“Thanks
for coming.” Dolf sat at the table in his office, the betas sitting around him. “Before
we start, I want to update everyone on the construction on the jail. Tal and
his crew finished up, and it passed inspection. We’re officially open, and Marshell
is in charge.”
“Will
it be opened full time? Do we, I don’t know, have shifts there?” Remi asked.
“Yes,
it will. I’ll be interviewing for positions to help him out so I don’t foresee
a need for my betas to be there. There are only a few cells, but if there’s a
crime committed that’s significant enough, I’ll send that person on to the
Territory Leader to deal with. Think of it as a holding tank.”
“What’s
he going to do when the place is empty?” Brier asked.
“Running
applications for admittance into the clowder, coordinating with me for clowder
related issues, and things like that,” Dolf said. “I’ll keep him busy.”
Heller
grinned. “So, he’s an administrative assistant?”
“Don’t
bust his balls. He’ll help me keep things running smoothly from behind a
computer,” Dolf said. “Marshell won’t hold the title of beta, but I will depend
on him.”
“He’s
reduced his hours at the shop for this too.” Janelle wrinkled her nose. “When
the elders find out what he’s doing, they won’t be happy.”
“Yes,
well, they can add it to the list of things they’re unhappy with.” Dolf’s eyes
flashed blue for a second. “Moving along. The reason I called this meeting is
because Sam noticed an odd scent on a dumpster at his restaurant, Arches. I
sent Brier to investigate. It appears we had an unknown werecat in the
territory, which, by itself, isn’t worrisome. Intruders usually move on. The
problem is this werecat had no personal scent marker.”
Remi
whistled. “Whoa.”
“Indeed.
Brier? Would you repeat what you told me?”
“Yes,
Alpha. The first thing I noticed was the faded scent of a werecat, but it was generic.
There were stronger chemical-based notes—oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, and
water. As you all know, that’s the basic composition of humans, but this was no
human,” Brier said. “This was a werecat, but it had no personal marker and—”
“Are
you sure this werecat didn’t have a scent? Because, you know, we all do.”
“—and
yes, I’m positive. I know we all have one, Heller. This one didn’t,” Brier continued.
“Trust me, it’s not something you can miss.”
Janelle
shook her head. “Sam found it first and said it confused his cat. Left him feeling
territorial. Kinda pissed. It bothered him, which was why he brought it our
Alpha’s attention.”
Dolf folded his hands
on the table. “Which begs the question: How does a werecat not have a personal scent? I’ve never heard of such."
