“Something bad has happened to her. Patrin’s desperate to find her.”
It was on my lips to say something smart—something along the lines of like I’m supposed to care?—but I held back. I understood such desperation, knew it could force you to do anything—including contact an outcast. I’d felt it whenever Rhoan got into trouble, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Not even someone I hated.
“Then contact the Directorate. Give them the information. There’s nothing I can do without the official go-ahead anyway.”
Which was only a teensy lie. If I was so inclined, I could investigate just about anything. Guardians were the super-cops—the hunter-killers—of the nonhuman world, and we had free rein to investigate whatever we wanted. Though if I did investigate, and did find something, I’d have to report it back to my boss. And full investigation could only go ahead with his official approval.
“All I’m asking you to do is an initial investigation. If you feel there’s nothing the Directorate can do, then I’ll try other sources.”
He sounded altogether too reasonable, and my hackles rose. Blake and reason just didn’t go together—at least according to my memories of the man. “You were ordering me a few moments ago.”
“Perhaps I’m seeing the error of my ways.”
“And perhaps tomorrow they’ll put a woman on Mars.” I shifted from one foot to the other. I wasn’t trusting this new and improved Blake any more than the last one, but it couldn’t hurt to play along. “Why do you think her disappearance is a Directorate matter?”
“Besides Patrin’s feeling she’s in mortal danger, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“There’s a pattern, as I said.”
Annoyance swirled through me. “So tell me the pattern.”
“For a start, they all vacationed at Monitor Island.”
Is that why he’d contacted me? He’d been investigating the island and discovered my presence? It’d be my luck, that was for sure. “And?”
“And they all disappeared within a week of returning home from the island.”
“Meaning the island might not be the connector.”
“Then there’s the man.”
“Human or nonhuman man?”
“Human. He works on the island, apparently.”
Which wasn’t much of a clue, considering over half the people working on the island were males of the human variety. “What as?”
Blake shrugged, and the movement made his image shimmer. “Adrienne said he worked as a bartender.”
“Blake, there’s at least five bars in this cove alone. It’d be nice if you could pin it down a little.”
“I believe his name might be Jim Denton.”
“So she danced with this Jim Denton?”
He hesitated and annoyance flashed in his eyes. “I believe so.”
I restrained a sudden smile. So Adrienne wasn’t telling Daddy and Granddaddy everything. Good for her. Though I was surprised she’d gone against pack law and danced with a human. But maybe that was the whole point. “And the others?”
“I’ve talked to one other family. They also mentioned their daughter meeting a man who worked on the island.”
“Meeting? What about bedding?”
“That I can’t say. But probably.”
“And the women were all wolves?”
He nodded.
Well, we werewolves did tend to get around—although I did find it surprising they’d bed the human males over the nonhuman. There were too many inherent risks in that sort of choice—although the mere fact that wolf-human half-breeds existed suggested there were plenty who didn’t agree with my point of view.
“That doesn’t mean they bedded the same man,” I said. “As I’ve already said, there’s more than one male working on this island.”
“His description matches the one I have from Adrienne.”
So, Adrienne wouldn’t give her grandfather a name, but she did give a description? Somehow, I doubted it. There was more going on here than what Blake was saying. “If you’ve only talked to one other family, how do you know there are three women missing?”
“I know.” His voice was grim. “Clairvoyance is a pack inheritance, remember?”
“I don’t believe anyone bothered mentioning that to the half-breeds.” Though it did at least explain where my no-longer-latent clairvoyance skills came from.
Amusement twinkled briefly in his cold gray eyes. “An oversight, I’m sure.”
Hate swelled up, its bitter taste just about making me gag. “This isn’t a Directorate problem, Blake. Go haunt someone else, because I’m not interested in helping you or your get.”
I turned and walked away, as fast as I could. That prickle of awareness told me Blake hadn’t moved, and yet his voice reached out across the distance as easily as if he were standing right beside me.
“You will help us, Riley.”
“That impolite response I cast your way earlier still stands.”
“Riley, stop.”
My muscles twitched with the need to obey, but my vampire half was having none of that. It was all I could do not to break into a run to get away from his presence—though if I thought it would do any good, I probably would have.
“Riley, I’m ordering you to stop right now, or face the consequences.”
“There’s nothing you can do to me, Blake. Not anymore.”
I should have known better than to tempt fate like that. I really should have.
“If you do not stop this instant,” he said softly, “I will kill your mother.”
Chapter 2
I stopped.
How could I not? I might not have seen my mother since we’d been thrown out of the pack at sixteen, but that didn’t mean I didn’t love her. Didn’t mean I wanted her dead.She was my mother, for Christ’s sake.
I swung around. “Trust me, Blake. You do not want to go this route. It’s a very bad thing to do.”
His smile was arrogant. Confident. “There’s nothing the Directorate can do to me. I’m well within the law to chastise my pack as I see fit. If a pack member dies during meted justice?” He shrugged. “The law will not intervene unless the event is reported as something more than fair punishment. And no one in this pack will report it.”
“I can report it. I can investigate it. And trust me, you would not want me or Rhoan anywhere near that pack. We’re no longer the helpless cubs you booted out.”
“And we are no longer the dying pack you remember. We’ve grown stronger, richer. More influential.”
Yeah, and I knew exactly how. My ability to shadow had provided a means of learning more than a few pack secrets. And if the pack was now rich, it certainly hadn’t been via hard work and good money management.
I shook my head. “You really have no idea who you’re dealing with, Blake.” No idea what he was dealing with.
“I want this problem dealt with. Then I will leave you, your half-breed brother, and your mother alone.”
I shifted from one foot to the other, the need to run fighting with the need to wipe that cold look of satisfaction off his face. The twin desires made my muscles twitch. “And Konner? What’s he got to say about all this?”
Blake’s grin was gloating. “I defeated your grandfather in battle one year after you left. His ashes were scattered across his favorite hunting trail, as he requested.”
I stared at him for a moment, not sure what to think. What to feel.
There’d been no love lost between our grandfather and us, and he’d turned his back on much of the trouble we’d had with Blake and his get. Yet he’d housed the three of us, fed us, made sure we never wanted for anything basic, and had never allowed the games to go too far—except for the one time Blake had thrown me off the mountain. And even then, his hands were tied. Pack rules gave the second-in-command the right to punish as he saw fit—at least when it came to matters of insubordination.
And now my grandfather was dead, killed in a battle for leadership. I closed my eyes and tried to fight the bloody images that came to mind. I’d only ever seen one fight for dominance in a pack, and it hadn’t been pretty. Such fights were always done in wolf form, and almost always ended in the death of the old leader. Such were the ways of our wild cousins, and they had always been ours, too.
And the law allowed it, because it came under the title of religious beliefs and customs.
Which was just another way of sanctifying murder, if you asked me. Unfortunately, no one was ever likely to do that.
“If you’ve got a list of names, send them to me tonight,” I said. “I can check them against the island’s records.”
“I’ve already done that.”
“And I intend to redo it, because I may see something that you missed.” I crossed my arms and stared at his ethereal form. “I don’t want you harassing my every step, Blake, or I will have the full force of the Directorate brought down on the pack’s head.”
“Patrin wants regular reports.”
“I don’t give a—”
He held up a hand. “Yeah, I know. Tough.”
I glowered at him. He stared back. For several seconds neither of us moved, then he sighed and rubbed a hand across his eyes. “What is your phone number? I’ll send you the list of names and whatever other information I have.”