Chapter 220
A Week Later p>
Brian’s mother, Bianca, set the dinner table with her two daughters bustling around her.
The dining room smelled warm and good. Her two young daughters were helping her, bickering softly over who got to place the cutlery.
She smoothed down her apron, looked over at her younger daughter, and gave a warm smile.
“Ashley, sweetie, do your mother a favour and go call your father from his study. The food is going to get cold if we wait any longer p>
The girl hopped off down the hall.
“Don’t run on the stairs! Be careful!” Bianca yelled after her, shaking her head with an amused sigh as she adjusted the flower arrangement in the middle of the table.
She finished setting the table and waited for her daughter and her husband to come back. But the minutes ticked by, and there was no sign of either her daughter or her husband.
“Ashley!” she called. “What is taking so long, darling p>
Her younger daughter came padding back into the room, her little face puzzled. “Mama, I can’t find Papa. He’s not in his study p>
Bianca’s brows knit together. “What do you mean, he isn’t there p>
She rose and went to look for herself.
The study was empty. Her husband was nowhere in it. She glanced around the room, a small thread of unease beginning to coil in her chest, her heart picking up its pace.
Everything looked almost perfect. Almost. The books were neatly lined up, and the desk lamps were glowing warmly. But then, Bianca’s eyes darted down to the floor space behind her husband’s desk.
Right there on the carpet lay a vase, broken, lying in pieces on the floor.
Her heart plummeted straight through the floor. Something was wrong. Terribly, terribly wrong.
She needed to leave this house right now. She needed to grab her girls, run to the car, and drive as far away from this town as humanly possible.
The truth was that Bianca had been noticing some strange things over the past few days. Lycans had been subtly circling around her.
First it had been a Lycan girl who had bumped into her in the mall, helping her pick her phone and all.
Then, only days ago, a Lycan man had stepped up to her retail counter at work to pay for an item, his eyes studying her face far too carefully.
In this quiet little town, you almost never saw a Lycan. Werewolves, yes, plenty of those. But Lycans rarely left their packs, kept to their own territories. That was the very reason Bianca had chosen this place, all those years ago. To disappear. To be safe.
And now she didn’t feel safe at all.
She hurried out of the study, her pulse roaring in her ears, making for the living room where her daughters were waiting.
And stopped dead in the doorway.
Her two girls were being held by three Lycans in their full beast forms. One enormous clawed hand clamped over each of their small mouths, the other claw pressed directly against the soft skin of their throats.
Bianca’s knees buckled and hit the floor. Tears flooded her eyes. She pressed her hands together in desperate plea.
“Please,” she begged, her voice shaking. “Not them. I beg you, in the name of the goddess. Not my children. I’ll do whatever you want. Anything. Just don’t hurt them p>
“Anything?” a voice asked from the doorway.
Bianca’s head turned toward the sound, and her whole body lurched with horror as her worst nightmare stepped into the room.
Crane.
He smiled, slow and sinister, as he walked toward her. “Little bitch,” he said softly. “Did you really think hiding your scent all these years would make you stop being a whore p>
He looked around. “Where is that pathetic human husband of yours p>
Bianca tried to rise, but Crane seized a fistful of her hair and yanked her back down onto her knees. Across the room, her daughters’ muffled cries grew more frantic.
“When I speak, you don’t fûcking move p>
“What do you want?” Bianca choked out, her voice broken.
Crane laughed. “Everything p>
“Please.” Bianca wept openly now. “Please, don’t hurt my children. Leave my family alone. They’ve done nothing p>
“Family?” Crane’s lip curled. “You think you can run away and build yourself a sweet little family and live as though nothing ever happened p>
“I was only saving myself,” Bianca cried. “From you. You’re a monster p>
She didn’t get to finish.
Crane’s hand cracked across her face.
She yelped and crumpled to the ground. He stepped forward, fisted her hair again, and hauled her back up to her knees. Blood trickled from the corner of her split lip, mingling with the tears streaming down her cheeks.
“Where,” Crane asked, his voice low and deadly, “is that bastard son of yours p>
Bianca shook her head wildly. “Leave him alone. You already ruined his entire life!You turned him into what he is. You bloody p>
Another dirty slap. He yanked her upright once more.
“Now you listen to me,” Crane said, leaning in close. “You know exactly how I work. You’ve seen it. If you don’t produce him for me, right now, then it will be these two little bitches instead.” He pointed to her daughters.
“My men will have their fill of them while you and I sit back and watch. And when they’re done, I’ll watch them do the very same to you, just as brutally. Is that what you want, Bianca p>
Bianca sobbed, shaking her head, her whole body trembling. “Please. Please, I swear to you, I don’t know where he is. I haven’t spoken to him. I don’t know p>
“Still lying to me?” Crane’s eyes went flat. He turned to his men. “Take the girls. Start with the p>
“No!” Bianca screamed. “I’ll call him! I’ll call him, I’ll do it, please! Just don’t touch my daughters. Don’t harm my son. Please, I’ll call him right now p>
Crane held out a cell phone.
She took it with shaking, fumbling fingers and dialled Brian’s number.
It rang. And rang. And rang again. Then, at last, someone picked up.
Crane plucked the phone from Bianca’s trembling hands and lifted it to his own ear.
“Now,” he said into the receiver, his voice smooth and terrible. “Listen very carefully. If I do not see you here, in your mother’s house, in ten minutes, then p>
His smile widened, cold and cruel. “You remember what I did to that bitch, Natalie Wolfe, on that table all those years ago? What I made happen to her p>
He let it hang in the air a moment. “I will do far, far worse to this cursed mother of yours. And to her two little girls. Ten minutes, Brian p>