“Mercy will make them pay,” he told them, his throat tight. He looked at Aiden. “It wasn’t your fault, Aiden. We claimed this city . . . these cities, and put them under the pack’s protection because they are our home. You were the catalyst. You and Mercy were the catalyst that pushed us where we should already have been. If that was what inspired—” And he’d given that last word teeth, hadn’t he? He took a breath and tried again. “If that was what inspired someone to take Mercy, it still is not your fault.”

“I will burn them,” Aiden said, and the wolf in Adam loosened its jaws in approval and recognition of another predator, one possibly more dangerous than he.

“If there is anything left after Mercy gets done with them,” Jesse said coolly, “I might help you with that, Sprout.” She looked at Adam. “Is there anything I can do?”

He started to shake his head, then stopped. There was no hiding the accident. It was very late, but in a half hour or so, the people who had to head to work in the wee small hours would start driving past.

“Call Tony and tell him about this.” Adam was afraid that he wouldn’t be able to keep his temper long enough to stay coherent. But Tony knew Jesse well enough to listen to her. “Tell him I’ll give him the whole story as I discover it—but that it is supernatural and probably treading into too-dangerous-for-humans-to-know territory.”

Tony was a cop, the unofficial liaison between the police and the werewolf pack. There was an official liaison who was pretty competent. But Tony knew more than was safe for a human already. If he hadn’t been under pack protection, the vampires or the witches would have killed Tony by now. Adam intended to keep the official liaison safely ignorant of vampires.

Tony was trusted enough by his department that they took his word when he told them it was too dangerous to know but matters had been handled. That was satisfactory to everyone involved.

“Can do.”

Jesse dug into the small purse that went everywhere with her. A cell phone rang as she did so, but it wasn’t hers. Adam glanced in the direction of the noise.

Stefan reached into his pocket, pulled out the phone. Without looking at it, he threw it. It landed against the side of the broken SUV, denting the already battered metal. The phone exploded into powder.

The wolf thought that it was an interesting reaction in a man who appeared so calm. But then he suspected that his own aspect looked cool and controlled because soldiers learn early to hide intense emotion when among enemies—even enemies who are people you like. He and Stefan had both been soldiers.

Adam’s phone rang, and he pulled it out, half-surprised it was still in its holder. He glanced at the number and almost refused the call but stopped himself.

Vampires, he thought. They weren’t hers, but they had been vampires.