by Amy Green
“He left town right after Charlie died,” Quinn said. “We all figured he was gone for good, but it turns out he isn’t.”
“Yeah?” Brody said, keeping his voice to a casual grunt. Inside, his wolf paced, caged and miserable. “He’s in town?”
“Weirder than that,” Quinn said. He motioned to Trish for a coffee and dumped one creamer into it, then another. Quinn was Native American, a tall, dark bear shifter who had become chief of police after vowing to turn his life around. When Brody had given him the job, he’d had no idea how long the man would last, but Quinn had taken to the work like a duck to water. “I just got word that Dunne was arrested in Denver three days ago.”
Brody paused. “Arrested? For what?”
“Malpractice,” Quinn said. “Giving his patients drugs under the table for cash. Meth, morphine, Fentanyl, whatever they wanted. We always knew he was a crook and a hack doctor. Looks like leaving town didn’t make him change his ways.”
“I guess not.” Carson Dunne was a human, but he’d done well when Charlie was pack alpha. He’d been given a plum position and a lot of perks. Pretty strange work, when shifters were immune to both injury and disease and never needed medical attention. Part of the work, Brody knew, was tending to the strippers and hookers Charlie kept in his stable. But the other part of the work, not surprisingly, must have been connected to Charlie’s lucrative drug trade. A trade Brody himself was busy stamping out of Shifter Falls.
Fuck you, dear old Dad.
“So Carson Dunne was dealing,” Brody said, looking at Quinn’s serious expression. “So what? That’s nothing to do with us. They can lock him up forever for all we care. So why are you here?”
“Because something’s going on,” Quinn said. “They didn’t just arrest Carson and make him post bail, the usual shit. They arrested him and let him go almost right away. Scot free. But first, they put him in a police van and took a trip to Pierce Point.”
Brody put down his fork and thought it over. “You think he offered someone information in return for a deal.”
Quinn nodded. “Someone in Pierce Point,” he said. “And the mayor of Pierce Point is giving press conferences about his big hard-on for shutting down shifters. I think that to save his own skin, Carson gave them some kind of information about the pack. What do you think that could be?”
Brody adjusted his baseball cap and looked at Quinn. It was an honest question: What do you think that could be? Not a loaded cop question. Still, Brody felt a prickle down his spine. Well, Quinn, it could be about the fact that Charlie’s skull had an ice-pick-sized hole in it, and I paid him to shut up. He’d learned to school his emotions since he was a boy, but in this moment he nearly opened his mouth and said it. Opened his mouth and gave Quinn the whole fucking thing.
He was tired—that was part of it. Tired of carrying around the heavy burden of that death. He wanted to put the bag of rocks down off his shoulders and walk away. But when you’ve killed your father, you don’t get that choice anymore.
He wished Alison was here. She hadn’t lifted all the rocks from him, but she’d made a start. She crazily didn’t think of him as the killer and the liar that he was. She saw something else when she looked at him. Sometimes, he wished he knew what it was.
“I don’t know,” he said to Quinn. “Carson was in my father’s confidence, so he probably heard a lot of things over the years. If Pierce Point’s mayor wants ammunition for his fear campaign, I bet Carson has plenty to sell—for a price.”
“It’s hard to pick,” Quinn agreed. “The drugs, the hookers, the murders—I mean, if Carson wants to spill his guts, where does he start?”
Brody felt his jaw harden. “What do you know about the Pierce Point visit?”
“It was brief,” Quinn said. “One of our guys has a human cousin on the Denver force. He says they put Carson in a van, drove him to Pierce Point to talk to the new sheriff, then turned around and came back to Denver, driving Carson home. He’s under house arrest now, but my guess is his lawyer is setting up a deal. The information for the charges to go away. I don’t know why humans think their justice is so much better than ours.”
Brody put his fork down. He couldn’t eat any more.
The meeting was brief. That meant Carson had given them something, but not much yet. He was waiting for the deal to come through, waiting to know he was on his way to being home free, before spilling everything.
Carson knew about the murder. That was a problem. But that wasn’t the biggest problem.
No, the biggest problem was all of the other dirt, as Quinn had just pointed out. If Pierce Point was looking for a reason to fear shifters, Carson could hand it to them on a silver platter. All of the nasty wrongdoings Charlie had done over the years, yes. But Carson knew about Charlie’s final plan. The plan to move in to Grant County and take it as pack territory, at any cost. Charlie had written it out—each step, what it would take. Brody himself had seen that written plan. So had Carson. The step-by-step battle plan to kill their neighbors.
If the humans found out about that, Shifter Falls was finished.
In short, Carson Dunne could start the very war that Brody had killed his father, and sold his soul, to avoid.
He closed his eyes briefly. The last time he’d seen Carson, he’d been sending him on his way, getting a solemn vow that he’d never come back to Colorado again. That was a mistake—he should have killed Carson there and then. But he’d been so tired of death, of murder, he hadn’t had the heart. He hadn’t been alpha then, and he hadn’t learned to see far to the horizon, to the places others couldn’t see. He hadn’t been able to see that this would happen.
He could see it now.
Brody opened his eyes again. “I’ll take care of it,” he said to Quinn.
Quinn didn’t move. He didn’t nod. He simply sat, his eyes locked to Brody’s, unwavering. One of the best things—and one of the worst things—about Quinn was that he picked up so fucking much behind his quiet, dark demeanor.
“Let me help you handle it,” he said.
Brody shook his head. “No.”
“One of your brothers, then.”
They would. To prevent a war, they would help him do it. He knew that now. But letting them in meant telling them everything, and it was too late for that. Too late for a lot of things.
“I’ll handle it,” he said to Quinn again.
Now Quinn had a glint of uncertainty in his expression. “You’re sure there’s no other way?”
He thought that over. He saw Alison’s face in his mind’s eye, heard her voice, knew exactly what she would say. Brody, no. There has to be something else you can do. Anything at all.
She’d say that, but she’d be wrong this time. Just like Quinn was wrong right now.
“It’s taken care of,” he said. “Are we done?”
Because an alpha had to make decisions, and some of those decisions were hard. And the only alpha worth respecting was the one who did his own dirty work instead of sending someone else.
That was Charlie’s lesson. After all, he’d snapped Brody’s mother’s neck with his own two hands.
Now, all these years later, Brody had to stop Charlie’s war.
Which meant Carson Dunne had to disappear.
14
Alison had never been to Pierce Point, even though it was only two hours from Shifter Falls. She’d never been anywhere outside of the Falls, in fact. So the trip to Pierce Point, as insignificant as the town was, was a novelty for her.
It wasn’t just that Pierce Point was bigger than the Falls—though in the scheme of things, Pierce Point was a small place. It was that Pierce Point was human. Everyone here was human—the people on the streets, the shopkeepers, the people in restaurants, the staff of the small motel she was staying at. Humans and shifters didn’t look different to the untrained eye, but Alison could always tell: shifters were bigger than human men, more powerful, and they moved with quiet animal grace. Even aging shifters, like her own fa
ther, gave off a heightened vitality that middle-aged humans didn’t have. So when Alison walked the streets, and went to her first press conference, she found herself staring discreetly around her, looking at all of the humans in her midst.
It was exciting, that first day. They’re all like me, she thought with wonder. No one gave her a second glance, though she felt like she could be wearing a sign: My daddy is a werewolf, and so is my mate. But no one in Pierce Point had a shifter’s sense of smell, and none of them could smell the alpha of the Donovan pack on her.
She put on a carefully chosen outfit for her first press conference: a dark gray pencil skirt and a cream-colored blouse, topped with a black cardigan for the cool weather. She added a small silver heart on a chain around her neck, and silver hoop earrings lent to her by Tessa. She topped the outfit with her fake credentials—Alison Masterson, journalist for Women’s Week Denver—on a lanyard around her neck, black flats, and her usual light mascara and lip gloss. She kept her hair down. When she looked in the mirror before walking out the door, she saw a professional woman, pretty perhaps, but serious and a little plain. She wondered what Brody would think, but she pushed the thought away. He’d liked her in a waitress uniform, after all. And he’d liked her in nothing. Which she thought now was her favorite outfit for him, too.
She missed him, even though it had only been one night. She’d slept alone last night in a strange hotel bed in a strange city, far from Brody and everything she knew, and in the darkness of the wee hours the adventure hadn’t seemed quite so fun. But now it was daylight, and she was about to go do some work that could seriously benefit the pack, and she pulled out her phone and texted him. How are you?
Worried, he wrote back. Are you okay?
She smiled to herself. It was okay to text him, she knew, because for some reason he could read texts all right. Fine, she wrote back. Off to collect intel. Report back later. You will be proud of me, I promise.
There was a long pause. The dots on her phone weren’t even moving. The silence stretched longer and longer, and she wondered if she’d said something to offend him. Then again, Brody didn’t seem easy to offend.
I will fix everything, he finally wrote, by the time you come back.
That was strange. Shifters usually just said what they meant instead of being vague. But Brody, she knew, was complicated. He kept so much to himself that the usual shifter honesty was buried deep. If she had been anyone else, the message wouldn’t seem strange.
But she was his mate. Mates were two halves of a whole. They didn’t play games with each other or make each other guess, any more than you would make your own arm guess what you wanted it to do. Brody’s text—I will fix everything by the time you get back—was both something and nothing at the same time. Which meant he had something on his mind that he wasn’t telling her.
Her gut did a quick flip of unease. It’s too soon, she thought. They’d only just paired up, after years of loneliness for both of them. Alison had given up her virginity; Brody had let her in. Or at least, he’d started to. Despite how excited part of her was, another part thought it was too soon for them to be apart. They needed time together, to get used to how things were now, to trust each other and read each other.
But these were not normal times. The pack needed information. So Brody would have to wait. A few days wouldn’t kill them. I’ll call you when I’m back, she said, and left the room.
The press conference was being held at City Hall, a squat, square building that looked more like a warehouse than a government building. Carrying a purse and a notebook, Alison ascended the steps with a small handful of other people, trying to look casual. She was sweating beneath her cardigan when she showed her credentials, but the bored-looking deputy just waved her through. And that was that: Alison Masterson, Shifter Falls waitress, had just become an accredited journalist.
In a small room labeled PRESS ROOM, a dozen people had gathered. At the front of the room was a dais. Alison sat in one of the folding chairs and waited until a handsome, distinguished-looking gray-haired man approached the dais, putting his hands on it and clearing his throat. The room was so small that there was no need for a microphone. The man, Alison knew, was Michael Archer, the mayor of Pierce Point.
“Thanks for coming,” he said to the room. He had a politician’s voice, calm and melodious. His gaze scanned the reporters in front of him, then fell on her. “You,” he said. “I’ve never seen you before. Do I know you?”
Way to be inconspicuous, Alison. It hadn’t crossed her mind that the mayor would know every face by memory. She half-rose, trying to keep her calm, like this happened every day. “I’m from Women’s Week Denver,” she said.
Mayor Archer’s eyebrows rose, then he seemed to shrug to himself. “Covering a few quick things today,” he said, carrying on to Alison’s relief. “I have a busy schedule today, so I’ll move quickly.” He began talking about something to do with smoking bylaws and a protest by one of the local business improvement associations. Alison sat with her notebook poised on her lap, hoping she looked like she understood.
Someone next to her nudged her arm. “Interesting, huh?” he whispered.
Surprised, she glanced over. The man next to her was about thirty, with dark blond hair. He was wearing jeans and a navy blue button-down shirt, and he was smiling at her with unmistakable interest.
The mayor was still talking, so Alison turned back to the front.
“I bet I know why you’re here,” the man said in a whisper, and then he raised his hand and stood up. “Mayor,” he said in his full voice, “is there an update on Shifter Falls?”
“Sit down, Ethan,” the mayor said, his voice just a little tired, as if this happened every time.
“It’s just that the people of Pierce Point are waiting for news,” the man—Ethan—persisted. He seemed rather pushy, considering he was talking to the mayor. “Last night, Sandy Kennedy’s beloved cat went missing, and there are traces of blood on the fence at the back of her yard. Her neighbors say they heard strange noises last night. Can you say, Mayor, with perfect confidence, that the people of Pierce Point are safe?”
Mayor Archer gave him a stern look, and suddenly Alison saw it: this was a show. A display, with both men playing their pre-decided roles. The mayor was trying to look put-upon, but in fact he wanted to answer that question. “Fine. If you insist.” He looked around at the faces in front of him again. “The fact is, our law enforcement team has discovered evidence that we are, in fact, in grave danger from the population of Shifter Falls. That in fact they do pose a threat to our safety.”
There was a surprised murmur.
“So we are taking action,” the mayor continued. “We are prepared to call in state and federal authorities if we have to. With the effort we’ve made, I believe we can safely say that we can put down this threat before it becomes a danger to our citizens. That although the shifters have bad intentions toward us, we simply will not let those bad intentions become reality. We will defend our town, defend our citizens, and defend our laws from the half-human creatures we’ve put up with for too long.”
Alison sat rooted to her chair, as if made of ice. Her notebook was forgotten in her lap. What did that mean? Evidence? Defending the town? State and federal authorities?
More questions were tossed at the mayor from other reporters, but with his well-rehearsed speech over with, he declined them and left. The reporters milled around, talking quietly as they filed out to pursue their stories.
“Well?” The blond man approached Alison as she rose from her seat, wondering what the hell to do next. “I think that was a pretty good show, don’t you? My name’s Ethan, by the way. As I’m sure you heard. I’m the senior news reporter for the Pierce Point Daily.”
He held out a hand and Alison shook it, the reflex automatic. “I’m Alison. What was that?” she asked him. “That… show? What’s going on?”
He looked impressed. “You caught that, did you? I didn’t think that Women’
s Week Denver would send their top reporter.”
Alison felt herself flush. He didn’t doubt her, she realized—he was just putting down her pretended publication. “We want to run a story about what’s happening with the shifters here,” she said. “Things have been peaceful for so long, and now it seems they’re not.”
“Well, that’s their fault, not ours,” Ethan said. “I can fill you in on anything you need. Let’s go for a cup of coffee.”
She hesitated. It sounded an awful lot like he was asking her out, but she couldn’t quite be sure. “I don’t know.”
“Come on,” he said with a smile that probably charmed a lot of women. “It’s just coffee, Alison. That’s all. I like having coffee with pretty women.”
She blushed harder. This was awkward. “I have a… boyfriend,” she said. Completely inadequate, but there it was. In the shifter world, she and Brody were married, but in the human world they weren’t, since they hadn’t stood in a church and said words in front of a stranger. Boyfriend would have to do.
Ethan looked around. “I don’t see him here,” he said lightly. “I think you can get coffee without him, right? Especially if it helps you with your story. Let’s go.”
He turned and she followed him reluctantly. She had spent a lot of time with alpha wolves in her life—pretty much the bossiest men on the planet. And yet never once had an alpha wolf annoyed her the way this man just had. There was a difference, she realized, between being an alpha and simply telling a woman what to do because you couldn’t be bothered to listen to her. But she was here for a reason, and he was right—it was just coffee. The sooner she got her questions answered, the sooner she could go home.
He led her to a shop around the corner from City Hall, where people sat with laptops and sipped their lattes while some kind of jazz fusion music played. If you wanted coffee in the Falls, you either went to the Four Spot—Patty’s coffee was as powerful as jet fuel—or you stopped at Nick’s, which was a corner variety store. Inside the store, Nick always had a pot of coffee brewing and a few fresh-baked goods. He made both for himself to enjoy as he sat behind the counter, but for a dollar he’d give you some of his supply.