“I need to stay here, to coordinate communication and draw up a search grid.”

“That’s an old Alpha’s answer.” She waved off my objection. “The grids can wait, and thanks to the miracle of cell phones, you can coordinate on your feet. Don’t you think we’d both be more useful out there looking for him?”

Without a doubt. But new strays act unpredictably, and if Robyn got hurt on my watch, the council would never forgive me.

If she got hurt, I’d never forgive myself.

“You’re staying here to babysit me, aren’t you?” She sounded almost as insulted as she looked. “I can handle myself. In fact, according to the council, I can handle myself a little too well.”

“Against humans,” I agreed. “But you’ve never fought a fellow shifter, outside of sparring, have you?”

She blinked and suddenly looked more irritated than insulted. “No, and I don’t plan to fight Corey Morris. I’m going to look for him. If you want to ‘protect’ me, you’ll have to come with me.” With that, she marched out of the office and down the hall, toward the kitchen.

“Wait!” My chair rolled toward the shelves behind me as I stood and jogged after her. “I don’t suppose it’d do me any good to order you to stay here.”

She turned to walk backward, one eyebrow arched at me. “Are you still planning to send me to Atlanta?”

An ache spread through my chest. “You know I have to.”

“Then you’re not my Alpha.” She shrugged and headed down the hall. “Order away. But tie your boot while you talk.”

I looked down to find that my right boot was indeed untied. By the time I caught up to her, shoelaces trailing behind me, she had one hand on the kitchen door. “Wait a minute, Robyn!” I dropped into a squat to tie my boot, and she let go of the doorknob. “Did you follow orders this well in Atlanta?”

“Nowhere near this well,” she said with a grin.

“Then I’m almost surprised they want you back.”

She shrugged as I stood. “Me too. Let’s go.”

I followed her out the door onto the patio, where she stopped to look over the pool and hot tub—both covered for the winter—and the tree-lined path leading to the tennis court. “So, what’s the plan?” I asked.

“Well, cats don’t track by scent, like a dog would. Man, was I disappointed to realize that.”

“You’re not the only one.”

“But a while back, I had some pretty good luck tracking people using my other senses—eyes, ears, and common.”

I couldn’t resist a smile, despite the circumstances. “Okay, then, work your magic. Where do we start?”

“At the last known location.” Robyn headed around the pool at a jog, and I followed her through the front door of the guesthouse and down the stairs. In the basement, she stopped and looked around again, and I was starting to wonder if she was part bloodhound.

Or a police detective.

She marched into the empty cell and picked up a sweat-stained shirt from the pile of clothing discarded on the concrete floor. “Okay, his clothes are here, so he’s probably in cat form.”

“Or naked,” I offered.

“That’s possible, I guess, but not likely.”

“How do you know?”

“I know because in the very darkest part of my post-infection period, I wanted to kill the people responsible—the need was so strong I could hardly think about anything else—but I never went outside naked, unless I was on four paws. I might have been on the edge of sanity, but I wasn’t crazy. And neither is Corey Morris. In fact, he seemed pretty coherent a couple of hours ago.”

“Okay.” I tried not to sound too impressed by her empathy and understanding. “So he’s probably covered in fur. Where would he go?”

“That depends on why he left. He could have been hungry, especially so soon after shifting. Maybe he went out to hunt.”

“But there’s more meat in the fridge. I told him to help himself.”

“Yes.” She stood and glanced across the basement at the kitchenette. “But if he can’t control his shifts yet and got stuck in cat form, he may not have been able to open the refrigerator.”

“Well, if he went into the woods, we’ll find him eventually.”

“Or he’ll wander out of the forest on the other side and be spotted by motorists. Or hunters.” She frowned as she rounded the table, her gaze narrowed on something behind one of the chairs. “Was Corey wearing a coat when he got here?” She squatted, then stood with a dark green quilted jacket.

The shredded remains of one, anyway.

“No, that’s mine.” Damn it. And it was my favorite.

Robyn held the scraps of material to her face. “It’s covered in both your scent and his. Why would Corey tear up your jacket?”

“I have no idea.” But that did not bode well for my attempts to bond with the new stray.

“When was he last seen?” Robyn asked.

“I saw him a couple of hours ago. I don’t think anyone else was down here after me, until Spencer brought his dinner.”

“And the doors were unlocked?”

“Of course. We don’t lock up new strays unless they’re dangerous, in more than a reactionary sense.”

“Meaning…?”

“Meaning new strays will often snap at or strike out at people who get too close, but if they’re not aggressive when given their own space, locking them up only makes things worse,” I explained. She seemed both relieved and frustrated by the answer. “We’ve never lost one before,” I added. “Most new strays seem comforted by the scents of their peers and wary of striking off on their own, at least at first.”

“Well, Corey doesn’t seem to have been comforted by your scent.” She held my ruined jacket up for emphasis. “But even if he wasn’t locked in, the doors were still closed, right?”

“Yes, but you may have noticed that all of the doorknobs are actually levers.” I gestured at the one at the top of the stairs for emphasis. “After I was infected, I had the knobs all replaced so I could get in and out without thumbs.”

“So he had a bad reaction to your jacket, and he let himself out sometime in the past two hours.” Robyn looked up at me. “I assume he’s never been on or near your property before?”