by Dannika Dark
“I’m sorry. We should have been more thorough. You mentioned he couldn’t start his own group. What did you mean by that?”
After a long pause, Harper finally replied. “Bono couldn’t start his own pack because of me. People didn’t understand why he chose someone who can’t have children. To be blunt, they didn’t get why he chose a life mate who was born a man. I’m a woman, but people don’t understand it. All Shifters and Chitahs care about is continuing their line—making sure that we don’t go extinct. So when one of us mates with even a Vampire or a Mage, you’ll get a lot of cold stares. Good packs won’t take you in, and going out to eat in a nice place is basically hell. Men like Bono are seen as traitors.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Aren’t we all? Bono was a good man. And yes, he was a good alpha.”
I reclined my head against the brick wall. There we had it. Everyone on our list who fit the criteria was either an alpha or a redhead. “The higher authority wants to offer compensation to the families of alphas.”
“You don’t say?”
A couple ducked into the alley and began making out. His hand was up her shirt; her hand was up his. It smelled like musty old cardboard and vomit. Apparently the perfect spot to romance a woman.
“Do you mind? I’m on the phone,” I snapped, irritated by the intrusion. The couple laughed and wandered off. “I’m really sorry, Harper. If it means anything, you’ll get the money despite all the bullshit you put up with. I’ll see to it.”
“Keep the money. Even if Bono had settled with a fertile wolf, there’s no guarantee he would have fathered children. He was passionate, affectionate, but very impotent. He didn’t climax very often, and I know that’s more than you asked for, but I have no secrets. Bono’s condition had nothing to do with his desire or mind—it was just how his body was wired. He worried that he wasn’t enough. But he was my everything.”
“It sounds like he had a good woman. Are you sure you don’t want the money? You might change your mind.”
“No, honey. If they couldn’t accept us when he was alive, I won’t take payment for his death. I guess meeting you was the kick in the pants I needed to finally box up the last of his things. It’s silly the stuff you keep around when somebody dies. Their razors, an old pair of shoes, their favorite ice cream. I couldn’t bring myself to throw it away even though I don’t like peppermint. It was the last thing he wanted, so I just held on to it. Anyhow, some of his personal effects I donated to a friend, but I don’t know what to do with his medication.”
“Toss it.”
“It’s not the stuff you buy in the store. It’s a special heartburn medicine. He got it from someone he knew. Seems like such a waste if it could help someone else. Do you know anyone who needs it?”
I sat forward, suddenly remembering how Andy had mentioned giving Alisa heartburn medicine before finding her dead. “Who gave it to him?”
“I don’t have a clue. He just mentioned it in passing. I think he was trying to find pills that worked for impotency but wound up with these instead. There are only a few left.”
“Hold on to those and I’ll get back to you. I really appreciate the callback. And why don’t you think about the money? I don’t want you to feel pressured about making a decision only to regret it. Give it a few days.”
“I won’t change my mind. But can you donate the money in his name? A good charity.”
“What about an orphanage for unwanted children? Or is that… insensitive?”
After a beat, Harper replied, “Bono would have liked that.”
“I’ll see to it. By the way, you left your cigarette case at the bar. It has an inscription. What’s your address?”
“Keep it.”
“Are you sure? It looks sentimental.”
“I kept what matters. Bono always wanted me to quit anyway.”
“I’ll hold on to it in case you change your mind.”
“You’re sweet. Have a nice life, Raven. And if you ever need a boost in the bedroom, you know who to call.”
I chuckled softly. “I just might do that.” After hanging up, I immediately dialed Wyatt. “Hey, is your ghost still there?”
“A hello would be nice,” he replied.
“Wyatt, I need you to ask him something. I don’t think this is a natural virus or genetic defect. I think someone’s infecting people.”
“Now that’s a twist I didn’t see coming. Hold on.”
I paced back and forth between the buildings, rock music thumping in the background. A car horn beeped a few times, some girls cheered, and a beer bottle shattered.
“Welcome to Dialing the Dead. My name is Wyatt Blessing, and I’ll be your spirit guide.”
“Ask King if he took any medicine for his heartburn. Not the boiling root stuff but real medicine.”
Wyatt repeated my question, and then there was a minute of silence. “He had some pills.”
“Put me on speaker. Did he get them at the store?”
“No,” Wyatt said. “He says human medicine isn’t strong enough.”
“Does he remember who gave it to him? Was it someone in his pride or did he buy them on the street?”
After a few seconds, Wyatt replied, “His father believed in natural healing and wouldn’t have approved, so he got them from a Relic.”
I stopped. “Was his name Graham Wiggins?”
“Yes. He wants to know how you knew.”
Graham had mentioned how he peddled medicine on the side. Not unusual for a Relic, but why wouldn’t he have mentioned treating King? Especially since he didn’t work for the Freeman pride? Maybe he didn’t want to get in trouble with Sambah for sneaking around behind his back. King must have mentioned how his family didn’t approve of Western medicine, but something didn’t feel right. In fact, it felt very, very wrong.
“Thanks. That’s all I needed.”
After hanging up, I sent Blue a quick text message.
Raven: Ask Graham if he prescribed meds to the victims. Be careful.
Blue: Where are you?
Raven: On my way. Don’t let him leave.
As soon as Blue hopped out of Raven’s truck, she stepped onto the sidewalk and made her way toward the hot dog stand. While she hadn’t spent any time in this area of town, she’d flown over it a few times. Young people flitted from one bar to another, but it was also a spot for lovers. Many were presumably on their first or second date, awkwardly holding hands and stealing glances at each other. Human courting rituals were so strange to her. Blue walked beneath the bright lights strung up all around the hot dog stand. The shop was nothing more than a long building with service windows. Most customers took their meals and walked off, but a few sat at the round outdoor tables.
She approached Graham and pulled out a chair. “Raven’s having trouble with parking, so she’ll be here in a minute.”
“Have you been here before?” he asked. “The hot dogs are delicious. Delicious! I took the liberty of ordering for you.” Graham handed her a wrapped hot dog from his pile before tackling his fries. “It’s on me. Payback for the last meal. That cup is plain soda and the other is grape. You get first choice.”
Blue took the plain soda. “Thanks.”
The smell of hot dogs and french fries made places like these irresistible to pass by. She hadn’t grown up with processed food, and maybe that was why it was so addictive to her. She pulled away the silver wrapping that kept her meal toasty warm.
“I put mustard on it,” Graham said. “Hope you’re not one of those ketchup people. I can go back and get another if it’s not what you want.”
“No, this is perfect. I love mustard.” She took a big bite and sighed. Sometimes the little things brought her happiness. Blue was also starving since they’d skipped dinner.
Graham wiped his fingers with a paper napkin. “Don’t worry about talking out in the open. It’s too loud for Vampires, and most Breed don’t like busy human streets on a Friday. Too many intoxicated college kids.�
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Usually people chose isolated areas for privacy. Lakes, underground garages, abandoned warehouses. Not Graham. He needed to be stationed near the food, and Blue was grateful. After finishing her hot dog, she eyed Raven’s.
“Might as well,” he said, chuckling. By the looks of the wadded-up wrappers, Graham was working on his third wiener. “I’ll give her one of mine.”
Blue smiled. “Raven likes burgers anyhow.”
“Overrated. Just a bunch of mystery meat.”
“And this isn’t?” She held up her naked hot dog.
“What’s the latest update? Your partner said you found something.”
Their table was small and intimate, but Blue still lowered her voice. “We found a connection between the victims.”
“How so?”
“They were all alphas or redheads.”
Graham set down his half-eaten hot dog and picked at the bread. “I don’t follow.”
“Almost all the men are alphas, and the rest—including all the girls—are redheads. You know as well as I do that a redhead is more likely to produce an alpha, and a strong one.” She suddenly belched and sat back, hand on her chest. “Pardon me. Anyhow, we wanted to get your insight. You knew some of these people.”
“You two have certainly done your homework. I would have never connected those dots, not without meeting every person. Are you absolutely certain?”
“Without a doubt. We asked everyone to either confirm alpha status or send us a picture. That’s more than a coincidence. Most of them were sick right before, so it fits a pattern.”
“Your questions must have raised suspicion.”
“We had a really good alibi, so you don’t have to worry. What do you think?”
“It sounds like what you’re suggesting—a virus. The thing most people don’t understand about viruses is that they’re designed to survive. And sometimes that means mutating and changing their behavior. It’s not that different from people except that we acclimate to change while they themselves change. Have you two thought about the consequences of leaking this knowledge?”
Blue cleared her throat. “We’ve considered it. We thought maybe you might have connections in your world—someone who can do an autopsy on some of the remains and identify the virus. Maybe even find a cure before it strikes more people.”
Graham stroked the scruff on his chubby cheek. “Just imagine what the higher authority would do if they thought a virus was spreading among Shifters. They would force you into isolation—away from the general population. People would resist, and there would be violence. So much violence. If it affected all of us, that would be different. But it’s just Shifters, and people don’t think much of you to begin with. Wouldn’t take long before everyone considered you a threat to the Breed population.”
“They’re more threatened by our numbers than they would be a virus. It could also be a genetic mutation. We’re not scientists, so that’s why we called for your expertise.” She rubbed her chest, wishing she hadn’t eaten that second hot dog.
Graham watched a couple walking past their table. He seemed to have a lot on his mind, and Blue could only imagine the heavy weight of deciding the fate of an entire race. “Now that I think about it, I should have noticed the obvious connection. If a person knew enough victims, they’d see it too. But you didn’t know them, so how in the world did you connect those dots?”
“Actually, we didn’t. We had help.”
Graham blanched. “I thought you weren’t including any outside help. It could ruin me. Ruin!”
“Calm down. He won’t tell anyone because he’s dead. You mentioned before that you’ve heard of the Freeman pride, so I guess you knew King.”
Graham stared, blank-faced. “King?”
“Sambah’s son. Somehow he followed one of us home, and we have a Gravewalker on our team who spoke to him. He knew several victims, and he’s the one who pointed out how many were alphas. More than what we knew. That wasn’t a question we bothered to ask, so it got us thinking.”
Graham’s eyes darted around. “Is he here now?”
Blue chuckled. “How would I know? I doubt it. He’s busy haunting our house.”
Graham shook the ice in his cup. “Have you found anything else I should know about? Every detail matters.”
Blue wasn’t sure there was anything additional she could provide, but she also didn’t want Graham to run off before Raven had a chance to talk to him. So she stalled. “We can talk through the details when Raven gets here.” She reached for her drink to wash down the indigestion.
“I can wait,” he said, studying her closely.
A few minutes rolled by, and she watched young people rushing to and fro. One lady actually carried her dog in a purse, and a man walked by, passing out fliers for a local band. Graham had a small pile of hot dogs and was working on another. She didn’t know how he could eat so many since they were spicy.
“You have the appetite of a hummingbird,” she said.
“Hummingbird? That’s a first.”
“We didn’t have books in my tribe, so everything we learned about animals was passed down from the elders. When I came to the city and learned to read, I found a book on falcons. I wanted to see what people wrote, and then I got caught up reading about all kinds of birds. Hummingbirds eat nearly twice their weight in nectar each day.”
Graham put down his hot dog. “Is that what you think I eat?”
“There’s nothing wrong with a hearty appetite. That’s my point. Hummingbirds are fast and efficient. I bet you’re the same. You mentioned you don’t sleep much, so your mind must always be going.”
He sighed. Relics looked so vulnerable to her. They were closest to humans genetically and even lived as long as them. But their intelligence was unmatched. Keystone was lucky to have Gem, who was born a Relic before becoming a Mage. They didn’t have to worry about her getting old and dying. Even Hunter would live longer according to his deceased mother.
“My clients are so demanding,” he complained. “They don’t appreciate the hours I put into my job. I barely have a social life anymore. Work, work, work.”
“That’s why I was surprised you didn’t have a partner. You don’t look strapped for cash unless you have some gambling addiction on the side. Give yourself a break.”
“Partnering up isn’t as easy as all that. You have to trust them, and that’s not easy to do with a stranger. That’s why most of them are married.”
Blue pulled out her phone when it vibrated. It was a message from Raven. While Graham went on about the dynamics between partners, Blue wrapped up a short exchange with Raven and frowned. Raven wanted her to ask Graham if he’d ever prescribed medication to their victims. Why would she ask that? Then Blue remembered how Andy had given his mate heartburn medication. In fact, several of them had mentioned the same thing. But if they were experiencing heartburn, of course they’d reach for medicine.
“Did you prescribe medicine to any of your clients?” she asked, setting her phone on the table.
Graham blinked. “I sell it on the side. That’s no secret.”
“I meant to the victims.”
He wiped his mouth with a napkin. “If they were sick and I had something for it, yes.”
“For heartburn?” She tried to read him, but he seemed truly baffled.
“Probably. I’d have to think. Sometimes I give people medicine and they don’t take it right away but keep it on hand. I’m not a pharmacy. Nobody gets an entire bottle of medicine. Can you imagine what would happen to my reputation if they overdosed or shared it with others? I only dispense a few pills as needed. Heartburn is a common condition.”
“Even Alisa, Andy’s mate?”
“Sure. Yeah. I gave her a few pills.”
“Why didn’t you mention that before?”
“What’s to mention? There’s nothing unusual about it. All pregnant women have heartburn.”
Blue stiffened. “You knew she was pregnant?”
She remembered Graham specifically saying that Teresa didn’t have kids. One doesn’t skip over the fact that a woman is carrying.
“Nobody knew about her condition except possibly the Packmaster,” he insisted, fidgeting with the wrappers on the table. “Alisa hadn’t told anyone but me and wanted to get tested because she was having stomach troubles.”
So that’s what Raven was hinting at. Blue decided to throw out an accusation and see how he reacted. “That seems like relevant information you should have shared. But you didn’t want anything tracing back to you. Not directly.”
Graham pushed back his chair and stood. “I think we’re done here. Hope you enjoyed the free meal.”
She couldn’t believe her eyes when he turned around and fled. Was he serious? She bolted to her feet and sprinted after him. Halfway across the street, a car nearly struck her before slamming on the brakes. Instead of asking if she was okay, the driver held down his horn. Blue pounded her fists against the hood, but she didn’t have time for this joker. When she looked up, Graham had vanished. Despite his size, he was apparently a quick runner.
She jogged in the direction he’d gone and spotted him far ahead, taking a right. Blue dodged into an alleyway and summoned her animal. But as she spread her arms, an emptiness filled her as if a wall had formed, breaking their connection. Confused, she conveyed the urgency, but again, nothing happened.
“What the hell?”
With no time to spare, Blue shot out of the alley and ran nimbly down the busy sidewalk. She turned right, dodging pockets of young people without breaking stride.
Dammit, I can’t see!
She felt handicapped on the ground. Was he hiding in a bar? Had he parked on this street and driven off? If only she could shift and get an aerial view. Even though she knew what kind of car he drove, she still looked in the window of every vehicle that rolled by. It didn’t seem likely he would have fought his way through crowded doors to hide inside a club—that would only trap him.