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  ‘Yeah, but hippies don’t wear shoes, do they?’ Bowden asked.

  She ignored the comment, not sure if he was being serious or trying to make some sort of grim joke. She drew her attention back to the body. In her darkest hours, she’d imagined returning to the sanctuary of Camden, wanting more than anything to put the trauma of last year behind her. But staring at the body of an unidentified murdered woman, she couldn’t help wondering if violence was a part of who she was, slinking after her like a dark shadow.

  Footsteps approached from behind her, making soft squelching sounds against the damp moss. She straightened and glanced back, seeing a thin man with a pencil moustache and a large bag grasped in one hand. His sharp eyes pinned Lydia.

  ‘I trust you’ve had the good sense not to disturb anything,’ he said.

  Her eyebrows snapped down. ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Jacob, this is Constable Lydia Gault.’ Bowden blew on his hands, breath puffing steam around his knuckles. He nodded at the thin man. ‘Constable, this is Jacob Anglo. He’s a medical examiner.’

  ‘Only here on sabbatical.’ Anglo pursed his lips, staring at the body on the ground.

  ‘He’s writing a memoir.’ Bowden winked at her. ‘We’re pretty damned lucky he’s around.’

  ‘Lucky for who,’ Lydia muttered under her breath.

  ‘I’d like your officer away from my body,’ Anglo instructed Bowden. ‘I don’t want her contaminating the scene.’

  ‘Easy on there.’ Bowden raised his hands in mock surrender. ‘Lydia here worked on the force on the mainland. I just asked her for some impressions.’

  ‘It’s fine.’ Lydia peeled off her gloves. ‘I’ll get out of the way.’

  She stalked off, back stiff and jaw tight. She’d met posturing men with big egos before and they didn’t scare her, but Anglo was still a self-righteous prick, acting like she was kicking shit over the body. She reached the mud-splattered police Ford Ranger and took deep breaths. Easy Lydia, she told herself. You came here to take it easy, remember? Maybe it was exactly what Bowden said, a hunting accident. Sure. And maybe she’d win lotto.

  ‘You okay?’

  She turned to see the blond firefighter, still wearing that annoying sad look on his face, like he understood something of what she was going through. She doubted he would have been wearing that expression if she were a man. Her eyes flicked behind him. His mates by the fire truck were watching and nudging each other with wide grins.

  So. She was fresh meat, was she? She fixed him with a scorching glare. ‘Why wouldn’t I be okay?’

  ‘I dunno.’ His high cheekbones flushed rosy and his feet shifted awkwardly. He stuck a hand out. ‘My name’s Jamie. Jamie McCormick.’

  She ignored the hand and stared pointedly behind him. ‘I think your friends want your attention.’

  He glanced back and swore, then gave her a sheepish expression. ‘They think I’m going to ask you on a date.’

  ‘Which would hardly be appropriate.’ Her look flipped from inferno hot to glacial cold.

  He muttered something she didn’t catch, then slunk back to the fire truck, where his fellow volunteers chuckled and patted him on the back. Lydia ignored them, rubbing her arms, the stiff material of her jacket rustling under her palms, and watched Anglo take photographs of the dead woman. Bowden stood to one side, one hand repeatedly rubbing the back of his neck and wearing a puzzled expression, as if he couldn’t figure how such a thing could happen in this quiet northeastern town. Camden was a quaint little town with apple orchards on its edge and rolling hills wherever you turned. Just a two-hour drive from Launceston on the Tasman Highway, it was a region known for fresh fruit, dark ales and creamy cheese. Not cold-blooded killing.

  But Lydia knew from firsthand experience that anyone was capable of becoming a monster and killing. She’d just hoped it wouldn’t happen here.

  She climbed into the car and pulled out a notebook from her jacket, scribbling down notes about the body she’d observed. Anglo didn’t want her help, but she didn’t care. While she knew nothing about her absent father, her mother had been part Polish, part German and a whole lot of stubborn, something Lydia had inherited.

  Camden might be a small town surrounded by mountains and pine plantations, but procedures were the same, no matter where you lived. Bowden was going to get a report from her, whether he wanted it or not.

  Chapter 2

  ‘Freshen that drink for you, Bulldog?’

  Jericho looked down at the whiskey glass in his hand, surprised to see it was empty. Behind the bar of Dusty Roads, one of the Diablo Dogs prospects, Winger, waited with an expectant look. Jericho shook his head, though his mouth was dry enough for another. But he couldn’t drink much, couldn’t afford to lose the control he needed at all times.

  Sunrise had begun streaming through the grimy windows of the bar and he blinked against the glow, eyes gritty as the past night stretched long behind him, full of nightmares and murder. When he’d returned from digging Lance’s grave, he’d showered the blood and dirt off in the staff bathroom in the back of the bar, and though he’d rubbed his skin raw with soap in the shower, he still felt dirty. The only good thing to come from the night was the realisation the blood on Lance had been animal, most likely a cow from a nearby dairy farm.

  Still holding his glass, Jericho leaned against the bar to survey the mixed crowd inside the Dusty Roads Saloon: messy leftovers from the night before and truckers looking for a greasy breakfast special before taking off on their Monday-morning trips. According to Winger, last night had been profitable, complete with a rowdy hen’s party making an appearance at midnight.

  ‘Trying to blend in with the locals?’ Winger quipped from behind him. Jericho knew the prospect was just wondering why he wasn’t wearing his cut, and while the question was innocent enough, it drove a spike of fresh regret through him. He almost reconsidered that second drink.

  ‘Something like that,’ he murmured, not turning around. The blood-drenched fight had been brutal. Lance had gotten close enough to tear through Jericho’s vest, his claws shredding his clothes and leaving deep gouges on his chest. Turk, the vice-president of the Diablo Dogs, had assured him he’d organise a replacement, but Jericho knew it wouldn’t be the same. The loss of his cut added to the sense of failure, along with the fresh blisters on his hands from digging Lance’s forest grave, a task he performed alone, every time. He knew the men at the Dog House would be even more unsettled now, and while everyone knew the consequences of losing themselves to the madness that dogged the virus, Lance’s fall had driven the hard message home. Control. At all times, or suffer the ultimate consequence.

  A rowdy bark of laughter drew his attention to a handful of out-of-town bikers who had had roared in twenty minutes ago. They’d ordered a round of fried eggs and bacon from the kitchen and had settled back with breakfast beers. Jericho recognised their cuts; an outlaw club called the Slayers. They came from the north, and occasionally got the bright idea of forming an allegiance with the Dogs. A powerful club, the Slayers had many chapters around the world, operating a gauntlet of trades: from chop shops to illegal brothels, with a brisk business in the production and trade of methamphetamine.

  Jericho had turned down their offer of joining forces twice last year. The second refusal had been done with enough force to knock one of the biker’s front teeth out after he’d been stupid enough to make threats. After all, the purpose of the Diablo Dogs MC was only to act as a massive ‘fuck off’ to anyone who got too interested in the compound nestled deep in the thick pine forest that hemmed the bar. The club was a necessary cover, set up twenty years ago by the previous Head Rehabilitator, and as time passed, the club had become an important part of the members’ identities, and a symbol of strength to those they helped.

  Jericho sighed. He’d hoped the brawl last time would be the end of the matter, but it seemed the Slayers wanted to poke the hornet’s nest one more time and that was a shitstorm he didn’t need. He wat
ched the Slayers make eyes at Reaper and Frost playing pool at the back of the bar and knew from the way they carried themselves that a fight was inevitable.

  Jericho tapped a couple of fingers against his empty glass, thick platinum rings clinking, blisters stinging. The Dusty Roads Saloon had a reputation for being a rough bar, but he had strict rules about fighting. The rehab centre was mostly funded by charity donated by wealthy Breed families, those with pure lines who saw themselves as a class higher than the unfortunate souls who got infected with the virus through a bite. Mutts was the term the full-blooded families used. Jericho knew this because he’d been called it often enough in the royal court when he’d served as an Enforcer. But the King he’d served had not allowed this bigotry to cloud his judgement, and he’d seen something special in Jericho when he’d applied for the role of Enforcer. He’d gotten the job and the King’s kindness, along with his indifference to Jericho’s position as a mutt, was something he’d never forget.

  Of course, the money donated was never enough and the shortfall was made up by what the bar brought in, with pocket change from Turk’s tattooing business attached to the side of the bar, and Reaper’s appearances in cage-fight gigs that popped up around the region. With nearly twenty-five mouths to feed back at the compound, every dollar was accounted for, so it was important people felt they could walk out alive from the bar. More important still, they came back with friends.

  Two women with hair teased high and skirts too short stumbled up to the bar, looking like they were reluctant to call it a night. Their hips swayed to Jimi Hendrix wailing out of the jukebox, and one of the women gave Jericho a pointed look with hungry eyes. She stepped over and draped a hand on his shoulder, smiling with lipstick-smeared teeth, breath a wash of sour wine.

  ‘Buy you a drink?’

  ‘Not tonight.’ Jericho shifted away and her hand dropped. Disappointment pulled the corners of her mouth and her bottom lip stuck out, as if she thought pouting would change his mind.

  He put his empty glass down on the bar and stepped away. He had other things on his mind, and a random fuck out the back of the bar wasn’t one of them. Though some release of the tension might have been welcome, violence permeated the air, drawn from the burning looks the Slayers were throwing Reaper and Frost. He needed to stay sharp. His gaze narrowed when one of the Slayers made a show of standing, hitching jeans up under a hanging beer belly. With a smirk, he sauntered over to Reaper and tapped the big man on the shoulder. Reaper turned slowly, brow furrowed, as the Slayer spoke to him in a low voice. Soon the two men were arguing.

  Jericho felt a trickle of surprise that Reaper was talking at all. A born brawler with a body covered in some serious ink after a prison stint, he was a natural as the club’s sergeant-at-arms, physical violence as instinctive to him as breathing. Jericho supposed his warnings about fighting with civilians had finally sunk through Reaper’s stubborn skull. He watched as thick cords popped out on Reaper’s neck, shifting the sinister tattoos of skulls and flames as he made a valiant effort to restrain himself.

  ‘Bulldog.’

  Jericho turned, seeing Winger point to where a tall woman had just entered. She wore a cowboy shirt and tight Levis with a thick leather belt. Her raven hair was long and her broad, tanned face was free from makeup. She crooked a finger at Jericho, then crossed the bar and disappeared down the corridor towards his office.

  He frowned. Karla Malthus rarely ventured out from the female-populated rehab centre she presided over a few miles outside of Camden. Like the Dog House, the female centre was far enough from town to discourage curiosity. Called Crystal Waters, it masqueraded as a hippie commune for abused women, and while it didn’t have the elaborate and marginally paranoid security that the Dog House compound did, the sprawling ranch house was surrounded by lookouts and top-grade security.

  ‘You want me to get Turk?’ Winger asked. Jericho was impressed the prospect had the wits to recognise that he rarely met with Karla alone. He knew from experience a witness always came in handy when dealing with full-blooded Breed, especially a spoiled princess who rarely liked to dirty her hands by assisting the Dog House.

  ‘He’s with a customer,’ Jericho rumbled, recalling a nervous redheaded kid being ushered into the cramped room Turk used as his tattoo shop. ‘I’ll deal with it.’

  Confident his crew would follow his no-fighting policy as best they could, he moved to follow Karla to the back office when Lipstick Teeth got in his way, wobbling on her heels. ‘Sure I can’t change your mind about that drink, handsome?’ she breathed, cocking one hip to the side so far Jericho thought he heard something pop.

  ‘Sorry honey, I’ve business elsewhere.’ He manoeuvred smoothly around her, feeling her eyes pinned to his back. Females were drawn to his kind, and even though he bore a mark of shame on his face, he found it easy to attract women. There was something about a male Breed scent and bearing: the heady promise of unrelenting, bone-shaking, window-shattering sex in its rawest form, unfettered by polite necessities. Though Jericho wasn’t averse to seeking his release every now and then, now wasn’t the time. Not with the King’s sister waiting for him.

  * * *

  Thomas Coulter stepped wearily off the private airplane and dropped his heavy backpack on the ground. Stretching out his back and yawning, he admired the white-topped mountains in the distance that bordered three sides of Camden. The scenery touched old memories, reminding him of the last time he was here, a time when he had the ideals and fire of youth at his fingertips. Back then, his fellow Hunters had nicknamed the small Tasmanian town the Witches Cauldron, due to the rather surprising discovery of a thriving coven. The Hunters had at first thought the witches were neutral, until they’d assisted the werewolves here to broker peace and sealed it with magic. After that, any Hunters within the region died within months from heart failure and it had been enough for them to beat a hasty retreat and agree to uphold the treaty. The agreement had extended around the world in a shaky peace between the two races.

  But that had been twenty-two years ago, and after the key players of the coven had been neutralised there had been little more evidence of any active magic within the town. Coulter had certainly felt no overt signs of being cursed for being a Hunter and entering Camden’s borders. Until now, of course.

  He yawned again, thoughts of the past making him feel old and exhausted. The trip had been long, and despite sleeping a little on the private plane, he wanted nothing more than to lay down for another eight hours to recover. At the very least, he needed a bracing cup of tea before he could sit through a debrief with Camden’s resident Hunter.

  A man in a thick coat and a baseball hat marched briskly towards him. Coulter picked up his bag and moved forward to greet the Hunter, caution colouring his thoughts. For the last few years, the reports from Camden had been nothing out of the ordinary. But in the last six months they had turned erratic and disjointed. Coulter had noticed and hastily began to intercept them before his Hunter could be red flagged. After all, this was his little project and it had taken him many years to convince the Association of Hunters that one of their own was needed in Camden to keep an eye on the Breed population. But there were many who feared that if his Hunter was discovered, their defiance of the treaty would reignite the war with the Breed, and they had shied away from his proposal. Some had even feared the wrath of any remaining witches within the town. Coulter knew there were a few scattered about, but certainly not enough to create another coven. And a witch on her own was just a vulnerable, weak old woman.

  Fortunately, he’d managed to sway their vote in his favour, with promises of a secure and covert operation, along with assurances that with the old coven gone, the magic was too. He’d even handpicked a fresh recruit and inserted him into the town, his own eyes and ears. But now something had gone wrong and a female Breed was dead. Wondering if the witches’ curse had taken hold somehow, manifesting itself in a different fashion, Coulter fixed a smile on his face and shook the Hunter’
s hand.

  ‘Welcome to Camden,’ the Hunter said. ‘Hope your flight was a good one.’

  ‘It was just fine,’ Coulter said. It would take more than a long flight from Heathrow to shake him.

  The Hunter gestured to his Jeep. ‘I’ll take you to your accommodation, I’ve also arranged your own transportation.’

  ‘Very good,’ Coulter said as they headed towards a mud-splattered Jeep parked by the hangar. ‘I also need you to locate someone for me. A woman by the name of Lydia Gault. I understand she’s just received a constable posting here.’

  ‘Yes, I’ve met her.’ The Hunter’s voice was curious. ‘She’s new in town.’

  ‘I want a residential address and number.’

  ‘Is she a problem?’

  Coulter heard interest in the Hunter’s voice. ‘No,’ he said firmly. ‘Just some personal business.’

  ‘Is she family?’ the Hunter asked, surprising Coulter with the accuracy of his guess.

  ‘Yes,’ Coulter replied stiffly. ‘She’s my niece.’

  ‘Didn’t know you had family ties here,’ the Hunter said.

  Coulter didn’t reply. The less this man knew about Lydia, the better, especially since he was entertaining the idea of recruiting her to take over surveillance duties here.

  The fact that his own brother and a fellow Hunter, had fathered a child with one of the witches in Camden had been a scandal quickly swept under the rug by the Association. As far as Coulter knew, Lydia had no knowledge of her Wiccan and Hunter heritage, and after his brother had been killed in a car accident Coulter had taken it upon himself to keep an eye on her, following her academic path, then her career in the police force. And now she’d returned to her hometown, and he was curious as to why.

  He drew in a long breath, the brisk air rejuvenating his foggy mind, and beneath his exhaustion, excitement stirred. Beyond the plan to rid himself of the clearly unbalanced Hunter here and hopefully recruiting Lydia to take his place, there was another reason he’d taken the long, exhausting flight from the Association’s headquarters in London: rumours the current ruling Breed King was planning a visit to Camden. His objective, therefore, was to not only evaluate his Hunter and ascertain what action was required, but also obtain more information on when the King was coming here and why.