by Lisa Kessler
I lay back and stare at the ceiling. Naomi could be walking into a trap, but with the phone out of commission I had no way to warn her. Dammit. They wouldn’t attack her in a busy hospital, would they? I didn’t have any good options. For now, I’d just have to hope Naomi arrived before my uncle did.
CHAPTER 17
Gage
My cell rang as I parked at the hospital. Asher’s name filled the screen as I accepted the call. “Hey, Asher.”
“Gage. Glad I caught you.”
I reached over to pick up the bouquet of red roses I’d gotten for Becca. “What’s up?”
“Becca’s uncle filed for a restraining order against you. If you go near her, they’ll arrest you.” He paused. “Stay away from the hospital.”
“I just got here.” It took me a second to digest what he’d just said. “Wait. You’re fucking kidding me. Can he do that?”
“I did a quick search after I talked to her, and it looks like he could if she was unconscious or temporarily unable to file the request.” He paused. “We have to be careful. He’s a judge. He could probably call in some favors and every cop in town would be on the look-out for you.
“This is messed up. I have to get her out of there.” I stared at all the people walking in and out of the double glass doors of the main entrance.
“Keep your ass out of that building.” Asher growled. “Tonight’s the full moon. If you get arrested…”
We were fucked. I’d be shifting into a wolf in a cell. I dropped the flowers on the seat and gripped my steering wheel with both hands. “Shit.”
“He’s hoping you’ll show up,” Asher reminded me. “If you’re in a cell while you shift, werewolves won’t be a secret any longer. He’d figure out some legal way to get custody of his grandsons and take shifters down, all in one shot. Don’t give him that chance.”
I rubbed my face, shaking my head as rage clouded my judgment. “Did she say when she’s getting discharged? I can wait at her house.”
“I don’t know. She didn’t say.”
My leg twitched with adrenaline as I fought the urge to run to her side. The wolf growled, eager to kill anyone who attempted to take our mate. “Was her uncle with her?”
“Not when she called me. He might be there now.” His pitch dropped, the Alpha dominance pushing through his tone and coloring every word as a command. “Go to Becca’s place and wait there. Naomi is on her way to the hospital. Once Becca’s discharged, Naomi can drive her home. We’ll get this straightened out.”
“Her uncle is a fucking Supreme Court judge,” I growled. “We’re not going to just ‘figure this out.’ He’s using the law against us.” I left the flowers on my seat and opened the door.
Asher must’ve heard it because he tried to force my wolf’s submission again. “You can’t be anywhere near that hospital, Gage.”
“No, I can’t be near Becca, but I can be all over her damned uncle.”
Asher groaned. “You don’t even know what he looks like, and he’s juiced up like one of the Timberwolves. Get back in your truck and drive away.”
“I know his scent. It was all over Becca’s place when we found her last night. I’m going to find him and get him to back the fuck off.” I ended the call and turned off my ringer.
My wolf ached to obey his Alpha’s command. If Asher spoke one more time, I probably would’ve driven away, but if I didn’t find Becca’s uncle right now, I might never see her again, and that wasn’t an option.
I sucked in a deep breath, searching for any scents I recognized. Nothing so far. I jogged toward the main building and went to the north corner. It gave me a view of the main entrance and kept me downwind so I could catch his scent before he got to the automatic glass doors. I checked my phone and frowned. There was already a voice mail from Asher. I didn’t listen to it. I could apologize later.
He said Naomi was coming to get Becca. They’d taken the boys out to the ranch last night while I was in the hospital with Becca. If Naomi was coming here, then she must be showing up alone since Asher would need to stay behind with the boys. Naomi could try to persuade me to leave, but she wasn’t my Alpha so my wolf wouldn’t be so willing to submit. She’d have to physically drag my ass back to the truck to get me to leave this hospital.
Suddenly, a scent had all my attention. It wasn’t the smell I’d catalogued in Becca’s house. This was a jaguar shifter, and it wasn’t Vance or Chandler from my pack. Shit. I moved around the building, pressing my back to the wall as I took another deep breath. I did recognize it. I’d smelled it on the casings we’d found the other night when they shot out the window in my living room.
One of Becca’s uncle’s snipers was here. But why? If the judge wanted my boys, why not send the snipers around the ranch?
I stayed covered, biding my time. I was at a disadvantage. They knew what I looked like, but I hadn’t seen them yet. I peered around the corner. No one seemed out of place.
A black sedan pulled up at the curb, and when the door opened a tall man with silver hair got out. His piercing green eyes locked on mine. General fucking Sloan. He was out of the military now, but he still walked as if he was wearing his dress uniform and keeping in step. He skipped the main entrance and headed straight for me.
I ducked back around the corner and waited. When he approached, he forced a smile. “Woods.”
“What the hell are you doing here?” I asked.
“I could ask you the same thing.” He glanced at the parking lot and back to me. “I got word that my quarry was due here soon, the judge. Why are you here, son?”
I clenched my jaw. “You don’t get to call me that.” God, I’d idolized this guy, and now I was standing face-to-face with him and all I could muster was rage. “You ruined my life.”
He arched a brow. “How do you figure that?”
“Because I’ve replayed it a million times in my head. When you heard I wasn’t going to sign my renewal paperwork, you were the one who mentioned Sedona to me. You were working with the same Nero Organization that the Alpha here was answering to. I’m thinking it’s not a stretch that you might have dropped my name to him. Am I close?” I studied his face, looking for even a trace of regret or guilt, but he was giving me nothing but cold indifference. I shook my head. “You know what, just stay the fuck out of my way.”
I started to storm past him, but he caught my arm. “Gage, wait.”
I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard him use my first name before. I met his eyes. “Are you going to tell me I’m wrong?”
“No.” He shook his head. “But I want you to hear the reason why.”
“I don’t give a shit why you thought my life was worth so little that I should be bitten and locked up like an animal.”
Sloan sighed. “I didn’t know Caldwell was locking up the new wolves. I apologize for my lack of judgment. I thought Caldwell was an ally.” His eyes narrowed. “I don’t have time to hold your hand and wait until your emotional wounds are healed. I needed a soldier I could count on to help us fight for our future. The Transparency Collective is gaining power. I thought they were an outside fringe. That was another mistake I’ll have to answer for, but if we don’t stop them, they’ll be running video footage of wolves shifting, violent images of men cracking under the pressure of testing no human could endure. Werewolves will be seen as a dangerous reality. We’ll be dubbed monsters, and hunted. None of us will be safe.”
I raked my fingers back through my hair. “All I care about right now is my mate who is currently trapped in a hospital bed with a police guard.”
“Becca Yates is your…mate?”
“Yes.” I pushed past him to peer around the corner. “And I don’t know if you missed it, but there’s a jaguar sniper around here somewhere.”
Sloan cursed under his breath. “Her uncle—”
“Is one of the four emperors of the Transparency Collective. We already know.” I glanced his way. “And before you try to pal around with our pack here, you might wa
nt to check in with your daughter, Serenity.”
He flinched. General Miller Sloan actually showed some emotion. The surprise was plain on his face. “You found her.”
“Or she found us.” I nodded. “Yeah. She’s a werewolf now and a powerful psychic, so if I were you, I’d keep my distance.”
He rubbed his chin. “She wasn’t born a werewolf. She was given up for adoption.” His voice sounded distant, as if he might be talking to himself rather than me.
The jaguar’s scent grew stronger on the wind. I ducked behind the corner again and pulled Sloan back with me. “The sniper is closer.”
The general shook his head as if he could shake off a magic spell. “I have to talk to your Alpha. There’s a member of your pack I need to connect with.”
I kept my voice low. “None of this gets me closer to helping Becca, so forgive me for not giving a fuck about what you need.” I started to check around the front of the building again when another familiar scent lit up my senses.
This was the guy who had been in Becca’s house—her uncle.
Sloan grabbed my shoulder. “There’s my target.”
As he moved around the corner, I realized why the sniper had been waiting here. He came to protect the judge. From Sloan.
“Get down, General.”
He crouched as a silent bullet ricocheted off the concrete building. The judge ran for the doors. Shit. I dragged Sloan back. “Are you hit?”
“No.” He jerked out of my grasp. “I’ve got to go after him.”
“I want him, too, but he’s got the police in there watching Becca and it’s the full moon tonight. If our asses are in jail…”
I didn’t need to finish. He nodded. “Understood.”
I watched the parking lot. Naomi should be here soon.
Sloan followed my gaze. “Are you certain your mate is on the right side of this fight?”
I glared at my ex-commanding officer. “I trust her intentions more than I do yours. You’ve been working for the government for decades, awarding contracts for research and experimental trials on shifters. You’re probably here to help that judge take my children and put them through who knows what to try to ‘cure’ them from being the werewolves they were born to be. So you can get the fuck out my face with your empty accusations about Becca.”
My words didn’t seem to get under his skin. He straightened his shirt. “I understand how it must look, and I’m sorry you were locked up after you were bitten. I wasn’t aware of Caldwell’s…breeding program.” He met my eyes again. “Our race’s entire existence depends on certain factions not declassifying the super soldier research. You can hate me all you want, but your boys’ lives depend on me succeeding in this mission.”
“Unless you can tell me what you’re trying to accomplish and how it involves my mate, you can shove your mission up your ass,” I said, then added, “Sir.”
He smirked. “I’ve sacrificed my entire life to keep shifters safe from being hunted down by humanity. My twin brother, Malcolm, and the others from our pack bolted after those experiments at Nero, but I stayed behind. I remained in the military and saw the mission through. I did my duty for my country and my kind. I never found my mate, I never had children, and I lost touch with my brother, who died before I could tell him I forgave him for persuading me to join the military and enter Operation Moonlight at Nero in the first place.” A muscle jumped in his cheek. “And here I am, still cleaning up other people’s messes.”
He moved to peer around the corner. When he looked back at me, his voice was raw, nothing like the stoic general I’d always known. “Your mate is the niece of one of the remaining two emperors of the Transparency Collective. When my nephew’s pack up in Reno blew up Nero headquarters and killed Antonio Severino, they set off a chain of events I’ve been fighting to stop ever since. When I finally thought I’d stabilized things, your pack started killing emperors without realizing the leader is inside the fucking Senate.”
My pulse stuttered as his words settled on my shoulders. “Someone in the Senate wants to expose werewolves?”
“Yes.”
Holy shit. My boys’ faces filled my head. How could I protect them from my own government? This was spiraling out of control faster than I could keep up. “How are you planning to stop him?”
“First I need to find whatever footage or proof this judge has about us and keep him from exposing us.” Sloan narrowed his eyes. “And I need him alive. If Mitch Jones dies, Senator Hanson will know he’s next. I won’t have any leverage left to keep him from declassifying all the werewolf studies from Nero and Evolution Defense in order to protect himself from us. He’ll let the rest of the world hunt us down.”
I stared at Miller Sloan and realized I’d never really known this man or his mission. “How can I help?”
“You can tell your Alpha I need to speak to Jett Kendrick.” He looked me over and added, “And don’t get your ass put in jail tonight. If you shift in a cell, even I won’t be able to stop that from going public.”
He sniffed the air and walked away.
I took out my cell phone just as a familiar car pulled in the parking lot. Naomi. I sent her a quick text.
There was a sniper with an eye on the front entrance. They’re watching for me. Be careful.
I could see her car from my vantage point. She glanced at her phone and then back up, scanning the building and the parking structure. Naomi wasn’t a trained soldier, but she was a devoted student of martial arts with multiple black belts. Since being bitten, she had added heightened senses that elevated her self-defense even further.
She got out of the car and took cover with a crowd of medical staff coming toward the building. If the sniper was still at his post, he wouldn’t risk killing innocents in a public place. She took out her phone as she disappeared through the glass door.
My cell buzzed with a text from her.
I’m inside. I’ll let you know when I have Becca.
Waiting was fucking torture.
CHAPTER 18
Becca
My uncle swept into my hospital room like a hurricane. “We need to get out of here.”
I didn’t move. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”
His mercenary dressed as a police officer came in behind him. “Mark spotted her boyfriend outside.”
Uncle Mitch shook his head, grabbing the plastic bag with my clothes. “Sloan is out there, too. We’re going out the back door.”
If they managed to drag me out of the hospital, I might never see Gage again. While they talked, I fished through the sheets on the bed and found the nurse call button, pressing it a few times.
Uncle Mitch handed the bag to his mercenary and turned to me. “Get up. We’re leaving.”
“I can’t.” I shook my head. “I haven’t been discharged.” I held up my arm. “And I’m still hooked up to the IV.”
Where was my nurse? Under my sheets, I pressed the button again.
The big guy dropped my bag on the floor and stalked over to my bed. He grabbed my wrist and tore off the IV tape so fast I gasped. Before I could scream, he slid the IV needle free and pressed his thumb against my vein. “Get up.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you.” I tried to jerk away, but his grip was like a vise.
Jamie came into the room and frowned. “What are you doing?”
My uncle shook his head, every bit the sympathetic relative. “She’s very eager to get home. Someone saw her abusive boyfriend out front in the parking lot. Is there a back door we can use?”
“She hasn’t been discharged yet.” Her gaze went to my arm and back to my uncle. “What happened to her IV?”
“She removed it. She’s agitated,” my uncle lied.
“No, I didn’t.” I shook my head vehemently. “Please, Jamie, help me.”
Jamie crossed her arms. “I’m going to have to ask you both to leave.”
“We’re not leaving without my niece.” Uncle Mitch adjusted his suit jacket. �
��This hospital has current litigation in the courts for malpractice. I’d hate to have to add my complaint into the mix.” He checked her ID and nodded. “I can mention you by name.”
Jamie hesitated.
Shit. I frowned, praying she’d believe me. “He’s lying.”
“She’s upset.” He sighed. “Can you find the doctor? I need to get my niece to safety.”
“I’ll get the doctor.” She pointed at him. “She’s not to be moved.”
“Jamie,” I said. “Wait.”
But she was already out of the room. Uncle Mitch picked up the bag, narrowing his eyes in my direction. “Not smart, Becca. I don’t want to hurt you. But if you insist on making me, I will.” He turned to his guard. “Carry her. We’re leaving now.”
He lifted me up and I sucked in a breath to scream, but my uncle jammed a blue towel into my mouth. My muffled cries couldn’t compete with the beeping of machines and blaring TV sets on the floor. Uncle Mitch led the way, and although I wriggled and punched and kicked, the bastard’s grip on me never weakened.
They stepped into a service stairwell, and my heart sank. I didn’t know where they were taking me, but this wasn’t going to end well unless I could figure out a plan—and fast.
CHAPTER 19
Gage
I tracked Sloan from a distance, careful to stay upwind from the general. I’d expected him to enter through the main entrance now that the sniper had left his post, but he didn’t. He continued around the building. I rounded the corner, but it was a straight shot with no cover. Shit. The general would see me if he checked behind him.
My phone buzzed. I pulled it out and read Naomi’s text.
She’s gone. They have security searching for her. I followed her scent to the stairwell. There’s a jaguar shifter with them.
I jogged back to the front as Naomi came out. She frowned, shaking her head. “I lost them. He must’ve had a car waiting at the back.”