Desert Bound (Cambio Springs) (24 page)

“But there was no way of knowing anything like this was an issue, Alex. Give yourself a break.”

Caleb said, “Is there any way you can find out what job that was?”

He nodded. “I’ll ask his guys. They’d know.”

“And so would Avery,” Ollie said. “If Marcus was going back to fix the jobs that Avery had payed off, then Avery would know Marcus was on to him.”

Sean nodded. “So why were they still working together?”

“Family?” Willow asked.

Jena shook her head. “I’ve gotten to know Josie a little. I don’t think she’d back her brother against Marcus. She was
Marcus’s wife
. If her husband wanted him out, I don’t think Josie would have said a word.”

“Agreed,” Allie said. “So Marcus was keeping Avery in. Trying to avoid exposure?”

“It’d kill his reputation, something like that came out,” Alex said. “And cost him a mint. Every permit he ever pulled would have been scrutinized. He might have lost his business.”

“So he was trying to fix it without raising any alarms,” Caleb said. “I still haven’t figured out why he wouldn’t have kicked Avery out. Or at least taken him off jobs. He was a fifty-fifty partner, but he could have just stuck him in the office.”

There was silence in the room until Alex spoke.

“Avery had something on Marcus.”

Sean asked, “But what? No skeletons that I’ve found except the ones his brother-in-law stacked up.”

“Then we need to find out,” Alex said.

Sean nodded. “I’m on it, cuz.”

Allie’s voice was soft, but Ted could hear her from across the room. “What about Joe?”

Alex’s face got soft when he looked at her. “I don’t think he’s involved, Allie.”

“But are you not looking at him because he’s my husband?” Her mouth got tight. “Don’t do that. You’re not going to hurt my feelings, guys. I know he owed Marcus money. I knew he wasn’t a nice person. If I’m really honest, he could be involved in something like this.”

“Allie,” Caleb said softly. “I really don’t think Joe’s involved directly, but I didn’t ask you about drugs before. At the time, we didn’t know Marcus had been drugged.”

“So ask.” Her chin came up.

“Did Joe take drugs?”

She was silent for a moment. “Define ‘drugs.’”

Jena leaned toward her. “Allie—”

“I know he smoked pot. A lot of it sometimes. But there were other times… He didn’t seem right. Especially toward the end.”

“Could he have had roofies?” Caleb continued the soft questions. “They’re blue now, but they used to be little white pills. Might not look like anything weird. You wouldn’t think—”

“He had a baggie of… something. In the back of his sock drawer. I found it putting laundry away. He… he said they were antihistamines, but he didn’t have allergies.” She took a deep breath. “He never had allergies. I… I didn’t know. Didn’t ask.”

Ted felt a chill settle over her. Felt Alex’s arm go around her shoulders. What had Allie been living with for so many years? She glanced at Ollie in the corner and chanced a look in his eyes. She’d caught a glimpse of it before, but nothing like what he was holding in now.

Deep. Quiet. Rage.

Caleb knelt down in front of her. “You want to go in the other room for this? We don’t need to do this with everyone—”

“No.” Allie’s hand was gripped in Sean’s. “You have a question, ask it. I’m fine.”

“You guys fought.”

“Yeah.”

“A lot?”

“Yeah.”

“Because you thought he was cheating on you?”

“Maybe. I… I didn’t… Toward the end, we didn’t fight about that anymore.”

She didn’t have to say why. Ted knew Allie and Joe hadn’t had sex in months. It was more than possible Joe was getting it somewhere else. Was he using a date rape drug to get it, though? Could Joe have drugged Marcus or been involved? Or was it all just a horrible coincidence?

“Was that bag with the pills still there after he left?”

“No,” she whispered. “It was gone when I cleaned out his drawers.”

Caleb took a deep breath. Sat back on his heels. “You knew him best. Do you think he could have drugged someone else? It’s one thing to take something yourself, but it’s another to use it on someone else.”

“I don’t know, Caleb.”

“Did he… ever ask you to try some of that stuff with him?”

She looked close to tears, but she kept her chin up and kept talking. “I said no. The kids need… I never wanted to do that shit. Not even pot. He would make fun of me. Say I was stuck up. Thought I was too good for him. Shit like that. He could get mean.”

Ted was disgusted. It was one thing to smoke a little pot, but to pressure your wife to do it when she obviously didn’t want to, then try to make her feel like crap about
not
using drugs was more than messed up. 

Then Caleb went somewhere Ted never would have expected.

“Sweetheart, you ever… Do you think Joe might have given you… anything? Ever?”

Allie paled and Willow sucked in an audible breath.

“Caleb?” Jena whispered. 

He ignored Jena and kept looking at Allie. “Let’s go in the other room with Jena, okay? We don’t have to—”

“No.” She sat up straighter and looked Caleb in the eye, but Ted could tell she was struggling for words. “There are some questions…” She took a deep breath. “There are some questions you don’t let yourself ask when you’re married to someone like Joe.” She wasn’t whispering, and Ted couldn’t stop the surge of pride she felt for Allie’s quiet strength. “Because asking them might make a lot of things a lie.” Then she lost it and her voice fell to a whisper. “Might make your whole life a lie.”

Ted heard the slam in the corner. Her eyes flew there just in time to see Ollie disappearing out the back door, a massive hole in the wall where he must have driven a fist in. Alex flew out the door a few minutes later, following his friend into the night.

Chapter Eighteen

Alex tore off his clothes the minute he got out the door. The shift took him and he fell to all fours, nose lifted until he could track the bear’s scent. Thick muscle rippled under the heavy fur of his wolf as he tore into the darkness. Dry scrub crushed under his paws. The night air called him as he lifted up his head and howled.

Ollie would know he was giving chase.

People underestimated bears because they tended to keep to themselves. But Ollie’s bear could run as fast as Alex in wolf form. And he was a hell of a lot bigger and stronger. Shifters tended to be a little bigger than their full animal counterparts, and Alex guessed that Ollie’s bear weighed nearly six hundred pounds. 

And he was enraged.

Part of him was tempted to let Ollie run it out of his system. But if his friend lost focus and hurt something, he’d never forgive himself. Alex could hear him, running past the springs and into the canyon. The large shadow looming on the canyon walls as the waning moon lit the night. He moved silently, listening for the deep huffs of grizzly breath. 

He caught a glimpse of Ollie moving in the darkness.

The bear had slowed his pace, probably exhausting himself with the hard run from Jena’s house. He could run fast, but not for long. Alex would always be able to catch him. He halted when he saw Ollie’s hulking form pacing back and forth at the canyon wall. The grizzly huffed out his breath, and a low groan echoed through the canyon. The wolf pushed down the urge to howl and watched.

Then he bit back a growl when Ollie stopped pacing and ran straight into an outcropping of rock, crashing his shoulder into the sandstone, causing a minor landslide as chunks of rock showered down on his fur.

The bear was so angry, he was hurting himself.

The wolf circled on silent pads until he was behind him. A low growl simmered in his throat a moment before he ran to the grizzly, leapt on its back, and sank his teeth into the thick hide.

The bear roared and reared up, throwing the wolf into the rocks. Alex scrambled to his feet and faced his friend, but there was no recognition in the animal’s eyes.

Ollie turned and lumbered straight for him, his lip curling and a rumble growing in his chest. 

Alex turned toward the dark canyon and ran.

He darted through the rocks with Ollie at his heels. Back and forth, leading him away from any areas where a human or shifter might wander when they ran at night. Hard at the chase, the grizzly followed, totally focused on the wolf who attacked him. A frustrated roar echoed in the night, and Alex knew he was getting tired.

Not tired enough.

Alex came to a clearing surrounded by cottonwoods and hid in the trees, then watched as the bear entered the clearing, huffing out puffs of breath in the cold night. He circled, scenting the air a moment before Alex burst out, leaping straight at Ollie’s flank and jumping on his back again. When he bit, he tasted blood. Ollie reared up and threw him off. Alex quickly dodged the paw that could break his back with one swipe. The grizzly’s anguished roar was deafening.

They fought until the moon was high. Alex darting in to bite at Ollie’s legs, the bear trying to grab the wolf in it’s deadly arms and landing excruciating blows to his legs. Ollie was stronger without question, but Alex was fast and focused. He could outlast Ollie, and he wasn’t blinded by anger. But Ollie needed a fight, so Alex gave him one until both animals were bleeding.

After a while, the bear sat, its giant chest heaving in the night. Then it blinked and Alex saw his friend reemerge from the boar-rage.

The bear shook his head, then shifted and the giant man lay back in the dust, staring into the night.

“Fuck,” he groaned. “Your teeth hurt like hell.”

Alex shifted right after him. “I’m surprised you didn’t break my leg.”

He sat with his back against a rock, watching Ollie. Making sure the anger had burned down to something he could control.

“You okay?”

“No, I’m not fucking okay, Alex.”

“You going to kill anything?”

“Other than Joe fucking Russell when I get my hands on him?”

“Your mom hear you use language like that, Campbell?”

Ollie said nothing, just raised a hand and flipped him off. Alex grinned through the pain.

“I forget how strong you are,” he said on a grunt, stretching out his legs and rubbing his knee. “When was the last time we had to do this?”

Ollie’s voice got quiet. “When Loralie was born.”

When Joe hadn’t even shown up at the hospital.

“He’s gone now.”

“He better be, because if he comes back, I’ll kill him.”

It wasn’t said as a boast or a threat. Just a statement of fact. If Joe Russell stepped foot in Cambio Springs again, Oliver Campbell, pillar of the community, would kill him.

And Alex had not a doubt in his mind that this would happen.

“He gave her that shit, Alex.”

“We don’t know that.”

“I do. Think back to high school. You ever think of trying anything with Allie?”

“No. I was always thinking about Ted.”

“Pretend you’re sixteen for a minute.”

He thought back and realized that yeah, he’d looked. Allie had a fantastic ass and curves for days. But Ollie was right. He’d never, ever have gone there. Not with Allie. Neither had Sean. None of them had, though Ollie had probably been in love with her even back then. 

“No,” Alex said. “You’re right. None of us would have tried anything.”

“Allison Smith was one of the sweetest, cutest girls at school. And not a single one of us would have gone there with her, because that wasn’t Allie. She was shy about boys. Always. Not in a bad way, just her own way. And two months after Joe Russell hooks up with her, he’s gone there, hooked her in, and didn’t let her go. He wanted it. She gave it to him. Now, think about sixteen year old Allie and tell me that doesn’t sound off to you.”

“Man, we have no idea what went on back then.”

“Maybe I need to hunt him down and find out.”

“Ollie—”

“I can do it, Alex. And I would not have a problem finishing the job.”

Alex fell silent and thought about the best way to get Ollie back on track. Joe might have been trash, but he didn’t need to be dead. He just needed to be out of Allie’s life. For good. And not in a way that made Ollie a murderer.

“You think Allie needs you off hunting her ex or around her, helping her and the kids out?”

“I think I can’t be around the woman and think straight, so maybe I need to be gone for a while.”

Ollie didn’t need to be gone. He just didn’t know what to do with the emotion he was feeling. Because despite the fact that Alex was in love with Ted, Allie was family. And what Alex felt was rage, confusion, and guilt for not seeing things that were right in front of him for years. He couldn’t even imagine what Ollie felt.

“You need to be here for her, Ollie. Get a grip on it. Be there for the kids. I know Kevin spends a lot of time with you. What would it do to him if you left town right now?”

“Fuck you, Alex.”

“Fine. Whatever. But you know I’m right. Get it under control and do what you need to do. What you
don’t
need to do is go hunting right now.”

“Do you think he had a hand in Marcus’s death?”

“I think…” All of a sudden, it clicked into place. “I think he spent a lot of time at casinos.”

“So?”

“And so does Chris Avery.”

“Almost every weekend.” Ollie sat up. “You said Avery was on a job at the river when Marcus was killed?”

“Yeah.”

Ollie fell silent for a moment. “Find Joe. Find out if he knows Avery. And do not tell me where he is if you want him to be breathing.”

“Did he look as bad as you?”

Ted was kneeling by him as he sat on the couch, wrapping the knee that Ollie had wrenched. Shifting had pulled the bones back into place, but the muscles were still swollen. And his face was still cut up. He also had a few gashes on his side from Ollie’s claws, but they weren’t serious and were already healing.

“I think he looks worse, but he feels better.” He flinched a little when she tightened the bandage. Then she grabbed the bag of ice and plopped it on his knee.

“Keep it on there. Even if it aches.”