The Hunted

Twenty-One

Red

"What did Toby hear exactly?" Red asked. They paused in the woods a few hundred yards from where they'd left Blake at the dead human's campsite. Far enough away that she didn't have a hope at hearing their muted conversation but close enough to keep Red's instincts at bay.

They'd been strangling him lately, attempting to push him into keeping Blake closer than she probably wanted him. It had been more than an effort to resist those temptations. To ignore the gravitational pull of her scent or the glint in her eyes when she looked at him like he was more than an animal.

Which wasn't often. No, Blake had been more than content to operate in near-silence these past three days, speaking only when the case dictated it. It was clear that she was reserving herself. Locking up anything vulnerable that might actually allow a connection to form between them.

Yet Red understood her better after only three days than he had the entire month-and-a-half they'd kept her contained in that cell. He knew that what drove her intensity was a desire to keep people safe. That staying silent was a way to protect herself and others. At her very core, that's what she was. A protector.

Not so different than what he was. So even if they were only spending time together working, it was still enlightening. And behind that hard exterior was a woman who was smart and strong but also had a streak of self-sacrifice. Someone who would walk into a pack of werewolves knowing very well that she might not walk out of it again.

Perhaps even someone who hoped that she wouldn't walk out of it again. Someone who didn't think that she deserved to walk out of it again.

Monroe's lips twisted into a frown, unhappiness marring her expression as she plopped down onto a moss-covered log. She drew circles in the dirt with her toe. "People are talking, Red. Not the good kind. They want Henry to force Blake out of the pack. A few were talking about taking matters into their own hands if he wouldn't do anything."

"Let me guess, Victor, Deacon, Jessica, Carsen—"

"Among others."

Tightness clinched Red's chest. Constricting his breath. He could only imagine what they were saying – the things that they wanted to do to Blake. "And Toby?"

Monroe's silence stretched for a moment, thin and brittle, before she said, "He doesn't trust her."

"None of us do."

"You don't?" Monroe raised a brow at that.

Red exhaled. "Not entirely. I'm not stupid, Mon. I think she has good intentions and that she truly wants to know who is killing these humans. I want to know that too. But it wouldn't surprise me entirely if she was testing us for weaknesses. Looking for ways to hunt us like she does every other supernatural creature. It's in her nature the same way that it's in ours to protect each other. That's why the pack is so riled up. They're worried – they think she'll try to hurt us again."

"Will she?"

"I don't know." He didn't. Not really. But he hoped. God, did he hope that Blake wouldn't. Red didn't know how he would live with himself if he had to put down Blake to protect the pack. It would destroy him, utterly wreck him. Yet she was his Mate and that made her his responsibility.

For better or for worse.

Red looked Monroe in the face and added, "But I do know that we need her to solve these murders. She's already helped me figure things out. Not many but in looking at some of the crime scene photos, she was able to tell that we're dealing with two people, not one. Sometimes they use claws and teeth and other times blades."