I glanced at him. “I didn’t figure it’d fly with you, and there’s no way in hell I’ll let our baby be a part of anything they’re up to.”
“Not a chance.”
“Yeah, the Blacks are dangerous. The less we see of them, the better. If Johnny really is dealing in dark magic, then it’s definitely bad.” I tightened my hold on the steering wheel. “The other five witches Johnny said were coming are my cousins. Gran was one of five siblings, and they all had lots of kids. I haven’t seen my cousins for years, but they’ll all be able to do what we need them to. Even when I left Eugene when I was sixteen, they were already powerful. I’m sure they’re more so now that they’ve been training with the clan.”
“Have you gotten word about Willemena yet?” Brock asked.
I shook my head, flicking a quick peek at the dark screen on my phone. “Cass said he’d text as soon as Tianna had news. If Willemena can’t make it, then I’ll have to ask Johnny to bring an extra witch, though I’d rather have Willemena. Gran trusted her, and she’s played straight with us so far.”
Brock nodded, sharp eyes peering out the windshield ahead of us. “Willemena seems to know what she’s doing. I hope she can make it too.”
“Any news from Ray?” I asked. Brock had left his second in charge while he was away with me.
“Not since we first arrived at Cottage Grove. A few of my wolves couldn’t get home in time, but they’re locked in their offices, windows shut, vents blocked, waiting for instruction. We’ve got to get this dealt with soon. If a single one of my wolves gets infected, I don’t know what it would do to the rest of the pack.”
I gasped. “I didn’t think of that. The entire pack is linked!”
“Including you and the baby.”
“Do you think the effects of the fog could travel along the pack link?” Dread weighed heavily in my gut.
“I don’t know, Evie, I really don’t. When something bad happens to any of us, we can all feel it. When Nathan died, it hit every one of the wolves really hard. I think it’s possible that if the fog takes hold of one of us, it could influence the rest of us. I hope it’s not the case, but we’ve never dealt with one of these monsters before.”
I was busy considering how bad this shit show would really go when I noticed something up ahead on the road. I squinted, trying to make it out. “Is that … fog?”
A blackish green-tinged mist rolled across the road. Bile rose up my throat at the sight of it.
Brock clenched his jaw. “Fuck! It sure is. There was no fog on this road when we first drove through. It’s spreading fast.” He clenched his hands into fists and grunted in frustration. “I don’t know how to fight fog! Give me something I can hit or sink my teeth into, not this crap.” He gestured wildly up ahead of us.
Poor Brock. He was used to being in charge and in control. Since I’d arrived in his life, very little had been within his control.
“We’re going to have to drive right through it,” I said while Brock turned off the air conditioning, double-checked that the windows were fully closed, and grabbed two gas masks from the back seat, where we’d stashed them earlier. I’d learned today that Brock owned a dozen gas masks. When I’d asked him why, he’d just said he liked to be prepared for anything. Right then, I was mighty glad he was obsessed with protecting his pack.
While I kept driving, he strapped the mask on me before putting on his own. We had no idea if you had to breath the fog in to be affected or if it could just touch your skin, but this was the only road to the sheriff’s office and we couldn’t wait if it was spreading this fast. Yeah, it was like the apocalypse in Eugene, Oregon, and we didn’t have a second to spare. It was only going to get worse if I didn’t find a way to seal the gate before that siren bitch Calista and her sisters could get back out to create more havoc.
The fog thickened ahead of us until it fully concealed the rest of the road behind it. I was forced to slow down. “Dammit! If we had all ten witches assembled right now, we could take it down.”
Brock’s truck crawled through the haze of blackish-green.
“Did it take over the whole town while we were gone?” Brock asked. Through the mask, he sounded a bit like a sexy Darth Vader, though his question sent ice water through my veins.
“I sincerely fucking hope not.” But as I drove the truck through the fog, with no end in sight, panic started to thump in my chest. “Send Johnny a text to warn the Blacks behind us.”
Brock fiddled with my phone and then set it down, watching the road ahead keenly. He didn’t speak for a moment, and I wondered if he was checking in with his second-in-command via their telepathic pack link.
“Oh no,” he finally said.
“What?” I asked right away, keeping my attention fixed on the road ahead of me. Visibility was limited to like five feet in front of us. It was going to take us forever to get to the sheriff’s office like this, and the Blacks wouldn’t be able to get there any faster, and they were still probably ten minutes behind us even though I’d told Johnny they had to hurry. Though I didn’t think they had gas masks, they were powerful enough to magically protect themselves from the effects of inhaling the fog.
“Ray says the fog has completely overtaken pack land. He’s locked up in our house, so he can’t tell if the fog rolled back in from town to our property, or if more of the fog is seeping out of the gate. Could there be more than one fog demon? Or could one fog demon take over a whole damn town?”
“Dammit, I don’t know! Cass would though.” But I couldn’t exactly call Cass with a gas mask strapped to my face. But if he was close enough...
‘Cass!’I called out across our link, hoping I was within range. We’d never been able to figure out exactly how far our telepathic capabilities stretched.‘Can you hear me, Cass?’
‘Barely, but yeah, I can hear you. Shit’s gone to hell faster than we thought. It’s chaos over here.’His voice was muffled inside my head but it was there.
‘Where’s here?’
