In utter disbelief. Maybe something closer to despair.
We watch him tilt his head, clearly scenting the air, and then he turns around. His eyes are gold against the dark, announcing that he’s a wolf—
But we already know that.
“Connor,” Ty grits out, sounding as winded and sucker-punched as I feel. If a whole lot more furious. “What the fuck?”
20.
“Fuck you,” Connor snarls back at Ty.
“What the hell is this?” Ty belts at him. “All this bullshit isyou? Why would you betray the pack—andme—like this?”
I can’t make sense of this. I can’tbelievethis.
Too many things are whirling around in my head, like a kaleidoscope shifting pieces into patterns that never resolve into a single, comprehensible image. All those sacrifices. All thatblood.
Ty isn’t the only one who can’t get a grip on this. On everything it means, and everything I now have to look back on and wonder about. This means that it was Connor stalking me. More than once. That his are the eyes I’ve felt on me, making my neck prickle, making me jumpy. That he has been coming for me—all while showing me nothing but his trademark kindness and support to my face.
That he’s been the one sabotaging our runs.
It makes my stomach twist.
I think about a few days ago, when he walked me through the dark tunnels of the den and I had the strangest inkling that he was a threat—but I’d been sure I was just being paranoid. He’d done nothing. I hadn’t even mentioned it to Ty, because I’d thought I was being silly.
I think, here in the snow with the woods and the blood and Connor with an axe, that this is a lesson. I’m known for all kinds of things, but beingsillyisn’t one of them. Maybe next time I’ll listen to my instincts.
Right now I want to know how Ty’s trusted and beloved VP turned into a traitor.
“She’s coming, you asshole,” Connor bellows at Ty. I watch his fist clench around the axe he holds. “The goddess of filth and misery is coming. The princess of pestilencewill arise, and all of this will mean shit.Youwill mean shit.”
Vinca.
Somehow this is about fucking Vinca.
I can’t decide if this is better or worse.
I feel Ty’s powerful body quake with the same impossible realization that careens through me. In a way, I suppose it makes more sense. The fact that there were sacrifices at Savi’s place too. The idea that this is about the three of us, Savi, Winter, and me. None of that really tracks if this was all a traitor to the pack focused on wolf shit.
Not that Connor being a fucking death clan minion is something I can get my head around.
“You fought against her on Halloween,” Ty growls at him. “You personally rid the world of more of her creepy little minions than I can count on one paw. How the hell do you go from calling red cloaks candy to chopping up furry animals in the winter woods and pledging your fucked-up allegiance to a goddess who doesn’t give a shit if you live or die?”
Connor’s gaze is a dark hole. It makes my spine feel like it’s slicked in ice.
“One of her faithful found me afterward and led me to the truth,” he tells us, his hand seeming to convulse on the handle of the axe. “She showed me. The destroyer of worlds rests, but is not finished. The prophecy did not fail. She will rise again and this time, there will be no stopping her. Her oaths are stained in blood.”
Always with the blood, I think.
“She’s not here now, motherfucker,” Ty throws back at him. “The only bloodstains are the ones you keep making.”
Connor sneers and lurches forward. Ty swings me around so I’m behind him, his big frame between us. I hold on to him, my arms around his waist, and keep my eyes on the threat.
The threat I’m still having trouble believing is really a threat. Then again, that’s a whole lot of blood on the ground.
“It’s just you and me and a few carcasses tonight,” Ty goes on. “And I’m going to need you to explain how you go from being my second since the day I won my crown to this bullshit. Chopping up animals and leaving them all over the place like a deranged psycho. Sneaking around and fucking up protection details.” He shakes his head. “I was so sure it couldn’t be you. Even though no one else would have the authority to call back any protection I set out, I was convinced it couldn’t be you. I told myself it was impossible. I came up with a hundred theories about how someone was working around you becauseno fucking waycould it be you.”
They stare at each other as the snow drives all around them. They’re both breathing hard. I can see their breath against the dark. I can see Connor’s chest move. I can feel Ty’s.
