by Hart, Sadie
“Never really thought you of all Hounds would be—” He broke the words off midsentence, cringing.
It would have been easy to take offence. To lift her inner hackles and snarl at him. Except, she really hadn’t seen herself spending the night with two lions. “It’s not quite what it seems.” As if that cliché would save her. She raked a hand through her hair and sighed. “But yeah. Neither did I.”
There was no way in hell though, that she was admitting Kanon was a target of hers. That he really should be sitting behind bars in a silver cage, not playing necky-necky with her and his partner.
The expression on Walker’s face told her he wanted to ask, the restraint damn near strangling him, but she wasn’t about to explain further. When she said nothing more, he tilted his head towards the plain blue Crown Vic parked at the curb. “I could still use your take on the scene.”
Of course he could. There would probably be other Hounds there too. If word got wind and scurried back to Bree... Lennox fought the urge to pick up her cell and call her boss, just to spill her guts before the international gossip highway started talking.
But gossip wouldn’t move that fast. Not about to refuse him, she did have one catch. She didn’t even have to look at the pair behind her to know they’d both insist on coming, and nothing short of a silver bullet through each of their hearts was going to stop them.
“They’ll have to tag along.”
“As long as they don’t touch anything, I really don’t care.”
Flat handed against his chest, she nudged Kanon back into the house. “Get your shirt on.”
He didn’t argue, and a second later he reappeared tugging his shirt back on over his head. He stuffed his feet back in his shoes while passing Tegan’s pair to him. In all of five seconds they were ready, in their rumpled, sleep, sex, and alcohol riddled clothing.
“One last thing,” she murmured. “The written testimonies, where are they?”
It took the three of them another five minutes to turn the room and hall upside down, but nothing. Lennox felt a painful twist in her gut. “Maybe we left them at the bar.”
The words didn’t sound at all comfortable to her ears so instead, she turned back towards the front door and waved them out. “After you.”
Chapter Four
Death.
Tegan recognized the smell the moment the car door opened and Lennox stepped out, the coppery tang of blood thick on the mid-morning breeze. The lion in him regarded the smell with a cool, distant regard. Possible food? Tegan slammed the no down on the animal hard and fast, shoving the instinct away.
One hand gripping the car door, he froze, the yellow crime scene tape wrapped off Metro and part of the surrounding parking lot. A camera whirred under the trigger happy snap of a reporter’s finger, but Tegan ignored it, instead focusing on the splay of blood against the brick wall.
Tristan’s.
Kanon slipped out of the car behind him, large hands wrapping around his waist. Just a brief contact to lend strength as they walked around the building after Lennox. But he had to know. Someone had killed a close friend and—Hounds or no Hounds—Tegan wasn’t about to let whoever it was just walk away.
If he could pick something up at the scene, he would. And by the brief flex of Kanon’s fingers against his hips, he could feel the taut anger in his partner too. They’d get their revenge. Whoever had done this would pay.
Two other Hounds—a second ridgeback, and something else, a muskier flair to her scent—stood around the back of the building between the bar and the dumpster. Tristan’s body was slumped against the wall, his guts draped out over the sidewalk. Tegan stopped cold. A roar built in his chest, aching to rumble and he swallowed it back.
He would not lose it here. Not yet.
The couldn’t afford a show of anger.
The woman rose, eyes narrowed on them as she addressed the Hound with Lennox. “Hennessy...”
“They’re clear.” He gestured towards Lennox with a broad wave. “Sesarina Dade, Kyle Rogers, this is Lennox Donnelly.”
Both Hounds looked shocked, Sesarina’s lips curling back in a small sneer, but Lennox met her with a cool glare. Her confidence never faltered, not even when she looked down at Tristan’s blood splattered against the bar.
“I didn’t realize ridgebacks fucked lion-shifters.”
Lennox’s lips thinned, but she stepped towards the body, attention solely on the work at hand. Her voice came out sweet, pleasant, but Tegan didn’t miss the bite to it. Nor did the woman with the barbed tongue. “Less than wolfhounds and their wolves.”
Neither denying nor confirming sex, Lennox knelt beside the body, her nostrils flaring. Tegan found himself scenting as well. Concrete, blood, sweat, the Hounds milling around, a hundred other bodies that had passes this very spot last night, but nothing on Tristan himself. Not even the slightest whiff of his attacker, and for wounds like that, the son of a bitch should have left a mark. And yet there was nothing. How the fuck were they supposed to find who was behind it if there was no scent?
Lennox tilted her head slightly, a frown creasing her brow as she studied Tristan. “It’s like it’s been wiped?”
Sesarina snorted. “If you’re accusing a Hound of doing this, maybe we should be looking at you. You are after all with the two suspects we originally had in mind and if anyone has the skills to cover up a murder, it’d be you.”
“Dade!” Walker took a step towards the wolfhound, but she didn’t back down. Her gaze was locked on Lennox’s back, waiting, ready for the pounce. Tegan curled his hands into fists at his side and leaned back into Kanon. They couldn’t afford to react.
Whatever happened between the Hounds, they needed to trust Lennox to try and handle it first. If she failed, then maybe, they could consider stepping in. But Tegan didn’t think for a second that Lennox couldn’t handle this. She’d handled them after all.
Lennox took another long, deep breath then stood up.
“Can’t tell if it’s a dog or not. Could be a witch. Could be whoever killed him is just really hygienic and used a concealment charm.” She shrugged and hobbled over to the blood stains on the side of the building. Lennox tilted her head back to look at the wolfhound. She kept her voice pleasant as she added, “I don’t make premature judgments.”
For the first time since Lennox started investigating the scene she winced as she turned back to focus on the blood at hand, pain flashing in her eyes. Hennessy moved towards her, concern written in his face, but Lennox shook her head, turning him away. “Tristan’s,” she said softly. She moved down the length of the alley, scenting the blood. “All of it.”
Her gaze fell on Tegan and Kanon, sorrowful. “I’m sorry.”
What could he say to that? Lennox turned away, instantly turning her attention back to the scene at hand, but she’d meant it. Kanon’s hand found his, squeezing, and Tegan clung to it as they watched her work. She ignored the other woman as if she didn’t exist at all, despite the wolfhound’s barbs. Lennox claimed authority just by being there. When she spoke it was with a quiet demand that both Hennessy and the other ridgeback jumped to comply with, and even Dade had to catch herself more than once.
The four of them secured the scene, filing what evidence they could into baggies. It was a barebones glimpse at law enforcement; nothing near as thorough as the local PD, but it was all a dead shifter would get. Tegan leaned against Kanon, his head resting on his partner’s shoulder.
Tristan deserved better than this. He deserved his killer found and dead.
Lennox turned to Hennessey. “Mind if I have a look inside?”
The Hound shook his head and led her in. Tegan watched her go, not bothering to try and muscle his way in. The blood had started and ended out here. It led straight in the direction of Tristan’s car. Whoever had done this had caught Tristan on his way out.
Kanon bent his head and whispered against his ear. “The testimonies.”
Of course, Lennox would still be trying to find them. Still try
ing to salvage Kanon’s innocence. It seemed so far away now, not important at all when he was staring down at Tristan’s lifeless body. Until he remembered that if she didn’t find them, Kanon could be dead next.
Lennox appeared in the door again, her lips grim. They didn’t need to ask to know.
Tegan bit his lip. Where had they gone?
Lennox appeared in front of them, almost guilty in the softness of her face. “I’m sorry for your loss,” she whispered.
He flinched under the touch of her fingers against his chest, and only Kanon’s hand holding his kept him from bolting. She gave Kanon the same sympathetic look and his partner looked away.
“We can go. I’ll be right behind you, just gotta wrap a few things up.”
She didn’t have to ask them twice. Tegan backpedaled down the alley towards the parking lot, dragging Kanon behind him. He didn’t want to see anymore. Someone had killed his friend, someone he cared about, and Tegan hadn’t been there to do a damn thing to stop it. His inner beast flexed, anger billowing up.
It was instinctive. Cornered, the lion inside him saw no other recourse but anger. Claws, teeth, roars. Tegan clamped his jaw shut. A roar built low in his gut, shuddering up the length of his spine and stopping at his teeth.
The only sound that spilled from him was a low, ragged groan.
Kanon gave his hand a painful squeeze and Tegan forced himself to turn and look at his partner, to see the haggard drag to Kanon’s face as the man stared up at the sky. Anger danced in Kanon’s eyes.
“He’ll pay,” Kanon whispered.
Tegan nodded. They’d let Lennox drop them off, send her on her merry way to clear Kanon’s name, if she could even still clear it, and high tail it back here. “We need a trail though.”
And there was nothing, fucking nothing.
“You two look like murder,” Lennox said as she caught up, stopping in front of them, car keys in hand. Tegan gave her a grim smile, but it didn’t stop the battle raging inside him. The lion wanted out. He wanted to bury claws into something and rip it apart.
Murder pretty much fit him at the moment.
The car beeped unlocked, starling him and Kanon both.
“Get in the car,” she said, looping around to the driver’s side door.
Tegan reached for his door and froze. Shit. No. He squeezed his eyes shut as another moan ripped from him. Kanon blew out a pained hiss, no doubt thinking the same thing. A second later, Kanon’s low whisper confirmed Tegan’s worst fears.
“Caro.”
The name slammed through Tegan and he wavered on his feet.
How were they going to tell her that Tristan was dead?
“They didn’t find her here,” Lennox soothed, but Tegan already knew that. Caro always left early. They lived across town in a small, two bedroom house damn close to the middle of nowhere. Caro liked to slip out into the woods each night and let her wolf take a run.
They’d gone with her more than a few times to let the lions out for a romp.
“We should be the ones to tell her,” Kanon said. “She shouldn’t have to hear it from a Hound.”
Instantly, Tegan saw the understanding in Lennox’s eyes, the answering pain. Her bottom lip dragged between her teeth for a moment before she nodded. “Just tell me where to take you. Hopefully we’ll beat Hennessy to her. I think he came looking for you guys first thing this morning. They still have to finish a few things up here.”
Numb, Tegan slipped into the back seat, his head resting on Kanon’s shoulder. He’d never told someone...never... He closed his eyes. What was he going to say? Caro and Tristan had been soul mates; anyone with eyes could have seen that.
They’d finished each other’s sentences, laughed at jokes no one else understood. In so many ways, they’d been Kanon and him. Now he was going to walk into her life and shatter her heart.
One hand wrapped in Kanon’s, he clung to his partner.
***
Kanon was tired of the scent of death, but there was no denying the metallic flavor of blood on the air. A crow gave a shrill cry from the trees as he shut the car door. Damn it. Caro. A pained snarl sounded from Tegan and Kanon turned to see his partner struggling to hold back a roar.
“Just let it go,” he said. It wasn’t like anyone could hear Tegan out here anyway.
The man opened his mouth and screamed, deeper than anything humanly possible. The roar vibrated through Kanon’s chest, clutching painfully at his heart. Lennox flinched at the sound, her eyes drawn tight with pain, but Kanon knew just by looking at her, it wasn’t physical.
She’d liked Caro and Tristan.
Tegan staggered, his hands fisted at his sides, but he held himself upright. Trembling. Kanon felt the lion inside him stretching to get out, wanting to run free. He lashed out; fist hitting a tree and Kanon’s fingers stretched open, dragging lines across the trunk.
“Why don’t you guys stay here? I’ll go see what I can find and then I’ll call it in...”
He didn’t have it in him to argue with her. Kanon turned away, hunched against a tree as he stared off down the country road. Sun filtered through the canopy, dappling the ground around him. The forest lay quiet, the only cries rising from the forest was the caw of a crow somewhere up in the trees.
Gravel crunched under Tegan’s shoes as the man stepped up behind him, his breath hard and fast, shallow as he struggled for control. Then Tegan’s arms slipped around him, holding fast, and Kanon closed his eyes.
He needed this. Being held, being touched.
His lion didn’t understand, all he wanted to do was whip around and rip claws into flesh, but Kanon held back the violence in the wake of his partner’s touch. Calming, even as pain and rage snarled low inside him.
They’d get their revenge, for Tristan and Caro’s sake, but the Hounds would come here eventually, probably soon, and they couldn’t afford to go berserk. And Lennox, as soft as she’d been since Tristan’s death had been announced, she’d do her job. Murdering lion-shifters were exactly her type of bounty; she wouldn’t tolerate them running off on a rampage.
Feet scuffed the gravel behind him and Kanon forced himself to turn, Tegan moving with him, only to find Lennox standing in the drive. They froze. Lennox stood there, arms braced at her side, stiff. Wild. As if something deep in her soul had reached up and shook the feral wilderness out of her dog and let it loose inside her.
Green eyes wide she looked at them and then turned away, angling her face in a follow-me gesture. “You should probably come see this.”
Her voice was breathy, distant, and when Kanon stepped out of Tegan’s arms to go to her he felt it. Magick. Hound magick. A lump built in his throat. Why would she need magick?
Tegan took a step towards her. “Is Caro alive?”
Lennox shook her head.
They didn’t bother with extra questions. Kanon moved straight for her, the magick a sharp prickle up his arms. It lifted goose bumps over his skin and he took the stairs two at a time, Tegan at his heels. Lennox followed them in, her expression distant, alien as she led them to the kitchen. The marbled tile floor was slicked red with blood.
Caro was slumped against the backdoor, head tilted to the side. She’d been gutted, just like Tristan. Rage clawed its way up Kanon’s throat, there was blood everywhere. Her hand was red with it, gritty. A streak of crimson led from her fingertips to the smeared name on the door.
Kanon.
Tegan sucked in a sharp breath, a snarl rising, but Kanon just stared at it, unbelieving. He hadn’t, Caro never would have believed it was him... Kanon jerked his attention to Lennox, expecting to see the accusation in her eyes.
Instead, raw acknowledgement stared back at him. She knew. She trusted him. The thought emptied out his gut and nearly knocked him to his knees.
“He didn’t,” Tegan started before he, too, turned to look at the Hound in the room with them, her eyes still wild with magick, but there was no mistaking her intention.
Hounds were the
only shifters to have magick, something granted them when they passed through the Shifter Town Enforcement Academy, thanks to the witches on staff there. It helped them process crime scenes; arrest unruly shifters, in general, magick gave them a boost to do their job better. Now, it’d help Lennox erase a false accusation that could have gotten him killed. The realization sank like a boulder in his gut, the relief almost painful.
She was helping them, even now. Tegan’s shoulders sagged, pain and relief flashing through his eyes as Lennox stepped past them, muttering something that sounded more like snarls and bays than words.
Palm extended flat towards the door, she wiped the blood clean, erasing his name. She left part of the smear, only enough that it looked natural, as if it were part of Caro’s fall. “Get out, so I can erase the smell of you both.”
Magick haunted the edge of her voice, but there was something more to it. Fear.
It clawed at Kanon’s gut too. Someone had killed his friends to pin this on him, but why? What had he done? Tegan caught his arm and dragged him out of the house, leaving Lennox to her whispered chants as she wiped any traces of them from the house.
And she wasn’t the only one to have worked magick in that kitchen. Someone else, the same person who had gutted both Tristan and Caro, had done the same to mask their own trail, just like they had with Tristan’s. He was certain of that now. Kanon sagged against the car, staring off into the forest.
How were they supposed to track someone who never left a trail?
Tegan slumped against him. “You think we need her?”
Think? He knew. Kanon tilted his head in a nod. “I think she’s the only one who has a clue about what’s going on.”
Hair tickled his neck as Tegan leaned his face against Kanon’s shoulder. “Someone has an issue with you. Someone damned good at making sure you’re the suspect.”
Kanon nodded. Yeah. Someone a lot like the Hound in the building keeping him safe. They needed her all right, because without Lennox, Kanon wasn’t going to be able to keep himself from a silver bullet.