The Bureau (A Cage for Men and Wolves Book 1) (9 page)

With a nod, the other man moved with the current of people toward the doors. Elliot and Clover remained where they were, along with a smaller group who intended to go further into the city.

"You're going to get us caught if you keep acting like this," Elliot muttered, his hand finally releasing her arm.

The train car was dead silent as it rocked its way toward the inner city. The discolored face of the injured girl who had disembarked still dominated Clover's head. She considered thanking Elliot for his flawless bluff, but the cruelty of the conversations made her feel like any gratitude would be a betrayal to that swollen-faced girl.

"Come on." Elliot's voice broke through her nauseating grocery list of shock collars and generally violent things. "This is our stop."

The streets were as crowded as the subway, but the cool air on her burn was a relief. Clover had to keep a close eye on Elliot's black-uniform so as not to get separated, and as the buildings rose up around them, more and more of the pedestrians were dressed just the same. Clover had never been so far into the city before. No werewolf was brave enough, or stupid enough, to wander right up to the Bureau’s door.

Gripping her still-bruised forearm, Clover hoped the dull pain would keep her mind grounded, afraid it would be carried away on the waves of terror that were breaking against her. In just her immediate line of sight, she counted at least ten Bureau agents, two of them marked with the dangerous red shoulder guard; neither of them had Rainer’s black hair.

When dealing with a normal trio of officers, the type that didn't include her personal terror, she was relatively confident, sure she could feed them a lie, or outrun them if that didn’t work. But she felt like she was in the vipers' pit already, and she hadn't even made it into the building yet. If something went wrong here, she knew her chances of escape were nonexistent.

Eventually, the imposing grey building came into view, the words "Bureau for Werewolf Control" marked in massive bronze letters across the wide entrance. It was impossible for her to guess how many floors there were, but its immense size and the way several streets merged into the round drive at the front made it feel like the literal heart of the city. As they neared the entryway, Elliot turned and caught her by the arm again, whispering quickly to her.

"Don't say anything to anyone. Don't look them in the eyes. Even if someone is talking about you, keep your mouth shut." He rattled his directions before filing into the massive rotating doors. "People will be staring."

She did as she was told, trying to keep her curious glances to a minimum. But why would anyone stare? She looked the part, didn’t she? And at least a quarter of the crowd was made up of tan uniforms.

The entrance area gave Clover a bad case of vertigo. The clear atrium hung some ten stories above her head, glass elevators and stairways winding their way up every wall. Just as she knew every turn in her freight car towers, Elliot seemed to be at home in this massive building. She followed him to a tightly packed elevator that took her up past the atrium, the clear walls looking down on the empty cylinder formed in the building’s center.

Once they had migrated into a long, unmarked hall, she began to notice the staring. This hall was not as crowded, but every person, without exception, watched them pass with more interest than she'd expected. Most of them looked surprised, though a few seemed amused. She fought the urge to ask him what their strange reactions were about, afraid that maybe her disguise wasn’t as good as she’d thought. 

Taking a quick turn into a smaller set of offices, the staring became more intense. Clover was surprised by how mild the space was. The room was simple and white, with desks on either side separated by thin cubicle walls. It was hard to say what exactly she'd imagined the inside of the Bureau to be like, but she supposed a few torture devices and spatters of blood would have made it more accurate. Ignoring the workers on either side of them, Elliot marched straight through to an office in the back.

Outside the door, they were met by a middle aged woman with a blue shoulder pad.

"Elliot? It's unlike you to stop by on your own. Can I help you with any—" Her voice cut out abruptly, and as Clover raised her eyes she realized why.

The woman stared at her like she was a bomb.

"What is that?"

"Don't worry about it, Monica. Is he in?" Elliot seemed even stiffer than he’d been when she’d had him at knife-point.

"Your father, Elliot." Monica was shaking her head. "He's going to..." She seemed unable to finish.

"I know. It'll be fine. It's better than him finding out through the gossip chain."

She covered her mouth with slender, painted fingers as she looked Clover up and down, then she sighed. "He's in," was all she said before returning to her desk and paging them into the office.

Something about the office seemed more intimidating than the rest of the building, though it may have been Elliot’s rigid posture.

"Dad." He positioned his body so it shielded Clover from his father.

"What did the doctor say?" Montgomery Sr.’s voice was deep, intimidating. It made Clover sweat.

"Some minor bruising and scrapes. Nothing serious. The bite was clean." His lying was surprisingly good.

"What do you need then?"

Elliot paused this time, the lie seeming thick on his tongue. "A new laptop. Mine was damaged when I fell."

"Damaged? What the hell kind of dog did you—"

Clover immediately recognized the pause in his sentence. He'd seen her, but this time she thought better of sneaking a peek.

"What is that?" The same question seemed harsher coming from him than it had from his secretary.

"Please don't make a big deal out of it, Dad."

"Excuse me?" The sound of his chair scraping the ground made Clover jump and grip her bruised arm again.

"I'm just trying it out," Elliot insisted.

"I'm surprised at you, Elliot." His tone made it clear that 'surprised' wasn't so much what he meant. Maybe 'disappointed' or 'disgusted' was more accurate.

"It's only temporary. I probably won't keep her." Elliot's voice was weak.

"I see." There was something about the tone of those two small words that said much more than Clover could hear. "Let me have a look then." 

"She's still jumpy."

Montgomery Sr. walked so quickly toward Clover that she stumbled over her own feet in an attempt to put distance between them. The hand that latched onto her chin a moment later was like a vice.

"She
is
still fresh, isn't she?" He pulled her head to the side to get a good look at her blistered numbers.

Clover kept her eyes shut, knowing it was the only way to hide the disgust and fury she felt as he turned her face back and forth to get a good look at her. She felt like a piece of meat. She could also hear whispering coming from the open door, and figured it was curious workers peeking in at them.

"Which school did you get her from?"

To keep her eyes averted from his, Clover trained them on a small shadowbox hanging behind his desk—a gun with three bullets lined up beneath the barrel. Silver bullets—a salute to a time when werewolves were slaughtered in the streets. Clover hadn’t been born then, but she’d heard the stories. Countries all over the world depleted their silver stores to make bullets. By the time they realized regular metals killed them when they weren’t in their wolf form, silver had become rare. Bullets like those were hard to find any more. Seeing them in person made the fire in her stomach burn that much hotter.

She turned her eyes back to the Director, wanting to see what a man who would display something so horrible looked like. His jaw was strong, broader and harsher than Elliot’s and covered in a trim, salted beard, but the resemblance was still there.

"Does it matter?" Elliot dismissed. "About my laptop, though..."

"Relax." Montgomery finally released Clover's face. "After all these years, Elliot. I can't believe you folded like this." 

"Can we
please
just carry on like normal?" Elliot asked, his face surprisingly flushed.

"Your brother is going to be very disappointed." He leaned against his desk, his thick arms folded across his chest.

"I don't give a damn what he thinks." Elliot's voice was suddenly hot with an aggression Clover hadn't heard from him before.

"Good. Then you can explain it to him right now."

Clover looked up in time see the older man's eyes move to the door behind them.

"Come see what your little brother has, Dominic." He ignored the subtle cursing Clover heard from Elliot.

"Oh god, the rumors were true?" 

The new voice that entered the room made Clover's blood run cold. The heat of anger in her puffed out like a candle in a storm. Her stomach clenched so hard she thought she might vomit, and her body began an immediate tremor.

"Is this thing seriously yours?" Dominic asked as he came in behind them, sounding amused and disgusted all at once.

It was hard for Clover to keep from crying, or screaming, or running from the room. She dared an unnecessary glance, praying that this man, who sounded so familiar, was someone,
anyone
else. From the corner of her eye she saw his red shoulder guard, though, and his neat, black hair and immediately knew that she'd been right.

It was Rainer.

- 11 -

It had crossed her mind that Rainer would be working in the same building, but for him to know Elliot personally? To be his older brother? What had she done to deserve such miserable luck? Was she not even going to get to
see
her family? She figured this was what she got for making things up as she went.

Determined to play her role to its inevitable end, she held fistfuls of her skirt to keep her shaking under control. She hoped her performance as a new, frightened slave would make them less suspicious of her increasingly erratic breathing.

"I thought we'd talked about this." Dominic Rainer's tone was stern but less hateful than she remembered.

"People change their minds." Elliot was hardly convincing.

"Sure you weren't just lonely?"

As fake as Elliot's emotions were a moment ago, the hardening of his stature seemed very genuine now. Rainer's suggestion was only barely veiled. Given that most indentured werewolves were women or girls, it wasn't surprising that many of them suffered more than physical abuse. Clover took stock of how many girls she'd seen, just that morning, with male owners strong enough to subdue them, and felt a spike of anger shoot through the cloud of fear.

"Mind your own business, Dom." His face reddened as he turned back to his father. "Dad, please, I just need a laptop."

Rainer scoffed at the slighter boy's obvious attempt to avoid the subject, turning his cold eyes toward Clover instead—the exact thing she wished he wouldn't do. She tried her best to keep turned away from his cold stare, hoping her now-clean face would be difficult to recognize if he wasn't allowed a proper look.

"Wait a second." The informal tone in Rainer's voice had evaporated, leaving the dangerous edge he'd had on the streets.

The agent's hand latched onto Clover's chin and, like his father's, his grip was immovable. She went still, her mind whiting out with terror as he forced her face in his direction.

"I know you." His voice sounded distant, like he was still combing through an internal database.

Clover locked her eyes shut, trying to block out the icy stare. She'd done everything right. She'd not met his eyes in the park, she'd let her hair obscure her face. She'd even blocked her face from cameras when she'd passed by them. Had she not done enough?

"Of course you know her." Elliot snapped, sounding annoyed in a way that couldn't be faked. "You're probably the one who picked her up."

Clover couldn't decide if she found Elliot's attitude toward her personal nightmare impressive or stupid, but he seemed to be on her side now, and she was glad for it.

"What school did you buy her from?" Rainer didn't seem convinced yet, but looked confused now as he turned Clover's face back and forth.

"It doesn't matter which school I got her from."

"This branding looks shoddy." Dominic took a closer look at her injured neck and Clover swallowed, hoping she hadn't messed up the numbers when she'd thrown the iron onto the carpet.

"Will you get your hands
off
my property?" Elliot snatched Clover away from the other man with enough force to almost tip her off her feet. The sudden explosion shocked Clover, but didn’t seem to faze his family. 

The small group of office workers at the doorway dispersed and the room fell quiet. Clover tightened her fists, reminding herself that he was playing his roll, even if the word “property” made her ill. Heat and electricity passed between the two young men and, by instinct, Clover tried to inch away from them. Just as the tension seemed to be reaching its snapping point, though, their father's voice cut between them.

"Knock it off." In one motion, Montgomery Sr. knocked the back of Elliot's head and shoved Dominic's face in the other direction, forcefully breaking their line of sight, and their battle of wills.