Chapter 29
Chapter Twenty-nine
COLBY
The pack returned far sooner than Colby had dared hope. He was sure that was a good sign, right up until Bryce climbed out of the first truck, grim-faced and silent.
Colby stopped breathing. Terror gripped him low in the gut.
He only started again when he saw Tristan driving Matt’s truck up the driveway.
He hadn’t been driving on the way out. Perhaps Matt— But then Colby got a glimpse of him in the back seat, with Jesse curled up against him, clinging tight. So maybe Jesse was hurt?
Before he had time to run through all the other possibilities, Tristan was in his arms, clutching at him as he buried his face in his shoulder. His body was taut, and Colby knew something was badly wrong.
“Hey,” he said softly, wrapping his arms around Tristan. He ran a hand through that mop of dark hair, offering what comfort he could. “Hey, you’re home now. It’s okay.”
He watched as everyone except Matt and Jesse climbed out. They’d all come back, which meant whatever it was couldn’t be that bad. Could it?
After a few moments, Tristan drew a deep breath and pulled back from Colby. “Sorry,” he said. “I just needed to know you’re safe.” He took another sharp breath, as if preparing himself for something. “I need to talk to you.”
With one last glance at the rest of them standing around looking strangely somber, Colby followed him inside.
TRISTAN
Colby’s face was pale as he stared at Tristan. “All of them?”
Tristan hesitated. “They didn’t find Nico’s—he wasn’t there,” he amended.
Sinking down on the bed, Colby closed his eyes and drew in a shuddering breath, which Tristan had no way of interpreting.
“Are you okay?” he asked at last, and could have kicked himself for the useless question.
Colby shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said. “I just—I should be feeling something, shouldn’t I?”
“There’s no right way and no wrong way to deal with something like this,” Tristan said, and winced. Fucking Psych 101 and its clichés. He put a hand cautiously to Colby’s knee. “I’m sorry.”
Because even if they were assholes and worse, he couldn’t see that anyone—except perhaps Cale, and Nico, and one or two of the others—deserved to be slaughtered. He fought down a wave of nausea at the memory, and he pushed to his feet.
“I need to shower.” He was desperate to get out of his clothes in case they carried any hint of that terrible stench.
“Do you want me to come?” Colby asked.
Tristan nodded, suddenly close to tears. It wasn’t just the shock of what they’d found and the smell that he knew he would never forget. It was knowing that if it had happened a few days earlier, Colby would have been among the bodies.
And then there was Jesse, because try as he might to concentrate on the road on the way home, Tristan’s eyes had been drawn to the rearview, and he’d seen proud, defiant Jesse Turner clinging to Matt like a lost child.
And Matt… He’d never imagined Matt was capable of the tenderness he’d shown as he held Jesse.
Tristan had snapped his gaze back to the road as he’d realized he was looking at something between them no one should see.
He needed Colby’s strength and comfort. The mirror was misting as Colby stepped into the shower, and he leaned against him, letting Colby wash him.
Slowly, the stench of that place was erased and replaced with the steady scent that was uniquely Colby.
And maybe he was the one who should be giving comfort, but right now he needed this, and he let himself be held.
COLBY
The pack, lacking only Matt, Bryce, and Jesse, gathered in the kitchen. It was evident to Colby that every one of them had showered. The subdued air in the room led him to wonder just how bad it had been, and he swiftly decided he was glad not to know.
He was still numb from hearing what had happened, though a part of him, one he couldn’t understand, was glad Nico hadn’t died like that.
He also couldn’t understand how in the hell it had happened, because while they might not have the tight discipline he’d known from the Army, not one of them backed down from a fight and they were all aggressively aware of the world around them.
Bryce came into the kitchen and sat in Matt’s usual chair, prompting the rest of them to settle around the table. Most had mugs of coffee in their hands, though the one held by Dave didn’t smell like any coffee Colby had ever tasted.
“How’s Jesse?” Tristan asked. His voice was low, as if he were speaking in church.
“Matt’s with him,” Bryce said. “In fact, that’s as good a place as any to start.
I don’t know how many of you know Jesse was found wandering on his own as a pup, with no memory of anything before that.
Well, it turns out that the thing his mind was blocking out was a massacre like the one we found today.
So far as he knows, his whole pack was slaughtered. ”
“Jesus.”
Colby wasn’t sure who’d said it, because everyone around the table looked as ill and shocked as the word had sounded.
“Now that might be coincidence—”
Christian barked a mocking laugh, silenced by Bryce’s glare.
“We don’t assume anything,” Bryce said, and damn, he was no Matt Urban but there was an authority in him Colby hadn’t suspected. “That’s both lazy and dangerous. Karl, what can you tell us?”
“Eighteen bodies, including Cale’s. Only a couple had started to shift.
Means it happened fucking fast, and to take a pack like that by surprise, we’re talking pros and a lot of them.
I found footprints from multiple combat boots.
” Karl’s grip tightened on his mug. “This wasn’t a fight.
It was a planned, coordinated hit. They were shifters but also ex-military.
Probably special forces. It had that kind of slickness. ”
“But who would do something like that?” Tristan burst out. “And why leave them there that way?” His voice was shaking and Colby placed his hand on Tristan’s arm in an attempt at comfort.
“As for that, give them a while, and they’ll be picked clean, all evidence gone,” Karl said.
Colby concentrated on comforting Tristan instead of wondering what the hell was wrong with him that he could just accept that statement about his previous pack and not feel anything.
He should be angry, or upset, or something.
But it was like he was watching all this unfold from behind a glass screen, where none of it touched him.
“The easiest way to get rid of any evidence would have been to burn the place, but that would draw attention, not least because it would probably start a wildfire this time of year,” Karl continued.
“I’d have done what they did. No one except Cale’s pack has been near that property in years, and chances are it would be as long again before they were discovered. ”
“And law enforcement aren’t going to be interested in shifter-on-shifter violence, while the shifter community are just going to be pleased that a troublemaker like Cale was dealt with before he brought shifters any further into disrepute,” Bryce agreed.
“Since why is an open-ended question, I’m going to lead with who. Colby?”
Colby looked up to find Bryce’s gaze on him.
His eyes were hard and grew hostile when he didn’t answer immediately.
Colby tried to summon a memory, anything useful.
But his mind felt sluggish, like it was waiting to be told what mattered.
He hated that—hated how often he looked to Tristan to know who he was supposed to be.
He needed to figure that out for himself.
“For fuck’s sake,” Bryce snapped. “Get your head out of your ass and think.”
“Sorry,” Colby said swiftly, aware that Bryce’s tension was rising by the second. “I don’t know,” he started.
“Well, that’s just fucking perfect,” Christian spat. “About the one way you might be of use, and you’re still a waste of fucking space.”
Colby shook his head as Tristan stopped glaring at Bryce and started glaring at Christian instead.
“I was going to say, I don’t know of any shifters we’ve had dealings with that have such a disciplined setup.
” He hadn’t been involved in the planning stages, but Nico had often taken him along to deals—just don’t speak and give away how useless you are.
“If it had been a fight, sure, I could give you more names than could be run down in a lifetime, but a planned attack by professionals? I have no idea who Cale might have upset or ripped off who would have the resources to go to those lengths.”
“Resources is beginning to sound a mighty dirty word.”
Colby started, and looked up to find Matt standing in the doorway. Bryce made to stand up, but Matt waved him off and took a chair next to Karl. “It seems to me someone in Washington might have a lot of resources, if we’re talking money and connections,” he said.
“Holy shit,” Bryce breathed, staring at him. “When you said firepower, I didn’t think you meant literally.”
“Neither did I.” Matt’s lips twisted. “We can’t close our minds to other possibilities, but it takes someone with money to run a pack or militia like this one, if they’re as good as Karl says they are—and if he says it, they must be good.
It’s always possible it’s organized crime even if Colby doesn’t know about it, but then there’s the timing of it.
A couple of days after my phone calls meant the top shifters in Washington got to hear about Jesse. ”
He looked around the table. “You telling me that didn’t send Cale’s buyer into a panic, wanting to cover his tracks?
When he found out that people knew about Jesse, he must have realized he couldn’t simply produce an Argent himself without some awkward questions being asked, and so he got rid of the one person who might lead to him. Or her.”