Page 45 of Bad Wolf's Nanny

Dane clenched his jaw.

They’d been ripped apart, deliberately. Not a clean kill, not a fight gone bad. This wasartistry, if you could call it that. Bones snapped at angles that spoke of torture, flesh flayed with surgical malice. A message in crimson.

“Red Teeth,” he growled.

Felix nodded grimly, “No doubt. It’s the same as before. Same signature, cruelty for cruelty’s sake. No other purpose but shock value. Except this time, he’s wiped out the whole damn pack.”

“Why now? Why this close?”

“That’s the point. He’s escalating.”

Dane leaned back in his chair, the air around him turning colder. “He’s not just taunting us. He’s sending a warning.”

“Exactly,” Felix said, “this wasn’t some feral lashing out. It was staged. Location, timing, victim selection—he wants our attention. Wants to remind us we’re vulnerable.”

“And is he right?”

Silence fell.

Nicolas finally spoke, “It’s close. Too close. Thirty miles outside the border used to be neutral ground, but if he’s crossing into that…he’s either grown bolder or he’s not working alone.”

Rick’s voice was flat. “He never had the discipline for strategy. Someone’s helping him.”

Felix nodded. “I think he’s recruiting.”

The room went still.

Dane frowned, “From where?”

“Other packs. Rogues. There are always ferals and outcasts. If he’s been promising them power, revenge, territory…they’ll follow.”

“He’s building an army,” Rick muttered.

“Looks like it,” Felix confirmed.

A sharp pang twisted in Dane’s gut. He glanced back at the laptop, the last photo, zoomed in, a hand missing three fingers, left on top of a blood-soaked tree stump like an offering.

It wasn’t just a kill.

It was a declaration.

“Let me go after him,” Dane said, rising to his feet. “I’ll take Rick. We’ll track his trail, see who’s with him. Cut the head off before he spreads further.”

“No,” Felix said.

Dane stared at him. “What?”

“I said no.”

“You saw the photos. He’s not going to stop. If we wait—”

“We wait because it’s what we have to do,” Felix snapped, standing. “He wants us to chase him. He’s baiting you. If I send my enforcers into rogue territory without intel, we risk walking straight into a trap.”

“So we do nothing?”

“Wesecure our people.” Felix jabbed a finger toward the map pinned to the wall. “Double patrols on the northeast border. Set up checkpoints. Any unknown wolves crossing in or out get flagged, followed, and questioned. We protect the pack first.”

Dane’s jaw clenched. Every part of him wanted to argue. Wanted tomove. Waiting felt wrong. Cowardly.