and into an imposing metal hallway.
At the very end of the hall, the whole wall was the door to a large steel vault.
Magic filled the air, covering every inch of the metal, the stone behind and above the walls, covering every possible way that someone could think to break into the vault.
"A week before—" Mark swallowed, "before it happened, one of my pack members, Ryel, caught wind of a hidden treasure hoard in the nearby mountains."
Jake's eyes widened. "Like a dragon hoard?"
"We thought so ... but it was worse. Treasure goblins."
"We're thinking about the same goblins, right?" Jake said. "I thought goblins were at the lowest end of the monster threats out there."
"Regular goblins, yes. A child with a bit of magic could sneeze on a goblin and it would fall over, dead. Treasure goblins are far, far worse. They are vile little creatures. They don't have the brute force or fire of a dragon, but to the unsuspecting, they're far deadlier."
From a hidden panel on the wall, Mark opened up a screen and started disabling the protective wards on the innermost layer of the room one by one.
"The goblins told us the treasure was unprotected and convinced Ryel that it had once belonged to our pack and that we were free to re-claim it.
There were old stories in our pack of old wealth and riches so we were easily convinced.
Of course the goblins tricked us, but we did not know at the time.
Several trips to investigate left us to believe it was safe to take," Mark continued as he disabled the next round of protections.
"But we were wrong. We took the treasure back to our pack .
.. planning how the treasure would change our lives forever.
We would expand our little settlement and turn it into a shifter paradise—a safe haven for our kind.
"The treasure did change our lives, just not in the way we expected."
When all of the magical protections were down, Mark passed fingerprint and DNA scans, which allowed him to cross the room without being incinerated.
Once in front of the door—which was twice his height—a sensor blinked down at him to scan his irises.
After a second, the machine made a pleasing chime.
Finally, Mark input the combination into the safe, and the massive door hissed open under his palm.
At his urging, it swung open. Automatic lights flickered on, and a swarm of dust flew up from mountains of treasure. Gold coins, bars, jewelry. Emeralds, diamonds, piles of every valuable gemstone imaginable. Jewel-encrusted goblets and vases, artifacts from ancient cultures and more.
This door hadn't been opened in over eight years, ever since Mark finished the mansion guarding it and took out enough gold to last him the rest of his life.
Looking at it now pained him more than he could describe.
His heart clenched, and he wanted to look away, but he forced himself to take it all in.
"Wow ... so this is what you've been hiding down here?" Jake made to step into the vault, reaching for the nearest shiny thing in reach, but Mark immediately grabbed his arm and pulled him back.
"Don't touch anything," Mark warned.