Curses and Convicts (Prisoners of Nightstone Book 3) Read online

  Curses and Convicts

  Prisoners of Nightstone Book Three

  Helen Scott

  May Dawson

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Epilogue

  A Note from May

  Also by May Dawson

  About the Author

  Also By Helen Scott

  About the Author

  Curses and Convicts

  Prisoners of Nightstone Book Three

  © 2021 Helen Scott and May Dawson

  Cover by Dark Imaginarium Art & Design

  All rights reserved.

  This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author, except for the brief use of quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction and is intended for adults only. The sexual activities represented in this book area work of fiction intended for adults. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Created with Vellum

  1

  Nasima

  The warden’s eyes were wide with fear as Bane held the gun toward him, his mustache trembling. The guard stared at the gun I held in shock, his hands raised. Men like this weren't used to having the gun turned on them. The warden definitely wasn’t handling it like the badass he’d pretended to be just moments before. He’d been so willing to kill all of us.

  “Nas,” Bane said gently. “It’s all right.”

  He’d moved by my side. My vision had narrowed with adrenaline so that I could barely see him, or the two bodies laid out on the floor. I caught a glimpse of booted feet, now outstretched on the ground, and my head whirled again. But not because I was about to pass out.

  I’d used my powers to save us both. If protecting my men took killing, then it took killing.

  I was done being weak.

  “It will be,” I said, my voice coming out as strong as I hoped. “Warden, let’s get you some of Nightstone’s signature hospitality. I’m sure we can find you a cell of your very own.”

  I knew from my conversations with Christian and Ambrose that they’d figured out how to wire cells to confine people in them long-term, subverting the prison’s control of the cells.

  “Good luck with that, little girl,” the warden said. “The second the guards figure out you’ve taken me hostage, they’ll come for you.”

  “We’ll see,” I promised him. “I think you’re forgetting that I can see the future. And it’s a lot more open-ended than you might think.”

  The Black Guard wouldn’t burn Nightstone down with the warden trapped in here with us.

  Probably.

  As soon as I thought about the future with the warden, I felt my stomach drop, as if I were about to slip into the visions again. The warden’s eyes narrowed, looking for any opportunity.

  “Bane,” I said, and he was there, taking the gun.

  “Get down,” he barked at the warden and the guard. Then Bane was the swift, dangerous man he always was, tearing the cuffs from the guards belt. I hadn’t even noticed them, but Bane had known they were there. The warden grunted in pain as Bane knelt on his back, cuffing him swiftly. Bane’s powerful back and shoulders rippled with muscle as he worked.

  When he stood once more he was holding some kind of control in his hand that he’d pulled off the warden’s belt. He straightened and raised what looked like a radio. “The controls over the cells.”

  I nodded, but I could barely hear him, then sound faded out completely. I could see his lips moving but couldn’t hear what he said after that about the controls.

  I hated to lose sight of him as the visions washed over me. Futures swirled around me and I knelt so I wouldn’t fall.

  But it was still hard to make sense of what I saw. In some futures, we interrogated the warden in his cell. He started to tell us about the people involved in Nightstone’s Karma manufacturing.

  Then I was pulled away into another future. Bane and I found ourselves on a deadly race through Nightstone, although I wasn’t sure why we were running. Then I flashed to another image of a body scorched into oblivion, and my stomach heaved.

  The world shifted again, and I saw all of us walking outside into the sunshine, away from Nightstone. My heart rose in my chest. I could almost feel the fresh air caressing my face, the sunlight on my hair, my men surrounding me. I counted them to make sure they were all there: Bane, shirtless and swaggering with his hawk and shark tattoos across his chest. Christian, holding my hand, the sun shining on his pale face as he smiled. Ambrose, tall and dangerous, breaking into an unexpected grin that lit his face.

  And then that future was gone, and I was back in the yard, listening to a distant alarm blaring. I was on my knees as Bane yanked the bound warden up to his feet.

  At least I’d seen a future where we survived. I had no idea yet how to shape events to reach that happy ending where we all walked out of Nightstone.

  At least now, I seemed to have some control over the visions instead of seeing endless violence and cruelty I couldn’t stop. I was seeing something useful, something that showed me how we might possibly be able to save ourselves from Nightstone.

  I rubbed my hand across my face, wracking my brain to figure out the future, and found Bane in front of me, regarding me skeptically.

  “You look awfully happy for a sweet girl who just took a pair of hostages,” Bane said.

  “Not a sweet girl anymore,” I promised.

  “Bullshit,” he answered swiftly. He tilted my chin up toward him, and his lips descended on mine. I kissed him back, clinging to his shoulders carefully, avoiding his wounded arm.

  I’d been so afraid I’d lose him.

  “Thanks for the save,” he whispered when our lips broke apart. “I’d be dead without you, Nas. You’re amazing.”

  Before I could answer, the door flew open at the end of the yard.

  Ambrose and Christian raced in, followed by their people. They’d come prepared for war, many of them already wolves or racing with fangs extended, hissing and ready for war.

  Once upon a time, they would have scared me. Now the sight of all those dangerous teeth and fur made me feel all warm and fuzzy.

  Ambrose came to a stop, his brows rising. “I didn’t think you had it in you, Bane.”

  “It’s all Nasima,” Bane admitted, surprising me.

  Christian whistled, then paced forward, his gaze fixed on the warden. “Well, this is going to make things very interesting.”

  “You were bored before you met me,” I reminded him.

  “Oh, I’m delighted by every adventure with you.” Christian caught my hand in his, his gaze fixed on me as if he couldn’t get enough of my face. Without looking away he handed me a pair of pants that I quickly pulled on.

  Ambrose, on the other hand, seemed to need to touch me after being separated. He came behind me, drawing me against his body, and I felt his hard muscle all along my back.

  Bane snapped his fingers at us. “Less flirting, more figuring out what the hell we do with these two now.”

  “Just because you’re terrible at flirting with Nas, don’t try to take the pleasure from the rest of us,” Christian said.

  “I think I do okay,” Bane disagreed.

  Christian laughed, a small, derisive sound. “You’re lucky she hasn’t castrated you yet, after what you did to her.”

  “Enough,” Ambrose broke in. “I swear, Christian, it’s you and Bane who are flirting.”

  He turned me into his arms and looked at me searchingly. “Are you all right, Nasima? You did this? How?”

  “I took down an alpha wolf earlier,” I reminded him, touching his face. It was good to see him on his feet again, healed from the poison that his wayward wolves had used to try to take him down.

  “You are incredible. Always.” He cupped my hand on his face with his own. “Too incredible. I don’t want you risking your life for mine, Nas.”

  His voice dropped to a rasp, even though the others could hear him, as if he could barely speak such emotional words out loud. “I would die without you. My mate.”

  “You are my mate too,” I answered, bobbing up onto my toes to press a quick kiss to his lips. “I can see… enough to begin to control things.”

  “I’ve heard rumors of how amazing a seer can be.” He stroked my hair back from my forehead with one big hand, his tou
ch affectionate. Ambrose was all hard edges, but his gaze on mine was adoring. “When she lets herself be.”

  It seemed surreal now that I’d tried to escape my visions. “I’m done being weak.”

  “Oh, you never were weak,” Ambrose promised me.

  Christian glanced over the crowd of shifters and vamps watching us, and cleared his throat meaningfully. Ambrose pulled away from me slightly, although his hand lingered on my lower back as if he’d never let me go.

  “Take the warden and this guard to a cell,” Christian said crisply. “Show them Nightstone’s hospitality, but be gentle. These two can be useful to us.”

  “Our cell or theirs?” Tali demanded.

  Lake, her vampire lover, looked at her skeptically. Tension seemed to hang in the air between the two factions, even the two of them.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Ambrose answered Tali, his voice loud enough to carry. “If we don’t all work together—shifters, vamps, witches—the Black Guard will bury us all.”

  “There are no more factions,” Christian added. “For now, there are only Supes and our enemies.”

  The warden had been pissed there was peace in Nightstone. It made me feel a glimmer of pride. My men and I had created that peace.

  Two shifters and two vamps took the warden and the guard away. I watched them go as Christian called Doc over and had her heal Bane fully, so we could get the splint off his arm.

  Bane fell in beside me, glancing down at me with what seemed like almost a shy expression in his eyes, just for a second, before his kissable lips quirked into a bit of a smirk. Ambrose took my hand in his, and for a moment, surrounded by my three men, I felt like I could catch my breath. We’d survived our confrontation with the warden, and Ambrose and Christian and their supes had taken down the Black Guard that had swarmed in once they were released from their cells.

  “We’ll need to interrogate the warden,” Ambrose said. “Make sure we know exactly what we’re dealing with.”

  “We need to get everyone out of Nightstone before the Black Guard get the chance to send another wave of guards in,” Christian said. “I’m sure we can persuade the warden to assist.”

  He flashed a dangerous smile. To get to that happy ending I’d imagined, we’d have to fight. We had a long way to go.

  My knees wobbled as a sudden ache lanced through my brain. The next second, the future swirled around me. Images shifted so fast that I couldn’t make sense of the futures I was seeing.

  The guys grabbed me, holding me up, and suddenly I was caged in by three protective, muscled bodies.

  “Talk to me, Nasima,” Christian said urgently. “Tell me what you see.”

  I gasped as the images of Bane and I racing through Nightstone suddenly started to make sense. Now I saw more of what would happen.

  “Somehow the kill switch for Nightstone is going to get activated,” I said. “The doors are all going to lock down, then the cells will be fried. The only safe place is here in the courtyard. We’ve got to get everyone out here!”

  The next second, I had the vision of police helicopters spraying bullets from the air, even though no one could fry the courtyard itself from outside.

  In the distance, I could hear Christian yelling commands, and relief rolled through me. He believed me and he’d acted instantly, and that would save lives. I knew the shifters and the vamps would obey and head to the courtyard—even if it had been off-limits to the vamps previously—but I wasn’t sure if anyone else would listen to us.

  “The warden’s got to have something else on him, something he could use to trigger the kill switch,” Bane said. “Maybe he has an implant we wouldn’t have found searching him.”

  Ambrose swore and headed for the doors to the prison. While I’d had my vision, the others must have gone ahead with the warden. He must already be in a cell—was he really willing to kill himself to kill all of us?

  “Stay close, Nasima.” Ambrose grabbed my hand.

  “I can stop it if it does happen,” Bane said, taking off suddenly for the doors to the prison.

  “Sorry, Ambrose,” I said, trying to pull my hand from his and take off after Bane. Ambrose still gripped me tightly, staring down at me quizzically.

  “I saw Bane and I together at the end,” I said. “I have to go with him. Trust me.”

  “Always,” Ambrose said, his voice harsh as if it hurt him to let me go into danger. But he released me.

  “I love you,” I whispered, then took off. I didn’t even get the chance to see him react.

  Vamps, moving so fast they were a blur, were evacuating others from Nightstone to the courtyard. They flashed around me as I reached the doors, and Bane turned and saw me, darted back toward me.

  I stumbled as a vision washed over me, and Bane grabbed my elbow, steadying me.

  “You should stay where you’re safe,” he said.

  “I’m not safe if you fail, and you need me,” I told him.

  Bane swore.

  But the two of us ran on together through Nightstone.

  2

  Bane

  As Nas and I raced through Nightstone toward the poison zone, vampires flashed past us, carrying witches and other supes at super-speed. Shifters bounded past us, streaking in wolf form toward the comparative safety of the courtyard.

  It surprised me to see the vamps risking themselves to save the witches, but Christian always had a kind streak buried under his cold and cruel demeanor. Nas brought out the best in him, just as she did with all of us.

  I glanced over at her. Her beautiful face was resolute in profile, her chest heaving with effort as she ran, and it reminded me of all the times I’d chased her down. Like the first time we met, or the moments in that bus station when she’d dropped a potion, or the time she’d knifed me a little. I’d enjoyed the chase back then.

  But I liked running with her even more than I liked running after her.

  Now we just had to survive the next hour. If we could turn this disaster into our chance to escape Nightzone, maybe we could have a second chance—both of us free this time.

  “What’s your plan?” she demanded. “I saw this race through Nightstone before, but I didn’t understand why then.”

  In the distance, I heard the sounds of cell doors slamming shut. The ground rocked beneath our feet. I grabbed her arm to steady her as she shied away. The two of us exchanged a glance.

  Hopefully everyone had already gotten the word and made their way out of the cells. We had no way of knowing if someone had activated a regular lockdown or if that was stage one of the kill switch.

  “I was always trying to find a way to beat Nightstone’s security measures,” I said. “At least my past in the Black Guard came in handy for something. I used to come in here sometimes. I thought...”

  I trailed off. I’d thought Nas would be safer here than she was on the street, once the Black Guard grew too interested in her. There was a rumor she was a seer, and they wanted people like her. They weren’t kind to those who resisted their recruiting.

  And of course, I’d wanted to protect my own reputation so I could keep moving supes to Canada. I’d assumed she’d be on the other side of Nightstone, where she could wheel and deal and win people over like she always did. I hadn’t consulted her when I decided what was best for both of us, and now that seemed so stupid. I’d wasted so much time we could’ve spent together.

  But despite my stupidity. she’d done better than I could’ve imagined, even on the cold side of Nightstone.

  “Anyway,” I said, “I’m pretty sure I can stop the kill switch if it’s activated. From the control panel in the old guard shack. And then maybe I can get us out that way too.”

  “You’re pretty sure?” She eyed me skeptically, even at a sprint. “You seemed very sure a few minutes ago.”