Chapter 9

In other circumstances I would be delighted with Hunter’s trust in me.

Now it just felt cruel.

“Consider it done,” I said brusquely.

He looked at me, his eyes slightly bright.

With desire?

He reached his hand halfway across the desk toward me, then dropped it and cleared his throat.

I stood before he could speak. If he was attracted to me at this moment because of my calm competence, that would be extremely irritating. Especially since being needed seemed to turn him on so much when it came to Maya.

I didn’t let him say anything, just walked quickly from his office and straight to Maya’s desk.

“Hi,” I said quickly. “I have a task for you. Can you come into the conference room?”

She leapt to her feet, nodding furiously.

I thought she looked determined, like she was desperate to prove herself to me.

“Okay, I need you to organize these purchase lists for the new member supplies. You’ll be helping me with preparations for the new member initiation ceremony.”

Maya nodded. She didn’t question why she was helping with her own ceremony. She still knew so little about the pack and our rules.

I left her alone to go make a cup of ginger tea. My new prescriptions were making it so I’d stopped actually vomiting up everything I ate, but I still felt nauseous most of the day.

The task was so simple, she couldn’t mess it up in the time it took me to go to the break room and back.

When I returned she had a phone cradled between ear and shoulder and was nodding. Who was she talking to?

“Yes, we need 500 of the flashlights, and—”

I lunged toward the phone and snatched it from her ear.

“Kara here—is this Bill or Adam? Hey Adam—yeah, that’s not right. We need 50 as usual. Yep. Thanks.”

She blinked up at me.

“What were you thinking—?” I started.

She looked up from under already damp eyelashes. “I finished the organizing so I thought I should show some initiative and start getting things ordered, so—”

“We only need a flashlight for all the new members and a few to keep spare. They’re for the night patrols you’ll be running.”

My tone was tense, a thin line away from cracking. I wasn’t sure if it was anger or sadness, but something was threatening to burst out of me.

I’d been trying so hard to be gentle with her—to rise above and make sure I didn’t punish her for being the one my husband actually wanted.

But I was too nauseous and exhausted and heartsick to keep it up.

“How could you make such a basic mistake?” I snapped.

I felt momentary relief at letting go of my composure. The feeling swerved immediately into guilt.

“I’m so stupid,” Maya spat, punching her clenched fist down onto her thigh. “It’s all my fault.”

“It’s okay, but I can’t deal with any mistakes right now.” I looked up and waved Laila over to us.

“Laila, can you take over on this for—“

“No,” Maya said firmly. “I can do this. I have to prove I can do this.”

I couldn’t argue with her determination but I also didn’t have the patience to watch her flounder.

I asked Laila to keep an eye on Maya’s work, and headed toward the Gamma camp near the border. The attack had happened on their shift change, so I’d been meaning to go review surveillance footage that was stored on-site.

I flashed my ID to the guards at the gate and they waved me quickly through.

The building was utilitarian and imposing, mostly concrete and steel. Near the border, the camp had to be easily defensible against attacks. I stifled a grunt as I pulled open the heavy iron front door and walked briskly to the control center.

I rapped the door and pushed it open.

The Gamma on duty was reclining in his chair, feet on the desk, ignoring the wall of cameras that showed various key strongholds of the pack’s lands.

I sniffed and my stomach roiled.

Liquor.

“I need footage from the road where the most recent rogue attack happened.”

He blinked confusedly.

“Now.”

The expression behind his eyes darkened into anger. Like I was at fault for disturbing his drunk nap.

“You don’t have the authority to view that footage,” he slurred.

His eyes cascaded down my body. He bit his lower lip ever so slightly.

“Actually, I might be able to make an exception, if you make it worth my while.” He leaned back and spread his legs slightly.

“As I think you know, drug and alcohol use on duty are punishable by flogging under pack law.”

He didn’t react.

Fine, then. I mindlinked the Gamma Captain immediately.

You’ve got a situation in the control room. Get here now.

I didn’t have to wait long until I heard his booted footsteps, followed by several Gamma Corporals.

I knew one of them in passing from some work we’d done together on patrol protocols.

“Hi, Kara,” he said, and I nodded to him.

I felt everyone’s eyes snap to me at the sound of my name. The gossip about Hunter and Maya was clearly getting around.

The Captain surveyed the scene. His brow furrowed when he saw the Gamma on duty, but he looked slightly confused about why I was there.

“He’s drunk,” I said simply.

“Wait, Kara? As in Chief Delta?” he asked.

I nodded.

He suddenly looked more confident in me and more trusting of my word.

“Take him away,” he said quickly to one of the Corporals.

If the rumors were even reaching the border outpost, they must be rampant. I couldn’t afford to show weakness.

“I want him punished to the fullest extent of pack law for this. And expelled from the unit.”

The Captain nodded. I thought I saw grudging respect in his expression.

I sat down, straight-backed, in the chair and began typing quickly, to pull up the footage from the quadrant I needed to see.

I found it quickly, and watched from above as Hunter’s car appeared on the screen and they attacked.

I’d been right.

They came from all different directions, but had all converged on Maya’s door.

They were targeting her.

And worse, they knew exactly where she would be.

I rewound the tape to see if I could discern their formations or movements just before the attack.

I watched and saw nothing.

I had an uncanny feeling I was missing something, though. I rewound and watched again, this time letting my heightened wolf senses take over.

There was a tiny, almost imperceptible movement in the bottom right corner of the screen.

I rewound again.

A raised paw through a small sliver of branch, closing into a fist and opening again.

A signal.

I counted from the gesture to the moment our car appeared on screen. The signal had been given before our car would have come into view.

This was planned.

I spoke, my voice quivering slightly with ire.

“There is a traitor among us.”

They all looked at me blankly.

“That was a spontaneous drive. We only decided 10 minutes earlier in the Delta office. They couldn’t have known we’d be on that road because we hadn’t planned on it until right before we left. They were tipped off by someone within the pack and set up the ambush.”

The room tensed. It felt like all the air had been sucked out of it.

“Why do they swarm the passenger side door?” the Captain asked after a moment. “Who was riding in that position?”

“It was Maya, the new rogue girl,” I said quickly.

Chatter broke out.

“Do we know anything about her background? Why would they target her?” the Captain asked.

One of the Corporals spoke up, confused. He looked young. He couldn’t have been around for long.

“I’ve heard Hunter treats her differently. Is there something going on there?”

The room went silent. I assumed because almost everyone in the room speculated about my relationship with Hunter—thought there was a chance that I could be considered the future Luna.

I wouldn’t dignify it with a response.

“There’s a flaw in the defense.” I zoomed the video out and pointed to the screen. “This watchtower is too far from the road and the ground is too low there. No wonder you didn’t see them attack. See that it’s moved immediately.”

The Gammas nodded. They seemed to be afraid of me now. I didn’t mind. I’d earned their respect.

I walked in the front door of the pack house that evening barely able to keep my eyes open.

There was a lamp on in the study off the hallway toward the kitchen.

Maya was sitting at the desk, Hunter leaning over her, pointing at something on the paper they were reviewing.

“And that’s how you order the food supplies,” he said.

It was the kind of work that he usually considered so far beneath him. He would never talk to me about something so basic. Would never speak in that kind, patient tone.

“Do you need to go over it again?” he asked. “Can I get you a drink of water?”

I prepared to tiptoe away. But the scene was so jarring that I was frozen for a moment. Watching them.

Imagining a world in which he talked to me like that.