Winter’s Wolf (17 page)

“How about you pay me for it, sir.”

“You a wiseass?”

“No. Just clear on what my responsibilities are. If you have an issue with the last delivery, I’ll be happy to look into it. This delivery is another matter. Pay me or I take it back.”

“Well, ain’t you the chipper customer service representative?”

Winter turned and started walking toward the SUV. The two wolf wimps stared through the glass, eyes wide. He got exactly the response he expected. He heard two steps behind him and turned in time to block a huge fist and bring his own right up into the guy’s gut—clearly an area of weakness.

“Ooof. You little shit.”

Winter delivered a right cross to the chin that took the big man to his knees. He looked confused. Yeah, without werewolf blood behind it, that blow wouldn’t have stopped him. Not fair, but so what?

Winter looked up. “Ma’am, do you intend to pay for this delivery, or do you want him on a stretcher?”

For the first time, the soccer mom looked scared. “Yeah, okay. I got it right here.”

She reached in the pocket of her sweater. Winter took one step and leaped through the air. His full body weight smashed into her and knocked her to the ground, sending the handgun she’d been fishing from her pocket flying. He rolled, grabbed the gun, looked back at Mr. Big, who was considering a rematch, and leveled the weapon at him. “Think again.” He walked casually to the package, picked it up from the ground, and blew grass off it. “Unless you display some better customer service yourself, I expect your days of deliveries are terminated.”

“Bullshit.”

Winter narrowed his eyes. “Make sure that you’re not the one terminated.” He stuck the gun in his waistband, walked to the opposite side of the car, and got in. “You can drive now, you shitty excuse for a werewolf.”

Mario raised a hand. “Hey, man.”

“Just drive, or I’ll use this fucking gun on you.”

Mario stomped the accelerator and turned up the music.

Winter took deep breaths for a few minutes. “Turn down the radio.” Mario ignored him, and Winter leaned forward between the seats and pushed the on/off button. “Okay, talk. Who the fuck put you up to this?”

Junior stared at Mario, who looked daggers at him. Junior shrugged. “Nobody. We knew that dude was in there and we wanted somebody large to deal with him.”

That could be true. They both smelled so strongly of lies it was hard to pick out the few true statements. “So who are you delivering the drugs for?”

Junior’s head whipped around. “Who said anything about drugs?”

“Don’t even begin to suggest you don’t know what’s in those packages. You’re enough wolves to be able to smell, aren’t you?”

“We never knew for sure.”

“Yeah, right.”

“We figured. But the money’s really good, so we don’t ask. Hell, they’re just humans. Nobody’s selling the stuff to pack. We made sure of that.”

“Made sure with who?”

Junior screwed up his face. “Some guy.”

“I’ve still got the gun.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Don’t test me.”

“Ollie.”

Winter’s mouth opened and closed. “You’re shitting me? The junior-birdman marshal?”

Junior snorted. “Junior birdman. Yeah. He’s just a middleman for some dude in New York. But he’s the only one we know.”

“Did he tell you to include me?”

Junior shrugged.

“Why? What did he want?”

“Don’t know exactly.”

Mario stared in the rearview mirror. “Maybe he just wanted to see you dead, Thane.”

Dead?
Shit!
Images of the forest floated through his mind. The scent of death, blood. The scent of humans. Junior and Mario. He hadn’t remembered because he’d smelled them in wolf form and memories blurred. Mario and Junior had been in that clearing with the dead FBI agent.

Who the hell was Winter going to tell about this? Fact. He now knew some lower-level scumbags involved in the drug ring and a murder, and they were all wolves. He could tell the pack, but who could he trust? It sounded like Marketo and Harker were so busy keeping their pack members in line, they wouldn’t have time to get involved in human business. What were the implications of wolves in jail? Was he going to rat out wolves to the human police or the FBI?

His eyes widened. FBI. This could be a direct line to Matt Partridge. The man would have to see him for this, right? Matt would care a fuckload about who was distributing drugs in his territory. Winter stared out the window and watched the trees go by.
Am I really so desperate to see Matt, I’ll use any excuse to do it?

Sad but true, baby.

Someone needed to know. Someone who’d care about the fate of a bunch of human kids and who’d want to get rid of cop killers.

What he needed was a human sympathetic to wolves. There was only one.

W
INTER
STARED
into the “tough-cop” face of Seth Zakowsky. Talk about the least likely husband on the planet for Lindsey—this was him. Maybe even more than Winter, nobody would ever guess Zakowsky oriented gay. Even the riot of light brown curls he kept bound in a band at his neck didn’t take away Seth’s lethal edge.

Winter frowned. “So you think Partridge will go for it?”

“Likely. The feebs understand expedient. They want the top guy, and I imagine they’ll trade some low-level fuck-ups for a chance at bigger fish.” He glanced out the window of the town car Lindsey had supplied to drive them to the FBI office and then turned back to Winter with his direct glare. “But Lindsey says you and Matt have a thing.”

“We did. He seems to have lost interest.”

Seth raised an eyebrow. “Would this be a play to regain that interest?”

“Can’t lie. Maybe some.” Winter pursed his lips and blew out a long stream of air. “Okay, maybe more than some, but it’ll also help get drugs off the streets and catch the guy who killed the agent, which I imagine matters to humans, right?”

“Yeah, sadly we don’t have a metabolism that burns drugs up like hot sauce, and we kill easy.”

“So, good.”

Seth looked down at his hands. “I know Lindsey warned you that the chances the pack is going to let any more wolves get away with breaking the cardinal rule are slim. Probably more like none, so trying to catch Matt’s interest could be very bad for him.”

Winter frowned. “I guess I figured you’d understand.”

“I do understand about getting the drugs off the streets. Even more I understand about wanting to be with a guy you shouldn’t want. I’m just telling you what Lindsey told me. If Partridge is staying away from you, maybe it’s best to honor that choice.”

“Shit.” He now officially qualified for selfish bastard material. His heart beat too hard. He didn’t want to give up this chance to impress Matt—to be with him—but even more, he didn’t want to see him dead. “You think they’d really do it?”

“I remember I was scared shitless at every shadow after Lindsey gave himself away to me. But Cole stepped in and arranged the marriage. I don’t think he can do that again. The opposition’s too strong. So yeah, they could do it, or, at best, you’d have to spend your life together jumping at shadows.”

Winter blew out a stream of air.
Not fair.
“Why don’t you tell him that you know someone who can probably get inside and make contact with whoever is behind this thing. No need to elaborate. Okay? You be the contact. I’ll stay anonymous. Think of me as Deep Throat Wolf.” He curved his lips. It never made his eyes.

“Maybe that’s better.” Seth’s face actually softened a little. “Sorry.”

“Yeah.”

Seth opened the door and, just like that, Winter’s chance went south. He watched Zakowsky walk into the tall building. Time to get this stupid political mess ironed out and get the fuck out of Dodge. If Damon didn’t want to go, maybe being a lone wolf wouldn’t be so bad.

P
ACING
AGAIN
.
Getting worse.
The last full moon about drove him over the edge, and this one was shaping up twice as bad.

Matt forced himself into the desk chair in his office, gripped the chair arms, and stared at his computer screen. Maybe it was time to resign. Could he trust himself and his decisions when the moon affected him so badly? Just like his father. Could he trust himself when all he wanted was to find that big hunk of platinum blond alpha male and fuck him into oblivion?

He grabbed his right hand with his left and squeezed.
No. No, he wasn’t that bad yet.
But who could he rely on to tell him when it was? People counted on him. Lives were at stake. He carried a weapon, for Christ’s sake. If he went out and got a simple job that let him work at home or over the phone, he could be sure not to hurt anyone but himself.

The idea made him sick.

“Matt?”

His head snapped up. “What?” He let his breath out slowly and made himself smile.

Seth Zakowsky stood in his open doorway. “Zakowsky. Hell, man, how are you? Been saved by any more wolves lately?” Seth had always stuck to his story that a wolf walked down the stairs of a warehouse building and attacked a guy holding a gun on him.

The flash of—what? Fear?—on Seth’s face made Matt’s stomach flip. Then Seth smiled. “Yeah, right.” He stepped inside and closed the door. “Hey, I know you’re working on the drug distribution case, and I want to talk to you about it.”

Matt frowned.
Get into work-brain and stop fucking around.
“Sure. You got something for me?” He nodded toward the gray guest chairs in front of his desk, and Seth lowered his large frame into one.

“Maybe. I’ve got an informant who kind of accidentally got himself in a situation where he was delivering a package with some other guys, and he thinks it was drugs. Apparently he gave a good account of himself with some reluctant distributor or something. Anyway, he figures he could probably get an audience with somebody higher up than the goons who hooked him into this job.”

“You said ‘accidentally’ got involved. How likely is that to be true?”

Seth shrugged. “Surprisingly, it probably is. This guy isn’t a drug type. But regardless, he wants to know if we’re—I mean, if I’m interested in him trying to get some more info.” He shrugged. “So, are you?”

Matt stared at Seth. Great cop. Even got a citation from the FBI. Still, if any guy had secrets, it was Zakowsky.

“What’s he want?”

“I’ll worry about that. He’s my guy.”

“Who’s your informant?”

“Can’t reveal that.”

Matt stared some more. Seth was married to Lindsey Vanessen, who in turn had strong and largely unexplained ties to a large group of giant men in the Harker family. Where Harkers went, Marketos never trailed far behind. “I’d have to know the informant.”

“He doesn’t want it.”

“This isn’t a police operation. Your guys can’t protect him. I can. I won’t send a civilian into that kind of danger without a lot of backup.”

Seth leveled that formidable gaze. “What are you thinking in that conniving FBI brain?”

“That this is about one of those weird relatives of your husband.”

Seth snorted and put up his hands. “Caught me. But my informant says the delivery guys involved are just dumb kids who don’t know what they’re doing, and he won’t come forward if it’s going to mean jail time for them.”

“Shit, Zakowsky, those people stick together.”

“Yeah, they do.”

He nodded. “So unless I discover they’re in deeper than your informant thinks, I’ll leave the delivery guys out of this. So who is he? Gotta know or it’s a deal breaker.”

Seth stared at him with some war happening behind his eyes. Finally, he took a breath. “You’re not going to like this.”

“What.”

“Winter Thane.”

“Shit.” Matt swallowed. “And why do you think I don’t like that? He already demonstrated he’s a pretty impressive tracker.”

“Yeah, well, I understand you two have a somewhat more than professional relationship.”

Matt sighed. “He told you that?”

“No, he told Lindsey, who told me.”

Matt shook his head. “Your discretion—”

“Is assured.”

“Which means it’s a lot better than mine.”

“Hey, I married one of my cases. I’m not likely to be throwing stones at you.”

Matt glanced up, then back at his tightly clasped hands. “How is he?”

“Winter?” Seth’s lips curved up a little.

“Yeah.”

“Thinking you don’t care about him or want to see him. Is that true?”

“It should be true.”

Seth shook his head. “Hell, been there and done that.”

“You too?”

“I tried to stay away from Lindsey so hard. No go.”

“Winter’s a kid and I have a lot of responsibilities. I can’t get distracted.”

“Yeah, well, I’d call that a seriously distracting kid.” He grinned; then it faded. “But it would be better to keep it strictly business.”

Funny, that statement sounded like a warning. “Where is he?”

“In the car out front.”

“Parked?”

Seth looked at his feet. “In one of Lindsey’s limos with a chauffeur.”

“Shit, it must be nice, Zakowsky.”