by Renee Rose
Like I’m that teen again, covered in my stepfather’s blood, I go numb. Just shut off.
~.~
Kylie
“You going to shoot me with that thing?” I ask, peering in at Stu through his open car window.
He has a gun in his pocket pointed at me. He’s pale, sweat beading his forehead. “What do you want, Catgirl?”
“My grandmother. Where is she?”
Something that resembles sympathy flickers over his face. “Right. They took your grandmother. I’m sorry, I don’t know.” He rubs his forehead with the hand not holding the gun. “I had no idea they would do something like that.”
A sick twist wrenches my stomach. “Who is they?”
He shrugs like we’re out to coffee discussing code or what we think about the boss. “Guy calls himself Mr. X. That’s all I know.”
My hands turn clammy, and I sway on my feet. “You just took down the country’s top credit card security company working for a man named Mr. X? Have you met this guy?”
A flash of misgiving passes over Stu’s face before he hides it. “We’ve been in communication for over a year. He’s placed a good faith down payment in my offshore account.”
“Offshore account, hm?”
“It’s hack proof, Catgirl.”
I’ll see about that. I cut him with my most scornful glance. “You must be pretty proud of yourself, framing me to make yourself rich.”
Again, a flicker of regret seems to pass over his face. “Get out of town, Catgirl. You can still leave. They’ll never find you. You’re as hack proof as they come. That’s one of the reasons I picked you. You won’t be any worse off than you were before. Hiding and assuming new identities is what you do best.”
I must be crazy because I actually see his logic. “I need to know where my grandmother is.”
“I’m sorry. I really don’t know, but...I wouldn’t wait around.” Again, he looks almost sorry for me. “Get out of town, while you can.”
I eye his gun. It was crazy of me to come here unarmed, but I just had to look him in the face and hear him say for himself what he’s done. He’s telling me my grandmother is dead. My hands start shaking—whether from rage or shock, I’m not sure. Either way, there’s nothing I can do now. Not when Stu has a gun and I’m completely unarmed. Besides, physical violence has never been my way. I’ve always been the cyber attack sort. If he thinks his money will sit quietly in his offshore account, he’s fucking delusional.
I nod, once. “Okay.”
Relief flickers over his face. “Okay? You’ll leave town?”
I shrug. “What choice do I have?”
“Good.” He rolls up his window, and I watch as he puts the car in gear and coasts away. I want to throw Sam’s helmet through his back window, chase after the car and pull him out of it, stand on his throat until he tells me where to find Mémé, but I’m helpless. Just like when I watched my father murdered and couldn’t do a thing to save him. Didn’t do a thing to save him.
I’ve always wondered if things would be different if I’d gone after his partner that night instead of hiding like a terrified child. He’d already stabbed my father, but what if I’d found a way to kill him? Would that have been the honorable thing to do? Instead of hiding and going after him the sneaky way? The shameful way?
Now, I’m doing the same thing. Letting Stu drive away after basically admitting Mémé’s been killed.
The sound of a car door slamming nearby makes me jerk my head up. My throat closes when I see the figure storming toward me, dark and furious.
Jackson.
His huge hand shoots out and grips me by the throat.
“Jackson,” I choke, real fear shooting through me. His eyes are ice-blue, inhuman.
As if he catches the fear, something flickers in his expression. The fury slips away, replaced by something far more raw and broken.
“So.” He brings his face right up to mine. “You’ve been working with Stu all along. Played me for a fool, didn’t you?”
“No,” I gasp. “You have it wrong. I came—”
“Shut up.” He gives me a little shake. With my weight suspended by the column of my neck, he pulls me to my tiptoes. “All I have to do is squeeze to crush your throat.” There’s a sharp menace to his voice I’ve never heard before. It terrifies me. “Or snap to break your neck.” I remember this is the man who lost control of his wolf and killed his stepfather with an ax. Who hunts and runs wild on the mountain. He’s no stranger to violence. “Which would you prefer?”
“No.” It’s hard to speak around the fingers partially cutting off my air, around the crushing panic, because strangulation feels a lot like claustrophobia.
Tears spike, drip out the corners of my eyes.
His nostrils flare, and he releases me abruptly, a look of horror on his face. He shoves his fingers through his hair. “Get out of here. Get out of my sight before I harm you. You aren’t safe with me.”
“I’m not working with Stu,” I rasp, my throat sore from his fingers.
He lunges for me again, covering my mouth with his hand. “No more lies from that pretty little mouth. No more. Just. Leave.
He takes my helmet from my hands and puts it over my head, buckles it even. He tugs the chinstrap forward and stamps his lips over mine.
I moan into his mouth, hope flaring that he is still with me, that he will listen, but he makes a broken sound and, when he pulls away, he doesn’t even look at me.
A goodbye kiss.
Fuck.
That’s what it was. It guts me.
He stalks away without another word.
I open my mouth to call after him, to explain, but tears choke my voice, followed closely by anger designed to protect against the kind of injury I sustained.
Heartbreak.
He should have let me explain. Why would he give me the benefit of the doubt all along and then choose now to believe I’m against him? Now, when I’m already hopelessly in love with him? Now, when I can no sooner walk away from him than I can from Mémé?
Tears streaking my cheeks, I throw a leg over Sam’s motorcycle and take off. I have nowhere to go, no leads to follow. Stu was right. I should get out of town while I still can.
Why, then, would I rather cut off my own arm?
~.~
Jackson
Driving back to the office, it takes me a long time to realize my phone is ringing. I check the screen.
Garrett.
Because the guy doesn’t call me often, and that means it’s wolf business, I take the call. “King speaking.”
“It’s Garrett. Listen, do you know anything about a female called Kylie?”
The distortion in my vision and the roaring in my ears fall away, my attention sharpening to a razor point.
“What about her?” I snap.
“You do know her?”
I wait, my fingers fisting around the steering wheel, ready to rip it off.
“An elderly cat shifter showed up here this morning suffering from four bullet wounds, including one to the head that should’ve killed her. She couldn’t shift for a day, but she finally limped into my place, disoriented and badly dehydrated.
“Cat shifter?” I repeated, my brain skipping in twenty directions.
“Yeah. Jacqueline Dumont. You know her?”
“What does she have to do with Kylie?” I demand through gritted teeth, impatience tearing at me, even though I already know the answer.
“Says she’s her grandmother. Thinks Kylie works for you and is in trouble. Is this the woman who’s been all over the news for hacking your place?”
“Fuck. Yes. Where is she now—the old woman?”
“My place.”
“I’ll be right there.”
“She’s under my protection,” Garrett warns.
“I’m not going to hurt her,” I practically yell into the phone before tossing it onto the seat.
Downtown is just a few exits away. I follow roads that should
be familiar as if I’m driving in a new city. My mind turns over the new information. Kylie really has a grandmother. Who was shot multiple times. If she wasn’t a shifter, she certainly would have died.
And ho-boy—Kylie’s grandmother is a cat shifter? Is Kylie? She can’t be. Her fear when I partially shifted was genuine. But how would she have a shifter for a grandmother and know nothing about werewolves?
Another thought creeps in, full of heat and tingles. Kylie has shifter blood. No wonder my wolf wanted to mate her. And it means she probably would have survived it.
But that is water under the bridge. Kylie just met with Stu, proving she was in cahoots with him the whole time.
Except, now that this new information has knocked me out of my stupor, doubt creeps in. Could there be another explanation for her meeting with Stu?
I pull up in front of Garrett’s apartment and get out, walking swiftly in and onto the elevator. I stop on Garrett’s floor and get off. The scent of shifters—both wolf and, yes, the distinctly feline smell as well, hits me.
I knock on the door and one of Garrett’s housemates answers it and steps deferentially aside to let me in. The old woman is on the sofa, pale and weak. She’s dressed in one of the wolf’s T-shirts—far too big for her.
She sits up when I come in, eyes glowing gold. “Where is she?” She speaks with a thick French accent.
My eyes narrow. It’s not my habit to answer anyone’s demands, especially someone I’ve just met.
“Jackson, meet Jacqueline,” Garrett says, appearing from the kitchen.
“I smell her on you. Where is Minette?” Jacqueline demands.
“I don’t know anyone named Minette.”
She makes an impatient slash of her hand and attempts to stand, but it’s obviously too much for her. She sags back against the sofa. “My granddaughter, Kylie. They say she works for you. She’s in trouble.”
I pull a chair from the kitchen table and place it beside the sofa, settling into it. “Kylie is in trouble, yes. She stole hundreds of millions of dollars from my customers.”
“Pfft.” She waves her hand dismissively. “No, she didn’t. These men did.” She points at a place on the side of her head where she must have been shot. The hair is growing back, and the skin closing, but she’s extremely lucky she didn’t die.
The wall I spent the last forty minutes erecting shudders, as if moved by an earthquake.
This is the moment. I either go on believing in Kylie and her story as I have from the beginning, or I stick with my newer, excruciating understanding that she betrayed me.
If Kylie was in cahoots with Stu, there wouldn’t be an old Frenchwoman lying on a couch with bullet wounds, would there? An old woman who greatly resembles my little hacker. The high cheekbones are unmistakable, along with something about her mouth.
Which means...I’ve made a terrible mistake.
For the second time in an hour, my heart stutters. Stops. Starts again to a new beat.
Fates. I sent Kylie away to face her enemies on her own.
It’s unforgivable. I swallow hard. “Tell me what happened to you.”
She blinks at me with her big golden eyes, as if judging whether I’m worthy of her story. I must pass her test because she says, “Men came to our house. They were different nationalities. One Irish, one American. Two Germans, from the sound of their accents.”
I lean forward.
“I was returning from the grocery store. Minette’s car was there, but no lights were on. They surprised me—were waiting in the house. Drugged me before I could shift and fight.”
What a surprise it would’ve been for the men if the old lady had transformed into a giant cat and attacked them. Too bad she hadn’t had the chance.
“How did you escape?”
The woman groans, and her expressive hand flutters toward her face. “They kept me drugged. I was never able to fight because every time I woke, they stuck another needle in my neck.” She rubs a place below her left ear. “Next thing I knew, they’d taken me out in the desert and filled me with bullet holes. They must have thought I was dead when they left me. Thank the fates they were too lazy to bury me.” With noticeable effort, she swings her legs to the floor to face me sitting up. “Now, I have told you my story. You tell me where to find my Minette.”
She exhibits the same steely determination I’ve witnessed in Kylie, and my chest aches.
I scrub a hand over my face. “I just sent her away. I believed she had betrayed me.”
Jacqueline’s eyes move over my face, and she must see my misery because something akin to understanding flickers in her eyes. “You care for my Minette?”
I nod. How could I make such a mistake? The wolf knew, all along. I should have trusted my instincts. To distract myself from the searing pain that sliced me open from neck to groin, I ask, “What kind of cat are you?”
“Panther.”
“Kylie doesn’t know?”
“Non. My Minette never manifested. Her mother died when she was still a girl, and she was apart from me during puberty. Her father knew to contact me if she showed signs of shifting, but she never did. I reunited with her after her father’s murder, but she hasn’t needed me. Not until now.” She peers up at me, and I’m not sure if she means because of the men who framed her or because of me.
“Is she half or quarter?”
“Half. Her mother was truly the cat burglar.”
My skin prickles. Half shifter. No wonder my wolf wants her.
Mate.
I didn’t mean to speak it out loud, but I must have because Jacqueline’s eyes glow with curiosity. “She knows about you?”
“Yes. She saw my teeth when the wolf wished to mark her.”
The old woman shifts and, even with her obvious frailty, her movements evoke the grace of a cat. “Did you mark her, wolf?”
I immediately feel like a young teenager getting the third degree at his girlfriend’s parents’ door. Shame tinges my reply. “No. But I frightened her.”
Jacqueline’s eyes glint in that unearthly manner cats have. I can’t read her reaction.
I slide to the edge of my seat. “Jacqueline, come to my mansion. I will protect you, and we can find Kylie together.”
“Non.” She doesn’t even hesitate. “I will not be your bait for my granddaughter. I am safe here. If Kylie wishes to see you, she will make contact. In the meantime, Garrett will protect me.”
The band around my throat tightens. It’s like the woman already knows I don’t deserve to see Kylie again. I fucked up—put her in danger, failed to trust the female who had placed herself in my hands so many times.
I let out a low curse—not at Jacqueline, but at myself. I write my cell on my business card and hand it to her before I stand. “Please contact me if you hear from her. Tell her I’m sorry, and that I made a mistake. I’ll do anything I can to help her. That’s a vow.”
I go through the motions of shaking Garrett and his pack member’s hands on the way out, but my movements are jerky. Mechanical. I’m already a thousand miles away, searching for my mate. Figuring out how I’m ever going to make this up to her.
~.~
Kylie
I ditch Sam’s motorcycle downtown and check into the No-Tell Motel on Miracle Mile, a place where you can pay for a room with cash and rent by the hour. Porn is showing on the television in the room. Nice. Very nice atmosphere. I switch it off and pull out my laptop.
I’m dying to lose myself in code. No, I’m dying in general. I haven’t felt this lost, this destroyed since my father’s death. Back then, Mémé was the only thing that kept me going. If I don’t have her now…
No. I can’t think that. My gut says she’s still alive, and I have to trust she is. She’s tough, even for an old woman.
So my new plan is to find Mémé and leave town. But the emptiness of that plan, even being reunited with Mémé, leaves me thinner than a ghost. Leaving Jackson believing the worst of me is unthinkable. One part of me hate
s him for not trusting in me—after what we did last night, he thinks I played him?
But maybe that’s why it cut him so deep. He isn’t someone who gives his trust easily or to very many. Last night, he shared his deepest tragedy with me. Seeing me with Stu must’ve felt like the worst betrayal to him. But understanding doesn’t lessen the sharp cut of his mistrust. He flayed me in a million pieces back at the airport.
Still, I need to make things right. I won’t let him believe I destroyed his entire life’s work. That I stole from him.
And even if I didn’t care about Jackson and SeCure, I need to make those fuckers pay for involving me in their greedy plan. Stu, included.
I get to work following the money trail. The FBI should eventually be able to follow it, too, but by the time they do, the money will be long diverted.
I have to hack into five different banks, which takes me the rest of the afternoon, but I pick up the trail.
Bingo.
I let out a wicked witch chuckle as I send the money back to the first place from which it was diverted and reverse every transaction. Most of those accounts will be frozen or on hold. Issued new numbers. But the point is, the money will be tied up while the banks try to figure out where it’s supposed to go.
Take that, Mr. X. Take that, Stu. Framing Catgirl was your biggest mistake.
The light has dimmed, and I take a break and check the antique board for a message from Mémé. With a surge of joy, I see a message in my inbox.
Minette, I am with friends. Call them at 520-235-5055.
My heart pounds. I don’t dare use my phone, but I immediately hook up an Internet voice line and dial the number. A male voice answers. “Hello.”
For a moment, I freeze, not sure who I’m talking to or whether it’s safe.
“Hello?”
“May I speak to Jacqueline?”
“Ah. She’s been waiting for your call.” He says nothing more, but Mémé’s voice comes on. “Minette! Dieu merci. Is it safe to talk?”
“Yes. Where are you?”
“I am with the Tucson wolf pack. Downtown.”