“At least you know I’m not bringing strangers into your territory.”
My eye-roll only made him laugh. “Take a seat.” I gestured to his kitchen table. “I need to talk to you too before I go see Nell.”
The smile faded and Axel pulled out a chair, eyeing me warily as we both sat. “I wondered what your text was about last night.”
“The one you chose to ignore.”
He waved behind him in the direction of the gateway. “I had fae business to attend to.”
I’d known Axel for five years. When my dad left to live in the Fae Realm with his new bride, Axel had appeared, tasked with guarding the gateway between our worlds.
I could never work out whether that had been a reward or a punishment, and Axel was surprisingly tight-lipped about it. I’d never pushed for answers because, for one, it wasn’t any of my business and, two, it was the only time I ever saw him retreat into himself. The one occasion I’d asked him about it, his whole demeanour had changed, the easy-going happiness replaced by a coolness that made him look more like the fae we read about in books: cold and unapproachable.
And not a little scary.
Magic had crackled in the air around us, the hair on the back of my neck prickling before he’d shaken his head and snapped out of it.
I’d never broached the topic since, but that didn’t mean I’d forgotten about it. My curiosity never dimmed either, but just like before, I kept my mouth shut.
His explanation was that someone needed to act as Gatekeeper, so why not him?
“What’s so important you needed to tell us all at once?” Axel sat forward, arms resting on the table. The light caught his eyes, giving the vibrant blue an almost violet tinge. For a split second, he reminded me of Gabriel. Not the hair—that was about as different as you could get—but the eyes… the sharp cut of those cheekbones.
Fucking hell, Rys! Get a grip.
One day and he was already messing with my mind again.
“We’ve got active hunters in the area,” I said, diving in and pushing all thoughts of Gabriel away. At Axel’s raised eyebrows I got the impression he hadn’t been around for the last day or so. Usually he seemed to know everyone’s business.
“Why are they here now? I wasn’t aware we’d had any trouble that warranted calling in the hunters.”
“One of Falon’s pack went feral yesterday evening. The police called in a hunter group to help track him down.”
Axel’s eyebrows drew together. “They got here fast then.”
They had. With everything that had happened, I hadn’t given that much thought until now. Hunters had to get to places fast, time was almost always critical, but like Axel said, we hadn’t needed hunters around here for a while. “I don’t know how they got here so quickly.” Maybe that was a question for Gabriel.
I hated the way my pulse quickened at the thought of seeing him again.
“Anyway, Max thinks this might be connected to those other cases.”
Axel looked up. “He told you that?”
I shrugged. “Not in so many words. He said they had theories, but they wouldn’t know if they applied to Callum’s case until the bloodwork came back from their lab.”
“Wait, Callum?” He sat up straighter. “Callum Walker?”
I hadn’t caught Callum’s last name, but there couldn’t be that many in Falon’s pack. The fact that Axel seemed to know him set my teeth on edge.
“Young, about eighteen, nineteen, sort of angelic-looking?” he asked when I still hadn’t answered him.
Callum had looked far from angelic the first time I’d seen him, covered in blood on the forest floor. But yesterday? “Longish dark hair? Slim for a shifter?”
“Yeah, that sounds like him.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Fuck.”
I didn’t want to ask, but… “Did you fuck him?”
“What? No!” He looked as though I’d slapped him. “He was a baby. Give me some credit, Rys.”
