Page 23

Grace side-eyed him. “He’s just teasing you. It’s kind of cute.”

Cute? Alain gritted his teeth. She thought Louis was cute? Putain. Alain didn’t do cute. He was more like Pierre. Worse. Controlled and dominant. Intense, according to his mother. Sure, he could turn on the charm, but cute? Fate was a trou de cul pairing him with a woman like her.

“Come on.” Alain took Grace by the elbow. “The car is this way.”

Grace hobbled after him, with one heeled shoe and one bare foot.

Merde. He’d forgotten about that. He kneeled and unbuckled the remaining shoe, tossing it in the dumpster.

Grace sighed and wiggled her toes. “That’s better. I know they’re designer, but whoever invented those heels was a sadist. I’ve been wanting to ditch them all night.”

Sadist. She’d wrinkled her nose as she’d said it. Oui, Fate was an asshole.

On bare feet, Grace started off again. Oh, hell no. She was not walking across gravel and discarded trash all the way across the lot. Not if he had any say in it. And he did. She protested as he scooped her up, but he growled at her and she settled, throwing her arms around his neck and clinging to him. His fucking body rejoiced and his wolf crowed, victorious in his mind. Alain ignored them both. She wanted the grimoire. This was all part of her plan. Though for a moment, when she was in the toilet cubicle, he’d scented her indecision. She’d had second thoughts. Time would tell.

Keeping to the shadows to avoid making a spectacle and an obvious target, he skirted the building, avoiding the cameras, and carried her to a row of vehicles on the other side of the service center. Using his nose, he found the SUV where Pierre had said it would be, and hustled them inside before the flash of the car’s blinkers as he unlocked it caught anyone’s attention.

Hidden in the shadows, Alain watched his pack mates drive off. Though the car had tinted windows, Laurent was smart enough to avoid the brightly lit areas. Without werewolf senses, it would be impossible to tell who was in the car, only that there were three people in it. The same as when they’d arrived. Anybody watching or tracking the GPS would be none the wiser he and Grace were no longer inside.

Two men emerged from the service center loaded with snacks, hopped in a car at the pump and headed out after them. Another car edged out from a parking spot and also followed. Either of them could be the Faucherians or the DGSE or members of the King family. Two more cars pulled into the service center. Both parked at the pumps. Alain waited. With the GPS tracker in play, there was no need for a visual for their tail to follow them.

“I didn’t know the tracker was there.” Grace looked at him, those beautiful brown eyes imploring him. “I didn’t. I truly didn’t. The dress and the shoes were at the hotel when I checked in. They must’ve put the tracker in.”

He believed her. “They who, Grace?” He already knew the answer, but he wanted her to admit it.

She turned away, staring out across the lot. “I…”

A familiar face emerged from inside the service center. The guardien from his apartment building. Henri Dubois. Followed by a woman. Grace stiffened beside him. It was Irena King.

“Ain’t no way she got here that fast,” she mumbled, her accent thicker, broader, her attention fixed on Irena strutting across the lot like a woman on a mission. “Unless…”

Alain engaged the auto lock. Grace’s attention snapped to him. She wasn’t going anywhere. Because he couldn’t afford to draw the attention of Irena and Dubois or his plan to sneak into pack territory would be for nothing. Because Cordelia’s grimoire, and his own, sat less than a meter from them in the back seat.

Liar. His reasons for not wanting her to escape were far more personal.

“You know who she is.” There was a flatness to Grace’s voice.

“Oui. Irena King.”

“She’s been here all along, hasn’t she?”

“Oui. She moved into an apartment on the floor below mine a week ago.”

“A week ago?” Grace frowned. “Did she…you know…?”

“Try to get into my apartment? Seduce me in the elevator? Non.”

Her hands curled into fists in her lap. Non. She didn’t like his answer at all.

“And the man with her,” he said, “that’s Henri Dubois. He works for the DGSE. That’s France’s foreign intelligence agency.” He still couldn’t believe the twins had failed to identify him as DGSE. They were good. But Dubois had got her through their security, so he was better. He had all the resources of the DGSE at his disposal. “He has a tattoo on his neck. A fancy F. It means he belongs to a sect called the Faucherians. A highly organized but fanatical group that wants to see the end of all things supernatural. A witch hunt, if you will. He replaced the old guardien…how do you say…caretaker…in my building the day before Irena arrived.”

“Did he try to…?”

“Non.”

She turned away from him, staring out across the lot, her face pale. “You already know who I work for, don’t you?”

“Oui.”