8. Chapter 8 #2
I wanted to stay with her, but I needed to get inside that compound. Her gaze followed me as I pulled the Glock I’d brought with me out of my duffel bag and showed it to her.
“I have to leave for a few hours…”
“Don’t leave me here. I want to go with you,” she whispered, panicked, standing and taking a few steps towards me.
“I need to do this alone. You’ll be safer here. You know how to use this, right?” She nodded, but I walked her through it anyway. “Point at what you want to shoot, release the safety, pull the trigger, easy. Got it?”
She nodded again and I put the loaded weapon on the night stand.
“Just make sure you don’t miss, okay?” I winked at her and got a faint smile. As I left, I thought about what she told me. Was it really possible to transform someone into a lycan?
Maybe she had been born that way and didn’t know, but that would be almost impossible. I remembered going through puberty and the uncontrollable shifts — there’s no way she wouldn’t have known. If the guys in the compound really were experimenting on humans, it could change everything.
I needed answers and there was only one place I could get them.
As soon as I was in the truck, alone, I dialed Isla. The phone rang twice and she answered.
“Hi Max. Any update?”
Nice to hear from you too.
“I’m not sure.” I paused, the memory of what I witnessed still raw and unprocessed. “Last night I decided to check out a compound on the east end of the island.”
“What did you find?” She shuffled a few papers around and I could tell that she wanted me to get to the point, but I was still unsure what the point was.
“There was a woman, like the one in the picture you showed me.”
“Saints,” she paused. That got her attention. “Were they lycans, or something else.”
“One lycan, at least.” I suddenly remembered the one with the accent, wishing I could’ve seen his face. Something about him was so familiar, but I couldn't isolate his scent. “The rest were a hodgepodge of Peers, I just don’t know what. Maybe a few humans.”
“Interesting,” she mumbled, but sounded distracted.
“Still in Chicago?” I asked as I turned onto the road towards the array. I left out that I found Nadia. I needed to give her a few more days.
“Yeah.” she responded curtly, then paused and I knew she was hiding something. “Do you think you could get me some photos? We’ve got to figure out what they’re doing and why.”
“I can try. Do you need anything specific?” She’d been at this a lot longer than me and even though I was good at my job, her instincts were top notch.
“The compound, the people there. Anything I could look at to see if there’s something or someone I recognize.”
“I don’t know, the place is sealed up tight.
” I passed a utility pole and remembered seeing a few around the compound.
“Maybe I could get up on one of the utility poles.” The thought was immensely unpleasant.
The gusty, freezing winds that drove across the island made the prospect of hanging onto a wooden log extremely unappealing, but she was right, I had to figure out who these people were and why they were doing this.
“I believe in you, Max. You’re good at this.
” I appreciated what she was doing, but this was way more than I was used to dealing with and I worried that I wouldn’t be able to do it alone.
“Remember the standoff in Austin? You saved that girl. There’s no one else I trust more to get to the bottom of this.
” Her encouragement soothed me, calmed my racing thoughts. She was right, I could do this.
“Let me know when you have more information. Bye.” Isla hung up. I stared at the poles I passed. Most of them were old, cracked. Some had climbing rungs. This wasn’t going to be fun.
The island was powered partially by a large wind farm located off the coast of the mainland, but there was also an ancient coal plant that still provided backup.
I remembered reading about it and how the maintenance staff would only visit the island for repairs a few times a year.
It was my best option, but getting up that high could expose me. It was a risk I'd have to take.
It took almost an hour to get to the array, but the maintenance locker was well stocked with tools and supplies.
I rifled through the facility's equipment, searching for harnesses, hardhats, anything that could help with my plan.
Once I found what I needed, I loaded it into the truck, then looked towards town.
The buildings weren't visible and I scanned the open areas to the south, trying to catch any scents that didn’t belong.
The heavy odor of muskox floated past and my wolf begged me to hunt.
He wanted to track, to kill, to feast on raw flesh, but it was just too dangerous.
I got into the truck and drove down the road, turning when I reached the end, then following it until I found a pitted track that ran towards the small house where Nadia had been staying.
The door wasn’t locked and I pushed it, the old wood scraping against the packed dirt floor as I walked inside.
The place was decrepit, the floor covered in straw and a few ratty carpets and smoke hung in the air.
Her bed was basically a cot with a dingy sleeping bag resting on top and I had no clue how long she’d been here, but it obviously hadn’t been steadily inhabited in years.
I noticed a bag on a shelf in the corner and grabbed it. Her clothes were in a pile on the cot and I shoved them inside, adding them to a wallet and a few papers. Everything was in cyrillic except for one line on the letterhead.
Moscow Institute of Genetic Research
That meant nothing to me, but I took a photo of it and sent it to Isla. She could have someone at the Peerage look into it. I glanced around to see if there was anything I missed, then headed back out to the truck and drove east.