What bothered him was her reluctance. An hour went by, and while her wolf trotted around and checked out the property, she didn’t show any signs of tiring. Jericho could usually sit it out—the animal needed their time to run free, but Isabelle had shifted that morning and it wasn’t like her wolf to take control.
Jericho pulled out his phone and punched Reno’s number.
“Reno.”
“Hey, you got a second?”
“What’s up?”
Jericho paced in a circle. “I need to know what happened in that trailer between Isabelle and their attacker. What did April say?”
“She said he was looking for drugs and money. He worked for someone Hawk dealt with.”
“Did he know about Hawk being dead?”
“Yeah, she overheard that part of the convo,” Reno said, out of breath. The music in the phone began to fade, and it sounded as if he were distancing himself from the crowd. “April knows who the ringleader is.”
“What do you mean?”
“The guy said a name—Delgado. That’s the same sonofabitch who sent one of his lackeys after April. He’s a loan shark, but it looks like he has his finger in all kinds of pies. Drugs, for one. I know for a fact he’s been buying up strip clubs in town. Breed clubs.”
“So he’s human,” Jericho said, wiping a few blades of grass off his arm.
“Yeah, that’s problematic. He put his finger in the wrong fucking pie, but we can’t do a damn thing because he’s human, and he knows it. Delgado has other men do his dirty work and stays out of sight. That’s how the big boys like to operate.”
“Why does he think Isabelle has Hawk’s stash?”
Reno’s voice sounded tired. “Guess they did a search and couldn’t find it. You better check your girl out; she might know where it is.”
Jericho turned around and looked at her wolf pawing a hole in the dirt. “She doesn’t know.”
“Bullshit.”
“Look, Reno, I know this girl like the back of my hand. She would have done the right thing if she knew because that’s the kind of girl she is. But if we don’t give that asshole what he’s looking for, he’s going to keep coming back for her until I kill him. You can tell Austin we’ll sleep outside tonight, but if he tosses her on the street because of this shit, I’m going with her. That’s a done deal.”
“Hold up—”
Jericho hung up the phone and sat on his knees. “Come here, Isabelle.”
She trotted over and nuzzled against his chin, licking his mouth.
“If you want to make out with me, you’re going to have to shift.” He stroked her face and looked deep into her green eyes. “Come on, baby. We’ll figure this out together. I’m not going anywhere and neither are you. I know you’re freaking out in there and that’s why your she-devil wolf is on the prowl, but she’s not going to fix your problems, and you can’t hide from them forever. Maybe you’re scared. After what just happened with Hawk, I don’t blame you. But you need to trust me.”
Her wolf sat down and cocked her head. Yeah, something was wrong. Isabelle had a badass wolf, but she’d never been stubborn with him. She also wasn’t acting herself. Usually her wolf liked to dig in the dirt and roll around, but she stayed calm and almost protective of Jericho as she turned her back and kept her eyes sharp and alert.
Jericho glanced back at the house and saw Lynn had switched off the lights.
Maybe Isabelle was mad at him and not ready to come out. When he’d ditched her to make a run to town, he didn’t have any concerns about leaving her alone. She wasn’t a child. That human stood no chance against her wolf, but he wondered if Isabelle had fought him in human form. That seed planted in his head and made his wolf stir with anger. He surged to his feet, wiping the dirt off his pants. What he really wanted to do was take care of her problems by finding the piece of shit who went by the name Delgado.
Isabelle had been through enough, subjected to the worst kind of betrayal by an asshole boyfriend she’d thought she could trust.
Then again, who was Jericho to talk? He had turned his back on their friendship for drugs and women.
He clenched his fists and paced. They better have taken care of everything with the dead human, because killing a human was against the law. Self-defense had to be proven, and no one had found a weapon on the body. The higher authority could arrest Isabelle and charge her with murder.
The protective instinct was too powerful to resist, and Jericho’s wolf emerged.
Chapter 20
My back itched. When I rolled to my side, I could feel blades of grass stuck to my skin. I squinted as the morning light pierced my eyes like a reckoning, and I shielded my face with my arm.