“That’s a wild story.”
I nodded. “It seriously is,” I agreed. “Not the sort of thing I ever would have seen coming.”
“Some of the best things in life are the ones you couldn’t plan for,” Colby said with a soft smile. “Gods know that I never could have seen Rafe coming in a million years.” He shoved his plate away and leaned back in his chair. “But enough schoolgirl gossip for now,” he teased lightly. “We can braid each other’s hair and talk about our boyfriends after we deal with the elephant in the room. Or rather, the humans in the woods,” he said with a snicker. “I met with Pete for a few minutes earlier. He should already be out with the first wave to put the plan in action.”
“Do you mind if we take this to my office?” I suggested quietly. “We’ve been trying not to make too big of a deal out of it to avoid unnecessarily upsetting the students.”
Colby quirked a brow at me. “To avoid upsetting the students or so you don’t upset theOmegas?” he asked pointedly.
Sighing, I stretched and rubbed my neck. “I know what you’re getting at but in this case, it’s one and the same.”
Colby didn’t respond, just rose to his feet and grabbed his dirty dishes to leave in the collection tub before following me to my office and dropping into the chair across from me.
“I stopped on the other side of the ridge when I got here,” Colby said abruptly, clearly ready to talk. “Left the bike in the trees and went for a run to scope things out. You already know that they’re Hunters,” he said, waiting for me to agree.
I nodded and leaned back in my seat.
“There’s more to it, though,” Colby said with a groan. “These aren’t your usual anti-shifter haters, this is one of the fringe factions. Anti-government, anti-science, shifters-are-replacing-us, whole conspiracy burrito.”
“Great,” I sighed but before I could say more, there was a knock at my door. “Yes?”
Kade shoved the door open, a grim look on his face. “You got a minute?”
I cocked a brow and nodded toward my guest, but Kade just scowled and walked in with Fang right on his flank.
“Colby, glad you’re here,” Kade greeted before gesturing behind him. “We have an intruder.”
“What?” The word had barely cleared my lips when a human male stumbled into the room, his hands tied behind him and a pungent odor emanating from his clothing. “What the hell is that smell?”
When the human would have fallen, Fang easily caught his weight and righted him before wiping the hand he’d touched the boy with on his cargo pants and stepping back to block the door.
“I think it’s one of those wolf urine imitation things you can buy off the internet,” Kade said, rolling his eyes. “You know, the stuff you can sprinkle around property lines to keep stray animals out?”
Not to blather on but that raised a few more questions than it answered so I looked at the human. “You know you’re trespassing. Who are you and why are you here?” I asked firmly.
With his head held high and black eyes flashing, the boy almost managed to hide his fear as he stared into my face. “Connery Allan. Archman. HC231.”
My brow started to creep up, but across from me, Colby chuckled.
“Oh, that’s cute,” he said condescendingly. “Did anyone write it down?”
Kade and Fang both glared at the werewolf Omega without answering so I assumed I was the only one in the dark.
Ignoring the human, I turned to Colby. “You know what that meant?”
Colby nodded and rolled his eyes. “In a lot of the extremist groups, they like to play military. The kiddo here was giving you his name, rank, and serial number.”
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
“Are you serious with this crap?” I huffed at the man who repeated them verbatim. Turning to Kade and Fang, I narrowed my eyes. “Has he said anything useful?”
Kade shook his head. “What should we do with him?”
“Did he do any damage? Steal anything?”
Fang shook his head. “We reviewed the camera footage and other than pulling a knife when we caught him, he was just poking around, the same as they were doing the other night.”
“Keep the knife,” I decided. “We’ll hand it off to the Sheriff and let them decide whether or not to return it.” Nodding to Kade, I gestured to the woods behind my office wall. “Take one of the trucks and drop him off on the road on the opposite side of their encampment,” I instructed. “Close enough for him to safely walk to his people without crossing our grounds.”
