“My own father was actually choosing a mate. He was not trying to get out of a legitimate mating contract by biting the first floozy who -” Primo suddenly turned red, clawing at his own throat. Arturo stood there, pumping out waves of power that made Dominic’s head hurt. Everyone backed up quickly; even though Arturo was directing the power straight at Primo, it made their heads pound.
Several of Primo’s men hurried forward to try to help – and Arturo’s power caught them up too. They gasped, their eyes bulging from their heads. The rest of Primo’s men backed up warily.
Finally Benedict hurried over. “Enough!” he bellowed. “I demand that you release them! If you wish to kill Primo, issue a formal challenge and do it by the book.”
“Very well,” Arturo said, and released all of them. They collapsed, faces purplish, wheezing and clawing at their throats.
When Primo could speak again, he turned to Benedict. “You saw what he did to us!” he croaked.
“I remain neutral.” Benedict stepped back, a smirk curling his lips.Fucking weasel,Dominic thought. Benedict and the rest of the mages would be delighted to just stand back and watch the two packs fight to the death.
“Do you wish to meet me in the death arena?” Arturo demanded. “You can bring two of your strongest men with you; it won’t help.”
Primo stared at him with burning hatred. Arturo had just handed him the ultimate humiliation. If Primo said yes, Arturo would kill him. But if he didn’t say yes, he looked weak in front of everybody.
The moment stretched on and on. Primo shook with rage. He couldn’t bring himself to admit defeat.
“I’ll take that as a no,” Arturo drawled – and turned his back on him. He was dismissing Primo completely as any kind of threat.
Boom.NowArturo had just handed him the ultimate humiliation. And soon enough, they’d hear their answer – in sneaky ways, through stealth attacks, because they were cowardly bastards.
“Here the come,” Romano called out, and gestured at the woods. The scenters and the foot soldiers came trotting out, looking as glum as wolves could look. They shifted back to human form and walked up to the roadside, pulling on the clothing they’d left behind.
Arturo snapped his fingers at Ciro, his best scenter. “What did you find?” he said impatiently.
“The scent goes through the woods, to a small dirt road, and then vanishes,” Ciro said, looking frustrated.
“Like they were let out of a car?” Arturo said skeptically.
“That’s difficult for me to say. The road has a lot of car smells, some fresher than others.” Ciro looked unhappy. “I’m sorry, boss, we didn’t find any sign of a lesser portal and we have no idea where they could have come from.” The other shifters nodded in agreement.
Primo gestured impatiently at his own lead scenter, a wolf named Pasquale.
“We found the same thing,” he muttered, making a face as if agreeing with the Blood Oath packs’ scenters left a sour taste in his mouth.
“So, both of you failed,” Benedict said irritably. He scowled at Primo. “Your pack leaves first. The Blood Oath pack will wait twenty minutes. You both will return to your respective territories before hostilities are permitted to commence.” And he headed to his car and drove off.
Arturo waited until both Benedict and the Bianchi pack left before gesturing at his men. “Wait for me in the cars. You too,” he added to Romano, who glanced briefly at Dominic before walking away.
Then he returned his attention to Dominic with a frown. “Ottavio seems to have issues with you these days,” Arturo said coolly. “He thinks he’s not doing your job. Specifically, there seems to be more trouble in the territories that I’ve assigned to you.”
“I don’t care about Ottavio’s opinions. I care about yours. Doyouthink I’m not doing my job?” Dominic swallowed a surge of anger. Ottavio loved to make other high-ranking wolves look bad, because he thought it made him look good by comparison, and he lived and died for Arturo’s favor.
“If I thought that, there would be so many pieces of you that nobody could stitch them back together. But I have concerns. Many businesses have folded up shop. And there was the issue with the garbage collection. What have you found out so far?”
Dominic grimaced. Arturo wasn’t going to like his answer. “Several of the owners of the businesses claim various family or personal issues, and the rest have left town. Several of them were human, and therefore when they left, they didn’t go to other portal cities, making them harder to track. The owner of the waste disposal company was a low-level mage, he’s fled to another portal city. I was going to give you my report this morning, but then the call about the ghouls came in.”
“The fact that some of them not only closed up shop but fled town raises all kinds of red flags. I need you to find those business owners. Top priority.” Arturo walked off without another word, heading to his chauffeured Bentley, where Ottavio and Carlo waited for him.
Dominic went to his own car, where Romano was sitting behind the wheel. As they drove off, he felt a stirring of uneasiness. He didn’t give a rat’s ass what Ottavio thought, but something just wasn’t right. There were too many things going wrong lately. Impossible ghoul attacks, businesses closing shop and vanishing…hell, even the garbage pile up. Why would Jordan have thought he could get away with that kind of scam for any length of time? Were people starting to perceive the Blood Oath pack as weak and losing control?
Chapter Ten
Zoey glided to a stop in front of the warehouse on Lombard where Cin and her friends were staying now. She had a big box of pastries, and a mission. Lorenzo was travelling to the Bianchi Pack’s territory to hang out with Cin, and Zoey had to report back to Andrea that Lorenzo was all right.
Lorenzo was supposed to look for a job, since he wasn’t taking computer classes any more, but he spent all his time hanging out with Cin instead. Stewart had offered him an apprenticeship at his carpentry shop, but Lorenzo had turned it down with a sullen shrug. Andrea was so worried about Lorenzo and his crummy attitude and his new friends, that her sunny nature was dimming. And Stewart was so upset by it that he wasn’t even punning any more.
Zoey, who had been working at the messenger service non-stop and sleeping in the tiny crash-pad, only knew all this because Danielle had called her up to complain about it. “I thought that his puns were the worst thing in the world, but actually, Stewart being too depressed to pun is even worse. He looks like a basset hound that somebody kicked. Fix it!” she’d complained to Zoey.
