Page 37 of Cruel Revenge (Jacky Leon #12)

“My bosses remember a couple of humans who tried to kill you and were never seen again. No answers for us, just gone. Jacky, my hands are tied. I hate being the bearer of bad news. We’re not going to stop you from investigating.

We’re going to try to stay a step ahead.

We have to. There’s too much pressure on this for us to work with someone who bit a man in half on camera.

It’s on television. It’s all over the internet.

You jumped on police cars. You terrified people.

We can’t say we’re letting you do whatever you want. ”

“Fine. Why couldn’t you say any of this to Heath? Or Dirk? Or anyone in my family? Why wait for me to finally call you out?”

“Because you’re the official representative for the werecats, and… it bought my bosses time,” Beth admitted. “And since everyone has been trying to buy time all night…”

“Fuck you and your bosses,” I said finally.

“Please, Jacky. We have a really solid working relationship. We shouldn’t risk that right now.”

“Then you have to give me something, like where those SUVs were found,” I growled.

I entered Kick Shot to find Davor already there and frowned.

He was sitting in the middle of documents and multiple laptops and devices, his hair askew and messy as he typed away and wrote notes.

I hadn’t been paying attention to my territory magic.

It was my own fault for not knowing he was here.

“No, you have to give us something,” Beth retorted.

“Like the reason why a group of witches would kidnap Carey Everson in broad daylight, risking all the exposure they ended up getting. Everything got very strange after Alaska, Jacky. We both know it. Clearly, the BSA has been in the dark far longer.”

I pursed my lips, staring at Davor as he slowed down and looked up, clearly hearing what Beth said on the phone. Davor tilted his head to the side, like he was thinking about something. Then he scribbled a note and held it up.

Do they know where the witches dumped the vehicles ?

I nodded at him. He quickly scribbled more writing,

Tell them you’ll talk in Dallas. Buy me time and distraction. I can hack them.

“That might require a meeting,” I said, my eyes locked with Davor’s. “I’ll drive to Dallas, and we’ll talk.”

“Really?”

My sudden switch caught Beth off guard for a moment.

“Yeah. Clearly, I’ve been too secretive in recent months. There’s a lot you and the BSA need to know that led to tonight.”

I had no intention of telling them any of it. I didn’t have the authority to tell them most of it. The stuff I could tell them I would keep to myself for as long as possible out of spite for tonight.

“I’m already nearly back at the office. I’ll tell everyone to see you in two hours?”

“I’ll be there before seven,” I promised. I was going to have to speed, but it wouldn’t be difficult for me. I hung up on her and looked at Davor. “Can you really?”

“I know Dirk was trying to coordinate with them while I worked on all this, trying to find a breakthrough in the code for any new information. But I’m fucking stuck on this now. If the humans have information we don’t, then we need it.”

“Dirk was nearly certain they were withholding, even hearing about vehicles near the Houston airport, one missing a door. He was going to bring it to me when he had full evidence that it was happening. I decided to call, and Beth admitted to it.” I shoved my phone away and groaned.

“It’s politics. Because I killed a witch outside the restaurant where people could see, because of the chase…

they don’t feel it’s in the best interest of the United States to work with us.

They’re helping us in ways that also help them.

They want to be the ones who get the witches first. They want Courtney Lane, Carey’s biological mother.

They know we won’t give them those people if we beat them to the punch.

And why would we? They could know things no supernatural wants out.

They’re going to die no matter what. Why not expose a few more supernaturals for the chaos of it? ”

“Shit,” Davor said, exhaling. “Well, hacking them will take me some time. Unless you get me into the system off the bat. I carry one of these around just in case…” He reached down to his case, that case.

I had seen it before—the specialized technological box of tricks Davor took to Alaska.

Now he was pulling out a small USB. He held it up, and as I took it, he didn’t let go immediately.

“If this gets plugged into one of their desktops or work laptops, it’s over for them. I’ll have everything, from their communications to their records. If the device connects to their servers, I can copy everything.”

“How long would you need?” That was a lot of power for a tiny USB.

Davor grinned.

“Five minutes? If that. If I need to get it quickly, I can just search for what we need and move on. I’ll go for it first before taking everything else, just in case.

” Davor let it go, and I shoved it into my pocket.

“Just plug it in. That’s all. Hell, the computer can be asleep. It does have to be on, though.”

“Tell Heath where I’ve gone when he comes back from the Tribunal,” I said, knowing I needed to leave pretty much immediately.

“I will… Jacky, I know he’s been standoffish with you all night. He’s been like that for all of us… I?—”

“It’s fine,” I said quickly. “It’s probably best I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about it. Hasan and I talked about it. He’s trying not to lose it, so the werewolves stay under control. We can’t have all of them mobilizing…”

“Well, they are. The BSA at dawn is going to have a very bad day on their hands,” Davor said, almost sheepishly. I froze.

“What do you mean?”

“Every pack on the continent is going to go into witch businesses in their territories at dawn, publicly, looking for answers. It’s rather controlled for Heath.

No one is going to get hurt. It’s a lot of public pressure, though.

Plus, anything interesting they find, they’re sending me to help continue breaking the code. ”

“He’s escalating it way too much in the public eye, Davor,” I said, my chest tightening at the thought of that. “We’ve kept this so quiet for months .”

“The witches didn’t, though,” Davor countered, looking unmoved by my argument.

“I thought you knew that. No one must have told Dirk. It’s where Hasan is right now.

He and Niko went back into the Tribunal to talk about how to manage this level of operation.

You really need to pay attention to your territory magic. ”

“ Davor !” I hadn’t been paying attention. Hadn’t realized that Hasan and Niko had disappeared from my territory. “Now isn’t the time to give me a basic werecat lesson. We’re talking about public war!”

“We’re talking about a witch-based organization kidnapping the daughter of Heath Everson, the strongest werewolf Alpha in the world, in public, clearly using magic on camera, and nearly killing his fiancée in the process.

It’s already public. And it’s the best response anyone can think of without looking weak on one end or out of control on the other. ”

“Does Zuri know?” I asked.

“Obviously. But you’re missing something I haven’t had the chance to say.

Heath isn’t going to be having full-blown werewolves in the streets.

He’s going to have the packs quickly start questioning witches the world already knows about.

It’s more of a flex than anything else. This won’t be all over the news.

This is for the supernatural world and the BSA.

Sure, it’s more public than we’ve done, but it’s not nearly as public as what they’ve done. ”

“I’m going. I’ll text when I get to the BSA office in Dallas,” I said, shaking my head as I started walking off. Before I left the bar, though, I realized I never got an explanation about something.

“Why are you in here?” I asked him as I hovered in the back door to head back to my house for my car.

“Oh, when I learned Kick Shot was going to be shut down while we worked on this, I decided to use the space. It kept me close in case you needed a family member to lean on and gave me the space I needed for all of this without getting in Dirk’s way in his space,” Davor explained.

“Now, go on. I need to get Dirk so we can coordinate things on this end.”

I nodded, then started running for my car, hopping in without telling anyone else where I was going. As I headed for Dallas, I was left wondering how much this was going to blow up the status quo before it was over. I wondered what normal was going to look like once dawn reached us.

Most of all, I hoped Carey, Kody, Arlo, and Benjamin were okay.