No! She would not let that stop her now. Nina Reyes was not a quitter. She would see this through until she found out who killed her brother. There was time to fall apart later, but for now she was in a bad place. Shaking her head clear, she heard men around her, saw people moving bodies quickly.

Lex looked at her long and hard and she backed up a step, glancing right and left, looking for an avenue of escape. She was pale. He could see her pulse beating erratically in her throat. Her hair was partially out of the ponytail she had it in, her glasses were on the ground and he bent to pick them up. Surreptitiously, he wiped off the blood spatters.

“Don’t even think about it, Nina. My brother is right behind you. There’s nowhere to go.” He looked her over carefully. “Are you all right?” he asked in low, soothing tones. He handed her glasses to her. “Here, you probably need these.”

“Get. Out. Of. My. Way.” She enunciated each word very carefully. Her lip was swelling where one of the thugs had hit her and she tasted blood. She also had a very sore arm where one of them had yanked on her. She tried to rotate her shoulder without bringing attention to it but of course both werewolves noticed it.

“Do you know who shot him?” The other werewolf came to stand next to her.

“Obviously one of you people. He said it was one of you. That he didn’t know if he could trust you. Now let me go or I’m going to scream my head off. It might be close to midnight but there are plenty of people around.” She said it in a flat voice but it was backed up by steel.

Cade held back a grim smile of approval. She’d just lost her brother and didn’t trust them at all. Despite that, he liked her style. She wasn’t going to give in without a fight. He gave a long look at the legs and ass encased in the jeans she was wearing. She was certainly no spinster librarian that he could tell. Sure, her hair was back tight from her face and her glasses were thick but the way she looked in jeans wasn’t something to overlook. Then again, he had a thing for librarians—he thought they were all sexy.

“We aren’t going to hurt you. We’re on your side.” Cade was straightforward, he saw no need to speak softly. She wanted to know what was going on.

She shook her head. “You’re here, aren’t you? With them. You expect me to believe it’s just a coincidence that you showed up at the same time as werewolf hit men?”

Lex gave a frustrated sigh. “We aren’t here with them. We came here looking for you and saved you from them.” He jammed his hands into his pockets, the failure of letting one of his own die washing over him. Two of his people in a month, the bitter taste of it was metallic in his mouth. “Look, we suspect that some of our own are up to something but we don’t know what. One of the wolves we had looking into it is the one who got killed.”

“Oh, you’re a f**king genius. I can see now why you’re in charge,” she said sarcastically, rolling her eyes at him. “If you aren’t with them, how did you find me?” she asked, suspicious.

Lex leaned over and pulled a tracking device from the wheel well of her car. She cursed quietly.

“Why don’t you come back to the house with us? We can protect you. You can’t go home. Your house,” he hesitated, “your house was on fire when I doubled back after you ditched me.” He got a sour look. “I’m sorry, I couldn’t do anything. The fire department was pulling down the street when I drove past. By the time I got there it was already too far gone. They used an accelerant of some type, I could smell it. The guy who shot Rey, he has the scent on him.”

Suddenly she surfaced, remembering what had just happened. Spinning, she saw her brother’s body was gone. She surged forward and grabbed Cade’s shirt and heard growling in the background.

“Stand down,” Cade growled back at the men who’d stood forward to protect him. He gently but firmly took her upper arms and looked into her eyes.

“You have Gabriel’s body? Where is he?” she demanded.

He slid his hands gently down her arms and took hers, reading the grief in her eyes. “One of my lieutenants has him. We needed to take him away from the scene. We can’t deal with the cops until we figure out what’s going on. We’ll give him a proper burial, I promise,” he said softly. “He was one of ours, he’ll be buried as Pack.”

Lex felt the need to rip his brother away from Nina. To shield her from all other men. Damn it, but he had to admit it to himself before he went crazy. He’d been feeling that way since that day in her shop when the other man had touched her, kissed her, and it had only worsened when he smelled her room. He’d stopped by the Pack house several times, meaning to find some female company—god knew that there were plenty of females who wanted to share his bed. He’d really tried but not a single one appealed to him.

He knew that if he got close enough to bury his face in her neck, scenting the glands there, that he’d find the scent of his woman. He didn’t want to, he liked being a bachelor, and yet, he yearned for her with every fiber of his being. His c**k hardened in response to the thought. Pheromones didn’t lie, not to his wolf. She was the one for him. Her genes called out to his, she was his ideal mate, end of story. He sighed, resigned to it at last.

He stepped forward and put himself between her and Cade. “Let’s get out of the open. You’re bleeding, I can smell it. We need to get that taken care of. Which one was Rey’s room?” Lex asked gently.