She couldn’t imagine what it would have been like to not have him around all these years. She wasn’t sure she’d otherwise be the person she was today. Wasn’t sure she’d be as strong and confident and capable.
“You have to at least consider that I could be right,” said Noelle, snapping Blair out of her thoughts.
“I won’t believe that anyone from the Olympus Pride pulled any of the recent bullshit, let alone killed Macy,” Blair firmly stated.
“I can understand why you wouldn’t want to believe it, but your mother could be onto something here, Blair,” said Antoine. “You know Luke well. You know his family well. But you don’t know every pride member that well. I’m sure they’ve all been nice to you, but that doesn’t mean they’re thinking nice things about you. Let’s face it, they’ll be leery of offending their Beta male by slighting you.
“It doesn’t necessarily follow that they’d rather you weren’t part of the pride, true, but there could be some people that don’t. And just maybe one of them decided to do something about it. Just maybe they thought they’d scare you into sticking close to home, and they attached the bow to Macy so we’d finger your admirer. It’s a theory we should at least explore. It would do no good to dismiss people as possible suspects just because the idea of them being responsible is … is … I mean …” Antoine trailed off as she simply stared at him. Shifting slightly, he averted his gaze.
It really was amazing just how uncomfortable people could get when you merely stared at them without saying a word. It wasn’t simply that, in Mitch’s words, she had a “death stare.” For some, it was that they hated not knowing what you were thinking. For others, it was that receiving no feedback made them feel dismissed. Then there were those whose nerves just couldn’t handle dead silence.
“It wasn’t anyone from the Olympus Pride,” Blair insisted after a moment. “Even if someone there did think to scare me like this, they wouldn’t know to use the bow as a ‘red herring’ when they have no clue I’ve been receiving gifts with red bows attached. Embry asked me not to tell them.” Which wasn’t the true reason she’d kept quiet, but still. “He promised he’d get to the bottom of who was sending the gifts, despite that he felt I should be flattered that someone is so interested in me they’d risk Luke’s wrath by trying to ‘court’ me.”
Her parents had been equally dismissive of the situation. Neither Antoine nor Donal had thought there was any need for concern either, but they did feel that if a woman didn’t want to be pursued then she should damn well not be pursued. So they’d accompanied her as she questioned their pack mates and searched for answers. Mitch and Kiesha—both of whom were not happy about the gifts—had also been at her side. But the investigations had come to nothing.
Embry notched up his chin. “I did look into the matter.”
“But you didn’t take it seriously,” Blair pointed out. “Yeah, I get why you dismissed the first gift I received as someone’s idea of a weird-ass joke. And yeah, I understand why you also initially dubbed the strange phone calls silly pranks. But the longer it all went on, the more uneasy I got. You, however, carried on dismissing everything—including my concerns.
“You can’t ignore the obvious any longer, Embry. None of you can. The person doing all this isn’t merely a shy admirer or an idiotic prankster. They killed someone. And if the bow is anything to go by, they did it because they thought I’d be thankful. That screams ‘messed up in the head.’”
“She’s right,” said Mitch, thrusting his fingers through short hair the exact shade of blond that both he and Blair had inherited from their father. “This is some sociopathic shit right here.”
Les held up his hand. “We don’t know for sure that the same person is responsible for all those things.”
Kiesha folded her arms. “It would be a hell of a coincidence if she had a prankster, an oddball admirer, and a person willing to kill for her all focused on her at the same time.”
Noelle cleared her throat. “If you’re right and we’re sticking with Blair’s theory that this is unrelated to the Olympus Pride … well, the perpetrator can only be Gabriel.”
A short silence hit the room. Blair swallowed. She hadn’t seen her childhood friend since he left the pack at the age of ten. He’d never been far away, though. And he’d found ways to let her know he was close.
Antoine’s dark eyes widened, and his arm slipped away from the fire mantel as he straightened. “You can’t be serious.”
Noelle sighed. “I know he’s your cousin, but you can’t pretend he isn’t capable of this. Of worse.”