Thomas stiffened. From his rare dealings with the alpha council, Michael knew involving them wasn’t something any pack alpha wanted if he could at all avoid it. “He only admitted to those crimes to help you investigate Crossford’s death, Detective. If it weren’t for Aaron, you’d still be in the dark about a lot of things.”
Michael laughed. “Let’s not kid ourselves. He admitted it so I wouldn’t charge him with murder.”
“Which you can’t because he has an alibi.”
They were going round in circles. Yes, technically he should report Harper and possibly Nash to his boss and then liaise with the council, but the paperwork would be a nightmare and dealing with the council was never fun. And for what? It wouldn’t help him catch his murderer. Lax had that right. What he needed was proof that Smith was involved. Something concrete that would stand up against the very well-paid solicitors no doubt already on his payroll. He needed someone on the inside.
“Let me be honest with you,” Michael began.
Thomas’s eyes narrowed. “I’m always a fan of the truth.”
“Good. Then surely you want to find out who’s responsible as much as we do. There’s a shifter running around killing people—none of those victims deserved to have their throats ripped out. One of your own is doing this.” Thomas said nothing, so Michael carried on. “You have superior senses.” He waved a hand encompassing all the shifters in the room. “Someone must know something. Don’t you think?”
No one spoke, so Michael continued to forge ahead, regardless.
“He or she would’ve had blood on them. Lots of it. Are you telling me that no one smelt it? Surely they’d have had to go home to change, dispose of their clothes. I don’t believe for a second they managed to pass through London with not one other shifter noticing.” They were everywhere, for fuck’s sake. Not that he said that out loud. “With every passing day that this is in the news, the public are bombarded with speculation about whether we have a shifter serial killer on our hands. Are the streets safe anymore? Can shifters be trusted?” He let that sink in, gratified that Thomas had listened to him and not just thrown him out. “Do you really want to let this rumbling of bad feelings escalate into something far more dangerous?”
Thomas sighed and leant against the wall. “No. That’s not what any of us wants. And I can tell you now, Detective, I’ve spoken with the other alphas in this city, and as far as we’re aware, it’s not one of ours doing the killing. And whether you believe me or not, we would report anything we found out because, like you say, no one wants this to escalate. A shifter who murders humans is not one that any alpha would want in his pack. And if this continues, then the alpha council will become involved whether you or I want them to be or not.”
Michael had figured as much. Arlington had held off until they could identify the shifter and what pack he was part of, then they’d involve the council, but maybe they’d been going about this all wrong. “Can you identify a shifter by scent alone?”
“That would depend,” Thomas hedged.
“On what?”
“Whether or not we’d met before, for one thing. Pack scents are usually easy enough to recognise if nothing has been done to disguise them, but in order to identify an individual pack member, we’d need to have met at least once before. Why?”
“Because we’ve never had a shifter visit any of the crime scenes.”
Thomas raised both eyebrows. “That seems like a gross oversight on your part. I would’ve assumed that to be an obvious move, considering you already accept we have enhanced senses.”
Michael ignored the slight. Thomas had a point after all. “It rained at the first two crimes scenes before we could get anyone to agree to come down, and to be honest, we dropped the ball on this one.” He winced. “Well, I dropped the ball, to be more specific.” He’d been too wrapped up waiting to hear about the blood on the tape and had forgotten all about going through the proper channels to get a shifter to sniff out the crime scene. “But we’ve had no rain since Thursday night. Do you think any scents would still be there?”
“It’s possible. They wouldn’t be particularly strong after this amount of time, but couldn’t anyone have wandered down there since the murder?”
“No. It should still be taped off with crime scene tape. If anyone’s been stupid enough to ignore it, then they deserve to be caught.”
Thomas seemed to consider that for a moment. “I take it you’re asking if one of us will visit your crime scene and check for scents?”
“Yes.”
“Like a tracker dog?” Thomas’s arched eyebrow said he wasn’t all that amused by this idea.
Michael stifled a laugh at the thought of Alpha Sam Thomas running all over London with his nose to the floor, chasing a scent. “Not exactly,” he managed. “I just want to know if you recognise any other shifters or pack scents at the scene.” No one spoke, so Michael said, “Ideally, I’d like Mr Harper and Mr Nash to see if they recognise any scents from Friday night.”
Thomas shared a glance with Lax. “We’ll all go. I’m not letting two members of my pack go with you unaccompanied, and Isaac and I can identify all the London packs far more easily than Aaron or Harry.”
“Suits me.” In fact, that was a far better outcome than Michael could have hoped for when they’d driven over there.
“Don’t look so surprised, Detectives. A shifter who kills like this is detrimental to all packs. We want him caught too.”
“You ready now?”
Thomas looked at the members of his pack, who all nodded in agreement.
“Then let’s go.”
CHAPTER FIVE
