Total pages in book: 122
Estimated words: 116535 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 583(@200wpm)___ 466(@250wpm)___ 388(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 116535 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 583(@200wpm)___ 466(@250wpm)___ 388(@300wpm)
“We’ve got someone here who I think you’ll want to talk to,” said Vinnie, all business.
“Wayland?”
“No. That uncle of yours. Julius. A few of the enforcers found him hovering near your complex. They detained him.”
Taken off-guard, Camden set down his cup. “Where is he now?”
“One of the spare bedrooms in my apartment. You interested in questioning him, or shall I leave it to Tate?”
“I’ll do it.” Camden stood. “I’m on my way.” With that, he ended the call.
Aspen shot to her feet. “What? Where?”
“Vinnie has Julius.”
She frowned. “Julius?”
“He was found lingering nearby. Some enforcers nabbed him. Vinnie’s keeping him at his apartment above the antique store.”
“And you want to go question Julius,” she guessed. “All right, we’ll go together.”
Camden went rigid as everything in him, including his cat, balked at the very idea of her being anywhere near his uncle. “I need you to stay here.”
Her lips parted. “You can’t be serious.”
He stepped closer to her. “Julius hates women. I don’t know why, he just does. To him, they’re an inferior species. Completely beneath him. Trifling amusements. And he gets off on fucking with their heads. Gets off on their fear.”
“He’s not going to make me afraid of him.”
“I don’t doubt that.” His Aspen wasn’t so easily daunted. She’d find the other male pathetic. “But I’m not going to take you in that room when I know he’ll look at you and fantasize about sexually assaulting you—which he would. No way, Aspen. Not happening.”
She narrowed her eyes, studying him closely. “That’s not the only reason you don’t want me to go. There’s more to it than that.”
Dammit, the woman always saw too much. “I don’t want my fucked up past to touch you any more than it already has.”
“You mean you don’t want me to meet Julius.”
He hesitated, choosing his words carefully. “I’d rather you weren’t treated to a glimpse of the madness that runs in my family.” More to the point, he didn’t want her to see anything of Julius in Camden. Didn’t want to risk that she might suddenly question if she’d made the right choice in taking Camden as her mate.
“You know I don’t believe there’s any madness in your blood. Nor do I think that, having heard stories about Julius, you’re anything like him.”
Camden wanted it to stay that way. He curled a hand around the side of her neck. “I’m asking you to stay here. I know that’s no small thing to ask of you, but I need to know you’re far away from him.”
She stared at him for a long moment and then sighed. “Fine. But you’d better not pull this shit when Wayland gets brought back. I won’t stay here while you have your fun with him.”
“I wouldn’t ask you to.” Camden gave her a quick kiss. “Thank you, baby.” He gently squeezed her neck and then left.
He walked to the antique store, since it wasn’t far. Vinnie’s mother, Ingrid, directed Camden upstairs. The old Alpha was waiting for him there, along with Joaquin and one of the enforcers-in-training.
Vinnie gave a curt nod. “Camden.”
“Has Julius said anything?” asked Camden, returning the nod.
“He just laughed when the enforcers grabbed him,” said Vinnie. “He hasn’t spoken a word, though. Then again, we gagged him, so he’d have found talking difficult. Under normal circumstances, Tate and Alex would go in there with you. But they’re both in the process of capturing Wayland, so I’ll accompany you. Joaquin will stand guard inside.”
Camden nodded. “I need you to let me lead. You can’t interrogate Julius as you would a normal person. He isn’t normal. His responses aren’t normal. Your threats would mean nothing. He’d like that he got under your skin enough to wrench a threat out of you. Give him no emotion to work with, no matter what he says, and just let me lead.”
Vinnie pursed his lips. “All right.”
Camden followed Vinnie and the enforcer into the stark, spare room that consisted only of three chairs—one of which Julius was currently bound to. He was also smirking, just as he had been when Camden spotted him outside the parking lot.
Some would be nervous surrounded by pallas cats. Not Julius. It wasn’t that he didn’t have the sense to be afraid. He simply considered himself so much better, smarter, and superior to others that they were beneath his notice and unworthy of fear.
As Camden stepped further into the room, Julius watched him with that relentless, steady gaze. As always, his blue eyes were two bottomless oceans of nothing. It was like staring into a gaping abyss. But that smirk he wore was real. Cold. Smug.
Without a word, both Camden and Vinnie sat across from the captive while Joaquin removed the gag and then took up a position near the wall.
Julius paid no attention to the pallas cats, as if they weren’t even in the room. He was wholly focused on Camden. And still smirking.