Page 4 of Eclipse of the Pack

Whispers be damned, I have to get word to Malcolm.Ivy’s thoughts raced.There’s no way he’s working against Griffin, and even if he was, he’s still the only contact I have.

This changes everything.

6

JONATHAN

Jon followed some more PEACE agents as they headed towards the woods. He kept his distance. Looking like you were following a bunch of heavily armed PEACE agents was one of the quicker ways to catch a bullet. He was hoping to avoid that. It sounded unpleasant.

But he did manage to get close enough that he could listen to their conversations. He heard the names Layla Lovett and Rafe Gentry. He guessed those were the people the agents were looking for. He thought about following them for a bit more, but following agents in the woods was a different story than following them on the streets.

And it was unlikely Galen would return to his people. Jon got the impression things weren't great with his family.

Jon knew his city well enough that if he was stopped, he could always think of a place to say he was going to make it seem like he just happened to be walking in the same direction as a bunch of government authorities. But if they spotted him in the woods, it's not like he could claim he knew of a really great rock he was looking for or something.

Instead, he tailed another group back into the city, maintaining a healthy distance but keeping close enough to observe. He followed them into one of the more stable parts of the city. After a while, he thought he saw one of the agents looking back at him several times. To maintain his 'I'm just some guy walking about' cover, he stopped at a little coffee booth and got a cup.

It ate into his rapidly dwindling cash, but he could use the caffeine-fueled focus, and also not getting beaten to death or shot was a bonus. He was beginning to understand how epically unprepared he was for this task. He wasn't a detective. Sure, he had good instincts, but that only got you so far.

He didn't have any contacts that he could reach out to. He had no practice in tracking down leads and wasn't even sure what questions he'd ask if he got anyone who might be open to answering some. All he had was the gnawing anxiety that his friend was in danger and needed help.

He had to let that instinct take the driver's seat until he figured it out, ran out of cash, or he'd die trying. He wouldn't abandon his friend.

The pause for a coffee meant he had to nonchalantly catch up to the team of PEACE agents he was tracking. He managed to do it without drawing attention and trailed them to the warehouse district. At least he was familiar enough with the layout here, and if they saw him here, he could just say he was looking for work. That would be a lie he could tell convincingly enough.

He'd be probably less convincing if he was stopped and asked why he followed agents into the warehouse as they met with a bunch of werewolves. He couldn't figure out why in the midst of the violence when it seemed that the werewolves and PEACE agents were at each other's throats, these meetings kept happening. It was odd enough that he decided to hang back. He hoped someone would say something useful.

7

IVY

After a long, grueling, and very confusing day, Ivy was resting in her apartment when she heard someone step on the squeaky stair leading up to her door. She barely had enough time to rise to her feet before her door was kicked in, and three werewolves burst in, snarling and snapping.

She was getting tired of this. It was time to kick ass. She transformed and rushed them, claws out. All three wolves paused for a moment before her living room was filled with howls of pain, mostly not hers. The three hadn't been prepared for a fight because they quickly turned tail and ran.

Ivy didn't have much time to lick her wounds literally or metaphorically if she was going to find out what the hell was going on. She quickly followed them. They had managed to get a little distance on her, even as they ran circles around the city. Once they split up, she had to make a choice.

She decided that instead of rushing blindly after them, she'd hang back and track them by scent. In the city, a trail could quickly get lost, but she could keep up and not accidentally walk right into some trap or something.

The trail led her into the warehouse district. She could hear the whispered voices coming from one of the warehouses and followed the sound of conversation inside. There were a group of PEACE agents and werewolves talking. And it didn't look like a stand-off.

The air reeked of the tension between the two groups, but no one was reaching for a weapon or getting ready to spring. Why had Malcolm asked her to go undercover when there seemed to be plenty of wolves and PEACE agents getting along just fine in this city.

She hung back, hoping to get some idea of what was happening, but while she could hear them speaking, from this distance, she was only catching about a fifth of what was being said.

Staying downwind from the congregation, she slowly moved closer and closer. Then she spotted movement near the corner of one of the tall shelves just as she rounded the corner. She froze and was ready to turn and flee when someone sounded the alarm, but this guy didn't seem to notice her.

She sniffed the air. Human. There was something about him that she couldn't place her finger on. His scent caused her skin to prickle in a new and not entirely unpleasant way. She drew closer, and he continued to be oblivious to her presence. What the hell was he doing here? He watched the gathering intently.

With barely a whisper of sound, Ivy climbed up the shelving unit to get a better vantage point. She needed to figure out what was going on, but she didn't want this guy to mess things up for her. She had to make sure he wasn't going to alert the gathering that they had one or more visitors.

He was tall, built, with light brown hair and honey-colored eyes. He was handsome. Foolish but handsome. She just hoped he was only moderately foolish as she watched the scene unfold.

8

JONATHAN

Jon continued to watch but didn't dare get close enough to them to be able to make out any of what they were saying. And there were simply too many of them for him to even imagine handling them if they caught him. He needed to winnow down the number of people he was dealing with.

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