Read Online The One We Answer To: A Shifter MC Novel (Pureblood Predator MC Book 3) by May Ellis Daniels - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: May Ellis Daniels
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my brother used to say.
The world only makes sense when you batshit crazy.
C HAPTER F IVE
L ILY
W E FOLLOW W ES down several flights of stairs and through a series of cinderblock corridors with roofs so low I’m forced to bend nearly in half. Anik has to crouch on all fours and scamper along under the rotting wooden rafters overhead.
“Seattle’s really two cities,” Wes begins, then launches into a breathless speech about the subterranean tunnels constructed after the Great Fire of 1889 leveled nearly the entire downtown core. “You got your suits and squares and working stiffs shuffling along up there,” Wes pauses to flash me a broad, broken-toothed grin, “and down here you got another sort of citizen.”
“Junkies and thieves,” Trish scowls, swiping a giant spider web from her face.
“Yeah, those,” Wes says with a shrug. “Back in the day it was gambling and hookers and opium dens. Not much has changed in the Emerald City, if you know where to look.”
Trish casts me a glare that says, You know this is a lousy idea, right?
As if on cue Wes pauses beneath a grimy glass skylight in the roof of a corridor. The thick glass is lavender, and the purple-tinged daylight streaming in makes us all look surreal and slightly alien.
“Listen,” Wes says quietly. “We’re out from under the hospital now. That’s a sidewalk above.”
At first I hear nothing, then screaming, a burst of automatic machine gun fire and a booming explosion, then more screaming.
Wes looks at Trish, points to a rickety-looking ladder that leads to a trapdoor above and says, “Pretty police lady care to go on up? Take a snoop around since she doesn’t like it down here with the lowlifes?”
Trish fingers her Glock and tells Wes to go fuck himself.
“Yeah,” Wes smiles. “Thought not.”
We hurry forward. Newer cinderblock walls give way to crumbling red and brown brick. The air becomes stale and dank. “They fixed up some of the tunnels for tourists,” Wes says, hopping over a three-foot wide black pit. “But most haven’t been touched for nearly a century. A man who knows these tunnels…he knows something all right.”
“You used them to break into the hospital,” Trish says.
Wes laughs and shakes the pill bottle at her. “Hospital’s like a big vault full of my kind of bling.”
There’s a tremendous boom from the street above, then more gunfire.
Dust settles around us.
“Last I was up top the street gangs were warring for whatever they could steal. Aiming for the heavy artillery locked inside the cop shop and army bases. Seems like they found what they was after.”
Dizziness washes through me, forcing me to stop and lean into the wall and catch my breath.
“Lil?” Trish says?
“It’s nothing. I’m fine.”
“Boss lady don’t look fine,” Wes says.
“No, he’s right,” Connor says, offering me his arm. “You need to stop a while? Rest?”
Something roars on the street above us. An animal. Something big and mean and black-blooded that can probably scent us scurrying down here like frightened rats.
Shitballs.
I shake my head, allow Connor to slip his arm around my waist and nod at Wes to keep moving.
Wes takes off with Trish close on his heels and Connor limping me along. It’s the hunger, I think. This weakness of body and mind. I can’t keep a thought straight. I can’t…concentrate.
Everything’s jumbled. Blurry.
The tunnel walls feel too close, pressing in, the weight of the city above like the weight of responsibility crushing into me. Forcing the breath from my lungs.
The All Encompassing? Me?
The thought makes me want to scream.
Run.
Anything to escape the future they’ve written for me.
You are your own keeper.
Opiyelguabiran. The Dog God’s words. The creature who stole my unborn child from my womb. I cradle my hands under my belly and resist the urge to shriek.
I feel it in how my companions look at me. Their fear
The world only makes sense when you batshit crazy.
C HAPTER F IVE
L ILY
W E FOLLOW W ES down several flights of stairs and through a series of cinderblock corridors with roofs so low I’m forced to bend nearly in half. Anik has to crouch on all fours and scamper along under the rotting wooden rafters overhead.
“Seattle’s really two cities,” Wes begins, then launches into a breathless speech about the subterranean tunnels constructed after the Great Fire of 1889 leveled nearly the entire downtown core. “You got your suits and squares and working stiffs shuffling along up there,” Wes pauses to flash me a broad, broken-toothed grin, “and down here you got another sort of citizen.”
“Junkies and thieves,” Trish scowls, swiping a giant spider web from her face.
“Yeah, those,” Wes says with a shrug. “Back in the day it was gambling and hookers and opium dens. Not much has changed in the Emerald City, if you know where to look.”
Trish casts me a glare that says, You know this is a lousy idea, right?
As if on cue Wes pauses beneath a grimy glass skylight in the roof of a corridor. The thick glass is lavender, and the purple-tinged daylight streaming in makes us all look surreal and slightly alien.
“Listen,” Wes says quietly. “We’re out from under the hospital now. That’s a sidewalk above.”
At first I hear nothing, then screaming, a burst of automatic machine gun fire and a booming explosion, then more screaming.
Wes looks at Trish, points to a rickety-looking ladder that leads to a trapdoor above and says, “Pretty police lady care to go on up? Take a snoop around since she doesn’t like it down here with the lowlifes?”
Trish fingers her Glock and tells Wes to go fuck himself.
“Yeah,” Wes smiles. “Thought not.”
We hurry forward. Newer cinderblock walls give way to crumbling red and brown brick. The air becomes stale and dank. “They fixed up some of the tunnels for tourists,” Wes says, hopping over a three-foot wide black pit. “But most haven’t been touched for nearly a century. A man who knows these tunnels…he knows something all right.”
“You used them to break into the hospital,” Trish says.
Wes laughs and shakes the pill bottle at her. “Hospital’s like a big vault full of my kind of bling.”
There’s a tremendous boom from the street above, then more gunfire.
Dust settles around us.
“Last I was up top the street gangs were warring for whatever they could steal. Aiming for the heavy artillery locked inside the cop shop and army bases. Seems like they found what they was after.”
Dizziness washes through me, forcing me to stop and lean into the wall and catch my breath.
“Lil?” Trish says?
“It’s nothing. I’m fine.”
“Boss lady don’t look fine,” Wes says.
“No, he’s right,” Connor says, offering me his arm. “You need to stop a while? Rest?”
Something roars on the street above us. An animal. Something big and mean and black-blooded that can probably scent us scurrying down here like frightened rats.
Shitballs.
I shake my head, allow Connor to slip his arm around my waist and nod at Wes to keep moving.
Wes takes off with Trish close on his heels and Connor limping me along. It’s the hunger, I think. This weakness of body and mind. I can’t keep a thought straight. I can’t…concentrate.
Everything’s jumbled. Blurry.
The tunnel walls feel too close, pressing in, the weight of the city above like the weight of responsibility crushing into me. Forcing the breath from my lungs.
The All Encompassing? Me?
The thought makes me want to scream.
Run.
Anything to escape the future they’ve written for me.
You are your own keeper.
Opiyelguabiran. The Dog God’s words. The creature who stole my unborn child from my womb. I cradle my hands under my belly and resist the urge to shriek.
I feel it in how my companions look at me. Their fear
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