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Chapter Twelve

M o stared at the empty bed. The carefully folded t-shirt he’d been given because he had no clothes with him, and no one had thought—offered even—to get his things from his apartment. Well, he was done. He was going. Daniel hadn’t been back, and they were all busy with the new kid…and Mo’s heart ached for him. So much anger. They didn’t need the problems he was bringing to them. Khloe was his problem. These guys had enough of their own.

The door opened and Zack walked into the bedroom, stopping when he saw Mo standing looking at the t-shirt he’d worn yesterday. Mo let it drop to the bed. “You’re leaving.” He said it like he was foretelling the end of the world.

Mo looked up. “I have to find Khloe. Hiding here isn’t going to help.”

“It shames me, but not one of us thought to get your belongings. I guess we’re so used—” But Zack cut himself off.

“So used to taking in throwaways?” Mo asked through gritted teeth. “I’m not one of your charity cases. I’ve been looking after myself all my damn life, and most of that I looked after Khloe as well.” How dare he?

“I don’t blame you for being angry. Hell, spitting mad. We dumped all this on you and didn’t so much as give you a chance to breathe.”

“I don’t need help to breathe,” Mo snapped. “I can breathe just fine. What I need to do is get back to what I should be doing.”

Zack looked distraught and Mo got it. He understood their apparent motives but he couldn't be caught up in all this shifter stuff. “You have Mattie,” Mo said softly. “He has to come first with you, and I wouldn’t expect it any other way.”

“I don’t know what to say, what to do,” Zack whispered, “but please take Victor with you. These shifters are playing for keeps. You need him.”

Mo hesitated. “I don’t know.”

The door opened and Victor prowled in. He seemed to read the room. “What?” he asked, but Mo saw his dark gaze fall on Mo’s pathetic bag of borrowed belongings.

“I’m going to find Khloe,” Mo said, glancing at Victor. Victor frowned, shot Zack a look, but nodded.

“With me.”

At least he hadn’t fought him over it. Mo looked at the bed. “None of this is mine,” he mumbled and walked to the door.

“Mo,” Zack whispered and moved toward him. Mo took a step back, but this time instead of hesitating, Zack kept going until they were standing almost face to face. Even if Mo had to look a long way up. Any other second in time and that would have been funny, or incredibly hot. Zack took Mo’s hand and drew him closer. “Don’t ever think that I don’t want to fight for you. That I want nothing more than to walk out that door with you.”

Victor glanced at him. “Go,” Zack choked out, stepping back. “He needs protection.” Victor strode toward Zack and wrapped one big hand around Zack’s neck, dipping his forehead to Zack’s, and Mo took the hit like a blow. “You should stay here with Zack.” At that moment they looked like they needed each other far more than Mo needed them.

But Victor didn’t even answer Mo. He addressed Zack. “I know this is killing you. I’ll keep him safe.”

But that meant Mo was splitting them up. What a mess.

“Zack? Mo?”

Hearing Riley shout, Mo opened the door and walked down the stairs. Daniel was standing at the entrance to the kitchen. “I have news,” Daniel said and walked into the kitchen with the expectation he would be followed.

Mo was glad to see just Riley and Daniel when he followed them in, but was surprised to see Alex come in behind Victor and Zack, who had followed him. “He’s watching a movie with Tyler, and he can't hear,” Alex said at Riley’s eye-brow lift, “but I want to hear this.” Mo knew who Alex was referring to, which was the main reason Mo had to take his problems elsewhere. Daniel leaned back and eyed the seventeen-year-old, who seemed like he was going to be a powerful alpha from what Mo had heard yesterday. “This affects my school, Daniel. I have the right, and you know you can trust me.”

Daniel's smile was slow in coming but it did, and he glanced at Riley half in amusement. “Good luck.” Riley just rolled his eyes and Alex grinned, battle won, and went to make coffee.

Daniel turned his attention to Mo. “We have eleven more missing teenagers.”

Mo gaped.

“What the hell?” Zack said, straightening up. “Since when? Where?”

Daniel held a hand up. “Not in this area but close. That’s why they haven’t come to my attention, and,” he sighed, “three have turned up dead.”

Riley leaned forward. “This is on top of the ones we already know about?” Daniel nodded, then thanked Alex for his coffee. Alex delivered some more and plonked cream and sugar down so everyone could help themselves.

“Yes,” Daniel said shortly. “But they weren’t immediately claimed, which is why I didn’t know.”

“What do you mean?” Mo asked, equally horrified and confused.

“When shifters die, they revert to human,” Victor answered. “There is nothing on any sort of post-mortem that can identify them as shifters.”

Mo felt sick. The poor kids.

Daniel turned his gaze on him. “Over the years, our main fight has always been about discovery. That if certain human governments knew about shifters, we would be forcibly weaponized. We’ve been lucky so far in the fact that the humans that know are as protective of us as a resource as we are ourselves, but that could change any day with any election, and we are trying to put policies in place that will protect us when that happens.”

Mo couldn’t imagine. No, unfortunately he could, and he reached out without thinking and grasped Zack’s hand. Victor hadn’t sat and was too far away, or he’d be holding onto him too. “Last year,” Daniel continued, “a maniac tried to make his own shifters by transferring the shifter’s animal to a human by force. I lost my cat when I was taken and it’s only because of Luke that I got a wolf.” He shrugged and smiled. “Took a little adjusting.”

Mo gaped, then realized what he was doing and closed his mouth on a snap. “Luke is the one who can create shifters?”

Daniel hesitated. “You understand how vital it is that he’s protected.” Daniel didn’t phrase it as a question, as if there was any doubt.

Mo nodded, still completely stunned. “I won’t—”

“We know,” Victor almost growled, and in the middle of everything, to be trusted with such a huge secret meant an awful lot.

Daniel leaned forward. “This is what we think. We don’t know but we suspect that Rigor Elkin—Khloe’s boyfriend—found out about shifters through your dad. Rigor doesn’t have the brains or the money to take this any further. The kids have to be being held somewhere. Judging from the state of the bodies and the puncture wounds on the ones we found, human law enforcement is discounting the victims as junkies, even though they are often children. Only we know any different.”

Daniel took a breath. “We know recreational drugs don’t work on shifters so there has to be another reason.”

Mo’s head shot up. “But I was told Khloe was a drug addict.”

Daniel shook his head. “If she has shifter genes, that’s impossible. Who told you that?”

“Detective Pauley,” Mo whispered.

Daniel nodded. “I’ve already pulled his records, and I think he’s taking bribes from Rigor,”

Mo sat back in stunned shock, but for the first time hope swelled in him.

“What do you think is the other reason?” Victor asked.

Daniel shrugged. “Our best guess is that they aren’t trying to create new shifters, they’re trying to control the ones they already have. Either someone with insight or someone that has access to confidential information knows that the NATO member nations are discussing a joint shifter peacekeeping force. I’m sure you can imagine there are a lot of governments that don’t want that to happen, or if it does, need to find a way to neutralize it. We think the deaths have been caused by overdoses as they are trying to perfect the drug to control shifters.”

He felt rather than saw Victor’s reaction, as the wolf gave nothing away. Still, the slight straightening of his body was telling, at least to Mo.

“How are they identifying shifters?” Alex asked.

“We looked into the ones that we know about. “They were all athletes, some football players. So physically strong. One guy even carried three classmates to safety when one of the labs exploded.” Daniel sighed. “Simultaneously.”

Mo nearly smiled at the reaction from the others. They all had disapproval down pat.

“Do you know who the spotter is?” Alex asked.

“Spotter?” Zack asked.

“A spotter is someone who is trained to look for something,” Mo explained before Daniel could. “In a high school, I’m guessing ancillary staff, someone not quite as much in the public eye. Someone on the custodian’s staff maybe, or the athletic team, according to the reports you mentioned.”

“He or she would need access to students,” Alex said, “so there during the day, not after hours like the cleaning crew.”

Daniel sent Mo an admiring look. “If you ever get sick of teaching.” Mo graced him with a smile, and Daniel turned to Alex. “You finish school first.” Alex grinned like it was an old argument.

“So, what’s the plan?” Zack asked.

“We’re getting an agent that looks young enough to be a student,” Daniel said.

“No.” Alex stood, almost defiantly. “I’m already there. Established.” Mo watched in fascination as every other adult around the table objected, but Alex didn’t react. He regarded Daniel. “I’m already there ,” he repeated. “I have a ton of friends at school. I live here, so no one is going to think it weird when I interact with Daniel if they’re watching, which we assume they are.”

“I want in,” Victor said immediately. “Find me a job coaching whatever Alex does.”

Alex smirked. “Soccer. Think you can keep up with me?”

Victor nodded once, and Riley groaned. “Why couldn’t you have been a beta?”

Alex just shrugged. “Maybe I wouldn’t have needed you as much if I had been.” The silence, Mo thought, was telling, especially when Riley stood and enveloped Alex in a hug.

“And I can come in to teach self-defense,” Zack insisted. He shrugged. “I can do computers as well.”

Riley snickered, letting go of Alex. “You should be able to after all these years.”

Mo glanced at Daniel, who to Zack looked, resigned. Were they really gonna do this? Mo swallowed then spoke, “None of you need to do this. It’s—”

“If you’re about to finish that sentence with it’s my problem ”, Zack said, “Then you’d better get used to being part of this family, right the hell now.”

Mo gazed at Zack, and then Victor, who nodded once to show his total agreement.

“I still want my clothes,” he said almost belligerently.

“I don’t know,” Victor drawled. “I’m kind of liking you without them.”

Daniel held a hand up. “We’re not ready yet for plants. I need agents in place, and even I cannot run an undercover op at a school without permission. I would need an awful lot of people’s permission, and it would look suspicious if we suddenly had up to four new staff when no one has left. Let’s leave it on the back burner for now while I do more digging into the ones that are already there.”

“There’s an assistant football coach that’s new,” Alex murmured. “He’s the only one I can think of, but he takes a lot of interest in soccer and general athletics as well.”

Daniel nodded. “On it.”