Thomas Etheridge, Royal Inspector for the Upper Mulgrew Pack and veteran member of the inner circle of advisors to its alpha-king and queen, found himself in the strange predicament of not knowing what to do.
From the moment he'd seen the she-wolf there on the shoreâJoan, he at last knew her nameâhis crisp manner had thinned to a brittle mask. She hadn't been a hallucination, that bewitching figure who had shined through the dark fever of his mind like a beacon. She was real, flesh and bone and beating heart... and she was the one who had discovered the alpha-queen's latest victim.
Despite the weight of his badge, there was no guilt to his thoughts as he drove like a madman, pushing the car's engine as far as he dared to get them further into human territory. Every inch of his experience, authority, and intelligence was already thrown into helping her out of danger. Determination filled him, not doubt.
But what left him feeling like a gangly pup all over again, full of fire and confusion over what he hungered for, was the realization that their near miraculous encounter was nothing more than a brush of fingertips and lingering questions. To save her would mean losing her again... for good.
One more regret to add to the rest, and he pushed them all to the back of his mind while glancing at Joan. "We're going deep into the city to meet with a wolf with resources among humans. He can help us."
Joan had been watching through the rear window as if to see whether they were being followed, and she now turned to him. "Did you plan all this?"
"Not exactly," he admitted. "In fact, I was completely caught off-guard. But in the past year, I've saved other wolves from the queen's attention, enough times so that I now carry charms to escape at a moment's notice."
Not that anyone would have expected him to betray the alpha-queen. Not Etheridge, unwavering as steel and twice as dependable. Not Etheridge, who had taken a silver knife to the liver before going down while the rest of her advisors had fled at the first crack of a bullet. It was a solid shield, his reputation, but he well knew that the most paranoid members of the royal court were also the ones who survived the longest.
"So that was all the smoke in the car. But now everyone will know what you did to save my skin. There's no way you can go back."
"It's worth it," he said, and meant it. "I just need to get in touch with my contact. He won't be happy to move openly against an entire pack, but he'll still help."
"Why trust him over our own teeth?"
She sounded amazingly calm if skeptical. He could only admire her stoicism. Most wolves in her position would have been whining in fear. He'd seen a few who had even died while waiting in their cells, blood seeping from their noses because their hearts had burst in sheer panic. Living gods, he'd heard humans mutter about alpha-kings and alpha-queens, the inflection to the words scornful, mocking. They didn't realize the utter truth of it. Every pup was raised to worship royalty, was taught that even the moon bowed to those crowned heads.
And yet this she-wolf acted as if the wrath of demi-gods meant nothing to her, as if she would face them and only demand the same answers she now asked of him. A sea-wolf. He should have guessed from the beginning, even with his mind disoriented by silver sickness.
As the road turned into city streets crowded by other cars, he said, "It's not easy to escape the queen's wishes. He helped me rescue three other wolves from the pack before they were killed. While we're among humans, he's our best chance at hiding in safety."
Her mouth tightened. She clearly didn't like being hunted as prey. "Who is he?"
"Hayes. His name is Sam Hayes." He said the name carefully, unsure of her reaction.
She noticed. "Haven't heard of him, but you're acting like maybe I should."
"He's notorious among all wolf packs for living in exile among humans as a private detective. Because of it, he's forged many connections."
Once, he wouldn't have been able to say Hayes' name without baring his teeth. Private Detective Hayes had once been Royal Inspector Hayes for the Saxby Pack. Then he had abruptly left his prestigious position without one word of explanation, choosing to live among humans instead. Etheridge had thought him disloyal, a traitor to the oath he'd sworn to his pack. Now he was working with him. There was so much a bullet could shatter.
No. The truth. Always the truth, if only because he now realized how many lies he had believed. It hadn't been the silver but what the alpha-queen had done to the most vulnerable members of the pack. With a sigh, he added, "Through him, I can save you and maybe even the other sea-wolves from being caught and tortured."
"They'll be fine. I already warned them to leave." Joan ran fingers through her long hair, emphasizing the tiny shells and glass beads woven into it, before adding, "They'll go to our true home, and no outsider knows how to find it."
At his obvious surprise, her tone lightened. "Did you believe those of us living in the cliffs are the only sea-wolves to exist? That the rumors are right and we're all young because we melt into foam once we're too old? That we're all female because we devour any male we meet?"
Despite everything, her teasing brought out his own. "I don't know. Do you?"
She laughed. "You're still alive, aren't you?"
Traffic was thick yet sluggish, and he risked looking at her. Despite the hard angles of the car seat, she sat with the fluid grace of seaweed rippling in water. She had left the blanket behind, uncaring of how much of her body was exposed, but it was the mischief in her expression that caught him. Now he finally knew the rest of her face glowed with her eyes whenever she teased him. "Very much alive, thanks to you."
A car horn blared, jerking his attention back to the road, and he tried hard to concentrate on the route to the nightclub. Joan also fell silent, studying the crowds of humans and the stark geometry of the businesses and apartments they passed. If she noticed the buildings growing shabbier and the pedestrians dwindling as they drew close to their destination, she didn't comment on it.
"How do you feel about walking for the final several blocks?" he said, eyeing a nearby junkyard. He didn't want the pack to be able to find them by finding the stolen car. With any luck, it would be stripped in a matter of hours.
Joan nodded, still calm despite their situation. "Do you have anything I can cover myself with? I know humans get upset if you're not wearing enough clothes."
For the first time since he had seen her surrounded by guards on the beach, he hesitated. "The blanket was left behind with the others. There's only the jacket of my suit."
In other circumstances, the offer would have been brash, even rude. Wearing his jacket would leave her covered in his scentâa sign of possession among wolves, and an intimacy normally shared between mates. Joan's eyes widened slightly, but after a moment, she nodded again. Etheridge's heart felt tight for reasons he couldn't name while he shrugged off the jacket and handed it over.
Once they began walking, the few humans who saw them stayed away, unwilling to cross his revealed shoulder holsters and her cold glare. Etheridge's nose itched from the combined stench of cheap perfume, moldering trash, and teeth rotting in mouths. The Black Cat wasn't in the worst area of the city, but the smell of so many humans left him edgy. Joan seemed nervous as well, jerking when the piercing whistle of a factory sounded a few blocks away.
The club hadn't yet opened for the day, but Etheridge remained cautious while leading Joan down the alley to its side door. Then they slipped inside, blinking until their eyes adjusted to the dim lighting. The bartender was already in place, busily shining a glass. Other workers mopped the floors under the tables set out before the stage where, in a few hours, a woman would croon into a microphone as if it were a lover. No one glanced their way, some very deliberately so.
The air smelled like stale cigarettes, fresh flowers, and cologne from the waitstaff, overwhelming his nose, but Etheridge remembered where to go. He led Joan behind the red velvet curtains on the stage, their feet stepping between the mess of wires powering the lights until they found the hallway into the back rooms. A few more twists and turns and then he pushed at a bookcase, revealing it to be a door that swung open silently. A wooden stairway disappeared into darkness below.
Dust hung heavy in the doorway, and so did the smell of oak caskets and old cigarettes. Joan gave the air an uncertain sniff, but when he nodded at her to go in, she stepped ahead without hesitation. As he followed behind, her head turned this way and that, studying all the posters on the walls.
The stairs ended at another doorway, and she eyed it with suspicion. "Sure we're safe?"
He wished he could be more reassuring. "As safe as can be while waiting for my contact."
The protective wards set into the very walls of the room hummed uncomfortably against his bones, sinking into his bad knee until it ached as badly as on a cold, damp day, but it was a small price to pay in return for muffling all noise and scent while they hid. He wished there were stronger spells cast on the room, ones that could protect as well as cloak, but Sam Hayes had never expected to meet him here again.
Hiding pain was something he'd grown very practiced at, and he showed nothing while pulling out his wallet to retrieve a spelled piece of paper. It was blank, unremarkable, but the moment he ripped it in half, the pieces flared like the gleam of sunlight off water. They crumbled into ash before reaching the floor. He sighed and looked over at Joan again, who paced around the racks of oak barrels.
"A message to Hayes," he said, in response to her unspoken question. "We've been smuggling wolves to safety for some time and have a good system in place. Yet he didn't expect to hear from me today. It might be hours before he appears."
She only shrugged, circling the dim room again. Without windows, the traffic outside was barely more than a rumble. Even the car horns were only faint gasps of noise, and the factories hardly more than a low rumbling that vibrated the walls. The sharp burn of alcohol in crusted wooden barrels overwhelmed most other scents. Crescent City, usually so well-defined, had waned into vague shadows around their bubble of privacy.
It made the back of his neck prickle. He felt blind and deaf, cut off from his surroundings just like when his body had been rotting away from silver. It had really been the worst part of the poisoningâthe delirium of the fevers. Losing all sense of the world without knowing how much of himself he would come back to. The only recognizable sensation had been a hand holding his.
His gaze returned to Joan. She now watched him with the same worry in her eyes as he'd seen back then. He sighed, aware of how much more needed to be said and how little time they might have. "The wait might go more smoothly with a drink."
His knee throbbed in agony even with the brief steps it took to reach the whiskey bottle waiting on a scratched card table. Walking through the sand had aggravated it, and now he couldn't keep himself from limping. Joan didn't look away as most would have. If he had caught pity glimmering in those wild eyes, he would've bristled, bluffed, and insisted that his crippled leg hadn't left him useless. As it was, the anger and shame that stabbed at him with each step left his hands brusque as he poured scotch into two glasses.
When he gave one to her, she sniffed at the amber liquid as if unsure. He offered her a grim smile and said, "If you're suspicious of drinking anything made from humans, I'll sip from it first."
"You're protecting me enough already," she said, voice low. Then she raised the glass to her lips and swallowed the scotch in one go, offering the afterburn nothing more than a soft growl.
And he had once thought he could reduce her to a simple question mark in his past? That finding out she truly existed would be enough to drive her from his mind for good? He was a fool. Silver bullets had shattered his body but she was what had gotten to his heart.
"You keep staring at me," she murmured, but it wasn't anger that flashed in her eyes.
His words were equally quiet. "It's hard to believe you're real. There weren't any records of the wolves pulled in to nurse survivors after the assassination attempt. I had no way to find you."
"You looked?" A blush spread over her cheeks.
He found himself stepping closer, the shame of his limp suddenly faint, even forgettable. "Every day."
Eyes flecked with green studied every inch of his expression. Then she flashed him a smile filled with that mischief he remembered so vividly from his days in the recovery ward. "You missed me as much as I missed you."
Even with a stride's worth of space separating them, her scent was still clearâsalt and clean skin and that delicate warmth that was impossible to compare with anything else. What was the worth of denying what he felt? Or of admitting it? They had so little time left.
He shook his head, kept the distance between them. "I did. You've been a ghost in my thoughts for a year. Now I have to make sure you don't become one for good."
The admission drew her closer, relaxed her shoulders as she settled into one of the rickety chairs at the table. "That makes two of us then. Since we have to wait, tell me everything about this bitch and why she's after me."
He couldn't have been more shocked if she had knifed him, and for a moment only stared at her.
She flashed another smile. "Don't tell me no one's ever called her that. Not with what she's been doing."
He laughed, a stunned huff of breath as he took the other chair. "She's long gone mad, but she's still a queen."
"Not mine. Anyone who claims to own the sea is a fool. She only thinks she controls Mulgrew Bay and us." Then Joan leaned toward him, claws growing out until they scratched against her glass. "There were at least fifty wolves in that ward when I arrived. All put in there and left to die on the orders of your queen. I'm not giving her an inch of respect."
"Fair enough," he said, and meant it.
But the answer didn't seem to satisfy her, and she continued to search his face, eyes troubled. "Do you still respect her?"
He knew the truth bone-deep and forced himself to say it. "No. Not when I found out what she did."
"To you?"
"To me... and to others." Then he sighed. There was no reason to hold back now. In fact, it was something of a relief to release the knowledge that had bitten away at him for the past year. "It all stems from the assassination attempt. The one that gave me this bad knee and brought us together."
"Was she behind that?"
"No. That was truly an attack by another pack. The Loup Moreaus, as I suspected. Not that they matter anymore."
When she only nodded, he wasn't surprised. News about the Loup Moreau Pack's ugly demise had ranged far and wide. "It's common knowledge that the king-consort and the prince both died in the attack. What's unknown is that the queen was also injured in the assassination attempt. Not life-threatening thanks to anti-silver, but she was left with a mutilated face. Since then, she's turned to blood magic to restore herself."
Then he stopped, feeling like the pain in his knee had spread, twisting into something uglier, something that scraped away everything it found until he was as hollow as a husk.
Joan must have seen something in his expression, for her voice fell soft. "What is she doing?"
"Killing she-wolves and taking their faces."
There was a short silence after that. The words had shattered the air between them like stones through window panes. Even though Joan's pupils widened until her eyes looked black, she reached out without hesitation to clasp his forearm, gently stroking the tense muscles there.
"You found one of her victims," he said, after a moment. "We'd been waiting for the body to wash up. You see, she managed to escape before the ritual was complete, and threw herself out the nearest window. The alpha-queen's personal rooms overlook the seaside cliffs. The girl didn't have a chance. She disappeared into the waves."
"That explains the bad shape of the body. Those rocks could crush anyone's skull like an egg. But... what does it matter to the queen at this point? The remains are barely more than bone and seaweed."
He raised his eyebrows. "Anyone decent at magic could scry her identity. What if you talked about it with the other sea-wolves? What if you grew curious enough to find out more about her? You cared enough to keep the crabs away while waiting for us to arrive. What else might you do for her?"
She let out a short, sharp breath. A huff of anger. "So, she's just going to be covered up. Shoved somewhere where she'll stop being a problem. Just like you were."
Etheridge felt a muscle jump in his jaw. "Believe me, I'm not any happier about it than you are."
Her eyes didn't soften any. "The rest of the wolves that came to the beach to investigateâthey're all in on it, aren't they? They know what she's doing to these poor things."
"Yes. But it's considered essential to protect the alpha-queen. To protect her is to protect the pack."
"As she's killing members of the pack." She stared at him. "I don't understand you city wolves."
"Neither do I. Not anymore." He still remembered the day he returned to his position as the chief royal inspector, gaunt from the silver poisoning and defensive over his bad knee. Every detail remained in his mind with a painful clarity. The bead of sweat rolling down Master Enchanter Terrell's neck as he explained the queen's "activities." How the handle of his cane had dug into his hand from clutching it so tightly. The way the captain of the guard had scrutinized his face for the slightest hint of protest as the rest of the royal council had put into place a program that would pluck the most beautiful she-wolves from their families under a benign pretense.
He had been a fool to believe nothing could shatter him worse than silver bullets. That nothing could curdle his perspective worse than waking up in a makeshift morgue and realizing he had been put there to die.
The last swallow of scotch soothed the sudden ache in his jaw as his teeth sharpened. He had lost control of them, lost control of himself, and his next words came out as a snarl. "We call ourselves a pack, call ourselves wolves as if we still have any honesty to our kills. We don't. We've become nobility who murder through common consent. She's butchered over twenty she-wolves, and soon she'll want you to be the next. And in response, everyone will just bow their damned heads and agree."
Then he willed himself into silence, willed his teeth to shrink back into harmless shapes.
In response, Joan settled her chair closer, offering the sympathetic press of her body and the warm weight of her attention. "You always looked angry when I visited you for the first time during my shift. As if you'd spent the whole night stewing. You really believed you were doing good by serving her, weren't you? That you were serving the pack by serving her."
"Yes." He kept the word clipped, leached of emotion. "I never knew her personally. No one can. She is the alpha-queen, and we are the subjects who serve her. So I can't claim affection or familiarity blinded me to her nature. All I can say is that one of her royal orders saved me from being an orphan who died in no man's land, and that I always believed she wished to protect her pack just as well."
"And now you feel like a fool for it."
He growled softly. Pups whined their complaints. A royal inspector didn't. Couldn't.
Then Joan rested her chin on his shoulder, easy and calm as if they were old friends. When their faces pressed together cheek to cheek, it was impossible to ignore her steady heartbeat, to smell her lack of fear. "Well, you're not. Not one bit."
With the heavy salt-air of the shore now far away, her hair had dried into soft waves that fell around her face, and her skin smelled sweet and clean. For a moment, he let himself imagine that things had turned out differently, that he could bury his face into her neck with the familiarity of a mated pair.
Then came the sharp crack of wood from somewhere above them, muffled only from being on a different level. It sounded like someone breaking down the front door of the nightclub. The scent of human blood drifted into the damp air of the cellar. So did the scent of wolves, many of them. The other Mulgrews had found them.
Etheridge bit back a curse as he rose to his feet as quickly as his knee would allow. Joan was already at the cellar entrance, dragging over barrels to barricade it. He joined in as she growled, "Are there any other ways out of here?"
"No." The word tasted bitter on his tongue, but there was no use wasting breath on his shock. A pack attacking so openly in human territory was no less than a taunt at the city. The alpha-queen was truly willing to break every rule.
Muffled voices appeared on the other side of the worn door. Etheridge offered his silver-edged dagger over to Joan just as the first body slammed against it, jolting the wood. The rusted hinges didn't look like they'd last long.
"What about that window?" said Joan, easing toward it. "It must lead out into the street."
Despite her words, she kept her gaze on the groaning door. It was why she didn't see a flicker of shadow through the crusted grime on the glass.
Etheridge did, and his voice deepened into a roar over the growls of the Mulgrew officers. "Get down!"
A gunshot obliterated his words. Shattered the glass. Joan flinched but in the next moment threw the dagger through the broken window. A howl of pain proved the deadliness of her aim.
By then, Etheridge reached her and pulled her down out of range. Joan remained silent while they hurried behind racks of whiskey-filled barrels, but her movements seemed clumsy and uncertain, and Etheridge murmured her name as soon as they were protected from the window.
"Joan?"
Wood cracked. From their vantage point in the cellar, he could see that the door had split enough to expose the gleaming buttons of Mulgrew officers while they reached for the handle. Etheridge shot at them to force them back, responding to their snarls with one of his own. Then he spoke Joan's name again, needing to hear her even though he couldn't look away from their attackers.
She simply panted through the deafening noise of returning gunfire. Even as whiskey streamed all around them, his ears caught a certain wetness that froze the blood in his veins. Despite the danger, he turned to her. Joan stared in the direction of their attackers with unfocused eyes. In the dimness of their surroundings, the blood trailing down her shoulder appeared thick and black.
"No." The word tore itself out of his throat while he holstered his gun and checked her for the injury. A bullet hole under her collar bone. The surrounding flesh already showed black veins of rot. Silver poisoning.
Panic made his heart buck in his chest like a rabbit. Aware that every passing moment pulled Joan closer to death, he lunged up and fired at their attackers. He had to get them out. He had to find anti-silver somewhere in this damned city.
One of his bullets caught a Mulgrew; he smelled the blood. Another officer rose in his place, and even in the thick haze of gunsmoke, the silhouette of the tommy gun in his arms was obvious. Both he and Joan were about to be riddled with silver.
Even as he tried to cover Joan's body with his, a shot rang out. The wolf with the tommy gun staggered. A second bullet sent his head snapping back. As the body crumpled, blocking the rest from the door, Etheridge twisted in the direction of the shots.
One of the racks against the rough cellar walls had swung open, revealing a secret passageway. A wolf in a plain suit emerged from it, gun ready as he snarled, "Etheridge, don't move a damn muscle."
Despite a sudden blast of magic that made his nose sting, Etheridge relaxed a fraction. It was Sam Hayes. Light speared through the broken door and out the window, obliterating the yelps of panic from the Mulgrew officers.
Etheridge shielded Joan's eyes from the brightness, all too aware of the danger of each passing moment. "Hayes, I need anti-silver. Quickly!"
The other wolf appeared in view as the cellar fell dim again. "I have some on me. What the hell is going on? We already smuggled someone from your pack through here. You know better than to risk using the same place twice."
"I had no choice," Etheridge shot back. Everything had gone quiet except for Joan's bubbling breaths. The Mulgrew wolves remained motionless, knocked out by the spell.
Envy sparked in Etheridge's heart at Hayes' smooth movements while he crouched beside them, but it flamed out again the moment Joan muffled a cough. "Joan? You'll be all right. Just breathe."
"Can't push out the bullet," she gritted between her teeth. "It's still in my shoulder."
"I'll get it out," said Etheridge, trying to keep his tone reassuring even as he pulled out a pocket knife with a plain steel blade.
Her eyes met his. They didn't look frightened so much as furious, and she growled when Hayes moved closer to support her shaking limbs.
"This is Sam Hayes," said Etheridge. "The wolf who's here to help us."
Then Hayes himself spoke, sounding serious yet calm. "Let's save introductions for later. There are more coming, at least another car's worth. I saw them searching for you on the way here."
Etheridge nodded, his focus returning to Joan's face. She glanced at the knife in his hand and then back at him, expression pained yet fearless. Despite the bubbling in her lungs, she sounded steady. "Don't worry about hurting me. I trust you."
"I'll be fast." Then he flicked open the blade while the smell of her blood filled his nose.
No time to hesitate or worry. In that moment, the world narrowed to the bullet lodged beneath the skin, the gleam of silver apparent even through the dark red welling up and out of the ragged hole. Joan remained quiet except for her shallow panting.
A few twitches of his hand and out it came. "It's whole," he said, unable to keep the relief from the words. "There aren't any fragments to pick out."
Joan tried to lick at the blood streaming from the wound. His heart tightened into a knot at seeing her movements grow clumsy. Dark veins of silver rot snaked up her neck as Hayes approached with a syringe of anti-silver. She snarled at him, eyes unfocused.
Hayes raised his eyebrows and handed it to Etheridge. "Looks like you'll have to do it."
"It's all right, Joan," said Etheridge, quietly. He half-expected to be attacked as he gently caught her nearest arm, but she only panted at him, the green flecks in her irises almost gone. Her limbs began tightening with convulsions.
"Hurry," warned Hayes, already watching the door. "Even with the passageway, it'll be a race to get out before we're surrounded again."
Etheridge just growled softly and injected the anti-silver into the crook of Joan's elbow. Her eyes rolled in the back of her head as she fell limp.
"It's done," he replied, pulling away long enough to toss the empty syringe aside. Then he gathered Joan in his arms, waiting for her to respond. The black fluid oozing from her bullet wound brightened into clean, red blood. "How long will it take her to recover?"
"Too long. I can hear cars." Hayes shifted to the balls of his feet, hand ready by his holstered gun. To the other wolf's credit, he seemed willing to stay and fight.
Etheridge swore, realizing they'd never all be able to escape. Not with his bad knee and Joan's poisoned condition. A decision struck him with all the force of the knife that had once stabbed him deep enough to nick a lung, taking away his stamina forever. Yet now he only felt clear-headed and determined, panic seeping away into acceptance.
He looked up at Hayes. "Take her. I'll keep their focus on this cellar for as long as possible."
Surprise flashed in the other wolf's eyes, quickly followed by realization. "You love her."
"Yes." His heart clenched over missing the chance to tell Joan.
Hayes glanced from the broken door to Joan's limp body. "Damn it, Etheridge, this isn'tâ"
Desperation left him vicious. "Save her or I'll shoot you myself."
At last, Hayes gathered her in his arms, but his expression told Etheridge that the other wolf had reacted to the despair behind the threat instead of the threat itself. And even as Hayes rose to his feet with Joan, he warned, "You won't die here. They'll take you back to pack land and kill you as a traitor."
"I know. Don't say where you're going. I don't want it tortured out of me." Etheridge's gaze locked on Joan's face. She remained unconscious, yet the pain etched between her eyebrows had already smoothed out. Her chest rose and fell beneath his jacket in deep, easy breaths. A final moment to memorize the sight and then he turned away, sure that Hayes would leave.
Etheridge's shoulders relaxed at the muffled thud of the secret door swinging shut, and his breath remained calm while he reloaded his gun. The idea of Joan returning to the safety of the sea kept his aim steady as footsteps pounded toward the entrance of the cellar.
He couldn't win this, but he'd give these bastards a hell of a fight.