Rogue Wolf by Paige Tyler
Chapter 11
“Why didn’t you guys tell me you were out looking for the killer tonight?” Trey asked as he slipped into the booth in the nearly empty bar where Connor, Trevor, and Hale were sitting. “I would have come with you.”
Trey had been planning to drive over to Connor’s place to talk to him after leaving Samantha’s apartment, but when he’d texted to see if his friend was still awake, Connor had messaged him back, telling him to meet them at a bar.
“We didn’t want to interrupt your date,” Connor said, motioning toward one of the waitresses, then at Trey and the beers on the table. “What happened? You look like crap.”
Sighing, Trey slipped into the booth beside Hale, ready to tell them about what he’d seen in Samantha’s spare bedroom, but then he noticed the police sketch on the table in front of Trevor that completely distracted him. Reaching over, he grabbed it, realizing it must have been the woman who’d attacked him at the Main Street Garden Park. Well, at least what she looked like before turning into a big eyed, pasty-faced, soul sucker.
Earlier in the day, he and Connor had taken one of the department artists to the bar on Pacific Avenue, asking the bartender and the server to help work up a sketch of the woman they’d seen leaving with that guy last night. Unfortunately, Trey had been pulled away on a domestic violence call before the drawing was anything more than a couple of circles and a few lines on a pad. The picture he was looking at now was a finished product with enough detail to hopefully make her easy to identify. Even if she didn’t look a thing like the creature who’d almost killed him. Attractive, in her midthirties, the woman in the picture was heavily made up with lots of eyeliner, bright red lipstick, and dark wavy hair that skimmed her shoulders.
But as good as the sketch might be, it was still only a two-dimensional drawing of a real person. He knew from experience how difficult it could be identifying a suspect from a sketch. It was hard enough with men, but with their makeup and hairstyles so easy to change, it was even harder to do with a woman.
“Have you found anyone who recognizes her?” Trey asked as the waitress brought over his beer.
He was glad his teammates had stayed together tonight. Trey didn’t want to think about how dangerous it would be for one of them to confront that thing on their own again.
“Yeah, a couple people,” Hale said. “Especially when we showed them the photos of Demario and Alden at the same time. But while they definitely know her face, nobody has a clue what her name is. And since she always lets the guys buy her drinks, we can’t pull credit card receipts and get a name that way. Worse, it seems she has an almost preternatural ability to avoid surveillance cameras. We haven’t caught a glimpse of her face on video yet.”
“We’re planning to hit a few more bars before we call it a night, but she’s going to be hard to identity, even with this drawing,” Trevor said. “She’s a trained predator and people are her prey. She’s not going to slip up and make herself easy to find.”
Trey took a sip of his beer. “Speaking of prey, any word on that guy we rescued in the park last night? Has he woken up yet?”
“I talked to STAT a couple hours ago and as of then, the guy was still in a coma,” Trevor said. “They’re giving him fluids and trying to replace all the crap the creature sucked out of him, but they have no idea when—or if—he’ll wake up.”
Connor leaned forward to regard him thoughtfully. “Back to your date for a minute. Why are you here instead of rolling around in bed with a certain attractive medical examiner?”
Trey frowned, rubbing his thumb over the fancy label on the beer bottle. When he didn’t respond right away, his pack mates looked back and forth at each other like they were playing a silent game of rock paper scissors to see who would have to dig the issue out of him.
“What happened?” Trevor finally asked.
Trey opened his mouth to tell them what he’d found at Samantha’s place, but at the last second, his tongue made a wide right turn and decided to go in a different direction. “You remember that buddy of mine I served in the army with, Kyson? Samantha and I went to visit him tonight and found out that he killed himself a couple weeks ago.”
No one said anything, then they were all talking at once, asking why Kyson had committed suicide. Trey told them about the issues Kyson had been dealing with since being medically discharged from the army but had to admit he had no idea what had ultimately pushed his friend to take his own life.
“I’ll probably never know why he did it,” he finally said. “I’m just sorry that when it really mattered, he didn’t reach out to me. After everything we went through together, he decided to go it alone.”
“You doing okay?” Connor asked. “I know you guys were close.”
Trey nodded. “I’m okay, thanks to Samantha. After I found out about Kyson, I kind of shut down and she was there for me. I don’t know what I would have done without her.”
“Dude, if that isn’t proof that she’s The One for you, I don’t know what is,” Connor said.
Trey felt the corner of his mouth edge up. “I’m not even going to try to fight you on that anymore. Samantha is definitely The One. That only makes it even harder to accept the fact that she’s planning to betray us.”
His pack mates exchanged looks, clearly confused.
“What do you mean?” Connor asked.
Trey blew out a breath. “I got a look in her guest bedroom, and it’s one big stalker haven. Three walls were covered with pictures of the Pack, and she’s got all these pieces of yarn connecting each pic to other shots of various crime scenes where we used our werewolf abilities. I don’t know how, but she even has stuff from when we were in New Orleans and LA. Worse, she has a file on me with my whole life in it—military records, work evaluations, even medical stuff. And I’m willing to bet she has similar files on all of you guys, too.”
“Damn,” Trevor breathed. “How much do you think she’s figured out? Does she know we’re werewolves?”
Trey shook his head. “I don’t think so. But considering what happened Saturday night, I’m guessing it’s only a matter of time before she has proof.”
“What happened Saturday night?” Hale murmured. “And why are we just hearing about it now?”
“We were in her kitchen making out when Samantha broke a coffee mug. She started to reach for the pieces and I instinctively put my hand out so she wouldn’t get cut.” Trey held up his right palm. “I sliced myself pretty good, too. Blood went everywhere.”
“Shit,” Connor groaned.
“Yeah, exactly,” Trey muttered. “I didn’t tell you because I didn’t even think about it at first. I assumed it was an accident. But in light of all the stuff I found in her apartment, now I’m wondering if she orchestrated the whole event to get a blood sample.”
That announcement was met with complete and total silence. Trey didn’t blame them. This was huge.
“What do you think she’s going to do with it?” Trevor asked. “I mean, what can she do with it? I’m not exactly up on the science of werewolf blood. Can she find something to prove you’re a werewolf?”
Trey shrugged. “Samantha is a doctor and a medical examiner with access to a multimillion-dollar DNA lab. If anyone could rip my blood apart and pull out the werewolf bits, it would be her.”
“What are you going to do?” Hale asked.
Trey would have laughed if there were a single thing about this effed-up situation that was funny. “I don’t know. I mean, seriously, she could be in the process of outing the entire pack as we speak. So if any of you guys have a suggestion, I’m all ears.”
He didn’t honestly expect an answer, especially since they seemed as blindsided by the whole thing as he was, so he wasn’t surprised when the first piece of advice was less than brilliant.
“I say we grab her,” Trevor suggested. “You know, to protect the Pack.”
Trey gave him a wry look. “And what do we do with her then? Keep her locked up in the arms room at the compound?”
Trevor winced. “Okay. Maybe that wasn’t the best idea. But we have to do something.”
“Agreed,” Trey said firmly. “But not that.”
“This might sound crazy, but maybe you should simply talk to her,” Hale advised. “Put your cards on the table and see what she has to say.”
“Put my cards on the table?” Trey snorted. “And what do you expect me to tell her, that yes, the entire Dallas SWAT team is a pack of werewolves, but that she shouldn’t hold that against us because we’re really nice people? Or maybe I should tell her she’s my soul mate? Because I’m sure that would go over really well.”
“Maybe it would,” Connor said. “If Samantha is The One for you, then she’s going to feel the connection, too. Do you think she’d honestly out the Pack once she knows the two of you are soul mates?”
Trey did a double take. “You’re willing to risk the Pack’s safety on the chance that Samantha would be willing to drop everything she’s spent the last two years collecting simply because she’s my soul mate? That’s damn risky, don’t you think?”
“Maybe,” Connor replied. “But it’s not like we have a lot of choices here. If you won’t talk to her, the only other option would be for the whole Pack to go on the run.”
A weight dropped into the pit of Trey’s stomach and settled there. The thought of the whole SWAT team and their mates leaving the homes they’d built in Dallas was gut-wrenching. But that was why their pack alpha and team commander had a plan in place to do exactly that if and when this very situation came up.
“Connor’s right,” Hale said. “Either you talk to Gage and prepare for the likelihood that we’ll all have to leave the country. Or trust in the soul-mate connection and talk to Samantha.”
***
Samantha was so preoccupied with thoughts of Trey that she didn’t realize her electric toothbrush had turned off and she was standing in front of the bathroom mirror slowly pushing the bristles back and forth across her teeth like a robot. Considering how much foam was in her mouth, she could have been brushing for the last ten minutes for all she knew.
She spit, then rinsed, her mind still spinning with everything Trey had been through that evening. The anguish in his voice as he’d talked about Kyson, the agony in his eyes when he’d looked at the photo of the two of them together when they’d been younger, the desolation that had seemed to consume him as he’d talked about failing his friend. Seeing him like that had hurt her like nothing she’d ever experienced. She swore it was like she was grieving over a loss of her own.
When Trey told her that he was going to head home, the urge to stop him and make him stay there so she could take care of him was so overwhelming it was almost scary. To make matters worse, the worry she’d felt for him all night had actually gotten more magnified when he left. She was terrified he was sitting in his apartment right now, alone with his grief. The thought of Trey being in pain was enough to make her want to cry. The idea of going to bed and trying to sleep was ridiculous. There was no way she’d be able to do anything but stare at the ceiling all night.
When she heard the soft knock on her door a moment later, Samantha didn’t even pause to think. She was certain Trey had come back. Pulse racing, she hurried to the door and jerked it open without looking through the peephole.
“Trey, thank God!”
Only it wasn’t the big sexy cop she was very quickly falling for.
“No, sorry.” Loralei looked at her in concern as she stepped inside. “Did you guys have a fight or something?”
Samantha closed the door and turned to follow her sister. “No. He just learned that a friend of his passed away and he took it pretty hard.”
Loralei nodded and sat down on the couch. “Sorry to come over so late, but I got the initial DNA results on those blood samples you gave me and thought you might want to hear what I found. Even if none of it makes sense.”
Samantha’s heart beat a little faster. “What do you mean it doesn’t make sense?”
Her sister frowned. “The blood you gave me matched two of the other profiles you provided—the ones labeled Airport Sample Six and Loft Sample Three—but that isn’t the freaky part.”
“Freaky?” Sam repeated softly, still trying to come to grips with the confirmation that Trey’s DNA was on two of the bodies that coyotes had supposedly nibbled on. Airport Sample Six was from the throat wound of a body recovered from the scene where the SWAT team had gone toe-to-toe with a band of criminals working for an organized crime family. Loft Sample Three was from the throat of an Albanian criminal SWAT had tangled with a few months later. Cause of death in both cases had been rapid exsanguination—common when a person gets their throat ripped out. Of course, the final reports out of the ME’s office had implied the initial wounds could have been from a gunshot with the majority of the damage coming postmortem courtesy of the apparently invisible coyotes. But while Samantha had never believed that part, nothing in her wildest dreams had made her think she’d find Trey’s DNA in the wounds.
“Yeah, freaky,” Loralei said. “What else would you call human and wolf DNA blended together? Are you sure the samples didn’t get mixed together somehow?”
Samantha was sure she’d heard her sister wrong. “Definitely not. I watched the blood pour out of the guy’s hand after he cut it open, so I know for a fact they weren’t contaminated.”
“Not contaminated,” Loralei said. “Blended. As in there are pieces of wolf DNA attached perfectly to the human genetic material. It’s not corrupted in any way, but it’s—”
“Impossible,” Samantha finished.
Her head was really spinning now. What her sister was describing didn’t make sense. But then the little voice in her head reminded her that the other sample she’d sent to an outside lab had come back contaminated with wolf DNA as well.
Samantha took a deep breath. “I know you’re really good at what you do, but is there any way you might have contaminated the sample?”
Her sister shook her ahead. “I thought the same thing when I first came up with the anomaly. So I started with a fresh sample and ran it again and got the same results. I thought maybe you’d been messing around with some gene-splicing techniques and were trying to see if I would catch it, but I’m guessing from the look on your face that isn’t the case?”
Samantha sank down on the couch beside her sister. “I wish I could tell you that was the answer.”
Loralei pulled up a knee, turning to face Samantha. “Well, as long as we’re complicating the situation, I might as well tell you what else I discovered.”
“There’s more?” Samantha asked, not sure she wanted to know.
“Afraid so. I’m not sure how to explain it, but it looks like the wolf DNA I found is slightly…unusual, I guess is the best way to describe it. I have to run some other comparisons to be sure, but I think the material is prehistoric.”
“Huh?” Samantha croaked, not even trying to come across as intelligent at this point. This whole thing was getting too strange for words.
“Yeah, my thoughts exactly.” Her sister smiled. “And before you say it, yes, I know how crazy this sounds. But there’s no other explanation for the fact that the genetic material is definitely in the Canis genus, with wolflike traits, and yet it doesn’t quite match anything in our current database.”
Samantha didn’t say anything, too busy trying to figure out what all of it meant. How could Trey have prehistoric wolf DNA blended with his own? Even if it were possible, what did it mean?
“This feels like something out of a Marvel movie.” Her sister leaned forward and grabbed one of Samantha’s hands. “What the hell did you get yourself involved in?”
“I wish I could tell you, but I can’t,” she said softly. “At least not right now. I’m going to need you to trust me, okay?”
Loralei gazed at her for a long time before squeezing her hand again. “Okay, I won’t push for now. But you will tell me at some point, right?”
Samantha nodded, and that seemed to be enough to satisfy her sister.
“There’s more I can do with the blood if you want me to,” Loralei said. “I have a contact in the paleontology department at Baylor who can get me DNA samples from extinct wolves for comparison with no questions asked. I can also isolate exactly which parts of the human genes have been affected by the wolf DNA.”
Samantha thought a moment. “How hard will it be to hide what you’re doing?”
She didn’t want her sister getting in too deep. Getting fired might be the least of Loralei’s problems if someone found out.
Loralei shrugged. “I won’t lie, I’ll have to come up with some pretty fancy BS to cover up why I’m doing this. Maybe you could help me come up with a false request from DPD animal control? Make it look like the city is looking for details on an animal attack or something. I need to have something to justify the time and money I’ll have to put into this. This testing is expensive.”
Samantha nodded, promising to send over some ME paperwork that would probably pass a cursory inspection. “Be careful, okay? Absolutely no one can know what’s really going on here, especially not anyone in the DPD.”
Loralei assured her that she would, then headed home a little while later, leaving Samantha sitting on the couch wracked with guilt over the fact that she was betraying Trey more and more the further she took this. But she couldn’t stop now, especially after learning there was wolf DNA mixed with his. There was something strange going on, and no matter what her heart might be feeling when it came to Trey, she needed to know what it was.
The conversation she’d had with Crystal that morning came back to her. The one where her friend suggested coming out and just asking Trey what was going on. But how could she ask him about something so bizarre?