passages that are already made or squirm through the loose dirt as long as we know where to go.”
Looking at Quinn, Paige asked, “Why can’t you take him?”
“Because I lead this pack and our home is under siege. I don’t have the time to crawl underground at a snail’s pace just to drag one human to safety. We’ve been wearing ourselves to the bone to keep as much of this town alive as possible. We risked our necks to save you three because we need help to make sure everyone in this place isn’t destroyed. If you’d rather take a few months to learn all the ins and outs of tunneling so you can take your friend yourself, you’re welcome to it.”
Nadya didn’t need lessons in wriggling through Mongrel tunnels. Paige knew that much after listening to Cole’s stories about the Amriany using spiked wrist braces to pull themselves through the confined spaces. That didn’t mean Nadya knew how to navigate a dirt maze with her eyes closed.
Staring directly into the feline’s eyes, the Amriany asked, “What is your name?”
“Gail.”
“Tell me if you can keep him safe, Gail.”
Sensing the importance of her words, Gail nodded once and said, “I can’t promise anything for him or me, but I’m the best shot your friend has.”
Nadya sized up the Mongrel in a matter of seconds. “I’ll help you get him ready, but I want to know where he winds up.”
Already sifting through the clutter beneath a dusty workbench, Quinn said, “She’ll send word to me when she gets there and we’ll tell you about it as soon as we can. Here,” she added once she’d found a coil of rope. “Get him secured and then we’ll get out. Those Half Breeds are closing in fast.”
As Nadya helped Milosh to his feet and held him steady, Gail stood with her back pressed against his chest while Quinn tied him to her. Within a minute or two rope was looped under Gail’s arms and around her waist to form a makeshift harness. The Mongrel shifted into her four-legged form, which added enough bulk to tighten the harness as well as support Milosh’s weight when she crawled to the wall Quinn had been monitoring. The feline’s claws extended farther out from her hands and sank into the vertical surface. Although her scraping dislodged plenty of dirt, most of it merely shifted within the wall and allowed Gail to squirm inside. There was something else keeping that wall from collapsing. When the Mongrel’s head got to within an inch of the wall, the dirt compacted as if being pushed by something and even moved aside before it made contact with her fur. But Paige wasn’t inclined to try and figure it out. Sometimes it was best to let the experts do their thing.
“All right,” she said. “You wanted our help. Did you have something specific in mind?”
“The Full Bloods have been paying special attention to a house on Montana Avenue,” Quinn said as heavy bodies charged down the street above them. Judging by the scrapes and fleeting impacts, the Half Breeds were most likely scrambling across the roof in their haste to jump over the garage. “They can’t track us by scent as long as we stay underground. There are precautions we can take for you two, but the Full Bloods’ senses seem to have gotten even stronger than normal. The moment we come up, they will know where we are.”
“Which means you can’t check out that house,” Paige said.
“Right.”
“As long as it involves leaving this freaking basement, count me in.”
Chapter Nineteen
Atoka wasn’t a large place, but traveling by foot went a long way in shifting someone’s perspective. Quinn and another digger could only take them as far as West Fourth Street. As Paige and Nadya headed toward Montana Avenue, she swore the town tripled in size. Every step she took was stuffed with worry that it might be too loud. Even when her foot managed to land without kicking anything or crunching on something else, there was a legitimate concern of making a noise that could be picked up by supernatural ears. Then there was the smell. That was something new, and it bugged her most of all.
When she couldn’t hold her tongue any longer, she leaned over to Nadya and asked, “What the hell is this stuff?”
“What stuff?”
“The stuff Quinn smeared on us before she left,” Paige said in a voice that wanted nothing more than to lift into an aggravated snarl. “The stuff