“Fuck, you guys are so much more agreeable than the bunch of feral cats I have here.” Cyrus sounded tired and just generally done with most things.
“How is Wr—Black?” Teddy squeezed his eyes shut on another near miss and hoped everyone would just let it slide.
“Black is gonna be the reason I end up behind bars,” Cyrus said. “Other than that he’s fine. The entire team is fine.”
“Good.” Teddy swallowed and felt Saint’s hand come to rest on his knee in comfort.
“If you’ve had enough small talk,” Cyrus said. “Feral humans not of the cursebreaker variety ransacking houses, cars, clubs, and streets, and nobody saying a peep about it? Sound familiar?”
Saint perked up immediately. “It does! We have several ongoing cases now and have for a while.”
“How long is a while? This is very new in Slatehollow.”
“I’d say at least six months?” Saint said, looking at Teddy.
He picked up his journal and flipped through to the first entry he’d made about these cases.
“Five,” he said. “We had a few decent leads early on, but since then, nothing. Until today.”
“You found something today?” Cyrus asked, and Teddy hummed in agreement. “Right. I don’t think this is gonna work over the phone, and I have way too many active cases to just take a road trip.”
“We could come down?” Teddy rushed to say, and Saint snorted but said nothing.
“Fuck yes,” Cyrus said. “Finally someone helpful, I’m buying you all the whiskey in the world once this is done.”
“We’ll be there with all the info in a couple of days,” Teddy said.
“You know where to find me,” Cyrus said before cutting the call.
“Someone’s eager,” Saint said.
“Saves you from wearing heels,” Teddy fired back, and that…shut him up enough for Teddy to get his heart in order.
He’d see him again.
He’d be close to him again.
Cases forgotten, that was all that mattered to him.
Chapter 5
Wren
“Poachers?”
Wren stared at the image of an eye carved into the tree trunk Bianca had found on her fence-checking rounds around the perimeter of the sanctuary. The carving was still fresh, the sap still bleeding so it looked like it was crying.
He snapped a quick photo of it and sent it to the group chat. Just one more to add to the growing pile they had with zero answers. But they’d agreed to keep a log so…
“Worse,” he said, stomach turning.
Bianca’s frown of skepticism wasn’t unwarranted—there was a top ten list of worst humans on the planet and poachers made top three. Wren didn’t know how to explain that whatever this eyes cult was might be much more sinister.
“I don’t want anyone here alone, especially at night,” Wren said.
“I’ll let everyone know…but what is this about, Wren? I know that a few zoos have been targeted lately. That Komodo dragon going missing was the latest one on the news, and we’ve heardabout more through back channels. Is the sanctuary in danger?” she asked, dark eyes glimmering with anxiety.
“Not if I have anything to say about it,” Wren growled, clenching his small fists. “They picked the wrong place to mess with.”
