Allure of the Wolf (Seraphine Thomas Book 2) (23 page)

I wiped the back of my neck, moving the towels around front and trying to keep cool about what I’d just learned, even as I made a snap decision about these guys. If nothing else, I needed wolves I could trust at my back. “Come to Chicago. I can’t promise to take over the pack, but I’ll talk to Alena, verify what you guys have said, we’ll talk, get you settled somewhere you can call home. We’ll fix the pack and figure out
something
. I could definitely use the help. Is that enough for you both for now?”

They glanced at each other before Hagan moved closer and kissed my neck. “Would we also at the minimum have the chance to be your moon mates, Seraphine?”

“We meant what we said about being everything you need and pledging ourselves to you, being
your
wolves,” Reagan growled as he mirrored he’s twin’s actions.

“Yeah, I’m sure moon mates wouldn’t be a problem,” I moaned, knowing my siren’s answer. “But more than that I’m not sirening anyone else. I already have a vampire and a wolf by accident. My life is complicated.”

“We want to help, not complicate.” They both stepped away, smiling as Hagan spoke.

That sounded great. But then again, wasn’t that what everyone said?

Right before they complicated things.

They slipped out of the bathroom first to head back to the lecture, then I did, tired in a whole new way, my mind spinning out at the new possibly
good
development and the idea of killing Engle.

“While Davis has been talking to you about witches, Agent Barnes has been moving around the room undetected planting cloning and monitoring devices,” Monroe informed the lecture hall as I stepped back in. “I now have remote access to twenty phones, laptops, and tablets.” He thanked Shaw as he took a tablet from her. Then he flipped through what we now had from the bugs Barnes had placed before glancing up at Curtis. “Cute kids. I love this one of you guys eating the sundaes.”

“How the fuck—” the man exclaimed, reaching in his pocket to pull out his phone. He ripped off the little disc thing on the back of it. “How? I didn’t feel a damn thing?”

“No one wants to see what else we have first?” Monroe teased, shaking the tablet. “I’ve got some good stuff here.”

“Your point has been made, Chief Monroe,” Curtis growled. “Tell us how.”

“Agent Barnes, come take a bow,” Monroe instructed.

There was a quiet
ribbit
and then a tiny frog came hopping down one of the main staircases.

“Shit, there’s a frog in here!” one trainee sitting on the aisle bitched as he stood and raised his foot to stomp on Barnes.

“No!”
we all shouted, but Shaw and Monroe were the ones who reacted in time. Shaw used her fairy powers to freeze the trainee as Monroe just about launched himself at the guy, careful of Barnes.

“You
touch
my agent and I
will
eat you,” Monroe snarled as he grabbed the guy by the neck, fangs out and all. “You were warned to be prepared for
anything
today. You’ve seen two other animals in there. Why
else
would a frog be in here, asshole?”

“And what kind of douche stomps on a frog?” I added as I hurried over to Barnes and caught him when he leapt off the last step. “You okay, Agent Barnes?” I waited until the frog nodded. “Chief, he’s fine. Don’t eat the idiot. Let Curtis give him extra training. I remember how much fun the instructors have with people who make bonehead calls.”

“Yes, yes we do, Chief Thomas.”

Monroe let go of the guy but he still couldn’t move until Shaw released him… Which ended up being an effective and cool demonstration of fairy gifts all on its own.

“Meet Agent Shaw, our team’s fairy,” I introduced with a sweep of my free arm. “And I think you now can see how useful and miraculous having one of her on a team can be. Once she’s had a chance to be field-trained since she hasn’t been afforded the opportunities all of you here have, I
fully
plan on having her at my back when I’m out in the field.”

“Thanks, Chief,” she replied, her cheeks heating up. I kind of felt bad because it wasn’t actually true. She was one of our techies, but after I’d seen what she could do, I might think of putting her in the field.

Or finding some fairies who wanted to work in the field because what she’d done was badass.

The rest of the lecture went off without a hitch, and overall I thought we were a really big success. We took a break for lunch, and while the trainees got a kick out of feeding Harris raw steaks and the rest of the team answered questions, Monroe and I spoke with instructors about helping
our
people and continuing to guest lecture remotely.

All around it was a win, win,
win
situation. And when I got the call from Cooper as we piled onto the plane to go home—poor Harris and Barnes still in animal form—that another seven people had qualified the field shooting test, I was pretty damn pleased with myself.

I was really starting to make a difference. Who
wouldn’t
pat themselves on the back for that?

14

The day after I’d returned from Quantico I’d sat down with Tristan and Riley, discussing what I’d learned about needing to kill Engle. They were both
truly
upset, having thought I’d known the rules of an Alpha challenge since they said I’d told them I’d learned about dominance fights. We talked a lot about it, and while I was still completely conflicted, the more I learned about Engle and the pack, the more I had a sinking suspicion there wouldn’t be any other alternative to stop what had been going on.

I also filled them in on the Cooney twins. Riley was
thrilled
about the possibility of getting some moral Betas in the pack and maybe arresting the law breakers as a good way to take out the trash.

“Why are you behind this
now
?” I hedged, my knife freezing mid-slice to the ribs I was preparing for the smoker.

“Taking them all out leaves us with no strength in the pack,” he explained, rubbing his hands over his head. “That means another asshole or roaming group will see us a prime target for take-over potential. That’s the
last
thing we need. Having strength keeps us safe. We need strong wolves to keep out invading wolves, but we can’t have the all the ones in charge now keep being the leaders of the pack without the same shit happening.”

Well didn’t that just make shit even
more
complicated?

I gave Alena Dorcus a call as well. She couldn’t say enough great things about the Cooney twins and thought I was making great progress, handling the situation just as she would. I could hear the pride in her voice as she spoke of my choices, and for the first time in my life, I almost understood why people went to such great lengths to please their parents. I’d basically grown up without any but now it was as if I had wolf ones.

Which was
so
Jerry Springer since I’d gotten them when I’d killed their
son
. No, that didn’t scream we all needed therapy.

Thursday morning, trace came back from our shark case and there wasn’t anything useable. The clothes were generic, anything they could identify or process was simply too basic to give us a lead. Surveillance was a bust as well. Nothing was caught by the cameras, and too many people were coming and going in that area to match our victim when we couldn’t even recreate what he really looked like.

“But they do it on
Bones
all the time,” Jennings had whined to me.

“Real life isn’t TV,” Davis reminded him, cuffing him upside the head.

“Wouldn’t it be nice if it was sometimes,” I sighed, wishing we could just pull a facial sketch out of thin air and match it off some database in three seconds.

Friday afternoon, between checking on shooting training and how the rest of my squad was doing inputting Noah’s
edited
species files, I went for a run at the pack lands, my wolf ready to burst out of me at how badly I’d been ignoring her, besides only showing her off and teasing her. I let her run free, and she took
full
advantage, wearing me out for an hour, so when I shifted back as I reached my car, I was ready for a nap.

Instead I was received by a pissed off Engle and three of his Betas.

“Alpha,” I greeted, nodding but not baring my neck, which made his eyes fill with even more rage. Oh goodie. I took my fob off my necklace and popped my trunk to get my
clothes,
but he stepped in front of me, blocking my path. “I’d like to get dressed now.”

“I want you naked, and I’m dominant to you,” he taunted, raking his eyes over my body in a creepy way.

I felt my hackles rise and in a move I knew he couldn’t keep up with I bolted around him and to my trunk. “Well good thing we live in America and pack Alpha or
not
you can’t order me to stay naked just so you can ogle me. Not the best way to start a conversation when I was playing nice, Engle.”

“That’s
Alpha
to you,” one of his Betas snapped.

“As I said, I
was
playing nice,” I purred, batting my eyelashes at the guy as I pulled on my panties before my jeans. “What can I help you gentlemen with? I assume this isn’t a coincidence.”

“It’s not. We want to know where our mates are,” the Beta demanded. “Tell me where my mate is this
instance
, woman.”

“They’ve been gone long enough, Seraphine,” Engle added. “I said until the full moon. The lunar cycle begins in two days and we haven’t talked. It’s time for them to return. I’m ordering you to bring them home.”

My stomach fluttered, and I froze in putting on my bra but then continued. “I’m going to pretend I didn’t just hear you say that and instead take your
wishes
under advisement, Mr. Engle.”

“You heard me correctly,” he growled, storming around my car and getting in my face. “Your Alpha is—”

“Demanding something he has
no right
to demand,” I snarled, letting my power flash in my eyes and over my skin. “You’re asking me to illegally shut down my investigation. That won’t happen. They asked for police protection. I have absolutely no reason to deny it.
My Alpha ordered me to
doesn’t fly and technically you’re attempting to intimidate a federal agent by trying to get me to do it. So let me inform you that you are so you
stop
.” I glanced past him at the other men. “Your mates are fine, they’re safe.”

“How do we know that?” the same Beta demanded.

“If you are asking me for an official request for visitation, I can speak with them and
ask
if they are willing to meet with you, supervised. But that’s it. Other than that, I can pass along any message you’d like. I can’t force them to see you or come home. There have been some claims they were coerced into signing marriage licenses and their ceremonies were not exactly on the up-and-up.”

“That’s
all
they’ve said?” Engle pushed, rubbing his chin as if debating that charge over possible others. No, that didn’t make me wonder what else was going on that we didn’t know about yet.

Fucker.

I swallowed my hate for the man—actually feeling the lump in my throat—and played the game to buy time. “I cannot discuss an ongoing investigation, but I will tell you that at this time.”

“You
will
—”

“Don’t finish that sentence!”
I ordered, putting all my power in my voice. I smiled as Engle bared his throat to me before he could catch himself. Then he did and lowered his head. “Exactly. You may be Alpha but do not try to challenge me, Joseph. You won’t like the outcome. You’re acting like a
criminal
, coming to me, pushing me to close my investigation, bringing muscle to intimidate me. I put this in my report and the bureau will start tearing into
all
your lives. Do you want that?”

“No, no we don’t,” he answered, taking half a step back.

“There are already enough eyes on you and the pack because of the Bernard Dorcus thing and all the unanswered questions,” I reminded him as I angrily grabbed my shirt and tugged it on, roughly enough I heard a few of the seams tear.

His eyes went wide. “I thought you shut that down?”

“Shut
what
down? You never helped me with shit. We have no answers.”

“It’s your job to protect the pack, Seraphine!”

“My
job
is to find the truth and to solve crimes,
Joseph
! The Shifter Council backs my office on this one. If the pack had anything to do with the illegal weapons Bernard and the wolves at the bust were involved in, they want them turned in so the heat is off the community.” I zipped up my boots now that they and my socks were on, glancing up at him and smirking when I saw him squirming.