“You just asked where we were meeting today. I thought you were just keeping track of us,” Sloan explains.
“Wow,” I say. “Like she’s ourmother? That’s such a weird thing to think, Sloan.” I shake my head too. You miss out on all the opportunities for revenge you don’t take.
Sloan glares at me, and Meena sighs. “Sloan had told me you all were meeting today, without any inquiries from my end about your whereabouts, just so it’s clear. I thought I’d come down because we need to plan our next steps to catch the Vigilante Wolf Hunter.”
My heart drops to my stomach. It still manages to speedup. “Vigilante Wolf Hunter?” I mutter.
Meena looks at me sympathetically. “Yes, if you need more time, I understand. What happened couldn’t be easy. But with the recent developments, we can’t put it off anymore.”
I frown. “Recent events?”
Meena looks confused. “Yeah, we found another werewolf’s body this morning.”
Everything goes silent. I can see her mouth moving, but can’t hear anything over the static in my ears.Another murder?
“...I thought Matt already…”
It’snotpossible. He promised he was done. But then why is there another body?
“...we would have gotten to it eventually…”
Maybe it’s an old body. No, Elliot told me about all his victims. We had found all the bodies he had hidden.No.
“...you were blocked, so I obviously didn’t get your message…”
My body goes cold. He can’t be lying to me. He just can’t—
“—Nick,” Cami’s voice brings me back into the chaos. From the worried look on her face, this wasn’t the first time she’d called my name. “You okay?”
I nod. I pull my focus back into the room.Information. I need more information before I come to the worst possible conclusion. I ignore Matt and Marcus’s whisper fight beside me and turn my gaze to Meena. “Who was the victim?”
She frowns at me. It takes me a second to realize she was mid-conversation with Sloan. “James Adler. A pharmacist. He was found in his home.”
“Same MO?”
Her frown deepens. “Of course. We found the concoction of drugs in his blood.”
“And we had this James in our system?”
She nods. “He was being investigated for the murder of his neighbor. We were very close to making an arrest.”
“Fuck, I really thought we were done with this,” I blurt out.
Matt pats my shoulder. “New relationship has made youtoo optimistic if you believed the killer moved on just because he went quiet for a few months, bud.”
Hopefully, the relationship hasn’t made me irrationally trustworthy. “When was he killed?” I ask, holding my breath. This is my last hope.
“Some time last night or early morning.”
I blow out a relieved breath. Itcouldn’thave been him. We’ve been together every minute for the last two days. I hadn’t left Elliot’s side since I went grocery shopping on Thursday. I hate that I doubted him even for a second.
Of course, he wouldn’t do this. Now I just have to make sure he never learns I even entertained the thought. Or I'll lose what little trust he has in me.
Chapter Three
Misunderstandings, Meaningful Emails, and Mounting Insecurities
Elliot
