📎A/N. Thank you very much for the wonderful comments you left on the previous chapter.  It made my day :)

It's been a while since I checked the countries map. In case you are curious, we  are now joined  by readers from:  Suriname, Ethiopia, Egypt, Greece, Poland, Iceland, Sri Lanka, and Papa New Guinea.  Welcome to you all :)

Don't forget to vote... just click the star... it's so easy - even I can do it ;-) 

Thanks for your continued support, I hope you enjoy this chapter... I must warn you however, this chapter is a little dark...ish...

M.

❧ ⚛ ✺ ≋ ≋ ≋ ≋ ≋ ✺ ⚛ ❧

"How can you be so sure?" Andrew asked as he leaned closer to the monitor.

Tara tapped the screen and dragged a second image next to the first. "The police think that the two wolves are the same. I admit they are similar, but they are two separate animals," she explained.

Andrew felt the excitement rise from the pit of his stomach. He trusted his girlfriend implicitly. Tara was a Zoologist, specialising in animal behaviour at Southwick's Zoo. And, if she said they were not the same animal, and they were not ordinary wolves, then he believed her.

"Their markings are similar," she explained, pointing at different parts of the two images, "but the Wolf from the freeway is a fraction larger, and has an additional marking that the one from the party didn't."

"Have you spoken to your colleague about the size yet?"

Tara pursed her lips and nodded. "Yves is convinced someone has doctored the videos. He's adamant there's no way wolves of that size exist. Not even the Dire Wolves were that large. You're positive these two," she said, indicating the screen, "are the originals and have not been touched?"

"I took copies directly from the witnesses' phones. There is no way they were tampered with," he confirmed.

Tara sighed in frustration. "The problem is, it's like a Bigfoot sighting. You may have proof caught on camera. But without the actual body, no one is going to believe it."

"It doesn't help that it's getting harder to find the videos," mumbled Drew, distracted by the disparate pieces that he was positive were connected. Yet, didn't seem to fit together.

He did not know what it was about this story, but things were not quite adding up. He was bumping into roadblocks at every turn. It was not helping that the videos which had gone viral, were suddenly disappearing. Each time another copy was uploaded, within a few hours - it was gone again.

What was more frustrating was that the copies that he had uploaded to the Boston Globe's server had become corrupt. Rumours were also running riot that other networks were having the same issue. No one was admitting it, but someone was systematically removing all traces of the two wolf attack videos. His natural reaction to most things was to cite a conspiracy. Normally, however, he did not actually believe that forces were at play to bring people closer to 'world domination'. This time, he was not so sure.

To compound matters, he had interviewed the majority of the witnesses from the night of the party. Something they all had said triggered an uneasy feeling. Each and every person he had spoken to thought it was odd that the wolf bypassed a number of partygoers and went directly to Taylor and Louise. It was only after the wolf was finished with the first two victims that it turned its focus to the others.

The only person from that evening that had shown any sort of animosity to the primary targets, was the ex-boyfriend. The fight between the two had, by and large, been ignored. The focus being on the wolf attack, rather than the moments leading up to it.

Drew had made an attempt to track the missing student. Since the night of the party, no one had seen the boy.

His curiosity was piqued after some the survivors had commented on the fact that they could not believe how Brian had managed to best Taylor. After all, Taylor was the Captain of the football team. And Brian, well Brian was a gamer and all around geek. For all accounts, the teenager was a timid introvert who had more brains than brawn.

Looking at the video in this light, Andrew thought it remarkable how the obviously smaller and lighter assailant could have dominated the fight so completely. The force behind each punch belied Brian's slight frame.

Returning his thoughts back to the present, he refocused on Tara, who was looking expectantly at him. He grimaced. "Sorry, this story is getting to me. I can't help but think there is something big at work here. I'm just struggling to work out what, and it's driving me nuts."

Tara rose and placed her arms around Drew's neck. "Don't overthink it. You'll work it out. In the meantime why don't you turn your thoughts to me? I'm sure we can work something out to keep your mind off Wolves."

Andrew smiled as he snaked his arms around her waist, and leaned towards her. Just as their lips met, he jerked back violently. Tara fell unceremoniously backwards onto the bed as he let her go without warning.

"Shit! Why didn't I think of that before?" he cried out as he lurched across the room and grabbed his keys.

A very confused zoologist scrambled up from where she had fallen and stood, staring at the door her boyfriend had just disappeared through. Crossing her arms angrily she called out to the man she could hear running down the stairs, "Do that one too many times and I might just not be here when you get home."

All she heard was a 'Sorry' just before he slammed the front door.

"Men!" Tara snorted.

❧ ⚛ ✺ ≋ ≋ ≋ ≋ ≋ ✺ ⚛ ❧

The ear-piercing, high-pitched scream reverberated up from the cellar and echoed throughout the house. It was a blood-curdling sound that instantly had Ambrose on his feet, and racing down to the basement to locate the source of the outcry.

He skidded to a halt as he rushed through the doorway and was hit by an unexpected sight.

Ambrose's eyes opened wide, as it took in the gruesome scene before him. Elijah had repurposed the large storage area in the basement level as his 'play room'. It was the only place in the mansion that had bare walls and concreted floors. Ambrose now understood why the madman insisted on needing the space for himself.

Hanging by his arms from a giant hook, attached to a ceiling beam, was the broken form of a man. Blood running from each slice that had been cut into his flesh. From his vantage point, Ambrose could see that there was little, if any, untouched part of the figure. Elijah had used the man's body like a canvas, and his ever present knife, dipped in the man's blood, was the brush. Chunks of flesh hung by a thread from sections of his torso. Digits from the man's hand, lay on the floor where they had fallen, after being viciously detached from his hands. Confusion overtook the Don, as he attempted to work out what was hanging from the man's face. The victim's head had fallen to his chest, obstructing Ambrose's clear line of sight to the face. A queasy feeling began at the pit of his stomach as recognition dawned loud and clear.

Oh, Christ! That's his eyeball hanging out of its socket.

Ambrose looked closer at the limp form and could just make out the shallow rise and fall of the victim's chest.

Shit, the poor bastard's still alive!

Ambrose had been so distracted by the sight of the beaten and bloody man that he had failed to notice the remainder of the scene. A weak, tortured whimper registered in his brain and he slowly turned towards the direction the sound had come from.

It was this moment that Briana chose to investigate. Not able to stop her in time, his cousin stormed into the room. "What the hell is going on down here? It sounds like-" her voice cut mid-sentence as her eyes settled on what he had just noticed. An instant later she brought her hand to her mouth. Quickly turning she raced out the door again, not getting too far - as a moment later he heard the sound of her retching.

Unable to take his eyes off the repugnant spectacle, Ambrose watched in abject horror as Elijah continued the torture of his second victim. Uncaring that he now had an audience.

The Werewolf had strapped a woman face down on the table, her arms pinned to the table top by a sharp blade through each of her hands. Her feet only just able to touch the floor. The young woman, barely conscious, cried out in pain with each thrust as Elijah continued his brutal assault on her naked body. Blood was pouring from her mouth. Attempting to discern the cause of injury, Ambrose sucked in his breath as he discovered her tongue had been cut out and placed on the table beside her.

Elijah continued to pound himself into the half-dead body, a sneer across his face as he looked towards his spectator. "I don't share," he spat out before turning back to the woman he was violating and increased the force in which he was slamming into her.

Ambrose, after his initial shock and inertia, was now able to move again. The mixture of emotions almost more than he could cope with, the New England Mafia Don strode across to the unconscious man, lifted his bloodied head with both hands, and snapped the man's neck. Putting him out of his misery.

Anger pushing to the fore, he turned to verbally assault the deranged Werewolf. The feral look on Elijah's face halted any preconceived notions he might have had about the man. Pure venom was oozing from every pore in his body as he disengaged himself.

"My wolf is not going to be happy you did that," he snarled.

"I don't give a shit," spat back Ambrose. Lunatic or not, the man could not bring his playthings to the property and risk exposing them. "How the fuck would we explain the screams? They were loud enough for someone in the next state to hear them." A thought then hit him. "And how in God's name are you going to get rid of the bodies?"

A livid, irate and exasperated Ambrose, stalked back into his office a short time later. The moment he walked through the door he was assaulted by a frantic and upset cousin. "Did you see what he was doing in there?" Briana cried out, her face still devoid of colour from witnessing the brutal display of violence below ground.

Trailing behind him as he walked across to stand in front of the French doors that overlooked the back yard and river beyond, Brianna attempted to plead with Ambrose. "You need to do something. We can't live like this. He's fucking psychotic!"

Ambrose swept a hand through his thinning hair in frustration. "We don't have a choice. We'll have to deal with it until we are ready."

"But why?" she cried out. Not understanding his decision.

Ambrose let out a short laugh. "Why? Because we still need him. And because at the moment, short of a bazooka, we are not strong enough to take him on."

"But is it worth having to put up with this?"

Ambrose turned to Briana. "Bri, you weren't there. We are so much more powerful now. Those Mexicans had no idea what hit them. I'd snapped the neck of the third one, and the first had only just hit the ground. That's how much more superior we are now."

It had taken some convincing, but Ambrose had managed to talk Elijah into accompanying him to a meeting with members of the Mexican Cartel.

The Cartel were under the assumption they were meeting with their new partners – the Russians. However, when Ambrose and Elijah had turned up instead, they most definitely had the element of surprise.

Until that moment, Ambrose had never gotten his hands dirty. There was always someone else more willing to enforce his law. This time, he was limited in numbers. He was not prepared to put Briana and Frank in danger unless he was sure of their invincibility.

Between Elijah and himself, in the blink of an eye, a dozen men had fallen. Ambrose, expecting to feel remorse, was astonished at the euphoria and adrenaline pumping through his body. The feeling was potent, and his wolf was only too happy to provide encouragement and pushing him on further to inflict more damage.

To place the blame squarely on the Russian Mafia, Ambrose had Elijah hold up each dead body while he placed a well-aimed bullet in each man's skull. As per Junior's instructions, the Don changed weapons as he proceeded. They needed to doctor the scene to look like there had been more than one shooter.

Not only had Ambrose paid back the Cartel for double crossing him. He had also incited war between the Russians and the Mexicans. And, to top it off, he and Elijah had stumbled on the drug shipment at the docks. It was not too hard. Their heightened sense of smell led them directly to the container.

Ambrose had to laugh at their ingenuity. The pills were hidden in a shipment of canned tomatoes. With the security disabled, they were able to spirit away with eight pallets before it became too risky to come back for more.

Before the night was through, Briana had coordinated the distribution of the pills throughout their extensive network. All evidence that they had been the ones to acquire the shipment was destroyed and no one was the wiser. Not even their own people.

Knowing the path they needed to walk, Ambrose attempted to get Briana to understand why they needed to put up with the madman – for now. "We need him to turn more of us. We can't turn people into Werewolves. Only someone born a Werewolf can do that," he explained.

Grabbing her gently by the arms, he looked pleadingly at her. "When he has turned enough for our needs, then we will deal with him. Until that time, we will just need to try and contain him."

Briana stared at her cousin for a while before sighing. "Okay, but we need to hurry and get more turned. I don't know how long we can go before he exposes us all." She turned to Ambrose with a concerned look on her face. "I just hope you are not setting us up for disaster with this slippery slope."

Understanding her concern, Ambrose attempted to alleviate her concerns. "I am working on that. Elijah only had access to our family tree. It turns out, his former 'Alpha' had done her homework and had a large number of others. I picked his brain and we managed to come up with three other names. I've paid a lot of money to get those family trees compiled."

"Any luck so far?" asked Briana.

Ambrose nodded. "One looks very promising. The family was involved in bootlegging during prohibition - and not much has changed over the years."

"Well, you'd better hurry. Junior is also wondering when it's his turn." She let out a giggle when she realised what she had just said.

Ambrose frowned. There was no doubt that Junior needed to be turned. He was a vital part of their organisation and being related through his mother, he was eligible. However, they needed him where he was. The information he had access to was vital to them. So much so, that it was kept from Elijah in case he decided to become vindictive and cause a problem for them.

"Can't we find another Werewolf to get rid of him?"

"If only it were that easy," lamented Ambrose.

In one of the rare extended and useful conversations he had had with Elijah, Ambrose had ascertained that the Werewolf was a wanted man in his community. Something called 'The Alliance' was after him. This did not surprise him in the least. And, based on Elijah's rantings, there was one particular Werewolf targeting him. Ambrose got the distinct impression that Elijah was afraid of this hunter, despite his rantings to the contrary.

Ambrose's initial thoughts had been to try and pump more information out of Elijah so that he could track down this group. Perhaps they could get rid of him once and for all? In the next instant, he had to quash that line of reasoning. There was no way a group of Werewolves, whose entire focus was to stay under the radar, would go along with his plans.

There were twelve others in varying stages of conversion. They needed to focus their energies on finding others with the right profiles. The sooner, the better. His new found ability and detachment to killing, had spurred him to move his plans to bring down the Russians forward.

Ambrose turned back to gaze out the window. "First things first," he began, "we need to work out how to soundproof the basement."

"Slippery Slope," was his cousins only reply.

❧ ⚛ ✺ ≋ ≋ ≋ ≋ ≋ ✺ ⚛ ❧

A/N. Hey! Who turned out the light? It's getting really dark in here :-(

... I'm not sure who is worse, Elijah the sicko, or Ambrose who is effectively allowing it to happen... and under his roof no less!!!!

... What the hell is Ambrose thinking? He needs to work out how to get rid of that psychotic evil creature!

... And what has Drew running off like that?... can't be good.  Hopefully he won't expose the next 'Wolfgate' :-)

... also, I wonder how the YouTube videos are coming down? ;-)   So many questions... I hate waiting for the answers... hang on... I know the answers ...  **smacks herself and tells herself off  -  shut up before you give the story way.**

... my doctor has given me some stronger medication to fight the virus that I can't seem to shake.  Hopefully, it works so it will give me the energy to get another chapter out before the weekend.  If not, the next part will be up by Sunday.

Till then, take care, be good and don't forget to vote. :-)

M.