CHAPTER 5
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“This is Collins,” Isaid as I put the phone up to my ear and was surprised to hear Theo Nilsson’s deep voice come through the speakers.
“Hey, Guppy.” Theo greeted me, using the nickname that he had given me when he was my trainer during my time at Quantico. I had spent the first three months telling him that I didn’t do nicknames and that he should just call me Agent Collins. But eventually, he’d gotten me to respond to the nickname and the rest was history. Bullet-riddled history.
“Hi Theo, what can I do for you and—before you ask—the answer is no. I cannot help Pack Russo again. They are the biggest pain in the ass to deal with, aside from you of course.” I still had nightmares about the operation to rescue Eloise Taylor and how Pack Russo had made my job hard every step of the way. I was lucky that I didn’t lose my damn job after all of the shit that they put me through. Director Cruz was still pissed that I had brought two civilians into a hostile zone. I never mentioned the fact that Gage Larson had taken the shot that had ended Alexei Volkov and I never would mention it. The sheer amount of rules that I broke during those forty-eight hours still made me break out in hives, so there was no way in hell that I was going to help the Russos out again.
Theo chuckled at the tone of my voice, and the sound of it curled its way down my spine and I shivered involuntarily. I forced my spine straight and shook off the feelings that always came whenever I heard Theo Nilsson’s voice. Longing, frustration, sadness and a sea of lust that had no business rearing its ugly head again.
“I’m not calling to ask about them, although they did bring something to my attention. Have you heard about Hezekiah Jordan’s retrial?” Theo asked and I groaned inwardly. Hezekiah Jordan was like a cockroach. I had heard his name so many times over the past few weeks that I wasn’t even surprised that Theo had mentioned him.
I hadn’t been keeping an eye on the news cycle today. My hands had been full all day and this was the first time that I had been able to look at my phone. The last time I had checked on Jordan’s current status in prison, he’d only been up for a parole hearing. “Retrial?” I questioned, pretty sure that whatever Theo was about to tell me was going to make my shitty morning that much worse.
“They are throwing out the original trial and granting him a retrial. There was tampering with one of the jurors that sent the whole thing down the drain. It’s absolute bullshit.” Theo sounded pissed. “Anyway, I never told you this but I was a part of the original operation. I pulled the youngest witness out, and this morning I found out that someone has been sending her threatening mail for over a month. She was sent a dead kitten this morning.”
“Shit.” I cursed under my breath and tried to process the new information. Theo had told me that there was an operation that had changed the way that he looked at the world around him, but he had never shared it with me. “You said the youngest witness? I’ve been trying to get her record unsealed, but it’s been a nightmare of red tape and bureaucracy since she was a minor and an omega.” I’d been getting the runaround from the courts for the past week. They either left me on hold or told me to call so-and-so at such-and-such office.
“Well then, I guess it was lucky that I called you.” There was a note of relief in Theo’s voice, like he had been dreading having to call me. The feeling of hurt that always seemed to float just beneath the surface of my interactions with Theo bubbled up and I had to force it down. My feelings were irrelevant right now and Theo had continued to speak. “You won’t need those records after all. I have access to her and we are going to head to the academy soon. You in?”
I was vaguely curious about why he wanted me to stop digging into her records. It was a part of FBI procedure and he knew that I would need all of the information about the omega that I could get. But for now, I just needed to focus on making sure that she was safe and secure.
“I’m in. What time are you heading that way?”
“In about an hour. Hey, Guppy, at least this is kind of a silver lining. You’ve got one of your witnesses. Four more to go after this.” I knew that Theo was trying to sound encouraging, but looking at the scene around me, I was anything but encouraged.
“Yeah...” I looked up at the still smoldering body that was tied to a post in front of me. Agents scurried around me, taking pictures and collecting evidence. The medical examiner turned the wrist of the victim so that I could see the faded tattoo, confirming what I already knew. “About those witnesses.”
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“So what you’re tellingme is that every other witness, other than Tibby, has been burned alive by some unknown killer?” Theo asked as he slid into the passenger seat of my FBI issued black SUV. Matteo Diaz and Aria Simmons, Theo’s packmates, hopped into the backseat.
I opened my mouth to tell them that there was no way I was involving them in all of this, but Aria cut me off, “Before you start, Cobb,” she said, using my childhood nickname. It had only ever been used by my grandma and mom, so it immediately made my spine straighten like I was about to be scolded. “If Theo is involved, we are involved. I am 100% prepared to argue with you about this and you and I both know that you will lose that fight.
Touche, I thought and closed my mouth with aclick. Aria was one of the best lawyers in Northern California. Arguing with her was, and had always been, pointless. With a final sigh I pulled away from the curb and did my best to ignore her smirk of triumph. She reached from the backseat and gave my shoulder a squeeze. It was crazy how easy it was to fall back into the same old pattern with these alphas. It was like I had never left.
I had known Aria and Matteo almost as long as I’d known Theo. They’d been living in Virginia with Theo while he did his time as a training agent at Quantico. He had trained me and had recommended me for the San Francisco field office so that I could be close to my family again. Theo had been a good trainer, a good friend, and, well, a goodsomething more than friends. That was, at least, until the incident that had ended it all and had driven a wedge between me and Pack Simmons.
Speaking of the incident, “How’s the shoulder?” I asked, glancing over at him as I turned at a light.
“Fine. I hardly feel it at all.” Theo was never one to complain about his aches and pains. But I knew better than anyone that a gunshot wound to the shoulder wasn’t something you ever completely recovered from. Especially when the bullet shredded the majority of the muscles in his shoulder and permanently grounded him from field duty. The same feeling of guilt that I always felt when I thought about the incident bubbled up in my gut and I couldn’t help but frown at the blue-eyed alpha.
Matteo was also having none of Theo’s blasé attitude, the dark-eyed alpha stuck his head between the seats to glare at his packmate, “That is a straight-up lie. Who was the one who needed a cortisone shot last week because your shoulder was so stiff that you could barely go to work? Hardly feel it my ass.” The two shared a look that contained an entire silent argument before Matteo finally flopped back into his seat with a huff.
The old guilt gnawed away at the edges of my conscience again, like a flesh-eating disease. The incident that had abruptly ended the close relationship that I’d built with Pack Simmons and had sent me running away from them...only to end back up in San Francisco three years later. I avoided them like the plague, not wanting to feel this guilt any more than I needed to. But when Theo had called me and asked for my help I had come running like a puppy who had been promised a treat. From there, the floodgates had opened and sent me hurtling back into Pack Simmons’ orbit. Here I was yet again, caught by Theo and his pack. I still didn’t know how to feel about it.
Theo’s tone was harsh as he growled: “Guppy, don’t you dare apologize, or I will get out of this car and walk the rest of the way to the academy.”
My mouth snapped shut and we drove the rest of the way to the academy in silence.
When we arrived, a tired-looking woman greeted us at the front desk. She looked to be about middle-aged with dyed blonde hair and a manicure that probably cost more than my weekly groceries. Glancing down at her name tag, I clocked her name: Amber.
“Hi there, I’m Special Agent Jacob Collins, and this is Theo Nilsson. We’re supposed to meet with Tibby Sinclair?” The use of my full title immediately made the woman sit up straight and she gave me a long up-and-down look before a slow smile curled onto her face. I was sure that she thought it was definitely a flirty smile, but I was very much not interested. After a few uncomfortable seconds of her staring at the four of us, I finally cleared my throat. At the sound, Amber jumped out of what I was sure was an erotic daydream that involved Matteo, Theo, myself, and a pair of handcuffs. Her cheeks warmed, and she smoothed her blouse, plastering a professional smile back onto her face in the process.
