Miranda seethed for a minute before Jae touched her arm. “Come on, Miranda. Let’s go.”
But Miranda wasn’t quite done. “Mark my words,” she said through bared teeth. “The Pack belongs to shifters. And I’ll do whatever I have to do to ensure you’ll have no part in it.”
With that, she turned on her heel and walked away.
“Game on,” I muttered into darkness. “Game on.”
* * *
* * *
I wanted to hit something—technically, both of us did—from the frustration of dealing with Miranda. I wasn’t afraid of her; she talked too much, and did too little, for fear to take hold. But she knew just where to strike to do maximum damage. If she put that cleverness to good use—helping the Pack—instead of fixating on Connor, she could probably do a lot of good.
“Maybe the Beast of Owatonna could find her,” I muttered, and strode toward Traeger’s cabin. “She’s plenty wicked.”
Still fuming, I knocked on his door.
It took a few seconds, and the door opened, Traeger sneering at me through the crack. “You at the wrong cabin, vamp?”
“Thank you for acknowledging my biology,” I said, and enjoyed the irritation that flashed in his eyes. “And no. I’m here to talk to you.”
“I don’t have anything to say to you or anyone else.”
“Charming attitude.”
“I’m not here to charm anyone, much less a vampire.”
“Yeah, you mentioned that. You were dating Paisley when she was killed.”
“So what?”
“So, I bet you knew her better than anyone else.”
“Yeah, I did. Why do you care? She’s gone now.”
“She is. And I’m wondering about that.”
Pain crossed his eyes, as sharp and brutal as the pain I’d seen in Dante’s. But it changed, mutated into anger, hot and bitter.
He turned and walked into the cabin, leaving me in the doorway, then sprawled onto the sofa, stared into the dark window beyond. “Ask your questions and get out. Like it matters, anyway. The clan is what the clan is. Cash and Everett and the others are going to do whatever the hell they’re going to do, and what we think doesn’t matter.”
Taking the invitation, I moved inside and closed the door. In the air was only typical shifter magic. Nothing broken, nothing splintered.
I looked around. This was one of the smaller cabins, and it was even shabbier than ours. Cabinets worn at the edges, surfaces not entirely clean, pop cans here and there.
It was interesting how each family started with the same basic structure, the same cabin, which almost evolved to fit their personalities, their lifestyles. I didn’t see much forward progress here.
“It matters to me,” I said, moving toward the couch. I glanced down at a club chair, the brown leather faded and crisscrossed with scars, considered sitting, but opted to stand. Given his attitude, I’d rather stay on my feet. Prepared in case he pounced. Literally and figuratively.
Traeger’s eyes went cold, mean. “Maybe you’re a big fucking deal in Chicago, but you’re nothing here. So why don’t you take your questions and get out and leave the rest of us to our business?”
There was a lot of anger here. And because of that, I opted for honesty. “Because I think something’s going on in this clan. I’m not entirely sure what, but there are a lot of angry people. And two people are dead. I’d rather there not be more.”
He just looked at me, his face hard.
“Did she have any enemies?”
“Paisley? No. Of course not. She was a good person. Nice. She was friendly to everyone.”
“Do you think her death was an accident?”
His lips pressed into a thin line. “I wasn’t there, was I? No one was. Clan says it was an accident.”
“And what do you think about that?”
“The clan is what it is. It runs the way it’s always run. What I think about it doesn’t matter.”
“Who do you think killed Loren?” I asked.
He looked out the window. I’d have put his age at nineteen or twenty, and that made him seem even younger. A child angry at the world’s unfairness. “The fuck do I know?”
“You’d know better than me,” I said. “You didn’t like him.”
His expression didn’t change, but he also didn’t disagree.
“In the lodge, you said he brought trouble to the clan,” I said. “What did you mean by that?”
“He was a dick, and he’s dead. So why does it matter?”
“Because someone cared enough to murder him,” I pointed out. “Did you know he was the last person to talk to Paisley before she died? And she was angry about something when that happened?”
Angry magic crackled in the air. He hadn’t liked the suggestion that Loren and Paisley had been together—or he hadn’t known about it. “Said who?”
“Said the people I’ve asked. You know anything about that?”
He stood up so quickly I nearly flinched with surprise; then he moved toward me. “You’re a fucking liar. I want you out of my house.”
I was getting real tired of being told what to do by shifters. And the monster was interested in the sharp whip strike of his anger. “Are you afraid of someone asking questions?” I asked quietly, keeping my voice low and refusing to move, to step back.
That challenge put a spark in his eyes. “I’m not afraid of anything.”
“Loren?”
“Anything,” he said, voice low and threatening. “Even nosy vampires.”
The door opened. Georgia walked in, grocery bag in hand; behind her, Connor carried two more. They put the bags on the counter, went very still as they read the scene. And I looked back at them, trying to figure out why they’d just walked into Traeger’s cabin.
“Hey,” Connor said carefully, taking in our positions, the fire in Traeger’s eyes, as he evaluated the situation. Assessed. “What’s up?”
“Traeger and I were just having a conversation,” I said, and looked up at him, refusing to step backward.
I could feel Georgia’s cautious but heavy stare, like that alone might be enough to hold Traeger back, to keep him from doing something stupid in front of the prince. Or to him.
“Trae, can you help me put these groceries away?”