Page 20 of Bound

Topher: And I thought my family was certifiable.

West: Really. Now?

Topher: Think it will be awkward if I start making popcorn?

West: Bite me.

“You feel like you’re out of the loop?” Brody continued. “You made that choice the day you signed on to be a Tracer. And I’m sick of you blaming me for it.”

For a moment, we all froze. Then (shocker), the call dropped. Brody swore.

Growling, I rubbed my temples. “August—”

“On it.” Grabbing the phone, August made a beeline for the balcony.

I spoke through my teeth. “If August manages to get him back on the phone—"

Brody shook his head. “Don’t.”

“I swear to God.”

“I get it, okay? You don’t need to ride my ass. The kid knows how to push my buttons. He always has.”

“For crying out loud, it’s River. You seriously don’t remember back when he was eight, how Mom used to go into the kitchen, stick her head in the freezer and count to ten just to keep from killing him?”

“It was twenty. And pretty sure she pulled that move with all of us. Hell, between seven boys, I’m surprised she doesn’t have permanent frostbite. Remind me to send her flowers the next time she’s in town.”

Out on the balcony, August had collapsed into one of my deck chairs, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You hear from her this week? I know she was outside of Albuquerque, following up on a lead.”

Our mother, Sofia Montemayor-Caldwell, was one of the deadliest fighters in the history of the Tracers. Though she was officially retired, she’d spent the past two years searching for our father, Ben.

Brody rubbed his face. He needed to shave. I wondered how many hours he’d been putting in lately between the anti-paranormal protests and the investigation into the disappearances down in Austin. “Didn’t pan out. She and River have interrogated most of the wolf packs in four states. If they were hiding Dad, they might have been able to keep him underground, keep him on the move for six months, a year at the outside. Shifters are social by nature. We like to talk too much. The only ones with a network sophisticated enough to pull something like this off are the vamps.”

“Dad was abducted in broad daylight,” I pointed out. “In July. There were no clouds that day and that stretch of road is just rocks and short, scrubby brush. Zero cover.”

“So vampires couldn’t have made the actual grab. But we saw last year they were working with the North Austin pack to traffic humans to use as blood slaves. The covens have a massive drug and money laundering operation going on. If they thought Dad was causing trouble, asking too many questions, why wouldn’t they pay off a rival pack to kidnap him?”

“There was no evidence of any shifter other than him when we searched his police cruiser. The scents were all human.”

He nodded. “Take it one step further. The pack in question hires out human thugs. Or maybe we’re looking at this all wrong. Vampires and other packs aren’t the only ones with reason to want to silence someone asking too many questions.”

The hair rose at the back of my neck. “You think the feds could be holding him somewhere?”

“Mom and River are all but certain it was shifters who took him initially.” My oldest brother looked out to where August was pacing on the balcony, running a hand through his tousled auburn hair. “There was that pack in North Texas Dad had been meeting with in secret in the weeks before he disappeared. Mom went up there and found the place had been wiped out. When River came in with a team days later to track down survivors, one of them remembered seeing Dad locked in a back room at his aunt’s house. River and Mom missed him by days.”

“Whoever has him is moving their prisoners around.”

“And that means he could be anywhere.”

“River’s pissed as hell that we’ve been lying to him for the past year,” I said quietly. “Ask yourself if you wouldn’t hate us all a little right now.”

“Yeah. Remind me whose bright idea that was again?”

August slid the patio door open using an elbow, bearing the phone out in front of him like it was a live grenade.

Brody ground his teeth. I made a mental note to sign him and Major up for an extra session of doga.

“Sorry for earlier, River. We need answers and I’m betting whoever is holding Topher’s brother has them.”