Zev had his gaze trained on Skyler. The second bullet hit the young wolf, and Dimitri’s lifemate dragged the bloody animal into the brush. He caught a glimpse of Branislava, crouched close. Another wolf, a huge male, leapt from a distance away, as if he’d come from a tree branch rather than on the ground. He raced across the open forest floor, cutting unexpectedly from one side to the next in a zigzag pattern.
Zev recognized Dimitri’s big alpha, Shadow. Whether he was protecting Skyler or the fallen female, he was uncertain, but it didn’t matter. Damon didn’t shoot him. Zev stuck the tip of a silver dagger hard into Damon’s back. All he had to do was use his mixed blood strength to penetrate through muscle and bone to reach the heart.
“Shove the gun out of the tree,” he advised. “You know me. You know I’ll kill you in a heartbeat. Don’t be stupid enough to make any mistakes.”
Damon stiffened, recognizing his voice. He let the weapon fall to the ground below. “I thought you were dead.”
Zev’s heart plunged. Had Daciana told her brother? Was she somehow connected to this betrayal? She was family to him. “Now why would you think that?” He kept his voice even, not wanting to sound in the least as if with that one question, Damon had unknowingly called his sister’s loyalty in question.
Damon shrugged. “The news came down the pipe that the Carpathians had pulled some trick and tried to off the council. You died protecting one of them and the Lycans fought them, trying to get the other council members out of their territory.”
“Link your fingers behind your head and just stay exactly the way you are. I mean it, Damon. Did Daciana tell you all that?” He reached out and casually cut through the belt looping around Damon’s hip, dropping the cache of weapons to the branch. With a flick of the tip of his knife, he sent the entire belt to the forest floor.
A low growl escaped Damon. “My sister? I was told they killed her.”
“Did you try to call her?”
“Over and over. I got no response. I tried her partner, Makoce, but he didn’t answer, either. No one did.”
“She’s alive and well, Damon. She’s guarding the council members as we speak. A faction of Lycans, not Carpathians, attacked the Carpathian village simultaneously with an attempt on the lives of the prince and our council members.” Zev reached around him to flip up his sleeve, revealing the tattoo of the Sacred Circle. “All of those who tried to assassinate the council have that same tattoo.”
“That’s bullshit, Zev. We believe in morals and ethics, not killing our own kind or murdering other species.”
“Yet here you sit, lying in wait to murder a young woman who has done absolutely nothing to you. You were waiting to wound a wolf just to use the animal as bait, knowing she had enough compassion to come to try to save it.”
The accusation was harsh, but he felt harsh. He felt like shaking Damon until his teeth rattled and then taking him out behind the proverbial barn to beat some sense into him. What was wrong with his people? Lycans were good people, not fanatics who killed without thought.
“I wasn’t going to shoot a wolf,” Damon mumbled.
“But someone gave you the orders to shoot them,” Zev insisted. “That was part of your mission. Draw out the woman by using one of our wild brethren.”
Damon sighed. “It didn’t make any sense, but someone has to pay for killing Daciana.”
“I told you, you idiot, she isn’t dead. And really, Damon, killing Skyler wouldn’t bring her back if she was. What possessed you to join with these people? You have a brain, why weren’t you using it?”
Damon didn’t answer.
Zev was fed up with the entire thing. “If you had lifted that rifle at either the wolf or Skyler, I would have staked you on the spot, and you would have deserved it.”
Damon sank back on his heels. “I don’t know why I joined them.” He sounded confused. “You’re right. This goes against everything I believe in. It isn’t like me not to check facts. This goes against the code of the Sacred Circle as well. We don’t condone violence. Self-defense, yes, but not murder. Not luring a girl out into the open and shooting her.” He dropped his arms and turned toward Zev. “What the hell is going on with me?”
“What part of ‘stay exactly the way you are’ didn’t you understand?” Zev asked quietly.
Damon placed his hands, palm down, on his thighs. “I’m not a threat. I want to see Daciana. Maybe she can figure out what’s really going on.”
His voice rang with truth. Zev didn’t know what to believe. He never would have thought that Damon would join in a murder.