“Hey Teag! Do you know why Derek’s hanging around outside the shop?”
“His boss volunteered him for guard duty—remember?”
I’d forgotten that Marshall had assigned Derek to us as his “punishment” for screwing up. Given the circumstances, I couldn’t imagine how effective he’d be at the job since he could hardly be faulted for resenting the duty.
Derek’s parked car sat across the street from the shop. The choice of a black pick-up truck didn’t surprise me; it seemed like the kind of macho ride I’d expect from the shifter. I saw Derek fidget and wondered how long he’d been sitting outside. If he’d been there all day, I hoped his truck had good air conditioning, since it was warm.
All of a sudden, Derek opened his door and stepped out of the truck. I frowned, wondering if he had decided to head to the shop for some reason. To my surprise, Derek strode off down the block, walking like a man with a purpose.
Before I could ask Teag’s opinion, I heard a knock at the back door. I glanced outside, surprised to see the food delivery man. Then again, parking out front was hard to find, and no one would care if he left his car running in the alley. I opened the door, reaching for my wallet.
Derek appeared out of nowhere, springing at the delivery man with supernatural speed and strength. I yelped as I dove out of the way. Derek and stranger hit the pavement hard enough to break bone. That both were giving as good as they got made me suddenly certain that the delivery guy was a shifter, too.
I’d never seen two shifters fight each other, and up close, the battle was brutal and terrifying. Teag and I couldn’t have stepped in if we wanted to, although self-preservation instincts kept us back. Sorren might have had a chance in matching their speed and strength, but the only way we could have held our own was with a gun, and there was no way to take a shot without hitting Derek.
The delivery guy twisted in Derek’s grip and threw him at the back door of the shop, blocking our exit and knocking Derek senseless for a moment. Before we could react, the attacker had vanished.
“What’s going on?” Teag closed the distance to the door in a few steps, a silver knife in his hand. Belatedly, I realized that the take-out pasta we ordered spilled across the alley.
“The food was drugged.” Derek hauled himself to his feet. Blood trickled from a cut on his eyebrow and a split lip, and I knew the angry red bruise on his left cheek would be black and blue tomorrow. “Permission to enter?”
I just stared at him. “What?”
Derek rolled his eyes. “The wardings? The ones that knocked me flat on my ass before? You have to allow me inside.”
“Permission granted,” I replied. As I watched, Derek’s injuries healed themselves, until only dried blood remained.
“Shifter metabolism,” Derek said, watching me as I stared at the prisoner. “Makes us hard to kill.”
“How did you know about the drugs?” Teag asked.
“Smelled them,” Derek replied, with a look at Teag that implied he was simple. He tapped his nose. “Enhanced senses. Roofies have a particular smell.”
“Why would someone want to roofie us?” I looked up sharply, glancing from Derek to Teag.
Derek raised an eyebrow. “I can think of at least four good suspects—the heads of the other packs. That’s assuming you haven’t pissed of anyone else recently. You and Teag would make good collateral, especially if your biter friend cares whether you live or die.”
Sorren definitely cared, which meant Teag and I had hostage potential. That wasn’t a revelation. Teag and I were both trained fighters, good with magic. We’d handled ourselves against some badass bad guys and come out on top. That didn’t make me cocky, but it did put the threat in perspective.
“That’s not going to make it any easier to have a peaceful meeting with the pack leaders,” Teag pointed out.
Derek rolled his eyes. “I imagine that a ‘peaceful’ meeting isn’t what whoever sent him had in mind.”
“Do you know which pack he belonged to?”
“None. He’s a lobo.”
“A wolf?” I asked.
“No. ‘Lobo’ is what we call shifters who operate outside of the packs. Wild cards. Lone rangers. They don’t trust us. The feeling is mutual.”
“Why would a… lobo want to derail the pack meeting?” Teag asked.
Derek shrugged. “Most lobos used to be in a pack, and either got thrown out or left on their own. We leave them alone, they leave us alone, and most of the time, no one gets hurt. But there’s a reason they’re flying solo—lobos are all a little edgy. Tightly-wound. Or to put it another way, they’re unstable, even by shifter standards.”
“So the guy could just want trouble for trouble’s sake,” I supplied.
“Maybe,” Derek replied. “Or he might not want to see the packs work together. After all, that would put the lobos even more on the outside.”
“Did you recognize him?” Teag glanced back toward the door, though the guy was long gone.
“No—but I’ll know his scent again if I ever get close to him,” Derek answered.
Two hours later, Teag, Derek, and I waited inside the cabin on St. John Island and tried not to look nervous. I knew why Sorren chose that spot for the pack summit meeting. Small, private, remote, and providing no cover for assassins. Each pack master came with two bodyguards, who took their places against the walls, silent and lethal. Marshall and Derek exchanged terse words, and Derek went out to stand sentry on the porch. No one would mistake Teag and me for Sorren’s bodyguards, and his insistence that both of us flanked him in seats at the table made the four shifters worried and uncomfortable.
I sized up the competitors. Marshall wore a polo shirt and khakis, sticking with his business casual look that would have been at home at a corporate retreat. Nico, sitting next to Marshall, looked more like a biker, with a shaved head, leather jacket and tat sleeves peeking from beneath his cuffs. Patty, beside Nico, looked like a soccer mom in her thirties in a matching twinset—except for the feral gleam in her eyes. That just left Sarah, a thin woman in her fifties with bottle-red hair and the world-weary look of a truck stop waitress.
“We don’t need your help.” Nico spoke first, and while Patty and Sarah remained silent, I could see in their eyes that they agreed.
“We’ve tried handling this on our own, and it’s not getting better.” Marshall might not have exuded support in our last meeting, but his resolve was clear now. “We need to work together. Share information. Hell, we don’t even know how many of our people are actually missing because we haven’t talked about it.”
“Then why don’t we talk—alone?” Patty’s icy tone left little doubt about her feelings.
“Because we need the help, dammit!” Marshall’s voice rose. Suddenly he froze. “Unless your packs are in on it.”
I expected a brawl at that. Anger rose in the other three pack leaders’ faces, swift and spontaneous.
“I lost four of my people this year.” Nico’s voice dropped to a low growl. “Four friends. How dare you—”
“We lost my cousin’s son and two young women—both college students with promising careers,” Patty snapped, lips set so tightly they paled. “This is not our doing.”
“Our pack lost its master of the hunt and two elders,” Sarah said in a whiskey rasp. “So either there’s an outsider picking us off, or the other packs are trying to whittle us down.”
“You actually think that we’d send… assassins against your pack?” Nico looked stunned and seriously pissed off. “How in the hell does that make any kind of sense?” His eyes narrowed. “Unless you suspect that from us because it’s what your people are doing?”
“Are you out of your mind?” Patty slapped her palm against the table. “My pack doesn’t slink down alleys throwing people into the trunks of cars.”
“No, they stick to white collar crime,” Sarah muttered. A corner of her mouth twitched upward at the look of disgust Patty afforded her.
“Beats cle
rking at the liquor store,” Patty replied.
I found myself profoundly disappointed to discover that even in the supernatural community, Charleston still divided into those who lived South of Broad—and everyone else.
“No reason to be ashamed of honest work—not that you’d know,” Nico sniped.
“That’s enough,” Sorren said. He might not have used true compulsion, but his voice silenced the room. “You don’t have to like each other, or trust each other. But be smart about this. Your packs aren’t large enough for each one to hide a secret killer. So if you’re not hunting each other—and I don’t think any of you believe that’s the case—then the killer wins when you don’t work together.”
“And you have a solution?” No one could mistake the cold sarcasm in Patty’s voice.
Sorren met her gaze and raised an eyebrow. One predator sizing up another. To no one’s surprise, Patty blinked first. “Not yet,” Sorren replied, completely unruffled. “And without full disclosure from all of you, this situation will just drag on. So I want to know the details about everyone’s who’s gone missing or died under suspicious circumstances for at least the last year—longer if you think it’s relevant. We need information to find a pattern.”
“I’ve got the list of everyone reported missing to the Charleston police for the last eighteen months,” Teag said, distributing copies around the table. “It would be a huge help if y’all could positively ID the ones who are shifters. I was able to make an educated guess about a third of them, but I’d like confirmation.” He looked up. “Here’s a tip—if you don’t want to be outed, watch who you friend on Facebook.”
The room grew quiet as the pack masters scanned down through the list. From their solemn expressions, I figured that the seriousness of the situation finally sank in, outweighing their differences. Marshall read off four names, his voice thick with emotion. “But they’re not the only ones,” he said, grief clear in his eyes.
“Two of these are mine, but one’s not on the list from this year—and if we’re going back that far, you can actually add two more on top of that,” Sarah admitted grudgingly. “And if the rumors are true, there might be up to half a dozen lobos no one would bother to report that have vanished.”
Teag and I glanced at each other. We needed to find out more about the stalker delivery guy and the rest of the lobos.
“You’ve got the names right for my folks,” Patty said, identifying her missing members. “But now that we’re talking about this, a couple of people left town suddenly last year—at least, that’s what I thought happened to them. Blamed it on a new job, bad breakup—but maybe not.” She gave those names to Teag, just in case, and actually had the good grace to appear slightly rattled.
“None of my people are on the list,” Nico said, leaning back in his chair. “We didn’t report them to the cops, because the cops couldn’t help. They just would have stuck their noses where they didn’t belong.” A sidelong glance in Sorren’s direction made his unspoken sentiment clear. Even so, he provided the names of the missing shifters, and Teag wrote them down.
Marshall looked at Sorren. “You got what you wanted. Are we done?”
“It’s not just disappearances.” They all turned when I spoke. “We tracked a series of break-ins and thefts that might be related. Someone’s targeting hunters and stealing very specific trophies. Taxidermy trophies.”
Marshall paled. Nico cursed under his breath. Patty recoiled, looking physically ill. Sarah swallowed hard, trying and failing to hide an expression of horror. “You think—” Marshall began.
“It’s a possibility,” I replied. I wasn’t going to bring up Marshall’s cache of pawn shop items just yet, deciding it would be best for everyone to leave Derek’s part out of the story, at least for now. “The thefts started a little more than eighteen months ago—same as the disappearances from what you told us tonight. The thieves are choosy. They’re not taking the most valuable pieces, or even the rarest specimens. It’s like the thief is looking for something in particular.”
“I thought that was urban legend.” We all turned to look at Nico. Slowly, the others nodded. “You know, like the guy with the hook for a hand at lover’s lane or seeing Bloody Mary in the mirror? Makes a good boogeyman story, but c’mon—you don’t really think—”
“I’ve learned that in more cases than not, the boogeyman is real,” Sorren replied. “The missing shifters and the stolen trophies happening at the same time are too similar to be coincidence.”
“Why?” Marshall licked his lips as if his mouth had gone dry. “Why would someone want the trophies? They’re… ghastly.”
A mental image of a sitting room filled with stuffed human corpses flashed in my imagination, and I had to agree with Marshall. I never had liked the idea of posing dead animals to look alive. Not killing them in the first place made a lot more sense to me.
“We don’t know,” Sorren replied. “But we’ll find out. In the meantime, if you hear anything about the thefts, we need to know about it. Warn your people. At best, we’re dealing with a sociopath who knows enough about the supernatural community to target shifters, and at worst, we’re up against dark magic.”
“So you want me to tell my pack to watch out for witches?” Nico echoed.
“Because being a shifter is possible, but being a witch isn’t?” Sarah mocked. “Come on. We all know people who dabble in the Art.” She looked at Sorren. “This goes a long way past love spells and putting curses on ex-husbands.”
“Do you think the stolen trophies are… were shifters?” Patty had gone green in the gills.
“Maybe,” I replied.
“Oh, god.” Patty pulled a hand to her stomach reflexively. I couldn’t blame her. “So that would mean that whoever’s taking the new people is—” She couldn’t finish the thought.
“You’d better not be making this shit up,” Marshall said.
“We’re not.” Sorren’s tone remained even, though I saw a flash of impatience in his eyes.
“If you can find out who’s behind this, fine with me,” Nico said, cocking his head as he looked at Sorren as though trying to take his measure. “But when it comes to dealing out justice, it should be done by the pack.”
“Let the professionals handle it.” Sorren’s voice had the edge of authority. “You all know what the Alliance is and what we do. Let us take care of it. Keep the blood off your hands.”
I could see that didn’t set well with the pack masters by their expressions, but to my surprise, no one argued. Hard to know whether that meant they grudgingly accepted the truth in Sorren’s words, or just intended to do as they pleased, regardless. For everyone’s sake, I hoped they would stay out of it, but I doubted it would be that simple.
Given the drama involved in setting up the meeting, the aftermath seemed anticlimactic. When the arguing and shouting finished, and Sorren had the last word, the pack masters and their bodyguards got up and left with barely a nod to acknowledge our existence. We heard their cars leave the drive, and that’s when I remembered Derek.
Teag and Sorren put the furniture back in place as I walked out on the porch. Derek stood a few feet from the door, blending in to the shadows. “Are you okay?” After the attack at the fish camp, and at the store, Derrek hadn’t been one of my favorite people. Now that I knew he had a personal stake in the situation and had saved us from the drugged food, I found it hard to dislike him.
“It wasn’t quite the suicide mission it looked like, being sent out here,” Derek replied, self-deprecation clear in his voice. “Each of the pack masters had a guard stationed outside. Marshall was just reminding me that I’m just the hired muscle.”
“Did Marshall lose someone close to him too?” My voice was soft, but I knew the shifter’s extra-sensitive hearing wouldn’t miss my words.
“Gossiping about the pack doesn’t usually end well.” He looked away.
“It’s not gossip when it provides key information we need to stop this thing,” I r
eplied. “Knowing you lost Jesse, I understand how committed you are to this. So anything you can tell me about the others—”
“Marshall lost his mate.” Derek looked away. “Marshall and Kayla were inseparable, and then she just vanished. He went a little nuts.”
“How long ago?”
“Three months. Not too long after Jesse disappeared.”
He was silent for a moment. “Do you have a picture of Jesse?” I asked.
Derek’s gave me a wary glance. “Why?”
I shrugged. “If I see a face, it makes the fight to find him more real.”
Derek hesitated, then pulled a wallet from his pocket and thumbed out a worn photograph of the two of them together. Derek looked younger by a few years, but no one could mistake the resemblance between him and Jesse. Jesse stood few inches taller and with his black hair cut in a short, trendy style compared to Derek’s unruly mop, but the dark eyes and angular cheekbones marked them as brothers.
“Thank you,” I said quietly. He put the photo and wallet away.
“Why did you replace the buttons on your coat?” That detail had bothered me since the first night we found him in the alley.
Obviously, Derek didn’t see that question coming from the look he gave me. “What?”
I pointed to the buttons on his field coat. Someone had punched two neat holes through shiny quarters and secured the coins with leather as fasteners.
Derek chuckled, and for an instant, his face lost its wary, haunted look. “Jesse did that. You know how they brought out those quarters for each state a while back? Jesse took one from each of the states we lived in for more than a couple of weeks and made them into buttons.” He smiled at the memory. “We moved around a lot when we were younger. All shifters do. So it’s kind of like my personal scrapbook, sort of. Jesse always liked doing things like that.” Abruptly, his smile faded.
We sat in silence for a moment. “So someone took your brother. What about the others who disappeared? Were they especially close to anyone?”
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