by Paige Tyler
Her smile faltered, which confused the hell out of him. He’d essentially told her she didn’t have to do anything other than simply let loose and be a werewolf.
“Trevor, Becker, Max, and Hale, you guys’ll play suspects and hostages.” He gave them a nod. “Go ahead and take up positions inside. Just basic stationary threats to start with.”
They went inside, leaving him, Khaki, Alex, and Cooper. Normally, he’d pair Khaki with a senior member of his team, like Diego Martinez. But Diego wasn’t in his squad anymore. The idiot had gotten into a brawl a while back and Gage had transferred his stupid ass to Mike’s squad as punishment. That was how Xander had ended up with Max, which was a crappy swap. Not that there was anything wrong with Max, but the guy was young, with less than a year in SWAT. Losing somebody with Diego’s experience and getting a pup who was barely more than a newbie himself was tough to deal with. And to make matters worse, as part of that same brawl, Gage had also partnered Max up with Hale, another senior guy. It probably wouldn’t be a permanent situation, but for now, those two were tied together at the hip.
That left Trevor as the only senior team member left, and right now Trevor still had his hands full with Becker. Becker was a good cop, but he had his own way of doing things, and sometimes he liked to color too far outside the lines for Xander’s liking.
Xander glanced at Alex and Cooper, watching as they showed Khaki how to operate the paintball guns they’d be using for the exercise. He briefly debated the pros and cons of pairing Khaki up with one of them, but decided against it. While both men had the experience and patience to train Khaki, Xander’s gut told him neither one would be a good fit with her.
And he would be?
“Khaki and I will take the right side of the house while you two guys cover the left,” he told Alex and Cooper before he could change his mind. “We’ll start at a crawl and speed up when she’s ready.”
Xander took the paintball gun Cooper held out. If he stayed focused, he should be able to pull this training off without a problem. After all, he’d trained all the other members of his squad. But then Khaki stepped closer and her scent gently wafted over and punched him in the gut.
He clenched his jaw as he loaded paintballs in the gun, then slipped it into his thigh holster. “Here’s how this is going to work, Khaki. I’m going to be at your right shoulder as we move from room to room, guiding you the whole way. Just relax and let your wolf senses guide you.”
She nodded. Her face might be calm, but her body vibrated with excitement.
“Ready?” he asked.
She nodded again, then turned to face the heavy wooden door, leaving herself enough room to rear back and get a good kick in. Cooper and Alex moved in close, and Xander could feel the hair on the back of his neck stand up as he felt all the energy pouring off the three other amped-up werewolves.
Xander placed his left hand on Khaki’s back, as Cooper did the same to Alex. Xander almost jumped from the electrical shock that coursed through him from the contact. He covered it by tightening a strap on her vest, but he had to shake his head to refocus.
“The moment you go through the door, stay low and clear the area just inside the door to the right,” he instructed, trying not to breathe in her intoxicating scent. “I’ll cover everything farther into the room. Cooper and Alex will worry about everything to the left of twelve o’clock. No matter what threats you see in the room, you have to clear your sector. You have to trust that everyone else will do their jobs. You have to trust us with your life.”
Xander rested his hand on her back again. He felt the tingle but was prepared for it this time.
“On my mark,” he said. “Go!”
* * *
As Xander’d expected, Khaki was a fast learner. And as expected, he found it difficult to focus on the task at hand, especially when he spent so much of the time with his body in contact with hers.
Schematically clearing a building typically required a lot of body contact between team members, with every instruction being communicated almost entirely through hand signals and taps on the other person’s shoulder or back, a gentle nudge here or there, a brief touch on the arm. Then there were the moments when all four of them were pressed close together, as they initially moved into a room or headed up a stairwell. Then his whole body was touching hers, and he was practically on fire.
Xander didn’t know how it was possible, but being this close to Khaki for so long had made him more aware of her then he’d ever been aware of another person—or werewolf. It was beyond picking up her unique scent. Now, he swore he could literally smell her emotions. She was so excited as she moved through the building that she bordered on being giddy. He’d never experienced anything like it in his life, and it was freaking him out.
Then there was her heartbeat.
All werewolves had good hearing, and picking up someone’s heartbeat when they were excited wasn’t all that special. But he wasn’t only hearing the rapid thud-thud of her racing heart; he was feeling it as well. Right there in his own chest, almost as if he had a second heartbeat.
Xander shoved the thought aside before it completely distracted him and concentrated on the only thing that really mattered—Khaki’s training. Moving through buildings like this was SWAT’s bread and butter. She had to get good at it, and she had to do it fast.
But he had to admit, she was good, and she was fast. After only a few minutes of instruction, Khaki picked up how their werewolf SWAT team cleared a room. A few minutes after that, she had their four-person team moving through the building nearly as fast as they’d ever moved. He could practically feel her confidence grow as she used her nose, ears, and werewolf intuition to figure out where people were before she even entered a room.
Khaki also proved very adept at quickly distinguishing who was playing the good guys and who were the shooters. Time after time, she slipped quietly into the room and put a paintball right in the middle of the bad guy’s chest before they even got off a shot of their own.
At this rate, Khaki would be considered a “go” at this task before lunch.
“Okay,” Xander said after they’d completed the exercise for the tenth time. “Let’s do it with the lights off this time.”
Xander cut the lights, then got in position behind Khaki and put his hand on her back. Her heart thudded beneath his palm as hard and fast as it had the first time they’d entered the house. He didn’t know why she was so nervous. Werewolves could see in the dark.
But when Khaki kicked in the door and entered the house, she didn’t move with the same confidence as before. Instead, she slowed down, working her way through the rooms at half speed. She was still new to all this, so it wasn’t surprising they’d finally stumbled over something she had a problem with. Even as slow as she was, she navigated the house much better than a regular SWAT officer equipped with night vision goggles would.
Despite knowing that, Xander still ground his jaw in frustration when she came to an abrupt halt outside one of the rooms. He took a deep breath, trying to get a grip on his sudden irritation when he realized he wasn’t the only one who was tense. The strange scent-slash-emotions connection he’d developed with Khaki told him that she was just as frustrated as he was. The anxiety and embarrassment was practically rolling off her in waves.
He didn’t realize how much it was truly affecting him until he heard himself growl under his breath.
What the hell? This had gone beyond picking up on Khaki’s emotions. Now it was as if he was experiencing them himself. The worse she did, the worse he felt.
He tried to fight his way through the feelings and emotions, but it was tough, like swimming upstream through fast-moving water. If he could just understand what had changed when he shut off the lights, maybe he could help her calm down. Which would hopefully calm him down as well.
It didn’t make sense. Werewolves could see in the dark just as well as they could in the light. There was absolutely no reason for Khaki to be having so much t
rouble.
Xander was so focused on what was tripping up Khaki that he didn’t realize they’d moved into another room. Off to the right, Trevor was standing behind the hostage tied to the chair—in this case, Becker—with his paintball gun pointed at Becker’s head. This was a standard training scenario for them. Step into a room, make an instantaneous assessment of the situation, then take out the shooter before he shot the hostage.
Even though Cooper and Alex were in the room with them, neither of them would take the shot. This was all about Khaki.
But when she swung her paintball gun in Trevor’s direction, her pistol was aimed too low. Either she didn’t know Becker was there, or she didn’t know he was playing the part of the hostage. Regardless, she was about to pop Becker in the head.
Xander reached out to signal a cease-fire by tapping her shoulder, but it was too late. There were two clicking hisses from the pressurized air gun and it was over. Xander couldn’t determine if the spike of adrenaline he felt had come from him or Khaki. Regardless, he ended up yelling a lot louder and harsher than he’d planned.
“Lights, dammit!”
Someone hit the switch outside, lighting up the room. Becker was tied to the chair with a shocked look on his face and a line of orange paint streaking the side of his head.
The emotions Xander had been feeling boiled over and finally broke through the wall he’d put up around them. He caught Khaki’s arm and spun her around. “What the hell just happened? You killed the frigging hostage!”
The words came out so fast and so furious that it was as if someone else was saying them. Khaki opened her mouth to say something, but then closed it again. Face red, she dropped her head and stared down at the floor. The emotions that flooded Xander now weren’t anger or anxiety. They were shame.
Fuck.
Xander wanted to howl in frustration, but he couldn’t do that in front of his team. They’d think he was losing it, although it was probably too late for that. Cooper, Alex, Trevor, and Becker looked at him like he’d already lost his mind. Shit, with the way things were going right then, maybe he had.
But there was no way to explain his outburst. He growled and pointed at the door.
“Everyone downstairs. We’ll run it again with the lights on, then with the lights off. And we’ll keep doing it until Khaki gets it right.”
* * *
“So, how’s Blake working out?”
Xander practically jumped at Mike’s question. He’d been so lost in thoughts of Khaki that he hadn’t even heard the other squad leader come into the showers. That woman had him so messed up, he wasn’t even aware of his surroundings anymore. Someone could have ridden through the compound on an elephant and he wouldn’t have noticed.
Hopefully talking to Mike would get his mind off Khaki and all the crap that had happened in the House of Doors, at least for a little while.
Xander dumped half a bottle of soap in his hand and started washing the sweat and grime from that day’s training off his skin. “A lot better than I’d thought she’d be doing at this point.”
“You sound surprised.” Mike glanced at him as he lathered up a bar of soap. “You know if Gage went to all the trouble of bringing her here as the first female on the team, she had to be good.”
Xander shrugged as he reached for the shampoo. He squirted some on his head and let it run down his face, thankful when the stuff blocked the scent Khaki had left lingering in the locker room.
“She’s raw as all get-out, but she has a natural instinct for anything related to cop work,” he said as he washed his hair. “She’d never even held a Sig until two days ago, and I’d already put her up against almost any guy on the team. She’s picking up the M4 faster than anyone I’ve ever seen, and she can climb and rappel like a frigging monkey.”
Xander cringed as he rinsed the shampoo out. Shit, could he gush any harder? But he was being honest. Outside of the little issue she had navigating the House of Doors in the dark, Khaki was turning into one hell of a SWAT officer. Now if he could just get used to being around her without feeling like his body was in sexual overdrive. Maybe with a little more exposure, she wouldn’t have such a drastic effect on him.
“Glad to hear she’s doing so well,” Mike said.
Xander didn’t miss the glance his friend threw his way. Next to Gage, Mike was his closest friend in the Pack, but Xander’d already had a really shitty day and he wasn’t in the mood to wait for the guy to get to the point he was so obviously trying to make.
“What the hell does that mean?” he demanded.
Mike shrugged as he turned off the water and walked out of the shower. “Nothing. It’s just that some of the guys think you’re pushing Khaki too hard.”
Xander bit back a growl. Obviously someone on his squad had told Mike about what had happened in the House of Doors. That bothered the shit out of him. If someone didn’t like the way he was doing things with Khaki, he should have the balls to tell him to his face, not tattle to someone outside the squad.
He turned off the water and stormed out of the shower, grabbing his towel and angrily scrubbing it over his chest.
Mike glanced over his shoulder at him. “Take it easy. You’re starting to shift.”
Xander hadn’t realized his claws were out until he looked down at his hands. He quickly ran his tongue over his teeth to see if his fangs were out and damn near cut himself on their sharp tips. He took a deep breath and forced himself to relax. A moment later, he felt everything retract back to where it was supposed to be.
What the hell was wrong with him? He hadn’t lost control like this so many times in a single day since he’d been a freshly changed pup.
“I guess I hit on a sore subject, huh?” Mike said as he pulled on his jeans. When Xander didn’t say anything, he continued. “So, have you been pushing her too hard?”
Xander opened his mouth to ask who the hell had told him but then shut it again. Who it was didn’t matter. Why they’d done it did. And he already knew the answer to that. Because they knew it was time someone talked to Xander, and they knew that Mike was the best one to do it.
He shoved his towel in his duffel bag and thought about the way he’d been treating Khaki, not just this morning, but the previous two days as well, and he cringed. When he hadn’t been scowling at her, he’d been shouting at her to go faster, or be more aggressive, or stop thinking like a cop and start acting more like the werewolf she was.
Doing those things wasn’t out of character for him—he always wanted the best from his guys—but the way he’d gone about it was. Standing here now, he couldn’t remember even one time he’d told Khaki she’d done something well, not even when she’d done it better than anyone else in the squad ever had. And then this morning? Yeah, he’d crossed the line.
“Shit,” he muttered. “I suppose I have been.”
“Mind telling me why?” Mike took his shirt out of his locker and shrugged into it. “Because it isn’t like you to be an ass.”
Xander started getting dressed too, mostly to give himself a chance to figure out what to say. How the hell could he explain to Mike why he’d been such an ass to Khaki when he barely understood why himself? He wanted to teach her to be the best SWAT officer she could be, but if he didn’t maintain some distance between them, every guy in the Pack would figure out how attracted to her he really was. He didn’t understand it and it scared the hell out of him—especially the part where it seemed like he wasn’t in control of himself when she was around.
Of course, he couldn’t say any of that to Mike. They were best friends, but Mike was also about as by-the-book as it got. If Xander admitted what he was feeling for Khaki, Mike would definitely tell Gage. No matter what else was going on, the thought of Gage transferring Khaki to Mike’s squad almost made Xander’s heart stop beating.
But Mike was waiting for an answer.
“I’m just feeling the pressure to get her trained as fast as possible,” Xander said.
“Bullshi
t,” Mike said. “There’s more to it than that. I know for a fact that you thrive on impossible challenges. What’s really got you going?”
Why couldn’t Mike simply let it go? Xander grabbed a T-shirt from his locker and pulled it on, trying to come up with something that would satisfy his friend’s curiosity. He couldn’t lie. Mike’d pick that up in a hot second.
“Shit, Xander. Don’t you think Khaki deserves the best training you can give her?”
Xander’s head rocked back like he’d been punched. Where the hell had that question come from?
“You know I do,” he growled. “Why the hell would you even ask me that?”
Mike finished lacing up his sneakers and stood. “I was wondering if the reason you’re being such a dick is because you don’t want a woman on your team.”
This time Xander felt his claws and fangs come out. But Mike stood his ground, his eyes turning golden and his fangs sliding out too.
“Are you frigging kidding me?” Xander shouted, clenching his hands into fists to keep from ripping Mike’s head off—literally. “After all the years we’ve worked together, you pick now to start having such a low-ass opinion of me? How could you even think I’d pull something like that—treat Khaki like shit—just because I didn’t want her on my squad?”
“Then look me in the eye and tell me you’re not trying to punish Khaki because Gage put her on your team,” Mike shot back, his elongated canines inches from Xander’s. “Then maybe I’ll believe it.”
Xander didn’t feel like going through a werewolf lie detector test at the moment. He would have much preferred giving in to his animal instincts and letting the claws fly. With all the stress he’d been under since Khaki’d arrived, a good brawl would make him feel better.
Although Mike hadn’t been a werewolf as long as Xander had, he fought in a much more controlled manner compared to Xander’s more instinctive style. If it came down to a brawl between the two of them, they’d be evenly matched and get equally bloody.
By some miracle, Xander controlled himself and retracted his claws and fangs millimeter by millimeter.