Page 102 of The Alpha’s Unclaimed Mate

“Your mother and her are undisturbed. I removed a small portion of the grave to check.” He looks nauseous as he says it. Disturbing a shifter’s resting place is akin to disturbing their spirit.

I force my attention on the two empty graves, and a hot wave of grief and anger washes over me. “How long ago do you think—?”

“Years.” Adrian crouches on the other side. “The soil was settled back. Grass grew over both of them. Whoever did this did it a long time ago and let the ground heal.”

I sit back in the dirt. For a second I can’t do anything but breathe. My thoughts are a tangled mess. So all this time I’ve been coming to the empty graves of my family members.

As my emotions rise within me, I tamp them down. This isn’t the time to get worked up. I need to focus on this situation. I force the grief and rage somewhere deep inside.

“Why take them?” I grit out. “What possible reason—?”

“The wolfsbane,” Adrian says suddenly, and I freeze.

I meet his gaze, and his jaw is clenched. “You said that wolfsbane leaves its mark, right? For anyone who knows what to look for, it’s evidence.”

I purse my lips. Bastards. They knew I’d come looking at some point, so they got rid of the bodies.

“This is proof, isn’t it?” Adrian persists. “They were trying to hide evidence that wolfsbane was used against two alphas of this pack.”

“Maybe,” I murmur. “But something isn’t adding up. If they are going after alphas, my uncle might be a target as well. We’ll have to talk to him.”

“I don’t think he would make an easy target.” Adrian frowns. “He has a lot more security than your father or Daniel ever chose to have. He’s surrounded himself with people he trusts. But he could still be a potential target.”

“Someone was able to get close enough to both my father and my brother to poison them. One of our own. And since we know the hunters have access to wolfsbane, we know they are involved.” It’s hard to connect dots right now when all my wolf wants to do is track down those who desecrated my family’s graves. “But destabilizing the leadership of a shifter pack is not without its own consequences, and the hunters know that. Without an alpha, a pack is more prone to increasing violence and producing more rogues. Why would hunters do that?”

I can’t figure it out.

It’s like there’s something I’m not seeing, something that’s so obvious, but my mind keeps side-stepping it.

“They didn’t take Hannah or your mother because they weren’t being poisoned then.” Adrian looks at me cautiously.

“Without the bodies, we have no proof of the poisoning, Adrian,” I point out heavily. “This is all speculation at this point.”

“Speculation that makes sense.” Adrian scowls.

“The knowledge that wolfsbane can be detected is something only alphas are taught. How would hunters know anything about it?” The question is bothering me.

“By testing it.” My friend looks furious. “The same way they were able to use it as a slow-acting poison, learning how much and how often, then sooner or later they’d learn what it leaves behind.” He looks at the graves. “They’d know to clean up after themselves. If they believe our kind knows about the existence of wolfsbane, it can spark another war between us and the hunters. We have to discuss this with your uncle.” Adrian studies me. “The bodies of two alphas are missing, Marcus. We can’t just—”

“You’re right.” I agree heavily. “I’ll talk to him. Alone. Gather all the information, I need it substantial in hand. Send me everything tonight.”

He holds my eyes a long beat and then nods. “I’ll put the dirt back.”

“No.” I shake my head. “Leave it as it is. You go.”

Adrian looks at me a beat longer, then sighs and walks off into the trees.

I stay. I can’t make my legs walk away from the two open holes, so I sit back down in the grass between them, and with nobody here to see, I put my head in my hands. My father and my brother, somewhere I can’t find them.

A branch shifts on the far side of the clearing, low and careful, a foot set down by something that doesn’t want to be heard. My head comes up. The wind turns a breath later, laying his scent across the graves, gun oil over cold sweat. I have him before he’s out of the trees. I’ve smelled him twice on the edges of my land, and I saw him once through a windshield, thirty yards from Jessa’s building. Kylan. The man who runs the hunters in this county.

I don’t think. I’m across the graves and on him before he clears the last tree.

He throws an arm up, and I smash it aside. My knuckles crack across his jaw, snapping his head around, and he grunts as I drag him back by the coat for the next one.

“You bastard.” I hit him again, and he nearly dodges it. He’s fast for a human, but it’s useless. I want him bleeding over my brother’s empty grave.

He gets one back, a punch off my temple I don’t feel. Does he think he stands a chance against an alpha-born?