onyx

"You've been awfully quiet today," Everest noted.

"I'm missing, Gaius," I told him and it was true. I was missing my mate but that wasn't the reason why I was so quiet.

In reality, I was trying to scheme ways to help. I knew Gray would stop me before I managed to get to the border if I tried to leave now and even if I did make it, I didn't know how exactly I'd find Gaius.

Everest gave me a sympathetic look before he opened his mouth to probably give me some wannabe-motivational speech about how I had to be patient and we'd find him eventually. I was tried of hearing the same thing over and over from everyone.

"Onyx-" Everest starts to say, but he stops and his eyes gloss over.

He's linking someone.

Everest's face switches from sympathetic, to shocked, to worried, to excited. My brows knit together in confusion as I watch him.

"Are you okay?" I raise an eyebrow.

Everest looks over at me with the biggest grin I'd seen on his face since I've met him. He quickly grips my hand before he drags me through the pack.

"Everest?" I try to catch his attention but he seems to he in his own world and his smile grows bigger making him look like a creepy Cheshire cat.

"Everest!" I yell. "Where are we going?"

Everest stops walking and turns to me. Excitement shines within his eyes and his grip on my hand tightens.

"They found him," he finally tells me.

My heart stops and my eyes widen. "What?" I whisper, trying to make sure I heard him right.

"They found Gaius," he repeats.

I blink at him before our roles reverse and I'm the one dragging him around.

"Then why are we still standing here?!"

Everest laughs at that and the two of us quickly make our way to the office. My heart's pounding in my chest and hope fills. My mate is finally coming home; Gaius is coming home.

When we get there, Everest raises his hand to knock on the door but I push it open before he can do so. Gray sits in the room with people surrounding him. Most of them are the same as last time but the difference is the man sitting beside Councilman Steele. He has blonde hair, piercing green eyes, and pale skin.

"Onyx, thank you for knocking," Gray says sarcastically. "Sit down."

I take an open seat next to Gamma Foster while Everest sits beside his brother.

"You found him?" I immediately ask Gray.

Gray looks at me for a minute before nodding. "Yes, Vernon here managed to do so," he gestures to the green-eyed man.

My brows furrow as I stare at him. "Where is he? How did you find him? Is he okay?"

Vernon gives me an amused look. "One question at a time. He seems to be at an abandoned lab, I was able to find him using your bond, and I'm not sure if he's okay."

My heart drops a bit at the last answer.

"What do you mean you were able to find him using their bond?" Everest questions

"Think of it like this," Vernon starts. "A bond is like an invisible rope. That rope is different depending on the connection between the two people. I'm able to see that rope and a werewolf's bond shows where each party is."

"How are you able to see them?"

His green eyes flash pink and he grins at Everest. "I'm an incubus."

Everest's face heats up and the councilman throws Vernon a look of disgust before moving away from him. I ignore them and turn back to Gray.

"Why didn't we try this sooner?"

"Incubi are extremely rare to come by these days. It's surprising that we even managed to come by one," he explains.

"So when are we leaving, Alpha?" Moses asks.

Gray stands up. "We will be leaving tomorrow after I talk to the other alphas and finish one more thing. Onyx, Foster, walk with me."

Gray leaves the room causing Foster and I quickly follow after him.

"Where are we going?" I ask but he ignores me.

We continue to walk until we're outside the office building and further away from the pack house. There's practically nothing around except a building. My brows furrow when Gray opens the door, a warrior nods at him as we move deeper inside.

My eyes scan the room and grow wide. There's wolves down inside cells. Most seemed to be in decent condition though. Gray walks further down the row of cells and stops at one with a man who was rocking back and forth.

"Glassman," Gray growls.

The man looks up at him, his eyes had a crazed look in them and when he saw Gray flinched before turning to me.

"I told you!" He raised a finger at Gray accusingly. "They got him! I told you they would!"

I fight back a shiver as I watch the man yell at Gray. Gray doesn't seem the least bit bothered by his yelling and neither do the other wolves; I guess they're used to it by now.

"I don't care what you said before," Gray's eyes narrowed at him. "What you're going to tell me about is how you know Dexter and the lab."

The man's yelling stops and his eyes widen before he shakes his head vigorously. "They'll kill me!"

"I'll kill you too. Take your pick."

The man stares at Gray for a minute and jumps back when Gray lets out a loud growl that has the other wolves around whining also.

"How do you know Dexter?" Foster interrogates.

The man shakes. "I-I met him through someone else."

Gray rolls his eyes. "Who?"

"A woman...a doctor, she introduced me to Dexter and the other man. They tricked me, I didn't want to help them!"

Gray ignored his last comment. "The other man? Who's the other man?"

He shakes his head. "I don't know! They never told me...but he knew a lot about the former beta! He has to know who he is!"

Both Foster and Gray's brow furrows at this before he turns away from the cell and moves in front of another one.

"You heard all that didn't you, Cyrus?" Gray raises a brow. "So who's the man."

Cyrus scoffs at this and glares up at me. "Like hell if I know and even if I did, if I wanted to tell you I would've done so by now. It's not like these cells are soundproof."

His scent was so similar to Gaius'.

"You're Gaius' dad," I accuse the man. He doesn't deny my claim only rolls his eyes.

"Really? What gave that away?"

I frown at his attitude. "Do you not care that your son is in danger?"

He barks out a laugh, his eyes meet mine and they hold more anger and disgust than I had ever seen. "Do I not care? He's in danger because of you! You brought this on him! Do you not care? If you did then you'd do the right thing and turn yourself in and take your death like a man instead of making Gaius do it for you," he shakes his head. "Gaius chose his fate and his decision was to give up his life for some...some defective piece of shit."

Foster growls at him and he seems to be saying something to him, but his words are deaf to my ears. Though I didn't want to admit it, Cyrus' words stung more than I thought they would. Gaius did get captured because of me and now he was paying the price.

"Onyx, let's go," Gray calls out.

I nod slightly and follow behind him. When we reach the door, I look back at Cyrus one more time and he glares at me. Turning around, I walk out with Foster and Gray before letting out a sigh. We walk back to Gray's office in silence and when we reach the building he stops.

"Don't let his words get to you," I look up at him and he continues. "Gaius wanted to protect you; it's only natural for a mate to want to do so. If it was Quinn, I would've done the same thing. That being said, you can't blame yourself- Gaius wouldn't want that and when he gets back, he's going to need all the support he can get. If you're busy blaming yourself then how are you going to be there for him?"

"But it is my fault," I frown.

He scoffs. "If you truly believe that, then make up for it. When he gets back be there by his side, support him like he did for you when you were stuck in rogue form. Don't just sulk around."

I nod at his words. He's right, I don't have the time to wallow in self pity.

We walk inside the office and Gray immediately moves to open his computer.

"What are you doing?" I ask Gray.

"Comparing the files we have on Glassman, Dexter, and Cyrus. There has to be some connection we're missing."

Foster and I move around to glance over his shoulder. He scrolls through file after file looking for anything that matches up. I struggle to keep up with him, but eventually he stops scrolling and reads one of the files before pulling up more.

"I found it," Gray mumbles to himself.

"Found what?"

He looks up and offers me one of his rare grins. "The connection."

He turns his computer and I look over each of the highlighted parts of text in each file. At first there seems to be no connection between the them until a name pops up.

"In the past war with the Lunar Moon Pack, Cyrus killed Alpha Alphonse Cain. The whole pack was wiped out, or so we assumed. But that doesn't seem to be the case," Gray told me. "Glassman was there that day to help tend to the wounded warriors who couldn't heal fast enough. The files say that all the wolves were killed, but when I look at the laboratory files whose name shows up?"

"Michael Cain - his son," Foster reads the screen. "But how did he manage to survive and what's his connection to Dexter?"

Gray frowns at Foster. "I don't know, Glassman probably had something to do with it. But, I'm willing to bet Michael is the one who has Gaius."

Gray closes his computer before he grabs his phone, he begins to dial a number before looking back at us.

"Get ready, we leave for the laboratory tomorrow."

My eyes widen. "We?"

He shoots me a pointed look. "If you can shift, you can come. Don't make me regret this, Onyx."

"But what about the council?" Foster looks at Gray.

Gray shakes his head. "We handle that issue when we get there. He would've tried to find a way to come anyways."

He's right, I would've.

"Thank you."

Gray raises an eyebrow. "Don't thank me yet, if you can't manage to shift, I'll lock you in the cells before we go just to make sure you can't follow after us."

I nod my head at him. "Don't worry, I'll be able to shift," I promise him.

Now the issue is figuring out how to do so.