The Bite (Book 1)

Original Edition - Chapter 25: Thorne

"So, why the hell were there rogues on my property and how the hell did the patrols not catch them? Eight rogues?!" Levi's voice boomed in Derek's room. After we ate, one by one, everyone came in to see Derek and ended up joining us, much to Elliot's annoyance.

David ranked his hands through this hair and shook his head. "I don't know Levi. I asked everyone that was on patrol. We should have been able to smell that many from the pack house, but no one smelled anything, not a trace! It was like they weren't even here."

"Really?" Levi asked sardonically. "Because this place reeked of rogues the minute we stepped out of the car."

"Levi I grilled the patrol leaders myself, they wouldn't lie to us, and they wouldn't endanger the pack that way."

"So you're saying that eight rogues and a damned human snuck onto our property and into my home and held Derek captive for three days!? Unnoticed?!" Levi was fuming. His anger made my wolf whimper a bit, but she didn't blame him. She was angry too; this shouldn't have happened at all.

"Brother," Lander said with his hands up in surrender. "We're going to look into it. I already placed calls to the alphas around us to see what they know. We'll get to the bottom of this, you're right, there is no reason this should have happened."

"Think you could tell us what happened to you?" Blake gently asked Derek.

Elliot hissed a little but Derek just swatted his chest. He sighed and sipped at his blood bag again then looked at our group. "I was making myself lunch when two guys showed up. They said they were looking for a girl and described Charlotte. I immediately knew something was wrong, but before I could do anything they attacked. I would have been fine but first, there were eight of them and second, they had silver–"

Elliot interrupted with a low rumble. I looked over at Derek curiously then at Levi. "So it's true? Silver is vampire kryptonite?"

"I forget that she was a human," David added with a small smile. He nodded to me then went to a sack laying in the corner. He pulled out something with a cloth and walked over to me. He kneeled then opened the cloth in front of me and revealed a little silver chain in it. "Touch it."

I eyed him wearyingly. I looked at Levi who nodded then back at the silver. My beast did not like it. Alarms were going off in her mind, but still, I was curious. I touched the chain with the tip of my for finger and immediately pulled it back.

It burned like a bitch. "Holy shit!" My finger burned and stung as the pain zinged through my body.

David covered it up and stood up slowly then walked over to the bag and dropped it in. He sat down and looked over at me with a half-smile. "Silver is kryptonite for all supernaturals."

"What kind did they use?" Lander asked.

Derek sighed and looked over at us with eyes that still held the pain from the past three days. "Water. They had it dissolved in water and threw it on me. Before I could do anything they pounced and poured more on me. Before I knew what was happening they had me locked in the cellar without any blood. I hadn't fed in a few days and was already running low, I was planning on feeding that evening. Usually, I can go longer than three days without it, but since I was already starting to get thirsty I was at a disadvantage."

"Did you hear anything? See anything that could be helpful?" Blake gently asked again. He was a good second beta, he learned well from Lander how to carefully use his words.

Derek shook his head. "Not really. After they tossed me down there they forgot about me. Other than hearing them walk around the house, I did see them until today. They really didn't say much. They all smelled like rouges and I was too out of it to notice anything. Charlotte's ex-kept asking questions, I guess he didn't know what they were at all."