Brooks must have known where this was heading if the look on his face was any indication. “Damn, Max. Please tell me you didn’t do something stupid.”
Max wished he didn’t have to tell Brooks anything of the sort. The Pack’s biggest werewolf had always been a friend and mentor to him, and Max felt like he was letting him down.
“Yeah, I pulled a stupid,” Max admitted. “I heard one of the Wallace girls scream, so I busted into the house. I hoped I could catch that bastard in the act of beating one of his kids, but the moment I saw the boy was standing there trying to protect his mother, blood seeping through the bandages on his hand, I lost it. I ended up pinning Wallace to the wall and almost choking him out.”
Brooks shook his head, and the disappointment Max saw on his face was almost enough to crush Max’s soul. “Why would you do something like that?”
Max shrugged. “Because it’s not in me to let that woman and her kids stay in a house with a man who beats them.”
Brooks looked at him like he was a complete idiot. “I know why you did it, you moron. I’m asking why you didn’t think to tell me or anyone else in the Pack. Cooper, Becker, Zane—hell, any of us would have gone with you and helped make sure we got this piece of crap. What, did you forget you’re part of a pack?”
Max cursed silently. If Brooks had wanted to say the one thing that would make Max feel like crap, he’d done it.
“I screwed up,” Max said quietly.
“No shit.” Brooks’s mouth tightened. “What the hell has gotten into you? It’s like you’ve gone completely off the rails.”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “It seems like my head is spinning lately. I can barely keep my shift under control at the best of times, and even when I do, I see myself doing stupid stuff without being able to stop it.”
Brooks regarded him silently, then sighed. “I guess I should probably cut you some slack. A werewolf can’t be held responsible for his actions while he’s an emotional train wreck. It’s happened with everyone else who found their One, so why not you?”
Max stared at his pack mate, surprised Brooks was letting up on him. “You think IA will be as understanding with my screw-ups as you are if I tell them my relationship status is complicated?”
Brooks let out a snort. “I don’t see that helping you out very much. But this time, trust Gage and Xander to watch out for you, huh?”
Max nodded. “You sticking around for a while?”
“Nah. I’m meeting up with Diego and Zane at a sports bar for the Thursday night NFL game.”
Max snorted. “Zane? He doesn’t even understand the game of football.”
That wasn’t an exaggeration. Their British teammate was all about soccer.
Brooks chuckled. “I know. I’ve made it my mission to teach him. Listen, text me later and let me know what happens with IA, huh?”
Max told him he would, then headed for the main admin building and Gage’s office. The moment he opened the door, a trio of unfamiliar scents hit him. He found two women and a teenage boy sitting at one of the desks in the bullpen, eating barbecued pork, beans, and corn bread while they watched a home makeover show on the TV mounted on the wall on the other side of the room.
As Cooper got up from his desk and walked over to meet him, Max took a sniff. The two women were beta werewolves. One was in her thirties, while the other was a little older, midforties he guessed. The boy definitely wasn’t a werewolf, though his scent was similar to the younger of the two women, so he was probably her son. The women gave him a curious look, then went back to eating. Something told him they hadn’t seen food this good in a long time.
Max glanced at Gage’s office, and his heart sank. Even though the door was closed, he could pick up Vince Coletti’s scent. Of all the detectives from internal affairs, why did it have to be Coletti? The man had a hard-on for the SWAT team, for sure. He’d even forced Cooper to attend anger management sessions with a shrink. And Cooper was the most laid-back, in-control werewolf in the Pack.
Max was screwed.
Cooper motioned with his head, indicating Max should follow him outside.
“So, you went back and punched out that child-beating piece of shit Wallace, huh?” Cooper said, then added, “I overheard Coletti talking to Gage and Xander.” He grinned. “Good for you.”
“Yeah,” Max muttered. “Well, now I have to deal with the fallout.”
Cooper shrugged. “Put on your best I’m-horribly-sorry-and-promise-never-to-do-it-again face, and you’ll be out of here in time for dinner with that new babe of yours.”
Max wasn’t nearly as sure of the outcome with Coletti as Cooper seemed to be, but arguing with Cooper about anything was like chasing a greased pig. You ended up looking foolish and feeling all dirty.
“What’s with the two betas in there?” he asked instead. “They on the run from the hunters, too?”
“Yeah,” Cooper said. “Grace; her kid, Rudy; and her friend Kari have been moving around the country with an omega who’d been watching out for them. Four weeks ago, a group of hunters caught up with them outside of Norman. The omega sacrificed himself so they could get away, and they’ve been ducking and hiding ever since. They heard about our pack and headed this way. They rolled in here about an hour ago, and haven’t stopped eating since.”
Cooper may have dropped all that on him casually, but there was so much crazy in that story it was tough to figure out where to start. The fact that there were hunter packs operating so close to Dallas had to make Gage and the other senior pack members a little worried. Until now, hunters had been this vague threat that hovered far enough away for people to be lulled into the belief they’d never come here at all. But Norman, Oklahoma, was barely a hundred miles north of the Texas line. That was damn close.
