“Boarding kennels?” I raised a sceptical eyebrow. “What kind of kennels would have room for thirty extra dogs at short notice?”
“The kind that pay their rent to Goon. Don’t underestimate the thrall he has on this fucking county.”
Rae stamped into his boots and tied them. He took my offered hand and jumped out of the van, pointing across the camp. “I’m gonna find Sprig. Can you tell Fletch?”
“Of course.”
We separated less than a minute after laying eyes on each other again. It felt wrong, but I pushed the feeling away. It was hunt day, and the pain lancing my chest was the reason we couldn’t be anything more than comrades. There was no time.
Fletch was still by the fire. He frowned as I filled him in.
“Boarding kennels are a long shot,” he said. “Kind of brute Goon is, I wouldn’t put it past him to have them dogs crammed into those trucks overnight. Have ‘em parked up somewhere, frantic and hungry.”
I pictured it and shuddered. Hungry hounds meant wild hounds that even the huntsmen couldn’t control. It didn’t bode well for the rest of the day. “Do you know anywhere they could park those trucks unnoticed?”
“Nowhere public,” Fletch said. “But there’ll be plenty of big houses round these parts willing to lend a driveway. It might be that we won’t know where they’ll come from today. We just have to be ready.”
Sprig and Rae agreed when they returned from a fruitless check of the local kennels. The fox hound pack was nowhere in plain sight, so we’d be heading out blind.
Rae’s camp mobilised. Saturday sabs joined the ranks, backed up by neutral observers with Go-Pros and high-vis jackets. The numbers were higher than I’d expected, even accounting for the Buckinghamshire gang who had time on their hands due to their own hunt never running the last week in November.
“I did a sneaky Facebook campaign,” Rae explained as he tied his bandana around his neck. “Anonymous profile in the local arts college groups, and Mumsnet pages. I wrote a couple of diary entries from a vixen’s point of view, stayed away from the gruesome photos, and stuck to some low-key emotional impact. It seemed to work better than upsetting people so much they don’t stick around to absorb what we’re saying.”
Some days I forgot that Rae was a man with stories to tell, a painter with a thousand words as his brush. “I want to read what you wrote.”
Rae gave me another dead stare. “No, you don’t.”
“Rae—”
Meg stepped between us, an open box in her arms. She handed us a radio each, brand new and sleek. “Saves worrying about losing phone signal.”
Clearly surprised, Rae turned his over in his hand. “Where the fuck did these come from?”
“We got another big donation.” Meg inclined her head at me. “And Cash said we needed them, so Drey went out and got them from Costco last night. You were asleep by six, Rae. I didn’t want to wake you.”
She moved on.
Rae raised an eyebrow at me. “Was the big donation from you?”
“Fuck no.” I shook my head. “I cleaned myself out last time. You must have someone else rooting for you.”
Rae didn’t seem convinced, but short of showing him my empty savings account, there wasn’t much I could do about that.
The gang assembled by the gate for a last minute briefing from Fletch. He split us up, a prospect that relieved and terrified me in equal measure. I didn’t know the ground, so I’d slow Rae down if things got lary, but on separate teams, chances were I’d lose track of him. That he’d be facing heavies with quad bikes and crow bars without me at his back.
I swallowed thickly and joined Meg. I’d been tasked with driving her to the most likely area the hunt would start, in Rae’s van, and keeping her safe as she filmed and monitored as much as she could.
“Take it seriously,” Fletch growled when he caught me staring at the side of Rae’s head. “Anyone touches my missus, he’s a dead man.”
I believed him.
Rae was partnered with Sprig to run interference, both active and reactive. They’d worked together a long time, and the deployments made sense, but seeing them depart for the woodland without me left me feeling slightly sick. I wasn’t used to playing possum.
The rest of the group disbanded. Meg took my arm and gave me the kind of smile that made it seem as though we’d known each other years instead of barely a month.
“Hard not to worry, isn’t it?” she said. “I don’t sleep the night before a hunt, especially one like this.”
I tracked her gaze as it darted around us. “What’s so hot about this hunt?”
