Drawing my courage up around me, I said, very softly, “And for me? What does our dear, kind ol’ Uncle Sam have for skinwalkers?”
Eli’s scent changed, and the look he shot me this time was thoughtful as he processed my question, what it might entail in practice, and what it might lead to in our future. “So far as I know, and so far as my nosy, snooper brother can find out, the U.S. military is unaware of what you are, beyond some kind of magical creature. Alex was able to find one report that suggests you’re a witch of some kind, one previously unknown.”
“They asked you to watch and report on me.”
Eli’s eyes went hard and cold and he whipped the vehicle over to the curb, braked hard enough to rock the armored SUV on its reinforced undercarriage, and slammed it into park. “You got something to ask me?”
“Yeah,” I said softly. “The guy who asked you to spy on me? When you decked him, did he bleed much?”
Eli snorted softly, the sound way more refined than my own snort. He closed his eyes and scrubbed his face, the action showing just how tired he really was. My partner needed sleep, much more than the power naps he’d taken since the death of the fifty-two, since the growing death toll among New Orleans’ marginalized and least protected citizens. Softly, musingly, he said, “You really are a cat, baiting and pouncing on the unwary. And no.” He dropped his hands and met my gaze across the darkened interior. “I didn’t deck him. He was in one piece when I walked away. But any chance of ever serving with the military went down the drain with that decision.”
There was something in his tone that said the story hadn’t stopped there. “So who’s watching me?”
“Alex.”
I didn’t react externally, where a human could detect it, but my heart rate leaped and sped.
“They approached him when I turned them down. They offered him to end his term of probation. We decided to take their offer, and so he’s been feeding them info for the last few months. He’s a free man now. And whoever it was who wanted info has been firmly convinced that you’re a witch of limited power who came into Leo’s employ by stealth and deceit.”
Holding myself still, I considered what Eli had said. From one perspective it was a stunning betrayal, and my heart hurt, far deeper than I had expected. They should have told me. But from the perspective of a military man, one grounded in strategy and tactics and need-to-know, it probably seemed like the smart thing to do. With Alex collecting data, Eli knew who all the players on the field were: who was watching me, who was collecting information, who was spinning it, what it looked like when it was reported, and who it was being reported to. Except for the last part, it was all in the family.
My tone just as mild as his, I said, “You didn’t think about telling me all this?”
“I did. But.” He turned his eyes back to the road and pulled into the sparse traffic. Passing headlights created planes of illumination and zones of shadow on his brown-skinned face. He was thinking, trying to find words to tell me something important, something he found difficult to say. “You were making money. You were seeing George. You were happy for the first time in a long time,” Eli said. “I didn’t see a reason to tell you something unnecessary and bring you down, not for a situation that would never affect you. Did I screw up?”
“I think so.”
“You’re not sure?” Eli snorted again and slanted his eyes at me. “That is such a girl remark.”
“Yeah. It is. Doesn’t change how I feel about you and the Kid conniving behind my back. How would you feel if I did something to try to keep you safe or happy or something?” And I knew it was a mistake the moment the words left my mouth. Because Eli grinned, showing teeth, the way Beast shows teeth—to make a point, and not a nice point either.
“You mean like you not shifting into an animal with a tracking nose because you’re afraid to leave me to fight Santana alone?”
I let the question hang in the air between us for a while because, well, he was right. Which I hated. I frowned at his self-satisfied grin and finally said, “Is this what family does? All this conniving and arguing and keeping secrets? ’Cause I don’t like it.”
Eli’s face fell into what might have been his normal, regular, ordinary smile, had the Rangers and service to his country not beat all the softness out of him. “It’s okay, babe. You’ll get used to it.”
Which made me feel all warm and fuzzy, because that meant that he and Alex weren’t planning to take off anytime soon. They were sticking around. Being partners didn’t mean they’d stay. Being family meant they’d stay. “I’m sorry I didn’t shift.”
“I’m not. That sucker woulda eaten me alive and spit out the bone splinters.”
I laughed softly. “Yeah. He would. And thank you for telling the U.S. government lies about me.”
“Anytime, babe. Anytime at all.”
* * *
We got back to Samuel Square Park and tootled down Loyola Avenue as the sky grayed and the shadows changed depth, shrinking, drawing into themselves, as if the sun injured them. The new town house smelled of fresh paint, adhesives, wood, and floor finisher—lacquer or whatever they used to make wood shiny. We got out and I lifted my head into the wind currents, drew my lips into a snarl, drawing the night air into my mouth and over my tongue with a soft scree of sound. Flehmen behavior. Beast behavior.
Over all the outgassing building materials, I smelled fresh plantings, turned soil, and flowering plants, primarily jasmine, a floral that seemed designed by God himself to ruin my nose. Along with the floral bouquet, I scented chlorine and burned vamp flesh and fresh and old werewolf blood. My lips fell back into neutral and I shrugged at Eli, who had a tiny smile on his face. My cat-like responses didn’t bother him at all, which made me even happier on some level I didn’t look at too closely. The Youngers were becoming family, which meant that they had power over me, over my emotions. I’d cry like a child if they left me. “All the scents, including the biggest concentration of dead human and werewolf blood, come from the backyard. There’s a pool.”
Eli clicked the dart to the highest dose, shouldered the oversized trank gun, tossed a massive gobag over one shoulder, and moved away from the street. I followed. “What’s the plan?” I asked.