Page 149 of Cold Curses

Connor looked down at me, and this time he let me see the conflict in his eyes. The fury, fear, and grief multiplied by all-American adrenaline.

“You know you can trust us to get him to safety.”

I put a hand on Connor’s chest, felt his heart beating a fast tattoo as his body prepared to fight. With my hand there, a reminder he didn’t have to fight alone, it began to slow.

“You want some scritches?”

He growled.

“Not yet ready for sarcasm. Acknowledged. Let’s use our brains,” I said. “How could Black have gotten Swift?”

“Went willingly,” Connor said. “Or was alone.”

“Agreed. I don’t think Black’s brave enough to take on the entire Pack by himself. He might be powerful enough, but he’s not brave enough.”

And we hadn’t heard from anyone that other shifters had been injured or found dead.

“Maybe Swift went out for a run,” I said. “Shifters like exercising, even solo. Maybe Black was watching him, doing some surveilling, saw Swift jogging. Black decided he’d make a good bargaining chip. Used magic to pick him up and take him to wherever that is.” I gestured to my screen. “And kept him alive, because he wanted me—us—to have an incentive to hurry. To go in so hard and quick that we ignored the risks and consequences. Which we aren’t going to do.”

Connor’s chest tensed against my hand.

“Call your dad,” I said again. “Get Alexei and Lulu over here. We’ll put together a plan to get Swift back in one piece. Buy us as much time as you can.”

“We’ve got a location,” Theo announced. He gestured to the wall screen, where the image of Kieran Swift was now displayed.

I took Connor’s hand, squeezed hard as fury had him stiffening again.

“How do you know?” I asked.

I scanned the image left to right, then up and down, trying to understand what Theo had seen. But I found nothing familiar. The wall behind Swift was empty—blue corrugated steel, it looked like. Not unlike the paneling on the Reeds’ building.

“GPS information in the file?” Connor asked.

“No, Black was smart enough to delete the metadata before he sent it. This was trickier.”

Theo zoomed in on a link of silver chain that bound Swift to the pole, and he kept zooming in until we could see a faint reflection in the metal. It was the vague outline of a large yellow block letter.

“Chicago Industrial Port,” I said, and my own adrenaline started pumping.

“Give the vampire a prize,” Theo said. “Fortunately for us, the image has a ridiculously high resolution.”

“How could he do this there?” Connor asked.

“The entire facility has been closed since the explosion,” Theo said. “The forensic work is done, but there aren’t enough humans left to run the place, and demons are still on the loose.”

I turned to put the image at my back; then I envisioned the sign visible in front of me but at a slight angle.

“Swift is on the opposite side of the facility from the Buckley warehouse,” I concluded.

“If there’s ever geographic ChicagoJeopardy!,” Roger said, “I want you on my team.”

“Done,” I said. “In the unlikely event.”

The door burst open. Lulu came in first, followed by her parents.

“One wonders about the security of this building,” Roger said with a smile. “What’s the good word?”

“We’ve got something,” Lulu said, moving to me. “It’s not a guarantee—that little a-hole is sneaky. But we think it will work.”