“A few hundred lycans,” his Beta said drily. “I’m back at the warehouse. As the teams move across the country, they’re running across expat lycans and sending them here. Someone needs to be here ful time to process them.”

“Thank god you’ve got initiative.”

Stephan laughed. “If I bothered you with every administrative decision, you’d bite my head off. Perhaps literal y.”

“You’re too valuable. I’d find something else to torture you with.”

“Listen, there’s something else.”

The sudden gravity in his Beta’s voice set Elijah on alert. “What?”

“Himeko’s tel ing everyone you’ve mated with Syre’s second.”

“Hmm…” He watched as Vash stepped in front of him with a frown, her vampiric hearing ensuring that she heard every word. He smoothed the line between her brows with soft strokes of his thumb. “Not yet. She’s stil getting used to the idea.”

There was a long pause. “Alpha, I hate to point out the obvious—”

“Then don’t.”

“Vampires can’t breed.”

“Thank you for the recap.”

Stephan was not amused. “It’s my job as your Beta to inform you of concerns in the ranks. Don’t mock me for doing it.”

“I would never mock you—I respect you too much. In return, I ask that you don’t talk to me like I’m an idiot. I’m doing everything I can to the best of my ability. That’s al anyone has a right to know. My personal life is my own. If there’s a problem with that, tel the others to direct their energies to finding the Alpha outpost. Then we can have a democratic election and everyone can have a say.”

Vashti’s gaze darkened. Not funny, she mouthed.

No, it wasn’t. The only way another Alpha could gain control of the packs was by taking Elijah out. They wouldn’t get the respect they needed to lead without that victory.

“I’l keep you posted,” Stephan said.

Elijah kil ed the cal and returned his attention to the monitor. “Now, where were we?”

The ringing of the phone in the workstation interrupted as if on cue. Samuel answered. “Did you double-check? Wel , check again.”

Vashti’s gaze narrowed. “Wanna bet the blood’s missing?”

“Don’t like the odds,” Elijah replied, not surprised when Samuel proved Vash’s hunch correct. “Okay, then, pul up their photos.”

“No problem. Let me see…Ah, here’s one. Peter Neil.”

A familiar image popped up on screen and Elijah scowled. “I know him. Worked with him a time or two. His name isn’t Peter.”

“A sibling, maybe?” Vash queried.

“No. See the scar on his lip? Same guy.”

“Is he here?” she asked Samuel.

“I’ve never seen him before.”

“He’s dead,” Elijah said curtly. “Kil ed in a nest raid about twenty years ago. I was there when it happened. Do you have head shots of the others?”

Whistling, Samuel tapped out another string of keystrokes and another picture popped up. “Here’s Kevin Hayes.”

Vashti sucked in a deep breath.

Elijah’s remaining patience thinned dangerously. “Wrong photo.”

“That’s the one that was shot on intake,” Samuel insisted.

“It’s a mistake. That’s Micah McKenna.”

“McKenna, huh? Hang on. Okay, there’s a Micah McKenna in the system. Yeah…you’re right. He came in the same day as Kevin. Maybe the photos got switched around and misfiled. Here’s the one from Micah’s file.” The same photo popped up. “Someone fucked up.”

But Elijah’s attention was riveted to the history data that had opened along with the photo. His gaze skimmed through it, finding al the expected information—registered mate, archives of transfers and kil s, breeding chart.

“He lied,” Vash said. “I asked him his age and he said—”

“—fifty.” Micah’s official record put him at eighty years old, which made it possible for him to have kil ed Charron. He’d been too young at fifty— the perfect alibi. “Where’s the third lycan’s photo?”

“Here.” Samuel pul ed it up. “Anthony Wil iams.”

His fists clenched with recognition. “Look up Trent Parry.”

“Al right…Yep, he’s here, too.”

“Wel , look at that,” Vash muttered. “The same photo as Anthony.”

Elijah’s entire world tilted to the side, skewed by the realization that the men he’d trusted had betrayed him and every other lycan.

She began to pace. “It’s a fucking cover-up. They created a paper trail for three imaginary lycans and absolved them of guilt in Char’s death.

Why, damn it? Why did the Sentinels protect three rabid dogs?”

He shot her a look that warned her to say no more. “Samuel, get me copies of al these files, on both a flash drive and disks. Look up a Charles Tate, too, and throw him in the mix. He’s the one using the alias Peter Neil.”

Vash stopped directly in front of him. “Is Trent dead like Micah and Charles? Have I been hunting ghosts?”

“Trent was with me in Phoenix during the trip when Nikki attacked Adrian and we found Lindsay.” He pressed his lips to her brow and murmured, “You may have to fight her for him. She wants him, too.”

“Why?”

“I’l explain later. For now, let’s get out of here.”

CHAPTER 20

Vash didn’t realize how furious Elijah was until they returned to the hotel and he began shoving things into his bag.

“Elijah.” She reached out to him as he stormed past her.

“Get your shit. I want you out of here. I don’t trust this place. Don’t trust what’s left of that pack.”

“Elijah.”

“I’l throw it together if you won’t,” he growled, grabbing toiletries out of the bathroom. “But you’d better not bitch at me if something gets left behind.”

When he emerged, she stepped right into his path. “Wil you talk to me, damn it!”

“What?”

“You’re pissed.”

“Goddamn right I’m pissed.” He tossed the things in his hand on the bed and growled. “You know what Rachel said to me before she incited the rebel ion at Navajo Lake? She said, ‘It’s al on you.’ Now I have to wonder if I’ve been manipulated in ways I haven’t figured out yet. It’s certain they wanted you and me to kil each other. If we hadn’t fal en into rut the minute we scented each other, one or both of us would be dead. We’d never have spent the time together that led to where we are now, and Syre would be out for someone’s blood.”

“You think Micah’s the one who planted your blood for me to find?”

He crossed his arms, straining the armholes of the T-shirt he’d borrowed after getting blood on his own. “You kil ed Micah’s partner but kept Micah alive to interrogate. Why not the other way around?”

“He had a big mouth. Taunting me and being an al -around asshat. It was easy to pick him.”

“He made it easy. And I think it’s possible you recognized his scent from Charron’s attack without realizing it. Maybe you even recognized it from Nikki’s abduction. That knowledge might’ve been there in the back of your mind.”

“I have Char’s kil ers’ scents ingrained in my memory. I wouldn’t miss that.”

“I once had to argue my right to claim a kil because a badly wounded lycan had bled al over the body. It smel ed like her, more so than me, because of the blood. If Micah had access to my blood to frame me, certainly he had access to others’. Considering the trouble involved in creating that paper trail, dumping a couple bags of blood around Charron’s body would be the easy part. And we both know how a disemboweling smel s.

That could explain why the attack was so vicious—they wanted the stench to cover up their identities.”

She sank heavily onto the bed. “Why?”

Elijah crouched in front of her. “To break you. I think they’ve been trying to do that for years. First through Charron’s death, then through me.

Micah’s the thread there. You can’t tel me that’s coincidence. I won’t buy it.”

“No.” She exhaled harshly. “I’m not buying it either.”

“And we can’t forget about your double attacking Lindsay’s mother. Lindsay grew up planning on kil ing you her whole life.”

“They would’ve had to know who she was. That she had Shadoe’s soul inside her.”

“Yes. Just as they’d know Adrian or Syre would find her, and through them, she’d find you. It explains why she wasn’t kil ed along with her mother.

In my experience, the minions who go batshit have a liking for children’s blood.”

“I’ve heard it’s sweeter,” she murmured absently, rubbing at the ache in her chest. To think of Char dying because of her…“I’m not important enough to go to this much trouble for.”

“You’re important to Syre. Very much so. And so was Phineas to Adrian.” He caught up her cold hands in his. “This is psychological warfare— cripple the primaries by taking out their seconds. Micah likely deliberately sacrificed himself for the cause—just as I now suspect Rachel did. They wanted me in a specific headspace to achieve their aims.”

“To put you and the lycans on the high ground? Is that what this is al about? To make you the dominant faction?”

“I don’t know.” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “That wouldn’t explain the doctored files and missing blood; only Sentinels had access to cryostorage and data centers. And your double brings vamps into the mix, too. Why would they want lycans at the top of the food chain?”

“Vamps delivered Lindsay to Syre…after she was taken from the Point by a Sentinel.”

“Right. We’ve got the wrong vamps, lycans, and Sentinels involved here. The question isn’t just who’s dirty, but are they dirty together?”

Pul ing a hand free, Vash cupped his face with it, then told him about the conversation she’d had with Syre.

He cursed and pushed to his feet. “I have to go back. I have to go back to Adrian.”

She gained her feet, too. Her heart pounded. “What?”

“The Sentinels are wide open. Once it gets out that their blood is the cure, they’l be sitting ducks. They need help. I have to at least attempt an al iance.”

“They can take out a hundred vamps a minute, if they wanted to. They never real y needed you.”

The look he shot her was dark…and decided. “We need them. For al their faults, they keep the minions in check.”

“Minions are dying, El!” But she knew with a sinking heart that she wouldn’t be able to sway him.

“I need to go back if only because Micah worked so damned hard to force me to leave. There’s a reason for that, and I’m not going to just play along.”

“What about me? I need you. My people need you.”

Elijah tugged her close and pressed his lips to her brow. He held them there for a long moment, the beat of his heart slightly faster than it should be. “They’ve got you, sweetheart. You’re a one-woman army.”

She caught his belt loops, holding on tightly. Her chest and throat burned. “You can’t ask me to make this choice. It’s not fair.”

His hands pushed into her hair, brushing it back from her face. He looked down at her with such tenderness, she could hardly breathe through the pain of it. “I’m not asking you to do anything, Vashti. I’m tel ing you what I have to do.”

She stood frozen as he extricated himself and walked away. She watched him col ect the items from the bed and take his stuff to his bag and her stuff to her bag. Separating them. Dividing them up.

“Fuck you, lycan.” Her fists clenched at her sides. A surge of malicious satisfaction moved through her when he paused in surprise. “You can’t make me love you, then just fucking walk away. We’re in this. You and me.”

“I’m not walking away.” He faced her and crossed his arms. “You’re mine, Vashti. Nothing can change that. If you haven’t figured that out yet, we’ve got bigger problems than the war breathing down our necks.”

The fist around her heart loosened. “Then what the hel are you doing?”

“Letting you be who you need to be. Letting you be the woman I love, even if that means you’re on the other side of the world, on the other side of the line. If I make you go my way, I’l lose you. I know that, because if you try to force me to go yours, you’l lose me.”

“I can’t live that way, El.” Anxiety slithered through her, making her sick and cold. She began to pace. “We can’t be apart, working against each other. We have to find a compromise we can live with.”

“Tel me what that is,” he said softly. “I have to cal Lindsay and tel her the vampire most likely responsible for her mother’s murder is dead, which wil be both a relief and not, because she wanted to do the kil ing herself. Then I’l fol ow that up with the news that I probably got her father kil ed, since I handpicked the team of lycans sent to guard him and one of those team members was Trent. After that, I get to tel Adrian that Syre knows Sentinel blood is the cure and pretty soon more vampires wil know, so now the clock is ticking. In the meantime, Syre’s got rogues infecting his ranks and I’ve got lycans who are deliberately sabotaging my relations with both sides. Where’s the middle ground?”

“Switzerland.”