by Ann Gimpel
His fingers flew over the display while she backed out. “Ready?” he asked. She nodded and he tapped the find it icon. The car edged out of the alley and took a left turn. It would get them to the address in its automotive brain without any assistance. “Is there somewhere I can read more about the things I need to know about being a shifter? What if you hadn’t been sitting right next to me? I’d have gone to Tanaka’s house and been clueless.”
“We’ve never written things like that down.”
“But how can I learn if there’re no materials to study?” he persisted.
“According to Max, once we get all forty-three of you rounded up and flying the same direction, he’s going to chuck the lot of you into a crash course in magic.”
“Car’s slowing down.”
She glanced through the windshield at a well-kept, but older neighborhood with bungalow-style homes. Kate disconnected the autopilot and looked for a parking spot. “That’s the address, isn’t it?” He nodded. “Do you suppose they’d mind if I parked in their driveway?”
“Don’t see why not.”
The car doors opened. Once she and Devon cleared the electronic beam, they swooshed shut and locked. Devon moved ahead of Kate. “Let me go first, in case there’s something we hadn’t anticipated.”
She dropped behind him. It felt good to be side-by-side with Devon. They fit together—mentally and physically. A pleasant vibration hummed between them. If she’d been in her cat form, she would have purred. It had been hard to keep her hands off him during lunch. Still was.
He raised his hand to knock, but the door opened before he could. A diminutive Asian woman with waist-length dark hair and huge dark eyes peered out the door. “Who’s she?” The woman pointed at Kate.
“It’s okay, Mrs. Tanaka. She’s a friend of mine. I had a feeling I knew what might be wrong. I brought her along to help.”
The woman’s face crumpled. “I am Makiko. Please to come in.”
Kate heard the click of several deadbolts as the woman locked the door behind them.
An ominous growl came from the back of the house. Coyote. She sniffed the air. No, wolf. Kate sucked in a breath and took a chance. She walked to the woman. “Makiko. Your husband has taken another form. Am I correct?”
The woman’s eyes widened. She drew back. “H-how could you possibly know that? W-what are you?”
“It’s the injections,” Devon said. “The ones for the task force. Ray had shifter blood and the drug made it strong enough for him to shift.”
Makiko sank onto a footstool and dropped her head into her hands. “I thought maybe it was something like that.” She raised her gaze to Devon, pleading in her eyes. “Can you make him human again?”
“Yes—” Devon began.
“Maybe,” Kate said firmly. “Where is he?”
“Right behind you.” A low growl made Kate spin around. She made a split second decision, shucked her clothes, and reached for her cat form.
She circled him, tail swishing. “You are still thinking in words. That’s a good sign. A very good sign. Did you see me shift?”
“Yes. What does that have to do with…? Holy shit, is that what happened? I’ve turned into one of them?” The large gray timber wolf fell onto his haunches, threw back his muzzle, and howled.
“Stop, stop.” Makiko held out her hands. “We have neighbors. They’ll turn us in.”
“Get hold of yourself.” Kate made her mind voice stern. “Right now.” She gathered her rear legs under her, ready to spring and bite him if she had to.
Tanaka quieted. His amber eyes held a haunted cast. He got all four feet under him and paced up and down the smallish living room. “You went from woman to cat. How can I reverse the process?”
“Quiet your mind. Visualize your human form. It will come.”
He barked once. It sounded like the human equivalent of “ha” to her.
“Look.” Kate shimmered back to her human form. “It’s easy. The reason you feel trapped is because you’re upset. When we’re upset, we can’t shift. Come on, Ray. Take a few breaths, calm yourself and reach for your human form.” She picked up her clothes and dressed, never taking her gaze from him.
Devon came up behind her and placed his hands on her shoulders. “Do you think—?”
“Sssh. Let’s give him a chance.” The air around Tanaka took on a luminous glow. “You’re on the right track,” Kate murmured in mind speech. “Just keep doing what you’re doing.”
The air quieted, and then glowed again. On Tanaka’s fourth try, the wolf disappeared. Tanaka’s human eyes were wide with horror; his mouth opened and closed like a landed fish. He glanced down. His hands dove to his crotch to cover himself. He skittered out of the room with Makiko hard behind him. A door slammed shut.
Devon dropped his mouth next to Kate’s ear. “Well played. I didn’t think he’d be able to find his way back.”
“Neither did I,” she whispered back.
A few moments passed. Kate heard the low murmur of voices from the room Ray and his wife had disappeared into. “They need to come back out here. We have to talk with them.”
“I agree.” Devon strode to the closed door and knocked. When no one said anything, he knocked louder, following it with, “Look, man, I know how you feel, but I have to talk with you.”
Footsteps sounded. The door cracked open a few inches. “Thank your, ah, friend for me, Heartshorn. I don’t feel much like talking. Makiko, she was only trying to help, but she shouldn’t have called you.”
The door started to shut. Devon jammed his boot between it and the frame. “Put on some clothes, goddamn it, and come out here.”
“Give me a minute.”
Devon backtracked to Kate. They stood near the front door, waiting. The sound of a knob turning made Kate look up. Danger so thick she could barely breathe flooded her cat senses. She pounded her shoulder into Devon. “Get down,” she shrieked. They both hit the floor.
He rolled on top of her and drew his laser pistol. The phut-phut of a laser slammed into the front door just behind where they’d been standing seconds before. Kate peered from under Devon and eyed Tanaka. The man held an identical weapon trained right on them.
“Drop it or I’ll shoot,” Devon said.
“Your girlfriend, abomination that she is, would be dead before you got me.”
“What the fuck?” Devon snarled. “She wasn’t an abomination when she helped you find your way back.”
Makiko burst out of the back room and threw her body between her husband and Devon and Kate. “Go,” she screeched. “Just go. He won’t shoot me.”
“Kate. Get up. Back toward the door. Open it nice and easy.” Unfolding his body, Devon stood, gun still trained on Tanaka.
“But we need to talk with him,” she protested, scrambling to her feet. She locked her gaze onto Tanaka’s. “What if you shift again? You need to learn how to—”
The gun wavered in his hand. He dropped it to his side. “I don’t want to learn anything about being a shifter. Nothing. Not now. Not ever. Please leave. I-I can’t believe this happened to me.” A sob tore out of him, followed by another. His shoulders heaved. Makiko turned and put her arms around her husband, crooning in Japanese.
Devon backed toward her. “Open the door. We’re leaving.”
“But—”
“We’ll talk about this outside.”
Something in his tone got her attention. She reached behind her until she felt the latch, engaged it, and slid out the door. Devon joined her on the porch and eased the door shut. He put a hand on her shoulder and propelled her toward the car.
Before they got to it, she heard the report of a laser pistol and a high, keening cry. She heard the gun again, then silence.
“Was that what I thought it was?” She felt ill. Kate ducked from beneath his arm, spun, and ran for the house.
Devon grabbed her arm and dragged her toward the driveway. “Yes. We need to be gone from here. Now. Unlock your car.”
They were halfway back to her office before it dawned on her. “You knew.”
He nodded. “I speak some Japanese. They took the honorable way out—at least by their code.”
Tears pricked behind her lids. One spilled over. “To think we are so hated,” she choked out, “that death is preferable…” Her voice ran down. She swallowed back bile burning the back of her throat. “I could have helped him.”
“He didn’t want your help. Not mine, either.” Devon’s ragged breathing was loud against the silence inside the car. “I wonder how the other forty-one of us will fare.”
“Crap. I hadn’t even thought about that. You did all right—”
“Not at first I didn’t. Remember?” He took one of her hands in his. “I had you. It made a hell of a difference.”
“Do you want me to drop you at your car?”
“No.” His jaw was set in a hard line. “I’d like to come upstairs with you. I’m ready to talk with Max. We need some sort of plan so we don’t lose any more potential allies to suicide.”
Chapter 10
Devon kept an arm around Kate as she guided the car into her garage. She was visibly shaken by what happened. His heart ached for her, but he didn’t know how to soften her pain. He’d seen so much death, he’d found places to pigeonhole it. Ray Tanaka couldn’t live with what he’d become, so he checked out. Devon could accept that. Makiko hadn’t wished to live with the shame of her husband’s dual nature, so she’d followed him into death. In Japanese culture, their deaths were honorable.
He followed Kate up the stairs. Once they got inside, he drew her against him and held her until her tears slowed. “I love you, Kate. If there were some way I could reach into your heart and make you stop hurting—”
“Thanks.” She snuffled. “I’m sad, but I’m angry, too. He was such a beautiful wolf. What a waste of talent and ability.” She tilted her head back until her gaze met his, amber eyes red-rimmed and swollen. “Because he died in human form, the wolf will be lost, wandering endlessly, hunting for his human half. It’s just so sad. Being a shifter is a great gift. Tanaka spat on it and cast it aside.”
“When we die, it’s as animals?” Devon wanted to know more about the cat part of himself.
She nodded. “Yes, our spirits rest easy that way. It frees the animal to find another bond partner.”
He led her through the bedroom to the outer office, sat on a plush floral sofa, and drew her against his body. “Tell me some things about being a shifter.”
“What would you like to know?”
“How do the human and animal parts integrate?”
She cuddled closer to him and drew her feet up onto the couch. “All I can tell you is how it works for me, but I think it’s similar for the rest of us. My human side has one set of feelings and thoughts, my cat side another. The cat is more instinctual, the human more rational. Each side has the utmost respect for her sister.”
She took a breath. “When I’m human, the cat lives inside me. When I’m a cat, the human lives inside. For me to kill myself in human form would be the ultimate fuck you to my cat. I’d deserve to rot in hell.”
“How do you find out which animal is yours? It can’t be genetic. Mother was a bear. One aunt is a coyote; another is a wolf. Grandmother is a mountain lion.”
“You won’t believe it if I tell you.”
“Try me.” His arms tightened around her. God, but she felt good. Like she belonged next to him—now and always. He kissed her forehead.
Kate wriggled away so she could look at him. “Maybe you will believe me. After all, it’s part of your Native American background. Dreaming is, anyway. The animals are immortal. They exist in something like a parallel universe. We dream who our animal will be. We dream them and they become part of us.” She stopped; her forehead furrowed in thought. “Maybe it didn’t work that way for you since you were so old when your first shift happened.”
Devon pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. A chill ran down his back. The same one he felt whenever he faced something eerie. “I did have mountain lion dreams. Lots of them from when I was a child until I was, maybe, twenty or so.”
Her eyes lit with delight. “See! It was your cat trying to connect, except your blood wasn’t strong enough. As soon as it was—”
He laughed. It bubbled up from his belly and filled him with a sense of well-being. “My blood had a hell of a boot in the ass from your considerable charms.”
She smiled and shrugged. “Maybe so, but still…” Her smile grew broader. “I’d say that’s one happy cat. He waited a long time for you.”
“What would have happened if I’d never had those infusions?”
Her face grew serious. “He would have wandered on the other side, waiting. Sort of like Tanaka’s wolf is doing right now. Except the wolf knows Tanaka is dead, so he is grieving—and probably furious because he’s trapped. Your cat wouldn’t have given up until he was certain you were dead.”
“And then?”
“Because you had never actually bonded, he would have opened himself to another’s dreams. We die in animal form because it frees both human and animal to move forward to whatever comes next.”
“The night he tried to talk with me, Tanaka told me he’d had wolf dreams.” Devon frowned. “If I’d known more then—” Guilt jabbed him. He dropped his gaze.
She stroked his cheek. “Don’t. You still couldn’t have told him anything without compromising yourself.”
“Animals are amazing, aren’t they? Loyal, true, honorable, courageous.”
Kate nodded. “All those things and more. I can’t imagine not being a shifter. It’s added so much richness to my life.”
“And I can’t imagine a life without you.” He pulled her close and kissed her. She fit perfectly against his body. She opened her mouth under his, but he broke away. “I have to go back to work. They’ll be trying to raise me on the radio, especially once they find out about Tanaka.”
“Do you still want to talk with Max?”
“Yeah, I do.”
She looked thoughtful. “Okay, I’ll see if I can connect with him through the vid feed, but you go wait in the bedroom until I call you. I need to make certain he wants to talk with you before I blow his identity.”
Devon hopped off the couch and walked into the bedroom. Since he had a few moments, he gathered his hair and braided it to get it out of the way. He heard the click of keys and the muted rise and fall of voices. It wasn’t long before she called, “Come on. It’s okay.”
Devon walked briskly to her side and hunkered so he could look at the screen. He whistled, then clapped a hand over his mouth. “Sorry, sir. I wasn’t expecting the California state governor.”
Max laughed. “No, son, I’ll bet you weren’t. Miss Roman told me what happened to Tanaka. Damned shame. Predictable, though, when someone turns into what they’ve been taught to hate. Quite a shock to the system.”
“What can we do to make certain the same thing doesn’t happen to the forty-one others in the Tracker task force?” Devon asked. “Not to mention others like us in different cities and states.”
Max’s lips formed a thin, hard line. “Unfortunately, there’s not much we can do to keep desperate men and women who’ve lived by the gun from turning their weapons against themselves.”
“What if we warned them?” Kate asked.
Devon spread his hands in front of him. “What would we say? Congratulations, you just won the kewpie doll? You’re now a shifter. Most of them would react just like Tanaka. Or like I did, for that fact, until I pulled my head out of my ass. Uh, sorry, sir.” He glanced at Max.
“No offense taken. Miss Roman is right that forewarning—or even a bit of frank discussion—might go a long way toward making the news more palatable.”
Max frowned. “How about this?” He moved his gaze to Devon. “Pay your commanding officer a visit. Tell him Tanaka tried to talk with you at the riot. Look uncomfortable,
then confide you’ve had some of the same problems with enhanced hearing and smell, but because you had the whole Native American mystic gig going, you’ve been able to manage things—”
“That will bring him to their attention and put him at risk,” Kate protested.
Devon held up a hand. “Let’s hear him out. So far what he’s said seems logical. I’m concerned about Tanaka’s death. Don’t want anyone else doing the same thing. Suicide’s quite common among cops. We don’t talk much about it, but it bothers all of us.”
“Exactly,” Max said. “Offer to spend time one-on-one with the other officers, especially the ones with shifter blood. You can even voice a suspicion that maybe the infusion strengthens shifter proclivities—but only a little. Since they have you pegged at twenty-five percent, you’d have a long way to go before you hit the magic halfway point which would spell your destruction.”
“I like it.” Devon ran the plan through his head, looking for holes. “It seems like a really clean way to give me access to the rest of the task force. I can feel them out to see who might be a candidate to join us.”
Max inclined his head. “Smart man. You understand how powerful this could be.” He shifted his gaze to Kate. “Looks like you picked a good one, Miss Roman.”
“I still don’t like it,” she muttered.
Devon took her hand. “None of us will be safe until this is over. I can take care of myself. I’ve been doing it for a long time.”
“Speaking of over.” Kate looked at Max. “How long?”
“Not more than a couple of weeks. Hopefully, more like ten days. We can move fast when we need to.”
“Sooner is better.” Devon’s brow creased in a frown. “Someone will talk and jeopardize everything.”
“Yes, that’s bound to happen,” Max agreed. He pointed a finger at Devon. “Watch your back. Best if you simply sound out the other task force members without revealing anything. Work through Miss Roman if you need me.” The screen faded to gray.
Devon pushed to his feet and shook his legs to get the kinks out of them from staying in a crouch so long. “I’ll be damned,” he muttered. “Guess it helps to have friends in high places.”