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who were dumb enough to come onto his land.”
     
    Dumb…like the deputies were being dumb then? To just race right up to the werewolf compound…like lambs to a slaughter.
     
    “We all know he’s…been with you.” Ken’s voice faded a bit. “The vamps could see the mark he left on you. One of ‘em told Viki Thomas—”
     
    Viki Thomas, the first victim they’d found slaughtered and staked out right between vampire and werewolf land.
     
    “Word got back to me,” Ken said. Strange, the guy was sounding less afraid and more too-damn-confident. “I knew you wouldn’t believe anything I had to say about the wolves turning bad, not when—”
     
    Not when you were screwing the alpha.
Yeah, she could finish the guy’s sentence for him.
     
    “But with the blood moon coming, there was no time to waste! I had to get the others ready to fight.”
     
    The others…the other deputies that Ken must have brought over to his side. The others in town who’d been all too willing to believe that the big, bad wolves were killers who had to be put down.
     
    How many folks from Crossroads were helping him? How many believed this crap he was trying to sell her?
     
    “Come to me!” Ken cried out.
     
    Really? This was the kid who’d vomited at the Powell crime scene? The guy was a good actor, she’d give him that. He must have shoved his finger down his throat at that scene. Must have made himself sick when she hadn’t been looking because Ava would lay odds he’d been involved in that brutal kill.
     
    “I can save you!” he promised her.
     
    Ava laughed. “Funny thing there, Ken…I don’t want to be saved.”
     
    Silence.
     
    Then…gunfire. One shot. Two. Three.
     
    Ava risked another glance just in time to see three of her deputies—Jonathan, Lyle, and Pat—hit the ground. Ken, with his gun still up and aimed, glanced to her window.
     
    “Hope you’re happy,” he snarled at her. “Cause you just blew the whole fuckin’ bit about us being here to rescue you.”
     
    Pat’s arm was trembling.
Still alive.
Oh, jeez, all the deputies hadn’t turned against her. They’d bought into Ken’s lies but—
     
    Ken brought his arm around and fired up at her.
     
    Ava slammed onto the floor even as glass shattered from the window pane. The glass cut into her, drawing blood, and that just pissed her off.
     
    Ava rolled, knocked off the glass, and brought her own weapon up. She looked down for Ken.
     
    Gone.
     
    In the distance, wolves were howling. Whatever distraction Ken had planned, well, looked like it was over and the cavalry was coming home.
     
    But coming home to what? Ken was down there, armed, and all her deputies always used silver in their guns.
     
    No.
     
    “Julian, stay back!”
She screamed. He’d hear her. She knew it. Hear her, but probably still charge right into danger and ignore the warning.
     
    No way. That wolf wasn’t dying on her watch.
     
    She glanced down again. No sign of Ken now. Had he gone into the house? Or was he just waiting for her to climb down?
     
    “H-help…” Pat’s cry. So weak. Full of pain. Blood was pooling beneath him. If he was alive, maybe one of the other deputies was, too.
     
    But how long could they last?
     
    “Pl-please…”
Pat begged.
     
    A trap. She realized that. Ken had just tossed out live bait to pull her in. She could stay in the bedroom, nice and safe, until the wolves arrived or—
     
    Or she could help those dying.
     
    More howls. Coming too close now. Coming fast because the scent of blood would lure in their beasts.
     
    Death was here. The showdown wouldn’t occur with the darkness of Halloween. It had come at dawn, and it bathed them in blood.
     
    “Please…h-help…”
     
    Her duty was to protect. To shield.
     
    “Ken, you bastard,” she sucked in a deep breath, “come at me, and you’re dead.”
     
    And Ava went through the window.
     
    ***
     
    No!
Julian saw her jump, saw Ava hit the ground, and even over