Chapter Three
THREE
From the wolf—Lynch, as he gives his name—Bishop extracts as much information about the Levine Cabal as he can: where they’re located, how many supernaturals they have, and so on. It’ll all need to be verified, but it’s a start.
“All right,” Bishop says afterward. “One final question. Who sent you?”
“I came on my own.”
“Solidarity with your fellow wolves?” Bishop shakes his head, looking more himself, less haughty, more incisive. “Try again.”
“I’m hoping for a reward, of course.” Lynch lifts a hand.
“Not an invitation to your Pack. While I intend no insult, Pack life isn’t for me.
I know you have money. I need payment, as I may need to lie low after this.
Beryl wouldn’t like me talking to you. And when Beryl doesn’t like something, her employees tend to lose something.
Their job. Their reputation. Their skin. ”
“So you want money. How much?”
“Five hundred pounds. Half for the information I just provided. Half for arranging a meeting to discuss the handover.”
That’s several years’ wages for the average workingman.
Bishop doesn’t react to the amount. “Is the meeting to negotiate handing over Cordelia? Or to actually hand her over?”
Lynch pauses as he sees the trap being laid. Because he’s supposed to see it.
“You would relinquish her at the meeting,” he says. “After you’ve made contact to say you’ve tired of her.”
Bishop’s lips purse. “What if I gave you two hundred and fifty pounds now and the rest after a meeting with your contact? I’d like to speak to them. Then I’ll turn Cordelia over later, and you won’t have to wait for the full payment.”
Lynch tries to hide his discomfort behind a grin. “I see what you’re doing, boy.”
“I’m not a boy.”
The wolf has the sense to say, “I didn’t mean it like that. But the meeting must be the handover.”
“Because the meeting would be with whoever sent you, and you don’t dare double-cross them.”
Lynch flinches. He saw the trap he was supposed to see—Bishop trying to get access to someone in the cabal without turning me over.
And so he missed what Bishop was actually doing—confirming that someone sent Lynch.
Otherwise, the wolf would happily take the full five hundred pounds and run before Bishop turns me over.
“No one sent me,” Lynch says. “This is my idea, brokering peace for a fair price.”
“Brokering peace, yes, but it’s not your idea.
Some high-ranking cabal member doesn’t like the way this has been handled.
It’s likely the same person who pointed out that Cordelia could be killed if Beryl pursues the Pack now.
But pursuing her later would still come with a fight, and Beryl may still insist on wiping out the Albion Pack, which reeks of petty vengeance.
Better to have me deliver Cordelia once Beryl has calmed down enough to decide Cordelia herself is enough.
More than enough if she has a babe in her belly, a witch with even stronger werewolf blood. ”
“I’ve heard that about you,” Lynch says.
Bishop’s brows rise. “Heard…?”
“That you think far too much for a werewolf. That’s the Danvers in you. Too much going on up here.” He taps his head. “It’ll get you in trouble. When a Danvers thinks too much, his mind runs to madness. Just ask your grandfather.”
Bishop only gives a humorless smile. “No one mistook my grandfather for a great thinker. I would suggest you keep relying on others for strategy. It’s clearly not your strong suit.”
Bishop rises, pulling Lynch up by the collar. “I’ll give you one more chance to tell me who put you up to this.”
“And if I refuse?”
“I’ll give you your reward, though it might not be what you’re hoping for.”
The wolf only curls his lip. “I’ve heard that about you, too. An overly high opinion of yourself. You’re a pup. I let you defeat me in hopes of making it an easier conversation. But since you don’t want what I’m offering—”
Lynch swings.
Bishop catches his wrist easily and leans in. “Thank you. I really was hoping to send back a proper response to your employer.”
Another swing, this time with Lynch’s left, but before it can make contact, he’s flying backward from Bishop’s uppercut.
“Now this is more like it,” I murmur.
Bishop gives a ragged laugh. “Sit back and enjoy.”
This fight lasts only slightly longer. Lynch held back in that first battle, and now he expects easy victory. He doesn’t get it, and that throws him off-kilter, his blows becoming increasingly frenzied.
He should recognize that he misjudged Bishop’s abilities and adjust. In the heat of battle, though, he lacks the mental calm for that, and all he can think to do is hit harder. When that fails, he makes a break for it.
Bishop catches him, and then comes a part I don’t enjoy, even while I know it’s necessary.
Bishop beats Lynch until the other wolf is battered and unconscious, lying in a heap on the forest path.
Then Bishop drags him into the forest and hides him from any confederates who don’t have a werewolf’s sense of smell.
“That will give us time,” he says to me as he binds Lynch’s hands. “He can break free, but not easily.”
“Would it be dishonorable to empty his pockets?” I ask. “If he doesn’t have any money or valuables, it’ll take him longer to get back to whoever sent him.”
A slow smile and then a nod. “Excellent point. We also need to search him for any clues.”
We do that, emptying all of Lynch’s pockets. He has nothing except dried meat … and money. Nearly a hundred pounds, and I whistle at that.
“Generous travel funds,” Bishop says. “They wouldn’t want him leading us to the cabal, so he might have needed to lie low for a while.”
“It’s money we can use,” I say. “And we had to take it.”
“We did. Let us get the horses and make haste. We’ll need to find a creek to hide our trail, and the Pack will be starving.”
We have three horses now. We find more supplies in saddlebags that Lynch put on Cinder, along with an ill-fitting saddle that has Bishop grumbling and switching gear until all three steeds have a better fit.
As Bishop said, we need to move fast while not leaving a trail Lynch can track. Waterways are the key, and Bishop directs us to the nearest one, following the sound of rushing water. When we’re back on dry land, he speaks for the first time since we left the forest.
“You know I didn’t mean what I said to him. About you.”
I smile. “You don’t need to clarify that every time you need to treat me as a prize.”
“I know. It’s just…”
He goes quiet, and we ride like that for at least a mile before he says, “I’ve spent the last week vowing that nothing will happen to you.
That was foolishness. A want and certainly an intention, but not a promise I could make, and you suffered for it.
So I’ll make a new one. I will do everything in my power to protect you and keep you safe.
But as I promised last night, you are always free to return home, no matter how much I might want to stop you. ”
“Thank you.” I meet his gaze. “That’s all I need—to know that I’m with you by choice. My choice, but also yours. Please don’t feel you have to make me promises, Bishop. Especially not promises of safety.”
“Because I can’t keep them.”
“They’re not yours to keep,” I say. “If lightning struck me down right now, you couldn’t stop it. I trust you to keep me safe to the best of your ability, and do you know where I feel safe?”
I move my horse closer to him, so our legs brush.
“Right here. With you. You might think you haven’t been able to keep your promises, but I’ve known from the start that my well-being wasn’t something you could promise.
I understood it was an intention, not a vow.
You did everything you could to keep me safe, and I offer the same back to you.
I’ll stay at your side, and I’ll watch your back, and if at some point you decide your Pack is safer without me around, I won’t argue to stay. ”
“We’re safer with you here,” he says. “That much of what Lynch said makes sense. Beryl could have pursued us. She didn’t because it endangers you.”
“Someone helped her realize that.”
“Most likely. But the point remains that you are our shield. As her sole viable heir, you’re too precious to risk losing on a vendetta. So there will be no more talk of you going back to her to protect us. You protect us by staying.”
I’m not sure of that, but he says it with such vehemence that I know he needs to believe it. He needs to know that I’m staying here, letting him focus on the Pack.
So I nod, and we leave it at that.
As we approach the camp, a figure strides to meet us.
It’s Julius, Bishop’s cousin and closest confidant.
Julius shares Bishop’s height and lean build, but his hair is chestnut brown and his eyes the gray of stormy skies, though no one would ever describe Julius’s personality as stormy.
He’s the “nice” cousin, the easygoing one.
Others consider him the better-looking cousin, though that just means he’s very conventionally handsome compared to Bishop’s more severe good looks.
“Tell me that’s breakfast,” Julius calls as we approach. “You’ve been gone for hours.” He pauses and peers at us. “Is that Cinder?”
“It is.”
“Found you, did she? I don’t suppose she brought my horse?”
“It’s a long story,” Bishop says. “But we have meat and bread.” He sniffs the air as he stops his horse. “Excellent. You have fires going already. Let’s get this meat cooking.”
“Oh, I’m not sure I need it cooked.” Julius makes a face and tips his head my way. “You didn’t hear that.”
“I did,” I say. “And I’m shocked. Shocked. Eating raw meat. Someone might think you’re a werewolf.”
Bishop helps me down as two others untie the bags of meat and Felix appears.
“I’ll take the horses,” Felix says.
“Others can,” Bishop says softly.