Page 32 of Starting a New Life

I needed to wait for a better chance.

Maybe they’d leave me alone when they realized I wasn’t talking.

Maybe I could wait for everyone to go to sleep, pick the lock, and sneak out.

And then what?

Run again?

Where?

And how?

My fucking mate was here.

A shiver ran down my spine again, icy cold spreading through my veins.

My mate. The Alpha of this pack.

There was no getting away from him.

“Nix, do you want something to drink?”

I shook my head but didn’t open my eyes, despair rolling through me in waves. Why did I have to have a shifter as a mate? Why did I have to find him now? I’d been here for months and never met him. I’d been blissfully unaware of the fact that my mate was lurking just outside of my reach.

“We need to talk about what happened,” a new voice said. The fox. “Gray should be here soon.”

Who was Gray?

Some kind of enforcer?

Was he supposed to make me talk?

Oh, shit… would they… were they about to hurt me?

I shivered again, my mind running wild with scenarios.

“Okay. But in the meantime, can someone please get him a blanket or a hot chocolate?” Levi sounded annoyed. “He’s shivering all over. And I still don’t understand why he has to be in a cell down here and not one of the spare bedrooms upstairs.”

Okay, I was definitely being held in the basement of the packhouse. I filed that information away for later.

“Rhett?”

“I’m staying.”

Levi huffed.

“Paul?”

“I’m sorry, but I feel responsible for watching over the prisoner.”

I flinched. A prisoner. There it was. Today I was a prisoner, and tomorrow I’d be…

“He’s not a prisoner,” Levi said sharply. “He’s my friend. And you are all extremely rude. When Rhett brought me here, no one put me in a cell.”

“That was different.”

Because Levi was Rhett’s mate.