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“I like that,” the Survivor says. “You can call me Camden, then. Nice to meet you both.”
Camden turns to the Tracker, his hand outstretched. The Tracker stares right back at him. Long seconds go by before he finally accepts the handshake.
“Memphis,” he mutters.
“Well, that explains the Southern charm,” Camden cracks. “Not much of a talker, are you?”
Memphis doesn’t say anything to that, just crosses his arms across his chest.
Camden lets it go, pulling a folded map out of his jacket pocket and spreading it on the table in front of us. “I hope it’s okay, but I made some notes on the paths we might want to start with. We know that she’ll need a water source. And since nobody’s reported spotting her, she’s probably far from the major trails and campsites.”
The map is marked up with red pen, dividing the park into zones, sorted into the most likely places to find her. I take my time examining the work, and find that it’s thorough.
“Nice work,” I admit. “We could start down here, by the lake. Then start moving north.”
We work together to get the search order in place. Well, Camden and I do, anyway. Memphis mostly watches quietly, grunting when he agrees with us.
Nobody wants to stay the night here and start in the morning. We’re impatient to get going. And at least for me, this house gives me the creeps. I’d sleep better under an open sky than with Grayson Castle snoring down the hall.
“Who wants to carry these?” I say, holding up the little black box.
“Fuck, I hate rut suppressants,” Camden says with a shudder.
Memphis and I nod our agreement. My lip curls in disgust just thinking about how I’ll feel after choking them down. Rut suppressants have their uses, but the side effects are hell. I’ve only had to take them once for a single op out east that I’d rather not have staining my memory. The meds are designed to rein in an Alpha’s instincts, to stop us from our relentless pursuit of an Omega. To effectively neuter the animal inside of us.
It’s fucking inconvenient, considering that those very instincts are the things that make me best at my job.
They make my muscles feel heavy and useless, compromising my strength. Plus, my senses feel muted. Like the volume’s been turned down on everything. The world feels slower and more distant.
The worst part is how they mess with my sense of smell. Normally, my scenting ability is invaluable in the field. It helps me identify predators, to guess who’s after me and how far away they are. More than once, back in the Marines, scenting an enemy soldier was the difference between life and death.
So yeah, I’d rather swallow a bucket of rancid goat milk than take those rut suppressants when I’m on an op. And judging by the sneers on Memphis and Camden’s faces, they feel the same.
“What if we didn’t take them?” Memphis offers.
I raise an eyebrow. “We’re disobeying orders already?”
The soldier in me stiffens in response. Ignoring orders can get you killed. It’s not something I take lightly.
“Let’s be honest,” Camden says. “Obviously, we hope the Omega’s managed to keep herself alive out there. I hope we find her in some makeshift shelter living off huckleberries and pinesap, but Olympic can be brutal, even for an experienced hiker. And according to Castle, our target’s not exactly Bear Grylls. So I hate to say it, but the odds are good that there’s nothing to find out there.”
There it is. The thing we’ve been dancing around. No way a pampered billionaire’s daughter like Brooklyn Castle has managed to keep herself alive in the wilderness.
The only thing waiting for us out there are her remains.
Remains that will be much easier to find if we can scent any faint whiffs of pheromones she’s left behind.
Which means that ditching the rut suppressants isn’t just for our comfort. It’s a damn good strategy.
“We don’t know for sure that she’s dead,” Camden pipes up. “You said she liked hiking, right? That her mom took her out there a lot? And she might have gotten lucky finding shelter.”
Memphis and I exchange a glance, and I can see in his grim expression that he’s thinking the same thing I am.
Maybe a casual hiker could survive the summer in Olympic. But it’s June, and Brooklyn disappeared a year ago. Winters in Washington can be frigid as hell.
“We could wait,” I offer. “If we pick up on a trail that’s not dead cold, we’ll take them. But until then, we need all the advantages we can get.”
Camden nods. “Good by me. Memphis?”
