Inez let Killian drive her back to the pack, but didn't let him drive her inside the pack. She didn't want Dominic to use anything against her when the two of them started hashing out their odds.
"Thank you." Unbuckling the seat belt, Inez thanked the man in gratitude. He had given her shelter and let her take a quick shower in the most luxurious bathroom that Inez had ever seen. To cap it all, he even drove her back to the territory.
He might have done it on a whim, as Lycans were not known for their kindness. They were known for doing sporadic things just for their amusement. Nonetheless, he had helped her and even asked one of his packmates to drive her truck back to the pack.
Now, it was resting under the shade of a large tree hidden in the shadows.
"There is no need." Killian winked at her. "I was going to meet with your alpha anyway. The two of us have some matters that require careful consideration and discussion."
"I hope it is not about the contract?" Inez asked hopefully. The last thing she wanted was another beating just before she left the pack. And in case Dominic realised that she had gone out of his control, he might even lock her up under the pretext that she had failed in her job.
She would rather not be locked away.
Scarlet had taken enough risks to send her away, and she didn't want things to go south. Especially not when it could cause trouble for Scarlet.
Killian shook his head. He said to her, "You don't have to worry about it. I will let your alpha know that I need to discuss the contract and designs further. As for today's meeting, it has nothing to do with the contract; it is closely related to the trouble of missing shifters."
Ah, yes. How could she forget? Over the past few months, shifters had slowly started to disappear. Especially shifters, who were known for their uniqueness and exquisiteness.
Inez heard about the disappearance of a lion shifter with part seer blood. No one knew where he went or was taken; they only knew that the man was no longer in the territory or his office.
It was as if the man had disappeared from the face of the earth. Though there were adequate signs that he was taken away by force, there was not a single shred of evidence, which led shifters to wonder if this was one of the witches' foul plays.
They were the same kind.
Children of Night, but it was as if there was some invisible law; shifters and witches had never gone along.
If someone put a witch and a shifter together, it would result in blood being drawn. However, this had nothing to do with her.
"I see," Inez sighed in relief. As long as this man stuck to his word, she didn't have to worry about being locked up.
She got out of the car, thanked the lycan again and watched him drive away. She gave him a ten-minute head start before driving her small truck to the pack's territory and driving it to the office.
As soon as she stepped out of the truck, a bunch of cold gazes locked on her. Even though they didn't physically hurt her, Inez felt a bit disappointed seeing the look in the eyes of her pack members.
It was bad enough that they were riding on whatever bandwagon that Dominic was driving; they even lapped up all the lies that Eve told them.
Inez had no idea why she was treated as a liar when she had done nothing wrong. Though the sight of those cold and contemptuous gazes as if they were hoping for her to drop dead hurt her, Inez still held her head high.
Even though shifters were tactile creatures, Inez knew that she would be fine. No matter how important social touch and trust were, she would never do a thing as foolish as bowing her head and hoping for acceptance.
Because she knew that she wouldn't get it.
Dominic and the pack had pretty much proved it to her.
"Where have you been?" Cecil walked over to Inez's cubicle when she saw her arrive. Her expression was tense as she crossed her arms and questioned, "You are two hours late, you know? Do you even know how much I had to listen to Alpha's scolding because you were late and, to make things difficult, you switched off your damn phone —"
She paused in her diatribe and looked at Inez with narrowed eyes. "What's wrong?"
"What?" Inez pulled the drawer of her table and took out the envelope that she had thrown inside years ago. She had once naively thought that this wouldn't come in handy, but surprise, surprise.
"You have that look in your eyes," Cecil pointed to Inez's face. "That same one when you are about to do something completely fucked up."
"Well, because I am about to do something like that." Inez smiled at the woman as she walked past her and headed to the office where Dominic was.
"Where are you going?"
"To meet with the Alpha, he called for me, right?" Inez turned and looked at Cecil. The woman parted her lips but then closed them. Indeed, after doing such a cruel thing, how could Dominic not see the effect that he had left on her?
That sadistic bastard must have called her to see how deep the dagger had sunk. And it did sink too deep.
So deep that it killed her heart and her wolf.
Her wolf was still a pretty big presence inside of her, but she had completely locked herself inside of Inez. The desire to protect Inez had stopped Nia from fading, but that was it. She wasn't responding to Inez, nor was she actively hissing or cursing like she used to in the past.
She was there, but she was almost dead—almost.
She didn't want to break past the surface and had lost the will to survive.
Inez was now sure that Nia would never be able to shift; the chances of it happening were close to null to begin with because Inez's being half-blood made it difficult for her wolf to take over, and after this, Nia might never surface.
She had turned into a latent from a half-shifter, and it was the fault of the man whom she had trusted more than herself.