Page 25 of Cold Sacrifice

“Okay,” I said. “When?”

“Now.”

“Saul, I’m working. I’m cleaning houses after having been in the office half the night. I want to finish up here and go home. I can meet with Wes tomorrow afternoon.”

“He needs you now, Kaitlyn. He has his reasons for calling you in. In his words, he wants to pull a loose thread he saw during your first session.”

I narrowed my eyes, preparing to tell him that he and Wes Korda and the council could all kiss my ass, when he murmured, “Please, Kaitlyn. This man needs you in desperate ways. He just doesn’t realize yet what you can do for him.”

I gaped at the phone for a few seconds before speaking. “So many things I want to ask you, but I know you won’t answer a single question. So I’ll just say…you’re his handler, aren’t you? The way you are my handler. I know you care for us.”

Of course he said nothing. He’d baited the hook and simply waited to see if I’d bite.

“Fine,” I said. “I’ll go see him now.” Saul had made me curious, damn him. And maybe he was manipulating me, but I didn’t think so. At least not completely. “Where should I meet Aaron?”

“You don’t need Aaron tonight. Weston is waiting at the usual place. You can drive there, and you will be admitted. Alone.”

“Yeah,” I told him. “I’ve learned my lesson about taking friends into the council with me. But why are they back in the regular place?”

“They feel the need to move places only if they have a meeting during the day.”

“During the day because that’s when whatever is killing the vampires is active?”

“I don’t know, Kaitlyn. Go now to see the wolf. He will find another piece of the werewolf puzzle.”

“I thought he was looking for another thread in the tapestry,” I snarked.

He hung up on me.

I’d had the call on speaker, so Joe knew what I knew. “I don’t like it,” he told me. “Why would they pull you in on the spur of the moment like this?”

“It’s not them,” I said. “It’s Wes Korda. I do wonder what Saul thinks this wolf needs help with. Not the Voss situation, but something personal to him.”

“I think Saul was just fucking with you to get you to go.”

I shrugged. “It doesn’t feel like that to me.”

“Lucy was right,” he said. “You take in strays.”

I pulled onto the highway. “Speaking of Lucy, I’m ready for dessert. What did she send?”

He reached over the seat into the back and grabbed a bag. “Donuts,” he said. “She didn’t give them all to Max.” He handed me a donut, then uncapped a protein drink. “Protein and carbs.”

The drink was warm, but I didn’t mind. A wolf needed protein. “You got any of those nutty candy bars?” I asked him.

“Yup. Two of them.”

“I’ll eat one and take the other to Wes. He looked like he could use more food than he’s getting.”

“Take the bag,” he told me. “There are a lot of snacks this time.”

When we arrived at the council building, he didn’t ask to go in with me. We’d both learned a lesson the last time that happened. “I’ll call and reschedule the other cleanings,” he said. “I can add three to Friday night’s schedule and three to Saturday night?”

“Friday,” I told him, opening my door and getting out of the car. “Not Saturday. I’m having dinner with Rick.”

“Fine,” he said. “I can watch the two of you eat and wish I—”

“Just Rick and me, Joe,” I said. “It’s sort of…I mean, it’s a date.”