Caroline’s heart felt like it was going to pound right out of her chest in the middle of the tiny bar bathroom.
“What about you?” Caroline asked. “What are you going to do? It sounds like you know these guys. Are you in danger?”
“Don’t worry about me,” Lance said. “Just get out of there yourself. I’m on my way over to eliminate the problem. And I don’t want you to be anywhere near there when I arrive.”
The line clicked dead, and Caroline took several deep breaths as she leaned her forehead against the dank, wooden wall.
No way in hell was she leaving now. She had a feeling Lance was in more danger than she even knew how to imagine, and she at least wanted to stick around and be ready to call the cops, if necessary. Caroline held her chin high and stubborn, and reached for the doorknob. She had a beer to finish, and she was going to go sit her butt in her barstool and finish it.
Chapter Seven
Caroline watched the minutes tick by on her cheap, drugstore watch, and grew more and more nervous with each tick. Where was Lance? It had been nearly an hour now, and he still wasn’t here. These men seemed to be wrapping up their conversation, and, if they left, Lance might not be able to find them before they found him.
Caroline shuddered, and willed herself to remain calm. Lance hadn’t commented at all about the fact that the men thought he was a shapeshifter, which Caroline had found surprising. But he seemed to already know about these guys, so maybe this wasn’t the first time he’d been exposed to their crazy beliefs.
Caroline heard the men gathering up papers, and she realized they were getting ready to leave. She turned in her seat to see what was going on, but she turned too far and too quickly, and she caught the eye of the older man. He narrowed his gaze at her, and she turned around again to face her back to him. But it was too late. He had seen her watching him, and his suspicion was aroused.
“Something the matter, sweetheart?” he asked, his voice cold and steely.
Caroline bit her lip. She had to come up with an excuse, and fast. She put on the sultriest smile she could manage, and spun around in the barstool.
“Nothing’s the matter, except that I can’t keep my eyes off of that gorgeous face of yours,” Caroline said, batting her eyelashes in what she hoped was a sexy manner. Flirting had never been her strong suit.
The older man’s face relaxed into a grin, and he patted his knee. “Well, well, then. Why didn’t you say so? Come over here and sit with me. You can get a better look at my face.”
Caroline winced inwardly, but she couldn’t exactly back out on her ruse now. So she batted her eyelashes again and went to sit on the man’s lap like he requested. She caught the bartender looking at her with a raised eyebrow as she sashayed over. He knew it was unlike her to talk to anyone, let alone flirt with them. She could only hope that the bartender would notice her behavior was suspicious and do something to help her if the men tried to hurt her.
“Mmm, now don’t you smell good,” the older man said, sticking his nose right into Caroline’s neck and breathing deeply. Caroline cringed, doing her best not to stiffen up. She wanted to tell the man that he smelled pretty awful himself. He had beer breath and seemed like he had no clue what a stick of deodorant was. Despite her best efforts to play it cool, the man must have noticed her hesitation.
“What’s the matter, baby? Don’t like my ‘gorgeous face’ as much up close?”
He kept his tone light, but Caroline notice that his arm had tightened around her in a solid grip. His friend leaned back in his chair with a smirk on his face. The old man looked up at his friend and chuckled. “Why don’t you go over there and grab this lady’s purse for her. If you can even call that ratty thing a purse.”
The younger man did as he was told, sauntering over to Caroline’s messenger bag and then throwing it on the table with a thud, covering up the photos of Lance and his crew that were still on the table. Without waiting to be told what to do, the younger man started digging around in Caroline’s purse until he found her phone. He pulled it out and started scrolling through it. Caroline kicked herself for not at least having a security code on the thing. It had always seemed like too much of a bother, but right now it could have bought her valuable time. She was quickly realizing that her little flirtation act hadn’t fooled these guys for a second. She should have known better. They had probably been aware of her obvious eavesdropping for most of the time she’d been here.
“Oh, what’s this?” the younger man said, squinting his eyes at Caroline’s phone screen. “Your last internet search on here was ‘Lance Bowman, Coast Guard.’ Are you friends with our buddy Lance as well?”
Caroline didn’t answer. She didn’t know what to say that wouldn’t make things outright worse. There was no sense in trying to deny that she knew who Lance was, since her last several Google searches had been some variation of his name and occupation. The younger man continued to look at her phone screen, still smirking and shaking his head.
“Oh, look, a search for ‘Lance Bowman phone number.’ Well if you wanted his number, you should have just asked us for it. We know it,” the younger man said, then lowered his voice into a chilling, sinister tone. “We know everything about him.”
Caroline shrugged, and the older man tightened his grip on her. Caroline silently prayed that Lance would show up soon and be able to fight these guys off and get her out of this mess. He was going to be pissed at her for ignoring his instructions to leave, but she would deal with that later.
“Well, now, this is pretty interesting. Your recent call log shows you made a call just over an hour ago. But if my memory serves me correctly, you’ve been here much longer than that. Did you make that call when you snuck off to the bathroom?” the younger man asked, his eyes darkening. Caroline was feeling more foolish by the second. Why had she actually thought these men hadn’t been noticing what she was doing?
“Let’s just see who you called,” the younger man said, pushing some buttons on Caroline’s phone and holding it up to his ear. She assumed he was redialing the last number she called, which spelled trouble for her. As soon as he realized she had called the Coast Guard air station, she was definitely going to be in trouble. As the younger man waited for someone to pick up on the other line, the older man tightened his grip on Caroline so much that she could hardly breathe. He also kept nuzzling her neck with his nose, sending chills up and down Caroline’s back—and not the good kind.
“Well, that’s just splendid,” the younger man said, hurling Caroline’s phone at the table. She winced as she saw the screen crack in several places. So much for her brand new Smartphone.
“Who’d she call,” the older man asked, his voice laced with scorn.
“The Coast Guard air station in San Diego,” the younger man said, crossing his arms. “Something you want to tell us, sweetheart? How do you know Lance, and did you talk to him?”
“I don’t know him well at all,” Caroline said. It was the truth. She had inadvertently painted him, and she knew he wanted to date her, but that was about it. The men clearly didn’t believe her, though. The older man’s arm tightened around her chest even more, causing her to gasp and cough to try to catch a breath of air. He used his other hand to grip her forearm tightly, digging his fingernails into her skin until she was sure that he must be drawing blood.
“Is everything alright over there, Miss?” the bartender’s booming voice called out. Caroline noticed that he didn’t use her name, even though he knew it. Maybe he didn’t want to take a chance on giving these lowlifes any more information on her than they already had.
“Everything’s fine,” the older gentleman said flatly.
“I was asking the lady,” the bartender retorted.
“And I’m telling you she’s fine,” the older man said, nuzzling Caroline’s neck again with his nose. “Isn’t that right, baby? Tell the nice bartender that you’re doing just fine.”
“I’m okay,” Caroline said weakly, trying her
best to smile at the bartender. It was obvious she wasn’t fine, but she was worried about dragging the bartender into this now. She had no idea what these men were capable of, but she had already underestimated them once today. She wasn’t going to do it again. She closed her eyes for a moment, and willed Lance to show up.
As if her thoughts actually did have power, the door suddenly flew open, and Lance stepped into the room. Caroline had never been so happy to see anyone in her life, and even in the middle of this high stress situation, she couldn’t help but notice how strong and muscular Lance appeared. His presence was commanding, filling the room.
And he wasn’t alone. Right behind him, three other men stepped into the bar. Caroline recognized them as the same men from the pictures that the two men in the bar had been looking at. Lance’s entire rescue crew had shown up to play.
The man holding Caroline quickly realized he was outnumbered, and stood to his feet, dragging Caroline with him and placing her in front of him like a human shield. Within moments, Caroline felt cold steel against the side of her forehead, and she knew the man had pressed a gun to her temple.
“Make one move toward me or my colleague and the girl gets her head blown off,” the old man yelled.
“Caroline?” Lance said, not dignifying the old man with a response just yet. “Are you okay?” His voice sounded tight and worried. Caroline just shrugged. She wasn’t exactly okay. She was terrified and she couldn’t seem to find her voice at the moment. But she didn’t want to say anything that would rile up her captors.
“Oh for fuck’s sake, Lance,” one of his crew members said. “You know her? Why didn’t you warn us there was a girl involved?”
“Yes, I do know her. She’s the one who tipped me off that these guys were here. But I told her to get out of here before something like this happened. I guess she’s not very good at listening, though. Seems like she doesn’t want to run from a fight.”
Caroline thought she detected a note of pride in Lance’s voice, and she couldn’t help but smile at him. He smiled back briefly, then turned to look at her captor with a steely grin.
“Look, dude, if you want to live, you better let that girl go right now. Because if you don’t, I swear on my father’s grave that I’m going to rip you to shreds.”
The older man just laughed. “I hope you’re ready to bury your girl, then.”
“Thanks for the warning about the girl, Lance,” another one of Lance’s crew members said.
“Oh, come on,” another one of the crew members said. “Don’t tell me you all haven’t been itching for a fight anyway. This just gives us an excuse to make it a bear fight.”
“So you are bears,” the older man said, sounding pleased. “Thank you for taking the guesswork out of that for us. Now, we won’t feel guilty at all for killing you off.”
The older man nodded at the younger man, who grinned and pulled out a gun. “Who wants to be the first dead bear?” he asked, sounding very pleased with himself.
“There won’t be any dead bears here this afternoon,” Lance said, his voice calm. “And if you want to live, I suggest you put that gun down.”
The younger man just laughed. The bartender, apparently worried that he was about to witness an all out gunfight in his bar, finally piped in. “Hey, guys, I don’t know what your beef is with each other, but take it outside. This isn’t the place for a gunfight.”
Lance briefly glanced over at the guy. “Sorry, buddy. I don’t want to mess up your bar, but I doubt these men are going to negotiate to head outside. I suggest you duck down behind that bar top for your own safety.”
The bartender sighed, but did as he was told. Caroline did her best to take slow, steady breaths. She didn’t want the older man to feel her fear, but it was getting harder to remain calm. She had never been this close to a gun, let alone two of them. She had a feeling that she wasn’t getting out of this bar without witnessing someone die, and she could only hope that one of those dead people wasn’t her or someone on Lance’s crew.
The older man suddenly jammed the cold barrel of the gun against her forehead, making her wince from the force. “Who’s first?” he asked Lance. “You, or the girl?”
Lance didn’t say anything in response. Instead he looked over his shoulder at his crew members, and said something in a low voice that Caroline couldn’t understand. Then he turned back around and held his hand up, palm facing Caroline. The expression on his face looked strange, almost animal-like.
“Don’t try any funny business,” the younger man said, although his voice sounded a little less confident than it had before. “Guns can kill bears just as well as humans, you know.”
Lance didn’t respond. Instead, he balled his hand into a fist and stuck it high in the air.
“Now,” Lance yelled out.
The next thing Caroline knew, she was thrown backwards, along with the two men holding her hostage. A rush of energy hit them, and the older man lost his grip on Caroline. She went flying sideways into the table next to them, and fell over several chairs as she tried to get her balance. She couldn’t get her footing, though, and she fell with a loud thud on the smooth cement floor of the bar, hitting her head on the table on the way down. One of the guns the men had been holding had been knocked loose from his hand in the chaos, and Caroline quickly grabbed it up and scurried behind a large jukebox. She didn’t know how to use a gun, but if one of those guys came at her, she would sure as hell figure it out. She flattened herself against the wall and peeked out into the room with the gun pointing at where her captors had been moments before. That’s when she saw it, and her mouth dropped open. She nearly dropped the gun she was holding as well.
There, in the middle of her favorite dive bar, stood four giant pandas. And they didn’t look like the cute, cuddly pandas that Caroline had seen at the San Diego Zoo. They were fierce, with angry eyes and teeth bared. They let out low growls as they surrounded the men who had been so cocky about killing them just moments before.
Caroline rubbed her eyes in disbelief and looked around for Lance and his crew, but they were nowhere to be found. She had known they wouldn’t be—it was obvious that the furious pandas standing in front of her had been men just moments before. Caroline started counting up how many beers she had ordered, trying to see if the alcohol might be affecting her perception. She desperately needed to find some reasonable explanation for why it looked to her like these men had just turned into bears. But deep within her, she knew that she had really just witnessed the impossible. Shreds of clothing were everywhere, the casualties of the men shifting out of the confines of their human bodies. The men hadn’t been crazy when they talked about bear shifters, after all. Such creatures really did exist.
One of the pandas, whose eyes looked exactly like Lance’s eyes, sniffed the air and swung his head side to side, searching. A moment later the panda turned to look by the jukebox, and Caroline realized that he had been searching for her. He strode quickly over to her hiding place, his paws making loud thuds on the floor as he walked. When he reached her, he sniffed around for a moment, nuzzling her chin with his leathery black nose to make sure she was okay. Up close, no one who had ever met Lance could deny that this bear was him. Even the fur on his face somehow resembled the way that Lance’s human hair stood on his head.
Caroline was absolutely in awe. For a long moment, she even forgot about the fact that there were two men on the other side of the room bent on killing her and Lance. She tentatively reached out her hand and, ever so gently, touched the fur on the head of the panda in front of her. The panda, or Lance—Caroline wasn’t quite sure what to call him at this moment—nuzzled her again. Growing bolder from this gentle encouragement, Caroline continued to let her hand run over the bear’s thick, wiry fur. She scratched behind his velvety black ears, and he grunted in appreciation. She let her hand run down his neck and onto his back, marveling at the size and thickness of the bear’s muscles. His eyes met hers, and he said so much with just his express
ion. He seemed to be telling Caroline that everything was going to be okay, and that he would protect her. Her heart melted at the care and concern that she saw in his eyes.
Then another one of the bears grunted impatiently from behind them, and Lance’s bear turned around quickly to head back to where the other pandas were surrounding the two men on the floor. Caroline’s whole encounter with Lance’s bear had lasted less than twenty seconds, but somehow in those twenty seconds, Lance had managed to touch a deep, special part of Caroline’s soul. She felt a growing affection for him, and all that mattered to her at that moment was both of them getting out of there alive so that they had another chance at exploring their feelings for each other.
The pandas were growling at the men, who were now begging for their lives. But no mercy would be shown here today. The growling intensified, and then was drowned out by the shrieks of the men as the bears closed in for the kill. Caroline turned around and hid as far behind the jukebox as she could, covering her ears. No matter how evil these men had been, she didn’t want to witness them dying. For what felt like an eternity, Caroline did her best to block out the noise of the fight going on behind her. In reality, the commotion only lasted a minute or two. The men were helpless against the large, angry bears. Their guns had been knocked away by the bears’ shifting, and, even if they hadn’t, it would take more than one very well-aimed shot to take down these beasts.
When things had finally quieted down, Caroline continued to huddle behind the jukebox with her knees drawn to her chest. The gun she had taken from the older man now sat next to her on the ground, unneeded. Another powerful whoosh of energy rocked the bar, and Caroline knew without looking that the pandas had shifted back into men. She shook her head in amazement, still trying to comprehend how a man could turn into a bear and back again.
She heard human voices again. Lance was speaking with the bartender, but Caroline couldn’t make out most of what they were saying. Lance was telling the man something about cleaning up the place and compensating him for damages. Shuffling and dragging noises filled the room, and Caroline shuddered as she imagined bodies being dragged out the door. She stayed glued to her spot, not wanting to look until she was sure the evidence of the bloodshed had been removed.
An Alpha's Thunder (Water Bear Shifters 3) Page 6