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“I don’t know. But I’ve strengthened the wards more,” she said. “I’m not sure how any of them got through.”
“Any of them?”
She shook her head. “Not important.”
“It is if someone’s trying to kill me. Or kill your alpha,” I said.
“Luke isn’t as bad as he seems,” she said.
I lifted my brows. “You’re not the prisoner.”
She sighed. “Who are you worried about back home? I can send someone to check on them.”
“We have wards of our own, you know,” I pointed out.
She looked like she was trying to keep from breaking into laughter. I watched as she cleared her throat and worked to put on a straight face. “The wards at your old pack are a joke.”
“They’ve kept plenty of people out,” I said. At least that was what my dad said at meetings. When a shifter wanted to visit, there were protocols to let them in. It wasn’t supposed to be difficult, but there was at least a hoop of some kind.
“Humans, maybe. And possibly shifters who weren’t willing to jump through whatever hoop they established, if there was one in the first place. But any beginning level witch could waltz right in.” She shrugged.
She had a point. Jasmine hadn’t had any issues crossing. Maybe those wards weren’t worth much. “Can’t I just go in real quick and check on my friend?”
“No. If your pack is behind all this, they’re working with someone powerful enough to break through the wards here, which means they could have any number of detection spells set up for when you return,” she said.
“You think they have spells to detect me but not anyone else?” I asked.
“I think your dad is using you as a pawn. I think trading your life for his was always his play,” she said. “There was no way he was going to defeat Luke. Luke’s dad, maybe, but someone took him out a few weeks ago.”
“Wait, what?” I couldn’t keep up with the limited new information and the missing facts I was getting. There was so much I needed to fill in the puzzle. “Someone challenged his dad?”
She looked around, and I followed suit. A couple of shifters stood outside the bar, but they seemed engrossed in their own conversation. Other than them, we were alone. This town was empty.
“Alright, you’ll hear this anyway because it’s not exactly private information.” She sounded exhausted, like she’d repeated this news too many times already. “Luke’s dad was our alpha, and he was respected. Not necessarily liked, but respected.”
“I can relate to that,” I mumbled.
“Three weeks ago, one of our patrols found the alpha’s body in the river on the border of our territory,” she explained.
“Someone killed him?” The conversation in the bar came flooding back, and I grabbed Zoe’s arm. “Someone killed the Blue River Pack’s alpha, too.”
“What?” Zoe’s brow furrowed.
I realized I was touching her and released my grip. “I don’t know all the details, but it was gruesome. They said he was drained or something.”
Zoe made a disgusted face. “Gross.”
“How was your old alpha killed?” I asked.
“We’re not totally sure,” she said.
“Why would someone do that?” Two dead alphas wasn’t something to overlook. Prior to the gossip at the bar, I’d never heard of an alpha dying in any way other than natural causes or a full on challenge. It was a waste to fight an alpha privately.
Whoever killed him would technically be able to claim the role unless it was done in a sneaky way. Which, now that I thought about it, was probably the case. “Who would want your alpha dead without a challenge? Especially if his son is a stronger fighter?”
The wheels in my head started to spin, and I almost blurt out a question about Luke himself. The way I saw it, the only person who’d gain anything from killing their alpha was the next in line. I swallowed hard and made a mental note to keep my distance from him. And from Zoe when possible. I’d let myself get comfortable with her too quickly. Even after she’d been inside my head. I couldn’t drop my guard.
It was possible the dead alphas were connected, but the Lost Pack was so isolated, it would be difficult to connect the two events. What if it was just one of those random things? What if the murderer was someone in their pack?
