“That’s because the explosive factor was canya.” I watched as Mallen’s expression turned from perplexed to horrified. “Yeah, we’re thinking sorcerers. The question is: Who did it, and how did they get hold of this crap?”

“Then toxicity results aren’t going to show anything.” He closed the folder and set it down on the table. “The fact is, the amount of canya needed to blow up a building the size of the Supe Community Hall points to some very powerful enemies. If they have enough canya for that, I wouldn’t put it past them to have other tricks like this up their sleeve. You have to find them, or I predict a body count like we haven’t seen in a long while.”

Chase let out a long sigh. “We so didn’t need that information. Okay, let’s go have a talk with the families. I know some of them are waiting upstairs.” He shook his head, looking resigned. “I’m used to breaking bad news to people, but the sting never goes away.”

Chapter 3

Chase told everybody but Shade and me to go home. There were family members out there, and it was better to avoid overwhelming them with too many faces, too many questions.

After Camille and the others left, we followed Chase, filing through the cubicles, waving to the night crew, until we reached Chase’s office. Nerissa hurried in behind us, looking a little worse for wear, but she was dressed in jeans and a pretty blouse, sober, and ready to work.

As soon as he closed the door, Chase turned to me. “I hate this part of the job. I know you do, too. But we have to word this carefully. We know this was no accident. So we have outright murder and arson.”

“What do we tell them?” It was better to defer to Chase on this one—he was the one who had to deal with the fallout, especially if it took us a while to find the murderers.

He stared at a piece of paper on his desk, tapping his fingers on the wood. After a moment, he looked up. “Let’s go. Just follow my lead.” With a decisive nod, he motioned for us to follow him.

We headed out into the waiting room, where a group of anxious Weres sat around the room. I caught sight of Marion Vespa—owner of the Supe-Urban Café—and quickly looked away before she could catch my eye. I dreaded being witness to when we told her that her sister was dead.

Exo Reed’s wife, Claudia, was there. She’d left the kids home. And others…most likely family of the dead and injured. Surveying the anxious faces made me want to weep. So much needless death and destruction went on in my world. The dead were usually okay—off doing other things—but here was the real aftermath of tragedy.

As we approached, Claudia glanced anxiously at us, scanning our faces. She must have read our energy, or perhaps it was simply body language, but whatever the case, her expression crumpled and she began to weep. Marion glanced at her, then hung her head, silent tears streaming down her face.

Chase glanced at them. “Will the families of Trixie Jones, Thomas Creia, Exo Reed, and Salvatore Tienes please come with us.” He turned to Sharah. “Will you talk to the others?”

She nodded, silently leading three people aside. They must have been family of the injured. I glanced at her as we led the others into a quiet conference room. Nerissa gently steered Claudia, who looked like she might collapse.

As I closed the door, Chase motioned for people to sit down. “I’m afraid I have bad news.” He let out a long sigh, pausing.

“They’re dead, aren’t they? My Exo is dead.” Claudia struggled to speak, her voice barely audible.

He nodded. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this…and in this manner. There was an explosion at the Supe Community Council tonight and seven people were caught in the blast—seven that we know of so far. Two are in intensive care fighting for their lives. The others…I’m sorry but they didn’t make it.”

I watched as he skirted the delicate line between caring too much and sounding too callous. He didn’t dare let himself get caught up in their pain, but neither could he remain totally detached.

Marion sucked in a deep breath and raised her head, letting out a long cry—a howl almost. The others, one by one joined in. Coyote, canine, wolf…they were all part of the tableau and they were all shifters under their superficial differences.

Chase waited till they finished, respecting the tradition, and then he gently passed around pictures of the elf. “I’m sorry to ask this, but first, do any of you have any idea of who this man was? He was caught in the blast, too, but we haven’t been able to put an ID to him yet.”

One by one they studied the picture, tears streaming, and shook their heads. Marion held it last, staring long and hard.

“I think he might have come into the café the other day, but I’m not sure. It was a slow day and I seem to remember…yes, Trixie was there, she was talking to him. But I don’t know his name.” She handed it back. “Who did this?”

“We don’t know yet.” Chase let out a long breath. “I’m sorry, but the sooner we ask you some questions, the sooner we’ll be able to catch whoever it is that did this.” He glanced around at the silent, tear-stained faces.

After a moment, Claudia Reed spoke up. “Ask your questions, Detective. We’ll do all we can to help.” She looked at the others, and they nodded their assent. Apparently, Exo’s wife was tougher than I had first thought.

“Thank you. I know this is a rotten time to ask, but it might help.” Chase shuffled a few papers and flipped open his notebook, pen poised over the paper.

“Have any of your loved ones mentioned anything out of the ordinary—any enemies? Anybody who might have been making threats? Anybody unhappy with them?”

He settled back in his chair while Nerissa unobtrusively passed out tissues, patted shoulders, and brought a blanket for Marion, who was shivering. I wanted to go over, put my arms around her shoulders, whisper that it was all okay, that it was a mistake and her sister was still alive and well.

Claudia shrugged. “Exo has…had…he’s made a number of enemies, definitely. Anybody turned away from the hotel could be out to get him. And there are a few members in the werewolf packs who don’t like the fact that he’s made such a public name for himself.”

I glanced at Chase, who gave me an imperceptible nod. “Do you know if any sorcerers have been hanging around the hotel?” If Van and Jaycee were part of this, chances were they had brought more of their kind over from the Sub-Realms.

The werewolf flinched, her eyes gleaming in the dim room. “Sorcerers? Crap—I didn’t know sorcery was involved.” Most werewolves didn’t care for outright magic.

Marion cleared her throat. “Delilah, can I speak to you in private?”

I led her out of the room, to an empty one next door. “Yes?”

“Could this have anything to do with the Koyanni? You cleared out a lot of them, but some got away. You know I’d have told you if I knew where they were, but it’s well known among the coyote shifters that you are connected with the Supe Community Council. And a strike at the organization you help run would be a strike at you.”

I cleared my throat. “You might be right. We’ve talked about this already. Which means I’m going to have to talk openly about the Koyanni. I know your people have kept them a secret all these years, but let’s face it, that barn door was left standing wide open and the horses are long gone.”

She closed her eyes and leaned against the wall. “I suppose it is.”

“When they attacked Luke’s sister, they forfeited their secrecy. Eventually, everything is going to come out in the open. We can’t keep a lid on old legends when they prove to be true and still deadly. And if the Koyanni are involved in this, we’ve got a huge problem on our hands. Would you like me to tell the others, or do you want to? You know their history better.”

Mario bit her lip. “I broke my vow of secrecy when I first mentioned them to you and your sisters. I guess…now it’s moot. And if the Elders can’t understand why I’m speaking up, then that’s their problem. We can’t keep them a secret when they may be terrorizing the entire Supe Community. Especially if they had anything to do with my sister’s death. And if they did, then I will hunt every last one of them down and slit their throats.”

“You don’t think they targeted Trixie because they knew you were the one who originally told us about them, do you?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged, then covered her eyes with her hand as tears slowly rolled down her face. Her voice throaty with tears, she added, “Whoever did it, I just want them dead.”

I swept the gaunt, lean woman into my arms and hugged her. She was so creative and nurturing in her restaurant; it was a shock to hear her talk so harshly. Grief was like that, though. It could make killers out of ordinary men and women. Heading back into the other room, I gave Marion a moment to compose herself. I motioned for everyone’s attention and glanced at Chase, who nodded for me to go ahead. He trusted us. We did our best not to abuse that trust.

“We have a situation that started back in October. Whether or not it relates to the bombing tonight, we’re not sure yet. But I think it best if we tell you about it in case the events spark off any connections…anything that might help us locate who killed your family members. Again, as Chief Johnson said, we’re sorry to have to put you through this tonight—we understand how hard it is. But the sooner we can gather clues, the sooner we can begin looking for the perpetrators.”

The word perpetrator felt odd on my tongue. To my mind, they were murderers, but the inflammatory tone of the word might further sidetrack the family members, who were reeling as it was.

Marion quietly joined us again. She slipped into her seat. I glanced at her, and she gave me a resigned look. I smiled at her and continued.

“Last October, some of you may remember hearing of several killings that happened among the werewolf community. We were investigating the case of several werewolves who were murdered—”

“I remember that,” the weredog said. “I’m Shane Creia. Thomas was my little brother. He was only a couple of years out of high school. He’s got a wife and twin boys.” He pinched his nose, the tears glistening in his eyes. “What kind of people do this?”

The other man—a werewolf—cleared his throat. I could tell his nerves were raw. Weres were readable; we were like open books at times thanks to our heightened body language. “Geraldo Tienes…Salvatore’s uncle. Word about the murders filtered down into Arizona, though there wasn’t much information released. Do you think those killings were connected with the explosion tonight?” He straightened, his nose twitching.

I nodded. “Right, we didn’t release a lot of information, and with good reason. We’re walking on treacherous ground here. There are things going on that we just can’t talk about right now. When those murders happened, we caught a number of the perps…but some got away. We think they may be back—not necessarily for their original reason, but to wreak revenge on the Supe Community. Maybe on Marion, or me or…who knows. The murders were connected with Wolf Briar—”

“Wolf Briar! Wolf Briar is loose in the community?” Geraldo’s eyes glittered with fear.

“Yeah, it is. We think we destroyed most of it, but we can’t be sure, so be cautious. And we know for a fact it was being made by a couple of sorcerers and a group of Koyanni.”

Doing my best to skirt the whole spirit seal–demonic invasion theme, I kept it to “sorcerers” and left out the Tregart part, then hashed the rest of the information together in a way that made sense.

“Koyanni?” Salvatore glanced up. “Who are they?”

I was about to defer to Marion, but Geraldo spoke up.

“Coyote scum, that’s who.” He pressed his lips together, the bridge of his nose turning unnaturally white.

“Oh, hell.” Claudia shifted in her seat. “Exo mentioned that he thought the Koyanni were in the area. He had trouble with them when he was on a special ops assignment for his unit, years ago, down in South America. He told me that they were a vicious breed of coyote shifters…” She turned to study Marion for a moment. “Does she know anything about this?” Shaking an accusing finger at the café owner, the werewolf slammed her chair back.

Marion slowly stood, meeting Claudia’s angry gaze. “Do not confuse me with the Lost Ones. They walk to their own vision, and any coyote shifter who follows the true path of the Great Trickster will have nothing to do with them. The Koyanni are dangerous and a tribe unto themselves. They left the old ways behind eons ago and are considered outcasts.”

Before fists—or fur—could fly, I stepped in. “Stop and sit down, both of you. Marion has nothing to do with the Koyanni. I see that you’re familiar with them, so for now we’ll forgo discussion of their past. Marion’s just as much a victim as the rest of you. Her sister was caught in the explosion.”

Claudia mumbled an apology and returned to her seat. Marion shrugged and slouched in her chair again.

Trying to ignore the scent of pheromones in the air—the energy was thick and volatile—I quickly laid out a highly edited version of what had happened last fall.

“What you need to know is this: Several Koyanni joined in with a couple of sorcerers to produce Wolf Briar. They were capturing werewolves from the area, beta males, and hyping them up on steroids in order to kill them, to harvest their pituitary glands and adrenals. We managed to put a stop to the operation and captured several of the main players, but the sorcerers—Van and Jaycee by name—got away. As did some of the Koyanni.”