by Heather Karn
“They will not harm us,” Louis spoke to me in a low voice when my eyes lingered on an abandoned factory with more windows broken out than intact. “They only wish to hide, just as I do, but they’re far more curious.”
“So, they aren’t going to jump out and try to fillet me alive?”
“No.”
I cast him a curious glance, but the darkness of the hood hid his face. “And why not?”
For once, Louis chuckled, pointing to Raven. “Because of him. They fear his kind.”
His kind. My kind. Well, since I still had normal eyes, no one could tell I was different. That was fine with me, and since Raven didn’t correct Louis, I didn’t either. From that point until we reached the SUV, none of us spoke.
Avery hopped out of the backseat as we approached, and waved Louis inside. The Stalker climbed in and Avery slid in after him. By the time Raven and I joined them in our pilot and co-pilot positions, everyone else was buckled with wary eyes on Louis. I couldn’t say that I blamed them.
“Hello, Louis,” Avery greeted without offering a hand to shake. “Nice of you to help us out.”
“The price was right,” came the muffled reply, which were the last words spoken as I navigated through the pot holes and trash littering the streets until we pulled back out onto the major highway.
By the time we reached a few blocks away from where the kits lived, rush hour was in full swing. Grinding my teeth together and muttering at the drivers surrounding us didn’t help clear a way, but it made me feel slightly better to vent, even if the other drivers couldn’t hear me. The apartment complex finally came into view and I cringed when I saw the space between the two cruisers was still open.
Without needing to be told to park between them, I initiated the parallel parking. Like last time, everyone was quiet, even though I could still feel them judging me. While it took less time to park than the last, it wasn’t by much. If my luck held, Raven wouldn’t decide I needed more parking practice like Lee needed more knowledge of supernaturals.
We met again on the sidewalk, this time all of us ringing Louis. He’d loosened his hood so he didn’t draw attention, but he still kept his face well hidden in the shadows. A stark black goatee was the only visible evidence of a face under the hood.
A short man in an Elite uniform stood beside the police chief, staring at the map. No, marking the map. He held a phone to his ear and kept marking several areas until we reached the canopy and he ended the call.
“Any luck?” Raven questioned the man, who slid the phone back into his pocket and lifted his head to flash a devilish smile.
Fox. He had to be a fox. With his ginger hair, cunning eyes, and slightly too long canine teeth, he screamed fox. Even wearing the smile, he shook his head.
“No luck. I hope you have a better plan because my team and I have scoured a five block radius and have come up empty. I’m not sure they would’ve made it much farther than that on their own.”
Raven ground his teeth together, stewing as he glared at the chief, who turned away. “No, they couldn’t have gone much farther, unless we’re all wrong. Thanks for taking over, Jonas.”
Jonas nodded before turning his eyes to me. “You’ve got new blood. She’s a pretty one.” He sniffed the air, his nose flaring with each breath. “She kind of smells like you. Either that or my nose is wrong, and it’s never wrong.” He watched us with expecting eyes, his grin curving further at the edges.
“And we have missing kits to find. We need one of their parents.” Raven redirected the conversation, but I could tell by the curious gleam in Jonas’s eyes that he wasn’t finished trying to figure me out yet.
“Let me call Niko. He’s upstairs looking for any clues or scents we might have missed.” Jonas punched a few buttons on his phone and placed it to his ear. “We need a parent. The first one you can find. Bring them downstairs and make it snappy. We don’t want to keep Raven waiting. Yes, he’s back. Hurry it up.” He ended the call and folded his arms over his narrow chest. “What’s the plan, big guy?”
A vein in Raven’s neck began to pulse to a steady rhythm, and I got the feeling this was why he always had Avery call Jonas. The fox was worming his way under Raven’s skin, and Raven was trying to act patient. It didn’t help when Jonas started tapping his fingers against the table, waiting for Raven to spill the plan.
The standoff ended when a beefy Elite escorted a tiny, young woman from the building over to the canopy. Raven’s demeanor changed, going from annoyed anger to compassionate understanding. His facial features softened, as did his voice.
“Ma’am, can you step over here? There’s someone I want you to meet.”
Chapter 11
Raven led the sniffling woman to our group. The dark haired Niko and Jonas stayed with the police chief, all of them watching our progress. I hadn’t noticed until now that the others had stepped back to the SUV, and they still surrounded Louis. His hands were now gloveless, and a chill ran down my spine and I fought not to wipe my suddenly clammy hands on my pants. All it would take was one touch and he’d be able to find me for the rest of my life.
“What’s your name?” Raven asked the puffy-eyed racoon shifter as she dabbed away more tears with a tissue.
“Janet. Please, can you find my baby? He’s still so little. He couldn’t have gone far. I know so many people are looking for him, but he has to be close by.”
“We know,” Raven responded, wrapping an arm around the smaller woman. “We’re doing what we can, but we have a few more questions. And I’d like you to meet a friend of mine, Reed. He has different contacts than we do, and we wanted to bring him in to help with the search.”
Louis, who apparently went by Reed when working for Raven, reached out his hand and took Janet’s tiny hand in both of his. The sight of their clasped hands made my skin crawl more, but I shoved the feeling away. This man was helping us, and it wasn’t his fault that he’d been born with this ability. In fact, because of his supernatural species, he was likely isolated more than most, which had to be a lonely life. Helping Raven was likely the few times he ever left his dilapidated home.
For the next several minutes, Janet reiterated to us what she’d already told everyone else, but the hope gleaming in her eyes never dimmed. Louis assured her we’d do our best to find the kits and Raven had Niko escort Janet back upstairs. Apparently the child’s father was across the country, and at this time on a plane heading home to help his mate bear this burden. At this point, everyone was expecting the worst.
“Step into my office.” Louis motioned toward the SUV and Raven nodded for us to climb inside. Once we were all settled back into our usual places, Louis closed his eyes and began speaking. “I see her kit, and the other missing kits. They’re northeast of here about twenty miles.”
“Closest intersection?” Raven asked, ready to start searching it out on the GPS. Louis gave him the names of two roads, and instead of focusing on the GPS, Raven turned to the back seats. “That sound familiar to anyone else?”
Luella snarled, turning her normally teasing, smiling face dark and deadly. “Let’s go catch ourselves a coyote.”
“You aren’t taking me with you, are you?” Louis’s panicked voice cracked and his shaking grew worse when Raven’s lips pressed into a thin, white line.
“I don’t think we have a choice. Those kits won’t last long against anyone in Jezzelle’s pack. Tie your hood tight and stay in the SUV. That’s as good as I can do for you.” Raven turned to me and nodded.
As I started the car, Louis’s panic spiked. “But they’ll scent me. I’ll never be able to hide from them.”
Shannon’s evil chuckle reached us up front from her seat in the back as I indicated and pulled onto the street. “Don’t you worry, Louis. By the time I’m done with this car, nobody is going to be able to smell anything inside of it, including you.”
“Yeah, but are we going to be able to smell afterward?” Luella shrieked.
“Hold your breath when
I tell you to and get out quick.”
Avery groaned. “Please tell me you’ll be able to clean the smell out of here.”
“Are you insulting me?”
“No, but I want to be able to breathe on our way back to those apartments, or dropping Louis off, whichever comes first.”
“Dropping me off,” Louis growled, and I had the distinct impression he was running out of patience with the situation.
Raven’s calm voice broke through the tension in the back seats. “The kits will likely need medical attention. Louis’s house isn’t far out of the way from the hospital. We’ll drop him off on the way there.”
“And my money?” the Stalker hissed.
“Already on its way to your account. If the kits are still alive when we leave Jezzelle’s place, you’ll earn another ten percent for your services.”
“Fifteen.”
This time when Raven turned around, his calm demeanor had vanished. “Ten. Not a penny more. If that’s unacceptable, we’ll part ways right here.”
“Ten is fine.”
For the next half an hour, we wove through traffic until we reached the outskirts of the city. Forests surrounded us as Raven gave directions once again. The further we drove, the more tension filled the car. At least I wasn’t the one who cracked first in their curiosity enough to open their mouth.
“So, who’s Jezzelle?” Lee asked from the back seat behind Avery.
It was his trainer who responded. “Humans have the mafia, and the coyotes have Jezzelle. She’s the head of crime yet no one can pin it on her. Raven, you do realize it’s unlikely we’ll be able to pin this on her as well, right?”
“Correct,” he murmured beside me. “That doesn’t mean we can’t try and take out a few of her people. Avery, call Jonas and warn him we might need backup.”
“Already ahead of you,” Avery chuckled. “I texted him a few minutes after we left that we met with one of Reed’s contacts and he mentioned Jezzelle.”
“Why would she want racoon kits?” I struggled to understand the motive behind this.
“She probably has no idea they’re there,” Raven stated. “One or more of her pack probably thought it was fun to kidnap and torture the youngsters and thought it was funny. They would never suspect we’d find them.”
“Which means we’ll need to be very convincing so she doesn’t suspect our friend here,” Shannon called from the back seat.
Raven turned in his seat and flashed a smile just as cunning and sly as Jonas. “I can be very convincing when I want to be.”
Ten minutes later, Raven had me turning into a wide driveway that led to a lakeside mansion. Large SUV’s and shiny muscle cars littered the parking area and garage bays. Lee whistled when Raven had me park next to a particularly fancy car. Since Lee was on the other side of our SUV, he stood as best as he could and leaned over Shannon and Jackson, who was still in wolf form, sitting on the seat. Our wolf friend laid his ears back and drew his lips away from his teeth in a silent snarl as he stared at Lee’s arm closest to him. My brother took the hint and sat back down, though he kept making glances at the car beside us.
“Shannon, be ready to do your thing,” Raven muttered as he watched out the windshield.
I followed his stare as a large group of coyotes exited through the closest door of the mansion. The coyote in the lead was bigger than the rest, its mixture of red, gray, and black fur in pristine condition. Too used to these smaller wild dogs having matted fur, I was shocked by their cleanliness.
“She’s not going to make us wait,” Avery commented. “We’d better not keep her waiting, Captain.”
“Do your thing, Shannon.”
Following Raven’s order, Shannon stated, “Hold your breath everyone. In five seconds climb out, starting now.”
No one second guessed her order to hold our breath or exit the vehicle. Even not breathing I could taste the fragrance of the perfume scent she’d released in the car. There was no way anyone would smell Louis’s scent through that powerful odor, and as the doors closed, locking him inside with the smell, I almost cringed. He’d have no sense of smell by the time we returned, and that was if he was still conscious.
We met at the front of the SUV and Raven led us across the well manicured lawn to meet the group of coyotes. The lead one didn’t leave us waiting a second. Before she’d even reached us, she shifted, and I fought my reaction as fur gave way to skin, revealing a gorgeous, yet naked, female. Long black hair settled around her shoulders, and I kept my eyes level with hers, though I could tell from my peripheral vision that she had way more curves than I’d ever have. She was enough to turn every male into a speechless school boy, and by the slow, sensual grin lifting her lips, she knew it.
“Captain Raven Cartana, it’s been a while.”
“Jezzelle, you’re looking well.”
Of course he had to comment about her looks. What a male.
She stared past us to Louis still sitting in the SUV. “Shy friend?”
“Disobedient trainee.”
“And the stench? Trying to cover his scent?”
“Trying to burn out his nose hairs,” Raven smirked. “At least I think that’s what his trainer’s trying to do. She nearly hit us all with it, and I think she forgets we have to climb back in there when we’re done here.”
Jezzelle smirked, keeping her conniving stare glued on the SUV. “My, my, your witch friend has a nasty streak. I’d best watch myself.” A giggle punctuated her sarcastic comments.
She stepped forward, swaying her hips as she did to draw more attention to herself. I was too busy trying not to stare below her shoulders to notice if any of my companions took a look. The only one who I knew for a fact didn’t stare was Raven. His eyes stayed riveted on hers. When she reached him, she placed a hand on his stomach and slid it up his chest and around his neck in a seductive move that made my insides squirm, yet Raven didn’t budge.
“Want to come inside and have a drink? You look thirsty.” Her sultry voice was full of temptation as she ran a finger from her other hand along Raven’s jawline.
“I’m sorry, Jezzi, but I’m working.”
Jezzi? Raven knew her that well that he had a nickname for her? My ears heated when I couldn’t stop myself in time from contemplating how well they knew each other.
“Awe, that’s too bad. Are you sure you don’t want to mix work with pleasure?”
Raven finally broke his serious expression, one side of his mouth lifting in a half grin. “Sorry, not today.”
“Then that leads me to wonder what brings work out here? Surely I haven’t done anything wrong.”
His grin fell. “Not you, I’m sure, but a coyote for certain.”
Jezzelle took a step back and narrowed her eyes. Her eyebrows drew low over her eyes, and for the first time, I could see how this female was lethal in her own right. The males standing behind her in both forms tensed, ready for action.
“There are three more coyote packs in close proximity, yet here you are. Why focus on me?”
And this was where we all hoped Raven was a smooth talker. Instead of talking, he took a step forward, putting himself nearer to the Alpha female. This time, she didn’t seem to like how close he stood, but she wouldn’t retreat.
“Jezzi, we aren’t here to blame you. Yes, there are several more packs, but I don’t know their Alpha leadership as well as I know you. You know them. Have you heard any word of racoon kits being kidnapped?”
She didn’t appear any happier. “You want me to rat out other packs, is that it?” Jezzelle shook her head, a sad smile lighting her face and eyes. “No, you know something. What is it?”
“We have a witness that recognized the coyotes responsible as belonging to your pack.” Raven’s tone brooked no argument. He remained quiet as Jezzelle’s face grew a deep shade of red and she bared her teeth.
When I thought she’d explode like Raven had earlier with the police chief, she turned away and focused on four of her posse. “Find
those kits and bring them to me, as well as those responsible. I will not have anyone in my pack harming children, of any species.”
The men who were human shifted, and the four of them didn’t hesitate. As one, they raced away past the house. Within seconds they were out of sight. I wasn’t sure where they were going, another house maybe? An entire pack couldn’t exist out of one house, no matter the size, right?
“Are you sure you don’t want to come in and have a drink?” Jezzelle asked, a grin lifting her lush lips again, abating her anger. “This could take a while, and you look thirsty. Your eyes are awful dim, Rave.”
Wait, she was asking if Raven wanted to drink from her? From my angle, I couldn’t see his eyes, but I hadn’t thought Raven’s eyes that dim the last time I’d taken notice. Then again, with the way she was running her fingertips over his bicep, I wouldn’t be surprised if this was her way of trying to seduce him somehow. That she was trying to do so in front of Raven’s team was awkward, at least until Avery chuckled.
“I could use a drink, Jezzi. Got anything that a feline might like?”
The coyote shifted her attention to Avery and smirked, stepping back from Raven. “I don’t think I’m the right blood type for you, but I might have something you’d enjoy, kitty cat. The rest of you can stay outside. I want to catch up with my boys.” She flicked her fingers, beckoning the men to follow her as another vehicle parked beside ours. “Oh look, Jonas is here. He stays outside. That man is more of a weasel than a fox. Come on, Rave.”
Jezzelle tugged Raven behind her as she made her way to the mansion. A chuckling Avery followed behind and a pit opened in my stomach. This couldn’t be good. Hadn’t they just told me that she was part of some shifter mafia? And now they were going to enjoy some drinks with her?
While the three ventured inside, the remaining men stayed outside watching us. Jonas’s team remained inside their large sedan, waiting for any sign of trouble. If we all played this cool, there wouldn’t be any fuss, but my luck hadn’t been the best lately, and it was only going to get better. The minutes ticked by, and eventually nature called.