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I turned, maintaining my grip on the man.

Ollie stood behind me, his suit jacket pushed aside to reveal the detective’s badge clipped to his belt.

His blond hair was swept back from his forehead, chiseled jaw cocked in a grin.

Ollie’s smile faltered as he looked down at the man and realized he was a shifter.

“Sir,” Ollie said to him, “I believe that was assault I witnessed as I walked in. My name’s Detective Oliver Vickers, and I’m gonna need to have you taken in.”

Ollie pulled a pair of cuffs from his pocket and locked the guy’s hands behind his back.

“This is bullshit,” the drunk shifter grunted. A line of blood trailed from his lower lip where it had split.

“What’s bullshit,” Ollie said, “is that my officer friend outside is going to have to do the paperwork to get your ass thrown in lockup instead of doing jack-all his last two hours on duty. He gave me a ride to be nice, and now you’ve ruined his night.

” Ollie shook his head in disappointment. “Very unfortunate.”

I glanced at the door and saw a uniformed cop staring through the glass doors as Ollie shoved the drunk guy out of the bar. The two men exchanged a few words, then the beat cop took the drunk, leaving Ollie to return to the bar.

“Thanks,” the server said, rubbing her wrist.

“No problem. Any time.” I grinned at her, then went back to the booth.

Ollie slid in across from me.

I glared at him. “What the fuck took so long?”

“I told you. Work. Being a detective has a shit-ton more paperwork than being a beat cop. I swear, had I known, I never would have gone for the promotion. Besides, I didn’t think I’d be running in a drunk-and-disorderly while off the clock.”

I watched the cruiser pull away from the bar. “Looks like your buddy there is actually doing all the work. Why’d he give you a ride? Don’t you have your own car?”

“I, like a good citizen, don’t drink and drive. Gonna get a cab back home.”

Ollie scooped up the drink and downed it in one gulp, wincing at the burn in his throat, then waving for a server to bring him another.

“That was a twenty-dollar cocktail,” I said, staring at the empty glass.

He shrugged and wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Anyone who said money can’t buy happiness never tasted Hendrick’s gin.”

“That shit tastes like licking a Christmas tree,” I said in disgust. “I can’t believe you like that stuff.”

Ollie raised an eyebrow at me. “You are a heathen.”

I ignored that. “Can we get on with this? That dick of a shifter has me in a piss-poor mood. Do you have some info on my assignment? Toronto is great and all, but I’m not here as a tourist.”

“Nate, you sure know how to have a good time,” he said dryly.

“This is work. We can’t do this stuff on the phone, we have to do it in person. I simply want to get it over with and continue with my assignment. We can be buddies later.”

The server returned with another drink for Ollie and slid another glass of whiskey in front of me.

“On the house, babe,” she said, winking at me before walking away.

“Son of a bitch,” Ollie said, watching her go. “I see you still have your touch with the ladies.”

I waited until the server was out of earshot. “Spill. What do you have for me?”

Ollie nodded to my glass. “Drink. Stop nursing that shit. Where are you staying while you’re in town?”

Flipping my phone over, I checked the time. “Maybe picking up a short-term apartment rental somewhere when we’re done here. Might find a studio available for less than a grand a week.”

“Good God, man. Just rent a hotel room. It would be cheaper,” Ollie said.

“Cheaper, but less private. I like privacy.”

Across the bar, the server who’d given me the free drink eyed me.

I held her gaze until she looked away, blushing and smiling.

As fun as it was to flirt, I wasn’t really in the mood for a romp in the hay.

All I cared about was figuring out where to bed down for the night and get proper rest. From the look I was catching from the server, the last thing she wanted was rest.

In all my years, I’d never really cared where I laid my head at night. A one-night stand, a buddy’s couch, a hotel, or a hostel—who cared? A bed was a bed. As a lone wolf, I’d never really had a home or family to speak of. So why give a damn where I slept?

Tearing my eyes away from the hot server, I glanced a few booths down. A man and woman sat, snuggled together. She held a glass of wine and was laughing at something the guy whispered into her ear.

For a moment, I wondered what it might be like to have that. A person to share life with. Someone who knew you inside and out.

I tossed the idea aside quickly, like I always did when those ideas snuck in. A lone wolf couldn’t put down roots and settle. It would only make it that much more painful to tear them out when I had to move on.

“You still haven’t finished your drink. Let’s go, bottoms up,” Ollie said, snapping me out of my mental reverie.

With a frustrated sigh, I finished my first drink.

As irritating as Ollie was being, things could be worse.

One good thing about my job was the personal interaction.

The people I worked with all followed the in-person rule, so they had to look me in the eye.

You could see body language, furtive glances, and surrounding distractions.

It made it easier to tell if someone was afraid, lying, or withholding information.

Honestly, if things ever changed and I started getting orders via email or text, I’d probably feel more like a robot than a person. Not that I’d tell Ollie that.

A secondary benefit of meeting in person was that it gave me the barest connection to other shifters, which kept me from going feral like many other lone wolves did when they stayed away from civilization too long.

After draining half his new drink, Ollie sighed and leaned back into the booth. “All right. I guess we should get down to business.”

“About bloody time,” I muttered.

“Are you gonna get comfy at least?” he said, nodding to my leather jacket.

I eyed his off-the-rack suit. “Worry about your own fashion sense, Ollie.”

“Hmph, fair enough.” He downed the rest of his drink and leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table.

The hot little server swung back around, this time eyeing me with a bit more heat. “You two need anything else?” She locked her eyes on me. “ Anything ?”

“All good, sweetie. Thanks,” Ollie said.

She walked away again, and this time, I gave her ass a much closer inspection.

Ollie cleared his throat. “Are we talking business? Or are we planning a three-way here?”

“In your dreams, Ollie,” I said.

“We were close that one time, remember? That stripper eight or nine years ago. She was ready to mount us both.”

“Ollie, if there is one truth in all of life, it’s that the stripper was never actually into you.

That’s why I dragged your ass out of that club.

I didn’t want you dumping another three hundred bucks in singles into her G-string.

She wasn’t gonna fuck us both. You know it, and I know it.

” I gave him a look. “Now, what the hell is the scoop, bro?”

Ollie chuckled, but his face changed quickly, morphing from my long-time buddy and jovial smartass into the streetwise and professional cop he’d been for over a decade.

“Here’s the deal.” He glanced around to make sure no one could hear us. “There’s a good reason I was late tonight, and it didn’t have to do with paperwork.”

“Ominous,” I remarked, sipping my second drink. “Are you getting to a point soon?”

“Don’t be a dick.” Ollie patted down his suit jacket, then slid his hand into a pocket. “I got called out to a murder scene a couple of hours ago. That’s where I was before coming here. I found this at the scene.”

He extracted a plastic evidence bag and handed it over. Tucked in the corner of the bag was a tuft of fur.

“That was caught in the doorframe,” Ollie explained. “Must have come off the attacker as he went inside. You know what that means, right?”

I opened the bag and sniffed. The strong smell of shifter musk swirled in my nostrils. “Means the perp was already in wolf form when he leaped inside. Anyone could have seen him. Has this been going on for a while? Is that why I was brought in?”

Ollie nodded gravely. “Your expertise is required. I’ve done all I can to shift blame elsewhere, but it’s getting tough.

This isn’t the first. This body was a few days old when we found it, but there have been two more prior to this.

All the same—torn apart, with obvious signs of canine teeth at the wounds.

The medical examiner’s best guess for time of death is between eleven p.m. and three a.m.” He shrugged helplessly. “That’s the best we’ve got.”

I resealed the baggie and stared at it. Finally, I looked up, handing the bag back to Ollie. “What do your colleagues think about it?”

Ollie put the bag back in his pocket. “Prevailing theory? That a serial killer is on the loose. A guy who’s trained a dog to do the dirty work. One of the detectives thinks the guy stands around jerking off while the dog rips them to pieces.

“I swear, man, as soon as the thought of a serial killer comes up, cops start freaking out. I think it’s part excitement and part horror.

So far, none of them have thought hey, what if it’s a magical creature that can change from a man to a wolf ?

Which is good. As of now, top brass is telling everyone to keep their mouths shut.

If anyone even mentions the words serial killer , they’ll get their asses reamed. ”

“Any other characteristics that stand out for the killer or victims?” I asked.

“M.O. for the first two was outdoor killings. One was on a running trail on the outskirts of the city, and the second happened in an alley. This one, though, was inside the victim’s house.

To me, that sounds like escalation. He’s no longer content to wait for prey to come to him. He’s actively stalking targets now.”