“We could use you in Brandon, Chris. Just for a few more days,” Matt was saying as he helped himself to more bacon. “I don’t know where those wulfleng disappeared to, but there are more, I’m sure of it. They must have someone organizing them or they’d be more obvious.”
Chris’s attention drifted over to Josh, standing with Peter at the sink. Josh chose that moment to return to the table, picking up more empty plates. His gaze locked for a moment with the enforcer, and something wordless passed between them.
“You gotta do what you gotta do,” he told Chris, but he smiled. “I’ll be fine. Go play big bad enforcer.”
Chris snorted, but his expression lightened.
Sam’s eyes flicked between Josh and Chris. “We might be fine on our own, Dad.”
Matt shook his head. “Those wulfleng are big suckers. Whoever is behind this has a recruitment strategy, and size is at the top of the list. We had a hell of a time putting them down. I think we need Chris.”
“We have Garrett.” And she grinned, which I interpreted more as baring of teeth. “And me. And Cass wants to get experience—”
“Cass is not going anywhere near this,” thundered Matt, his brows drawing down.
“Not until she gets more experience, anyway,” Chris agreed. “These wulfleng are fierce fighters. They’ve had training.”
Sam subsided but her eyes flashed fire. Were she and her sister anything alike? Not sure the world is ready for two of them. Then I noticed Sam’s gaze narrow.
“You know,” she said, “I only saw Dillon briefly when you guys pulled his body out of the water. I was kinda busy . . .” Her eyes slid over me and I realized “busy” was looking after my unconscious self. “But he was damned big. As big as those wulfleng we tackled back home.”
Chris’s brows rose and he exchanged a glance with Matt. “Dillon was a big guy, but his wulf was huge.”
Matt nodded. “As big as the ones in Brandon, and they were bigger than I’ve ever seen. With oversized teeth and claws. Dillon looked a lot like them.” He stared at Chris. “And someone took Dillon’s body.”
I turned to frown at Chris. “What are you saying? Someone’s recruiting Sasquatches?” I tried to imagine how that would go down. Excuse me, but you’re a big guy, wanna be a wulf? “And how is Chloe connected? I thought she infected Dillon?”
Chris sucked on his teeth. “If we’re right, someone else gave Dillon the virus.”
Chloe had lied about her brother biting Dillon. She might have lied about other things too. Like maybe Dillon already had the virus when he arrived at her college. But if that was the case, why not say so? Unless . . .they were running away from more than the Texas enforcers.
Sam was trying to work things through, too. “Were the ones who infected the humans the same ones who came for the bodies?”
Good question.
“Could someone else be cleaning up?” Chris asked.
Man, if there are two shadow organizations out there, we’ll never sort this out. How had they known where to find their bodies? Unless . . .
“Someone planted a tracker on Dillon,” Chris said, as if reading my mind. Or more likely, our thoughts galloped along similar paths. His mouth was straightened in a grim line, as he exchanged a long look with Matt.
“But why take Chloe as well?” Sam shook her head slowly.
We all contemplated that in silence. Whoever these people were, their agenda remained unknown. All we knew was that they were well organized. Seriously organized.
“Are all uprisings like this?” I asked.
“No.” Matt answered, his expression lined with fatigue. “This one’s different.”
Well, that’s not scary at all. I glanced at Chris, who rubbed a hand over his face. I noticed fine silver lines across the back of it. It seemed the more I looked at Chris the more I saw his scars.
“I can give you a few days,” he said to Matt. “You leaving right away?”
Matt nodded. “Yeah. We’ll need a ride. Mike took the helicopter back yesterday.”
Chris exchanged a glance with Josh. “I’ll just grab my bag.” He disappeared down the hall, and Josh followed.
Peter stood at the end of the table, his mouth in a hard line. He pinned Matt with his gaze. “You find out who did this. It’s them who killed Chloe, not Josh.”
Matt stood and placed his big hand on Peter’s shoulder. “We will. I promise you.”
Peter nodded and together they grabbed the last plates from the table, heading for the sink. Keen appeared, bone firmly clamped in her mouth. Apparently, Chris’s bed would be bone free for the night. She walked to the back door, looking over her shoulder at me. I want to bury this, please.
I went to let her out and stepped into the warm morning sun, admiring Josh’s gardens. Keen immediately started searching the soft earth for the right spot, and I watched to make sure she didn’t uproot anything.
A soft step behind me made me turn. “Are you seeing Fang next week?”
I looked down to meet Sam’s bright gaze. Her question took me aback, not that she knew about Fang—I’d told her about him—but that I hadn’t even thought about my return to work. Life as a vet seemed so far away. For the last two weeks, my future as a walking, breathing entity had been in doubt, never mind my career treating animals.
“Yeah,” I said, realizing she waited for an answer. She’d be heading for Brandon as soon as Chris got ready. Unsure of my feelings about this, I consulted with my inner wulf. With a rush of something dangerously akin to desire, I recognized I didn’t want her to go. But I also lacked a reason for her to stay.
Her shrewd pale eyes searched my face and perhaps detected my angst. “Give me your phone.”
“My phone?”
“Yes. Little black thing, about so big. You talk into it.” She sketched a small rectangular
