“You’re a potential mate for a wolf shifter. Your scent is different, at least it always was to me.” Lyle’s gaze darted to Gage. “And I’m betting it is to him, too. One scent, just one deep breath, and I could tell you were . . . ripe.”

“Bastard!” Kayla screamed. “I don’t—”

“Of course you were only sixteen when we met, so I decided to give you some growing time. I knew you’d be the perfect lure that I needed.” He gave a little shrug. “It’s so hard to find potential mates for wolves these days . . . so hard, but in that bloodbath, I found you.”

Gage barely managed to hold his wolf back. The beast was clawing him from the inside. Ripping and tearing with his fury to break loose. “What do you want?” Because the jerk had to want something. Otherwise, Gage wouldn’t have woken in the cage.

He wouldn’t have woken at all.

“I want your pack—and you’re gonna give them to me.”

“Keep wishing, asshole.” He’d never turn on his pack. Pack was sacred. Pack was life.

Lyle’s green eyes narrowed. “This city’s mine now. I’m taking over.”

It would feel so good to smash the jerk’s face. He could already imagine the bones crushing beneath his fist. “Is that why you sent that human to carve up the showgirls? Cause you were taking over?” And using Hawk to do his dirty work for him.

Some humans didn’t mind getting their hands bloody. Some liked the blood—some, like Hawk.

Lyle just smiled and his canines lengthened. “I’ve always found humans to be very accommodating.”

“I’m gonna kill you.” The snarled threat wasn’t Gage’s this time—it was Kayla’s. Now she’d broken through the shock and was going right for the rage. Good.

They’d need her rage.

“Doubtful.” Lyle didn’t look worried at all. The guy just shrugged and rocked back on his heels. “You’ve always rather lacked what I think of as the killer instinct. Some humans have it . . .”

Hawk came to mind. That bastard had refused to turn on Lyle all the way to the end. No matter how much pain Gage had given to him. I gave him plenty. Payback for the women’s pain.

“Some don’t,” Lyle finished. His gaze hardened on Kayla. “But if you don’t do exactly as I say . . . I promise, I’ll bring your brother to you in pieces.”

Kayla sucked in a sharp breath. Hell. The brother was gonna be a problem for them. Gage hadn’t counted on that attachment when he’d been doing all his grand planning.

Lyle obviously had.

When Lyle’s gaze turned back to him, Gage knew the other shifter had planned for all sorts of fucking situations. “Your pack . . .” Lyle said, almost snarling. “I know you got them to pull from the city. To hide. That’s not gonna work. They aren’t gonna stay in the shadows and then jump out and try to take medown.”

Actually, they were. That was his plan.

“So you’ll take me to them.” Lyle crossed his arms over his chest, stretching his fancy suit. “And I’ll take them out.”

So there’d be only one top dog in Sin City.

“Not happening.” Gage hadn’t built that pack from the ground up just to watch the wolves get destroyed.

Lyle pointed to Kayla. “Then she’ll be the one in pieces.” He turned away. Strolled toward the door like he didn’t have a care in the world. “You’ve got an hour. So I’d suggest you start rethinking that position of yours.” He reached for the heavy door handle, then glanced back. “Because it’s so hard to find a good mate these days.”

Then he was gone. The metal clang of the shutting door echoed through the room, and Gage swore in disgust and fury.

That son of a bitch wasn’t going to push him into a corner. Lyle wasn’t destroying the pack that Gage had built, and Lyle damn well wasn’t hurting Kayla.

Not while I’m still breathing.

Kayla glanced over at him. For a tough hunter, she sure looked vulnerable. No, broken.

Especially with the faint drops of blood on her neck.

“He was . . . he was the only person who kept me going after my parents died.” Her voice was softer, huskier, than he’d ever heard before. “Lyle found me, alone in that house with their bodies. I was holding Jonah, trying to stop the bleeding and save him—”

Gage didn’t speak when she broke off and inhaled on a deep, shuddering breath. He just waited. She needed to put these pieces together faster. Didn’t she realize yet what had happened? As soon as he’d seen Lyle—as soon as he’d caught the bastard’s scent, Gage had known the truth.

“He—he said he was a hunter.” Her shoulders hunched even as she wrapped her arms around her stomach, as if she were trying to hug herself. Or to guard herself. “Th-that he’d tracked the wolf shifter. That he was there to help us . . .”

Only Gage bet that if Kayla hadn’t been so wild with her grief at the time, she would have seen the blood on the man’s fingers. Wild with grief... and too young.

You were only sixteen when we met, so I decided to give you some growing up time.

The bastard’s words rang through his mind. “You were just a kid. You didn’t realize—”

Her savior was the monster who’d been at the door. The monster who’d destroyed her life.

Her hands fell to her sides as she lifted her chin. The gesture almost broke his heart. “He . . . killed them? My parents?” Her fingers rose to rub against her shoulder. He knew a line of scars was beneath her shirt. Right in that exact spot. He’d kissed those scars during that too short night at the hotel. “Lyle was the wolf who tried to kill me?” she asked, but he knew the words weren’t a question, not really.