Wolves of Haven: Lone (25 page)

Akia’s face dropped. “I’m sorry.
Did you want to take a nap?”

Damian snorted. “Latria Mou,
usually we sleep for twenty-four to thirty-six hours after such
passionate love making. This time we don’t have that option because
there’s a Stray that is trying to start a war with your pack. Why?
I don’t know, but I have a feeling that if we don’t take care of
it, and quickly, the Covenant will not turn a blind eye for much
longer,” he regrettably informed her, tying his necktie in the
mirror. “I’m surprised they haven’t sent a representative… Huh,” he
said, stopping in mid-tie.

“What?” she asked, joining him then
taking over tying his tie.

“They sent me,” he said, watching
her. “It’s nice to know that someone of control in our shadowy
world has enough faith in me that they’d actually take the time to
tell me I’m doing their job for them.”

She didn’t miss his sarcasm or
tone.

“I’m sure father of the year had
something to do with that…” his words trailed off, and he shook his
head. “My apologies.”

“Your filters elude you with
exhaustion as mine do,” she reminded him, smoothing the lines of
his suit jacket down for him. “It’s okay. If needed, I can run
interference for you at the precinct. You can stand back and be the
sexy eye candy that you were born to be,” she offered then
growled.

Damian chuckled and hugged her
tight. “I’ll make sure I keep that option in the forefront of my
mind. Let’s eat then your brother can drive us to the
station.”

“Understood Captain,” she said,
getting a smack on the backside in return.

****

Faelan had the dining room table
filled with more food than a small army could eat, but Akia was
going to try her damnedest to consume it all. Her family sat and
watched her gorge herself on rare steaks, blood sausage, black
pudding, and crubeens. Damian was upstairs making a couple of phone
calls and promised to join her momentarily. Once the smell of the
food hit her, she completely forgot everything else but her need to
eat.

“Huh,” Ulrik finally said and
loaded his plate up with whatever wasn’t in Akia’s reach, “I think
I know why there are no chick werewolves: famine would have killed
us all if there were.”

Connell laughed. “True. She burned
over twenty-thousand calories in that little hump-fest in the
cellar. I’m surprised she can walk, in all honesty.”

“A bit saddle sore,” Akia agreed,
talking with her mouth full. “Nipples are sore as well, but nothing
a cotton bra can’t help soothe, in case you were wondering.” She
smiled as she chewed.

Connell shook his head. “Oh yes,
because your tiny titties are one of my biggest concerns,” he
sneered, making a face.

“
They aren’t
tiny,” Varg mumbled under his breath as he joined them from the
kitchen. “Like the rest of her, they are perfectly sized. Are you
okay?” he asked, looking at Akia as he took a seat across from her.
“I was concerned because your
boyfriend
is notably absent, and in
case you didn’t catch the tone, I was using that term very
loosely.”

Akia rolled her eyes and continued
eating. “He’ll be down when he’s done making some
calls.”

A deep, menacing growl rolled from
the throat of the hulking man across from her. “Touching base with
his pack you mean,” Varg sneered. “You do know what his Alpha, his
father, will do to you once the opportunity presents, don’t
you?”

She gave him a look. “Give me two
enthusiastic thumbs up for giving his little boy the best sex of
his life?” she sneered.

His brown eyes widened before they
narrowed and his nostrils flared. “No, he will fuck you mercilessly
until you produce a full blooded heir for him!” he
yelled.

Akia’s eyes widened before they
narrowed.

“That is enough!” Beowulf said with
a loud, primal growl of authority that instantly caused their
mouths to snap shut. “You will mind your tongue and show Akia and
Damian the respect that they, and their relationship,
deserves.”

Varg growled and got to his
feet.

“Sit!” Beowulf snapped at him, so
he did. “I do not know what the animosity between the two of you
is,” he said, looking between Akia and Varg, “but this is where it
ends. Until this Stray is dealt with accordingly, and with
discretion and proof of death for the Covenant, you will put your
differences aside and work together in order to achieve the dire
task in front of us. Varg, you will stop antagonizing Akia and
Damian, you will show each of them the respect they deserve, and
you will not meddle in their relationship. Young Master Nikas has
pledged his allegiance to our pack, something that his Alpha will
not look favorably upon, so you will leave him be. And Akia,” he
said, turning to her, “stop shooting Varg, regardless of him
deserving it or not. We are a pack and family, and before your
absence the two of you were very close.” He raised his hand to stop
her when she opened her mouth. “I do not need to know why that is
no longer the case, but you need to put your differences aside in
order to tackle the case which is in front of us. Once the Stray is
taken care of, you may return to Boston with our
blessing.”

Akia looked at him with wide eyes;
she was expecting a fight before she left again. Having her
father’s blessing would make it easier to go, and left the
invitation of coming back open for when she needed to take it.
“I’ll attempt to keep my sidearm holstered, but I make no promises
that it won’t accidentally discharge in his direction.”

Beowulf nodded. “Terms accepted. We
will continue to go through the records that we have regarding your
brother’s hypothesis on this latest victim… Where is Damian?” he
asked.

She looked towards the stairs,
concern clearly washing across her face. “I’ll check on him. Connie
can drive us to the station.”

Ulrik smiled. “Can I come?” he
asked.

“Why?” she guardedly
asked.

He shrugged. “I’m bored. They won’t
let me run, said I have to wear clothes since we have company… I
have a really good nose,” he offered.

Akia groaned and pushed back from
the table. “Sure, why not? Let’s make a family outing of
it?!”

“Sarcasm totally noted, Sis,” Rafe
said, and Faelan nodded his agreement.

Ulrik pouted.

“Go put something on that’ll make
you look older, and I’ll pretend you’re a specialist or something,”
she said, motioning for him to get moving.

“Yes!” he hissed then ran past her
as she started up the stairs, and hurried to his room to
change.

Akia simply shook her head;
obviously she was much more exhausted than she realized if she
hadn’t shot Varg for his comment at the dinner table and allowed
the blue-haired young man to join her in the middle of an
investigation without much coercion on his part. “Hey Captain, I
was talked into having a rookie along for the ride,” she said,
pushing open the bedroom door. “Now isn’t that inconvenient,” she
mumbled from the doorway.

Damian was sitting on the edge of
the bed, elbows on his knees, chin resting in his hand, and was
fast asleep.

“Fae?” she softly called
out.

When her brother joined her, she
motioned with her chin.

“That is adorable,” Faelan cooed.
“That suit is hot. Damn, Sis, help me find a man that dresses that
well and smells that damn good.”

Softly she smacked him in the back
of the head. “He’s mine,” she reminded him. “Help me get him
comfortable. When he wakes up… If he wakes up, let him know I’ll be
back shortly, and that I just went down to the precinct with Connie
and Kid to check out the latest body and run interference for
us.”

He nodded. “What’s wrong with
him?”

Akia smirked. “Nine hours of
nonstop, mind blowing sex, and ten back to back orgasms—he got me
to seventy before I lost count—tends to do that to a person,” she
mused.

Faelan looked at her with wide
eyes. “Oy, I’m a bit chubbed up at the thought of being able to cum
that many times in a night. He can kick me back doors in any day,”
he said with the thickest Irish accent she’d heard in a long
time.

“Why do I bother?” she
groaned.

****

Pierre slammed his office phone
down then got to his feet, his chair rolling out from under him
with such force that it nearly embedded itself in the wall behind
him. “Paquette, Leclair!” he yelled, storming out of his office.
“Leclair!”

“Sir?” Leclair asked, hurrying to
meet him.

“Have you heard from
Boston’s finest?
” Pierre
sneered; they were notably absent and that made him
suspicious.

Paquette made a face from his desk,
smacking his computer screen, trying to get it to turn on. “What’s
wrong, Inspector? Finally realizing that I was right when I said
that they were hiding something and most likely had something to do
with these murders?”

Pierre glared at him. “Leclair,
find them.”

Just then, the door opened and
Connell, Akia and a blue haired young man wearing a suit walked
in.

“Where in the hell have you been?”
Pierre demanded. “There was another murder, another body dumped,
and you and Captain Nikas are suddenly missing. That’s a bit
suspicious if you ask me,” he said, and no one missed his
accusatory tone.

Akia gave him a look. “Sir, I was
briefed on the latest victim. Captain Nikas and I were out all
night with some local volunteers staking out the existing dumpsites
in case the perp revisited them for nostalgic reasons. After
sunrise, we went with a couple of local survival guides into the
thick of the woods, following up on possible leads that have been
trickling down the pipeline from the door to door interviews your
officers were doing. Captain Nikas is following up on some leads
and will be out of cell range for the rest of the evening. I,
myself, did not realize that we were out of cell range, otherwise I
would have touched basis with you prior to heading out. My
apologies, Sir. It won’t happen again.”

Pierre looked at her skeptically,
but he couldn’t tell if she was lying or not. He hadn’t thought to
stake out the previous dumpsites. “Did you find anything?” he
asked. “And who in the hell is that?”

Ulrik smiled.

“A specialist that will be able to
help with my ignorance of the area,” Akia said. “I need the
findings from your Officers for the first four victims, a map, and
colored push pins.”

Still skeptical, but without
options, Pierre nodded with his chin, and Leclair hurried to get
the items she requested.

While Ulrik color coordinated the
pins to each victim on the map of the region, Akia read over the
reports. It was a struggle to stay awake. She wanted nothing more
than to crawl into bed with Damian and sleep for the next week, but
she knew that Pierre would be knocking on the door to Verulfr Manor
looking for her if she didn’t show up to work on the latest body.
Hopefully Damian would be conscious by tomorrow and could take the
reins while she got some sleep.

“It’s a circle,” Ulrik mumbled
under his breath, stealing her attention from the partial report in
her hand.

“What’s that one?” Akia asked,
pointing to the out of place pin far from the others.

“I used black because I don’t know
which victim it goes with,” he said under his breath, much too low
for the humans to hear. “There was a penciled in note on a Post-it,
but I don’t think anyone followed up on it. Most likely it has to
do with the first victim, at least I think it does because that’s
the weight station.”

Akia nodded. “Inspector,” she said,
turning to regard the irritable man, “am I to believe that the
statements from the bodyguards of the fifth victim are only a page
long?”

Leclair looked at her curiously.
“No, they were ten pages each,” he said.

She handed him the
folder.

“This isn’t right,” he argued,
looking through the report. “Each statement was very detailed with
timelines that were verified accurate down to the minute. It must
be misplaced. I’ll print you out another, Lieutenant,” he said then
hurried to his desk and woke up his computer.

“Did you want to look at the body?”
Pierre asked.

“In due time,” Akia said, flipping
through the report on the first victim again now that Leclair
drafted a timeline of events for the truck driver.

Curious, Pierre joined her. “Is
something wrong?” he whispered.

“I don’t know,” she admitted.
“Something feels off.”

“Sir,” Leclair said in a panic, “my
reports are missing. All of them. Someone deleted everything
regarding the case that was on my computer!”

Akia looked to Connell, and he
nodded then hurried to his office to check his computer as
well.

“You did this, didn’t you?” he
accused, looking at Paquette.

“I can-” Ulrik started to offer,
but Akia shook her head.

The two stood back and watched the
anything but composed Officers and Inspector run around trying to
figure out what happened and who was responsible. Akia hadn’t
entertained the notion that the man they were looking for might
have ties to the police department; it was a jump and a half since
nothing pointed in that direction. She was confident that the
breech wasn’t professionally executed, and that the data Ulrik
would be able to recover once she let him loose on the system, thus
standing back and watching gave her an idea of who the culprit
might indeed be.