The guard carrying the keys shuffles toward Sebastian, limping, winded by his minor jaunt, and Sebastian couldn't be more disgusted if he tried.
"So…you're sure…you want…this one?" the man pants, resting a hand against the corner edge of the cage, bending over at the waist to catch his breath.
Sebastian groans, frustration building within him, within his wolf. The animal is pawing at the soft folds of Sebastian's psyche to take control, scratching beneath his skin to break free. Sebastian wants out. His wolf wants out. Even without a cage, he feels trapped in here, in the heat, in the stench, in the dim light, away from the sweet night air, the soothing silver moonlight, and freedom, the need to hunt, to run, unbearable.
This boy that he's found, his one true mate, lying still on the floor of his cage, may be a stronger wolf than Sebastian, stronger than any he's ever known if he can bide in these conditions for this long.
"Just get the cage out to my vehicle and charge my fucking card," Sebastian grinds through teeth preparing to transform, holding his wolf back when what it wants is to spring free, rip this man's trachea out, and carry his new mate away to his den.
"Alright, alright," the guard grumbles. "No need to get grumpy." The hefty man starts unlocking the chains that keep this cage tethered to the rest. "But just so you know, there's no returns, no exchanges. You bought him, you keep him. He runs off, or he kills you…well, that's none of our concern."
"Got it," Sebastian growls, giving the guard pause, the hairs at the nape of the man's neck, usually numb to the hostile sounds of the wolves, shooting on end. "Now give him to me!"
"Belay that." Another voice cuts through the din of whines, howls, and rattling cages. Sebastian's head snaps up, his eyes an inch away from shifting, and sees another guard, a much more fit and commanding guard, hurrying their way. He stops between the two men, smiling wickedly as he directs his attention to Sebastian, more than pleased to relay his message. "Hunter wants to see him."
If there is anywhere in this Godforsaken place Sebastian hates more than the pens, it's the offices above, where the real filth can be found. The pens might stink of illness and decay, but the offices reek of corruption. These wolf hunters operate in a carefully orchestrated grey area alongside the law. They peddle life to the rich and the perverse, and know the ins and outs of the regulations where they operate so well that they often exist with the backing of local government.
And in a profession filled with loathsome, despicable human beings, the foulest of the foul, Hunter Clarington is the absolute worst. Cruel, cold, he intimidates most people with little more than a look. Where other hunters are prone to inspections and delays, necessitating the need for "donations" to move the red tape along, there isn't anywhere Hunter goes that he doesn't usually get whatever he wants.
Sebastian, however, isn't most people. To him, Hunter is just another bottom-feeder, and he has something Sebastian wants.
"What the fuck is it, Hunter?" Sebastian roars, barging through his office door. The man himself sits behind his desk, not flinching an inch when the door rebounds off the wall with a harsh bang. "There's no way my credit check didn't come up clean."
"I'm sorry," Hunter says, his upper lip curling in an amused snarl. "There's been a mistake."
Sebastian slams a hand down on the desk, bending over low to talk into Hunter's face. He's had enough. He has to get out of here with his mate before he does some damage.
"What kind of a mistake?"
Hunter sighs, looking from Sebastian's hand planted on his desk, splintering the wood, to his simmering green eyes.
"You can't have him," Hunter says coolly, ignoring Sebastian's outburst, even though the display of strength that went with it is…interesting. "That boy was never meant to be put out in general population."
"Well, that is a shame," Sebastian says, straightening, eyes flicking with slight dismay to the new dent in Hunter's desk, "for you. Any animal out on the floor is fair game, bar none. Those are the rules. That's part of the loophole, more for your benefit than for ours. That's why filth like you can operate within the county line."
Hunter stares Sebastian down with a peculiar smile twitching his lips, wavering somewhere between mocking and condescending. Hunter points at Sebastian, his smile becoming forced, taking over his face, but coming nowhere near his eyes. They stay dark, overwhelmed by his pupils, flat and black, emotionless like a shark's.
"You are really bad at this negotiating stuff," Hunter says with a disingenuous laugh. "I mean, you want something from me, and yet here you are insulting me. How in the world do you make any money doing whatever it is you do with an attitude like that?"
"How I make my money is none of your concern," Sebastian snaps. Hunter's wanted the inside scoop on Sebastian's finances since he started coming to the pens, looking for a mate. "Nor what I do with it. And that boy in your maggot-ridden holding cell is no longer your concern, either. I chose him with the intention of purchasing him. I voiced that intention. The law states that as long as I'm cleared, he already belongs to me."
Hunter's forced smile drops from his face. He stands from his seat to confront Sebastian, quietly furious at Sebastian for assuming to usurp his authority.
"He belongs to you when I say he belongs to you," Hunter says, low and menacing, "and I don't think I want to sell him to you."
"And why not, Hunter?" Sebastian asks.
"You come here every full moon, you pick through my pens, you leave here empty handed. Now you've found what you want, and he's, by all outward appearances, not even a wolf. So why him? Why now?" Hunter's eyes stay locked on Sebastian's, waiting, and for a second, Sebastian thinks the man might know, that he might have figured him out. But there's a vexation on Hunter's face, lingering behind his eyes, at the corner of his ever-twitching lips. Hunter's desperate to know Sebastian's secrets, and Sebastian knows he's in the clear – for now.
Hunter's good at this game, but not that good.
"You know something about him," Hunter says. "Something I've been trying to uncover for weeks, and I want to know what it is."
"I know people," Sebastian says, his tone so much a threat as to be unmistakable. "I can make sure you never peddle your wares in this county again. I can keep you miles away from here. I know that people jump when you snap your fingers, but I assure you, they jump higher for me."
"Yes, I know they do," Hunter agrees with something up his sleeve, sly and cunning like a fox, "but the moment you walk out my doors, I'll have everything packed up. In an hour, I'll be gone, and you'll never see your special snowflake again."
Sebastian pinches his lips together and thinks before he speaks, weighing this threat with his own, calculating quickly who would come out on top. It doesn't matter that, by all accounts, the winning hand is his. He doesn't want to take the chance that Hunter wouldn't worry about the other wolves. They'd only focus on his, turn loose the rest as a distraction, and somehow get away.
"What do you want, Hunter?" Sebastian asks, the growl returning to his voice as his anxious wolf claws inside Sebastian's head, eager to be downstairs with his mate, to see him safe and sound.
Hunter shrugs, playing like he's caught between a rock and a hard place, opening his hands wide as if begging for compromise.
"The least you can do is say please," Hunter says. "Come on, Sebastian. Let me hear you say it."
Sebastian glares, and Hunter's secondary façade of humor slips away.
"Say please, Sebastian," Hunter demands, "or you can say good-bye to your little boy."
Sebastian swallows hard, but he's not swallowing crow. He's swallowing down his wolf's hunger for blood. Specifically Hunter's blood, the blood of the man keeping him from what's his.
"Please."
Hunter holds Sebastian's glare, reveling in it, enjoying the tension growing between them. Sebastian can see Hunter on the brink of turning him down again, prolonging this game, but with his lips parted, the word no hanging on them, he starts doing calculations of his own. A softer smile returns to his smug face, and he sits back down in his chair.
"You see? Now you're learning." Hunter raises a hand and waves, signaling one of his guards waiting outside the open door. "Keith, give this reasonable man his goods, and get him out of my pens."
Sebastian's pretty certain Hunter's waiting for some form of thank you, but if he opens his mouth to kowtow to this prick again, his wolf's going to have something to say about it. Sebastian turns, ready to follow the guard out, when Hunter calls him back.
"And Sebastian?"
"Yeah?" Sebastian grunts.
Hunter sits forward in his seat, his expression stern, hard, his smile doing nothing to mask his contempt. It turns into a grimace with every heartbeat that passes between them.
"Don't fucking come back."
Sebastian scoffs, satisfied with his victory over this vile man, even if it did cost him, and not the money. This half hour of his life that he won't get back, but time means little to him.
It's the secrets he might have unwittingly parted with in the process. His wolf has no talent for subtlety, especially on nights like this, and so close to the one thing he wants.
And Hunter is good at his trade, even if he is a sadistic asshole.
"Don't worry," Sebastian says. "I won't."
Sebastian stalks off with one guard trailing behind, but a second guard hanging around outside the door comes in with a copy of Sebastian's bill of sale for Hunter's review. He signs it without looking at it and thrusts it back at the guard.
"Why did you give in?" the guard asks, confused. He doesn't care one way or the other if they lose that freaky boy in the cage, but it would have been fun to see Hunter stick it to that douche with the snarky attitude and the disrespectful mouth.
"Because Sebastian's smart," Hunter says. "I can't move these pens until sun up. I'm bluffing and he knows it. He can bring all manner of shit storm down on this place, every authority from here to Timbuktu."
"But you have connections," the guard says, suddenly feeling a need to worry about the status of his paycheck. "If he puts you in a tough corner, you can wiggle out. You've done it before."
"Yeah, but that was small time compared to him," Hunter says with a modicum of respect for a superior predator. "If he calls down the heavy, my connections won't matter. He has pull I don't, and the money to have me injunctioned from every corner. He'll have me locked down so tight, I won't even be able to walk down the hall to take a shit."
"But he won't?" the guard asks in surprise. "If this man has the upper hand, why doesn't he just use it? He doesn't seem too fond of the pens or the hunters."
"No," Hunter says. "He's no activist, if that's what you're thinking. As long as he gets what he wants, he'll leave me be."
The guard nods. "That's good, right?"
"Yeah," Hunter agrees, "but something about him wanting that sickly kid so bad" – Hunter taps his chin with his index finger – "I don't know. It just doesn't smell straight to me." He breathes in deep, trying to capture something that the man left behind, something that will tell Hunter what his machinations are, what he's planning with that boy.
"What do you want us to do?" the guard asks. He sees a look in Hunter's eyes, one he's seen before. Hunter has machinations of his own. He may have had to turn over the boy, but he has no intention of letting this go.
"Follow him," Hunter says, eyes not leaving the doorway, as if he can see through to the insufferable man downstairs, ordering his guards around and taking his prize home. "I want to know where they go. I want to know what they do. I want to know why that boy's so special."