Alpha Omega 03 - Fair Game

anything?”
    Leslie shrugged. “Why do the fae do anything, Nick? Maybe they don’t want to draw attention or encourage a copycat. Maybe they didn’t notice.”
    “So the killer was out shooting fae and decided to hit a couple of werewolves, too.”
    “That’s the latest theory Craig and I subscribe to.”
    “What about the werewolves? Will they help us? Do we want their help?”
    Leslie tapped the side of her foot on the floor. “The guy is Native American and big. He stood back and didn’t say a word he didn’t have to. All of us in that room were doing everything we could not to pay attention to him because he was that scary.”
    “Scary how? Cold? Crazy?”
    Leslie frowned at her boss. “Like you get when you are trying to intimidate someone we’re questioning—only not so deliberate.”
    “Thousand-yard stare?”
    “Yeah,” Leslie agreed. “He’s seen some blood somewhere.” And the thing that had been bothering her about the pair of werewolves coalesced. “The girl who is his wife, she looks so sweet she ought to be attracting honeybees. Innocent. Even Jim Pierce was feeling protective around her; you could see it in his body posture—and Dr. Singh deliberately distracted the Cantrip agents when they got in her face and tried to intimidate her. And you know Singh.”
    “You think she was faking it?”
    Leslie shook her head. “No. Not really. But both of the werewolves looked at photos of dead bodies and didn’t bat an eyelash. Granted we didn’t show the bad ones in full color, but the old police black-and-whites are pretty nasty.”
    “You think they’ve spent some time looking at dead bodies,” Nick said. “You think they’re killers.”
    She nodded. “Him, yes. He has that…that look. You have it. A lot of the armed forces guys have it. I think he could have killed us all and not given it another thought. As for her…” She frowned, trying to get a better handle on it. “Have you ever worked with Lee Jennings? The guy the Behavior Analysis Unit sends to interview the nasty guys in prison?”
    Nick frowned. “Yes.”
    “He’s pretty unremarkable. I like him a lot, and so does everyone else who’s worked with him. And the reason they send him into the prisons with the scum of the earth and the crazies is because they like him, too. They fall all over themselves to give him whatever information he asks for.”
    Nick raised his chin and his face went still. “Right. She’s like that?”
    Leslie nodded. “Her husband didn’t say more than two or three words,but he dominated the room. The only one not intimidated was Craig—and he just wasn’t looking. I’d bet Charles Smith is an Alpha of some pack we don’t know about.”
    “Intimidating.”
    She nodded again. “He was playing muscle, I think. But she didn’t treat him that way.” Why did she think that? “He came in late with coffee for all of us—she’d sent him out so she could explain to us how to make the matter easier for him.”
    “To keep everyone safe?”
    Leslie shook her head. “She said so, but I got the distinct impression she was a lot more worried about him than she was any of us. It was the standard stuff—don’t meet his eyes if you can help it. No aggressive moves. The only new thing was that we weren’t supposed to try to touch her at all. I expected a wild-eyed maniac, and the man who came in was tight, controlled, and at ease. He looked like he conducted meetings with the federal government every day of his life.”
    “And that made you think he was running the show behind the scenes?”
    “No. That’s not all of it. Body language said she respected him and deferred to his judgment. She was in front, but he was more than just backup.”
    “So do we invite them in?”
    “She pointed out that our killer took out werewolves. Taking out werewolves, I gather and surmise, is akin to taking out a SEAL team. This UNSUB has been hunting fae and coming out—as far as we know—unscathed. Do we have a choice?”
    “The FBI has some fae on payroll. We have a choice. You met them and you’re damn near the best agent I have for reading people. What do you think?”
    Leslie sighed loudly. “I like her. I told you. And he is…competent—he’s got that air. The one that says, ‘I’ve seen a lot and made it out alive.’ They won’tcost us anything, so the budget will be happy. But”—she held up a finger—”he’s not going to take orders.”
    Nick nodded his head and did his