Ferro took my card between his index and middle finger, giving it a cursory glance before sliding it in his back pocket. “Anything else?”
“No, that’s all we—”
“Actually, I have one question,” Blue said, tapping her chin. “Does Frank have any sons?”
“Yeah.”
“Alphas?”
Ferro huffed out a laugh. “No. That’s why he keeps going through women like underwear. None of them can produce a son, let alone an alpha.”
Blue didn’t look back at the chained bear, who was growling, but kept her eyes steady on Ferro. “Who’s in line of succession?”
“No one.” Ferro turned away and disappeared into the woods.
I turned to Blue. “What was that about?”
“We have to explore all angles to rule everything out. Frank might have felt threatened by a young alpha male. Most groups follow an order. When a leader gets too old, they choose a successor—usually their son—and step down. But sometimes you get a challenger who wants to overthrow the leader. It doesn’t sound like Rain was that kind of alpha, so maybe Frank was afraid that some of his best people would follow Rain if he started his own sleuth.”
I glanced at the bear. “Why would he want to take anyone fromthisfamily?”
“Likable or not, it would have been impossible for him to form a reputable sleuth because of his ties to this family. So he might have just settled for some of the men in this group. I’m sure they’re not all bad. Sometimes people get stuck for lack of options.”
“I don’t see why he couldn’t have started with a clean slate.”
“Let’s just say that groups like these sometimes have interbreeding going on. They share their women with the leader. Shifters looking to join a new group don’t want to mix themselves up with an alpha who came fromthis,” she said, gesturing toward the bear. “They usually don’t care about things like inbreeding.”
“It sounds like we’re going to have fifty different cases on our hands. Jealous mates, jealous leaders—what Pandora’s box did I just open? This wasn’t in the brochure.”
She poked my arm. “That’s what you get when you pick your own cases. Viktor has a vetting process for a reason. If we can’t solve a case, we look bad.Helooks bad. Makes it harder for us to get the good-paying jobs. I think he felt a little obligated because Ren is like your family, but you should be careful with favors. People take advantage, and it doesn’t always work out.”
I scanned the property and noticed an axe lodged in a tree stump. I put my foot on the wood to steady it and pulled the axe free.
“And what do you plan to do with that?” Blue asked, her eyes dancing with amusement.
“Break the chain.”
She strutted up and tossed the axe onto the ground. “Don’t be ridiculous. The only thing you’ll break with that is your pride. That bear wouldn’t even let you get close to her with a weapon in your hand. This isn’t what we’re here for.”
“Maybe not, but this isexactlywhat I signed up for. We got what we needed from Ferro, so now it’s time to take care of business.”
She put her hands on her hips. “So you’re willing to start a war on an impulse?”
I met her steely gaze. “It’s only impulsive if you haven’t thought it through. I know exactly what’s at stake, and freeing her is worth a few pissed-off bears.”
A smile touched her lips. “I knew I liked you for a reason. But Viktor won’t approve.”
“Look, I know you follow his orders to the letter, but we’re not a military unit. You and I both know that Viktor doesn’t care what goes down on these jobs so long as we clean up our mess and don’t jeopardize the case.”
She toed up some dirt with her boot. “If word gets out we’re stirring up trouble on Shifter territory, we won’t get very far with the case.”
“What rumors are these assholes going to spread? That two women single-handedly shamed them? That they were chaining up Shifters in order to break them? If some of the elite groups in the area get wind of what’s going on out here, these guys will have bigger problems on their hands than the bear that got away.”
Blue stroked her bottom lip, and I sensed she wasn’t trying to talk me out of this. She was trying to getmeto talkherinto it.
I studied the bear, who was lying on her belly. “Why doesn’t she shift? The cuff around her neck would fall off.”
“Because her life is threatened. When our animal senses our life is in danger, they’ll take over. That’s what these guys want. You have to break the animal, or they’ll never be submissive. As long as she’s in those chains, she’ll protect her human side because the human is weak. I’ve heard of Shifters staying in animal form for years—some even decades.” Blue took a deep breath and relaxed her shoulders. “Once I release her, she goes her way, and we go ours. If she wants to lie there, then we let her. Got it? Unless you want to help me lift a three-hundred-pound bear into the back of your pickup.”
