A Wolf After My Own Heart by MaryJanice Davidson (good books for high schoolers .TXT) 📕

gotten personal about a body before. It’s not like he knew her.”

Except he did know her. His family is Kiyuska.

“I just figured it was the stress of switching jobs and moving. And now I really have to get back to it,” Debbie said, which was a relief, because Annette was still “helping” by packing up more of Debbie’s workspace. “The only reason I told you guys this stuff is because Gulo’s gone.”

Not if we can catch him.

“And the quicker I get him packed up,” Debbie added, “the truer that’s gonna be.”

Cling to that hope, Debbie.

“We’ll see ourselves out,” Oz told her, and Debbie’s relief was palpable.

“Sneaky, clever, wretched little man,” Nadia hissed on their way back to their cars. To Oz: “And that, darling, is why you must always, always be nice to your assistants. In their hands lie the power to destroy your life, your lunch orders, and possibly your dry cleaning.”

“Noted.”

“And slow down, damn you. These shoes cost nearly as much as one of your suits.”

Oz realized he was practically jogging toward the cars. “Sorry. Okay, so I’m betting Gulo wasn’t personally involved with Shakopee ten years ago—too young. He’s…what? Mid- to late-twenties? But I’d bet every pair of shoes Nadia has—”

“I beg your pardon!”

“—that his family was. They might’ve masterminded the whole thing. And why wouldn’t they? They’d been soaking up resentment and rage—”

“To which they’re entitled,” Annette pointed out.

“No one’s arguing that,” Oz agreed. “But they’re not entitled to start riots and murder every Stable and Shifter who gets in their way. They had a plan. Obviously. And when it went wrong, the survivors would have asked themselves why.”

“Exactly,” Annette replied. “They would have realized someone talked. They would have been wild to find out who blew up their little power grab. But it’s not enough.”

“What?” From Berne, who’d been shockingly quiet. “It’s more than enough to find that Gulo and pull out his guts.”

“How is that enough?” Oz asked. Because here was something else Annette had warned him about. You’re going to find out the worst of people. You’ll come to realize that what happened to you and your sister happens all the time, all over the world. And there will be times when you won’t be able to do anything about it. Our work is primarily custodial. “The cops have closed it—and they’re Stables, anyway. Gulo has signed off. We can’t raise much of an alarm. You know why.”

And there it was: every Shifter’s priority, all the time. Oz was glad David wasn’t here just then, because it was a major (and justified) peeve of his.

We went through this when we were tracking the Sindicate, he thought, while they stood in the parking lot and looked at each other and pondered what came next, since the obvious options weren’t actually options. David was right then, and he’s right now. It cuts us off at the knees at every turn. So we fumble around on our own and pull back the moment we get close. We prioritize getting the children to safety, but then we step off when anyone else could call a cop or go see the DA.

How much evil will I have to look away from? What will get overlooked—who will get overlooked—because our bosses figure the devil we know—ourselves—is better than the devil we don’t?

“What, then?” Berne was asking. “All we know is that his family is from Shakopee.”

“We don’t even know that,” Annette pointed out. “If you want to get technical, all we know is that Debbie said his family was from Shakopee.”

“What, then?” Magnus asked again. “What can we do? Say it and I will. Anything. She was my friend. Her mate was a good man. And I have a responsibility to their little lass.”

“We can dig around quite a lot more,” Nadia said. She held up a shipping label with the address of a self-storage company. “Starting with where Gulo is keeping his pristine belongings while he transitions.”

Oz broke into a delighted smile. “So that’s why Annette keeps you around.”

“That, and my impeccable fashion sense.”

“No,” Annette replied. “Just the first thing.”

Chapter 43

“I don’t know what’s scarier, the cache of automatic weapons or the fact that you could eat off the floor in here.”

“You don’t have to choose, Annette,” Oz said. “They’re both pretty damned scary.”

Nadia had gone off to track down more files, so Berne had driven his rental and Oz and Annette had taken the other love of Oz’s life to the Burnsville address for ShiftStuff.

Oz and Berne made quick work of the lock, and now they were examining the most immaculate storage space in the history of storage spaces. Annette was still frowning at the paper with the address Nadia had procured. “ShiftStuff? That doesn’t even make sense unless you’re a Shifter. And their company motto is just as insipid. ‘Need to Shift your stuff? We can help!!!’ A single exclamation point is more than sufficient.”

“That all sounds bad,” Oz agreed, “but could we maybe focus on what the hell we’re looking at?”

“War.” Berne sounded grimmer than usual, which was disconcerting. “That’s what we’re looking at.”

If it was an exaggeration, it wasn’t much of one. Because there were boxes marked kitchen and bathroom, but there were also boxes marked ammo and 9mm and reloading presses and casings and gunpowder. And yes, it was an ordinary storage space, but it was climate-controlled, and someone had put in extensive, expensive shelving, and those shelves were jammed with boxes of rifles. And instead of a standard ten-by-fifteen-inch slot, Gulo had taken down the wall and doubled his storage space.

“And what’s this?” Annette said, walking over to the bench in the corner, nostrils flared while she tried to parse the jumble of scents.

“Reloading bench,” Berne replied. “Dr. Gulo likes to make his own ammo.”

“I’m flummoxed,” Annette admitted. “This is odd and off-putting.”

Oz could relate. Most Shifters avoided guns, and he’d never known one who loved guns enough to make his own ammunition. And then there were the weapons, enough to