“How did they get you all?” asked Asil.

“We thought they were government agents, so we did not initially respond with lethal force.” Adam breathed deeply, but it must not have helped because he got to his feet and began to pace. “That is a mistake, Agent Armstrong, that we will never make again. You might pass the word along.” For a moment, his menace was such that no one, not even me, dared take a deep breath. He shook his shoulders loose and spoke more moderately. “At any rate, we did not kill or harm anyone when we were taken. So two dead women and the dead man are the responsibility of either the Cantrip agents or the mercenaries they hired.”

“If you please, Mr. Hauptman,” said Armstrong. “Renegade Cantrip agents. My agency was not responsible for their actions, and both officially and unofficially, we find this business appalling.”

“I just bet you do.” Warren’s voice was heavy with rage. Warren was usually the voice of sanity in the pack.

“Warren,” said Adam—and Warren looked up, then away. “Do you need to leave?” It was a real question, not a reprimand, and Warren took it the way it was meant.

“You need Kyle here,” he said, his voice low and his head tipped slightly away from Adam’s. “In his legal capacity.”

“Not as our lawyer,” Adam said. “Not yet. But his presence is useful, yes. I’d like him to stay.”

“Then I’ll stay, too. I can deal.”

Adam looked at Tony. “I asked Sylvia to come because Gabriel was endangered. I asked you to stay because I do not want to keep the police in the dark about what happened. You are safer if you know everything. However, we cannot afford to let this go to trial in human courts. We … I will not allow it.”

Tony narrowed his eyes. “I am a servant of the law, Adam.”

“There will be hearings, just not in the human court system,” Adam told him. “I answer to a higher power—that power that kept werewolves from being the monsters Cantrip is afraid we are for all the years that humans knew nothing of us. If my actions are deemed excessive, I will pay for them with my life.”

“Those werewolves who killed that pedophile in Minnesota this past spring—they died within a few days of it. All of them. Natural causes, we were told, though their bodies were cremated very quickly and no autopsy was performed,” Armstrong said neutrally, his eyes on me rather than Adam.

“A force of nature, anyway,” I said obliquely. Charles was a force of nature, right?