Page 55 of Hart's Redemption

“In case you missed the memo, she fucking hates him,” Eric supplied.

Unwilling to accept the only answer we had, Remus pressed. “But wouldn’t exposing him risk exposing herself?”

My shoulders sagged in defeat as the sudden burst of anger left me. I rubbed my forehead against the pounding starting there. “I just don’t understand why she waited so long. It’s been months. Why now?”

Remus’s brow pulled down in a sharp V. “Wait. You didn’t know?”

A fresh wave of anxiety flooded through me. “Didn’t know what?”

“We’ve been searching for the detective for months. We looked everywhere. Ran down all known contacts. Even went to his actual house in upstate Washington.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. He’s been here the whole time. It’s not like he was hiding.” Even as I said it, pieces started clicking into place. Josh’s unwillingness to leave the cottage for anything other than the doctor or the change, and only when he absolutely had to. His evasive answers when I pushed for more. How, no matter what I tried, we always ended up staying home.

Remus shook his head and confirmed my suspicions. “But he was. Detective Hart apparently had a very…uniquemedical plan. The second the hospital scanned him for intake, he went dark. Like dark-dark. It was like he literally fell out of existence. I don’t even want to know how much money it took to secure both a cloaking and an aversion spell that thorough. Though after seeing his house, I imagine he can afford it.”

“But why now? If he had that kind of magic at his disposal, why not just keep it up?”

Remus shrugged. “My best guess is that it was the extent of the spells. Even high-class magic has its limits. Because exactly six months after he vanished, down to the minute, he suddenly popped back up again. A retrieval team was scrambled, and fiveminutes later we walked into the Adler Springs precinct. You already know the rest.”

“‘Walked’ isn’t exactly the way I would put it,” Officer Mack grumbled.

I tuned both of them out as Remus turned to argue semantics with him. The last pieces were falling into place, and it wasn’t making the pill any easier to swallow. Why, today of all days, Josh wanted to clear his desk. His determination not to be anywhere near the cottage. His familiar appearance. The lack of weaponry. How he kept checking the time.

“Son of a badger! He knew. Bastard fucking knew this whole time and never said a word.”

Eric shot me a knowing look.

“Shut up. It’s not the same.”

Eric simply rolled his eyes and looked away. It appeared some things hadn’t changed at all. Josh and I were still absolute shit about sharing important information with each other.

“I have to find him. I won’t let him face this alone.”

Remus nodded. “I’m overdue to report back. I’ll try to find out what I can.” He shouldered his discarded gear, then turned to Tommy. “We’ll find him.”

I couldn’t help but be impressed with how well Remus was handling everything. All things considered, he was doing substantially better than I would have been. I couldn’t even imagine how difficult a conversation he faced telling his family and old pack about his shift in allegiance. Not to mention, he’d disobeyed a direct order from his commanding officer.

“Remus.”

He glanced back at me. “Yeah?”

“Good luck and… thank you.”

His smile was substantially more optimistic than I felt. He clapped Tommy on the shoulder, instinctively recognizing his packmate, and left the cottage.

“I should be going too,” Mack said and quickly scurried out the front door, closing it behind him.

Tommy’s gaze followed them out, then turned back to me and Eric. “Someone want to tell me what the hell is going on?”

Chapter 18

Josh

Therewasnowayto distinguish the passage of time in my cell. No windows to show the sun making its daily rounds across the sky. No clock on the wall. Even my bio-ware was jammed. A painful lesson I’d learned when I’d tried to dial out and met with ear-piercing static. The physician arrived as promised on that first day, examined me, said nothing, and left. Food manifested at regular intervals on the sole table that was magically bolted to the floor. And I had an enchanted pitcher of water that never ran out.

If it weren’t for the change, I’d have no idea that I was coming up on two months of being here. Even though I couldn’t see the moon grow fat, every cell in my body sang with the pendingfull moon. At my current state of restlessness, I estimated I had three days before my next turn. I glanced at the wall that had withstood the fury of a caged wolf with scarcely more than a scratch and rolled my shoulders.

Since I couldn’t work off all of my excess energy on Elijah like before, I did the next best thing and focused my energy into near-constant exercise. Sweat ran down my body as I ran through the forms yet again. I froze mid-attack sequence when the opaque wall suddenly became translucent. It wasn’t the first time someone had come by, but it was the first time a full regiment of soldiers didn't accompany them.