Page 15 of The Werewolf Cowboy
Chapter 5
Seated at his massive desk, Aiden propped one dusty boot upon the desktop as his mate sat in a chair next to him. Darius perched a hip on the desk while Dave and his sons took up the conference table. Katy’s white Stetson sat in the table’s middle, like an awkward centerpiece.
Katy’s father and brothers kept glaring at Grayson. Probably blaming him for this incident, too.
“Katy is in the Dark Kingdom. I don’t care what you think of me, but I need information. Anything you can tell me about who she’s been keeping company with lately. Especially men,” Grayson said.
Nia and Aiden exchanged troubled glances. The Mitchell alpha frowned, as if he had trouble believing Grayson’s words. “We don’t know for certain that she is in the Dark Kingdom.”
Grayson held up his hand, still dusted with Fae glitter. “I sure as hell do. This didn’t come from anywhere else. Charles left a trail of it, which means he’s found a way in, or he has a Dark Fae working with him. Since Dark Fae prefer their own world, I’d bet my ranch that bastard found a portal. And he took her there. Now, are you going to sit around and jaw or do something, Mitchell?”
Darius bristled and snarled at the insult to his alpha, and Katy’s family sprang to their feet. But Aiden only flashed a tired smile. “If you’re trying to insult me, Moore, you need to do a hell of a lot better. I believe you.” The alpha took his boots off the desk. “She hasn’t been keeping company with any men, far as I know. Dave?”
Katy’s father shook his head.
“Tell me about when you first found her,” Grayson ordered. If he was in luck, the amulet was still with her.
Darius began to pace the room. “She didn’t speak much. She knew her name, but had no memory of her folks or where she’d been living. She smelled like a Lupine, and when I took her here, she wasn’t afraid. Even when I shifted into wolf, she wasn’t afraid. She laughed and clapped her hands.”
Probably she’d never seen such a small wolf. But Grayson kept that thought quiet.
“Did she have anything on her? An amulet?” he asked.
Darius frowned. “A locket hanging on a necklace, I think.”
“It wasn’t a locket.” This was from Katy’s father. “It was a purple stone with runes on her neck. I put it away, didn’t want to upset her. Figured I would give it to her when she got older.”
Right. Dave put it away because the gemstone scared the hell out of him. “Go get it.”
Katy’s father scowled. “No.”
“Get it,” Grayson told him. “If you ever want to see her again, get the damn stone.”
Dave looked at Aiden, who nodded. “Get it. Now.”
A few minutes later, the Lupine returned with a wood box. He set it on the conference table and opened it.
Upon a bed of blue velvet, the purple gemstone pulsed with raw power. Barbed wire wrapped around it, and formed a necklace.
Aiden and the others peered at it and shuddered. “Damn,” Darius murmured. “I don’t remember barbed wire.”
Aiden hooked an arm around Nia, who looked deeply troubled. “A barbed wire necklace around the neck of a small child? Who would be so evil?”
Darius rubbed his chin. “I don’t remember her hurting. Katy just seemed…sad.”
As Darius went to pick it up, Katy’s father blocked his hand. “Don’t touch it without gloves or you’ll get burned. I did when I removed it from her neck.”
Everyone stepped back.
Entranced by the glowing purple gemstone, Grayson picked up the box with reverence and shut the lid. “The barbed wire wasn’t intended to hurt Katy, but protect her from anyone wishing to harm her. And it was a symbol of where to send her.”
“Send her?” Aiden’s grip tightened around the shoulders of his pregnant mate. “Send her where?”
“To a Lupine ranch, where she would be safely raised until she became of age.”
Grayson drew in a deep breath. Telling them anything more was risky. He’d reveal more secrets that could endanger him.
Then he looked at the faces of Katy’s adoptive father and brothers, who looked frantic with worry.
