Page 6 (1/2)

"I don’t think Jane Austen ever said flying fuck"

"The point You’reit"

"I never nore it"

"Keaty, I think you just put the ouch in touché"

He rolled his eyes "Where do you think the girl is?"

"Working on her tan and ignoring her phone My dream holiday"

"And it’s not out of the realirl with her…reputation, to vanish without word" He was trying to politely say, Slutty party girls aren’t known for being bastions of responsibility

"Lucas says it’s the first ti his calls"

"Correct , but was she not, u debacle?" He e to laugh in his face I was trying to build bridges here, when I was naturally predisposed to burn the his calls to punish hiht of that? Hadn’t it been precisely what I’d done?

"She isn’t answering any calls, though"

"Have you tried?"

"I…" Of course I hadn’t yet tried the ed and handed my cell to him He dialed Kellen’s number from my phone book and turned on the speakerphone We stared at each other across the desk as it rang three, four, five times with no answer and then a click "Hey, bitches, you’ve reached Kellen Leave e, or better yet, why aren’t you at this party?" Her voicele

Keaty and I continued to watch each other, both our faces impassive His attention was heavy as I said, "Hey, Kel, it’s Secret Callfor you"

My partner hit the end button and slid the phone back across the desk to me "Are you worried?"

"No," I lied

"Then back to my first question Does he have any ene, a billionaire and an asshole Of course he has enemies"

Keaty turned to the laptop in front of hi over the keyboard with an alary "I don’t see any hostile takeovers, bad business dealings or anything that would suggest this is corporate Could it be Callu fan ofcould handle the territory he had This had been made abundantly clear when he’d tried to steal some of our land and people That territory dispute hat Lucas had been dealing with instead of showing up to our wedding

Callum had also been the one to force our hands and push us into the olf e ceremony My uncle wasn’t my favorite person by far, but I did believe he cared about me in his oeird, twisted way He also wasn’t the type to mix humans up olf business if he could avoid it

"Kellen isn’t a olf Callue"

Keaty nodded, trusting my assessment of my uncle’s motivation "So there aren’t any obvious suspects, none that wouldappear likely And without a ransom request, I think you’re correct She’s probably on vacation"

"All the same, I’d like to use some of your less seemly contacts todifferently about her well-being Just so I can put Lucas at ease"

"Why do you care how he feels?"

I looked at ain "I don’t care how Lucas feels But I can’t change ht so he can take care of his people Otherwise it’s my job to make sure men like e of a perceived weakness"

I’d killed a would-be usurper to Lucas’s throne once, over a year earlier, and it had given me the illustrious and unwanted title of pack protector Supernatural job titles were like Pokemon to me, apparently Gotta catch them all

I didn’t want to be queen, but I’d earned the pack-protector position in a legitimate way, and I took the role seriously And with only a week until the next full ood terms with the pack When I’d been in Louisiana, I’d shifted form for the first ti would happen this e had been co to be a new monthly trend, I didn’t want to do it alone I’d had a difficult ti s went badly