Alex rubbed a thumb between her eyes, where her pulse still throbbed. Allowing the anger in was letting the beast out. She had to take several deep breaths before she could speak again.
“You let him bite me.”
He didn’t deny it; she hadn’t expected him to. Edward could be depended upon for one thing, and one thing only. He’d do whatever he had to do to defeat the monsters.
“We need someone on the inside of Barlow’s pack,” he said.
“I don’t think so.”
“He’s up to something, Alex.”
“Werewolves always are.”
Edward’s face tightened, the expression stretching pale skin over sharp bones, making him appear almost skeletal. “There are rumors of another army amassing, with Barlow at the helm.”
“A werewolf army?” Alex clarified.
Edward dipped his chin. “Can you imagine one with him in the lead? They will march over the earth, leaving blood and death and fire behind.”
For an instant Alex saw the world in flames, an army of werewolves on the rampage, and she ached to be one of them. She’d never be alone again. She’d never be afraid. No one could ever harm her. Then the image vanished, and she was left blinking in confusion, stunned at the duality raging within her.
“I don’t want to stay like this,” Alex said urgently. “Cure me. Then tell me where they are, and I’ll turn them to ashes.”
“We don’t know where they are. Anyone who’s ever followed Barlow hasn’t come back.”
She lifted her brows. If the British SAS were considered by many to be the best Special Forces in the world, and the US Special Forces were easily the best equipped, the Jäger-Suchers were both. Not only did Edward recruit those who were willing to give their lives, but he had them trained by agents who had seen everything, fought it all, and won. Like her father.
Edward also had a secret ops budget that would make Delta Force envious, if they knew about it, and an in with whatever weapons and technology experts were considered the boy and girl geniuses of the moment. Edward volunteered his elite group to test new toys, and if they lived, they got to keep them.
So if every J-S agent he’d sent after Barlow had failed to come back, Alex had to wonder what the wolf man was packing. The only thing more powerful than
American weaponry was magic.
“We’ve never had a chance like this before,” Edward continued. “You’re one of his now. He’ll take you with him.”
“He hates my guts.”
“Nevertheless, he has made you. If you’re in danger, he cannot abandon you. He will teach you things. It is their way.”
Huh, their way didn’t sound half bad.
Alex smacked the heel of her hand against her forehead. She had to stop thinking like that.
“What if he takes one whiff of me and smells you?”
Edward narrowed his eyes, sensing an insult in there somewhere but not quite sure what it was. “You’ll have to take that chance.”
“Why should I?”
“Because someone in that pack killed your father.”
Alex froze. “What?”
“You think I allow the monsters who murder my agents to run free? It may take time, Alex, but eventually I find them; then I make them pay.”
She didn’t need to ask how he’d discovered the information when she couldn’t. She’d been traversing the country hunting on her own, taking odd jobs wherever she could find them just to have enough money to keep herself in ham sandwiches and silver bullets. Edward had access to resources she did not, and still it had taken him eight years.
“Are you in,” Edward asked, “or are you out?”