Page 142 of The Wolves of Forest Grove

“I should probably go check on things at the Quarry,” Jared said, breaking the silence. “Call all the guys back to camp for now. There’s no sense in them being there while there’s no power to work.”

“What, so that whoever took out the power can do worse while it’s unguarded?” Clay asked, incredulous, and I had to admit, he was right.

Jared chewed his lower lip, realizing his mistake. He was usually the thinker of the three of us, but I couldn’t blame him for not thinking straight right now. None of us were. It was a good thing we had each other to fill in the gaps where needed.

“Clay’s right. You should go check on things there but leave the crew and tell them to be on high alert and to stick together. We can’t risk the Quarry, the pub isn’t enough on its own to keep us all afloat.”

“Speaking of,” Clay grunted. “With Destiny...gone...I’ll need to train up another bartender. And we should probably double security there, too.”

I nodded, agreeing, and then shivering as my blood chilled at the realization that Clay was talking as though Destiny wouldn’t be back anytime soon. I couldn’t believe that, even if all the signs pointed that way. I wouldn’t.

“Before either of you leave, there’s something we need to talk about.”

They waited for me to go on, and I saw the flicker in Clay’s gaze that told me he knew what I would say and he was bracing himself against it.

“Clay and I caught Sam’s scent out near Glenwood,” I said before I could change my mind. “It was on the air. We tracked it to the old bus depot there.”

“What was she doing out there?”

“Maybe nothing,” I admitted, keeping a wary eye on Clay as I explained things to Jared. “Maybe something. I’m not sure, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think it was a bit suspicious.”

“You think she’s been taking a bus out of town?”

I shook my head. “I honestly don’t know. But it would allow her to leave our territory unnoticed. Her scent would die near the bus depot inside of our third ring, and if she traveled back and forth through the same spot then…”

“Then it would seem like she never left.”

“But if she was going to meet with a foreign pack, we’d know,” Clay said, not so much argument as a statement of fact. “We’d scent them on her.”

“Not if she were careful. If she’s half as good of a tracker as you, she would know how to cover their scent.”

“Not well enough that I wouldn’t catch the stink,” he bit back.

Jared stood quietly for a moment, and I could sense his unease ramping up within him, quickly morphing into hot, savage sort of hatred, fueled by a feeling of betrayal he knew far too well.

“What do we do?” Jared asked in a dangerous timbre, licking his lips like he wished he could taste Sam’s blood on them.

Clay pushed off from the counter and stood, towering over us as he rolled his shoulders back and set his jaw.

“I’ll camp out near the depot in case she goes back there.

She’s here most of the day so she has to be going there at night.

I’ll cover my tracks and stay far enough away and downwind so she won’t scent me. ”

That could work.

“I’ll go with you,” I decided. “I’m not going to fucking sleep anytime soon, anyway.”

“I could—”

“No.” I stopped Jared before he could finish.

“I need you here. I need her and everyone else to think I’m asleep upstairs with you.

I can mask my scent with Clay’s to go into town, and we can take the Chevelle to Glenwood and go on foot from there.

” The pan began to take shape in my mind, accounting for any possibility of error.

“She won’t scent us as easily in our human forms.”

“You should stay,” Clay argued. “I can do this myself.

It might not be safe.”

“Which is exactly why I won’t let you go alone.

And also why it needs to be me. I’m the strongest. Besides, we don’t even know what we’ll find, if anything.

If I send someone else with you then the whole camp will be talking.

They already don’t trust her, imagine if they knew we suspected she had something to do with this, too? ”

He paled.

They’d fucking eat her alive.

“Why not just confront her?” Jared asked, a crease forming between his brows.

I explained to him how she could get spooked and take off and how we couldn’t risk that—not with Destiny and the others on the line.

“If she has anything to do with this, then we need whatever information she has. It might be the only way we can get them all back.”

“I can think of other ways to get information…” Jared argued and I saw malice flash in his amber eyes like flames and an image of Gregory, bloody and cold at my feet sprang into my head, making me cringe.

Surprisingly, Clay didn’t say a word against the idea, though I could feel his stress like an elastic band pulled taut to the point of snapping.

“No,” I shook my head. “That’s off the table.”

This was Clay’s sister we were talking about. His flesh and blood. We had to give her the benefit of the doubt, at least for now. Until we had some form of proof of her intentions. If we got it, though, all bets were off. That bitch was going down.