Austin nodded as he stood. “This feels more like a wild west posse than any arrest I ever made with the police.”
He was not far off.
“Where does Billy live, anyway?”
I glanced at Vance, who answered, his voice dipping into a deep, grim growl. “Eamon took him in years ago. Kind of our version of a ward of the state. And I believe he’s still living in Eamon’s trailer, on the far side of the lake.”
“Wait.” Austin turned to look at all of us, his brows drawn low. “The former Marshal of the northern zonetook inthe son of the man who later kidnapped and infected the future—now current—Marshal? And isstillletting that kid live on his property? Without telling anyone of his connection to all this?”
I nodded as I mentally sorted through his summary. “And Eamonwillanswer for that.”
But as we headed out to the parking lot, the case fact eating at me was not what part Eamon had played in all of this. It was the roleI’dplayed. I’d had multiple opportunities to protect the men of this zone and their unsuspecting human relatives. None of this would have happened if I’d realized sooner that Silas wasn’t working alone. Or that Billy’s background didn’t add up. If I had even once in the three years he’d worked for me thought to verify his birth certificate. Or even to ask him about his family.
I’d failed the citizens of the northern zone over and over, and people had died. Ultimately, the blame for that could rest on only one set of shoulders.
Mine.
I rode with Vance because it would be easier to get Billy to the bar in the back of his SUV than in the bed of my truck, for several obvious reasons. Austin drove separately, mostly to keep Bishop from following us in the 4Runner.
On the way around the lake, I called Eamon. Again. I’d called him twice on my way back from the cabin, but he wasn’t answering.
“How suspicious do we consider that?” Vance asked when I dropped my phone onto my lap in disgust. “Does he usually answer when you call?”
“I don’t usually call.” In fact, before this, I’d only phoned Eamon three times since I took over as Marshal, and those calls were all attempts to sort out zone records he’d kept. Poorly. “As for suspicious… I don’t think he had any idea that Billy could have been involved in anything like what Silas did. Did Eamon fuck up as Marshal? No doubt. But I can’t believe he would intentionally put the zone in that kind of danger.”
Vance nodded without taking his focus from the road. “If he had, why tell you about Denny in the first place? Why draw attention to his own failures?”
“Exactly. That said, Iaminterested in what he couldpossiblyhave to say for himself. He knew about Billy’s paternity. Hemusthave. Even if he didn’t suspect Billy of being involved, there is no excuse for him not to have told me about the connection between Silas and Billy after I was infected. After we had to execute Billy’sfather.”
“Agreed,” Vance said. “On all counts.”
We parked nearly a mile from Eamon’s trailer, and Austin’s 4Runner pulled to a stop on the side of the road behind us. Any closer, and Billy might have been able to hear the engine. And hewouldrecognize the sound of Vance’s SUV.
“Sunrise is at six forty-nine this morning,” I said, reading from an app on my phone. That gives us about an hour until twilight, which is when the human eye will begin to register daylight. We need to have him in custody and out of sight before then.”
Because we could not risk anyone seeing us shove a boy who could pass for a teenager into the back of Vance’s SUV.
Fortunately, this side of the lake was pretty sparsely populated. But as always, it was better to be safe than sorry.
“Vance, you’ll go on foot.” That was standard procedure. We always worked with one enforcer in human form, so someone could open doors, tie knots, and speak actual words on short notice. “This is your head start. Go on. We’ll catch up.”
Vance took off into the woods, in the direction of Eamon’s trailer, at a quick jog, gently pacing his human-form legs and lungs, with a small backpack bouncing against his spine.
“The goal is to corner him.” I pulled my shirt over my head and shoved it into my nylon bag. Suddenly I really wished I’d had time for a burger. My body was not going to like shifting twice without sustenance. “Vance will do the talking, obviously. If Billy’s in human form, he’ll be cuffed. If he’s on four legs, we’ll basically hog-tie him.”
“Then how do we get him back here?”
I gave him a look as I stripped out of my pants. “Vance will throw him over one shoulder and carry him to the car. If we’re running short on time, I’ll race back here and drive the SUV back to him, to speed things up.”
Suddenly I wondered whether Austin had everreallyput his shifter strength to the test. It was entirely possible that choosing to isolate himself from the rest of the Pride had kept him from understanding his true capabilities.
Though I highly doubted his best friend had fallen into that same trap.
“Charley.”
I turned to find Austin watching me with a quietly intense expression I couldn’t quite interpret. Despite our nudity, his gaze stayed focused on my eyes. “I just wanted to apologize for last night. For…Bishop.”
My heart pounded so hard I was sure he could hear it. “For Bishop?”
