Chapter 67 Hollow Moon
Kier’s POV
Emma patched Jenna through on video first.
Jenna answered from her couch, hair up, hoodie on, a blanket over her knees. “You found her?” she blurted.
“Not yet,” I said. “We have a lead.”
Jaxon leaned into frame. “We need you at Ironclad. Fast.”
She froze. “I’m not going to like this, am I?”
“Probably not,” Emma said dryly, and ended the call with a time and a floor.
Fifteen minutes later, Jenna stepped into the war room with rain on her sneakers and fury in her face. She didn’t waste a second. “What do you need?”
“We need you're help. We need to send you into a bar,” I said. “The Moon Den.”
She blinked, then laughed once, short. “That sounds like a video game dungeon. Tell me it’s just a bar with bad lighting.”
“It’s a bar for wolves who don't run in packs,” Jaxon said. “And people who do business with them.”
“Oh,” she said. “So a nightmare.”
I nodded. “We believe a woman named Rhea runs it. She met Sam there. She helped him.”
“Rhea,” Jenna repeated, rolling the name like she might drop it or throw it. “And you want me to walk in and… what? Order a drink and say ‘hi, is your illegal wolf consultant in?’”
“Pretty much,” Emma said, bringing her a steaming cup of tea.
Jenna took the cup with both hands. “Why me?”
“Because if we go, the room empties,” Jaxon said. “They’ll scent pack on us before we cross the threshold. Humans get more grace.”
“Sometimes,” I added.
She looked between us. “And you’re sure they won’t… I don’t know… eat me?”
“No eating,” Emma said. “Humans taste horrible.”
Jenna stared at the tea like it might offer advice. “I’m not trained for this.”
“I know,” I said. “That’s why we’ll layer you. Eyes, ears, fallbacks.”
Her gaze sharpened. “Say it without the CEO words.”
“You won’t go in blind,” Jaxon said. “We’ll mask your scent so they don’t smell us on you. We’ll keep visual from across the street, rotate cars. You’ll have a panic phrase that triggers extraction—say ‘I left the porch light on.’ We come in.”
“Okay,” she said, voice thin.
“We’ll mic you,” Emma added. “A Necklace with a microscopic camera. Nothing bulky. Your phone will run a dead app broadcasting GPS. If it goes black, we assume trouble.”
Jenna drew a slow breath. “What am I asking for?”
“Information about Sam and possibly where he’s keeping Sable,” I said. “Don’t say her name. Lead with him. You're looking for him an know he would go there.”
“And if they ask who sent me?”
“Say you heard Sam speak of the place often." Emma said. "And you're willing to pay for information on his whereabouts."
“Emma,” I said, “get her a burner and the cash pack.”
Emma nodded, already moving.
Jenna set the tea down untouched. “I hate this. I hate that he did this to her. I hate that I didn’t see it.”
“Stop,” Jaxon said, and his voice gentled with a note I hadn’t heard all night. “This is on him.”
Her eyes flicked to mine. “And a little on you.”
“I know,” I said. No defense.
The room thinned around us. The plan was there, clean and ugly.
Jenna rubbed her forearms. “Tell me about the scent thing.”
Jaxon pulled a small kit from a duffel—brown apothecary bottles and matte tins. “We can’t make you smell like a wolf. But we can make you smell like not us. Neutral base of coffee grounds, old smoke, city grit. A light swipe of clove and motor oil. The Den smells like that anyway—you’ll blend.”
She wrinkled her nose. “So I’m going to smell like a mechanic’s ashtray.”
“Congratulations,” Emma said, returning with the burner and an envelope. “You’ll be popular.”
Jenna cracked a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “And you two? You won’t be anywhere near me.”
“Three blocks away,” Jaxon said. “Two teams. Isaac on rooftop overwatch. If something moves wrong, we tilt the whole bar.”
“Define ‘tilt,’” she said.
“Close doors, cut power, fill a hallway with men who don’t miss,” I said.
She stared. “I'm in marketing.”
“Then consider this crisis communications,” Emma said.
Jenna swallowed. “What if Rhea recognizes your… pack-ness on me anyway?”
“That’s why we keep our distance,” Jaxon said. “And why you don’t wear anything we've touched in the last forty-eight hours.”
Jenna blinked. “That’s a thing?”
“Scents cling,” he said simply.
Emma laid the envelope down in front of Jenna. “Eight thousand in small bills. You’ll negotiate like you’re the conduit, not the wallet. If she pushes, you push back.”
“She’ll push,” I said.
Jenna looked at me. “What if she threatens me?”
“You’ll tell her you have friends who don’t like to be threatened,” I said. “And if she calls your bluff—”
“I say the porch light line,” Jenna finished, nodding. “Okay.” She glanced at the table, then at the door. “What else?”
"We prepare you." I said.
Jaxon uncapped a bottle and dabbed the brownish oil along her wrists, behind her ears, the hem of her jacket. “Don’t touch your face,” he warned. “Let it sit.”
She wrinkled her nose again. “That is… aggressively not perfume.”
“Perfect,” he said.
Emma clipped the necklace clasp on a thin chain and fastened it at Jenna’s neck. “Don’t fiddle. If it twists, it hisses. If it hisses, I panic.”
“Don’t panic,” Jenna murmured, more to herself than Emma.
I pulled a printed photo from the folder—the clearest shot we had of Rhea from a dock cam. Dark hair, coin-bright gaze. I slid it to Jenna. “This is her.”
Jenna studied it. “She looks like she knows where the exits are.”
“She always does,” Jaxon said.
Emma handed over the burner. “Preloaded. One number—me. Text only. If you need to send a picture, send and pocket. Don’t linger with your phone out. People get twitchy.”
Jenna nodded, then squared her shoulders and looked at me. “If she tells me where Sable is, what do I do? Leave? Stall? Ask for proof?”
“Any of the above,” I said. “If she offers to take you, refuse. You don’t get in a car with wolves you don’t know.”
“And if she won’t talk unless I go with her?”
“Then you go to the bathroom,” Emma said, “say ‘porch light,’ and let the professionals ruin their plumbing.”
Jenna laughed, small and sharp. “I can do that.”