“Alex is here,” Caleb said.
Ted quickly locked down the protest that wanted to spring to her lips. It was Alex’s job site. Alex’s employee. And Marcus and Alex had been friends.
“Shit,” she muttered.
She hadn’t been sleeping when she got the call. Thoughts of their fight the night before had filled her mind. Alex’s anger. His accusations.
“You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve known in my life, Ted. And the hardest.”
It was true. She could be hard. She had to be.
Maybe he hadn’t recognized it at the time, but when they’d been together, she given everything to Alex. Every worry. Every fear. Every hope. She’d held nothing back. And when he’d left…
It was as if the foundation of her world crumbled. She’d given him everything, and he’d taken it all with him. It hadn’t mattered that she’d been the one to leave L.A. He’d left her first. She went home to lick her wounds and piece herself back together. And every time he came and left, the foundation she’d patched up crumbled a little more.
“What are you frowning at?” Caleb asked.
Don’t think about it. Think about anything but that.
“Maybe I’m frowning because someone I knew has been murdered, and I’m not quite as okay with it as you are.”
“Harsh.” Caleb’s eyes narrowed. He knew she was deflecting. “I called Alex because it’s his job site. Plus, he and Marcus were friends.”
“I don’t care that you called him, but if you want my professional opinion, the body was dumped here. There’s not enough blood.”
“I noticed the same thing, but we’ll look more when the sun is up. Hard to search right now, and the body has obviously been dragged.”
She couldn’t argue with that. The animals hadn’t done them any favors.
“Has anyone called Josie?” Ted asked. “She lives in Vegas with the kids, but I think she was coming down next week.”
Caleb’s face was grim. “Any of Marcus’s family live up that way?”
She nodded. “Call Old Quinn. He’ll know who to send. Those poor kids.”
Ted could hear Alex talking to Jeremy McCann, Caleb’s deputy and one of the higher ranking members of Alex’s pack.
Caleb spoke in a quiet voice. “I’m asking for your read on this, Ted. Accidental or criminal?”
She paused, but went with her gut. “Criminal. The bite wounds could easily be obscuring the cause of death, but I’m not going to poke around at the body until after I’ve documented the scene and have him back in my office. I’m betting I find something. Sudden death by natural causes like heart attacks are practically unheard of with our kind. Especially at his age.”
“Keep me updated. Let me know what you need.”
“The body will go to San Bernardino. I can’t do anything about that. If we can’t play this off as an animal attack like we did with Alma, then they’re going to want to do a full autopsy.”
“Will they find anything?”
“I hope not. But honestly? I have no idea.”
Caleb nodded before he walked away.
“You have got to be kidding me!” Alex had clearly lost it by the time Ted was finished examining the body. She needed Jeremy to help her bag it and transport it back to her office, but currently, Jeremy was holding Alex back from throttling Caleb. The chief of police, as always, stood nonchalantly, watching Alex lose his temper in front of the growing crowd of construction workers who had gathered for their morning shift.
They were all shifters, and aggression was scenting the air. Alex was the future alpha of the Springs, and Ted might not have been a wolf, like many of the work crew, but her lion could scent the rising tension. Workers shifted toward others in their clans. The birds had already disappeared, but wolves drifted to other wolves. Cats to cats. The few bears on site stood where they were: tall, wary, and waiting. And the reptiles drifted to the edges of the crowd, watching. Always ready to run.
“I have to question her. Just like I have to question you, Alex. And the Quinns.”
Ted heard a hiss on the edge of the crowd, and a low growl rumbled from Alex’s throat. Caleb may have had a lot of fine qualities, but he could still be clueless about shifter politics. An open challenge like this helped no one. She, as the most dominant cat at the scene, needed to step in.
“Listen, McCann, this is far from my first murder case. Over seventy percent of murders—”
“We don’t know that it’s murder yet,” Ted said in a low voice as she approached the three men. “What are we fighting about?”
Alex’s eyes were glowing. “He asks for Josie’s number, then tells me she’ll have to answer questions about Marcus’s death.” He was spitting mad, his wolf very close to the surface. “Does she even know her husband is dead yet? Has anyone talked to Joe Quinn? Who’s driving up there? If that woman and her kids get a damn phone call—”
“She’s not gonna get a phone call!” Caleb threw his hands up and pointed at Jeremy. “You explain it. I’m done with him.”
Alex’s lip curled up. “If you pull any shit with Josie—”
“Threaten me, McCann.” Caleb took a step closer and lifted his chin. “See what happens.”
Ted’s heart warmed at Alex’s protective stance toward Marcus’s family, but the two men were seconds from blows being exchanged. And despite current appearances, she knew that Alex actually liked Caleb and would regret tearing off one of his limbs in anger.
Probably.
“Whoa, boys.” She stepped between the two, then patted Jeremy on his shoulder and gently pushed him away. The poor guy was stuck between future alpha of his pack and his boss. “Remember, no one wins when testosterone starts flying. Jeremy?”
The young deputy turned to her, an instinctive response to her more dominant animal. Sometimes, it annoyed her, but in situations like this, it was useful.
“Yeah?”
“Can you go to my Jeep and grab the bag in back? There’s a backboard there, too. We need both to get Marcus’s body back to my office.”
He glanced at Alex, who nodded briefly. Then he ran toward Ted’s green Jeep, and Ted stepped between the two glaring men.
“Alex, the Chief already talked to Old Quinn. Marcus’s sister is on the way to meet Vegas PD. She lives in Henderson, so she’s close. They’re probably already on their way to Josie’s. And Caleb, can we wait to talk about questioning people until we know for sure that this is a murder?”
“I’m done talking about any of this with him,” Caleb bit out. “He’s not my boss or my alpha. As far as I’m concerned, he has no role in this investigation. Send your boys home, McCann. This scene is going to take hours to process, and no one gets to work until I say so.”
Alex growled low in his throat, but Caleb was already walking away.
Ted stepped in front of him, and put her hands on his shoulders. Thoughts of their fight the night before flitted through her mind, but she swept them away. Ignored the tense stares of the men around them.
Alex had lost a friend. He needed calm. He needed comfort. He needed… petting.
“Alex?”
“What?” He was still glaring at Caleb’s back, and she could see his eyes glowing gold.
Ted slipped her arms around his waist. He tensed, then wrapped his arms around her.
“I’m sorry about Marcus,” she whispered.
His arms tightened, and she felt his cheek against her temple. “Ted, this is… It makes no sense.”
She stroked his back, urging him to calm with her touch. “He was a good man.”
They stood like that, lion and wolf embracing, until she could sense the tension of the crowd behind him start to dissipate. Low murmurs started as men and women got back to work. She could hear some moving toward vehicles. Hear what sounded like a foreman start to organize the ones that were left. Within a few minutes, the breeze had carried away the scent of adrenaline.
Alex didn’t let go. “What the hell happened?” he
asked. “Everybody loved that guy.”
From what Ted knew, Alex was right. No one in the Springs had a problem with Marcus. Even those who didn’t much like Alex and his plans for the resort hadn’t shown any resentment to his crew. They were all local boys who were working. And Alex had made sure at least a few were hired from every clan. No one carried a grudge over that.
“I need to know what’s going on, Ted.”
She knew what he was asking, and she pulled away. “Alex—”
“Whether you want to admit it or not, this is my town. You know what being a McCann means. You and I and my father all know what’s coming. And you know a lot of people still don’t trust Caleb. Old Quinn is already stirring shit up about coyotes or some other canine shifter being responsible for this. Someone even mentioned Joe disappearing like he might have had something to do with it.”
“Did Joe even know Marcus?”
Alex grimaced. “They had words at the Cave a few days before Joe took off. One of the guys told me this morning.”
“Shit.” The last thing Allie needed was people talking about her kids’ dad being a murder suspect.
“I need you to keep me in the loop on this. I need to know where the fires are starting, so I can put them out before they get bad.”
And have one more excuse to talk to him, despite her bruised heart?
“Why don’t you ask Jeremy?”
“I’m already putting him in an awkward position, arguing with his boss like that. You saw him just now. Caleb knows Jeremy looks to me as a higher authority. I don’t want to take advantage of that.”
Dammit. Why did he have to be such a good guy sometimes? As much as Ted wanted to dislike him, his obvious concern and respect for his pack always softened her. Cats didn’t have that. And maybe it went against her animal nature, but part of her longed to be part of something bigger than herself. If there was one thing she envied about the wolves, it was having a pack.
“I can’t make any promises,” she said.
“Ted, please—”
“But I’ll do what I can. I do have some latitude in my own… investigation.”
A grateful smile spread over his face. He leaned forward and planted a quick kiss on her forehead. “Thanks, baby.”
“Don’t—” She lifted a hand and stepped back. “Don’t call me baby, Alex.”
He winked at her, then turned to walk back to the parking lot where his men were gathered. Jeremy lifted a knowing eyebrow as he passed Alex and headed toward Ted.
“Not a word,” she said, grabbing the body bag and walking back toward the body. “Come on, Deputy. Let’s do this before it gets hot.”
Ted had discovered last year that it was a particular kind of torture to examine someone she’d known in life. She tried to separate herself from it. Tried to view it just as a body.
But inevitably, she’d have a thought like, ‘Gee, I didn’t know Marcus tattooed his kids’ names right over his heart.’ Then she’d get choked up because half of that tattoo had bite marks in it and the other half would never be seen by those kids he’d loved so much. Kids she could picture, even if she didn’t know them well. And their hilarious mom with the sassy blue hair that Marcus had tattooed in a pin-up pose on his shoulder. Josie had everyone rolling in snake jokes the first time she’d ever visited Cambio Springs. Marcus had adored her.
Sometimes, life just sucked.
And it especially sucked when she found the evidence she was looking for lodged in one of his ribs. She suspected it had banged around his ribcage for a while, tearing into his internal organs like a lethal pinball. Bleeding would have been extensive. Death would have been quick.
The bullet was heavily deformed from impact, but she carefully bagged it to turn in to the Sheriff-Coroner’s office in San Bernardino. All her pictures and notes would go along with the body, but not before she made copies for her own records. She was tempted to cut into him more, but knew that doing that would only compromise the larger investigation. She was a consultant. That was all. And she knew she didn’t have the equipment for a full autopsy.
And the county would demand one, especially for a victim like this. A well-loved business owner and family man, living out of state, but with strong ties to the community. The county prosecutor had no idea that in Cambio Springs, justice often took a decidedly vigilante turn.
She heard someone come into the office. From the thump of the boots, she was guessing Caleb. The suspicion was confirmed when he walked right in after a perfunctory knock.
“Hey.”
“Hey.” She pulled pulled off her gloves and used a spare rag to tug up the zipper on the body bag. “Call the ambulance. He’s going to the main office.”
“Murder?”
She nodded and held up the small bag with the bullet. Caleb took it, looking it over with a practiced eye. He might not have intended to use his formidable deductive skills when he moved from Albuquerque to the small town in the California desert, but sadly, they hadn’t been allowed to get rusty.
“It’s a nine.”
“Positive?”
“Pretty sure. Send it in. Their ballistics lab will be able to confirm.”
“Nine millimeter handguns are common around here.”
He sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. “Common everywhere.” He pulled out his phone and punched a few numbers while Ted started throwing garbage into the red medical waste bags she’d set out before she started the exam.
“Dev?” Caleb was talking to the Sheriff’s deputy that covered their area. “Yeah, send them over. …Uh huh. …Yeah, I’ll call you when we get the report. Thanks, man.”
Dev and the elders in his tribe were some of the few outsiders who knew about the shapeshifters of Cambio Springs. But since they didn’t appreciate attention any more than the Springs shifters did, a tentative alliance had formed.
Ted and Dev had once tried to form a more personal alliance, but Alex had stepped in the middle of that almost immediately. Dev hadn’t given up easily, but there was only so much of her shit that he’d been willing to put up with. When Dev figured out he wasn’t making any headway, he’d stepped back. He didn’t seem all that broken up about it, considering how quickly he’d moved on, but Ted still considered him a friend.
“They’ll be here in about fifteen minutes.”
Her eyebrows raised. “That’s quick.”
“Well, I called awhile ago. Gave them a heads up. I had a feeling.”
Ted didn’t question it. Whether it was his Navajo uncle’s hatałii blood, or just a practiced sixth sense, Caleb Gilbert often had very accurate “feelings” that turned into substantial leads. And now that he’d married a hawk shapeshifter and drank the water of the fresh spring, developing an ability to turn into other people, the feeling of ‘other’ her cat sensed in him had only grown stronger. Ted wondered if he even realized it.
She felt her phone buzzing in her pocket. She pulled it out and noticed three calls from her mother and two from Alex.
“Is that McCann?” Caleb asked.
“No.” Not this time anyway. “My mom.”
“No doubt there’ll be an elders’ meeting once this all comes out.”
“Your favorite activity, Chief.”
Technically, as a city employee, Caleb worked for the Elder Council that ran the Springs. Seven of the oldest residents of the town, one from each of the seven original families. Her great-uncle was on the council, but her mother would take over eventually, as she was the most dominant in their family. Alex’s dad was also a member, even though he wasn’t the oldest. But then, Robert McCann had always set his own rules.
“Listen, Ted…”
“Hmm?” She was blinking and trying to remember where she left her keys. It was past three o’clock, and even though her air conditioning was cranked, she needed a nap.
“I know McCann’s going to dig for his own answers. I get that.”
“And you’re going to try to warn me not to give Alex any informatio
n on the investigation.”
“I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
Ted stepped around the exam table and set a thick file on top of the body bag that contained the remnants of Marcus Quinn, one of Alex’s friends.
“Caleb, I’ll tell you the same thing I tell everyone in this town: I don’t work for you. I don’t work for the Elder Council. I don’t work for the police. I don’t even really work for the county. I’m just a consultant.”
His eyes narrowed. “I’m not sure what that tells me.”
Ted smiled and patted his cheek before she walked past him. “It means you’re not the boss of me. But I’m sure you can wait for the ambulance, because I’m heading home.”
“Please don’t involve McCann in this investigation, Ted.”
That’s right, her keys were on her desk. “They have my number if they have any questions.”
“Ted?”
She stretched her shoulders, eager to be home so she could shift and climb. After this day, she needed it.
“Ted?” he called again, even more impatient.
“Good night, Chief. See you when I see you. Tell Jena I said hi.”
Chapter Six
Alex was sitting with Josie Quinn, Marcus’s widow, drinking coffee in one hundred degree heat and listening to Marcus’s mom, Delia, weep openly as her sisters tried to console her. Josie took a deep breath and set her coffee down.
“I’m not handling this very well, Alex.”
“No one expects you to. You just lost your husband, Jos. I can’t imagine—”
“I don’t mean that.” Her choked voice said otherwise. “Them. All the weeping and carrying on from his mom. His aunts. Like they were so close. Marcus could hardly wait to get out of this house. You know why.”
Because his dad was a shifty bastard who yelled at his wife and kids almost as much as he drank. And his mom stood there for years and took it until her old man got drunk and ran himself into a telephone pole on the way back from his girlfriend’s house in Blythe.
Alex nodded, then glanced at Josie and Marcus’s oldest daughter, who was entertaining her little brothers with a board game by the window air conditioner. He had to hand it to their parents. Josie and Marcus might have been tattooed and dyed from top to bottom, but they let their kids be who they wanted. Their daughter, Kasey, looked like a tiny version of a Disney princess. Completely opposite her mom with her bright blue hair, bird tattoos, and piercings. Still, the sheer amount of love that poured off of Josie was mirrored in her daughter’s gaze when she happened to look over. They shared a small, sad smile, before Kasey was distracted by the boys again.