Tooth and Claw (The Harry Russo Diaries Book 2) (17 page)

I rode shotgun. It was the only way I could keep an eye on
the two big wolves as they galloped along the street in front of us. Tess complained
for a minute or two in the back seat of Isaac’s big SUV, but soon the thrill of
an adventure roused her from her pout.

We had geared up, as Tess suggested, donning clothes meant to
add a layer of protection and ease of movement in case of a fight. Tess and I
both had our katanas. I also had two smaller knives strapped to my thigh and
my ankle. I’m sure Tess was similarly decked out. She wasn’t powerful enough
yet to shift to a half-were form and would only shift to full wolf if she
absolutely had no other choice. She was deadly enough in her two-legged form.
I was wearing the long black leather duster I had acquired from Salvador’s
wardrobe people a few weeks back. It looked totally badass and I felt like
some chick off the cover of a vampire novel.

We were heading north through the city following Daniel and
the big grey wolf. It was a little surreal watching them trot up the middle of
the busy street. They didn’t even bother to dodge the cars. Watching them
disappear as a car drove right through them and then see them reappear farther
up the street was a little disconcerting at first, to say the least.

Tess and I had argued over calling Nash. She, the good
little pack wolf that she was, felt that we needed to call him, Nash being an
alpha and all that. I thought it was best if we followed the lead first. For
all we knew it would be another dead end and I didn’t want to pull Nash away
from the leads he was pursuing. I told myself it had nothing to do with the
fact that I was avoiding having ‘the talk’ with him. Still, when I finally
caved and agreed with Tess, I was relieved when his phone went straight to
voicemail. I left him a brief message telling him what was going on and that I
would call as soon as we found anything then put my phone on silent mode.

The wolves had begun to head slowly towards the northeast
edge of the city. I wasn’t overly familiar with this part of town, but Isaac
began nodding his head.

“I believe I may have an idea of where we are headed,” he
said.

“You do? Where?” I turned to look at him in surprise.

“There are several industrial areas on this side of the city
and there is also an abandoned cement factory. Any of these places could be
used for nefarious deeds.”

I pulled out my phone and brought up the map Bryce had
created for me, pinpointing all the holdings of Bellemare and its subsidiaries.
“Bellemare doesn’t seem to own anything out this way though.”

“Maybe that’s a sign,” Tess said from the back, leaning
forward and resting her arms on my seat. “I mean, if you had some top secret
facility where you are doing crazy ass experiments on werewolves, you might
want to make sure it wasn’t in your own backyard.”

I shrugged. She had a point and it looked like it wouldn’t
take long to find out. The wolves took a left onto a quieter street, heading
towards the outskirts of town.

“It looks like they’re going to the decommissioned cement
plant,” I said after looking at the map again. The road we were on eventually came
to a dead end at the edge of the cement plant’s property which appeared to
encompass several acres with four separate buildings. There were half a dozen
abandoned quarries, several of which had been allowed to collect water over the
years and now were small lakes, attracting migrating waterfowl and other
animals. The whole facility was a bit of an eyesore, especially as the city
had spread out, its suburbs beginning to encroach on the property. I
remembered there had been some talk of the city buying the land to turn it into a
park or something, but the owner wouldn’t sell.

The sun was just setting as we drew near to the cement
factory. The wolves had stopped at a chain link fence blocking the road. It
had been chained shut and was covered with ‘No Trespassing’ and ‘Private Property’
signs.

Isaac pulled up to the fence and turned off the engine,
killing the lights. The wolves had disappeared, reappearing on the other side
of the chain link. Daniel threw his head up and howled only to be joined by
the grey a few seconds later.

“Alright, alright, I get it.” I said to them rolling my
eyes. “Give us a second to come up with a plan.”

“Do we have a plan?” Tess struggled not to grin.

“No, but the least we can do is take a minute just to check
things out before we go rushing in,” I replied.

“Since when are you the voice of reason?” Tess shook her
head in disbelief.

“I guess I’m just more mature even if you’re old…DER.” I
gave her a smug smile.

“Ha. Five months, Harry, I’m older by five months.”

“If you two are done with the less than witty banter,”
Isaac’s said wryly, “I believe there is some sort of activity going on at the
plant.” He had grabbed a set of binoculars and was looking in the distance at
the main factory.

I looked across the barren terrain. Headlights flashed as a
car turned and parked. There were several other vehicles already stopped there.
“Do you think it’s the fight club? We didn’t get a call or anything. Maybe we
didn’t pass their checks when we called for the invite?”

“I don’t know,” Isaac frowned. “The fake identities that
Bryce created for us were very thorough. They should have passed inspection.”

“Maybe this is something else then?” I looked back across
the open field to where another car was pulling in to park.

“Omigod! Maybe it’s a meeting of the Society of Montferrat!”
Tess gripped my coat and whispered in excitement.

“Well, I guess there’s only one way to find out.” I pulled
out my phone. “Let’s see if this is going to work.” I quickly typed out a
text and sent it.

“Hey, it worked. I’ve got Bryce.” Bryce had set himself up
a phone number so that he could receive texts.

….NO U R CLEAR. THERE R NO CAMS IN THE BLDG>

“Okay, we’re clear. There’s no security between here and
the factory. At least there are no cameras.”

“You should call Nash,” Tess said quietly.

“Yes, you should wait for Detective Nash.” Isaac nodded,
agreeing with Tess. “I’ll go ahead and scout the way.”

“No, we should stick together, let me just call in the
reinforcements first and then we’ll all go.” I shook my head, grabbing Isaac’s
arm.

“I agree with Harry. We stick together,” Tess nodded.

I checked my phone and there was a message from Nash.

“
Harry, where are you? Don’t go off doing
something stupid. I’ve got a solid lead here and we’re locking it down. Stay
put and don’t do anything crazy until you hear from me. I mean it Harry
.”

Bossy wolf. I didn’t know whether I should be happy that he
was concerned or annoyed that he thought I would do something stupid. I called
him back and of course it went straight to voicemail again.

“Hey Cian,” I started, figuring if I used his name it might work
in my favour. “We have a solid lead on our end too. We’re at the old
Lafayette Cement Plant. There are half a dozen cars out front. Something is
definitely going on here. If you can, send us some back up.” I ended the
call, shoving my phone back into my pocket.

“Are you sure about this?” Isaac looked at me with concern.
“It would be safer if you waited here.”

“We’ll go together,” I replied, giving him a determined stare.

With a shrug, Isaac strode to the back of his vehicle and
then reappeared with a large set of bolt cutters. He made quick work of the
chain holding the gate shut.

“What do you think? Do we risk taking the vehicle or go on
foot?” Tess asked.

“We go on foot,” Isaac replied, stepping through the now
open gate.

I took a deep breath and then followed him through. Tess
brought up the rear after first going to the back of the vehicle and rummaging
around in the duffle bag she had thrown there before we left home. In her hand
she held a small crossbow.

“Whoa!” I looked at the weapon in surprise. “Where did you
get that?”

“My uncle just got it in and I wanted to give it a try.”
She held up a small pouch with about a dozen mini crossbolts. “They’ll punch
through Kevlar.”

“Cool. Hopefully we won’t need it.” With a quick nod to
her, I turned and hustled ahead to catch up with Isaac.

At first the wolves were nowhere in sight, but as we jogged
across the open terrain I spotted them pacing back and forth at the side of
the building. We made it across the field without incident and pressed
ourselves up against the side of the building. The entrance was just around
the corner, but now that we were closer, we could tell we weren’t going to get
in that way, at least not easily and not unless we managed to go through the
two guards armed with automatic weapons.

“Shit. They’ve got guns,” whispered Tess. I rolled my
eyes. Of course they had guns. We were dealing with norms. They always had
guns. I had complained as much to Tess’s uncle, when I tried to convince him
to teach me to shoot a handgun. Tess thumped me in the arm. “Hey, look!
Isn’t that the guy?”

I peeked around the corner to look where she was pointing.
“You’re right. It’s Douglas Bellemare. I knew he was involved. I just knew
it.” I did a little victory fist pump for being right.

“We should look for another way in,” Isaac said.

Luckily, I figured I had already found one. “I think I’ve
got that covered.” I grabbed Isaac’s hand and pointed to the far end of the
building. There was a fire escape leading up to a second level window. The grey
wolf was sitting on the second storey landing, his tongue hanging out of his
mouth. Daniel paced below the ladder as if waiting impatiently for us to catch
up.

“Persistent spectres,” Isaac replied. He grasped me by the
shoulders and eyed me critically. “How are they staying so solid and for so
long? Are you feeding them? You’ll deplete yourself completely in no time,”
he scolded.

“I’m not doing anything, honest.” I sucked in a breath.
“At least I don’t think I am. I don’t feel like my aura is getting drawn on.
In fact, I feel great.”

Isaac gave me another penetrating look, his eyes suddenly
widening. “Oh, I see. Well…”

“Oh. My. God. Did you just look at me and figure out I had
sex with Nash?”

“Well…” If Isaac could have, I’m sure he would have
flushed with embarrassment. “It’s not that exactly it’s…”

“It’s the fact that you have the equivalent of a big ole’
neon sign on the back of your neck that screams ‘property of Cian Nash’ in big,
bold letters,” Tess added gleefully.

“Shut up! I do not.”

“Do too.”

“Why didn’t you say something to me?”

“Hey, I’m sorry, but that’s Nash’s job.” Tess threw her
hands up in surrender. “He gave me strict instructions I wasn’t allowed to say
anything until he got a chance to explain things.”

“You’ve got to be freakin’ kidding me.” I pushed my fingers
through my hair. Damn wolves and their damn hierarchy.

“Excuse me, ladies? Could we maybe have this conversation
at a more convenient time?” Isaac swept a hand towards the fire escape at the
far end of the building.

“Yeah, right. Like maybe never,” I grumbled as I stomped
off towards the waiting wolves. Tess snickered, but kept her mouth shut.

The fire escape was rusted, but looked solid enough. The
only problem was that the bottom of the ladder was far above our heads. Isaac
could easily make the jump and possibly Tess, but I was pretty sure I wouldn’t
be able to.

“Not a problem,” Isaac said as he stepped under the ladder.
He made a basket with his hands, interlocking his fingers and bent forward,
holding them out in front of his thighs. “I’ll give you ladies a boost.”

Tess looked at me and gave a little shrug then launched
herself at Isaac. Her foot landed in his hands and he pushed up, throwing her
into the air. She grabbed last rung of the ladder easily and pulled herself
up. “Easy peasy, Harry,” she called down as she scrambled up to the landing at
the top of the ladder.

Isaac had assumed the position again. I followed Tess’s
example and found myself launched into the air. The ladder was suddenly right
in front of me and I grabbed on. My hand slipped and for a split second I
thought I was going to fall and then suddenly Isaac was there, pulling me up.

“Thanks Isaac,” I said with relief.

“You’re most welcome, Harry.”

At the top of the landing, the fire escape was accessed
through a window. The pane was broken already, so it didn’t take much to clear
away the shards of glass and climb through. We found ourselves in a small
office. A quick peek out the door and the coast was clear so far.