Deceptions (Evie Cortez Book 1)

Chapter 16

Chapter 16

I walked down to the basement to find it wasn’t your normal household basement. It stretched out longer and wider than the house, Nick’s been doing some remodeling. There were multiple hallways and different doors where I could hear different voices. I was right, the party was going on downstairs and I was all alone with no magic. Yay.

All the extra space would give me some cover but I didn’t feel any better about this predicament. I felt like a little girl walking into the big bad wolves’ cage.

I needed to find the witch and interrupt whatever spell she was using to create the barrier. After I had some backup I’d be able to breathe a little easier.

I dashed and hid down another hall as two men walked by. I listened to see if they’d say anything useful. They talked about what they’d do with their share of the money. Money? Nick was paying for the werewolves’ help, that actually made sense because I didn’t see him trying to gain it.  The more I learned about Caleb’s brother the more I disliked the guy. He wasn’t the first vindictive type I encountered but he was the first to go this far to hurt his own family.

My father was a cold man but I doubted, or maybe the word was hoped, he wouldn’t stand by while I was being killed if he could stop it.

After the men passed I continued in my search for the witch. Another set of voices caught my attention and this time there was a female in the mix. She wasn’t happy to be talking to the werewolf. She demanded he leave the room, with a snort of a growl he did. The surge of magical power I had been feeling stopped right where the woman was held up.  Bingo.

I didn’t just find a witch, I found someone who didn’t like me very much and trust me the feeling was mutual. When the man was out of sight I made my move to get inside the room. Vampire strength was really coming in handy.

She was sitting on top of a table with her eyes closed in a focused trance. She opened them and looked dead at me. “Evie Cortez as I live and breathe. I heard the traitor was connected to this job.” Miranda spoke, and to think we had been friends once.

“I don’t see ruining a family’s life as a job.” I did start to see her as a job and when I worked a job I threw all emotions and personal thoughts out the window, solely focusing on the task. “How is he getting the Coven to let him use their witches?”

“If you didn’t cower and run away you’d know that.” Miranda always led with her emotions. She was angry as she climbed off the table and gave me a dark look. “What’s your plan now?”

“To give that girl upstairs the chance we didn’t have for a happy life. I don’t know what the hell is going on but I don’t care much for the details anymore. It was another life time but we knew each other Miranda and I know you’re better than this. Help me end this long day. Drop the spell.”

Her eyes were swelling into darkness as she used her energy for the spell and to speak with me, the spell wasn’t an easy one. “What, no please? I have orders Evie and they aren’t yours.”

I slowly nodded and seemed to be thinking of another approach, only to throw her off, when she least expected it I pushed her down to the floor and ripped off her pendant. With such a strong spell like the one for the barrier a focal object was needed. Instead of using the clichéd wand we used our pendants that carried their own boost of magic. I threw her necklace to the floor and stomped on it. Something like a sigh of air grew visible from the pendant as the spell broke. I let out a long exhale, now Caleb’s pack could get inside. I didn’t want to face multiple angry werewolves alone.

“You bitch!” Miranda gripped the back of her head. I wonder if she heard ringing from falling that hard? If she did it wasn’t enough to stop her from grabbing at my ankles to knock me off balance.

I kicked her in the stomach and stepped back out of her reach. “I have gotten into enough fights this week.” I had lost my patience some point the other night and had none to waste with Miranda. Now that I had use of my magic I placed my hand over her arm and knocked her out with a long sleeping spell. I didn’t want to have a magical fight on top of dealing with the wolves. I looked at her for a moment and saw she became everything I didn’t want, the Coven’s loyal soldier with an unhappy life.

I left the room before any suspicious guards came by. My next order of business was finding Caleb. I tried not to think of all the scenarios he could be in with his very pissed off brother running the show. I used a shadowing spell and walked along the halls hidden from any curious eyes.

I noticed one door that looked different than all the others. I pout my ear to the door and heard a few voices inside. I guessed the man that spoke with authority and gave out orders was Nick. Another voice reported that the girl, Jamie, finally calmed down and stopped screaming. She was taking my advice and I hoped she could wait just a little longer before losing her cool again.

Footsteps moved closer to the door from the inside. I ran down the hall before the door opened. I kept walking until I finally felt Caleb. When I reached the point of nowhere else to go I found him. This time I unlocked the door and slid inside. My heart was lodged in my throat with the fear of being caught.

I mentally swore when I saw Caleb, he was severely beaten and chained to the wall by his left wrist. I noticed the chain was silver and burned his skin nearly to the bone. The silver made it to he couldn’t shift or use much strength to rip the chain from the wall. Werewolves had their own amount of super strength.

I dropped the shadowing spell and kneeled in front of him. He looked at me. In the hours we had looked for Caleb he suffered some serious damage. There was a deep cut along his eyebrow, another across his cheek. His other eye was black and I thought back to Jamie, he was going to spit fire when he saw her face. Caleb had obviously been in a bad fight but thankfully his control was still in tact and he wasn’t trying to attack me. “I saw Jamie, she’s here upstairs.”

“Is she ok?” he asked softly.

“She’s furious but yeah she’s ok.”

“How did you get in here?” he laid his free hand over mine.

I took off the chain from his wrist. “Jared and the others are waiting outside and they should be in soon. Jake remembered something you had told him and used the right name to track this house down. Your brother is doing this to you? We come from some pretty fucked up families.”

Caleb cracked a small smile. “Agreed.” His eyes grew serious as he avoided looking at me. I started to think he wasn’t as in so much control after all, he was fighting not to let his wolf win. “He wants me to get angry enough to give him what he wants.”

I looked up from our hands. “What does he want?”

“For me to renounce my pack to him. No pack will take him so he’s come up with the idea to just take one and who better else than from me?” Caleb explained bitterly, staring into his eyes I knew there was no love loss between the Nikolas brothers.

“Then he doesn’t know you very well.” Caleb would die before betraying his pack. I was growing frustrated wondering where Jared was. I couldn’t fight off all the wolves alone but I was thinking about making a run for it. I helped Caleb up from the floor. “You’re heavy.”

We were barely standing upright when all hell broke loose upstairs.