Lupi 08 - Death Magic

mattered most—but that was his need. Not hers.
    When she paused, he asked, “You were in a county jail? In a holding cell the whole time?”
    “Doesn’t make sense, does it? Why not a federal facility? Why wasn’t I questioned at all? Thinking about it made me paranoid. I kept thinking they’d put me there for a reason, and maybe that was so someone could get to me, so I didn’t sleep. Which sounds paranoid, all right, yet I’m still not sure why they didn’t try for me. I can’t see why ‘disgraced and dead’ wouldn’t work even better for them than just disgraced.” She shrugged. “Maybe I’m overestimating them. Maybe they couldn’t get someone thrown in lockup with me that fast.”
    “You weren’t where you expected to be. Maybe you weren’t where our enemies expected you to be, either.”
    “If so,” she said slowly, “that would mean Mullins isn’t one of them. He’s the one who took me in for booking. Maybe he took me to the wrong place.”
    He turned his head so he could smell her hair. “Do you think Drummond is one of them?”
    “Could be. Or Sjorensen. She’s the one who tipped me about Ruben. Or, hell, maybe it’s both of them. Or neither. I don’t have enough to make a guess yet.” She fell silent, then tipped her head to the side to look at him. “Isen told you what happened, right?”
    His brows lifted. “Of course.” Isen thought there was a good chance her case would never go to trial—not enough evidence—but in the meantime she would almost certainly lose her job. Her badge. An administrative action didn’t require nearly the level of proof that a court did.
    “I’m okay, Rule.”
    She was tough and determined and not about to quit, and he felt her misery as clearly as if he’d turned empath. Maybe he breathed it in, some nuance of her scent he couldn’t consciously identify. She hurt, and he couldn’t fix it. “You will be.” He ducked his head lower, nuzzling her neck, breathing her in.
    “You’ve been all wolfish ever since we got in the car. Petting me. Sniffing me.”
    “Sorry.” He straightened. “I—”
    “It’s okay.” She threaded her fingers in his hair and pulled his head back to her. “You’ve been scared for me. I guess your wolf wants to check me out.”
    There was that vibration again.
    “But it’s just the wolf who’s curious. You haven’t said anything about me being healed.”
    “I knew about it, I knew . . .” Not a vibration. A trembling deep inside, as if . . . he had to hold it together. Had to stay calm. Lily needed him to stay calm. “The Rhej. Isen told me she said you’re healed. Completely healed.”
    “It was pretty freaky when it was happening. My head felt weird and I got these tingles. It was like I stood a step back from my body, like it wasn’t entirely mine and . . . I didn’t know the mantle was putting in a rush job, getting everything fixed before it left. But that’s what it did.” She paused. “What your Lady did.”
    His lips lifted in a snarl. “I’ll tell you what she did. She used you. She may have fixed you at the last minute, but she used you. I can accept you risking yourself. That’s what you do, who you are. I can’t accept her risking you that way. Using you.”
    “I put myself at risk.”
    “You didn’t know what you were agreeing to. You had no idea of the consequences. It’s my fault. I should have—”
    “Whoa.” Now she straightened, pulling away from him enough to frown at him. “Where did that come from?”
    “I wanted you to do it. I wanted you to keep Wythe’s mantle safe. You knew that, and because I thought it was safe, you did, too. She used me to get you to do what she wanted.”
    Lily cocked her head, studying him. “You are truly, deeply pissed at your Lady.”
    Yes. Yes, he was. Too angry to speak, the muscles of his jaws clenched tight on all that anger.
    “As I understand it, the deal between your people and the Lady is that she gets to use you. You give her permission for that.”
    He unlocked his jaws enough to say, “Not against you.”
    “I gave permission, too.”
    “You didn’t know what you were agreeing to.”
    “Part of me did. No, wait, listen.” She put her hands on each side of his face as if she knew how tight he was there. How much he was holding back, holding in. “The first time, when Brian was dying, I didn’t notice anything like that. If the Lady was telling me things about what I’d agreed to, I didn’t notice it. But