“That’s why she’s Alpha. Our instinct is to hunt them down. But these days? There are other ways. The point, though, is that my goal is Malcolm, and his trail is warm. He came to Detroit to visit a contact, right?”
“Yes, from his days with the Nasts.”
“Then I’m going to pay a visit to his contact. You don’t need to come along. It’s been a long night, and after Tina …” He shrugged. “I can drop you at a hotel and check back with an update in the morning.”
“I should go along, as backup.”
He said nothing.
She continued, “I won’t interfere. After what happened to Tina, you’re in charge here. You’re the one who understands what we’re dealing with.”
“Then just tell me where we need to go.”
12. NICK
Before they reached their destination, Nick pulled over. He had to update Elena, and he wanted to do that in private. Vanessa had her own call to make. She’d texted Rhys, but her boss wanted to speak to her about getting Tina’s body back.
Nick had hated leaving Tina behind. At the very least, he’d wanted to hide her body, but the arrival of the hunters quashed that plan.
He left Vanessa in the car so they could make their respective calls.
Elena put him on speakerphone—she and Clay hadn’t gone to bed after he told them he was leaving for Detroit. Jeremy had taken the twins to Charleston, where Jaime was doing a show, so they didn’t have to worry about him overhearing.
“So it’s definitely Malcolm,” Clay said after Nick explained about finding Tina. “Good.”
Elena sighed. “What he means is, ‘Damn, it’s a shame Malcolm killed that poor woman.’ Did you know her well?”
“I’d met her. We had drinks. It’s harder on Vanessa. She’s holding up, though—she hasn’t had much time to process it.”
He told them about the bounty hunters.
“Son of a bitch,” Clay said. “Bounties? Here?”
“Vanessa said it happens.”
“And no one bothered to tell us?”
“I’ll raise a stink,” Elena said. “Right now, we need to make sure these guys don’t pick up your trail. Did they get a look at you?”
He told them what the bounty hunter had said.
“So he’s probably seen your picture somewhere,” Elena said.
Clay grunted. “Hopefully on a list of ‘werewolves you do not fuck with or you’ll bring the whole Pack down on your head.’”
“Hmm,” she said. “Did they seem to know you’re a werewolf?”
“No,” Nick said. “I’ll keep my eyes open, but they’re on Malcolm’s trail. Which is still inconvenient. They don’t stand a hope in hell of taking him down, but there’s always dumb luck.”
“You want me to hop in the car?” Clay asked.
Nick was about to answer when he realized it wasn’t him that Clay was asking.
“It’s up to Nick,” Elena said. “If he wants to get rid of Vanessa, you can back him. Rhys will squawk, but he doesn’t have much leverage here. He screwed up not letting Nick take over.”
“I’ll grab my bag,” Clay said.
“Hold on,” Nick said. “I didn’t answer yet.”
Clay made a noise, as if to say this was merely a formality. Of course Nick would want him there.
“Let’s wait,” Nick said. “We’ve got werewolf hunters in town, and you’re the most recognizable werewolf in the country.”
“So? They come after me, we end the problem.”
“And have three bodies to bury?” Elena said.
“Nah. One, maximum. I’ll just scare the shit out of them and make them realize this werewolf-hunting thing isn’t as much fun as they thought.”
“While Malcolm escapes?”
Silence.
“Fine,” Clay grunted. “But my bag is already packed. Find Malcolm. Then give me a call.”
“I will.”
They were in the suburbs, outside a house big enough to hold a family with five children and two dogs. As Nick surveyed the place from the idling car, he said, “So Malcolm’s contact doesn’t live alone.”
“Just him and his wife.”
“Kids grown?”
Vanessa shook her head. “No kids. He took advantage of a really bad real estate market.” She waved down the road. “Half these places are empty. Foreclosures everywhere.”
Which explained why the street was so dark. They’d driven through other neighborhoods that seemed to be thriving, but this—like that downtown street of vacancies—was what people thought of when you said “Detroit” these days. Nick looked at the huge house. It’d be less of a bargain when they were paying to keep it heated during a Michigan winter.
“Any idea which houses are empty?” he asked.
After a minute of flurried typing on her phone, Vanessa said, “I can tell you.”
“Direct me to one, and we’ll park there.”
13. NICK
They found an empty house, and Nick snapped the garage door lock and parked inside. Then they crossed backyards to the contact’s house.
The contact was Richard Stokes. A sorcerer, married to a half-demon named Sharon. According to Vanessa’s sources, Stokes worked for the Nasts as a hit man, which is how he’d gotten to know Malcolm. They’d done a few jobs together—the Nasts sending them out as tag-team assassins.
From all accounts, Malcolm did not like partners. His first two had suffered unfortunate and fatal accidents during their missions. Malcolm had barely bothered disguising what he’d done, and his excuses had been perfunctory at best. That was Malcolm flexing his muscles and nudging his boundaries, seeing how badly the Cabal wanted him.
With Stokes, the Nasts found a partnership model that worked, mainly because it wasn’t a partnership at all. Stokes figured out that Malcolm shouldn’t theoretically have a problem working with someone. Wolves were pack hunters. The issue was one of hierarchy. Stokes had let Malcolm take the lead, and it turned into a beautiful friendship. Or at least a functional working relationship.
In the Pack, every wolf who ran with Malcolm was never allowed to forget what a privilege that was. In the last decade, though, Malcolm had lacked his usual posse of sycophants. He’d had only one: Richard Stokes.
When Malcolm escaped, then, it wasn’t long before he’d showed up on Stokes’s doorstep demanding payment in services, information, and money. That put Stokes in a very ugly position. If the Nasts found out that he’d had contact with their valuable escapee, they’d kill him. If he ratted out his former partner, Malcolm would kill him. So Stokes had played both sides. He did help Malcolm. Meanwhile, he told the Nasts and got the Cabal to agree to let him keep aiding their escapee until Malcolm lowered his guard enough to be safely brought back in. A mole in the Nast Cabal had passed all that along to Rhys.
Now Nick and Vanessa were at the Stokeses’ back door, under cover of night, wearing gloves from Vanessa’s kit, evaluating the situation.
The dark house meant Stokes and his wife had gone to bed. Which made things easier. It did, however, increase the chance they’d startle the two and get hit with a combined blast of spell and half-demon power.
The first potential obstacle was a security system. Luckily, Vanessa had a device to detect if one had been installed, and the skills to disarm it. When the detection device came back negative, she hesitated.
“That doesn’t seem right,” she said. “Stokes is a professional killer. He knows the value of security.”
Nick shrugged. “Maybe he thinks being a hit man means he doesn’t need it.”