Page 72 of Broken Wolf

She was out before I even realized that I was going to throw the punch.

“I would suggest detaining her and having one of the other sirens question her later,” Nikos said quietly. “There could be more to this than she took a chance. She’s rather over the top for a trainee.”

I nodded, thinking it was smart and I shouldn’t be making the decisions right then. “Bring her with and get her locked down at the supe FBI office. I’ll tell security to pack up her room and go through everything on the way out.”

“Sera this is—” Carter started to say, but I ignored him and went for my vehicle.

“Helmer, ride with me. I want to hear this again from someone as old as you. I got—I want to make sure I got the right information on this,” I ordered.

“You’re going back to your apartment, right?” Nikos checked. He moved in front of me when I didn’t say anything. “Please? We need you, Sera.”

I gave a swift nod. Yeah, I could go cool off there even if it was on the roof of whatever.

Helmer jumped in the passenger’s seat and didn’t say a word as I pulled away from the curb. I stopped at the security station and filled them in, not even having the bitch’s name to tell them.

But I did have the picture of her with Carter which was just great. They promised they’d handle it and let Brian know when it was done.

“Talk,” I ordered him when we were on the road.

“It’s like any other gift or talent we can have,” he told me. “They all vary and build the older we get. I have the one that my bloodline has, but others as well, and not every one of our bloodline can have that gift.” He waited until I nodded. “I thought you were doing it intentionally, trying to get him to form that bond with your wolf more than siren him.”

“No.” The one word probably said a lot, but it was the truth.

“When I got off the plane, I immediately smelled Carter’s scent changed. He smelled a bit of wolf. Some of it was you on him, but also that he was bonding with a wolf. Thinking of it like the gift of alliance with a species. Wolves won’t be as on guard with him as they would other vampires, especially ancients.

“That’s a useful asset for a coven to make alliances. And it’s not always one wolf that has the strong bond with the vamp, but it can be the pack that he or she was close to when the gift developed. He’s here now, so he will start to smell like Chicago wolves a bit. When you siren him, he’ll always smell a bit like you—you know that from Noah.”

I snorted and ignored when he gave me a curious look. Yeah, Noah smelled like me. That wasn’t the snort.

The snort was at the idea I was still going to siren Carter.

Currently, my only plan for him was to drown him in Lake Michigan.

“So he was bonding to me because we were lovers, but then he switched to her and—”

“Wait, there’s a lot in that starting with the ‘were lovers,’ but I’m not touching that just yet,” he cut in. “But it’s not like that. It doesn’t have to be. Can it be if there’s lust or attraction? Yes, but I’ve seen it more times than not.”

“Okay, so that’s all I knew from Vlad and Bernard, and I never even saw it,” I told him.

He didn’t answer right away which confused me. “I don’t know that’s even what it was. We’ve heard different things, and even a few of the vampires—Remus wasn’t even sure. He had seen it with his previous Master who was tied to pumas and said it was different.”

I nodded. “Bernard’s blood is a drug as a siren, and he was also playing Vlad. Makes sense. Okay, so what is it supposed to be?”

“Like the buddy system. Who is a Beta you trust and have no feelings for?”

“Freddie,” I answered immediately. “He’s the one who first pulled me in and asked for my help—has done everything I’ve ever asked and helped me. Reagan might be the strongest, but Freddie is really the most senior Beta as the oldest and was higher in the pack from before.”

“Okay, that trust you built over the years, the bond makes you skip some of that. It’s like you trust and know—you generally can’t screw over your bonded. That’s why I don’t know that Bernard and Vlad were but again, I wasn’t here for any of it. It’s more symbiotic and keeping peace in an area. It’s normally not the Alpha and Master though.”

I nodded. “Yeah, that could throw off the balance and hurt the other supe groups in the area. I remember that.”

“Right, so it’s normally the Master and one of the other stronger wolves, and that wolf becomes the liaison for the coven. They won’t hurt the pack because they’re a wolf, but there’s a deep trust there so the coven works well. It’s all meant to bring peace and help supes like any of our other powers and abilities.”

“But things go wrong with that just like the others,” I hedged.

“Yes, and just like you separated them, that’s what’s done. Normally, if something happens or something goes wrong with the bond or—anything, the wolf is transferred to another pack. Last time I saw that it was less than a year until the bond was broken and like it never happened. The wolf adapted to his new pack and started smelling like them.”

“And the Master was still in the alliance with the other pack and then his power wouldn’t want to bond with a wolf from there. Got it.” I waited until he nodded. “So this whole thing about it housebreaking the shifter and taming them is just vampire bullshit just like everything else gets twisted up.”

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