“Neither, actually.” Deven’s smile slipped a little as he looked at Karissa. “I’ve been accepted at DC University in Washington. They have one of the best cybersecurity programs in the country. My contact at STAT recommended the school.”
Karissa’s mind went blank. Washington, DC? That was half a country away. She’d never see her brother. At least not often.
“And if you’re worrying about paying for me to go to college, don’t,” her brother added, almost like he’d been rehearsing what he’d been going to say. Which he probably had. “I’ve already taken care of it. I’m covered for the whole four years, plus a little extra just in case.”
Her head was swimming at that, and she paused with a forkful of coleslaw halfway to her mouth. “What do you mean, you’ve already taken care of it?”
Her brother shrugged and dug into his barbecue beans. “I know you don’t want anything to do with Mom and Dad—or their money—but I’m not so forgiving. I missed out on most of high school because I was working for them. The way I look at it, they owe me for four years of education. I’m just making sure they pay for it.”
Karissa could feel Hale and everyone elsearound the table looking at them and knew without glancing over that they were smiling. She kept her attention on her brother, knowing he’d crack.
“Fine,” he said with a long sigh. “I hacked into the company accounts and transferred an appropriate amount into an education trust fund to pay for college. I got the idea from that account Glenn Patterson had, and my contact at STAT helped me set it up. It’s not like Mom and Dad have room to complain. Not after all the crap they pulled.”
Karissa was starting to think that getting Deven and this person from STAT together was going to lead to a lot of trouble in the long run. But before she could point that out, Hale nudged her shoulder, obviously trying to get her attention.
“Now that we know what Deven has been doing behind your back, maybe you should let him know what you’ve been up to?” Hale said. “I’m sure he’s been worried about what you’re going to do with your life now that you’re not working for your parents.”
From the corner of her eye, she saw Deven looking at her with confusion. “I thought you’d just keep doing what you’ve been doing, saving innocents and stuff, but on your own.”
On your own.
The mere sound of those words was painful to hear, even though Karissa knew she’d never be on her own again. Not since she’d found her soul mate.But it appeared that shewouldbe without her little brother. For at least a while. That was painful, too.
“I considered going into the personal security business on my own, but in the end, I had to admit I didn’t have the kind of contacts necessary to find clients. That was Mom and Dad’s part of the gig and I never really worried about it.”
“So what are you going to do?” Deven asked, and Karissa realized he was actually a little worried about her. That concern felt nice.
“You know Hale’s pack mate Rachel, right?” Karissa asked, looking around the compound until she saw the woman at another table. “She was at the auto plant after everything went down, helping to clean up.”
Her brother glanced over at Rachel, who was sitting at the table beside theirs, then slowly nodded, clearly having no idea where this was going.
“Yeah,” he said.
“Well, her mate, Knox, runs a private security company here in Dallas,” Karissa said. “I was a little hesitant about working for someone I don’t know—especially after what Mom and Dad did to us—but Hale promises that I can trust Knox. That he’s part of the extended SWAT Pack, like you and me now. So I’m going to work for him.”
Deven considered that for a moment. “Won’t you miss running all over the world saving people?”
“Maybe,” she admitted, sipping her iced tea. “Butafter ten years of being separated from Hale, I’m actually looking forward to staying in one place.”
Her brother seemed to take that answer in stride, and the two of them spent the next few minutes talking about their most recent plans. The conversation was interrupted by Gage slipping onto the bench beside Deven.
Karissa couldn’t help noticing how tired Hale’s pack alpha seemed. Well, as tired as a werewolf could look, she guessed. According to Hale, his commander had been run ragged over the past week trying to tie up all the loose ends from Bagley’s assault on the auto plant, not to mention the involvement of the Gang of Five.
“Everything sorted with the Balauri and the district attorney?” Mike asked, looking up from his plate of steak and macaroni salad.
Gage nodded. “Officially, Darijo Tamm and the other three Balauri were handed over today to Interpol and the International Criminal Court, where they’re facing several dozen lifetimes in prison for crimes against humanity. Unofficially, they’ve been taken into custody by STAT and are being held at wherever it is they take all their supernatural prisoners.”
“So it’s over?” Carter asked quietly from the end of the table. He’d been so quiet that Karissa had almost forgotten he was there. “There won’t be anyone else asking questions about what happened that night?”
“It’s over,” Gage said. “As far as the DA and the chief are concerned, the Gang of Five was hired to kill Dominic Patterson and his son as part of a plot to steal secrets relating to the plant’s high-tech robotic manufacturing equipment. Everything they’d done before that was merely to distract the police and keep us off balance.”
“And the dried-up two-hundred-and-seventy-year-old corpse that Bagley turned into?” Connor asked in between bites of burger. “How did you explain that one?”
“I didn’t,” Gage said. “STAT showed up and took the body before anyone saw it.”
Karissa looked around the table, having a difficult time believing it could be that easy, even though everyone else seemed to accept Gage’s explanation—even Hale.
“That’s it?” she asked. “People are going to buy a story about a convoluted murder plot by a team of international fugitives and a little industrial espionage? What about everyone who saw us fighting Bagley and the Balauri? Didn’t their account of the events mess up your narrative?”
