Page 46 of Property of Crypt Keeper

The room suddenly felt too small. I stepped back from the desk slowly.

“Who the hell is doing this? Who are they?” I demanded, ready to take this to the table to request an all-out search and destroy mission. This touched all of us. Everyone in the club was some breed of supernatural being.

“No female Rougarous have ever existed,” I muttered.

Hack’s expression tightened. “Maybe not naturally.”

The silence after that nearly crushed the room.

Then Hack spoke again. Quietly this time. “The paternity test you took…”

My eyes snapped to him.

He looked genuinely sorry.

“I had them run a few additional tests on Zara’s DNA,” he admitted. “And yours.”

When I glared at him, he raised a hand and continued. “These people owe me favors and they’re discreet. I use them for a reason.”

“What tests?”

“Genetic irregularities. Species markers. Hybridization indicators.”

A bad feeling crawled down my spine. Hack swallowed once. Then said the words that changed everything.

“Whatever Zara is…” He paused, and fury flashed in his gaze. “…someone made her.”

The room went dead silent. No music downstairs. No voices. Nothing. Just the violent pounding of my pulse in my ears. And beneath it—my wolf.

Awake.

Territorial.

Furious.

Because suddenly every instinct inside me was screaming the same thing.

They didn’t just create Zara. They made her for something. Now it was up to me to find out who… what… and why.

“You know I have to tell Boomslang and Killswitch. This is too big. Stretches so far beyond us that it’s not even slightly funny,” he regretfully announced.

Teeth clenched, I nodded. “I know.”

Then I turned on my heel and walked out of the room. I had a few things to take care of for the club today, then tonight, I would pay a little visit to my little demonic prisoner.

12

KATALINA

The wards were getting louder. They’d gone from a soft hum to something like the thundering rattle of a train rushing down the tracks. Or maybe I was just getting tired of listening to them.

Like I had from the minute I realized I wasn’t getting out of here on my own, I sat on the floor of the cell. With my back against the wall, knees bent, and my eyes fixed on the narrow window at the top of the wall where moonlight filtered through the cypress trees outside.

The cuffs around my wrists hummed and vibrated faintly against my skin. It was as though they were suppressing just enough power to be irritating without actually weakening me.

Smart.

Gideon had built this place well. Too well.