(FREE TO READ) Bad Moon

chapter 36 ; spell

Then Quentin hung up. It was strange to see someone as polite as Quentin Bronx hang up without goodbye. But then, there was nothing ordinary about him right now. He clutched his phone hard, sent the device smashing and skidding across the pavement like he was skipping a stone across water. Tisper heard the glass of the screen shatter, chunks of the device splintering across the icy ground.

And then Quentin seemed to stiffen, his shoulders rigid as he stared at the broken phone in regret.

Slowly, Tisper removed the stick of jerky from her mouth. "You needed that, didn't you?"

"Yeah," said Quentin.

"In case someone calls about Jay."

"Yes."

Quentin let his back fall against the gas pump column. His hands came up to his face and his fingers wiped down roughly. "We're not going to Spokane," he said, his back sliding down the concrete pillar until he was seated on the curb.

"What do you mean we're not going to Spokane?" Tisper asked. She rounded the hood of the car, stood tall in front of him. "What the hell do you mean? Where are we going then?"

"I don't know."

"No. No more I-don't-knows. What was that phone call about?"

Quentin's voice was rough and grainy—shredded with exhaustion. "When Jaylin disappeared, I was manning the Idaho border. That territory belongs to another alpha—Leonardo. He was our closest ally aside from Imani. He has more wolves at his disposal than any other alpha on the continent. He was going to be our ticket to Jaylin, but...apparently, half of Leo's pack has been wiped out. They were ambushed by Eastern scouts. He's nowhere to be found. He was... Leo was all the muscle I had left."

Tisper didn't understand what he was saying, but he looked shaken, a hand clamped over his mouth and hair fallen over his eyes. She moved in and took a seat beside him on the curb. "So... theoretically speaking, how would one work around the 'ambush'?"

"I don't know," Quentin said. His knee bounced, up, down, up, down. "I know that's not what you want to hear, but I don't—I don't know. I have everyone looking. I have to call them all in now, explain what happened. That means bringing them in. That means taking all eyes off the search, sending some of them to Idaho to find Leo too. They were probably using his boarders for access into Washington. Getting as close as they can without alerting my men."

Tisper was lost. She waited until she was sure he had nothing more to add, then she said, "Can I ask you something?" He stared straight ahead she noticed then, how different he looked in this light. So tired. She'd seen that look before on herself. "Why did you bring me? I want to find Jaylin more than you know, but why me?"

"Intuition."

"Maybe you're not as intuitive as you think you are."

Quentin turned to look at her. His calculating eyes had grown weary, the ambition in them faded. He laughed but there wasn't a smile to it. "I couldn't do it. I can't do it alone. I can't do this."

"Then why?" Tisper asked. "Why are you this big bad alpha if you can't handle the heat?"

"I never wanted to. I never asked. Alphas don't have an option but to be alpha. It's something fate decides for you."

"I get it, trust me. I spent most of my life in a place I didn't want to be, pretending I was someone I'm not. But you're wrong about the rest; there's no such thing as fate."

"There is such thing as fate and it's kicking my ass."

Tisper drank in a deep breath. She was thankful for the high mountain air. It kept her head steady. "So say there is. Say you're this leader—this alpha or whatever. That means you've got this army behind you right? So what are you bitching about? You've got power, just use it."