Jesse had seen it, too, old memories breaking through from when he was just a pup. Different time, different place—but Bryce couldn’t believe the connection was coincidence. Two packs, both with ties to an Argent, both wiped out in the night? Thatcouldn’tbe coincidence. That was the same damn people. And still the only clue they had was the link with the Council.
Bryce rubbed his forehead fretfully. The die was cast now, and the Council involved, for better or worse. Maybe the murderer would give themself away in their reaction to Jesse.
And maybe then, they wouldn’t have to weigh every word, hiding what they knew to make sure they weren’t the next targets.
Well. He’d always been an optimist.
Chapter Two
TOM
Tom Barrington paused outside Councilor Steadman’s office and knocked. Never more than one soft rap. He’d learned the hard way his first day that protocol wasn’t optional.
When invited to enter, he found Steadman standing with her back to the large window overlooking Independence Avenue. It wasn’t optimal from a security point of view, but he knew better than to mention it. She’d already know, and it wasn’t his job anymore.
Although he’d started in the personal security role, these days he carried the grander title of “Aide to Councilor Steadman,” which mostly meant he handled the jobs no one else wanted. And from the look on her face, what she was about to hand him ranked high on the “do not want” list.
“I need you to go to Colorado and check something out,” she said.
“What?” he asked, because the councilor preferred straight talking to politeness.
Something flashed through her eyes, too fast for him to identify. “There’s a pack out there who claim they have an Argent. One of the more promising interns was dispatched to check it out, and he confirms their story.”
Tom’s jaw dropped. AnArgent? In this day and age? It was impossible. Like becoming a fighter pilot with red-green color blindness—some things just didn’t happen, no matter how badly someone wanted them.
But joking about interns on hallucinogens wouldn’t be well received, so he stood silently, his face expressionless once more.
“Bennett is ready to charge out there, bit between his teeth, to ensure he gets control over both the Argent and the inevitable press coverage,” she said, sounding as aggravated as she always did when Bennett’s name came up. “Which means I have to go with him for damage control.”
Everyone on the Hill knew Councilors Steadman and Bennett couldn’t agree on lunch, let alone policy. It made day-to-day running of the National Council rather awkward given that he was Leader and she was Deputy Leader. They’d be no more likely to agree on how to handle the discovery of an Argent than anything else.
“I need you to check out this pack for me,” she said, her eyes steely. “I’ve got the backroom wonks running down details, but I want you to find out the things that words on paper won’t tell me—where the power really lies in this pack, who holds any sway with this Argent, and what he’s like himself. I need to know what it will take to persuade him to come to our side rather than follow Bennett.”
She paused for an instant, to underline her next sentence. “And if you find that he’s not particularly persuadable, you need to identify the levers I can use to bring him onside.”
This was the part of politics Tom hated. When he’d first come to work in Washington, he hadn’t noticed just how dirty the place’s underbelly was. He’d been too depressed to notice much of anything after losing the life he’d planned ever since he was five and had watched his first fighter jet blast across the sky. Now he’d been here longer and was more experienced, he could see more clearly. Manipulation of those the politicians had been elected to represent was par for the course.
“Anything else, Councilor?” he asked.
“That’s it,” she said, and moved to settle in the chair behind the large oak desk that stood in one corner of the room. She smiled slightly. It was a pale shadow of the one she used on the public, but it still made her look sympathetic and unthreatening. “I’m counting on you, Tom,” she said, before turning her attention to the papers in front of her.
Dismissed, he retreated into the antechamber where the councilor’s executive assistant, Maria, was waiting to thrust a folder into his hands. Steadman still liked some things done the old-fashioned way, on paper, so that the audit trail was controllable.
“Everything you need is in there,” Maria said, her smile as genuine as Steadman’s had been manufactured. Maria was a ruthless gatekeeper for the councilor, but for some reason she had a soft spot for Tom. When Zack had left him, she’d taken to setting coffee and muffins on his desk every morning.
He flicked the file open and found it was as organized as everything else that left her desk. There was a list of pack members, together with the results of background checks on them, including known associates and previous pack affiliations where this information had been traceable. Probably, knowing the backroom wonks, they’d even found out how each of them took their coffee.
“Thanks, Maria,” he said.
“You better move,” she said. “Your flight’s in four hours, out of Dulles.”
With DC traffic, that barely gave him enough time to swing by the apartment, grab his overnight case, and tell—
That was when his brain derailed. Because it had been six fucking months and hestillforgot sometimes. Like when he woke up in the middle of the night and listened for Zack’s breathing beside him. Or when he heard something that made him laugh and he reached for his phone to text Zack.
But Zack was gone now, and there was no one to care how long Tom would be away.
Thirty minutes later, he slid through the front door of his apartment and quickly packed his case, feeling like an intruder in what used to be his life. Whatever awaited him in Colorado, it was better than sitting in the silence of a home where he’d thought his life was perfect—young, successful, and in love. He knew he should give up the lease, but the apartment held too many memories. They were all he had left of Zack, and he didn’t want to let them go.
