Deni stepped away from her reaching hands and scrolled down her list of recent calls. Only one had been made today, much earlier this afternoon, which meant she’d been faking talking to someone. Stalling. She’d made plenty of calls yesterday, though, and the day before that, and on into the previous week. All to the City of Austin police.

“Don’t think so,” Deni said.

Broderick turned around, scowling, not liking to have his beer drinking with his brothers interrupted. “Who the hell is making all the noise?” Broderick growled.

Deni ignored him. She swung away from the groupie lunging for her phone and went for Liam’s office door. This was too important for respecting Liam’s privacy. “Broderick, don’t let her leave,” Deni said, then was through the door and into the office.

Liam was on the phone at his desk, Dylan hovering next to him, listening. Usually Liam sat back here with his feet up, casually going over billing, invoices, payroll, and the like, but today he sat straight up in his chair, his hand over his eyes, and he was speaking rapidly into the phone.

“Have you pinpointed where?” he asked whoever was on the other end. “Well, damn it, find it.”

“Find what?” Cold washed through Deni, triggering the dizziness she’d been fighting all day. “Liam?”

Dylan came quickly around Deni and closed the door. “Keep it down, lass. We can’t let the world know.”

“Know what? Damn it, tell me.”

Liam glanced up at her, his face strained as he listened to the stream of words coming from his phone. He shot a look at his father and nodded.

Dylan took Deni’s hand between his, pressing warmth into it. “We didn’t want you to know until we were sure, Den. Marlo’s plane went down, somewhere in West Texas. We don’t know where yet, and we don’t know who survived.”

Chapter Twelve

Deni’s world stopped—or maybe it kept spinning, whirling out of control while she froze in one place. She could barely see Dylan as she stared at him, only the blue of his eyes as he held her gaze.

Shock and then panic swept through her, and her wolf started to howl, a grief-stricken, wild howl that only happened with the death of a mate.

“Deni,” Dylan’s voice cut through the noise. “Keep looking at me.”

The voice that came out of Deni’s mouth was snarling and wrong. “Where is he?”

“South of the I-10,” Liam said. “Somewhere between here and Fort Stockton. Great,” he said into the phone. “Covers a hell of a lot of ground.”

Deni heard a voice on the other end—Ronan, she thought, from the deep timbre. “That’s all we know,” Ronan said. “We can’t ask too many questions.”

“Ask,” Deni snarled. “Find him.”

“Lass,” Dylan said.

“Don’t ‘lass’ me. Find him. He’s my mate.”

Both Dylan and Liam focused on her, as the truth of it filled Deni, hurting her and elating her at the same time. My mate. Hurt. Lost. Find!

Deni was growling again, the edges of her world going concave as her eyes changed to her wolf’s. Dylan pried the cell phone she’d taken from the girl out of her hand, which Deni had clamped down on so hard the plastic was starting to crack.

“Where did you get this?” Dylan asked, looking at the smart phone, which no Shifter would carry.

“Spy,” Deni said, forcing out the word. “Broderick has.”

Dylan’s eyes moved as he read the phone numbers, then he gave a furious snarl and shoved his way past Deni, banging out of the office.

Deni yanked Liam’s phone from his hands. “Ronan. You tell me where he is.”

“Deni?” Ronan’s tone softened. “Yeah, thought so. Sean’s hacking as fast as he can. He’s trying to pin down the location based on reports.”

“Where are you?”

“Don’t know.” Ronan turned away from the phone, exchanging questions with others. “Looks like we’re about where the 55 runs into the 277, wherever that is. A little west of that. Ellison says don’t you dare come out here.”

“Tell Ellison . . .”

Deni’s coherence left her. She didn’t remember dropping the phone or saying anything to Liam. She only knew she was walking out through the bar, past Dylan, who had the pseudo-groupie pinned between himself and Broderick, ignoring them when they tried to stop her. She walked and walked until she found herself in front of her own house, pulling out the new motorcycle Ellison had bought her and mounting it.

Deni must have found the keys, put on her helmet, jeans, and boots. She didn’t remember. In a few minutes, she was pulling out of Shiftertown, skimming through traffic to the roads that led west out of town.

Deni didn’t know Texas like Ellison did, but she knew how to get from Austin across Hill Country west, heading through Fredericksburg toward the 10. At the onramp to the interstate, she paused, debating whether to go north or south. She picked north, turning again after about thirty miles to the 377 and cutting south.

Not until she was well down the highway, heading south and west as fast as she could, did she realize she was riding her motorcycle.

Alone. Out on the road, under the sky, through the flat Texas lands and dust. On her own. No one with her, no Jace holding her and telling her she could do it.

She’d navigated traffic that moved thickly to Fredericksburg and then the speeding trucks on the 10, and now the open highway without any fear except that which filled her about Jace.

The sun was still high, though evening was coming on. Not much traffic out here now. Deni opened the bike up all the way, the high-powered machine taking her swiftly down the road. Shifters weren’t allowed to buy new vehicles, but Deni always thought Harleys were better once they were broken in. Ellison had tinkered with this one until it purred like a lion, or maybe a snow leopard.

Deni ran it so fast she almost missed the 55, which jogged from this road west and a little north. She sped down it, squinting against the bright sun, nice and hot still in late July.

The 55 ended in a T junction with the 277, one leg of the T going north, the other going south. Deni stopped at a little pulloff at the crossroads and looked around. One truck rumbled past south, and a car sped north, its headlights turned on against the gathering twilight. No road went west from here except for a dirt track that headed off into the wilderness.