E
zra
After putting Kat to bed, we head back downstairs to clean up. Mateo and the pack warriors are removing bodies as I walk out, dumping them in a pile in the middle of what became a battlefield. The tide had turned the moment Shirley had fallen. What remained of the rogues slunk away into the cover of darkness, during the shock that had coursed through my pack.
“Jasmine,” I wave to her, motioning for her to come over. She drops the leg she is carrying and jogs over to me.
“Yes, Alpha?”
“Did you guys tell anyone where you were going?” I ask. It is a little too convenient that Jackson would attack while I was dealing with rosters and Mateo was on the other side of the town. Also, why attack directly near the river? They would have had to have known we were not with her. Jackson was daring, but even he knew it would be a death sentence to his men if we were close by.
“No one, we left the café where we met her parents, went to my place and Angie’s to grab our swimsuits, and came straight here,” she replies.
“So you didn’t tell anyone?”
She shakes her head. “Only my mate and my mom,” she answers, before glancing over at Angie. I follow her gaze, and Angie looks over at us before walking over.
“What’s going on?” She asks, looking at Jasmine. Mateo wanders over to join us.
“Did you tell anyone where you were going?”
“No, of course not! Kat was with Jasmine and me the entire time, we know better than to just leave her alone by herself without you or Mateo,” Angie explains.
I nod, yet something is off. And I can tell by the look on Mateo’s face, he is thinking the same thing.
“So you didn’t see anyone or stop to speak to anyone, not even while out?”
“No, we went to the café, met her parents there, and had lunch. Kat had an argument with Miss Taylor, then we all went home to get our swimsuits and came straight here,” Angie replies, and I nod along.
Wait, did they just say they ran into Madeline?
“Wait, Miss Taylor?” Mateo interrogates, asking the question I was about to. They nod again.
“As in Madeline Taylor?” I push.
Jasmine clarifies, “Madeline, the school teacher, she bumped into Kat and had a go at her, so Kat put her in her place.”
“Alex!” I call, waving one of our pack warriors over. He is in his mid-twenties and has longer hair, a bit of a hippy but a loyal member. He nods his head to me, waiting for my orders. “Go grab Madeline for me.”
“Okay, Alpha, she should be on duty soon anyway.”
“What do you mean on duty soon? She isn’t on patrols at night, and not on the north side,” Mateo counters, stepping around me and looking at Alex.
“Oh, I must be mistaken, then. She was on the other night, I will go get her,” he offers, turning around to go retrieve her, when Mateo grabs his arm, and stops him.
“When was she on duty and where? You know, Alpha Ezra doesn’t let women patrol at night. You didn’t think to question it?”
Alex freezes in place, staring at me before turning to face the rest. His brows are drawn and the self-confidence that filled me is gone in an instant. “She has been doing patrols along the borders and the back of the river, she has been on every night for the past month, I didn’t think anything of it because, well, you know,” he says, motioning to me.
I press my lips in a line. I have every urge to grab this wolf by the scruff of his neck and shake him. Such vital info was kept from his pack and because of my previous dealings with a she-wolf? I bite back the growl that longed to tear from my lips. “We are not involved, Kat is my mate, you know this.”
“Yeah, well, not now, obviously because of Kat, I just assumed you said she could because that’s what she said.”
“Find her and bring her to the packhouse,” Mateo orders him, and Alex nods, running off into the trees.
“You think Miss Taylor had something to do with it?” Jasmine asks, her hands pressed to her mouth.
“Not sure, but we will find out.” She nods, grabs Angie’s arm, and walks off to help clean up.
Mateo stomps over toward the two men and their mutilated corpses.
Meanwhile, I go over to the one lying next to the packhouse first, the man who shot Shirley. I crouch beside him. No doubt it was one of Jackson’s men, I can smell their pack stench on him when Mateo calls out.
“Ezra, he isn’t Jackson’s,” Mateo points out, making me look over at him standing next to the other one.
I get up, striding over to Mateo, and look down. No, he wasn’t Jackson’s man, he was Andrei’s.
“Great, just what we need,” I groan.
Mateo growls. “Kat?”
“Inside,” I answer.
“Derrick?”
“Taking Shirley to the morgue until we deal with funeral arrangements.”
“Okay, I already spoke to Mathias, he’s going to tell the families of our men that died.”
“Mated?” I ask, and he shakes his head.
“No, but they were brothers,” Mateo answers, and I sigh. Hard enough losing one kid, but two?” Shit, I would have to go see their parents. It would be disrespectful not to.
“You should go inside, let me handle this. Go be with Kat,” Mateo offers.
“Yeah, not such a great idea, she isn’t going to like me very much,” I admit, running a hand through my hair before flicking off the blood.
“Pretty sure she will hate all of us, we all stood there and watched, don’t think it was just you. If looks could kill, Jasmine and I would be dead too with the way she stared at us for not helping her.” He winces as he grabs the man’s foot and drags him over to the pile of bodies.