Shifter Wars (29 page)

“I’m not answering anything. I want a lawyer.”

I chuckled. “A lawyer? Where do you think you are?”

His eyes widened. “What the fuck do you want?”

“I want to know who else is in your group.”

“No one. You killed them all.”

“I seriously doubt that. Besides, technically, we didn’t kill your men. The shifters who were part of your group killed them.” He blanched, and I continued. “You do realize you were working alongside these so-called abominations, right? Where did they come from?”

He clamped his lips tight like a small child.

“Someone betrayed you and brought them into the group.”

“They knew Mark.”

“Mark Brennan brought them in?”

“No, they showed up after he died.”

I rolled my eyes for effect and walked around the bed. “And you were stupid enough to just let them in?”

“They knew everything about our operation and said they had worked with Mark out west.”

“Do they work for a guy named Lucas?”

He tried to disguise his shock then settled for turning his face away. “I’m done talking to you.”

The door opened, and Bruce walked into the room, “How about talking to me?”

Ken tried to launch himself off the bed, but his right arm was handcuffed to the rail. “Son of a bitch.”

I rolled my eyes. “Wow. I’m a bitch, you’re a son of a bitch. Ken has an astounding grasp of the English language.”

Bruce laughed, and Ken’s face turned red.

I continued, “Ken, here, was telling me his poacher buddies are dead.”

Bruce stopped laughing. “Then no one else at the shop is in on this?”

Ken scoffed. “Hardly. Those guys are useless, especially your brother.”

“How did you get involved?” I asked.

“Mark knew I liked to hunt, so he invited me out one night for drinks with Palmer and DeMarco.”

“And?”

“And after a few weeks, they took me hunting.” He smirked. “I was more than a little surprised by what we bagged.”

I swallowed back the bile in my throat. “What about last August, when Brennan was killed?”

He glared at me. “What about it?”

“Did you help Brennan with the hunt?”

“No, he insisted on going alone.”

“Was it normal to go solo on a hunt?” Bruce asked.

“Nothing was normal about it,” Ken answered.

Why was Trina different?
“What do you mean?”

He frowned. “I’m done talking.” He looked at his shoulder. Blood was seeping through the bandages. “I need a doctor.”

I walked to the foot of the bed. “You can bleed for a while longer. The more cooperative you are, the faster I get a doctor.”

Bruce interjected, “You’re on your own, Ken. No one is coming to save you. If I were you, I wouldn’t hold anything back.”

Ken sat quietly for a couple of seconds before responding. “What do you want to know?”

I asked my question again. “Why was the August hunt different?”

“Normally we hunt in teams, at least two people. We would bag them, then bring them to an agreed-upon site and release them. The rest of the team would then track and hunt them down. This time Mark went out on his own. Instead of bringing the animal to us, he hid it.”

I looked at him shocked. “So you weren’t going to hunt her?”

“Nope. Like I said, it was weird. Then the next thing we know, Brennan had been eviscerated by these monsters.”

I gritted my teeth and continued. “Then the new guys showed up?”

“Yeah. Simon told us he knew Mark and came to help us with the fight.”

“Do they work for Lucas?” I asked.

Ken shrugged. “I guess. Someone was supplying them with money and weapons.”

“Like the sound gun?” I prompted.

He nodded.

“Where is this Lucas?”

“Somewhere in Nevada.”

“What did they inject the shifter with last night?”

“It’s supposed to force the animal to come to the surface.”

“Why?” Bruce asked, although I already knew.

“We need their pelts. If they won’t turn, then we can’t skin them.” He smiled. “Or we can, but even though it’s fun, we don’t make any money from it.”

I looked into his smug face, and a red haze dropped over my vision. “You stupid bastard.”

He jerked up again from the pillow and pushed his left hand against his bandage. When he removed his hand, blood ran down his shoulder.

“We’re
not
done.” I turned toward the door. “Misha, get a doctor.”

* * *

Doctor Jensen examined Ken’s shoulder and wrinkled his nose like he smelled something foul. “Enough questioning for now. He’s ripped his stitches open. Sabrina is still here, she can sew him back up again.”

I couldn’t blame him for not wanting to help. Bruce and I stepped out of Ken’s room and into the room next door, where Misha and Jean Luc sat in front of laptops.

I turned to Misha. “Have we found out anything about this Lucas?”

“I don’t have much to go on. We don’t know if Lucas is his first or last name. So I am looking for the name Lucas in Nevada. The list is a bit long right now.”

“What next?” Bruce asked.

“I think Ken knows more,” I said. “Once he’s stopped bleeding, we can question him again.”

Jason interrupted from the doorway. “It’ll be awhile before you can talk to him. Doc just sedated him so she could re-stitch his shoulder.”

“Great. Let’s see what we can find out in the meantime. Have we run anything on Simon to see where he’s been hiding for the past fifty years?”

Jean Luc nodded. “I have been researching him and have not found anything yet. He more than likely was not using his real name. None of them had identification. So we are running photos of the other dead shifters through the database to see if we can identify them as well.”

Misha added. “We’ll keep researching. I just don’t understand why shifters would be willing to work with poachers.”

“I spoke with Griffin about this earlier, and he thinks they’re trying to discredit him as leader. Show he can’t take care of poachers or protect his own family.”

Jason took a breath, paused, then spoke. “It’s more than that. These shifters were using the poachers to help them test their weapons. What better way to hide their true intent then to have it blamed on the poachers?”

“What do you think their plan is?” I asked.

“I hope I’m wrong, but my gut tells me they’re getting ready for a shifter civil war.”

Chapter 36

I was rubbing the back of my neck when Doc sank down next to me in a waiting room chair. “Is Ken still out?” I asked.

“Yes, you won’t be able to talk to him for a couple more hours.”

“How’s Gil doing?”

“Better. He seems to have stabilized, but we don’t know about any long-term effects the drug may have.”

“Is Jensen working on it?”

“We both are. We’re having trouble isolating the components. It could be pheromone-based.”

“Only you would think it was based on pheromones.”

She grinned. “Hear me out. When a shifter changes, chemicals are released into their bloodstream to help with the transition. If the purpose of the drug is to force the change on unwilling shifters, then it would have to trick the body by releasing those same chemicals.”

“Which makes sense, but what’s the point?”

Doc frowned. “I thought the poachers were using it so they could collect the pelts.”

“I don’t buy it. It’s the reason they gave, but I can’t believe that much research and money would be expended for pelts. Did Jason share his theory?”

“Yes, but I’m not sure how the drug fits into it.”

“It must be some type of weapon. I’m just not sure what they’d gain from it.”

“Loss of control?” Doc suggested. “Gil wasn’t in his right mind. He didn’t keep his humanity when he turned into his leopard-self. It puts those affected at a huge disadvantage.”

“You could be right. I just hope we can stop whoever is doing this before anyone else gets hurt.”

“How’s Griffin holding up?”

“As well as can be expected,” I said. “He’s blaming himself for Nathan’s death.”

“He is a good leader. He cares deeply about his pack.”

“He needs to worry about himself, too,” I countered.

Doc smiled. “I see you’ve got some of your fire back again. Is he good in bed?”

I hung my head. “Have you no shame, woman?”

“Of course not; I’m a Succubus demon. Now don’t avoid the question.”

“He’s freaking fantastic, but don’t tell him I said so.”

A voice echoed down the hallway. “She won’t have to, sweet.”

I looked up at Griffin, who walked toward me wearing a large grin and tapping his ear.

“Cocky bastard,” I mumbled, my face burning. Embarrassment was one of my least favorite emotions.

“I heard that too.”

I glared at Sabrina. “Supes do not understand the concept of boundaries.”

She shrugged. “Maybe humans have too many boundaries to begin with.”

* * *

Griffin lost his grin shortly after I explained what we had gotten from Ken. Sabrina then filled him in on her research.

“How long until you have more info on the drug, Sabrina?

“I don’t know, but as soon as—” A high-pitched alarm interrupted her.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“It’s a code alarm.” Sabrina raced down the hall and we followed. She shoved open the door to Ken’s room, which was already crowded with medical personnel. Griffin and I remained at the door.

“What happened?” Sabrina demanded.

“Full arrest,” someone answered.

“Hook him up to the EKG. Where’s the defibrillator?”

And we watched for the next ten minutes while Sabrina tried to bring Ken back to life, but it was no use. By the time she called time of death, a crowd had gathered around the door. Misha, Jean Luc, Jason, and Bruce stood quietly staring into the room.

Sabrina walked out into the hall and slammed her hand into the wall. I was shocked. Sabrina never lost her cool.

Jason was the first to reach her. “Stop,” he whispered grabbing her arm and settling her against his chest. He turned toward the group. “We’ll meet you in the lounge down the hall in a couple of minutes.”

And there it was, the first time Jason had allowed us to see how much he cared for Doc. Misha and Jean Luc looked at each other for a moment. They both were a bit slow on the uptake sometimes.

Griffin was the first to speak. “Meet us at the house instead, Jason.”

Griffin led us outside, and while we walked toward the house, he whispered in Misha’s ear. Misha nodded and jogged over to the van.

We hurried into the house and out of the brutally cold wind and stood in the foyer waiting for direction from Griffin. “I’ll have Bea make us some coffee,” he said. “Wait here for a moment.”

Before any of us could respond, Misha came in with a small black box and went straight into Griffin’s office. This was strange, even for us.

Griffin walked back seconds later with a pad of paper and a pen. He turned the pad toward us and we read. “Checking for bugs.”

We glanced at each other and nodded our understanding. Five minutes of uncomfortable silence later, Misha came out of the office and gave a thumbs-up. Bruce, Jean Luc, and I followed Griffin
en masse
into his office.

Griffin shut the door. “We can talk now.”

“What about shifter ears?” I asked.

“This room is soundproof. Now that we know there are no bugs in here, we can talk freely.”

“So you believe me now, that you may have a traitor here?”

“Yes. With the mounting evidence, I can no longer ignore the possibility someone is supplying information to Lucas, or whoever wants to take over.”

The door to the office opened, and Doc walked in, looking much more in control, followed by Jason.

I stepped closer to her. “Are you okay?”

“Someone killed a patient under my care. He might have been a lowlife, but he was my responsibility.”

Jean Luc spoke up, “You’re sure he was murdered?”

“I won’t know for sure until I examine him further, but there is no way his injuries would have caused him to code. The only explanation would be an embolism, which is extremely rare.”

Bruce interjected, “Ken was telling us too much. Someone needed to shut him up.”

“Who could have done it?” Griffin asked Doc.

“Anyone with access to the medical facility.”

Griffin let out a hard breath and sat down at his desk. “There are at least a dozen medical personnel on staff during the day. Not to mention the people in and out of the house.”

“We can begin questioning the staff,” Jean Luc volunteered.