Lycan Legacy - 4 - 5 - 6: Princess - Progeny - Paladin: Book 4 - 5 - 6 in the Lycan Legacy Series

by Veronica Singer

  I picked up the major's wallet and read through his driver’s license, credit cards, and military ID card. There was a local address on his Nevada driver's license, which I memorized.

  I handed a credit card to Mason. "Can you make the computer believe he checked into this room with this card?"

  "No problem," he said. "They'll never know we were here."

  "Major Vincent Forrester," I said. "Do you mind if I call you Vince?"

  He snorted and shook his head.

  "Thanks, Vince. You can call me Luna."

  Another snort and an angry glare. "I've been trained to resist torture, physical or psychological,” he said. “Playing nice won't work on me."

  "So only name, rank, and serial number?" I asked. I leaned in close and took a deep sniff. "But you don't have to talk for me to find out all about you. You have a wife and two children. A boy of eight or nine, and a teenage girl." I held up his driver's license. "And I've got your address."

  "Threatening my family just shows your true colors, terrorist."

  "Says the idiot who beat my friend and used him as bait to assassinate me. You hurt my family, you tried to kill me, you forced me to beat up your Roid Rangers. Some would say I have every right to destroy you and your family."

  Vince just gritted his teeth and shook his head. No arguing with him.

  "But my pack, my family, we don't operate that way. I promise we will not harm a hair on your family's heads."

  I took a sip of water and decided. "You, on the other hand, will have to be taken care of."

  More silence from Vince.

  "Looks like he's too tough for us," said Logan. Then added in a conversational tone, "I know an abandoned copper mine less than fifty miles from here. It's got a shaft that goes almost a thousand feet straight down."

  Just then, Naomi and Kuga entered the room, chatting in Japanese. The major's eyes widened as he listened. He seemed excited to make a connection between his “terrorists” and foreigners.

  "Hello Naomi, Kuga," I said. "Was your secret mission a success?"

  Naomi smiled her predatory smile and said, "Yes. Although there’s no longer a need to keep it a secret. We rescued Biyu and the other Chinese girls from the human traffickers.”

  “Human traffickers in Las Vegas?” I asked. “I could have helped you.”

  “Not necessary, alpha,” said Naomi, using my rank as a reminder that I had my own matters to take care of. “We just wanted to have a talk with the traffickers."

  "Just a talk?"

  "Well, they talked really loudly as they dropped down that mineshaft," she laughed. Then she turned to Logan and said, "Thanks for letting us use your dumping ground."

  "Girls?" asked Mason. "I thought Biyu was the only one?" I was slightly miffed that he had known more about this secret mission than me.

  "Well, I wasn't about to leave the rest there for the next criminal to take advantage of."

  Mason crossed his arms and said, "Our deal was for one set of documents so that Biyu could return to China. I threw in a US passport in case she doesn't want to go back." He handed Naomi a blue-covered US passport, a Nevada driver's license, and a credit card.

  “Does this complete our deal?” asked Mason.

  “Yes, you’ve fulfilled your part of the bargain,” said Naomi.

  “And the girl will be free to choose?” Mason insisted.

  "Quinlong, the Azure Dragon, has an emotional attachment to this girl," said Naomi. At Mason's glare, she added, "But the child shall have a choice about whether or not to go back. Quinlong only wants to be assured of her safety."

  Naomi fanned the passport, stopping at the photo of a young Chinese girl. “You do excellent work, Mason. Are you interested in another bargain?”

  “What are you looking for?”

  “Just some of these documents that you are so talented at producing,” said Naomi. She looked at him with soulful eyes. “Just to help these few poor, innocent victims.”

  "So, you and your clan are doing a great favor for the Chinese dragon," said Mason. "For which you will be compensated. You, in turn, are now asking my help in handling the paperwork for the other victims."

  "For which you will be compensated," said Naomi. "What's the English phrase? We'll 'owe you one.'"

  "You’ll ‘owe me one’ for the extra women?" asked Mason. He shook his head. “Not good enough. I’m sure there are other counterfeiters in Las Vegas.”

  "But you’re the best. We'll owe you two," said Naomi.

  "How about three?" asked Mason.

  "Agreed," said Naomi quickly.

  Mason's tight grin let me know he would have helped the kidnapped women anyway, but magicians insist on compensation for their help.

  Then Mason stopped himself and shook his head. "How many women are there, and where are they?"

  "About twenty," said Naomi. "They're waiting in my room, taking turns in the shower and cleaning up."

  "Twenty?" said Mason. "That's a lot of paperwork." He looked at Naomi with narrowed eyes. "I think I should have asked how many people needed documents before agreeing."

  Naomi smiled and said, "The great bargainer might need more practice."

  "How did you herd a group of twenty women through the lobby and up to your room without getting security called?"

  "The clerks and cameras saw nothing," said Naomi. "I'm sure you have something similar to my 'unobtrusive' spell to make your life easier."

  Mason nodded but didn't comment. He liked to keep his spells to himself.

  Logan let out a low whistle. "Fake US passports and travel documents are going for about ten grand. You could make a lot of money with those."

  Mason waved away selling documents like a billionaire would wave away the suggestion that he could make extra money by collecting bottles for the deposit.

  "I don't need the money," he said. "Besides, who said they were fake? These documents will pass every test. There are even entries in government computers that back them up."

  "Then they're worth ten times as much," said Logan. "I still think you should make me a black passport."

  "A diplomatic passport?" scoffed Mason. "I don't 'owe you one,' and money doesn't interest me, so what do you offer?"

  Magicians don't perform for free. Mason might give Logan a diplomatic passport if I asked, but wouldn't do it at Logan's request without a trade.

  "What do you mean?" said Logan. "I help Luna out all the time. I've risked my life for her, watched her back when you were off on holiday, and was the first member of her pack."

  "Exactly," said Mason. "She's your alpha. You owe her loyalty. Wouldn't you have done the same even if I wasn't here?"

  "Well, yeah," admitted Logan.

  "Excuse me," said Naomi. "Perhaps we should finish our deal first and get the girls their documents."

  Mason opened his mouth to object, then thought better of it. "You're right. We need to complete this deal."

  Naomi, Kuga, Mason, and I headed toward Naomi's room, leaving Logan guarding the major.

  We entered Naomi's room and the chatter in Chinese instantly stopped. They were staring at Mason in fear. Their recent experiences must have led them to fear any man.

  I had wondered why Naomi had insisted on calling them 'girls' instead of women. It wasn't a Japanese idiom—none of these prisoners was older than eighteen. Most were much younger.

  Naomi started talking in Chinese, which I didn't understand at all. Mason caught my confusion and provided a running translation.

  Too bad his language lessons hadn't included all the languages he spoke. It wouldn't really have made my head explode, would it?

  "She's telling the girls to line up and brush their hair to get their photos taken for their new IDs," said Mason.

  Naomi, with Kuga's help, had them organized quickly.

  After the ninth girl was done, I thought to ask, "Why do they need US passports? Aren't they just going back to China?"

  "They probably don't want to return to Chi
na," said Naomi. "This way they'll have a choice."

  "Why wouldn't they return to their homes and families?"

  "Because of their parents," said Naomi.

  At my puzzled look, Naomi said, "Their parents sold them to the traffickers. If they go home, they'll have all their money taken and they'll be sold again."

  "And the dragon's friend? Biyu? Did her parents sell her off too?"

  "No," said Naomi, "they caught her in the wrong place at the wrong time."

  Mason finished up another set of documents and commented, "These girls were very lucky that they got kidnapped with Biyu."

  Mason magicked up passports, ID cards, and prepaid debit cards in each woman's name. Naomi added cash in the form of a wad of twenty-dollar bills.

  My bargainer brain added up the cost of those passports, ID's, and debit cards, and came up with an outrageous number. A favor from the kitsune must be worth a fortune.

  I’d felt a twinge of regret that Naomi had killed the traffickers before I talked with them. I had always felt that everyone deserved a fair trial. But looking at these children hardened my resolve.

  In fact, this situation gave me some ideas about how to handle Major Vince.

  "Kuga," I said, "the bank you work for has a correspondent bank here in the US, right?"

  She nodded her head and said, "Yes, we have affiliations with several US banks."

  I wrote out the address for Major Vince's home and handed it to her. "Can you find out who handles the mortgage for this home?"

  "Easily," she said, "it's all public records. I won't even need my internal access." She pulled out her iPad and started typing.

  "Yes," she said after a few minutes, "it's with one of our affiliate banks. What do you want me to do? Nothing illegal, please." She was hesitant. As a pack ally, she was loyal to me, but would not break any laws.

  "Nothing illegal," I said. "That's why I have Logan. No, I want to purchase this mortgage."

  She was still puzzled, but said, "Whatever you need, alpha."

  Before Mason was through with the new documents, Kuga announced, "It's done, Luna. You're now the mortgage holder for his home."

  Naomi, who had heard our conversation with her superhuman hearing, came over and asked, "What are you plotting?"

  I gave them a brief rundown of my plan. Once I finished, Naomi clapped in glee.

  "Now you're thinking like a kitsune!" she said. She looked over the group of women in her room and added, "But we can make it better if…"

  An hour later I was walking up the sidewalk toward Vince's home, resplendent in my fake BDU uniform. I must say I filled the uniform out pleasantly. I passed a messenger heading away from the house.

  Perfect timing.

  I knocked on the door and it was opened by a black-haired, mid-forties woman with red eyes.

  "Mrs. Forrester?" I asked. "I'm Luna White. I work with Vince—um, Major Forrester. I think we need to talk."

  She gave me the top-to-bottom look, then looked around to see if the neighbors were watching.

  "Please come inside," she said.

  I stepped through the door, but she stood in the hallway, blocking further entry. She wasn’t going to invite me into the kitchen for coffee and cookies. On a side table was an opened letter from their bank. The heading on the letter was "Foreclosure."

  I closed the door behind me. After a moment of uncomfortable silence, she said, "So you're the one."

  “The one?”

  “The uniform, the unit patch. You’re the reason Vince hasn’t been coming home these last few weeks. You’re the one.”

  "I'm one, but I'm not the only one," I said. "It’s true that Vince and I have been intimate." What's more intimate than attempted murder?

  Tears filled her eyes. "And you came here to rub my nose in it?" She looked me up and down again and added, "Vince always had an eye for younger women."

  In my most sympathetic voice, I said, "Oh no! Vince and I are through. I hope to never see him again." A long pause, then I added, "I'm thinking of having him brought up on charges."

  "Why?"

  "He took advantage of his position to induce me into a relationship."

  Her eyes darted to the foreclosure notice. She bit her lip, calculating the effect of ending Vince's career against taking care of her family.

  "Luna," she said, "call me Lacey. Please don't make a drastic decision now. Vince isn't perfect, but it would destroy my family."

  "Lacey, it's not just me," I said. "He's been acting erratically, spending a lot of time gambling and drinking. I've been covering for him, but this latest episode…"

  "Episode?"

  "He's been holed up in the MGM hotel for a long time," I said.

  Her face fell. "He promised me an anniversary dinner and a night out at the MGM," she said. "Then he canceled. Is he there now?"

  "Why, yes," I said. "I just left him there."

  "You have a keycard?" She grabbed the letter and said, "Let's talk to the bastard."

  We walked through the door to the hotel room and found that the shape-shifting kitsune had set the scene perfectly.

  Vince, stripped down to just a towel around his waist stood opposite Naomi. Naomi, in the shape of a barely pubescent girl, was cowering in a corner, whimpering, "Please don't hurt me. You promised you'd help me if I was nice to you."

  Vince's .45, loaded with dud bullets, was sitting on a nearby table. Lacey grabbed the pistol and aimed it at Naomi, whose eyes widened in terror.

  Vince looked on in shock, his mouth moving without making any sound.

  "Don't shoot me," she pleaded. "Who are you?"

  "I'm Vince's wife," said Lacey.

  "Wife?" she asked in a puzzled voice. "But Vince said he would marry me when I turn eighteen, and help me get a green card."

  "When you turn—how old are you?" asked Lacey.

  Vince opened his mouth to interject, but Lacey’s turned the weapon on him and he froze.

  "Sixteen?" Naomi said, then added after a short pause, "almost."

  Lacey moved the weapon to point at Naomi again. Under Lacey’s glare, Naomi lowered her head and raised her shoulders. Her cheeks quivered and her eyes filled with tears.

  “Please don’t be mad. Vince told me to tell everyone I’m sixteen!”

  The .45 swung from Naomi to a dumbfounded Vince.

  Lacey held up the foreclosure notice and said, "They foreclosed on our home, and you spend your time gambling away our future and raping young girls. You pedophile bastard!" she screamed.

  As her finger tightened on the trigger, I grabbed the gun from her hand.

  "Lacey," I said. "Think of your children. If you shoot him, you'll end up in jail and the kids will be homeless."

  I stared daggers at Vince. "You were right when you said he likes them young. Until today I didn't know how young."

  Vince finally found his voice. "Lacey, this woman's a terrorist with superpowers. She set me up!"

  Lacey and I laughed at the absurdity, and Naomi joined in.

  Vince collapsed into a chair and covered his face with his hands.

  I made a show of wiping off the .45, dropping the magazine, and ejecting the round in the chamber.

  "Lacey," I said with as much sympathy as I could, "I think you need to leave." I nodded at Naomi, and said, "There's no way I can cover this up. You don't want to be here when the MPs arrive."

  Lacey nodded numbly and turned away. Hand on the doorknob, she turned back to Vince and said, "You'll never see me or the children again."

  After she left Naomi morphed back into her adult form and clapped her hands in glee. "That was fun!" She started gathering her clothes and dressing.

  "Naomi," I said, "thank you for your help. I need to have a private chat with Vince."

  "I'll be right outside," she said. With her ears, she could hear every word.

  I leaned against the door and said, "Vince, it looks like you're in a tight spot. My friend will gladly testify in court about her relationshi
p with you, your wife never wants to see you again, and a woman beat your team."

  I tossed him the unloaded .45, which he caught automatically. "I hear that the inmates in Leavenworth really hate pedophiles."

  "I can get out of this," he said in a whisper. Then more loudly, as if to convince himself, "I can get out of this."

  "Vince, there's only one way out for you now."

  I pointed to the desk. "There's hotel stationary and a pen. Make your suicide note short and to the point."

  He looked around desperately, as if searching for a way to talk his way out of this situation. "What was Lacey screaming about—a foreclosure? I only missed one payment."

  "I purchased your mortgage from the bank and started the foreclosure."

  "So fast? You didn't even know who I was yesterday."

  "It's a new era, Vince. Everything's online. With enough resources, almost anything is possible."

  I wiped off the spare clip for the .45, the one that held live rounds.

  "I'll make you a deal," I said. "Put a line in your note about regretting injuring US citizens in your insane rush to find non-existent terrorists, and I'll stop the foreclosure."

  I tossed the full clip to him, expecting him to load the weapon and shoot me. Instead, he just stared at the clip and the weapon, a look of total defeat on his face.

  I tried to think of a witty way to exit, but settled for, "You know what the right thing to do is, Vince."

  17

  In the hallway, Naomi was waiting for me. We headed back to our room on the next floor.

  We entered the room to find Mason, Logan, and Kuga waiting. Naomi started chattering in Japanese to Kuga, catching her up on our mission.

  Logan and Mason were eager to hear the details. But when I finished my story, they both looked a bit let down.

  "Alpha," Logan said, "couldn't you have just killed him? What you did was evil."

  "Listen, Runt," I said, "don't question my decisions. He tried to kill me and failed. I left a message about messing with our pack by beating up his men. He still didn't listen. Then I sent a stronger message."

  "And leaving him with a loaded weapon," said Logan. "How sure are you—"