The man got down on all fours to check for damage on the undercarriage.
“The front end’s fine,” Ricky murmured.
I was about to ask what he meant when Lloergan pushed up, slowly. The guy didn’t notice—she was behind him, and he was intent on seeing what damage she’d done to his precious car.
Through the binoculars, I saw her lips pull back in a growl. The man glanced over his shoulder and then gave a very satisfying start.
Lloergan advanced, her head lowered, fur on end, inflating the big dog to the size of a bear. The guy scrambled up. She let out a snarl loud enough for me to hear.
The guy inched toward his open driver’s door. He made it three steps. Then Brenin came tearing across the field, two other cŵns on his heels. The man bolted for his car, but Brenin was racing across the road, and the guy clambered onto the hood of his car instead. He stood up there, looking down at Brenin and Lloergan, the other two dogs approaching. Then he peered along the empty road.
He took out his cell phone. Hit a button. Peered at it.
“Yeah, that’s not going to work,” Ricky said.
In today’s world, if you were beset by giant hounds, help was only a call away. Unless there was a high-tech cell-phone blocker . . . attached to the collar of the lead hound.
The cŵns circled the car patiently, allowing the man to realize that calling for help wasn’t an option. Then Brenin leapt onto the hood. The man slid down into the opening they’d left, and he started to run as the hounds herded him toward the waiting forest.
“And that’s our cue,” Ioan said, handing Ricky and I each a bundle. “We let the hounds tire him while we dress.”
“Our cloaking devices,” Ricky said, shaking his out. “Appropriately in the form of an actual cloak.”
Ioan waved for one of the others to accompany Ricky into a patch of forest so he could put on his cloak, turning him into a true Huntsman. While Ricky and I had ridden with the Cŵn Annwn on recreational hunts, this would be our first time donning the cloaks.
When I started after Ricky, Ioan said, “Wait,” and motioned for me to follow him to a larger patch of trees.
As we rode, he said, “Have you changed your mind? About wanting to know what our quarry has done?”
I shook my head, but not before I hesitated a moment too long.
“You can ask what he’s done, Liv,” he said.
When I didn’t respond, he said, “If you think you need to prove anything by not asking, please remember that you aren’t the only one who is anxious to do this right. You are our Matilda. The only one we’ve ever had, and the only one we’ll ever get. Having you ride strengthens us. That’s why you’re doing it, and we realize that, so we want you to be comfortable.”
“You know he’s guilty.”
He nodded, but I meant it as a statement. Huntsmen had the innate ability to see guilt. It was like the old saying about guilt being written on a face. They knew their target deserved their justice, and so they didn’t dig deeper. With my Cŵn Annwn blood, I should have that same faith.
“It doesn’t work like that,” he said.
I gave him a hard look.
He threw up his free hand, the other loosely holding the reins. “If you don’t want me to read your thoughts, don’t make them so easy to read. It’s like speaking and expecting me to not listen. You cannot have our faith because you are not us. Yours would be blind faith. Ours isn’t—we know they are guilty. Lacking that ability, you need evidence to develop honest—and open-eyed—faith in our powers. Which is why I urged you to investigate first. That’s what you do. It’s how your mind works, Liv.”
He was right. I was an investigator by trade now, for Gabriel’s law firm. But that was the problem. Gabriel was a defense lawyer, so my job was to keep people from what was, sometimes, proper justice. Which I supposed made me a lousy Matilda. But while my father had Cŵn Annwn blood, my mother—like Gabriel—was part fae, and their sense of ethics was a whole lot looser. Put those two sides together, and you got me: someone who was fine with setting a criminal free if the prosecutor failed to do his job, but who also believed that if you committed a crime, you needed to be prepared to pay the price.
“How much do you know about what he did?” I asked.
“His name and the very basics of the crime.” He stopped his horse. “If you have any concerns, Ricky can join us on this Hunt, and you’ll come the next time after you’ve done your research and are convinced that target is guilty.”
“I can’t ever know that, short of an actual confession. All the investigation in the world only builds certainty. It never seals it.” I shook my head. “No, this is better. You know the guy is guilty, and that’s enough. But I will take what you have on him.”
“Will that help?”
He told me what he knew. And I immediately saw a problem. A big one.
Gabriel
While Olivia was off on her first Hunt, Gabriel sat in a bar, drinking with a young woman who very clearly was hoping for more than pleasant conversation. Personally, he’d rather be at home working. Or with Olivia. But that was not permitted, so instead, he was doing her a favor by taking another woman for drinks.
The woman in question was a relatively new assistant state’s attorney. So new that she actually thought asking Gabriel to drinks to “discuss their case” was a good idea. It was a common error, though not one that was commonly repeated. Some of the younger attorneys looked at Gabriel, saw a young and unattached attorney and thought they knew exactly how to beat him in court. Oddly, the fact that he hadn’t been unattached for the past six months seemed to have no effect on the invitations.
Before Olivia, he had been known to accept invitations, finding them very useful. Not for sex, of course, but for the same reason these lawyers asked him—to gain valuable information. He just happened to be much better at the game than they were.
Gabriel had agreed to tonight’s invitation as a gift for Olivia. Something to cheer her up after the Hunt. To distract her, if she needed distracting. Of course he had other ways of distracting her in the short term, but beyond that, she would require more. His gift would be information on a case that was stymieing her, a case to be argued by Amy Keating, the attorney sitting across from him.
Ms. Keating was not particularly enjoying her evening. Gabriel could tell by the way she kept shifting in her seat. And the way she kept ordering refills, growing increasingly frustrated. Gabriel seemed oblivious to her flirting, and he wasn’t getting refills, which meant she couldn’t hope for an alcohol-loosened tongue. In fact, he barely seemed to have touched his drink. He hadn’t, actually, not beyond a lip-wetting sip. Gabriel didn’t drink unless he was with Olivia and comfortable with letting down his guard. Having an alcoholic drug addict for a mother tended to squelch any interest in social imbibing.
For all Ms. Keating’s frustration, though, it was proving to be quite a productive meeting for him. The younger lawyer wasn’t very good at this sort of manipulation. Getting information from a source required a degree of quid pro quo. You needed to give something first. The trick was to only provide details they could easily find themselves. Instead, Ms. Keating was luring him in with genuine tidbits, and when she didn’t receive nibbles, she threw out bigger lures. The alcohol certainly didn’t help her judgment.
What Gabriel really wanted was her cell phone. Ms. Keating was trying to cajole a reluctant witness onto the stand, and Olivia needed his name. Gabriel knew exactly where to find it—in Ms. Keating’s call records. While it was possible to obtain those in other ways, this was the safest method. Safe for Gabriel, at least, who’d been picking pockets since he was a child.
When he finally did take the phone from Ms. Keating’s open purse, the timing was not so much about the perfect opportunity to steal it, but rather the perfect time to have stolen it . . . when she began glancing about for the ladies room.
He watched for any sign that she’d realized her phone was missing. If so, he’d slip it on
to the floor. But she only sat down and started talking again, and he deftly returned it to her purse. Then, goal accomplished, he had to suppress the urge to leave. That would look suspicious. So they talked, a tedious conversation he could barely bring himself to follow. When his phone dinged with a text, he took it quickly with an “Excuse me.”
As he opened the message, Ms. Keating said, “Girlfriend checking up on you?”
“No, she’s out for the evening.” He caught her look and added. “With Ricky Gallagher.”
Ms. Keating’s blink confirmed she knew who that was. He hardly needed to divulge that, but he couldn’t resist really. Not after she’d smirked when he said Olivia was away, as if Gabriel had snuck out to have drinks with her while Olivia was otherwise occupied.
“Isn’t he . . . the biker?”
Gabriel fixed her with a baleful look. “Mr. Gallagher is the member of a motorcycle club.”
“Right, but I mean, weren’t they . . . together?”
“Yes, and now they are friends. Olivia said hello, by the way. I asked her to join us, but her plans with Ricky were apparently more enticing.”
Ms. Keating’s mouth opened, and nothing came out, which gave him time to read his text. It was from his aunt, which explained why he’d been in no hurry to read it. There was only one reason Rose texted him at this hour, and as he read the message, his stomach tightened.
“I need to go,” he said, rising. “A sick relative needs my attention.”
She snorted a laugh. “I think you can do better than that, counselor.”
He met her gaze, his pale blue eyes fixing on hers, and she shrank back.
“My mother is ill,” he said slowly. “I do not appreciate levity.”
“I . . . I’m—”
“If you wish to discuss this case again, please contact Olivia. I suspect you’ll find her far more pleasant company. Just do not expect her to divulge any useful information on the case, either. Now, good evening, Ms. Keating.”
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