Spiral of Need

Ally gave him a half smile before turning to Derren. “Okay, why am I here?”

“The captives are Russian,” Derren replied. “We need you to translate for us. I’d rather you weren’t here to see this—interrogations aren’t pretty. But they might be able to tell us who put out the hit on us, and we need to know.”

Eli looked at Ally curiously. “You speak Russian?”

“She speaks five languages,” Derren told him, proud. “And that’s not including English.”

Bracken’s brows flew up. “Impressive.”

“Let’s get started.” Nick went to move but stopped as Derren spoke.

“Wait, I have an idea.” Once Nick heard and approved the idea, the Alpha led all six of them inside the shed. Derren guessed that Roni was only there to keep Marcus from slitting the polar bears’ throats before Nick was done questioning them.

Ally studied the heavily built shifters, who were each secured to a chair. They appeared bored as opposed to afraid, but their unease gave her pins and needles in her fingers.

Bracken broke the silence, pointing to the one on the left. “That over there is Andrei. Next to him is Misha.”

With a predator’s grace, Nick slowly walked to stand directly in front of them. “I don’t think I need to introduce myself.” The bears just stared at him. “As you can imagine, I have a simple question for you. Why did you shoot at us?”

Neither answered; both looked confused, as if unable to understand Nick. But Ally sensed no such confusion from them at all.

“I’ll ask one more time,” rumbled Nick. “Why did you shoot at us?”

Andrei flicked a look at Misha and said in Russian, “It would seem he doesn’t know about the hit.”

Amusement briefly glinted in Misha’s eyes. He replied in Russian, “The Alpha’s not so smart after all.”

Nick growled, his voice a crack of thunder. “I know you speak English, so don’t fuck with me. Answer my question.”

“And I suppose he’ll kill us if we don’t.” Andrei oozed exasperation. “Does he think we’d be stupid enough to believe that he’ll let us live if we talk?”

Misha shrugged one shoulder very slightly. “We can handle whatever he does to us. Not like we haven’t been sliced before.”

Nick began to very slowly pace in front of them. “Did you ever hear of a form of torture called ‘The Water Cure’?”

Andrei’s exasperation increased. “How can a cure be torture? This shifter makes no sense to me.”

Misha briefly glanced at his friend. “Like I said, he’s not smart.”

His tone that of a professor, Nick elaborated. “The torturers would secure their captive’s nose and then stick a tube down their throat. Then the torturers would pour either vomit or piss down the tube. Their captive wouldn’t be able to hold their breath for long, so they’d have to ingest what was in the tube.”

Ally almost smiled as both Misha and Andrei tensed.

Nick continued. “The torturers would do it over and over, only stopping when the captive was full. Like that’s not bad enough, the torturers would then use a stick to hit the captive’s stomach until he vomited. Worse, the torturers would then do it again. And again. And again.”

Andrei’s mouth twisted. His exasperation was replaced by apprehension. His eyes momentarily slid to Misha as he said—still speaking in Russian, “I must admit, I have not heard of that.”

Nick smiled at the polar bears. “Merciless, right? But then—as I’m sure you’ve heard—so am I, especially when my pack’s safety is threatened. You shot my sister and my Beta. For that alone, you will die here today. It can happen in two ways. You can tell us what we want to know, and I’ll hand your punishment over to one of my enforcers. As you can see, he’s raring to fucking destroy you since you shot his mate. He’ll make it quick.”

Andrei and Misha cast Marcus a wary glance.

“But if you don’t answer our questions, I’ll deal with your punishment. And I will keep hurting you over and over again. Don’t doubt that for a second. And in the end, you’d eventually tell me what I want to know anyway. In my opinion, it makes sense to just get it out of the way and die quickly. But, of course, the choice is yours. To tell you the truth, I’m more eager to make you suffer than to get answers straightaway.”

Andrei looked at Misha. “Do you think he’s bluffing?”

“I think he’d do it and enjoy it.” Misha didn’t look nervous, but his unease chafed Ally’s skin.

“I suppose the question you have to ask yourselves is this,” began Nick. “Is the person who put out the hit on us worth the torture?”

Misha stiffened. “He knows about the hit.”

Andrei eyed Nick warily. “Not so stupid after all. How unfortunate.”

Nick danced his gaze from one to the other. “All we want is his name.”

“Sadly for the Alpha,” said Misha, “we plan to escape and kill them all. Do you still have the knife in your boot?”

“No, the rabid-looking one took it.” Andrei shot a glare at Marcus, who did in fact look a little rabid at that moment.

Misha didn’t seem fazed. “No matter, Andrei. We have other ways.”

After a long moment of silence, when it was clear that the bears intended to keep up the “we don’t understand English” pretense, Nick inclined his head. “All right. If that’s how you want to play it. Can’t say I’m all that disappointed.”