Pack Ruin (The Splintered Bond #3)

6. Flower Arrangements

6

Flower Arrangements

GLEN

I heard footsteps coming down the concrete stairs into the cell, and adopted a pitiful expression, fully prepared to milk Ida’s pity once more. Maybe she’d bring me ice cream if I looked forlorn enough.

My back to the wall, I reclined on the narrow bed with my head on the stack of pillows. This was actually far more comfortable than any prison cell had a right to be. It didn’t hurt that Ida had brought me a half-dozen blankets and two pillows, as well as a small cooler to keep snacks in. She’d even brought extra sweatpants and shirts, so I had clean clothes.

“Here you go, sweet Glennie,” a voice growled. “Heard you were starving.”

The key was still in the lock when I jumped up. Brand stood there, a plate piled high with food in one hand. He met my gaze for an instant, and I tried not to react at the change in his eyes. They almost glowed in the low light of the cell, though the room had a small, barred window that let in fresh air.

I nodded and took the plate through the bars, spying Ida at the top of the stairs. She waved at me before closing the upper door there and scooting off, probably back to the kitchen. She’d told me Brand wouldn’t leave Flor’s side, which was as it should be.

“Brand, is she up? Is she okay?”

He nodded curtly. “She’s having dinner with Dad. She was hungry.” He said the word like it implicated him in a crime.

“I bet she was. She slept for most of two days.” Inside, my wolf paced, needing to be closer to her. I sat and distracted myself with the food Brand had brought. “Have we heard anything more about Luke?” Ida had whispered what she knew the last time she’d brought food down. Luke was alive, if only barely, at least according to Samuel’s sources.

“You know the Council sent all the Mountain Enforcers home weeks ago, and replaced them with McDonnell’s favorites. I heard Torran was there.”

“Better than Niall.”

We both sighed. Niall was an Enforcer about our age. He was everything an up-and-coming shifter should be: strong, a phenomenal fighter, clever, and resourceful. But he was lacking any sort of morality. The stories of what he’d done when he was “learning the ropes” under the Eastern pack’s Head Enforcer, Torran, were the stuff of nightmares. I had a feeling we hadn’t heard the worst of it; Finn had obviously been under Alpha command not to share details of his pack. But we knew enough.

At the last Conclave that had been held in Eastern, just over four years earlier, almost no females from the Mountain pack had stayed to the end. The women of Brand’s pack had been mocked openly at many of the events, where they were outnumbered by the host pack.

But the poor treatment by the Eastern partygoers hadn’t been why Samuel had forbidden any of his women to go to future Conclaves there.

It was how many had come home with haunted eyes and whispered tales of waking up in strange rooms in the Mansion, with markings and lacerations on their bodies that couldn’t be explained. Some made with silver, that would never heal.

Far too many of those women said the last male they’d spoken to, or danced with, or brushed past, had been Niall.

Torran hadn’t been implicated, but he’d been given the duty of discovering what had happened to the women. After months of searching, he’d pinned it all on a human visitor, who was conveniently too dead to question further when Samuel asked to do so.

If Torran was at Southern, acting as interim Alpha while Luke was in a coma, there was no telling what was happening to the rest of the Southern pack.And if Torran thought there was any chance he could take the Alpha position himself, Luke wouldn’t be alive long enough for any protests to be heard.

“Has anyone located Callaway?” I wondered aloud.

“No.” Brand took my empty plate back. “Supposedly, Torran has every male left alive looking for him.”

“Every male left alive ?”

Brand shrugged. “The Council liaison’s words, not mine. Apparently, there have been even more deaths since the battle. All males.” He hesitated. “Josiah told me yesterday that the bodies started piling up even before they left. That reporting it was what had the Council swooping in and putting Torran in charge. Josiah said the old Enforcers were being killed, a few each night, beginning as soon as we left Southern. Their bodies had no defensive wounds, but their hands and heads had been removed. They located the heads—the skulls—but a few other parts weren’t found.”

Fuck. My stomach churned. “Killed in human form?”

“Yes. Smothered, maybe.”

For some reason, the rapist at Northern who had choked to death came to mind. He’d died with no obvious wounds.

Brand went on. “Josiah said the entrails of the murdered Enforcers were… arranged.”

“Arranged?” I was curious, but found myself unable to care about the worthless shifters who’d participated in the Hunts, forcing Flor to hide every night of her life for four years.

“Mmhm. Pulled out and placed in shapes. Like flowers, they said.”

I shuddered. That might have been the creepiest shit I’d heard in a while.“Only males, huh? Maybe the unranked there found their way into the kitchen like they did at my pa—at Northern.” I had to remember, it wasn’t my pack anymore.

I had no pack. Fuck. I really was a rogue.

“No. They put everyone on lockdown, forced the unranked into the dorms every night. They’ve been hunting the killer, or killers. They never found a trace, not one clue. But night after night, more headless bodies showed up. More flowers.”

Our eyes met, and I knew we were both thinking the same thing. Flowers. Flor.

“Who could it—” Brand began.

“Doesn’t matter.” I cut him off, not wanting to mention the black wolf I’d seen running at the side of our car when we left Northern’s borders. Flor had shared what had happened after she was abducted, and that the mysterious Russian who called himself Grigor had been the one we’d known as Joaquin Villalobos at Southern.

He’d followed her to Northern, obviously obsessed. I understood the feeling, though if he was the real Grigor Dimitrivich, I didn’t want him anywhere near. Since he hadn’t followed us all the way here, I hadn’t been all that concerned. As long as he stayed away from Flor from now on, I wasn’t going to try and find the sneaky fucker.

I had wondered where he’d gone before, and what he’d been up to, but as far as I was concerned, he could pick off every one of the assholes who’d hunted Flor.

I shrugged at Brand. “The only reason I’d need to know who killed them is if I planned to send some flowers of my own to whoever took care of those bastards. But we need to get back to Southern.”

He nodded once. “To save Luke.”

“To save Luke, which means saving Flor.”

Brand shook his head, those odd, white eyes filled with wisdom and pain. “First, we need to convince my dad to go to war with the Council.”

“You mean, to let me out of this room. Let me live.”

“Exactly.”