by Kate Rudolph
But in answer to Derek’s question, she said, “Would you be okay, if the tables were turned?” Her hands wanted to shake, so she laced her fingers together and kept them tight against her stomach.
He turned down the road that would lead them toward the town of Oak Wood. It wasn’t very close to either of their houses, but they could almost guarantee that the men who had taken her would be watching the town. This was her and Derek’s job - distraction. They just needed to buy Ruth and Morse enough time to move Paul back to Derek’s without the eye of the enemy falling on them.
“Was this what your life was like? Is it why you left?” He pulled up to the one bank in town and fumbled for his wallet, taking his time at the ATM. Anything to buy a few more minutes.
Once he rolled the window back up and they drove off, Sandra answered. “Not really, no. I honestly did a lot of secretarial work. I just happened to do it near important generals and dignitaries. When there was... excitement... I had a team behind me and a plan of action.” She might have been the only person on the ground, but there had always been a support team ready to back her up. She hadn’t been alone.
She didn’t look over at him, instead focusing on her rear view mirror. “Can you turn down that street up there?”
“Sure.” Derek did as asked and sure enough, the green minivan she’d spotted turned behind them. It was a hundred feet away, but close enough to keep them in sight.
“Now turn right on the next through street,” she said. The minivan followed them down a handful of streets, enough to convince Sandra that it was following them. Good, or mostly good; if they were following her, they weren’t bothering Ruth.
She instructed Derek to drive north but to stay in town. She didn’t want to give the people in the van a chance to engage them. A few minutes later, her phone beeped, chiming that she had a text message.
563-555-9892: OK
“We’re good,” she told Derek.
“But what do we do about the soccer mom back there?” He asked, glancing in the rear view mirror.
Sandra grinned, “Do you have a good back-way home? Preferably down a twisty or hilly road?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Follow my instructions and your car just might survive.”
Excitement thrilled through her. They tried to lose the tail in town, but Oak Wood was so small that it would have been impossible for even the most experienced driver. Giving that up, she told Derek to floor it. This came down to a race. And his truck had enough power to beat the minivan and leave it in the dirt.
But it was a close thing at first. Once they hit the highway, the van started gaining on them, closing the distance between them until it was just a few car lengths back.
“Hold on!” Derek warned before jerking the steering wheel to the right and turning onto a narrow dirt road. It was bumpy and the trees were close enough that their branches brushed against their windows. But Derek didn’t give up, and Sandra got the strangest sensation that he’d done this before.
They couldn’t have been going more than fifty miles per hour, and Sandra felt every stone they hit. But the van was lagging, distance adding up in between them. After a few minutes, it was out of sight completely.
That didn’t mean that Derek slowed down. If anything, he went faster, trying to put as much road between them and their pursuers as possible. After another two or three miles, he turned down a gravel road that was surprisingly short. It led them back to the highway and he headed away from town, back to his house.
They’d lost the tail.
Sandra’s heart was pounding and she felt like she could run a mile. But when she looked over at Derek, he wasn’t smiling. His brow was heavy with worry and his eyes were shadowed.
Sandra licked her lips, trying to find the right words. “I can’t thank you enough for what you’ve—”
“Don’t,” it was a harsh whisper, haunted.
She’d never wanted to be able to read anyone’s mind more. But that wasn’t going to happen. “I know you didn’t sign up for this. It sucks, and it’s terrifying, and it’s dangerous.”
He snorted, “You’re not selling this very well.”
“I’m not trying to.” She’d been blinded by her own experiences and his reaction at the hotel. Even though he could change shape into a bear, he was still a civilian. “What I’m saying is, you can back out and I won’t think any less of you. Ruth and I can—”
“No, I’m in.” He didn’t even let her finish.
Still, Sandra tried. “This is—”
He cut her off again, grabbing her hand and waiting until she looked at him before speaking. His eyes were emeralds, hard, bright, intense. “I’m. In. I don’t care if you’re a Russian spy, or an alien, whatever. I’m helping you. I’m with you. One hundred percent.”
Could the wind be knocked out of her while she was seated? She tried to find the words to match his declaration. It felt like she needed to make a vow. She wanted to give him that, too, even if this thing between them was still new. “I’m with you, too.” It was weak, but it was what she had. And since she was almost entirely in love with him, she hoped it would do.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
There was more to be said. A lot more. But they were back at Derek’s place and had other concerns. It wasn’t every day that Sandra needed to tend to a hostage or figure out how to take care of the handful of men who had it out for her.
Ruth was in the kitchen messing with a mass of wires that she’d piled onto the counter. “Morse is standing guard downstairs,” she said without looking up.
Sandra put a hand on Derek’s arm and suggested, “Why don’t you go check on him?”
She felt the thrill of alarm take him, and for a minute she thought he would try to argue. But he closed his eyes, let out a harsh breath, and nodded. He leaned down and kissed her quickly before leaving. Sandra was grinning when she turned around to face Ruth. She didn’t care.
“Didn’t take you for the type,” an untrained person might have thought that Ruth wasn’t paying attention. They would have been wrong.
“What type?” Sandra had a litany of things that she needed to cover with Ruth.
“The kind to wash out of the job and shack up with the first penis you run into.” She gently set down the piece of equipment that she’d been working on and placed her hands on the counter.
It stung, because a small part of her was scared that it was true. “Derek’s not just anyone,” she defended.
“Well, he’s sure as hell not human.”
So Ruth had figured that bit out. Sandra didn’t know what she should say. “He’s human,” she was sure of that. He was kind, loving, warm, and certainly a man. That seemed human enough for her. “But he’s a bit like us. Different.”
Ruth’s hand flashed bright, energy arcing between her fingers. “I might be able to deflect a bullet,” she said, “But if I get shot, I stay shot.”
“Diya doesn’t,” she countered, referring to another member of the Sector. Diya Mangal had superhuman healing abilities, she could recover from anything short of beheading in less than a day.
“Just be straight with me,” Ruth insisted.
“I could ask the same of you.” Sandra paced on the other side of the kitchen island. The kitchen had seemed so big earlier, but now it felt like the walls were shrinking in around her. “You’re holding back a lot. Don’t try to tell me otherwise.”
“I’ve told you what you need to know.”
That rankled. Ruth’s thoughts were guarded, there were no secrets for Sandra to divine. She wanted to scream, but she needed to keep calm. “So I don’t need to know how you knew where those men were holed up? Or how you knew how to find me?”
Now that she’d had a little time to think, certain things weren’t adding up. Why had the men nabbed her at Ruth’s hotel room? They could have just waited for Sandra to go home where she would have been vulnerable. It could have been days before anyone even knew she was gone.
Ru
th held up her hands in surrender. “You’re right, I’m sorry. You should know that.”
She paused long enough that Sandra quirked up an eyebrow to encourage her to continue.
“I was planting a trail. It was supposed to lead the men to me, thinking I was you. Since you didn’t seem too keen on teaming up, I thought I’d at least remove the threat before I rolled out. It seems they moved a bit quicker than anticipated. I wouldn’t have been there in time if I hadn’t left the camera in my room. How the hell did you find me?” She’d picked up a cord and absentmindedly wrapped it around her fingers while she spoke.
Sandra put her hands on the backrest of the stool and looked at Ruth. “It’s a small town.” She didn’t want to give Morse’s mom up.
Ruth shrugged, accepting that answer.
“But you’ve been staying there for two days,” Sandra pressed. Ruth wasn’t telling her everything. “It’s not even been twenty-four hours since you came to me.”
Ruth rolled her eyes, “Did you think I was going to sleep in a fucking tree or something?”
Fair point. “And the base?”
“Those men trashed your place a few days ago. I don’t know if they were looking for information about you or something else, but they were swift, brutal, and absolutely professional. Though I was able to plant a tracker on their car.” She held up a little plastic device. “I need to go set these cameras up.”
“We’re not done yet.” Sandra wasn’t backing down until she was satisfied. That might be awhile. She was done being left in the dark.
Ruth stood up. “We both know how this ends. I don’t see the need for debate.”
It had been knocking at the back of Sandra’s own mind, and the picture formed in Ruth’s, clear for Sandra to see. “The Sector.” They had the tools and the people to take care of all of Sandra’s problems. And she had something that they wanted.
Ruth shrugged, “Tell them you have me and they’ll come. You know they’ll deal with this mess as well.”
“And when they get here? It’s not like they’re going to welcome you back with open arms.” There was no recovery from desertion, from betrayal. If the Sector caught her, Ruth would end up buried in some hole in the middle of the desert. Maybe she’d be alive.
“I’m not going back.” She dug a cheap looking plastic cell phone from her pile of wires and screens. “That line should be secure enough to make the call. I’ve got work to do.”
Sandra reached across the counter and picked up the old flip phone. It felt like a brick in her hand. “Wait—”
Ruth pierced her with a look. “Make the call or don’t, I’ve got work to do.” She left, ignoring Sandra’s pleas for her to stay.
Sandra slid onto the stool and flipped the phone around, pivoting it on two fingers. It spun with almost no effort on her part. When she opened it, she saw that there was only one speed dial option.
Sandra took a deep breath and rolled her eyes skyward. They needed help. Desperately. She and Ruth were trained, could handle themselves, but not against so many. And even if they could, what then? Sandra didn’t want to rain slaughter down on her newfound home. And she couldn’t do so without consequences. Even in the best case scenario, she’d need to leave. And she didn’t want to. Not this town, not Derek, not her new house. She wanted it all, and she wasn’t going to let some good for nothing assholes steal that from her.
She pressed the speed dial and held the phone up to her ear. After three rings, Canary answered.
“Ruth’s here,” she said, foregoing a greeting. “I think you need to send a team to come get her before things get even worse.”
Neither Ruth nor Sandra knew how much their voices carried. It wasn’t that they were speaking loudly, but the kitchen was directly above the door to the cellar and both Derek and Morse had exceptional hearing. By unspoken agreement, they remained silent while Sandra and Ruth talked.
They were both sitting on the couch next to the door to the cellar. This wasn’t his main living room, but there was a small TV and an old couch. If this went on for long, Derek decided he’d bring in a mini-fridge to make guard duty a bit easier.
“You want to tell me how you managed to find the one girl in this state who’s weirder than we are?” Morse asked after they heard Ruth walk out. There was no malice in his voice, only a twisted humor.
“She found me, and I’m the luckiest bastard in the world for it.” War was coming, and the cavalry might turn out to be just as bad as the enemy, but Derek knew he’d walk into hell for Sandra. It didn’t matter to him that they’d only known one another for a short time. He knew her, he was almost certain that she was his mate. He’d fight for her.
They lapsed into a comfortable silence. It was another half an hour before Morse spoke again, the only sound in the meantime was Paul banging around in his cell. “What do we tell the others?”
“What others?” They were bears, and one of the perks meant they didn’t have to deal with the politics of the rest of the supernatural world.
“Um, the other bears for one,” Morse numbered them off on his fingers, “There’s that wolf pack a ways away, the witches, the vampires, you name it. There’s some shady-ass government organization recruiting human psychics who have no idea we exist. In what world is this going to end well for us?” His brown eyes were full to the brim with derision, “Have you seen the X-Files?”
Derek chuckled, but his mood turned somber. Morse had a point. A head’s up to the other people near them was almost required. Discovery by normal humans was widely understood to be disastrous. If the government found out about them, Derek could only imagine the trouble it would go to in an effort to either control or eliminated people like him.
“Let’s survive this shit first before dealing with that. I mean, look on the bright side, we might all die trying to get rid of these guys and we won’t have to deal with it.” Derek meant it as a joke, but Morse didn’t laugh.
“Yeah, the guys that thought like that back in Vietnam were the ones who got sent home with their own personal flag and box.” Morse so rarely brought up his time in the military that Derek sometimes forgot he’d served.
“We’re not in the jungle, Morse.” His tone was low, the words of comfort weak, but sincere.
“Aren’t we?” Morse sighed.
Before Derek could answer, Ruth walked in carrying a tablet computer under one arm. “We’ll need to set up a guard rotation for the time being. Eight hour shifts. Twenty-four hour coverage.” She held up the tablet, “I’ve got surveillance outside. Help’ll be coming soon. This is almost over.” She sat down on the couch next to Morse and reached for the remote.
Derek left them to deal with the schedule. They didn’t need three people guarding one door. He understood the definition of overkill. He went to his room, intending to wash up a little. It had been a long day and he felt like there was dirt caked onto his skin.
He took a shower, turning the water to near scalding and scrubbing at his skin. For the first time in hours he had a moment to himself to think. His reaction to Sandra’s kidnapping terrified him. The fact that she’d been kidnapped brought him to his knees.
This wasn’t the life that Derek knew. He lived in his house, helped his friends, and minded his own business. The most danger he’d ever been in was when he’d accidentally stumbled onto a feral bunch of wolves as a kid while ambling about. There were no spies in his life, no kidnappers, no intrigue. And he had never before experienced the level of rage that he’d felt and exacted against that man at the hotel.
Derek turned off the water and stepped out of the shower, slinging a towel around his waist. The shower hadn’t ordered his thoughts, and neither did drying off.
He heard the door to his room open and close as Sandra let herself in. She saw him and smiled, her eyes darkening with a possessive heat. “I told Ruth she could sleep in the same guest room I used earlier. I hope you don’t mind. Morse said he’d crash in his room. I didn’t realize he stayed here that often.
”
Derek smiled, “Of course Ruth can stay there. As for Morse, he likes to lay claim to things. Makes him feel important.” Seeing Sandra, Derek’s confusion evaporated. With Sandra, his life would be a little more difficult, more dangerous. So be it. He’d do anything to keep her.
Sandra scrunched up her face, “You just made a decision, a big one. Care to share?”
Derek walked over to her and took her hand, “The decision was already made.” He uncurled her fingers and kissed her palm before tracing the lines of it with his index finger. “But there is something I haven’t told you.” It didn’t feel like the right time, but if he kept putting this off, she might hold it against him later. Sometimes a man had to make the right time.
“Oh?” He shouldn’t find the fact that she could cut to the bone with just a syllable endearing. But Derek had always followed his own path in such matters.
“Earlier, you asked if there was some weird bear thing with the sex. I told you no.” And he hadn’t really been thinking about it then—all he’d needed was to be inside her. But he hadn’t lied.
“And?” She was apprehensive.
“I didn’t tell you the whole truth.” Even saying that felt like stepping off a cliff. But, much like cliff jumping, once he started, he couldn’t stop, and the speed only accelerated. “Shapeshifters like me can have sex with whoever we want. It’s just like it is with hu... with normal people. But sometimes it’s something more.”
She narrowed her eyes, “The phrase Morse used was ‘mate shit.’”
Of course Morse would have said something. That man couldn’t keep his mouth shut to save his life. “Did he explain it?”
Sandra shook her head, “I was a bit busy trying to stop you from committing murder.”