Smoke Bitten (Mercy Thompson, #12)(62)

“One of the invading wolves is Fiona,” I told him. I wasn’t actually sure of her last name, but I didn’t need it.

Bran inhaled, then said, “She’s dead.”

“Nope,” I said. “I just saw her tiny as life about three . . . no, five hours ago. Time flies when you are in the emergency room.” And I shouldn’t have said that last.

“Are you all right?” he demanded.

“Yes.”

“Mercy.”

“Jeez,” I complained, feeling about four. “I broke my nose running my car into a possessed wolf who was hurting one of the pack’s children. Because I broke my nose, she only has a broken wrist and ankle, and the wolf is dead. I’m all right with the results of today.”

“Semantics,” he growled.

“Truth,” I told him. “What can you tell me about Fiona?”

“Stay away from her,” he said.

I hoped he could hear my eyes rolling. “That’s what you told me when I was fourteen. I was hoping for something more useful now that I’m an adult and she’s trying to take over my pack.”

“Don’t roll your eyes at me,” he snapped. “And you were fifteen.”

I looked at the phone. “You remember how old I was?” I asked incredulously.

“It was the day Charles glitter-bombed my office,” Bran said darkly. “Of course I remember.”

“Charles?” There was no way. “Charles glitter-bombed your office.” Cold, scary, efficient, deadly—those were words that suited Charles. That the term “glitter bomb” and Charles’s name were in the same sentence was dumbfounding except maybe in something like “Charles discovered the glitter-bomber’s secret identity and hanged her by her toenails to teach the other people who stole her idea never to do that ever again.”

“Why did he glitter-bomb your office?” I asked.

“It was something I said,” Bran told me. “And not your business. What do you know about Fiona?”

“You told me to stay away from her,” I said, “which left me insatiably curious.”

“Of course it did,” Bran returned dryly. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“Like a carrot in front of a horse,” I agreed. “But no one knew very much. She was your assassin that you sent out to do work that Charles wouldn’t do.”

“Yes,” agreed Bran.

“That she is as deadly as Charles.”

“Differently deadly,” he said. “Charles or Adam could take her in a fight. But she won’t engage them unless she has to. She will use people . . . Charles told me that there were six wolves invading your territory. Since he didn’t mention Fiona—and he would have—are there any others you know of?”

“No. The only ones I have personally seen are James and Nonnie Palsic,” I told him. “Oh. And Lincoln Stuart, but he doesn’t count because he is dead.”

“He is the one you killed?”

“He’s the one I hit with my car. I would have shot him, but there were too many onlookers. James Palsic killed him.” I could see that I had the choice of telling Bran what happened today one sentence at a time, or I could tell him the whole story. Actually, I was probably better off throwing everything into the mix in order to save time.

“I think,” I told him, “that I really need to start with the jackrabbit.”

“If that is what you think,” he said. “Then by all means, start with the jackrabbit.”

He was utterly silent while I was talking—so I really didn’t know how he persuaded me to tell him about Wulfe when I hadn’t intended to. Or Adam’s growing problem with whatever it was that was making him shift without meaning to and that was causing him to close down our mating bond. Or that was what Adam had implied as the reason for closing down our mating bond—sometimes just talking about something out loud pointed out information I’d missed.

I did manage to keep to myself that cold feeling I’d awoken to last night, when only Adam and I had been in the room. I know what it feels like to be the subject of a hunt. To be prey. It could have been my imagination, despite the I’m-sorry breakfast sandwich.

When I finally finished up with Ben scaring Makaya in the basement, I was a little hoarse. I waited for Bran’s response. It took long enough that I checked my phone to make sure we were still connected. I’d feel pretty stupid if I’d spent the last hour talking to myself.

“Bran?” I asked. “Are you still there?”

“Tell Adam to kill Fiona, whenever and wherever he gets a chance,” he answered briskly. “She is selling her services to the highest bidder. She doesn’t share her money with a team, so the others are probably useful tools. She does not make a good ally for anyone or anything she is not terrified of. If she has made, as you are concerned about, an alliance with the smoke weaver—proceed with caution.”

“You said that she was supposed to be dead,” I said as I wondered who Fiona was working for—and didn’t like the obvious answer much. There were other people who wanted us dead besides the witches. She had been sincere when she told me that Adam and I could take three of our people and leave—so maybe she was here to create a base for herself, a pack independent from the Marrok and too important to his schemes for him to destroy.