Chapter 100: Inseparable

Nash

Attempting to track werewolves was a supernatural pain in my a.ss, especially when it came to the Valient Mountain Pack. Josiah wasn’t kidding when he said it was like the Fort Knox of werewolf packs. Not only did they have their boundaries locked down tight, they also had some of the best cyber security I’ve ever encountered. Even Josiah and Olivia couldn’t fish out any information on Daphne’s whereabouts.

I tried to throw myself back into my work, running my private security company. Several overseas jobs had popped up, but I either turned them down flat, or I sent one of my other teams on the assignments.

I didn’t give my clients the reason why I wasn’t going in person. “I have my reasons,” was my standard response to their queries.

What was I supposed to say? Sorry, friend, there’s this she-wolf that’s got me by the short hairs, and if I don’t find her, I think I might die?

Yeah, that would go over well.

Since I had hit a dead-end with Daphne, I threw myself into my other investigation; attempting to understand why the bear shifter had been slaughtering students at the university. But that had also proved frustrating, as bears, being mostly solitary creatures, were even more elusive than wolves.

I worked backwards from Bruce Ledbetter, tracked down his parents to a retirement village just outside of Miami. They had a landline that was listed online, along with a bunch of his personal information. It was a small miracle the elderly couple hadn't been victimized by identity theft already.

I made a phone call, and reached Mr. Ian Ledbetter.

“Hi, sorry to disturb you. I’m trying to reach Bruce?”

“Bruce? Why the hell would you call this number looking for Bruce?” A rough, grouchy voice greeted me.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I thought… well, never mind. Do you have a number where I could reach him?”

“Why? Does he owe you money?” His rather angry sounding father yelled into the phone. “Because if you are looking for money, you better stand in line!”

“No, no, nothing like that. My name is Nate, I’m an old friend of his from the university.”

“Yeah? I didn’t think he had any friends left, ever since he took up with that girl…”

“Girl? Do you mean Kodi?”

“That’s the one! He was never the same once that girl got her claws into him.”

I wondered if the old man was aware that Kodi had literal claws. I guessed by the disapproval in his voice that he knew nothing about fated mate bonds either.

“What was her last name, I can’t remember…”

“Oh hell, hold on.” It sounded like he held the phone against his shirt, the fabric rubbing noisily over the microphone while he bellowed, “Barbara! What’s the name of that girl that Brucie ran off with? What? Oh, right,” He put the phone to his ear again. “Wetmoore, Kodi Wetmoore.”

“Yeah, yeah, I remember now,” I said, scribbling the name down on a piece of paper. “So I guess you don’t have a number for Bruce then?”

“Nah, we haven’t heard from him in, what? Two years? Three? The last number we had was disconnected a long time ago.”

“Oh, that’s too bad. I really wanted to connect with him. Well, hey, thanks for your time, Mr. Ledbetter. If Bruce does get in touch with you, maybe you could give him my number, tell him I'd love to hear from him?”

“Wouldn’t hold your breath, kid. For all we know, Bruce is dead in a morgue somewhere,” the man grumbled. But he did find a pen and take down the number, just in case. I thanked him again and hung up the phone.

Kodi Wetmoore. At least I had a name.

I put it into the computer, and got a few hits on the name, but as I pulled up the social media accounts, none of them were a match for the blue-haired woman with the scar on her face. She was never a student at the university, either.

I did get a hit when I made a call to my contact at the state police barracks.

“Yeah, there’s a Kodi Wetmoore in the system, from way back." Banks told me, after a considerable amount of clicking and clacking on a keyboard. "First record is a welfare check from the Department of Children and Families after several reports of neglect and abuse. Looks like she was pulled into foster care two years later. Then there are some misdemeanors. Shoplifting. Defacing public property. She did six months in juvie, then she was moved to a group home… and, then we have a report of a run-away when she was sixteen. It doesn’t look like she was ever found. And that’s it.”

“Could you send me her file?”

“You know I can’t do that.”

“I’ll make it worth your while,” I promised.

“Of course you will. And who is going to support my ass when I get fired?”

“You’re too good to get fired.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

I knew I’d have that file soon enough.

I looked down at the notes I’d been making during the phone call. So, a bear shifter who somehow wound up in the human foster care system. How the hell had that happened?

However it had come to pass, it must have been a disaster for the poor kid. What had happened when she came of age and started shifting? What had it been like growing up like that, away from her own kind? She must have felt very alone, very frightened, and probably very angry. It was no surprise that she had started acting out. And when she finally ran away at sixteen, it didn’t sound like anyone had tried very hard to find her.

The question remained, how did a sixte-year-old run-away end up as an elite assassin?

I picked up the phone again, and dialed Alpha Josiah. “Hey, got a minute?” I asked when he received my call.

“Um, yeah, I got all the time in the world for you, as long as it doesn’t take more than fifteen minutes,” Josiah chuckled. “What’s up?”

“I want to know everything you know about this King’s Assassins.”

“Oh man, well, that only needs about sixty-seconds. I know of them, I guess most of the alphas do, but I’ve never had any dealings with them, and I never want to. That’s dirty business, Nash.”

“Can you tell me anything at all? Where are their headquarters? How do they recruit? How do they train? If someone wants to hire them, who do they call?”

There was a long pause. “I don’t know any of that stuff. But I might know someone who does. I can’t guarantee that he’ll agree to speak with you though.”

I picked up my pencil. “Okay, hit me.”

“There’s a pack in Upstate New York, a big one, called the Black Crow.”

“Yeah, I think I’ve heard of it.” I jotted down the name.

“Well, the Alpha is a woman, but her mate... Well, rumor has it, he was one of them. They say once you are in, you can’t get out, but he made it out.”

“Give me a name.”

“He’s called Jericho. But Nash… It might not be a good idea to march in there and start asking these kinds of questions--”

I heard the murmur of a female voice. Olivia must have entered the room during our conversation.

“Olivia suggests you speak to Jericho's wife first, if you can get to her,” Josiah passed the message along. “She might be more sympathetic to your cause if you tell her you are looking for your mate. But man, do not try anything funny with her. Just tell her the truth, because she will definitely know if you are lying.”

I doubted it. I was a very good liar.

Olivia must have grabbed the phone from Josiah, because her voice was in my ear, loud and clear. “No joking, Nash. She’s powerful and dangerous. If you go there, do not f.uck around with her.”

“Okay, I got it.” I wrote the word dangerous with a big question mark on my paper. “What’s her name?”

There was another long, fat pause. “Eudora Carrol.”