The sprites dancing around the kitchen in the early morning’s golden rays were unaware of the trouble brewing in Stacy’s heart. She sipped the coffee, allowing the steam to curl into her face and assuage the barrage of thoughts taking over her mind.
The sound of her phone ringing broke the silence. Maybe it was someone from the hospital or her father calling with an update.
It was neither. Stacy hesitated at seeing the name of her friend Jenny, her old college roommate and former colleague. It was early enough that Stacy knew her friend was calling on her commute to work.
It had been weeks since Stacy last spoke to her friend, and fresh guilt washed over her. Yes, a lot of shit had gone on, but Stacy didn’t see it as an excuse to be a shitty friend. In the last day or two, it made sense, but not before that. Stacy remembered promising Jenny she would have her over for dinner soon and cringed.
She answered, forcing cheer into her voice she did not feel. “Morning, Jenny.”
“Bitch, where have you been?” Jenny’s cheer was not forced.
“I’ve been…busy,” Stacy weakly replied.
“You always say that.” Stacy imagined her friend rolling her eyes. “I know you don’t have cases as an excuse. What has it been this time? Have you been hired by the FBI? Is there a secret boyfriend?”
This earned a real laugh from Stacy. “Neither of those. I’ve been fixing the house and trying to set up my own practice.” Both were true, though Stacy didn’t plan on sharing that her house needed fixing because a greedy billionaire had sent a pack of werewolves to assault it.
“I see,” Jenny replied, tsking. “Did you hear about the shit that went on at the Corbinelli function the other night? Apparently, two journalists were chased out of the event and shot at. One died, and the other is in the hospital!”
It took everything in Stacy not to break down. “I-I did hear, yes.”
“Crazy shit,” Jenny muttered around a mouthful of food. A slurping sound followed. Jenny must have picked up her favorite iced coffee before heading to work. Part of her longed for those simple days. Mornings where she and Jenny drank coffee and gossiped about people in the office before diving into their work.
“A lot of legal work will come out of it, I bet,” Jenny added. “A shame you’re not here to take on a case. You’d whip ass in the courtroom.”
Stacy hoped to whip ass before ever reaching a courtroom. She didn’t say this to Jenny or that the journalist who died was not, in fact, a journalist but a bodyguard and dear friend to Amy, the real journalist. She didn’t explain that she felt at fault for Spencer’s death or how she planned to make Victor pay for what he’d done. All she said was, “How have you been, Jenny?”
It helped to hear about someone else’s troubles, especially the mundane ones. Jenny and her longtime on-again, off-again boyfriend were on “another break.” Though they had already bought plane tickets to Bali before going on said break, so they’d probably start hooking up again.
Jenny said this was okay since, though Derek was the dumbest fuck she’d ever met, he was hot. The new interns at the firm were young and annoying, but Jenny had won a property law case involving a single mother whose name was on the deed of a house she’d bought with her ex-husband.
Then, she tired of talking about her life and demanded to know when she would be coming to Stacy’s “new digs” for dinner.
Stacy’s first instinct was to make up an excuse about how this would not be possible, but she couldn’t do that without making Jenny suspicious or telling her the full, ugly truth. Yes, I’m rich now. Way richer than I was before, but it comes with regular werewolf fights didn’t quite roll off the tongue. Jenny would think she was high.
She decided it would be good to inject some normalcy into her life. “Is next weekend good? I need time to…clear some things up.”
“I’ll be counting down the days! That’ll give me plenty of time to decide what wine to bring.”
“It’s a plan,” Stacy replied.
“I’ll be late for work if I don’t go now,” Jenny told her. “Love ya, Stace. Please survive this next week so I can see your gorgeous face again.”
Jenny didn’t know how much weight her words held, but Stacy felt them. “I’ll be here,” she promised. “Can’t wait to see you.” A minute later, they said goodbye, and Stacy smiled. It was a relief at first, then she felt a punch of guilt. She wondered how Amy was doing and how Spencer’s family was taking the news of his passing. She wondered what plan Victor was scheming now.
I will stop him, she vowed as she finished her coffee.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Victor peered from the fourth-floor window into the training yard below. The men here called it a yard, but it was more like a field. A barbed wire fence ran its perimeter, and every security precaution possible had been taken. Victor had paid to ensure no one flew aircraft over this place. It was a hell of a lot of money, but he had faith it would pay off. No one else rising against him had this big of a secret.
The security measures were in place to keep insiders in and outsiders out. If so much as one of these prototypes escaped, Project Pack 013 would be done for. So would Victor.
He bristled as the prototypes were marched into the training area. Only four were out today, but they looked exactly as their blueprints suggested they would. They were much larger than the real werewolves he’d hired and a hell of a lot harder to kill.
These were made not from natural conception and birthing processes but through a series of chemical engineering and magic applications. They were bigger, stronger, and with a thirst to kill. Nothing stood in their way.
Victor watched grimly as they were marched out. The creatures prowled their enclosure, licking their chops when someone came along to feed them.
The head of security beside Victor spoke. “As you can see, the Project is coming along well. We have a few things to work out, but in time, you will have an excellent army.”
Victor liked that word. Army. However, he did not like that they were running out of time. They needed the Project accelerated. “I’ll need more samples of the prototype fluid for myself,” he announced. “As soon as possible.”
The man beside him paled, hesitating.
“There is some, right?” Victor growled.
“Yes, of course.” The man added, “Is the witch that big of a threat?”
Victor bristled. The last thing he wanted was to seem weak against a young woman like Drake. She had made Leonard look puny in the courtroom. He’d be damned if he looked like a fool, thanks to her power and strategy. I’ve been doing this far longer than her, he reminded himself. “No,” he snarled. “We have bigger threats. She is only the beginning. We take her out, we can target the rest.”
He paused, eyes narrowing on the werewolves below. They had torn up a goat sent in for feeding. Blood coated the grass of the training yard. “She’s young and stupid. She will attack here.” Victor gestured at their surroundings. “And quickly discover that it was always wrong to stand in my way.”
Rowan knelt in the grass, bracing his hands against the earth. He breathed in, then out, allowing the cool air to fill his lungs. The sun dipped low toward the horizon, casting orange rays through the grove of trees he had come to. Shadows gathered. Night would soon arrive.
The day seemed to fly past with Rowan in a daze. He thought of Amy often and hoped his old ally had done what she promised. He hadn’t heard from Wraith since their phone call last night, but they had heard from Kiera. She had arrived shortly after dawn and informed them Victor’s estate was nearly impenetrable, but she had found a few weaknesses.
