More Than Flesh & Bone

Chapter 25

PRISON RULES

I kicked the leg of the chair, sending it skidding sideways. Zayne groaned as he lurched, his bare skin rubbing against the rope around his arms and wrists.

"Careful," Zed murmured, giving me a look.

"It wasn't that hard," I said defensively. And it hadn't been. I was almost as surprised as he was by the movement of the chair given how little effort I'd used. Apparently, I'd gained some strength with this last resurrection. Something for me to look into more later.

Stepping forward, I gripped Zayne by the hair and tugged his head back. "Morning cupcake," I greeted with a hard smile as he blinked up at me.

His face was a mess of dried blood and dirt as was his poorly dyed, mint at best, hair. Deep purple bruises had formed beneath his eyes, and there was a distinct impression of a boot print down the center of his face. Zayne gave another groan, his eyes going wide as they darted side to side.

"Fucking bitch," he spat, his voice scratchy. "I'll make you pay for this," he said, squirming in his bindings.

"Is that any way to talk to a lady?" I asked, enjoying his discomfort more than was probably healthy.

"Enough," Zed said, stepping into his brother's line of sight. "Tell us about the werewolf."

"I'm not telling you shit," Zayne said, glaring at his brother as best he could through his swollen eyes.

"Please don't. It's going to be so much more fun for me if you don't," I said, crouching down beside Zayne's chair.

Zed and I really hadn't had much of a chance to talk through how we were going to do this, but I'd seen enough TV shows to know about "good cop, bad cop." And since Zayne is his brother, it made sense for Zed to take on the nicer role, and I had zero problems treating Zayne like the piece of shit he was. And if I were being honest, I wouldn't say no to the chance to punch him in the face a couple more times.

It was the least he deserved for what he'd done to my family.

"Fuck. You," he gritted out.

I stood up quickly, my hand jutting forward, a loud slapping noise sounding in the room as my palm slammed against his forehead and sent his head crashing into the back of the chair. "No thanks."

"Tell us about the wolf, Zayne," Zed said again, standing in front of his brother with his arms crossed. A few weeks ago, I would have described his expression as emotionless, but I was starting to learn his tells. The small twitch of a muscle in his jaw. The rapid pulse of a vein in the side of his neck. Zed was feeling all kinds of things he was trying really hard to keep buried. But what those feelings actually were was a lot harder to figure out.

"Why should I tell you shit?"

"Uh, because we have you tied to a chair and aren't afraid to smack you around some more?" I offered.

"Yeah, but it's so much more fun for me watching you try to figure it out."

"Can I punch him again?" I asked Zed conversationally like we weren't actually in the middle of some secret ops interrogation shit.

"Not yet," Zed said, his voice mild.

I let out an exasperated breath like a sullen child who didn't get their candy.

"He's clearly not going to answer our questions the nice way, and frankly, he doesn't deserve nice after all he's done. We should let Missy beat him into submission and see how well he holds out then."

At the sound of her name, my aunt's head popped around the frame of the door at the top of the stairs. "Someone say they need an interrogator?" she asked, lifting one of her sick-looking knives.

I looked at Zed pointedly, and he glared back.

"Not yet," he said.

Missy shrugged. "Suit yourselves. Just let me know. I'll be up here deciding on a pair of pliers?"

"Pliers?" Zayne asked, a hint of something entering his voice.

Missy smiled maniacally. "Oh yes. To pull your fingernails out."

His face went white as a sheet as my aunt disappeared once more.

"So…" I drawled, crossing my arms over my chest. "The threat of pain does work on you."

"No," Zayne said a little too quickly. "Do you worst," he spat. A glob of spit hit my boot and I went to kick him. He lifted his leg, barely dodging my foot, which instead hit the wooden leg of the chair.

Crack.

Well shit. I blinked a couple times as the chair sagged. The three legs groaned in protest while the fourth shattered entirely.

A hand grabbed my arm and Zed roughly dragged me to the other side of the basement.

"I know this is hard for you because he killed your brother and probably your dad, but beating the shit out of him when you're much stronger than you should be is not going to end well. You just broke that chair leg and you're all of five foot nothing."

"I'm five-foot-three, thank you," I interrupted.

Zed narrowed his eyes, and my jaw snapped shut.

"If you accidentally kill him, we won't find the werewolf. People will still die, and you won't get justice for Trace. Is that what you want?" he asked, even though he already knew my answer.

"No," I grumbled. He was right. That didn't mean I had to be happy about it.

"Okay then… no more lashing out. Especially when we don't know how strong you actually are at this point." He loosened his hold on my arm and I let out a sigh.

"Fine," I agreed begrudgingly. "Let's do this." I motioned to Zayne across the room who was glaring at me with open hatred.

Zed conceded, and we walked back over to his brother.

"Now, we're going to ask some questions…" Zed started, then paused at the sound of ringing. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. A pucker started between his brows as he squinted at the screen. "I gotta take this," he said, stepping away.

As soon as Zed was far enough away to not hear every word we said, Zayne turned his head toward me and said, "You know I'm going to get out of here. And when I do…" He let the words trail off and smiled maliciously.

"Oh really?" I said, not letting it get to me. "Because the way I see it, you're tied up. In my basement. And my aunt can't wait to play with you after everything you've done." I lifted an eyebrow. "So your intimidation tactics? They don't work."

In the corner of the room, Zed's voice had dropped considerably, but a word here and there still filtered through. Largely the mention of a werewolf. Something had happened. Of that I was sure.

"Just wait," Zayne said, pulling at my attention. He didn't like it when we ignored him. Lesser child syndrome at its best. "You'll get sloppy. Lax. When you least expect it, I'll make a break, and when I do, I'm not leaving any Wells behind."

I squatted next to him and leaned forward. "Well, that's a little hard to do since I can't die."

"I wasn't talking about you…" He looked up the stairs, his intent clear.

I grit my teeth and snapped my head forward. The motion caught him right in his already broken nose. His head banged into the back of the chair and without its fourth leg it tipped back and fell. Zayne hit the ground with a thud, and I stood quickly, glancing behind me.

Zed stood right over my shoulder, arms crossed. "We just talked about this."

"He threatened Missy," I said, motioning to the once again unconscious murderer.

Zed shook his head. "Well, he can't exactly do anything while he's knocked out. We need to go. My dad called. Mandatory meeting at Zeta Omicron Mu. Looks like our Were's been busy."

I glanced at Zayne. "Still? But Zayne is here… I thought it was taking orders from him?"

Zed shrugged. "Not like we're going to get any answers sticking around here. Grab your stuff, we only have fifteen minutes to get over there. The only reason he called me is because everyone else is already gathered."

Buzzing sounded behind us, pulling our attention back to Zayne's prone body.

Zed leaned down and pulled the vibrating phone from his brother's pocket. "It's my dad. He's probably looking for him."

"What are they going to do when he doesn't show up for the meeting?" I asked, only curious in case it meant I was going to have a team of zombies breaking down my door searching for him.

"In the short term?" Zed started, "Not much. They'll try to call him a few more times before sending someone to retrace his steps. We probably have a few days at most before we need to worry about it. Less probably with the wold on the loose."

I frowned. That wasn't much time. "What are we going to do if they come looking for him here?"

"Why would they?" Zed asked, heading for the stairs.

"I don't know, maybe someone saw us in the parking lot by the Bitter Brew?"

"You should have thought about that before you started curb-stomping him."

I glared at Zed's back. "If I go down, you're going down with me."

"I know," he said matter-of-factly as he started climbing. "Stop wasting time."

"I hardly think wanting to cover our tracks is wasting time," I muttered, rushing after him.

"I'll text my dad from Zayn'es phone tomorrow," Zed said, like that would solve the problem.

"And?"

"And, I'll give him some excuse about being out of pocket. It'll buy us time until we know what to do."

I fell silent. It was as good a plan as any… which honestly wasn't saying much.

"He crack already?" Missy asked, looking up from her torture kit as we crested the stairs.

"No, we have to save face and get down to the ZOM house. He's knocked out for the time being. Keep an eye on him, but stay away. I mean it," Zed said, staring hard at Missy as she started to protest. "You don't go down there without one of us." Zed glanced at me and corrected himself, "Without me. You don't go down there without me. Not until I know I can trust you to not be trigger happy."

Missy did not look please about the order, but she nodded anyway. "let me know when you're on your way back."

"Why, so you can run back upstairs really quick?" Zed asked, his eyes narrowing as he stared at her.

Beside him, I shook my head and grabbed my jacket and purse. I reached inside my bag to grab my keys, not remembering that Zed still had them. Feeling my phone, I pulled it out to find seventeen missed calls from Bree. Shit.

It only took one text for me to find out how mad at me she was.

You're officially cut-off. No more takis, jalapeno poppers, spicy pickles, or spicy goodness of any kind. This is a complete ban!

"Aw, hell," I grumbled, stuffing my phone in my pocket. I'd have to deal with the angry succubus later. Right now, I was about to head into the Zombie layer… or Reaper den… whatever ominous-sounding thing you prefer… and while they still thought I was one of them, I wasn't dumb enough to believe I was about to get a warm welcome.

"Let's get this over with so we can get back to our Q and A session with your brother," I said.

"Be safe," Missy called after us, waving goodbye with what looked like a machete.

"Jesus," Zed breathed, wincing. "It's going to be a miracle if he's still in one piece when we get back."

"Eh," I said with a shrug, "it'll still probably be an improvement."

"Ass," Zed said, following me out the front door.

"Nah, just honest," I said, turning to face him. "Now give me back my keys."