by Zoe Chant
Not even slightly the point of why we’re here, she told herself, as she saw Beau walking smoothly back across the room, a drink in his hand, and looking way too amazing for words.
If he’s coming back, it means he hasn’t found Scott yet, Annie thought, as the dealer began dealing a new hand.
Sure enough, Beau leaned down to give her a kiss on the cheek, breathing, “No luck yet,” in her ear as he stood back up.
Annie saw him do a double-take as he spotted the pile of chips – and various other items – sitting on the table in front of her.
“Though it seems like someone’s been lucky,” he said, blinking in surprise. “Though I suppose I shouldn’t say luck – this looks like pure skill. I thought you said this was just a bit of fun?”
Annie laughed, ducking her head. “’Fraid not. This is all luck.”
“Don’t undersell yourself,” Beau said, his thumb running over Annie’s shoulder, making her shiver. “But look, since you look like you’ll be here a while, I might go entertain myself somewhere else. Let’s say half an hour?”
“Sounds good,” Annie said, feigning disinterest in what he was saying as she lifted her new hand.
Half an hour. I guess that means I better be ready to go then.
At least she hoped that was what Beau meant. As much as she was enjoying her success, being here really was kind of nerve-wracking. Burying herself in the game was her way of making sure she wasn’t looking around for Beau every thirty seconds.
Letting out a slow breath that she hoped could be passed off as calming herself before the new hand started, Annie watched Beau’s back from the corner of her eye as he headed out of the room once more.
Hurry back, Beau. Please.
Chapter 12
As much as he’d known Annie was intelligent and courageous, Beau had to admit he was the tiniest bit surprised at the massive amount of chips and other winnings he’d seen piled in front of her.
Why would you be surprised? Our mate is perfect. Why should she not outshine everyone around her in every regard? his hippogriff spoke up, sounding affronted, as if it had to protect Annie’s integrity from him.
You know that’s not what I mean, Beau told it, irritated, as he put his empty glass down on the tray of a passing waiter. Poker’s not exactly easy.
The hippogriff merely rustled its wings as if Beau was being ridiculous, regarding him skeptically.
You may doubt our mate, but I never will.
The last thing Beau felt like doing right now was having an argument with an ornery hippogriff who seemed determined to misinterpret everything he said.
That’s fine, but right now we need to focus, he told it.
The mansion was vast – a maze of glass, timber and rock. So far, he hadn’t had much luck in finding Scott, and if he couldn’t find him in the next hour or so he might simply have no choice but to try to find him in the confusion when the Shifter Patrol Corps team moved in.
But with that comes the risk of him getting hurt or used as a bargaining chip, Beau thought, grimacing.
He’d been creating a mental map of the place based on his survey of it as they’d swooped in to land. The eagle’s sharp eyes and sense of distance and perspective had immediately created a model of the mansion in his brain, which he’d been filling in as he wandered from room to room, calculating what was missing, and which direction he’d have to go to find any sealed-off rooms or sections of the mansion that weren’t being used for the party.
Security guards were posted, but even so, Beau had managed to evade them twice to slip into areas he clearly wasn’t supposed to be in.
But so far, no Scott.
There was still a place he hadn’t checked yet: three large rooms made of timber that sat above the massive glass structure that formed the main part of the mansion.
Unlike the rest of this place, Beau hadn’t been able to see inside them as he’d sailed past earlier. But that made him almost certain that they were whoever owned this place’s private rooms – off limits to the partygoers.
And therefore, by far the most likely place for Scott to be.
And so, of course, by far the most difficult place to get to.
His hope that he might find Scott in a side room or even at one the gaming tables had been wishful thinking, but he’d decided it’d be better to at least eliminate them as possibilities before he tackled the far more challenging task of getting into the top floor rooms.
He glanced around. Security here was heavily visible – the huge, tux-wearing men with gun holsters obviously strapped to their belts who stood at most doorways and the ends of corridors – but not exactly proactive. They mostly stood and stared at people, though that was most likely because no one had caused any trouble yet.
Beau eyed a huge specimen of a man across the room from him. Taking one out quietly was probably going to be a challenge. All of them were probably trained fighters, and it’d only take one false move from him, one out-of-place sound, for him to put himself – and, more importantly, Annie – in danger.
He was willing to bet the guns were loaded with bullets tipped with dragonsbane, too. Despite the name, dragonsbane was dangerous to all shifters, not just dragons. Made mainly from the venom of wyverns, it would slow a shifter’s healing down so that it was almost on a level with a human’s, making a gunshot wound far more serious, and it had a host of other side-effects besides.
So, taking them out is probably not a great idea. But perhaps a distraction might be enough….
Grabbing another drink from a tray as a waiter passed him by, Beau feigned taking a sip out of it as he headed downstairs toward the main entrance. The massive arcing stairway might be impressive and draw the eye, but he’d noticed a small, semi-concealed door behind it, that was, of course, guarded by one of the heavies.
Still there, he noted, as he stepped from the stairs into the grand foyer. The guard was standing in front of the door, brows drawn together, hands folded in front of him. Well, let’s see what it’d take to dislodge him from his post.
Skirting around the edge of a group of men who’d obviously gotten bored of watching the women having all the fun at the tables, Beau picked out one or two who seemed the most likely to fall for the trap he was about to lay for them.
With their fast metabolism, it took a lot of alcohol to get a shifter drunk. But these two had somehow managed it, if their red faces and slurred speech were anything to go by.
Beau could also tell by the way they moved that they were likely to be some kind of fiery-tempered, hotheaded shifter type. He couldn’t tell exactly what their shifted forms would be, but he’d been around enough of them at the Corps to know them when he saw them.
It doesn’t take much to tip those types over the edge, Beau thought, as he sidled up.
A quick elbow to the closer guy’s upper arm was all it took to send his drink flying all over the other one’s shirtfront. By the time the first man had worked out what had happened and begun to turn to confront whoever had elbowed him, Beau had already moved on – and the man he’d spilled his drink over was already making a fuss over it.
“Hey, what the fuck, man?” Beau heard his voice ringing out above the general chatter of the room. “Watch what you’re doing! Fuck’s sake! Are you stupid or something?”
Beau didn’t need to look to know the man with the spilled drink wouldn’t exactly enjoy being called stupid, and he wasn’t surprised a moment later when the sound of incoherent yelling and landing punches rang out.
As he’d hoped they would, the heavies guarding the various doorways around the foyer left their posts to rush over and break up the fight, faces stern. There was no way they were going to let a drunken brawl upset the fine evening their boss had set up.
With his frame and height, Beau wasn’t exactly built for sneaking around, but he could be stealthy when he needed to be.
As the guard he’d been eyeing off left his place in front of the doorway beneath the stairs, Beau slipped into
the shadows, pressing down on the door handle.
Unlocked. That’s… interesting, Beau thought as the door opened smoothly. He didn’t have a lot of time to ponder it, though. He slipped through the door, closing it silently behind him.
He found himself in a plush corridor, wood paneled, a thick red carpet running its full length and leading to a small set of stairs.
I bet I know where those go.
Keeping an ear cocked for the sound of any movement, Beau took the stairs straight up, and found himself exactly where he’d predicted: in the cluster of rooms at the top of the structure. They mapped directly onto what his eagle eyes had surveyed.
Glancing around, Beau grimaced. He’d promised Annie he’d be back in half an hour, and he was starting to get pushed for time. He didn’t want to leave her in that gambling hall any longer than he absolutely had to.
I’ll be with you soon, Annie, he promised her in his mind as he tried the first door he came to, after first listening carefully for any signs of life in the room on the other side. Just hold on a little longer.
The first room was empty – a library, it seemed – but in the second one –
Scott’s head shot up as Beau opened the door. He was sitting on a dark red armchair by a window, his clothes rumpled and looking as if he hadn’t slept in days, though Beau knew at most he’d only been trapped here for a few hours.
Maybe that’s what a guilty conscience does to you, Beau thought as Scott gaped at him. Assuming he has one, of course.
“You –!” Scott gasped after staring open-mouthed at Beau for a moment. “I knew there was something fishy about you from the moment I saw you!”
Beau forced himself not to grimace in annoyance. He hadn’t been certain Scott would recognize him, or if he’d been too blinded by his own bruised ego to memorize his face. He’d been hoping Scott wouldn’t remember him. Now, it was going to be just that much harder to convince him to come with him, and Beau was running short of both time and patience.
I have to get back to Annie.
“I don’t have time to explain everything to you right now,” he said shortly. “Just know that I’m not with the people who have you prisoner here. I’m here to get you out.”
Scott looked at him, clearly dubious.
“Are you one of them?” he asked after a moment. “One of those things – those shifters?”
Oh, this is the last thing I need, Beau thought, scowling as he walked quickly to the window on the other side of the room, trying to open it.
Locked.
The lock probably wouldn’t have posed that big of a problem for him to either pick or break, but the bars on the other side would. He could probably have torn them from the window frame, but doing so would likely cause a lot of noise.
“Yes, I’m a shifter,” he told Scott quickly. “And lucky for you I am, or else I wouldn’t be here.”
Scott pursed his lips, before crossing his arms over his chest. “I don’t believe you’re here to save me,” he said. “I know your type. You’d never turn against other shifters.”
“I would if the shifters were criminals preying on humans and others,” Beau shot back, leaving the window and going to the wooden, ornately carved closet to his right.
If the window won’t work, then it’s time for Plan B.
He glanced at Scott as he opened the closet doors. “How do you know about shifters, anyway?”
Scott sneered, raising an eyebrow. “Are you stupid or something? Who in Bell’s Hollow doesn’t know about shifters? They’ve always lived around here, keeping themselves to themselves mostly, thinking they’re so superior.”
Beau had to admit he was surprised by Scott’s answer – though one look at him told him he was definitely telling the truth.
Annie didn’t know, though, he thought, as he rifled through the clothes hanging in the closet.
But then, as Annie had explained, she was a newcomer to Bell’s Hollow – she’d only lived there a couple of years. Was it possible she simply hadn’t been there long enough to be initiated into the small town’s secrets, the existence of shifters included? He recalled what she’d said to him while they’d been sitting by the lake, waiting for their chowder: Even here, where people are nice to me… I’ve only been here a couple of years, I guess, so I’m still not really considered part of the community. It’s just the way folks are in small towns, I guess. I’m still an outsider, really.
Well, Beau guessed he knew why, now: Bell’s Hollow had some bigger secrets than the usual small-town gossip. But he supposed it would have been much harder for shifters to stay secret in such a small place.
“I don’t have time to argue with you about this right now,” Beau said curtly, finding a hat and a coat in the closet and yanking them off their hangers. “Either you can believe me and come quietly, or you can stay here with the people who just tried to burn down your father’s bakery. It’s your choice.”
Scott stared up at him, what little color he had draining from his face.
“Burn down – they really did it?” he asked, voice filled with horror. “I thought they were just – I never thought they’d actually –”
“They didn’t, but only because we arrived in time to stop them,” Beau said, grabbing Scott’s arm and hauling him to his feet. “But you don’t know how close you came to costing your father everything. And if you don’t want to cost him even more, you have to come with me. Now.”
Finally, his words seemed to penetrate Scott’s brain. Somehow, until now, he hadn’t seemed to grasp just how serious a situation he was in. But he looked at Beau now, his eyes widening in fear, and he nodded.
“Good.” Beau jammed the hat down onto Scott’s head, doing his best to cover his face. He wound the large coat over his shoulders, pulling the collar up over his jaw to hide his face even more. “We’re getting out of here. If anyone asks, you’ve had too much to drink, and I’m helping you. So act drunk.”
Scott swallowed, plucking at the jacket. “I don’t think that’s a good plan,” he whined after a moment. “You think just sneaking around is good enough?”
“Yes,” Beau snapped. “The idea is to get out of here without them knowing.”
Scott’s expression turned mulish. “They humiliated me, though,” he muttered. “Made me beg them to give me a second chance. It was… it was humiliating,” he said again, clearly having reached the end of his vocabulary.
“I really can’t tell you how much I don’t care about that right now,” Beau told him. “This is the plan. Take it or leave it.”
Scott pouted for a moment longer, before finally, he nodded.
Beau didn’t have the patience for relief. Pulling Scott along behind him, Beau checked first one way and then the other along the corridor outside.
The coast was clear – too clear for Beau’s liking.
He guessed that the fight he’d started downstairs would be well and truly subdued by now, and so he couldn’t rely on the guards no longer being at their posts anymore.
But even when he pushed his shifter hearing and senses to their limits without actually shifting, he couldn’t detect any danger.
But that, in itself, seemed somewhat strange to him.
Within him, his hippogriff shifted about uneasily.
I dislike this.
I know, he told it, as he began making his way down the corridor, pulling Scott with him. But we don’t have another choice right now. Let’s find Annie and go.
This was the most dangerous part of the mission. Up until now, he’d done nothing suspicious. But leaving an area of the house he obviously wasn’t supposed to be in, dragging a man these shifters were obviously trying to hold captive… well, this was the tricky part.
Going down a small staircase leading down from the corridor, they reached a large set of doors, different to the one he’d come in by. Beau paused, cocking his ears to listen. Beyond the doors he could just make out the general chatter of the party and he guessed they probably let out ont
o the mezzanine above the foyer, directly across from the poker room where Annie would still be playing.
Scott was fidgeting with the hat Beau had disguised him with, until Beau reached up and pulled it down again.
“The only thing you need to do now is keep quiet and act like you’ve had too much to drink,” he said in a low, harsh, whisper. “Think you can do that?”
Scott looked like he might argue for a moment, but then he nodded.
All right. Moment of truth.
He supposed if there was a security guard he hadn’t been able to detect on the other side of the door, he could always tell them he’d just been trying to find a more private bathroom for Scott to throw up in.
Beau gently pushed open the door. No angry face popped around from the other side to demand what he thought he was doing, so Beau continued to ease the door open, until they could make their way out onto the mezzanine.
So far, so good. Now to get Annie and get out of here.
Once they were out of the house, he’d set off the low-frequency signal that would let the Shifter Patrol Corps agents waiting to enter the premises know that they were clear, and Annie and Scott were no longer in danger of getting caught up in things.
I’d like to know more about this ‘boss’, Beau thought grimly as he dragged Scott – who was in fact doing a great job of acting like he was too drunk to walk properly – toward the poker room.
But there’d be time for that later. His job was finding Scott and getting him out of the way. He couldn’t lose focus on that. Anything else he wanted to know he would find out during his debriefing.
Glancing around to check for any security guards who might have clocked them, Beau felt his blood beginning to simmer as he took in the outrageously luxurious surroundings.
He was usually extremely level-headed and easygoing. But the idea that there were some shifters who used their abilities for a life of crime had never sat well with him – and whoever had built this place had obviously had a lot of success in whatever their criminal ventures were.