CHAPTER 51

I stared at Aiden, because out of everything that had happened to me that night, this was the most frightening, and it set off a little alarm in the back of my mind. Something familiar, yet I couldn't grasp exactly what it was. Like deja vu.

"What exactly do they know? And war with whom? Us?"

"That," Aiden said, leaning back in his chair, "is exactly what I'm hoping to find out. And I could really use your collaboration. As a gesture of trust between you and I, I've given you the highest clearance that Hoventech has to offer. You have access to everything we know."

I was still stuck on the whole government werewolf conspiracy war thing. My mind spinning.

"Isn't that a little rash?"I asked when his words sunk in, "you don't even know me, I could take your information..."

"And do what?" Aiden spread his arms wide. "At worst you could try to spread some of the information we've gathered. That's why your friend doesn't want you working with me, did you know? We play a dangerous, but necessary game. Think of it as knowledge broking. We get the information and we use it to benefit Hoventech and therefore the pack. Sometimes we sell secrets, sometimes we keep them to ourselves."

"You bribe people," I caught on to where he was going, "and if they don't pay up, you sell their information to someone else."

He nodded. "That's part of it. We also hold it to keep power over certain political and business figureheads. Much like your organization does through more...violent means. The world is dangerous, Raven, a good alpha has to do what he must to protect those dependant on him."

That statement made me think of Anthony and his newly overprotective demeanour. I hadn't let myself really think about what had happened the night before, when he'd tried to strong arm me into hiding away at the ranch. It was...surprisingly painful. I'd spent a lot of the last five years admiring him, working up the courage to seek out a relationship that was a little bit deeper than the one night stands I'd allowed myself after leaving the valley. He'd always been protective, and kind, and it had made me feel like...well...not so alone. I wanted the thing between us to work, but becoming alpha had changed him. Or maybe I was changing. All I knew was that I couldn't live in the box he was determined to shove me in.

"Anthony is a good alpha," Aiden had been watching my face, and he must have read the guilt I felt on it because he'd guessed what I was thinking. "But he is...what was that word you used?...rash. His emotions are driving his decisions, and that is going to lose him his most valuable asset...You."

I frowned at him, because I wasn't a piece of a business to be bought or sold, and that's what he was making it sound like.

"Do you know I was surprised to see you at the assemblage. I knew Rob had something clever up his sleeve, some advantage that he didn't want to share with the world. He was smart to keep you hidden and tied to him. And Anthony knows it, he's a new alpha with all the questionable power and uncertainty that comes with it." he leaned forward so both elbows were on the table "he's desperate to keep you, I wouldn't be surprised if he chooses violence to do so."

I didn't tell him that he'd already done so. Sort of. I was a little tired of him trash talking Anthony.

"And you're different?"

"A wolf with your talents should be offered whatever you want, you should be allowed to shine. And Rob knew it. He knew someone would try to lure you away eventually. So what is it, Raven? Power? Money? Taking Luna of your own pack? What drives you?"

I studied Aiden. He was a business man, when it all came down to it, and he was behaving like one. He was making me an offer that was impossible to refuse and he was being earnest about it. The problem was, I needed the help, I had no way of sorting out anything to do with Thostchild on my own, and here was a man offering me what I needed on a silver platter.

"What do you know of Thostchild?" I asked him.

He smiled, and beyond his handsome face I could see the wolf in him. My own wolf was stirring now. She'd been listlessly listening to our conversation, but he'd gained her interest too.

"I know what you know. I'm assuming it is a facility of some sort, secret, and government. From the types of shipments marked to go there it looks medical in nature."

"That's all?" I'd already sorted that out, minus the government thing, but that wasn't particularly surprising given the ties to Defence Medical.

"The shipments were linked with weapons unlike those of which we've ever seen. One shot from them is enough to take out a werewolf, regardless of where it hits."

"Almost regardless, and trust me, I know," I rubbed my hip beneath the table.

That surprised him.

"What else do you know?" he tilted his head, eyes shrewd.

Well...in for a dollar.

"I know that the receiving address of the medical equipment was an abandoned house in Newcomb. There was nothing there except what should be, and a werejaguar. I know that Thostchild is the name of a doctor, or he has a doctorate in something, because the werejaguar called him Dr. Thostchild. And I know that he, or someone else in the facility are responsible, somehow for my parents' deaths. I know that some of the equipment passed through a shipping facility where the guns were also being held. That's where the first vampire attacked me."
His lips pinched together, but didn't exclaim the impossibility of the werejaguar.

"You've heard of other weres"

"We've been hiding so long that we're blind," he muttered to himself before glancing up at me. "Yes, that was part of the information we gleaned at Defence Medical. A list of medications and drugs being sent to upstate New York, they had the patients names on a roster...weres, their pack origins, and their species. Many different species."
I shouldn't have been surprised. There were werewolves, and werejaguars for sure. Selkies, which were wereseals. Why not other species? I waited, because I could tell he wasn't finished.

"We've kept our packs so well hidden, so afraid of coming out into mainstream public, that we've stifled ourselves. Somehow the government has been getting a hold of our people, and we've been oblivious to it, not talking between the packs, and assuming humans are oblivious to us."

"And somehow this all has something to do with me?" Because why else would he be telling me this if it didn't?

"You want Thostchild?"

I thought about it. I wasn't quite sure what I would do with Thostchild. The man, or the facility, but yes, I wanted answers. I nodded.

"Then first we need to figure out how they're snagging our people without the packs being aware."

A memory came floating to me. Something the werejaguar had said.

You know, when their inside bitch gave me the location of your pack's 'full moon run'...

He'd been taunting me, and I'd been trapped and desperate to get to Darius so I hadn't processed everything he'd said, given that he'd dropped some much more concerning information.

Inside bitch. And insider had given him the location of our pack's run. That was how he, the sniper, had found us. I knew it! I knew it was far too coincidental to be an accident.

But who?

I thought back to that night, running, racing getting ahead of everyone...until Leanne. She'd been waiting at that particular spot. And I'd caved and went in the river instead of running on.

Leanne was a traitor.

I had to tell Anthony.