Page 150 of Contested Crown

“Kieran,” he said.

“All right, Kieran, you’ll stay up here with us until we hear from the other floor.” I sniffed, scenting a few wolves with the group he’d brought up.

They looked awkward, staring at the familiarity between the wolves in our pack. Significantly, I glanced at Gabe, and he rounded them up as the rest of the people relaxed into the crowd.

“You know anything about the other holdouts?” I asked Kieran.

“No. They aren’t from one of the clubs,” he said. “I’ve never seen them before. Declan wanted us to split up into groups with people we know—most of the guys here are from Lion. The ones downstairs, he said they were his pack.”

“His what?” I said sharply.

“His pack. He said they were going to open up a whole new world for him.” Kieran shrank back from my glare, and I waved him off. He scurried off to mingle with the pack.

“Miles?” Cade asked.

“Declan has always had wolves,” I said, “but he never wanted us to be in a pack. He never let us form one. Why would that change now?”

Cade frowned. “A lot changed. He was under Leon’s control. Maybe he was looking to escape, and hiring an outside pack was his way out.”

“Maybe,” I said, but something about it didn’t sit right. Something about it made me nervous, and I didn’t like that.

“Miles, you there?” As if on cue, the voice on the radio crackled over the line. This wasn’t someone nervous. The confidence oozed from the drawl.

“I’m here,” I said. “You made a choice?”

“Well, it wasn’t much of one, was it? But we’re ready to deal.” The person on the other end clicked off, and I wanted to see Declan’s cameras, to see if I could recognize their face. “You going to let us out?”

I looked around the room. The pack was still tense, but we outnumbered them now with the addition of the humans from Lion. When I looked at Cade, he nodded.

“Come up.” I lowered the walkie-talkie, and Cade and another mage frowned, magic slithering up the open stairwell door as they released the final sealed door.

Stepping back, I gestured to Evelyn. When she approached, I lowered my voice. “Find out if there’s any weapons up here.”

She nodded, moving through the crowd smoothly, searching the room. The building did look like it was being renovated. Tarps covered things throughout the room, and there were buckets of paint and other building materials scattered around. That was the trick with a scheme like this. You had to look like something was going on, or people got suspicious.

A door creaked open further down the stairs, and everyone tensed. Evelyn returned with a toolbox and chains slung over her arm. Cade winced back from the chains.

“Iron,” he said.

I glanced at Evelyn, and she dropped the tools, moving to the edge of the crowd to get rid of the chains. When the wolves arrived at the top of the stairs, their alpha in front, we were ready. The humans who didn’t have guns had hammers and screwdrivers, sharp things that could do real damage.

Some of the wolves started to shift, but I held up a hand. No sense in asking for a fight when we weren’t sure we wanted one.

“Well, well, I had to see it with my own eyes.” The alpha smirked, and I caught his scent. I froze. “I didn’t believe it when Declan told me. One of Elena’s bastards survived.”

Ice water flowed through my veins, roaring in my ears. I couldn’t move.

The alpha stood framed by his seconds, tall and broad, wearing a plaid flannel shirt over work pants, his cowboy boots unmarred by dirt or scuffs. Part of me wanted to say that was because everything about him was fake, but I knew better than most that for all his bark, he had a bite to back it up.

“Yeah, I recognize you,” he said. When he grinned, I remembered his smirk. The same expression was on his face when he stood over my dead sisters and brothers with Miri, staring at all the blood like it didn’t matter.

“Ghost Pack,” I said.

He laughed, the sound so loud in the room that I couldn’t hear anything else. As I stood immobilized, my pack froze with me, unmoving even when the Ghosts came sauntering through, nudging the Los Santos pack aside.

“You remember me! I’m touched.” The Ghost alpha grinned at me. “Say it. Say my name.”

“Benji,” I croaked.