Page 13 of Winter Lost

“Were we keeping something from the SecDef?” Adam asked.

“We were indeed. It wasn’t a bullet that killed Kit, though they shot him in the head as soon as he went down. It was your kind of stuff. Ortega thinks it didn’t work on him because his grandmother was a bruja and he wears a protection of some kind that she gave to him.”

“Bruja” did not necessarily mean the kind of witch that Elizaveta had been.

Elizaveta.

Adam hurt whenever he thought of her. She had been a comrade in arms and reminded him so strongly of his own grandmother, also a Russian immigrant, that she felt like family. He’d called her for advice now and then. She’d been the head of a large and powerful family. She understood his job. But she’d also been a much bigger monster than he’d understood, and when he’d figured it out, he’d killed her.

Because of Elizaveta, he needed to find out what kind of a bruja Ortega’s grandmother was or had been. That might be a clue. Or a reason to distrust Ortega.

He really didn’t want to deal with witches again. But he would if he had to.

He spoke with Don for a while more, coordinating next steps. Once Adam understood that magic had been involved, his traveling to New Mexico was a given.

When he got off the phone, Adam continued making arrangements to go to New Mexico. He bought an airline ticket. He texted his office to tell them he wouldn’t be in for a few days, possibly more. When he’d done that, he punched in Darryl’s number. Darryl, whom Adam was about to drop into the middle of a screaming mess.

He made himself stop smiling before he hit the last number. People could hear when you were smiling.

His second answered on the third ring.

“I’ve been waiting for your call,” Darryl said with just a hair too much aggression.

Adam considered that tone, and also the words Darryl had used, before he said anything. There was no way that Darryl could have anticipated the reason he’d called him. He must feel that there was something else.

“Because?” Adam asked.

Darryl gave an almost angry huff. “Moon hunt.”

Three days ago. Adam’s wolf surged with satisfaction at the joy of that hunt. Speed had made his blood sing as they ran through the snow. The hunting sense connected all the pack so tightly, he felt as if he and they were one and the same. Their breath, their fangs, their strength all belonged to him—as his did to them. The power of the killing strike and the taste of blood.

Hastily Adam shoved the wolf back. He needed to pay attention here. What had bothered Darryl?

The beginning of the hunt had not been smooth. It was uncommon for beginnings to be without incident, and the pack was running hot all the time. When the wolf was tasting the moon, knowing a hunt was in the wind, it was hard to keep control. There had been a few pockets of violence, but they’d all been resolved without anyone dying, so Adam hadn’t considered that anything needed saying.

“No,” Adam said evenly. “I’m not calling about the moon hunt. I don’t need to. You handled it.”

A rumble of a growl echoed out of the phone. “I let Post do my job.”

Currently, Adam had a surplus of very dominant werewolves to manage. They were desperately needed, given the pressure the pack was under to defend their territory from all comers, but it wasn’t making life easy for any of them. Especially since Sherwood Post was considerably older and more dominant than Adam himself was.

Adam could feel his wolf bristle in defiant refusal at the thought of Post being more dominant. There was something that happened to a wolf once it had been in charge for a while. Very few Alphas were able to resume being answerable to anyone. Adam’s wolf’s determination gave him a lot of sympathy for Darryl, who was also supposed to be in charge of Post.

Darryl should be Alpha of his own pack. Adam and the Marrok had been in talks about finding the best fit for Darryl—something that would work for his career as well as for his wolf—when Mercy had made their pack responsible for maintaining the only place on earth where humans were safe from the things that go bump in the night. At that point, all of their options had changed.

If they were going to keep their promises and their bargains with the fae, Darryl was necessary. Post was necessary. Warren was necessary.

Now it was up to Adam to keep the three (four, if he counted himself, and he probably should) dominant werewolves functioning as a team.

He’d been privileged to serve for a few months under a staff sergeant who was gifted at team building. He’d put together a highly efficient crack team and managed to make them happy to serve under their idiot captain who should have been shot—and eventually was, amazingly enough by the enemy.

At the time, Adam hadn’t realized those lessons would be just about the most valuable things he learned from being in the army.

Which was why he intended to let them sort some things out on their own while he was gone. He knew his wolves. They understood what their pack had taken on and why it was important, necessary, not to fail. And if they were going to not fail, they would need every wolf. Without Adam, they would have to find a way to work together. He wished he could be a fly on the wall to witness it instead of running around New Mexico trying to figure out what happened on one hand and playing politics on the other.

“What was the job, the one you should have done, that you let Post do?” asked Adam.

“You were there,” growled Darryl.

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