by Renee Rose
“Kylie, I need to know what happened at the Louvre.”
She blinks in surprise and tries to pull away. I literally can see her emotional retreat before my eyes.
“Don’t run,” I command. “Look at me. I need to know.”
“Why?”
“You’ve been in hiding since then. And now you’ve been outed. Are you in danger?”
She shakes her head. “Not for the next seven to ten years.”
“Tell me.”
“It was my father’s partner in the heist. A double-cross. My father planned to return the painting to its rightful owners—relatives of the Jewish family it was stolen from during the war. As soon as they had the painting, he stabbed my dad and took the canvas. He didn’t know I’d come along. Never knew there was a witness. I stayed in hiding as a precaution. I figured if he knew where to find me, he’d want me dead. But, strangely enough, he became the victim of quite a few cyber attacks over the last few years, including one that stole enough evidence to send the FBI after him.” My brave little warrior smiles up at me. “So, I’m safe for now. Until he gets out of jail and comes looking for me.”
I growl. Not good enough. I vow to eliminate that threat completely. But at least I know, for now, she’s safe from that direction.
Kylie lifts her chin. “What about you? Anyone want you dead?”
I rub my forehead. “Maybe. If I returned home, I’d probably be challenged.”
“Why?”
My head suddenly aches. I lean my forehead against hers. “You don’t want to know, baby.”
“I told you mine. You tell me yours.” Her voice is firm, the challenge clear in her eyes. My female is alpha all the way.
“I killed my stepfather.” The only person I’ve ever told before is Sam, although Garrett might know if he’s done any research into my history.
To her credit, Kylie doesn’t flinch, doesn’t show any shock. She touches my face. “What happened?”
“He was the pack leader. Alpha. A first class asshole. Beat my mom regularly. Not like a spanking, the way wolves establish dominance. With his fists.”
Kylie pales but remains quiet.
“He put my mom in the hospital once. Shifters heal fast, so you have to know how bad it was.” The memories raced back to him. Seeing his mother bloodied and battered on that hospital bed. I’m not going back, Jackson, she told him. You don’t go back, either.
“She didn’t heal. I can only guess she didn’t want to. Or that he’d battered her mind so badly, too, that the ability to heal shut off.” I was only fourteen. Old enough to want to fight my stepfather, but too small to stop him. “She died three days later. I watched her just slip away. And I…” My throat works. I don’t want to tell her this part.
She strokes my arm, listening. Waiting.
“I killed him.”
“How?”
“Don’t ask me that, baby. I don’t want you to think of me—”
“You can tell me,” she murmurs. “It won’t change how I feel about you.”
Like hell it won’t.
“I ran home from the hospital. My fangs were probably down like they were tonight. I’d only just started shifting and had little control of the animal inside. He heard me snarling and came outside the house. Stood there like a son of a bitch with his hands on his hips. What? he sneered. Your mama send you after me, boy? Is she still pretending not to heal?
“It’s hard to kill a shifter. A bullet to the head usually does it. Or severing the head. There was an ax sitting there on the chopping block. I picked it up and came at him. I said something like, She’s dead, you miserable piece of shit and then I swung. I figured he’d stop me. Maybe kill me, too. I’d tried to fight him before and always ended up bloody.
“But he just stood there as I came at him. Probably the shock of hearing he’d really killed her. He shifted after the blow, but it was too late. He died just a few seconds later.”
Her breath hitches, but she keeps her face smooth. “Wow. That’s...intense. I’m sorry, Jackson. I’m sorry you had to go through that.” She blinks her big doe-eyes up at me, and they swim with sympathy.
Not horror.
Relief pours through me. Lightens the heaviness in my chest I’ve carried every day since my mother’s death. Sharing my terrible secret with Kylie eases the burden of it.
“So then what happened? You left? Do you have a buried identity like me? Are you wanted for murder somewhere?”
“Yeah, I left. I didn’t lose my identity. No one ever came after me. No police reports were filed, but I’m from the backwoods of North Carolina, where the entire town was made up of shifters, sheriff included. Shifter business is generally kept to shifters.”
“And you haven’t been back?”
I shake my head. “Never. I left a much younger stepbrother behind. I hate myself for that. But the whole town was made up of my stepfather’s extended family. He would’ve been well taken care of. I knew that much.”
“You took Sam in to make up for it.”
My eyebrows shoot up at her guess. “Yeah, I suppose so.”
She tucks her head under my chin and hums softly. I can’t believe I’m snuggling. With a human. And nothing has ever felt so right in my life.
I stroke her hair. “I won’t let anything happen to you, kitten.” Even if it means protecting her from myself.
Chapter Nine
Kylie
Jackson wakes me in the morning by pulling a T-shirt over my head and picking me up into his arms. “Come on, sweet girl. I’m taking you back to my house.” He carries me out of the cabin to his car. “There’s not enough good food for you here. Besides, I want Sam nearby so he can protect you if anything happens.”
I make a contented purring sound in my throat. I love being carried like I weigh nothing, gently deposited in the car seat. Jackson even buckles my seatbelt for me. When did the big bad wolf turn so damn sweet?
He climbs behind the wheel and drives down the mountain, shooting concerned glances my way every now and then. “How do you feel this morning?”
I stretch, still hatching from sleep. “Good. You?”
He drops a hand to my thigh and drags it up to my bare pussy, lightly brushing his fingers over my sensitive flesh. “How about this sweet pussy? Too sore?”
I flush a bit at having my pussy be the topic of conversation before eight a.m. “A little sore,” I admit. “But I’m not complaining. That was the hottest sex of my life last night.”
Jackson makes a choked sound, and pride battles with disbelief on his face. “You were a virgin two days ago.”
“So? It still was hot.”
“It was fucking nuclear. Baby, I want you to know, I’ve never had sex like that with any female before—human or wolf.”
I smile at the serious tone he adopted.
He shoves the hem of my T-shirt—his, really, but the one I’m wearing—up to my waist, exposing my bare pussy. “Spread those creamy thighs, baby. I need to see your pink heart.”
My breath stutters, but I part my legs. He cups my mons. “You remember who this belongs to?”
I flush.
“It’s mine. And if I was too rough with it, you’d be within your rights to pout a little, kitten. Make me kiss it better when I get home tonight.”
The thought has my nipples tightening, pussy clenching. The image of us as some kind of 1950s married couple floats through my mind. I’m the sex-kitten wife, waiting for him to come home from a hard day at work. Offer him a drink and loosen his tie before I pout and make him lick my pussy as compensation for pounding me too hard the night before.
Okay, I’m getting way too excited. And there’s work to be done. Serious work.
He pulls into his garage and insists on carrying me inside. “Your ankle is sore, and you’re not wearing panties.”
I laugh. “So those are the two criteria for getting carried?”
“That’s right. Now, watch the sass or I’ll have to see to that pretty li
ttle ass of yours before I go. Is it sore, too?”
I reach back and run my hand over my bare cheeks. “No.” I can’t decide if I’m glad or disappointed. He settles me on the couch. “Listen, I didn’t tell you something that happened yesterday. I got a call from the blackmailer—with the robotic voice. They identified themselves as Catgirl. Said they installed corruption code to wipe out all of SeCure’s backup data. Told me to transfer five hundred million dollar by midnight tonight if I want it back.”
I sit up straight. “Tell me you have the information backed up somewhere else.” Of course he does. He’s Jackson King, genius of cyber security.
“I do. Triple saved. Not even my infosec team knows how.” He flicks his brows, and I understand he believes this threat came from the inside.
“So what did you tell them?”
“I told them to go fuck themselves.”
I laugh. “I believe I used those exact words, too.”
His eyes crinkle, and he kisses the top of my head. “I have it handled. I just wanted you to know. No contact with me. Stay off your phone, or they’ll trace you here.”
I roll my eyes. “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Preaching to the choir, big guy. I wrote the manual on going dark.”
He gives a reluctant nod. “Okay. Make sure you eat and get more rest.”
It’s too good to be true. I like it way too much. The practical little voice in the back of my head tells me not to get used to this. Not to trust. He’s already made it plain he can’t be with a human. And I can’t stay in hiding in the mansion of a member of the Forbes Fortune 500 CEOs.
I need to put my head on straight, fix this situation, and get lost. It doesn’t matter how good the sex was. How much I want to be claimed and marked and kept by Jackson King. It can’t happen.
Won’t happen.
I grab some toast and coffee and start to work. I start by opening Mémé’s favorite Parisian antique message board. Mémé and I have prearranged to message each other there if we are ever separated or need to get in touch. We made the arrangement years ago, and I forgot it until last night. I hope her memory serves her better. I search out her alias and click to private message her. Even though it’s a private message, I keep my note cryptic.
Looking for you. Can we meet?
I hope she remembers.
From there, I click open the DefCon boards. The place where hackers meet. The place I let slip, years ago, that I’d hacked into SeCure. Someone there had set me up. And now that I realize that, something in the malware has jogged my memory. If I can find the conversation I’m remembering, I might have my hacker.
~.~
Ginrummy
Something is wrong. He should be hearing more about the blackmail threat. They should all be scrambling to try to decode my corruption. He knows SeCure doesn’t have additional backup. He’s in charge of this shit.
And the FBI clowns should be all over it, too.
Which means Jackson King didn’t tell anyone about the call. Why in the fuck not?
Perhaps out of nostalgia, he opens the DefCon boards. It would be interesting to see if they were talking about the SeCure hack. Some idiot is probably bragging in there that it was been him.
He finds a direct message in his DefCon inbox. From Catgirl.
His pulse stutters as he opens it.
Ginrummy,
I need to talk to you. In person. Meet me at the Park ’n Save at the Tucson airport at one p.m.. The shade structure on Row 7.
~Catgirl
His heart pounds triple time. He knows, without a shadow of a doubt, going to that meeting would be a huge mistake. He should let the FBI know he’s had a tip she’ll be there. But what if she presents the FBI with the dirt on him? Better to tell Mr. X.
But that thought just doesn’t sit right with him. He now has no doubt they will kill Kylie like they did her grandmother. And, while he should be glad he’s working with an organization willing to tie up loose ends, he can’t stomach it.
Catgirl means something to him. Even if she doesn’t reciprocate. Even if what she means is mostly in his head. He’s not willing to let go of that fantasy.
What does she want to say to him? Why does she want to meet? The fascination with her every move, every thought hooks him like a barb, reels him in. How does that brilliant mind work? Is she planning a counter-blackmail?
She asked to meet at the Tucson airport. Does that mean she’s headed out of town? If she is, he’ll let her go. Let her disappear into hiding again, bearing the suspicion for his crime. Perhaps she just wants to let him know she knows.
Or maybe she wants to kill him.
No. he doesn’t think Catgirl’s a murderer. She has principles. Very high moral standards. He remembers long discussions they had about right and wrong, which he later realized must have been colored by her parents’ vigilante thieving.
So, what does she want with him?
Damn. The temptation to meet with her overrides reason. The need to know, to see the beautiful hacker one last time infiltrates his being, sucking him down the rabbit hole of bad decisions.
He has a gun. He’ll bring it to the meeting, in case she tries anything. And he won’t notify anyone—not the FBI or Mr. X just yet.
Better to figure out her game first, then make a decision about how to react.
~.~
Jackson
Work is still a public relations nightmare. I’m on teleconference with the board most of the day, and many of them are calling for my resignation. Our stock price is down, and there are threats of lawsuits.
All I can think is fuck them all.
I can’t even make myself give a shit about SeCure’s stock price or what I’d do if the board fires me. My mind is only focused on one thing. Figuring out who framed Kylie.
Apart from me, I try to remember who from SeCure knew Catgirl hacked us eight years ago. Luis. A few members of the infosec team at the time. Who were they? Stu?
No, he didn’t work here then. Why did he pop into my head, though?
I remember Kylie’s interview. How eager he was to get her hired. At the time. I’d thought it had to do with her beauty, the Batgirl tits.
But what if Stu was the one who orchestrated her hire? He’d be capable of writing the code that infected our system—he’s a damn good programmer and probably another hacker-turned-infosec professional.
A prickle runs up the back of my neck, and I stand. I need to have a word with him.
As if I’ve conjured him with my thoughts, I catch sight of his slouchy figure out my window, walking to his car. The prickly feeling hasn’t gone away, so I head for the door and take the stairs down to the parking lot at shifter speed. His car pulls out the gates. I jog to my Range Rover and climb in. It’s all I can do not to screech the tires following him, but good sense wins out, and I keep a distance. He drives for a long time. This isn’t a quick lunch date. It’s a forty-five minute drive to the south side of downtown.
Though I have nothing to go on, my gut tells me to keep following.
He pulls into the Park ’n Save at the Tucson airport and parks near a shade structure. Rolls down his window like he’s about to make a drug deal. My instincts flare into high alert. This is not normal. Whatever he’s doing is totally suspect.
I hang back by a few cars, park a distance from him, and stay in my car. He also stays in his car. A growl rumbles in my throat as my wolf prepares for danger.
I stop cold, though, when a familiar motorcycle zooms in front of me and pulls up alongside his car, the long-legged brunette looking way too good on Sam’s motorcycle. What in the fuck is Kylie doing here?
Pain pushes through my heart like a nail in a coffin. Punctures straight through to the other side and leaves me wheezing for breath.
Betrayed.
She’s been working with Stu all along? A great roaring starts up in my ears, deafens me. My body goes numb, freezing cold as it all clicks into place. She and Stu are working together on this. I was so stupid to beli
eve all her lies. A known thief, a known hacker, I actually saw her install the malware into my system, and I didn’t realize I was being played? She took me by the balls.
What in the hell is wrong with me? I was thinking with my dick, not my brain, that’s what. I let a pair of sexy legs and Batgirl tits lead me around by the nose. What a fucking idiot.
I watch, like a dead man, as she pulls off her helmet and dismounts from the bike. She leans back against it, folding her arms across the same breasts I worshipped only last night.
I can’t tell what they’re saying. Even if my wolf hearing could detect their voices through the window, the rushing in my ears keeps me from being able to concentrate.
I turn weak, like she’s wrapped me up in silver chains—a werewolf’s kryptonite. Power simply drains from the soles of my feet, leaks beneath the car like blood.
The betrayal coats my mouth, puts a red filter over my vision. Darkness falls across everything—the peachy future with Kylie I’d been trying way too hard to figure out. It blackens the time we spent together, muddies my trust in my own instincts.
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?”