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“Or so he’d have us think.” Cabal shrugged as his gaze moved back to Winslow’s lifeless body. “Seven down. Four to go and one to die again,” he stated, repeating the message that had come through Jonas’s personal sat phone several hours earlier.
Jonas stared back at him silently, and understanding the look wasn’t a problem for Cabal.
“We know the last one,” Jonas stated. “Help me with the other four, Cabal. Tell me you have names by now. Something.”
“Ivan Vilanov, former Russian intelligence officer, a double agent for the CIA. He was one of Winslow’s assets at one time. I identified him from the picture last night with some help from a few new buddies I found at a bar near Gauley Bridge. He was a regular here more than twenty years ago, during his assignment to the Russian Embassy in D.C. Hunting weekends with Brandenmore and Engalls both here in the States as well as in Europe.”
Jonas rubbed at the bridge of his nose in disgust. “He’s missing. Son of a bitch. A report came through Homeland Security less than twenty-four hours ago. He slipped away within hours of being picked up for questioning in the case we have against Brandenmore and Engalls.”
Cabal grimaced at the information. “I have some other names, but I’m running them. Banks’s body hasn’t turned up yet. Walt Jameson thinks he’s still alive. I think its possible. Whoever this Breed is, he would have left the body to be found within twenty-four hours of his death, just as he has the others.”
“Does Walt have any idea who this could be?” Jonas bit out furiously.
Cabal shook his head. “It’s obviously connected to the massacre that took place in the valley we found Alonzo’s body in. The Breeds that were part of that group that night were all killed though, according to all the information we’ve been able to come up with. Walt gave me the names, I ran them. There’s no one unaccounted for.”
Each Breed on that list had either arrived back at the labs dead, head intact, or just the head had been returned and payment collected.
“Any way someone fucked up?” Jonas asked.
Cabal rejected the suggestion. “If they fucked up, then I haven’t found proof of it. There was DNA proof of each kill. That’s damned hard to fake.”
“Someone fucked up somewhere,” Jonas assured him. “Forward that list of names to my sat. I’ll go through them myself. I want to know every man and woman in that group, Breed or human, and their connection to everyone in this fucking town. And I want it yesterday.”
“It was forwarded just before I left the inn to meet with you here,” Cabal informed him. “Good luck with it.”
Jonas was silent once again, his expression brooding, uncomfortably cold as Cabal watched him.
“We know who the last one is,” he finally said. “The one that gets to die again.” He narrowed his eyes on Cabal. “Tell her.”
“No.” Cabal realized the instant refusal was more instinct than intellect.
“If you don’t, the killer’s going to,” Jonas told him. “What then?”
“He can’t prove a damned thing,” Cabal growled. “There’s no way to get proof and no way to get to him. Forget it, Jonas. It’s not happening.”
Jonas shook his head. “The best laid plans,” he sighed. “This isn’t going to end up well, Cabal. You’re fucking up.”
“Then it’s my fuckup.”
Douglas Watts was dead to the world, and as far as Cabal was concerned, he was going to stay dead.
“How did our rogue Breed know Watts was still alive?” Lawe asked, the question barely a breath of sound. “That information was contained to just a few Breeds.”
Jonas shook his head. “I suspect it was information Winslow was sent to find proof of. We know his last assignment took him overseas. We lost him for a while there. Weeks later the first killings began. It’s tied in.” He turned back to Cabal. “You know it’s tied in. And you know where it’s leading.”
He’d known all along where it was leading, but that didn’t mean he had to like it, and it damned sure didn’t mean he had to handle it however Jonas dictated.
Cassa was his mate, plain and simple. Period. Nothing was going to change that, and there was no reason that he could think of to muddy the waters of the mating with the knowledge that the man she had believed she was married to was still alive.
Watts had lied to her, cheated on her. He had betrayed her trust in the most elemental fashion from the beginning. The wedding had been no more than a farce, because Watts didn’t believe in contracts or promises. The preacher that had married them had been no more than an actor hired to act the part. The papers signed, the marriage license—the whole deal was no more than a collection of props.
Watts liked drama. He liked ceremony. He had enjoyed fooling everyone so effectively. It had been his own private little joke, and now the joke was on Watts. The woman he had thought he would hold through lies now belonged to one of the creatures he had so despised. One he had thought he could destroy.
“Drop it, Jonas,” Cabal warned him as he watched the eerie silver of the other man’s gaze shift thoughtfully.
Jonas was studying the situation, considering it, coming up with the most effective way to ensure that Cabal moved to the correct spot on the mental chessboard he was certain Jonas often used.
Jonas shook his head. “Hell of a way to start a life together,” he stated. “You can’t hide something like this forever. It always ends up biting you on the ass, my friend.”
