Chapter 13
title: "Fever Truths" wordCount: 3232
Finn's name in Declan's mouth sounds like a confession and I'm through the door before I decide to move.
The recovery room reeks of sweat and silver poisoning. Declan thrashes on the cot, sheets tangled around his legs. His skin gleams with fever-sweat. The bandages on his shoulder are soaked through, dark with blood and something else. Something that smells wrong.
"Finn." His voice cracks. "I did not mean—the fire spread too fast—"
My nails dig into my palms hard enough to draw blood.
Chen appears at my elbow. He's holding a syringe filled with something amber-colored. "You should not be in here."
"What's he saying?"
"Fever dreams. The silver is in his bloodstream now." Chen moves past me, checks Declan's pulse. His frown deepens. "His heart rate is erratic."
Declan's eyes snap open. They're unfocused, pupils blown wide. He looks right through me. "Garrett said it would be quick. He promised it would be quick."
The floor tilts.
Chen grabs my arm. Steadies me. "Sloane—"
"Get out."
"You do not understand. The poisoning—"
"I said get out." My voice doesn't sound like mine. It sounds like something with teeth.
Chen hesitates. Then he sets the syringe on the side table and leaves, closing the door behind him with a soft click that sounds like a gunshot.
I cross to the cot. Declan's still muttering, words tumbling over each other. "Should have stopped him. Should have—Finn was just a kid. Just a kid and I—"
"What did you do?" The words scrape out of my throat. "What did you do to my brother?"
His head turns toward my voice. For a second his eyes focus. Really see me. "Sloane?"
"Tell me what you did."
"I tried to—" He convulses. His back arches off the cot and his teeth clench so hard I hear them grind. The mate bond flares white-hot with his pain and I stagger, catching myself on the edge of the cot.
When the seizure passes he's gasping. Shaking. "I am sorry. I am so sorry. I was there."
"Where?" But I already know. I've always known, haven't I? Since I saw that portfolio. Since I felt the mate bond snap into place and wondered why the universe would be so fucking cruel. "Where were you, Declan?"
"The fire. I tried to get him out but Garrett—" Another convulsion cuts him off. This one lasts longer. His body goes rigid and foam flecks his lips and the mate bond screams with agony that isn't just physical.
I grab the syringe Chen left. I don't know what's in it but Declan's dying and I can feel it through the bond like my own heart stopping. I jam the needle into his arm and push the plunger.
For three seconds nothing happens.
Then Declan goes limp. His breathing evens out. The fever-flush fades from his cheeks, leaving him gray and waxy.
I sink onto the floor beside the cot. My hands are shaking. The watch on my wrist—Finn's watch—has stopped at 11:47 PM like it always does. Like it did the night I lost everything.
The night Declan was there.
I should leave. Should walk out of this clinic and never look back. Should let him die from the silver poisoning because that's what he deserves for whatever he did to Finn.
But the mate bond won't let me. It's wrapped around my ribs like barbed wire, pulling tight every time I think about leaving. Reminding me that he's mine even if I don't want him to be.
I hate it. I hate him. I hate myself for staying.
The door crashes open.
Mira stumbles through the doorway and I'm on my feet with my hand on the knife I'm not carrying before I register it's her.
She's bleeding. Head wound, looks like. Blood sheets down the left side of her face, soaking into her collar. Her jacket is torn. There are claw marks on her forearm, deep enough to show muscle.
"We have to go." She's breathing hard. Favoring her left leg. "Now. Right now."
Chen appears behind her. "What happened?"
"Garrett's wolves found me." Mira wipes blood from her eye. It just smears. "I lost them in the industrial district but they're tracking Declan's phone. They'll be here within the hour."
I look at Declan. Still unconscious. Still gray. "He can't be moved."
"Then he dies here and we die with him." Mira crosses to the cot, grabs Declan's arm. "Help me get him up."
"The silver poisoning—" Chen starts.
"Will kill him slower than Garrett will." Mira meets my eyes. "Sloane. We're out of time."
The mate bond pulses. Declan's pain is a dull throb now, muted by whatever Chen gave him. But it's still there. Still mine.
I move to the other side of the cot. "Where's your car?"
"Alley behind the building." Mira gets her shoulder under Declan's arm. "Can you carry his weight?"
"Yeah, no, I'm great at carrying liars." But I mirror her position, taking Declan's other side. He's heavier than he looks. Dead weight. The thought makes my stomach turn.
We half-carry, half-drag him through the clinic. Chen follows, protesting in Mandarin. I catch maybe one word in three. Something about liability. Something about death.
The pre-dawn air hits like a slap. It's that gray hour before sunrise when the world feels held together by spit and prayer. Mira's car is a beat-up Honda with a cracked windshield. She pops the back door and we maneuver Declan inside.
His head lolls against the seat. For a second I think he's stopped breathing. Then his chest rises. Falls. Rises again.
"Get in," Mira says. She's already sliding into the driver's seat. "Sloane. Get in the car."
I should ask her how Garrett's wolves found her. Should ask why she's bleeding from a head wound but the claw marks on her arm look defensive. Should ask how she knew where to find us.
But Declan's eyes are opening.
He blinks. Slow. Confused. His gaze finds me and something in it sharpens. Focuses. "Sloane."
"Don't talk."
"I was there." His voice is barely a whisper. Rough as gravel. "I was there. I am sorry. I was there."
The world narrows to those four words. I was there. Everything else—Mira's bleeding face, Chen's protests, the approaching dawn—fades to static.
"I know," I hear myself say.
Declan's eyes close. He slumps sideways against the seat.
I meet Mira's eyes over his body. She's watching me with an expression I can't read. Something between pity and calculation.
"You knew," I say. Not a question.
"Get in the car, Sloane."
"You knew what he did."
"I know what he didn't do." Mira's hand is on the gearshift. "And I know if we don't leave right now, none of us will live long enough for you to hear the whole story."
A howl rises in the distance. East side. Maybe three miles out.
Chen swears in Mandarin. "Go. Now."
I climb into the passenger seat. Mira guns the engine before I've closed the door. The Honda fishtails out of the alley, tires screaming.
We drive in silence for twenty minutes. Mira takes side streets, doubles back twice, cuts through a parking garage. Professional evasion. The kind you learn from running.
In the back seat, Declan's breathing is shallow but steady. The mate bond tells me he's unconscious, not dying. Not yet.
"Where are we going?" My voice sounds flat. Empty.
"Somewhere Garrett won't look." Mira checks the rearview mirror for the fifth time in as many minutes. "Somewhere we can regroup."
"Not my circus."
"What?"
"I'm done. Drop me at the next corner."
Mira's laugh is sharp enough to cut. "You think you can walk away from this? From him?" She jerks her chin toward the back seat. "The mate bond doesn't work like that."
"I'll figure it out."
"Sloane." She says my name like a warning. "You don't understand what's happening here."
"Then explain it." I turn to face her. The scar through my eyebrow pulls tight. "Explain how you knew where to find us. Explain how Garrett's wolves just happened to track you to Chen's clinic. Explain how you know what Declan did or didn't do the night my family died."
Mira's jaw tightens. For a long moment she doesn't answer. Just drives, hands white-knuckled on the wheel.
Then: "Garrett has my sister."
The words land like a punch.
"What?"
"My sister. Cara." Mira's voice cracks on the name. "He's had her for three months. Keeps her in the basement of the pack house. Uses her to make sure I do what he wants."
My brain struggles to process this. "You're working for him."
"I'm keeping her alive." Mira swipes at her eyes with the back of her hand. The blood on her face has dried to a rust-colored crust. "He said if I brought him information on Declan, he'd let her go."
"So you sold us out."
"I bought her time." Mira's voice rises. "What would you do, Sloane? If it was Finn? If you could save him by giving up someone you barely knew?"
Finn's name in her mouth makes my vision white out for a second. When it clears, my hand is on the door handle. "Stop the car."
"We're on the freeway."
"I don't care. Stop the fucking car."
"Sloane—"
"You led them right to us. You told Garrett where we were and now you're—what? Driving us to him? Is that the plan?"
"No." Mira's voice breaks. "No, I swear. I'm trying to fix this. I'm trying to—"
Her phone buzzes.
It's sitting in the cup holder between us. The screen lights up with a text notification. I see it before she can grab the phone. Before she can lock the screen or turn it face-down or do anything to hide it.
The message is from a number with no name attached.
Package secured. Bringing them to you now.
Time stops.
I look at Mira. She's staring straight ahead, both hands on the wheel. Her face is carefully blank.
"Mira."
"It's not what you think."
"Then what is it?" My hand finds the knife that isn't there. Finds nothing. "What the fuck is it?"
"I had to." Her voice is barely audible over the engine. "He said he'd kill her. He said if I didn't bring you both to him by dawn, he'd kill Cara and send me the video."
The Honda swerves. Mira corrects, but her hands are shaking now. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. But she's my sister. She's all I have left."
In the back seat, Declan stirs. Groans. The mate bond flares with his returning consciousness.
I reach for the door handle again. We're doing seventy on the freeway but I don't care. I'll take my chances with the asphalt over whatever Garrett has planned.
Mira hits the child lock.
"Don't." Her voice is steady now. Cold. "Don't make this harder than it has to be."
"Let me out."
"I can't do that."
"Mira—"
"He has my sister." She's crying now, tears cutting tracks through the dried blood on her face. "You'd do the same thing. You know you would."
Maybe I would. Maybe if Finn was alive and someone had him locked in a basement, I'd burn the world down to get him back. Maybe I'd betray anyone, sacrifice anything, damn myself a thousand times over.
But Finn's dead.
And Declan—the man who was there the night Finn died, the man whose fever-dreams confessed to things I can't even let myself think about yet—is waking up in the back seat of a car that's taking us straight to the monster who killed my family.
The mate bond pulses. Declan's consciousness surfaces like a drowning man breaking water. Through the bond I feel his confusion. His pain. His sudden, sharp awareness that something is very wrong.
"Sloane?" His voice is rough. Weak. "Where—"
I twist in my seat to look at him. His eyes are open. Clearer than they were. He sees me. Sees Mira. Sees the locked doors and the freeway rushing past and the truth written all over both our faces.
"No." He tries to sit up. Falls back. "Mira, what did you do?"
"What I had to." Mira's voice is steady now. Resolved. "I'm sorry, Declan. I'm sorry, Sloane. But I'm not losing her. I'm not losing Cara."
Declan's hand finds mine through the gap between the seats. His fingers are cold. Shaking. "Listen to me. Garrett is not going to let your sister go. He is going to kill her the moment we arrive. You know this. You have to know this."
"He promised—"
"He lies." Declan's grip tightens. "That is what he does. That is all he does. Mira, please. Turn the car around. We can find another way. We can—"
"There is no other way." Mira's voice breaks. "There's never been another way."
The phone buzzes again. Another text. I can't see the screen from this angle but I watch Mira's face as she reads it. Watch the color drain from her cheeks. Watch her hands start to shake on the wheel.
"What does it say?" I ask.
She doesn't answer.
"Mira. What does it say?"
"He wants proof." Her voice is barely a whisper. "He wants me to send proof that I have you both."
Declan's hand goes slack in mine. Through the mate bond I feel his despair. His certainty that we're already dead.
But I'm not dead yet.
I look at Mira's phone. At the child lock on the door. At the freeway stretching ahead of us, leading us straight into Garrett's teeth. At Declan's reflection in the rearview mirror, gray and shaking and still bleeding through his bandages.
At Finn's watch on my wrist, stopped at 11:47 PM.
The moment everything ended.
Or the moment everything began.
I reach for Mira's phone.
She tries to grab it but I'm faster. I unlock the screen—no password, she's too panicked to think straight—and I see the full conversation. See the messages going back hours. See the instructions. The threats. The promises.
See the last message, sent thirty seconds ago: Send photo or she dies. You have five minutes.
I look up. Meet Mira's eyes in the rearview mirror.
"Take the next exit," I say.
"What?"
"Take the next exit. We're not going to Garrett." My voice is steady. Calm. The voice of someone who's already decided to burn. "We're going to get your sister."
Mira's foot eases off the gas. "Sloane—"
"You said he's keeping her in the basement of the pack house."
"Yes, but—"
"How many wolves does he have there?"
"I don't know. Ten? Fifteen?"
"And how many does he have out looking for us right now?"
Understanding dawns in Mira's eyes. "Most of them."
"So the pack house is vulnerable." I look at Declan. He's watching me with an expression I can't read. "Can you fight?"
"I can barely stand."
"That wasn't the question."
a slight curve of his lips touches his lips. "Yes. I can fight."
I turn back to Mira. "Take the exit. We're going to get Cara. And then we're going to make Garrett wish he'd never heard the name Carrigan."
Mira's hands are shaking so hard the car drifts into the next lane. She corrects. Swallows. "This is insane."
"Yeah, no, it's completely rational." I pull up the camera on her phone. "Now smile. We need to send Garrett his proof."
The photo is perfect. Me in the passenger seat, Declan slumped in the back, both of us looking appropriately defeated. Mira's thumb is visible at the edge of the frame, holding the phone. Proof of life. Proof of capture.
I hit send before I can second-guess myself.
The response comes in seconds: Good girl. Bring them to the north entrance. Come alone.
"He's going to kill us all," Mira whispers.
"Probably." I delete the photo from her phone. "But he's going to have to catch us first."
The exit ramp appears ahead. Mira signals. Takes the turn. We're heading east now, toward the Cascade Pack territory. Toward the house where Garrett keeps his prisoners. Where Mira's sister has been locked in the dark for three months.
Where my family died six years ago.
Declan's hand finds mine again. This time his grip is stronger. "This is a terrible plan."
"You have a better one?"
"No." He shifts in the back seat, trying to sit up straighter. Failing. "But I want it noted that this is a terrible plan."
"Noted." I watch the city give way to suburbs, then to the industrial wasteland at the edge of pack territory. "Mira. Tell me everything you know about the basement. Every detail. Every guard rotation. Every exit."
She starts talking. Her voice is shaky at first, then steadier. She's been planning this for months, I realize. Been mapping the pack house in her head, looking for weaknesses. Looking for a way to save her sister.
She just needed someone crazy enough to try it with her.
Or someone with nothing left to lose.
Through the mate bond, I feel Declan's pain. His weakness. His absolute certainty that we're driving toward our deaths.
But I also feel something else. Something that might be hope. Or might just be the fever talking.
"Sloane," he says quietly. "About what I said. About Finn—"
"Not now."
"I need you to know—"
"I said not now." I don't look at him. Can't look at him. "We're going to get Cara. We're going to get out. And then—" I stop. Swallow. "Then you're going to tell me everything. Every detail. Every lie. Everything you did the night my family died."
"Yes."
"And if I don't like what I hear—"
"I know."
The mate bond pulses between us. It's not forgiveness. It's not even acceptance. It's just acknowledgment. We're bound together whether we like it or not. And right now, we need each other to survive.
After that?
After that, we'll see.
Mira turns onto a gravel road. Trees close in on both sides, blocking out the rising sun. The pack house is three miles ahead. Three miles and a lifetime.
My phone buzzes. I pull it out, expecting another message from Garrett.
But it's not from Garrett.
It's from Chen.
The wolves that attacked Mira—they weren't Garrett's. Check her left pocket.
I go cold.
"Mira," I say carefully. "Let me see your phone again."
"Why?"
"Just let me see it."
She hands it over without looking away from the road. I scroll through her messages. Find the conversation with Garrett. Read it again, more carefully this time.
The timestamps are wrong.
The messages she showed me—the threats, the demands, the five-minute deadline—they were all sent in the last hour. But the conversation goes back three days. And the earlier messages tell a different story.
A story about cooperation. About partnership. About Mira feeding Garrett information in exchange for her sister's safety.
About Mira promising to deliver us both.
Not because Garrett threatened her.
Because she chose to.
I look up. Mira's watching me in the rearview mirror. Her expression is calm now. Almost peaceful.
"I'm sorry," she says. "I really am. But Cara's all I have left."
She reaches into her left pocket.
Pulls out a syringe.
And the world goes sideways as she jams it into my neck and everything goes