He follows, one hand extended, palm out. “It wasn’t him, Aren. Whatever you think he’s done and needs to die for, it isn’t him.”
I snarl at him to move.
He meets my gaze steadily.
I dart right.
He mirrors me again, still blocking me.
Growling, I rise, shaking off my beast to embrace my human side.
“Move!” I snarl in his face.
“It wasn’t him,” he says calmly.
Over his shoulder, Jasper is bleeding fear through his pores. He’s trembling slightly.
“You were with Kat. Now she’s…” I can’t bring myself to finish.
Wait.
No longer fueled by rage, my mind is now telling me something I wasn’t hearing before.
I whip around, focusing on Kat’s blood beside the creek, where she came after we argued at the party to celebrate Emilio and Joy’s pregnancy.
“The creek.” I walk back to it.
“He swam across it.” Emilio, one of my enforcers, trails me. He’s in his best clothes. I was too until I ripped mine off to shift.
It’s not far to cross. Deep, but easy enough to paddle through to reach a grassy clearing that leads to pine trees and mountains in the distance.
“There.” I point at the footprint on the other side of the creek. “Whoever took her carried her across. That’s why her scent didn’t lead anywhere I could track.” I start to cross the creek when Jasper speaks.
“We were talking,” he says hesitantly, head down, probably afraid I’ll remember he’s there and rip his head off for existing.
I twist to face him, itching to go after Kat, but he could have seen something important. I nearly killed the guy. The least I can do is listen to him for two seconds. “You left her here.”
He nods his dark head. “She said she wanted to think, and I didn’t want to go to the party.” He clears his throat. “Too many people.”
He’s a new arrival here. Twenty strangers drinking and dancing is a lot for most shifters to handle at the best of times. With pack, it’s different. Pack is family. He’s not pack yet.
Every second I waste here is another second someone takes Kat farther away from me.
Impatient, I prompt him. “Then.”
“That’s it. I heard you howl, and I came out to find out why.” He lifts his head and looks at me. “But I didn’t hurt her. She was nice. I would never have hurt her.”
I turn to my enforcers. “Joy, Silas, Troy, and Wes, stay here. Watch the pack. Pair up and take turns checking the perimeter. There could be another trap waiting to snap shut. Fin, Emilio, and Cruz. Shift. You’re with me. We’re crossing the creek.”
We could go around it, but Kat might not have time. We need to gonow.
“You look shaken,” Dania, one of my packmates, says as she walks over to Jasper. “I’ll make you some tea.”
“Thanks.” Jasper smiles gratefully at Dania, and they disappear inside the bunkhouse. I start to shift when I realize Finan hasn’t moved.
“Finan!” I snap at him.
He yanks his gaze from the bunkhouse and starts stripping.
