Forty-Three

 

Saoirse called Alasdair a moment later to find out where we were and what we were doing. She said the political situation back in Galway was growing fraught. The covens wanted to know why we hadn’t returned their witchlings yet, and the fae were being themselves.

I pricked my ears when I heard footsteps shuffling around the door outside. They weren’t heavy-booted like the military guys had been, but that didn’t mean they hadn’t changed into lighter footwear. I pulled my knife and approached the door with Alasdair and Gray right behind me. We listened for a moment and heard a pair of female voices speaking in Romanian.

“They’re arguing over whether they can afford to buy a full ki of Tempo,” Gray said.

Alasdair gave a predatory smile and we threw the door open before we grabbed the two women and pinned them against the wall.

“Tell us everything you know about the bastards that have been making Tempo,” I said as I pressed my knife against the young woman’s throat.

Her eyes went wide, and she trembled. I growled.

“There are two men. They sell us the drug, but we never take it ourselves. We make good money. They said this was their new address.”

“Do you ever bring them witchlings or other people?” I demanded.

“No, that would be my job,” a middle-aged man said.

We turned to face him.

“Are you looking for the extra money? Because we’re down two people and you’ll make more from that than from stealing from dealers.”

I glanced to Alasdair and released the girl.

“Yes, we are.” I said.

“Excellent, we require three young shifters. Wolf. There’s a pack near here that will be going for a night out, take them before they get too drunk,” he said.

It seemed like a set-up to me, but something was better than nothing.

“Bring the shifters back here, and if you’ve brought me good specimens, I’ll take you to meet the alchemists,” he said.

“Deal,” I said.

The women ran the opposite direction down the alley the moment we released them.

“You have one hour,” the man said.

I turned and walked in the direction the girls had gone and hoped Alasdair had some clue where the fuck we were supposed to be going.

“He thinks we’ll make a good prize for his bosses,” Alasdair said.

“As long as we get to the alchemists,” I said.

 

 

Thankfully, it wasn’t too hard to find the shifters in question. They were a small pack, perhaps ten in total. Eight men, two women, and all looked to be younger than me.

“What’s the plan here?” I asked as we watched the group stumble down the street.

“We don’t want to hurt them. We need to split three of them off from the rest of the group,” Alasdair said.

“And we’re unlikely to be able to hit on them; shifters aren’t entirely open to the whole same-sex sex thing,” I said.

They were likely to be far too possessive over the women to let us take them.

Alasdair raised an eyebrow at me.

“I’m unsure how I feel about where your head went,” he said with a smirk.

“Why don’t we act like dumb tourists and ask them to escort us back to our hotel?” Gray said.

“Trigger their protective instincts, you mean?” I asked.

I admit it felt bad trying to act like poor, fragile prey, but needs must.

“Aim for the three guys, the lower ranking ones; they’re more likely to have something to prove,” Alasdair said.

I sighed and prepared to act my tail off.

We all lowered our eyes, buried our wolves as deep as we could, hunched our shoulders, and approached the group. Alasdair and I did our best to cover our sigils, although it was dark and they were likely too drunk to notice them anyway.

“Hey, er… we’re lost…” Gray said.

The tallest of the shifters, a rather striking guy with pretty periwinkle blue eyes turned to face us. He looked us up and down and gave us a generous smile.

“Which hotel are you in?”

“Savoy,” Alasdair said softly.

“We’d be happy to take you back there, wouldn’t we?” He looked at the two guys closest to him.

“Are you sure? If it’s not too much trouble…” I said adding a slight waver to my voice.

The wolves’ ears pricked at that. They looked around and straightened their backs.

“We’re going to take these guys back to their hotel,” he said to the rest of his pack.

“Come on, it’s not far,” he said taking a wobbly step towards us.

His eyes were already beginning to clear. Shifters burnt through alcohol quickly, and he’d be a lot more trouble sober.

The tallest wolf and his broader, shorter friend held their arms out to shepherd us back in the direction we’d come from. Their steps were growing steadier the further down the road we got. I looked to Alasdair. They were too big to sling over our shoulder. We needed a plan, here. We turned a corner onto a street where the lights had all been blown out, leaving us in inky darkness. Alasdair turned to face them. He put his hands in his pockets to reduce his level of threat.

“So, we’re going to be honest with you… we’re not lost.”

The shifters looked at each other before they looked at us, gold slipping into their eyes.

Grayson gave them his trademark grin, which made them relax a bit.

“See, the thing is. Some asshole has been stealing and killing Irish shifters.” He increased the Irish lilt to his accent, which I was sure was fake. “And the only way we’re going to get close to them is by taking a couple of handsome shifters to them. So, how would you like to help us take down a serial-killing asshole?”

The shifters looked at each other before they returned Gray’s grin.

“Sounds like a great end to the night to me.”