“He’s not back yet,” Owen said. “Did you order the pizza?”
“No, I heard Craig did.”
Something definitely seemed off here. Why would Yvanne think only the shifters would be around now? Or was this some kind of ploy on her part? Had she ordered the pizza and decided on this pretense of innocence for reasons of her own?
“You know,” he said, “I was just up on the mountain with our aides. Why don’t you and I go back there and see if they know what’s going on?” He didn’t want to leave this woman here alone. He didn’t especially want her with him, either, but at least this way he would know where she was and what she was doing, even if she had some kind of nefarious plan in mind. He needed some backup, and the aides could help to watch her while Owen determined what he needed to do next.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I was told to wait here.”
“By whom?” Owen demanded.
“Would you like a piece of pizza while we’re waiting for everyone?”
What he would like was some answers. Yvanne was clearly avoiding answering anything directly.
Which made Owen feel certain he wouldn’t like the truth.
“Come on,” he said. “We’re going up to the aides’ station. Now.” He wasn’t certain that was the best solution, but for the moment it was the best he could think of. “We’ll come back and have pizza when the rest of the crowd’s ready.” He hoped that would take some of the onus off his giving her an order.
“Well...” She looked nervous, concerned. Which made Owen all the more certain about their leaving.
He grabbed her arm firmly, but not strongly enough to hurt her. “Let’s go.”
* * *
She had forced herself to stay hidden as she watched Boyd’s car drive off.
She saw then that the front door of the meeting house was closed, but she nevertheless heard Owen talking with someone else. There were no other cars up here except for the rentals that belonged to the group. Who was there?
She needed to go inside. Now.
Slowly, stalking along the ground, she drew nearer. Below the strong odor of the ipecac wafted the softer scent of another human beside Owen. That scent soon joined with another. Identifiable. Human.
She knew then who was inside.
She wasn’t certain but believed she knew why.
And just in case, she had to find a way to help Owen.
* * *
Owen didn’t want to drag Yvanne or do anything physical beyond what he had already done to garner her cooperation. He wasn’t acting as a police officer in charge here, and even if he’d had his weapon, this wasn’t the kind of circumstance in which he would use it.
He was glad, then, that although Yvanne resisted his initial touch, she shrugged off his hand and started moving slowly toward the kitchen door and into the hallway.
And stopped.
“Oh, there you are, Holly.” Yvanne sounded relieved.
Holly Alverton stood there, and despite her small stature she blocked the way Owen had intended to go. A disproportionately large purse was slung over her shoulder. What was she doing there?
What were both women doing here?
“I know this is supposed to be a surprise,” Yvanne continued, “and I didn’t say anything, but I think maybe you need to let Owen in on it.”
“What kind of surprise?” He kept his tone cool even though he wanted to demand an answer. Was this some kind of game? A joke?
This was not the time for either. And the women should not have been here.
“A celebration.” Holly aimed her large blue eyes down at the floor. “We know today’s just practice for something that will be real tomorrow. Yvanne and I love our shifters and we wanted to do something both to thank them and to wish them luck. We just figured having a pizza party here when they got back would show them that. I ordered the pizzas for Craig. It won’t be a long party, though, since we know they’ll need their rest.” She looked around Owen and into the kitchen. “I see Lupe there, but is everyone else up on the mountain?”
That seemed too nosy a question. She didn’t need to know where any of the CAs or Alpha Force members were. He’d already mentioned to Yvanne that the aides were up on the mountain and she could probably guess where the others were, too. But Owen didn’t choose to answer Holly.
“I appreciate the thought,” he lied, “but since you know things might get a bit more intense tomorrow, you should understand that we really need some privacy here to finish our plans.”
“We can’t party, then?” Holly looked up at him, a mournful expression on her pretty young face. But Owen had no desire to placate her.
“Sorry, no. In fact, it’s time for you to go.” Then, to ease things just a little to encourage them to leave, he said, “If all goes well in our actual job, we’ll all celebrate afterward, including you.” Maybe.
“Well...okay. I want to take the pizza with us, though. Okay with you, Yvanne?” Holly looked toward the other woman, her expression still hurt.
“I guess.”
Holly maneuvered around Owen into the kitchen, Yvanne following. Lupe came up to them, too.
Holly patted the dog, then moved sideways, not toward the table.
In moments, Owen saw that she had taken a hypodermic needle from her purse and, with no fanfare, stuck it into Yvanne.
“Hey,” the other woman said, looking confused.
“What the—” Owen began, then stopped.
He found himself looking down the barrel of what appeared to be a Smith & Wesson pistol similar to one of the kinds available to RCMP officers.
Holly no longer looked sorrowful. Determination and glee now framed her face as she raised the gun to his head.
Chapter 24
She heard.
From the back of the house, Selena had been able to listen to some of the conversation that must have been occurring in the hallway.
Holly and Yvanne had planned something that did not sound right, some kind of party.
She heard much more when they all reassembled in the kitchen, and it made her fur stand on end.
“What the hell did you do to her?” Owen demanded. “What was in that needle?”
“Something temporary until I decide on the best way to kill her—more drugs or a gunshot wound like you’ll die from soon. I know exactly how to use this gun.” That was Holly’s voice. Had she drugged Yvanne? “I have to figure out how to make it look like you took one another out.”
“Why? What’s this all about?”
Owen’s voice sounded furious. If only she was in human form and could enter the house at will. But shifting back would take time she didn’t want to expend.
More important, her being shifted like this was better. Holly might not expect it.
Yet she might, with so many shifters around.
And she apparently had a gun.
If only Selena could tell Owen she was here. Could have him arrange for Lupe and her to change places.
“This is about your interference in my life. Our lives. You and your damned CAs.” Holly spit her words out loudly enough that Selena needn’t have been in wolfen form to hear them.
But she was. She also had her human mind. Now she needed to employ both. Quickly. To save Owen as well as the mission of Alpha Force and the CAs.
Staying low to the ground, she growled softly, loud enough for Lupe to hear, but not a human.
Lupe responded right away, giving one short bark. It did not, fortunately, sound like a bark of alarm that would tell Holly of anyone else’s presence—human or wolf. Or so Selena hoped.
“I haven’t had her out since I’ve been back here,” Owen said. Did he suspect Selena was there? Or was he just looking for an excuse to get to the door?
“Fine. I’ll let her outside.”
“She needs to be leashed.”
“She’ll survive—or not.” Clearly, the nonshifting woman was a bitch of a different kind.
There was shuffling inside. Selen
a guessed from the noise that Holly was making Owen accompany Lupe and her to the door. She slunk around the side of the house toward the front.
In moments the back door opened and Lupe ran out. Fortunately, the door closed again before her cover dog reached her side.
Two canines together. Selena was pleased. She wished she could confine Lupe where she would be safe. Alternatively, she wished that she could communicate with her and order her to the clearing where the aides waited. Just her presence there would alert them to the trouble.
But commanding her cover dog to go there was not possible, not while she was shifted.
She needed time. And help.
One thing she knew she could accomplish in wolfen form was to run. Fast. And so, making sure Lupe followed, she began dashing as rapidly as she could toward the clearing where the aides waited—two silvery fleet and cunning canines with a mission.
Would Owen be alive when she returned?
The question made her rev up her speed even more.
* * *
“So what are you going to do now?” Owen asked.
“Stop talking,” Holly demanded. “Now.”
Owen had attempted to appear scared and obedient in the face of a weapon. He currently sat on a chair in the kitchen. Yvanne lay on the floor near him, and Holly stood against the wall, facing both of them, her gun pointed straight at Owen’s chest.
If he was honest with himself, he would accept that he was, in fact, a bit scared of this deranged woman. But his determination to do his job, and ensure everyone else was able to do theirs, outweighed any fear within him.
He would succeed...or die trying.
He had hoped that by letting Lupe out, he would buy some time, and maybe the dog would dash off to find her Alpha Force trainers and get help.
But Lupe was just a dog, not a shifted human. Not really Selena, despite being her cover dog.
He wished he could at least have one more conversation with Selena. See her again one more time.
Kiss her again.
But that was the least likely scenario of all.
He just hoped she was off assisting his CAs so that, no matter what happened to him now, they would follow their orders, save the hostage and help to bring down the kidnappers.
The kidnappers.
Was this disturbed woman affiliated with them? His mind raced for a connection.
Either way, she’d indicated she was working on a plan to kill Yvanne and him. Would she start shooting the instant she zeroed in on what to do?
One way or another, he had a plan. He would disarm her, perhaps emotionally at first. But definitely physically. Somehow.
He took his time about saying anything, then began another attempt at distraction. “That guy Boyd,” he said. “When I first saw him here with the pizza boxes, I wondered what he was really up to. You and he seemed to have something going on before, and—”
“I was just using him,” Holly spat. “I wanted someone else in town to look interested in all of us visitors, mostly you CAs and the people from the States you were working with. I flirted with him partly to make Craig jealous, but also so the rest of you wouldn’t think too much about Craig and me.”
“That worked,” Owen said, then changed the subject to something of more concern. “I’d still like to know what you drugged Yvanne with. I assume you didn’t use ipecac on her or she’d be awake and throwing up. You were the one to taint the elixir with ipecac yesterday, weren’t you?”
“Of course.” She looked proud about it, if for only an instant. “I intended to do more today, even brought some more ipecac along.” She gestured toward her purse, which she had put down on the floor. “But the stuff that’s already here should be enough to deal with what’s planned for tomorrow. I’ll add more ipecac in a few minutes.” She waved the gun at him menacingly. “And you won’t be in condition to do anything about it.”
He didn’t dare focus on how deranged she seemed to be. He needed to focus on distracting her, no matter what her mental condition was. “We’re having fresh, untainted elixir shipped here, but I guess you didn’t know that. Patrick requested it. Did you know he’s supposed to return any minute after picking the new shipment up? That’s what they’ll use tomorrow, and once they’re here and on guard, you’re the one who’ll not be able to do anything about it.”
It was actually an hour or more before Owen expected Patrick and Marshall to return, but he wasn’t about to reveal that to Holly.
“Damn.” Her blue eyes that had appeared so sweet and innocent before today now looked crazed. She left her post near the wall and began walking toward him. Owen braced himself, preparing to use any kind of offensive action or self-defense move to disarm her, but she didn’t get near him. Instead, she approached Yvanne and gave her a light kick.
The other woman didn’t move, although she did appear to still be breathing.
“So what did you drug her with?” he repeated again. “Will she survive it?”
“She’d better,” the woman spluttered. “She was only supposed to be knocked out for a minute or two, and it’s been nearly twenty minutes now, damn her. Okay, I’ve decided. When she wakes up, she’ll shoot you, then be so upset about it that she’ll shoot herself in the head. I’ll just be walking in and see the end of it.” The expression she next leveled on him looked horrified and mournful. The witch was a good actress.
Not to mention a psycho.
He needed to keep her talking, sidetrack her—and, if possible, learn what all this was really about.
“What will Craig think of all that?” he asked.
“He’ll be upset. So upset that he’ll leave your horrible CAs, or what’s left of them, and come home with me so we can get married the way we planned before you and your miserable Mounties interfered.”
Now she was facing him again, her gun aimed at his forehead, but she had taken a few steps back once more and was too far away for him to disarm her.
He still needed to keep her talking. “Then you like shapeshifters?”
“I love them. I love Craig, at least. We’re going to be married and I’m going to have his children, and they should all be shifters like him. That’s why I had to stop this stupid CAs mission and—” She glared at him and ceased talking.
She had to stop the mission? She had made one CA ill with ipecac, but that wouldn’t necessarily have prevented the rest of them from proceeding with their assignment.
Owen wondered again if she had something to do with the kidnappers, even indirectly.
Anthony Creay and he had suspected some kind of mole riling the kidnappers even further, driving them to taunt the police and act faster.
Could it have been Holly? If so, how?
He wasn’t going to ask her that. Not now, at least.
“You know,” he said quietly, “you and I have something in common.”
He paused, waiting for her reaction.
“What? Are you mad about what your stupid team is doing, too?” Her tone was scornful.
“No, I believe in the CAs and how they will help our country. But I only realized recently that it was possible for nonshifters to truly care about shapeshifters, and not just be amazed at who they are and what they do.”
That seemed to startle Holly, who lowered the gun a bit and stared at him for several long seconds. “You and that Selena? I kind of wondered about the two of you.”
“Yes,” he said. He knew he wasn’t lying now. He’d already admitted to himself that he cared about Selena despite what she was. Or maybe her ability to shift only added to her appeal to him. Could he use this truth to shut this woman down? “I love her. I want to be with her. I think she cares for me, too.” He stuck a pleading expression on his face. “She and I need to be together, like Craig and you do. You obviously understand about love with a shifter. If you kill me, what do you think that will do to Selena? Imagine how you’d feel if something really bad happened to Craig.”
Oops. He could tell from the change on he
r face—from confusion and interest to fury—that he’d gone too far. “I do imagine it. I’m sure it’ll happen if he stays with your damn CAs. That’s why I didn’t want him to join at all. I just thought you’d all give up if the kidnappers knew more and told your damned RCMP handlers about it. I didn’t think they’d speed things up this way, but—”
“You contacted the kidnappers?” Now Owen was the one to feel fury. He only partially attempted to keep it to himself. “And you thought that would somehow protect your Craig? Did you tell them what the CAs were all about? Are they going to be ready to attack the CAs who come to observe them and bring them down?”
Was that actually a look of contrition on Holly’s face? She once more stood with her back against the kitchen wall, but now she seemed to be trembling, from her shoulders to her hands holding the gun. “I...” She swallowed hard and seemed to try to still her hands, but failed. “Did Craig tell you I’m a tech consultant for a cutting-edge Canadian software company?” She didn’t wait for his reply before she continued. “I figured out how to send information back, in reverse of how I gathered from news reports that the kidnappers contacted our national police with their demands. I didn’t tell them Craig or the others were shapeshifters, honest.” As Owen continued to glare at her, she said, “I just hinted that they weren’t ordinary people and that, just like I might be using sci-fi-like connections to reach them, the people tracking them down had some offbeat stuff behind them, too. I laughed to confuse them when I hinted even more about the kind of offbeat stuff I was referring to.”
Okay. Owen realized he was accomplishing what he’d hoped to at first—distracting this crazy, yet apparently very smart, woman. Maybe even making her feel a little guilty.
But she was still the one who was armed. And now he had even more reason to leave here alive, and fast, to pass this information along to his superiors.
“I—I really do understand why you’d care so much for your Selena,” Holly continued softly. “I assume she cares about you, too. I’m really sorry that I have to kill you, but—”
A noise sounded from somewhere in the house.
Canadian Wolf (Paranormal Nocturne Romance) Page 22