Page 35 of Shifter Situations

“Is that all you need?” Blaire interrupted as the officer opened his mouth.

“I think it’s clear that my client was not here and these are false allegations. More than a dozen witnesses are willing to make a statement on his behalf.”

The older officer sighed as his partner collected their file. “Yes, that’s all. Thank you for your time.”

“You’re quite welcome. I hope you catch whoever the murderer is. Since my client was named in this report, we’d like to—”

“It’s already handled, Blaire. There’s no need to press charges,” Sloane told her.

“Never mind then. Have a good day, gentlemen.”

The smile on my sister’s face clued me into their private conversation. I couldn’t hear what they were talking about, but I knew Blaire well enough to know she’d picked something out of the officers’ minds or off the report.

And I knew Trouble well enough to know that it was… Trouble.

For once, I needed to know more about what was happening. I wouldn’t be kept in the dark while someone was framing me for a murder that I didn’t commit.

After spotting that mountain lion during the fight yesterday, I had been actively trying to avoid my suspicions. Hearing Briggs and Baylor say they thought they knew who it was really put things into perspective.

I knew who the fucking mountain lion was too.

I didn’t like the pieces my brain connected together.

Sparing a quick glance at Palmer, I leaked my rambling thoughts to him.

Jack and Grim talking about brainwashing hit too close to home with the behavior we’d seen from the rogues. They weren’t organized like the shifters from the camp in Kentucky, but they were obsessive over their targets.

They had attacked the guys and me, but hadn’t gone for Briggs. They had left their backs exposed while they tried to take us out, and they hadn’t tried to defend themselves—or each other—once they’d caged us in.

The mountain lion had come to observe their attack, and she’d left quietly when it was a sure failure. I knew for a fact that she would be back, because the object of her desire was too close to let go.

Palmer used the heels of his hands to rub at his eyes as he listened to me.

We all knew who was behind this shit.

Katie was the mountain lion; I had no doubts about that. She was brilliant and manipulative, though she couldn’t understand why Briggs put so much stake in his friends’ opinions.

We’d kicked her to the curb for him when we saw how miserable he was with her. It hadn’t taken him long to bounce from the feline to the she-wolf. We’d hated her too, but it took us months to figure out why.

Anna’s mind had been a vault whenever she was around me. She’d expressed her dislike of Palmer numerous times and had tried to kill Stone after he caught her cheating on Briggs.

When she failed, she’d run back to North Fork with her tail tucked. But not before she warned him that she would get what she wanted as soon as she got us out of the way.

That was what she was trying to do.

I’d bet that report could be traced back to either Anna or Katie, if not both of them.

And I fucking knew… The only thing that had really saved me—possibly all of us—was not traveling to an already established portal to get to the Underworld.

Which would mean that they’d been watching Briggs or had someone doing it for them.

Maybe they thought we’d been at the estate in Nashville since we got back from Kentucky three weeks ago. At the most, they knew we had come back from Baton Rouge, somehow, and had not physically left the house since then.

Either Briggs and Sloane had two different parties stalking them at the same time… Or I’d just figured out who was behind the rogue shifters.

Both were plausible, but I felt like I was grasping at straws. My instincts also felt right.

Katie and Anna didn’t know where we were, but the fae-mage creeper did. He’d sent pictures of us from mere hours before. That USB drive had held images of the pack lodge, Sam’s house in Michigan, and the front gates to our home in Nashville.