Avery was so distracted walking into the prison that she bumped into four separate security guards and soldiers.

She hit each of them with a cold glare, and they all immediately apologised, which satisfied her.

They should have moved when they saw her coming, but she wasn't going to hold it against them this time.

She had changed into heels in the car, and the clip-clop of the heels on the tile floor was satisfying.

Flicking some of her hair over her shoulder, she straightens her back and pushes her shoulders back, schooling her face into a stony expression as she leaves the elevator.

Her steady walk down the corridor to the interrogation room encourages her.

This will be okay, Sonya encourages.

What if he doesn't say anything?, Avery asks, slightly panicked.

Then we're just in the same place we are now, relax; we have nothing to lose by going in here, Sonya shrugs, being a voice of reason for once.

Avery knows she's right, and she forces herself to relax.

She's terrified that she could make everything worse somehow - which doesn't make sense at all, because her words can't make York's coma any worse.

She nods to the guards outside of the interrogation room, and then she opens the door, wiping her clammy hands on her trousers.

Avery steps into the room, slowly letting some of her power ooze out.

"Hello, Elijah, how are you today?" She asks the emaciated man who smiles with the few teeth he has left.

Pack members are incredibly protective of their Alpha and the Alpha family, even if they have been punished. Their wolves will quite literally fight to the death in the protection of them, which Avery finds slightly weird - she doesn't want forced loyalty, she wants the pack members to respect her based on her actions.

Preston had been beaten four times in one week a few weeks previous for his comments and threats.

The guards couldn't pry the other prisoners off him on one occasion, and they beat him until he was nearly dead.

He had made a full recovery.

He had also tried a hunger strike after one of the other prisoners threatened to poison his food.

Her pack members, imprisoned or not, didn't take kindly to a rapist.

Avery was a bit shocked that the man in front of her had survived so long.

She had his file with her, and it just grew every day.

The warden was on the phone with her almost every night to inform her about incidents that had happened - fights, hunger strikes, and attempted suicides were just part of the list that sat in front of her.

"I'm alright today, Alpha. I tried to off myself again last night, but I wasn't allowed," he casually comments, shooting a glare in the guard's direction.

"Oh, you want to leave your children without a father?" Avery asks calmly, raising a brow as she stares across the table at him.

"I don't particularly care if I do or not. You've taken me away from them anyway," he sighs, sitting back and crossing his legs.

His white t-shirt and orange trousers hang off his frame.

He looks twenty years older than he did when he arrived, and Avery makes a mental note of that.

"You got yourself taken away from them," Avery mutters, and he pokes his chin into the air.

"What? I couldn't hear you," he sneers, his eyes beating into her as he waits for her to back down.

Unfortunately for him, she doesn't.

She slowly emits more dominance as the minutes go on, and he begins flinching as it gets too much.

"I said that you are the reason you're not with your kids, not me," Avery states, clasping her hands in front of her.

"Oh," he whispers, closing his eyes as his body begins to shake a little at the dominance filling the room.

Avery glances at the guards who are also buckling slightly, and she nods for them to leave the room.

They stagger out, holding each other up as they move quickly.

Avery slowly reclaims some of her power, and Elijah stops shaking after a minute or two of continually vibrating.

I wonder if we kept letting out power would he shake so much that he turned his brain into a smoothie, Sonya muses, and Avery smirks slightly.

We wouldn't be that lucky, she grins.

"Thank you," he gasps, clutching his chest with both of his hands.

"Cut the dramatic bullshit. I'm here for the answers. I was told you were talking," she says primly, staring into his eyes.

Elijah hesitates, looking everywhere but in her direction.

"Do I need to remind you that I have an entire case of weapons over here?" She asks, her eyes flitting down to his hands where he has stubs for fingers now.

"No, I definitely remember," he mumbles, looking around the room quickly.

"Are there cameras in here?" He asks suspiciously, and she raises her brows.

"No, do you want some?" She sighs, running a hand through her hair impatiently.

Alpha, we have all of the rogues who have loved ones in comas here, they're in the viewing room now, a guard informs her, and Avery nods.

Thank you, she simply says.

"Yes. I want this on the record because I'm going to tell you who did this. When they kill me, you'll have proof," he says determinedly, furrowing his brows while his eyes continue to dart around.

Avery raises a brow and then nods slowly, mindlinking a guard to bring a digital camera and turn the security cameras on.

The guard obliges, and the cameras on the wall swivel and hone in on the interrogation table.

"Could I get some water?" He asks, and Avery shrugs, standing up and grabbing one of the bottles from the weapons table.

She unscrews the cap and pours some water into a rubber cup, handing it to him as she sits down.

He frowns at her as she discards the lid, and she shrugs again.

"You're a suicide risk, you might choke," she mutters, staring at him again.

A guard drops in a camera and a stand, and he sets it up near the table, raising it so that the two of them are in the middle of the frame of the camera.

Avery nods in satisfaction and sends a thank you to him over the mindlink.

Elijah grumbles to himself as the guard leaves, sipping his water irritably.

"Okay, so how do we get everyone out of the comas?" Avery begins, and Elijah shakes his head.

"No, not that. I'm going to tell you everything else first," he reprimands, and Avery sighs, sitting back in her seat.

She hides her irritation well, but Sonya doesn't.

He had better hurry up, or I'll jump across this table and claw his eyes out, Sonya growls, and Avery tuts at her.

If we let him tell his silly little story, we might find out something useful, she reminds her wolf.

He's about as useful as a glass hammer, Sonya scoffs.

Avery grimaces as her wolf continues to give out, and she stares at Elijah expectantly, folding her hands into her lap.

"Go ahead," she encourages after a few minutes of wondering why he hasn't started yet.

"Vampires," he spits, and Avery raises her eyebrows.

"Yes, what about them?" She sighs, wondering if this will be the type of thing she gets out of him for the rest of the time she spends here.

"They made me work for them," he grits out, and she nods, leaning forward a little.

"Okay, how?" She asks, and he rolls his shoulders backwards.

"They threatened to tell my wife about Freya and Sam," he mutters, looking slightly distressed.

Avery raises her eyebrows.

"Why didn't you tell us this a month ago when you got here, then?" She questions, and he nibbles his lip.

"I was holding onto the hope that she wouldn't find out," he murmurs.

"And she did?" Avery guesses.

"She filed the papers for separation and asked to annul the mating," he grimaces, "so I have nothing to lose now."

"Okay, but these vampires started before Sam was born," Avery points out, gritting her teeth.

She feels like he's playing her, and she doesn't like being played with - she isn't a toy.

"Well, Sam isn't the only one," he awkwardly says, playing with her fingers.

Avery's jaw opens slightly, and she snaps it closed.

"Who's the other girl?" Avery asks, and he closes his eyes.

"Daisy Matthews, she lives in the Lancaster pack, and she has a little girl called Ariel. The little girl is eight," he explains.

Avery raises her eyebrows, trying not to grimace as she realises this means she'll have to contact Roman to inform him that they solved a case - if the girl even filed a complaint.

We'll just call him tonight and sort it out, Sonya reassures her.

Yes, of course, but it won't be that easy. Nothing is easy with Roman, Avery grumbles.

"Okay, we'll look into that. So the vampires threatened to tell your wife about Daisy and Ariel? And then about Freya and Sam?" Avery affirms, and he nods.

"How did you meet them?" She asks, and he rubs his neck.

"Yes. I met them in my office. They posed as though they were donors for a university programme I was running. Once I let them in, they threatened to slit my throat unless I sat and do what they said," he states primly.

"Okay, and was it then that you made your poison?" Avery asks, and he immediately shakes his head.

"Goddess no. That took over a year to perfect," he gasps, shaking his head in disbelief.

"It's not that easy to do. I had to test everything against some werewolf blood, my blood usually. I combined the most reactive compounds I could because they caused the worst problems with the samples we had," he continues determinedly, clenching his jaw.

All of his words have a slight lisp due to his missing teeth, and Avery slowly nods.

"So during your experiments, you didn't happen to find anything that the vampires reacted to, did you?" She asks curiously.

He pauses for a second, and her eyes widen as he hesitates.

"I did, technically," he finally says.

"What was it?" She asks eagerly, leaning forward in her seat.

She could mix it into the water and flush out any vampires on her land.

"What seemed most effective was chlorine and copper mixed together, forming copper chloride. It was very volatile even in a lab, so it would have been impossible to use outside of one," he admits mournfully, "I could have sorted my problem out entirely, and nobody would have been hurt."

Avery sits in silence, and then Elijah clears his throat.

"But you wanted the cure?" He asks anxiously, sitting forward nervously.

"Yes, or anything that could help to bring them out of the coma," she shrugs, drumming her nails against the metal table.

He stares at her hands until she stops tapping, the high-pitched and constant noise clearly irritating him as he refuses to speak until she removed her hands from the table.

"Alcohol will help," he states confidently, and Avery frowns, and then opens her mouth.

"But York was drinking before he fell into his coma - would the alcohol not have counteracted with the poison and stopped working?" She asks, and he gnaws on his lip and then sips some of his water.

He takes a minute to think about his answer, and Avery lets him.

"I can't explain how it helps. It doesn't make sense that the poison mixed with Alpha York's drink, because the alcohol should have denatured it," he admits, looking slightly distressed.

"And did the vampires know that alcohol would stop the reactions?" Avery asks curiously.

"Of course not!" Elijah exclaims, appalled.

"I could barely keep them convinced that they needed my help, never mind be sure that they wouldn't poison me. They thought it would poison them too, so they kept me in case that happened," he adds, shaking his head.

Avery nods slowly and stands up from her seat.

"You've been very helpful," she says, absorbed in her thoughts.

"Will you come back tomorrow?" He asks hesitantly, and she nods firmly.

"I will. I'm going to organise for you to see a dentist, too - I can't imagine it's easy to eat with those teeth," she notes, and he gives her a weak smile.

The month in the prison jail has humbled him far more than she expected.

He isn't combative at all anymore, and it concerns her slightly.

"Should we have them drink it or inject them with it?" She asks as she reaches the door, glancing over her shoulder.

He takes a sip of his water and places the cup onto the table gently.

"Inject them," he murmurs, and Avery nods, quickly leaving the room.

Hayden and Byron are waiting for her, their faces full of anxious tension.

"We've got something to try," she promises, and the three of them hurry to the elevator as fast as they can.

Avery closes the doors as soon as they get in, not willing to waste any time in waiting for anyone else to get in.

She mindlinks Mitchell immediately.

Tell the doctors to inject York and the other poison victims with alcohol, she orders, and she can feel Mitchell hesitate.

Will that kill them?, he asks cautiously, and Avery grits her teeth.

Start with a low percentage, she instructs, and he doesn't fight back.

Their blood is basically sludge anyway, Sonya quietly points out.

Avery can feel her wolf's nervous tension, and she sighs, pulling out her phone as soon as they reach the ground floor.

"Lancaster," is boomed at her as soon as she dials the number, and she rolls her eyes slightly as she, Hayden, and Byron all hurry to her car.

"Daisy Matthews, a rape victim from eight or nine years ago," she states, her heels echoing in the parking structure.

Byron and Hayden exchange a look and then stare at Avery in confusion as she speaks on the phone, holding it so tightly that her fingers are turning white.

"Who is this?" Roman asks in confusion, and Avery scowls.

"This is Alpha Wilcott," she snaps.

Roman makes a noise of confirmation.

"Okay, who is Daisy Matthews, and why is she my problem?" He sighs, sounding like he would rather be anywhere else.

"I would rather speak to Carolyn or Beta Ryan if this is how you plan on having this conversation," Avery grits out, swinging open her car door and connecting her phone to her car so that the conversation booms out.

The men clamber in too, buckling in while they wait for Avery to start the engine.

"No, I will be holding this conversation with you, not anybody else," Roman snarls, and Avery scowls again.

Hayden glances at her and then at the phone with an expression of disgust on his face.

"That isn't how you speak to a lady," he snaps, and everyone goes silent.

"Who's there with you?" Roman growls, and Avery grits her teeth, starting the engine.

"A consultant," she retorts plainly, giving him no room to question or probe into her words.

"Fine, tell your 'consultant' to stay out of this conversation," Roman mocks.

Someone got bitter, Sonya scoffs.

"Daisy Matthews is a woman living in your pack. She's probably about twenty-six now, based on the pattern we've established with this rapist," Avery simply responds, not giving him anything to argue with.

She can hear typing, and she presumes it's him looking through his pack database.

"Yes, I have her here, almost nine years ago," Roman frowns.

"We caught her rapist. Give her the good news for me," Avery grimaces as she pulls onto the main road.

Her sharp turn makes the men grab onto their seats, their eyes widening drastically.

"What, no conversation today?" Roman sneers and Avery inhales slowly.

"No, because I just got a rapist to admit to a crime nobody was aware of. I'm on the way to the hospital now, goodbye," she shrugs, forcing herself to seem nonchalant and carefree.

"Oh," Roman mutters, and then she hears a sharp inhale of breathe, "Why are you going to the hospital?"

Avery scowls a little at his questioning.

"None of your business," she snaps.

"You're not... pregnant, are you?" He spits, seeming disgusted at the possibility.

Her eyes widen, and her nose scrunches as her upper lip curls up.

"No. I would inform you if I were, I'm not a total prick. Goodbye, Roman," Avery hisses, slamming on the 'end call' button.

She is met by silence as Byron and Hayden look at her with slack-jawed stares.

"What?" She mutters, pulling into the hospital parking lot.

"Alpha Roman Lancaster... and you?" Byron murmurs, and Avery shoots him a slight glare.

"Why is that so unbelievable?" She grumbles, shaking her head as she gets the more common reaction from Hayden, which is just total surprise.

"He's just so... And you're just so..." Byron tries to word his thoughts but fails miserably, trailing off as they walk into the hospital as fast as they can.

"At least we were the entertainment for the journey," Avery sighs, practically sprinting to the hospital wing.

"I've seen some unlikely pairings in my day, but you and Lancaster... Didn't see that one coming," Byron murmurs.

"Yeah, it's unlikely because it isn't happening. It was a one-time thing, nothing serious," she shrugs, waiting for the elevator to arrive.

As soon as it does, she hurries into it, her nerves rising by the minute.

"I'd have thought you and Hayden were more likely to happen," Byron admits, and Avery raises an eyebrow, looking between Hayden and Byron.

Hayden's cheeks have gone a light pink colour, and Byron is still totally aghast by the revelation of Roman and Avery together.