by Eva Gordon
“Trust me, as someone recovering from a tragic loss, I have a gut feeling Raulf either killed himself or covered his tracks and remained wolf. There are vast forests, especially in Eastern Europe where he could go undetected for years without being found by his pack.”
Rylee nodded. “Our new Russian team member, Lev Volkov knows those forests, but, unfortunately, is not well enough to search.”
The Chernobyl werewolf had survived lethal bullets from a Wolfsbane rifle while combating the werewolves who had massacred his pack. A bullet to his spine had paralyzed him from the waist down. A crippled werewolf. He’d never met Lev, but heard rumors about his mutant powers.
Cricket blinked. “I’ve been meaning to visit Lev. I heard he took a few steps.”
“Dr. Becker’s surgery and therapy is working, but it’s Lev’s determination to walk that makes me believe he will not only walk, but run and fight again,” said Rylee.
Slade might pay his respect to the injured werewolf, as well, though he didn’t like Cricket’s sudden concern. Had he been more than a team member? The once lone alpha may not have any qualms about bedding a runt. Damn. I want her, but I must stay away from her. My primary duty is to the team, to honor my fallen kin.
Cricket laughed. “Last I heard, from Dominic and Mia, Lev flirts with every hot she-wolf nurse and physical therapist.”
“I’m sure before we know it, he’ll return to being the fastest and strongest lycan,” agreed Rylee.
He kept his manner calm and collected. “Since Cricket will work in the lab, will Jesper stay at my place?”
Rylee tilted her head as if she’d heard wrong. “No. Jesper will return to his base quarters. You wanted Cricket to accompany you, didn’t you?”
“I think I can handle being alone.” He’d be the one to reject her and not the other way around.
“I talked to Dr. Warner earlier, and he still thinks a lower ranked wolf should remain your companion in case you have a setback.”
Cricket blurted, “Sounds like Jesper should stay.”
“I have work for Jesper,” said Rylee.
Slade had done his best to convince them he was okay without Cricket, though every fiber of his soul wanted her at his side. “Fine. But she must follow protocol.”
“Don’t worry, she will,” said Rylee.
Cricket stiffened, but held her lowered gaze.
“Good. I find her calming, but I can handle being away from her.”
Rylee smiled. “No disrespect, Prince Slade, but you need to learn how to act a bit more human before you go on missions that might involve humans. Cricket will be your coach.”
Cricket snarked. “How can I be a coach and a groveling omega?”
“I will take her advice on being human,” he volunteered. He sneered at her. “As long as she understands who is in command.”
Rylee turned to Cricket. “Good, because in a few days you are going undercover.”
She smiled as if relieved.
“Naturally since we are on high alert, Slade will join you.”
Her eyes widened. “What? You expect him to act human in Santa Cruz, California?”
“Don’t worry, he’s backup. Nothing more.”
She whispered to Rylee, “Can we talk? Privately, ma’am.”
“Slade, go shower. Cricket will join you in an hour or so.”
He grinned. “I’ll leave the door unlocked.” What could have been a crashing disappointment turned out for the best. Rylee had ordered her to remain at his side even without him insisting. Try to get out of this one, Little Wolf.
Chapter 8
Cricket contained her temper. “No disrespect, ma’am, but I can’t be responsible if Sir Thick-Head-goes-Hollywood-werewolf in the middle of picturesque Santa Cruz.”
Rylee laughed. “He won’t unless you ditch him.”
“Am I not going undercover?”
“You are, but for only three to four days. You will pretend to be Randi’s kid sister. Follow his last footsteps, especially with his biker friends. Tell them some sob story about losing touch with your brother.”
“Okay, but how do I explain Slade?”
“Randi was into motorcycles. Slade can be your biker boyfriend.”
The thought of Slade dressed in badass leather biker chaps moistened her panties. Hot, but clueless about motorcycles. “He’s from the Yukon. He probably never rode anything mechanical, with the exception of a snowmobile.” Most likely stuck to sled dogs.
“Actually, Slade owns a Harley and travelled across Canada with his brothers a few years ago. He’s credible for the cover.”
Holy hell, three hot werewolves on bikes, her libido heightened and skidded to a stop to take an imaginary look. “Except Yukon weres have little or no experience with humans.”
“Precisely, which is why, you are the ideal candidate to teach him how to interact.” Rylee smiled. “Tone down his alpha wolf.”
From what she’d experienced, fat chance of that happening. “Yeah, right.” The far north packs, especially the Yukon pack favored their wolf side over their human side. Needing to shift at least three times a week, instead of just twice a month like most weres. “Slade is too wolf. From what I can tell, not open to human foibles.”
“Though he’s had little interaction with humans, Slade is a seasoned traveler. He acquired his great grandfather’s unusual wander lust, which is why he strayed from his pack to train abroad.”
“Glen rides motorcycles, why can’t I bring him?”
“Glen is tough, but still only a beta. I prefer sending an alpha.”
“A beta’s plenty powerful. At least he’s stronger than the average human.”
“Even though there’s no trace of werewolf scent, I have a gut feeling a werewolf or werewolves are behind the missing lycans.”
“I suspect humans.” Most likely an old-fashioned werewolf hunter driven by revenge.
“Once you run the DNA analysis of materials collected from his haunts, we’ll have a better idea if werewolves or humans are involved. So far, the cleanup crew came up empty—that is of werewolf involvement.”
“I’m on it.” Cricket wrinkled her nose. The mission sounded up her alley, but not her partner. Screw it. Slade and she wouldn’t work. He’d never behave as anything, but a suffocating domineering alpha. Probably bite her nose in front of a bar full of people. “What about Trevor?” Though she wasn’t a big fan of the alpha, better him than someone she couldn’t trust to act human, nor one she lusted for.
“If Lev had recovered, I would have sent him, but after Lev, Slade is a better fighter than Trevor.”
“I thought the idea was to go in undercover without claws and fangs.”
“Cricket, you are one of my best agents. If a werewolf or werewolf hunters are involved, I want you under Slade’s protection. I feel better knowing he’s obsessed with protecting you.”
Obsessed to the power of ten. “Didn’t you tell me, if the bear had killed me, he would have returned to a stage of deep morphopsychosis?”
Rylee laughed. “True enough.” Her laugh lines disappeared, and her eyebrows drew together. “If something happens to you, I want Slade to rip them to shreds.”
Rylee’s tender concern touched her. A side of Rylee others never saw. The alpha treated Cricket like her daughter. Maybe because she never had pups or that Cricket’s mother, Chloe died in an accident shortly after she survived the change. The alpha bitch didn't waste time and forced her father to throw Cricket out of the pack. Tara, her father’s real mate had not counted on the runt surviving the change. Rylee felt sorry for the abandoned new changeling and under her tutelage, Cricket flourished. If another pack had taken her in, she’d probably be no better than a slave, cleaning after the others, reminding her of her life prior to the change. “Maybe I should take some tranquilizers, just in case?”
“I should share with you what Dr. Warner discovered about Slade’s physiology.”
“Oh?”
“Last time he was
tranquilized, you gave him the highest dose possible. Apparently, each time Slade receives a tranquilizer his system fights it, and the drug is no longer effective. He sent Dr. Becker a sample of his blood for analysis.”
That could be a good thing or a very bad thing if she couldn’t calm him down. “Do Dr. Warner and King Conan agree with sending Prince Slade?”
“The king specifically wants him to solve the case. He feels the risk is worth it, if Slade solves the case. The victory will help heal his shattered heart and make him feel worthy enough to return to his territory.”
“And leave Team Greywolf?” Never see Slade? Her stomach clenched. Why be upset? He was a pain in the ass, and a distraction to her horny she-wolf.
“He can return to being a prince and still serve our team until he becomes king.” Rylee smiled. “I have a gut feeling he won’t. He enjoys adventure too much to resign himself to the mundane life of a king. He told me, he never wants to settle down.”
Rylee had privately discussed with Cricket how the rule by royal families was outdated and favored a more democratic governing board. An unspoken radical view held by a few American werewolves. Not something the royals wanted to hear, especially the British and European sovereigns. Cricket snorted. “Wait until he meets the ideal mate.”
“Actually, Jesper is working on that. Dominic is holding an all pack evening ball to raise money for Mia’s non-profit, Canines for Wounded Heroes. Word will get out Slade, the most available richest bachelor, will attend.”
Cricket remembered Mia scheduled the ball for the first day of spring. An ideal time to find the perfect chemistry with a mate. Every bitch would be in heat. She promised Mia she’d attend and had been excited about going to the gala event. Now? Not so much. Her haughty alpha half-sisters, Dacia and Oriana would be there, knowing there was a chance to mate a royal prince. How can I explain I don’t want to go? Especially, since Mia planned to perform a cello solo before the auction. “Why wait so long to find him a mate? The ball is not for months.”
“Only two months. Given his current progress, we feel it's sufficient time to get Slade grounded enough to find a mate.”
Who the hell are we? “Is that what Dr. Warner says?”
“It’s what our wolf shaman, Lunara predicted. In fact, she’ll meet with Slade today to heal his wounded spirit.”
Cricket wasn’t schooled in lycan mysticism, but magic often explained more about their kind than science ever did. She shrugged. “Explain to Slade he can’t bully me in front of humans.” Or fellow team members.
“Don’t worry. Trevor went over the rules on proper behavior around humans. I’ll remind him he’s an operative and if he does anything to jeopardize our kind, royal or not, he’ll visit Enforcer Dominic.”
“Doesn’t he have to shift more often?” Most states didn’t allow wolves as pets. Especially, alpha wolves the size of a bear.
“Once a day or preferably at night. Although there is another way to release his wolf energy, but I recommend against it.”
“Got it.” A lycan could skip a needed shift by releasing his beast sexually. Taboo for a runt to satisfy an alpha. However, if he kept his nature secret, he could attain satisfaction with an available human female. Cricket wanted no part of that discussion. If he needed tail, he’d have to do it without her help.
“However, if it’s a choice between going wolf or breaking a tradition, you know what to do.” Rylee winked.
Was she giving her permission? Not too surprising. Rylee often broke pack rules in order to keep their lycan society secret. Did she not know how easy it would be for her to have a romp with the hunky werewolf? Cricket frowned. “Trust me; I’ll make sure he finds a safe stretch of woods to shift.”
“The area is rich with mountainous terrain, inaccessible to humans,” Rylee agreed.
Cricket thought of the missing Colorado and Vermont werewolves. “What about the other two?”
“Dominic and his betas will investigate the Colorado case, and Trevor and a beta leave for Vermont in the morning.”
“Sounds good.”
“One more thing.”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“You and Slade should both know like Randi, Raulf was into motorcycles. Although, Raulf hung around a Berlin gang of skinhead bikers who call themselves, Wehrwölfe.”
Had Raulf been an oath breaker? “His alpha allowed that?” Nazi werewolves had been exterminated by decree of the German wolf king as well as the Allied werewolf forces. None escaped the culling. The remaining so-called human members of Wehrwölfe or Operation Werwolf were captured in 1945, end of story.
“Unfortunately, Alrik never discovered his brother had been hanging around with them, until the team investigated his disappearance. If he had, he would have sent Raulf to the enforcer and ordered him to give Raulf a werewolf lobotomy.” A lycan’s memory of ever being human erased; the only non-lethal alternative for punishing an oath breaker. A fate most werewolves feared more than a death sentence.
“Did Raulf’s mate know?”
“We don’t know, but the German lycan intelligence team is still investigating.”
Werewolves riding motorcycles was not uncommon, but joining a human gang or biker club was. “According to Warden Cody, Randi had biker friends, but kept to himself.”
“Although he didn’t belong to a biker club, we need to make sure the two cases are not related. And humans are not involved. That’s why I’m sending you.”
“Do you want me to contact you if we must take action against a human?”
“Slade’s been briefed on what to do.”
Her heart skipped a beat. Slade would take the role of executioner if a human knew of their society without signing the Lycan Non-Disclosure contract. That is unless she, as the lead agent, could convince said human they had hallucinated.
“If it comes to that, he’ll make it look like an accident.” Rylee stood and walked her to the door. “Keep me posted on what, if anything, the cleanup crew found.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Slade stepped from the shower and dressed for a meeting with several members of Team Greywolf, including Rylee, Trevor, three betas. Not Cricket. She’d spend the day analyzing the DNA data collected by the cleanup crew. Rather than returning to his guesthouse, he stayed at a studio apartment at headquarters until they left for their mission. He needed to accept Cricket was a fellow team member, nothing more. His bout with morphopsychosis had ended. Damn if she still didn’t calm him and please his ready cock. He had to wean himself from her presence and his raw sexual attraction to her before they left. When she returned from meeting with the warden, his wolf demanded to mount her like there was no tomorrow. Shit, if he allowed his beast to act on his raw feral emotions, he’d be in deep trouble for not controlling his lust.
Rylee trusted him to keep it in his pants. He’d prove to her and the others he remained in control of all his emotions; good, bad, or werewolf.
The packs depended on him to solve Operation Three Lost Sheep. No lycan ever went missing without a trace. Trevor had briefed him about the possible connection with the missing German werewolf, Raulf, and his involvement with a dangerous skinhead gang. Not only were they white supremacist assholes, but also involved in drug and illegal arms deals. Interpol had jurisdiction over these criminal humans. Lycan investigators, however, had to make sure the gang didn’t know about their kind. If they did, matters would soon get messy.
Were Randi and Raulf’s disappearances related? Trevor stated the only similarity the two shared was they were both lone wolves. Trevor suspected a well-trained werewolf hunter. Though werewolf hunters technically no longer existed there were rumors of ancient manuscripts about how to kill their kind, and in the wrong hands, could threaten weres. Especially, if hunters used Wolfsbane rifles that carried bullets lethal enough to bring down even an alpha. His hackles rose on the threat to his kind and specifically to Cricket.
His primary goal was to protect Cricket and if need be, execute
any human who threatened to reveal their secret lycan society. That is, unless Cricket could convince the person or persons what they had witnessed was an illusion. He snorted. Cricket making decisions and giving him orders. That'd be the day. Yet how could he disobey orders? Rylee said she was in charge. Not sure how he’d react to her taking the initiative, but he had no choice but obey if he wanted to remain a member of Team Greywolf. That meant burying his raw pack instincts to dominate.
Slade walked out of his quarters, then passed Cricket’s apartment and caught a whiff of sweet honey and roses. He cocked his ear. Her fingernails tapped on her laptop. He stood by the door and closed his eyes. Inhaling, listening, desiring. Imagining her red-polished fingernails strumming his cock.
The typing stopped.
Fuck.
Slade hastily left. As he turned the corner, her door slammed open. He pushed the elevator button and fortunately, it opened immediately. He stepped in, and the doors closed. Fucking sloppy. He better shift after the meeting to release his sexual tension.
As the elevator doors opened, he nearly bumped into Trevor. The alpha grinned at Slade. “We still have a few minutes to spare.”
And risk Rylee's wrath? She had an obsession with promptness. Slade narrowed his eyes at the alpha on his shit list. He disliked Trevor since he’d threatened to discipline Cricket after she’d slaughtered the bear. “In our line of work, we have no minutes to spare.”
Trevor gave him a pointed stare and then knocked on the team’s conference room. A beta opened the door and ushered them toward a long mahogany table.
Rylee sat at the head of the table, a laptop in front of her as two other betas stood behind her. Slade took a seat on Rylee's right, and Trevor sat several seats away. At least royal status afforded him some privileges.
A few betas entered and sat next to Trevor. Rylee's assistant beta handed them each a manila folder.
Rylee closed her laptop halfway. “Your assignment and documents are inside your folder.”
Trevor furrowed his brow. “I thought Dominic would be here?”