Private Dicks

by Samantha M. Derr

  Donovan makes a low growling noise, and I wince. Way to cuddle up to the alpha and practically announce your guilt and conflict.

  "Pup, I know I said I wouldn't pressure you to confide in me or anything, but you're not exactly making this easy." His hands tighten on my hips, and I lean up to bite his ear gently.

  "Sorry," I say quietly.

  He snorts. "That sounded sincere."

  I press my cheek to his. "I am sorry. I … why are you putting up with this?" There's no use pretending that he doesn't at least suspect, and taking the meeting into account …

  "I'm not going to tell you," he says softly. "You're a very good enforcer and a decent lone wolf. But you're an awful pack wolf, and it shows."

  "I don't understand."

  "Your alpha didn't have a spouse, did he?" he asks. He leans back a little so he can see my face, and I frown.

  "No," I admit after a tense moment of eye contact before I concede. "How did you know?"

  He smiles. "I'm incredibly intelligent, in case you forgot."

  I glare at his shoulder. "I didn't. But how did you know?"

  He yanks on my ears, and I snarl at him, shoving hard, but I'm trapped between his legs, and he's laughing. "I'm not going to tell you."

  "Let go of my ears!" I push at his face, but he keeps laughing, tugging, but not painfully though I know I'm going to lose a few hanks of fur, and I grab his ears and pull. He's completely unperturbed, laughing like a fool, even as I try to twist and squirm out of his grasp. "Lemme go!" I wail when I end up bent backwards and to the left, my side protesting something fierce.

  There's a distinct throat-clearing somewhere behind me, and I can almost see whoever's standing near the door. Two whoever's, actually, and Donovan releases my ears and spins me around, pressing my back to his chest, his arms wrapped around my waist again.

  I get a good look at the person Lee's escorting, and my stomach drops out into the ground. Ian, Ryan's personal bodyguard, is standing behind Lee, and he's looking right at me with barely-disguised contempt and loathing.

  Oh God. How much did they see? But it doesn't matter, it's enough. Just the sight of me playing with the Deepine alpha …

  "Who are you and what do you want?" Donovan asks, his tone something less than warm. His tightens his arms around me, and strokes his thumb over my hip. Ian's pointed glance says that he sees the little gesture, and that he's going to take great pleasure reporting it to Ryan. Oh God, why is he here?

  "I have a message from my alpha, Ryan Silverlight," Ian says.

  "Get on with it," Donovan says, sounding perfectly bored and not at all like he doesn't suspect Silverlight of having something to do with the current situation.

  "This is a matter of some sensitivity. I understand you wish for your mate to be present, but the law dictates I can request he leave," Ian says, perfectly polite, if a bit frosty, and I feel my face flame.

  Mate? What? Why would he think that? What would make him think I'm Donovan's—

  "I have no need to entertain you at all," Donovan says, his tone freezing. "You will respect my wishes concerning whomever I choose to be here, spouse or not."

  I half-turn, and Donovan looks down at me, one eyebrow raised, as if daring me to comment. "I need to get started on that rogue," I say. "I should go anyway."

  His mouth sets in a fine line, but he nods and reaches behind him. He lets me go and hands me the dossier. I stare at the folder, then back at him. I feel like I need to say something, but I don't know what, or why I'm hesitating, and Ian's probably ready to bust a blood vessel, but what am I supposed to—

  "Be careful." Donovan ruffles a hand through my hair, and then I can breathe again. I smile and walk away, determinedly not looking at Ian even though there's a tension strumming through him that he always gets when he's getting ready to kick my ass.

  The hall's quiet, and Lee gives me an inscrutable look from where he's lounging against the wall by the door. I start to walk off, then hesitate. "Lee?"

  "What's up, Reese?"

  "Watch that guy," I murmur. "He's dangerous."

  "Sure thing." Lee's mastered that tone of voice that conveys absolute carelessness despite the fact that one of his knives is naked in his hand, and he looks half-ready to kill something. I smile as I walk away. Lee may not be Donovan's bodyguard, but he'll do a hell of a job protecting our alpha, I know.

  *~*~*

  "To what do I owe the pleasure, Reese?"

  I finally stop smashing in windows over the dead rogue's body and turn to face the dragon. He's standing in the doorway, arms crossed over his chest and customary smirk on his face, the very picture of nonchalance.

  "I need something from you," I say, dropping my crowbar. "Tonight."

  He tilts his head to the side, green cast over his eyes, and his nose flares for a second. He nods. "Come on, then, let's get you out of the cold."

  *~*~*

  It's funny, I think as I lay half-drowned on cold concrete, that I was expecting a tiny bit of mercy from Ryan. Nothing big. After all, it's not like Ian walked in on me fucking Donovan.

  A hard kick flips me onto my back, and I stare up at the sky, all weeping and raining down tears on my face. Actually, it might've been better if that had happened. I could play off something like that, say I was just trying to get into his good graces. But playing with Donovan, pulling on his ears like that … That, Ryan won't forgive, I know.

  More kicks, Ryan screaming something at me … I cough up something hot and wet and wince, spit it out. Someone drags me to my feet, and I stare at Ryan's hazy form through the rain. He grabs my chin hard enough to bruise, his eyes backlit, and for just a second, I think he's going to kill me.

  "You will go back to that filthy pack's den," he says, enunciating each word clearly. "You will do as I told you to do six months ago. You will report them to the Syndicate, and you will come back home so that you may be properly punished. Do you hear me?"

  "Yes," I rasp out and swallow hard on the urge to cough. He backhands me, and I fall to the ground, coughing hard and painfully until it feels like something's been rattled loose in my chest and I'm about to see it in a puddle of water and blood. Someone pulls me back up, their hands hot against the cold of the rain, and Ryan grabs my hair and yanks my head back.

  "What did you say?" he asks, very pleasantly.

  "Yes, sir," I whisper. He nods curtly, and whoever was holding me drops me to crumple onto the street. One by one, I hear them leave, whisper silent under the downpour and thunder. I crawl over to the bag I'd talked out of Teinen, lying discarded on the sidewalk. Waterproof, I'd said, and he'd given me a funny look, but pulled out what seemed like ten bags worth of things from the one sitting on the ground by his leg and gave me his.

  His eyes had been curious, but he hadn't asked, for once, not even when I told him to wait for my call. I curl around the bag for a few minutes, needing the rest even though the cold and wet is seeping into my bones. I recite his phone number in my head over and over, not trusting that the cell phone they'd given me would make it through the night. And hadn't that gotten me another strange look, but I'd ignored it.

  Just like I'm trying to ignore the pain right now, though with a somewhat lesser degree of success. But I'm not too far away from the mansion, and I work on taking one short stagger of a step after another, the bag on my shoulder a too-heavy weight even though it doesn't hold anything, but a phone and a flash drive.

  I can do this. And before I know it, I'm in my room, taking in Deepine's—Donovan's—scent, wrapping it around me like a blanket. I strip off my clothes and head straight for the shower. Have to get Silverlight's scent off me, get rid of the stench of blood and fear. He's going to kill me, I know he will. I've disobeyed him for the last time.

  I take a break from pulling on clothes over my still-damp body to laugh until I'm coughing, and then I have to sit on my bed for a few seconds so I don't fall over. I very carefully don't let myself feel all the aches and broken bones and where Ian had
punched me with a silver necklace wrapped around his knuckles. Ingenuity, part of being an enforcer.

  I pick up the bag and start walking to the enrollment room. The bag is even heavier now with the files I'd collected and printed. I haven't known where my loyalties lay for a lot longer than I'd thought, going by those files. But I just need a few more and then this whole mess will be over. I can go back to finding kittens and dogs and lost scarves and others of that ilk.

  Annie, the enrollment officer on duty, almost screams when she sees me. I barely repress the urge to give her a comforting smile—I know my mouth is bloody again.

  "Please," I say as I drop into a seat. The room is cramped and dimly-lit with at least ten computers lining three walls.

  "Noelle needs to take a look at you!" she says, her hands fluttering over the places where I'm obviously still bleeding.

  "No," I say firmly. I dig the flash drive out of the bag. "This first." She stares at the flash drive like she's never seen one in her life. "Please." My voice breaks embarrassingly, but I push the flash drive at her. "It's for the pack."

  She's sitting in her chair, fingers flying over the keyboard, and I think I'm losing patches of time. I watch her from where I'm slowly sliding out of my chair, and she gasps.

  "Reese, where did you get this information? How did you know about the wolfsbane?"

  I smile, forgetting for a second, and she recoils a little. "Do you collate and bind?"

  *~*~*

  "Reese!"

  "Wake up, damn you!"

  I glare at Noelle, then look down at the phone clenched in my hand. I smile. "Anybody got my reports?" I force the words out past sandpaper and blood.

  Annie shoves the bag into my lap. "Collated and bound," she whispers. "You called someone—you told me to tell you when you woke up."

  "Good," I slur. "They'll be here …"

  *~*~*

  "He shouldn't be moved so soon!"

  "I'm sorry, ma'am, but the fact of the matter is, this situation needs to be taken care of quickly, and he's the only one who can make sense of these reports. And you said yourself he's increased his own healing rate."

  "At the expense of draining his body of energy it needs!" Noelle screeches. "He needs rest!"

  I open my eyes. Still in the enrollment room. The dragon's out-bullying Noelle, who looks ready to commit murder. I shove myself into a seated position and wince at the pain, though it's considerably less than before.

  "Reese!"

  "I'm fine," I say brusquely. "I just needed to rest a little." I turn to the dragon, and see Annie forcibly restraining Noelle in my peripheral vision. "Get Donovan and Dorian," I say, and he nods.

  Half an hour has me inside the same interrogation room as before, the dragon leaning against the opposite wall. He's staring at me hard, and I avoid his gaze as much as possible, waiting impatiently. There's a commotion in the hallway, and the dragon straightens.

  "So Reese," he says as the door opens, "who are you actually working for?"

  I ignore the question as Donovan and Dorian burst into the room behind another damn dragon. Donovan sees me after half a second and lunges towards me. "Reese! What the hell happened?"

  "I'll kindly thank you to unhand our consultant," Teinen says curtly, and Donovan lets my arms go as if he was burned.

  "What's going on?" Dorian asks. He puts a hand on Donovan's shoulder for a second, and they retreat from both me and the dragon.

  It doesn't hurt. It doesn't.

  "I was hoping Reese could enlighten us. A lot seems to have happened in the six hours since I last saw him." The dragon's tone is poisonous—he's obviously pissed about something, though I can't fathom what.

  I open the bag and pull out a file. "This is the entire file detailing the job the Syndicate hired me to perform six months ago." I drop it onto the table with a slap. "This is my enrollment file for Silverlight." Another file, another slap. "This is my file detailing the job Ryan ordered me to do six months ago. This is my enrollment file for Deepine and the work I've done for them since submitting my bid six months ago." Two more files, two more smacks in the dead stillness of the room. "This is my file detailing Deepine's business, along with their manufacturers for the past forty years. This is my file detailing Silverlight and allies' reaction to the expansion of Deepine into the spice trade. This is my file detailing public political disputes over land ties within the last twenty years that led to the gradual isolation of Deepine from their allies in terms of physical territory."

  The files dropping onto the table are a constant rhythm over my words now. "This is my file detailing the use of double agents within the last forty years to attempt to destabilize Deepine. This is my file detailing all of Deepine's enemies and Silverlight's allies within the past one hundred years, and why. This is my file detailing the wolves that have been kidnapped or otherwise have gone missing within the past two years, and this is a copy of the Syndicate file with samples of all the hair, saliva, and paw evidence found at the recent string of murders on the East Coast, along with the undisclosed information pertaining to traces of wolfsbane found at the scenes.

  "This is the file correlating all of the evidence found at the murder sites with the missing wolves, and this is my file detailing a stolen shipment of the rare spice only Deepine imports from a holding three years ago. This is my file correlating the evidence the Syndicate found with the information the pack keeps from its suppliers for quality control purposes."

  Finally the bag is empty, and the silence in the room is ringing. I keep my eyes on Teinen. "The string of murders on the East Coast over the last nine months was nothing more than a plan started twenty years ago to attempt to destabilize Deepine and move in on their spice trade by framing Deepine for the murders. They kidnapped enforcers and used wolfsbane on them to make it appear as if Deepine was attacking their enemies. Of course, Deepine couldn't refute the claims because they refused to get involved due to their lack of allies directly involved in the situation. It is also my belief that they wanted to divide the pack; Deepine is large and headed by a competent alpha, and therefore is a threat to the smaller packs such as Silverlight."

  The expression on the dragon's face is nothing less than stunned, and in some tiny corner of my mind, I let myself revel in the satisfaction of so thoroughly discomfiting a dragon. He clears his throat a second later, though his expression doesn't smooth out. "Like I said, wolf, who do you actually work for?"

  "I—" I clamp down on the urge to confess the truth—that I don't know anymore. "That's irrelevant," I say. "I've given you the truth. You hired me to infiltrate Deepine and find out the truth."

  The dragon drifts forward and tugs on a file from the bottom of the pile. "You belong to Silverlight."

  "Ryan took me in and raised me."

  "He told you to do—what?"

  "Plant evidence that would confirm Deepine's guilt." I keep my eyes on the dragon's cartilage piercings, don't let myself look at anything—one—else.

  "Why didn't you?"

  "I … " I swallow hard. "It wasn't right. He wants Deepine gone for petty reasons."

  The dragon frowns at me. "Was he the one who hurt you?"

  I stiffen. "Who else would?"

  A tiny smirk quirks his lips. "Oh, I don't know. I can't imagine your mate's happy with you right now." He glances at the corner where Donovan and Dorian are standing, but I refuse to rise to the bait.

  "I don't know what you're talking about," I say tiredly. "I've done what you asked. Can I leave now?"

  "Reese—"

  The dragon's looking at me funny, his mouth open like he's gonna say something, but he finally just shrugs. "Sure. Faine will take you home." The other dragon steps into the room like he was summoned, and I cringe. "Deepine, you're gonna have to stay."

  I glance at Donovan as I follow the other dragon out of the room. He looks furious, and Teinen looks positively gleeful. Dorian catches my eye, and I look away quickly. The door closes behind me, and I concentrate on
following the other dragon because I know if I let myself think about anything else, I'm going to start screaming or crying, or both.

  I did the right thing. I didn't obey Ryan, I helped Deepine—helped Donovan. He's not going to suffer because of me.

  This is the only outcome I have the right to hope for.

  *~*~*

  My little office fills with the clamor of bells I'd placed over the door, and I try to back out of the closet, balancing coats, maps and boxes precariously in my arms and on my shoulders. "I'll be out in a minute!" I call and focus on trying to escape a cave-in in the making.

  I finally manage to retreat with the little box I'd been looking for clutched firmly in my hand and turn to my customer, an apology on the tip of my tongue. I freeze.

  "What are you doing here?" I blurt. It's been three weeks. Is he finally here to punish me?

  Donovan gives me a blank look, and I can't feel his emotions at all. Is he purposefully blocking the pack bond, or is it … gone?

  "I'm looking for someone," he says finally. He leans against the wall next to the door, his arms crossed in front of his chest, and he seems so perfectly at ease, so unchanged by everything that my temper flares up, fueled by hurt even though I have no reason or right to feel that.

  "Yeah?" I bite out. I put the box down and lean against my desk, trying to project a calm air, trying to pretend we can't both smell my anger, hot and acrid in the air between us.

  "Yeah," he says, no mocking, no derision, just confirming what wasn't really a question. "You see, I managed to lose him somehow." He tilts his head to the side. "Do you want more details?"

  As long as Donovan's playing this stupid game, then I can, too. "Sure, why not."

  He smiles, but it isn't a happy sort of smile. "Okay, then." There's something deliberately languid in his stance, something liquid and deadly, and the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Something's going on.