by Dianna Love
Why couldn’t she live somewhere like this where people were down to earth and decent?
No wonder some rogue female shifters picked places like Clarenceville to hide.
The last thing Sam did meant more to Jaz than the food and the room. He took her to Sally Mae at the diner, but the woman had just hired someone. Sally Mae called a friend who called another friend and, after a bit, she asked if Jaz would be interested in a job at a bar.
Sam broke out a big grin. “Heck yeah. She’s worked in a bar.”
Jaz hadn’t had a break since being on the run. Everything had landed her deeper in trouble at every turn, but yesterday she’d felt karma smiling on her for helping George.
That’s how she ended up working at Clarenceville’s only watering hole where the female bartender had gone missing.
While walking to work this morning, she picked up two wolf-shifter scents at least a week old. When she’d stepping into the rustic building, she found the same two wolf shifter scents.
That reinforced her belief the missing bartender had been captured. Why else would two wolves come to this little town?
When she’d caught the smell of a female shifter, possibly fox, upon coming with Sam yesterday, she would have agreed to anything to work here.
But she’d almost been turned away.
Sam had given her a chance to clean up in a gas station bathroom, even producing a large Band-aid for her cheek when she stuck her head out with it bleeding. She’d used a claw to scratch her face. Then he’d brought her to meet the bar owner named Betty, but the woman said they’d didn’t need a waitress or bartender. They’d hired both in the past week.
After thanking the owner for her time, Jaz had been on her way out with Sam when Della, the new bartender, came out complaining that the bus boy hadn’t shown up again.
Betty grumbled, “That’s twice in two weeks.” She shouted at Jaz. “Janet, you want to bus tables?”
“Yes, ma’am. I’ll work lunch and dinner,” Jaz had confirmed and started right then. Her place over the barn had been just over three miles away. An easy walk. When she’d gotten home last night, she found food in the fridge and other things like soap and shampoo stocked. She’d find a way to come back to thank Sam and his wife if this worked out and she survived.
“Pick up table seven for me, will ya, Janet?” Thea, the new waitress, asked and smiled conspiratorially at her. She had a sweet accent, but not exactly southern. It reminded Jaz of someone she once met from Arkansas.
“Sure.” Jaz nodded. It had been Thea’s fox scent she’d scented yesterday. The young woman fit the criteria matching the other kidnapped female shifters. Attractive auburn hair, great body, perky personality, at least to the clientele, and a loner. She hid in a human town.
When Thea showed for the evening shift, she’d stopped short just inside the door.
Jaz smelled her, too, at the same time. She’d lifted her head and given a little head shake at Thea to let her know she wouldn’t bust her. Thea had huffed out a breath of relief, but she’d still smelled worried an hour later.
During the afternoon break, Jaz had a chance to talk to Thea away from human hearing. She’d made her position clear. “I’m not outing you, Thea, if you don’t out me. I need this job and to stay off the radar.”
Sounding thrilled, Thea replied, “Thank goodness. I’ve been on my own for a bit and it’s hard. I’m not busting anyone in the same boat as me. Got a fox alpha-hole back home who wants me for his mate. I’ve managed to stay out of his reach for seven months. Once I find a mate who can take me far from here, I’ll be free forever.”
Jaz had her doubts when a woman used that criteria for choosing a mate, but she stayed out of other people’s business when it didn’t involve her.
Picking up her bus tub, Jaz headed to table seven in the corner where she took her time. She’d slowed to inhale the old shifter scents from this spot. When she left the bar last night, she’d doubled back after everyone had departed for home and shifted to turn Tarski loose.
Her wolf found a place beyond the farthest spot in the parking lot, in a dark area, where that same female mountain-lion shifter had struggled with the other two wolf shifters.
When Jaz had stepped outside for fresh air earlier today, she picked up a fresh scent from one of the wolf shifters.
Had he come back to scout for another female?
The timing seemed too hard to overlook that he’d come by right after Thea had started working for the bar. Or maybe he’d been snooping around and caught Jaz’s scent.
She smiled. Tarski would make short work of one wolf shifter.
In addition to that, another woman who cooked here had gone missing three months ago. That might have been the older scent of coyote shifter, but when a customer asked what happened to Fanny, the cook, the owner ranted, “You’d think after six months you could depend on someone. Fanny took off in the middle of the night, then sends me a letter apologizing. Some shit about deciding to go back to her ex-husband. Like I care?”
Could be true for all Jaz knew. Cook might have been human.
Jaz finished cleaning the table and hoisted the tub, but not too easily to give away her shifter strength.
Were those missing women imprisoned with Daisy?
A group of three men wearing flannel and denim shirts walked in. They circled a table she’d just cleared and took seats.
All human, so no worries there.
She couldn’t stay here more than two days. Three would be stretching it. SCIS had a price on her head and, if they didn’t catch her, Kaiser’s dad would not let his son’s death stand.
Someone could live nicely for a while on her bounty price.
To stay in this town longer put her in jeopardy of being recognized. The bandage she wore on her face to cover most of the scar would only work so long.
She unloaded the bus tub in the dishwashing area and wrinkled her nose at the garbage getting full of food scraps.
Thea walked in with a handful of dishes she’d pre-bussed and dropped them down. She grumbled, “Hate that smell.”
Jaz whispered, “Breathe through your mouth. They don’t notice it the way we do.”
Nodding, Thea said, “I know. I don’t plan to do this forever. I can handle it for now. Hope Susie gets in soon.”
“Who’s that?”
Thea frowned at her. “The second waitress. Lumber yard pays every other Friday. Today’s the day. I can’t handle this place alone when it’s full.”
“No one told me there were two,” Jaz muttered.
At that, Thea’s eyebrows crawled up her forehead. “And they would do that, why? You’re a bus boy ... uhm, bus girl. You’re not exactly in the management loop.”
Ignoring Thea’s attitude, Jaz said, “No, but from what I’ve heard snippets of since coming on, it sounds like women leave this place in the middle of the night. You hear about any?” With Jaz’s sharp hearing, she’d caught the bartender complaining about no one having work ethics anymore.
When the last bartender disappeared, Betty received a scratchy voice mail from a woman identifying herself as that bartender and thanking them for the job. She said she’d discovered she was pregnant and needed to figure out what to do.
To the humans here, that probably sounded reasonable.
Thea gripped a plate that cracked. “Shit.” She tossed it in with the other dishes. “No, I don’t know about anyone else, because I keep my nose to myself. You should, too.”
While they still had a moment alone, Jaz pushed, “But I smell other shifters who have been here. Doesn’t that concern you?”
“What concerns me is some nosy ass bitch threatening to expose me. Cut. It. Out.” Thea spun and strode away.
Jaz bit down to keep from replying to that putdown. She’d been snubbed from childhood on. Thea would have to work harder to hurt Jaz the way others had done it so skillfully.
Speaking in Jaz’s mind, Tarski offered, You should explain why we are here. It wo
uld save time. We could finish sooner and leave.
No, Jaz said, shutting down that idea. The whole point is to do this while not exposing our identity.
I do not foresee success with that plan. The fox shifter is not to be trusted, Tarski countered. You won’t make her an ally.
Thanks for the vote of confidence, Jaz snapped silently.
What vote? Tarski smarted off.
Argh. Never mind. Jaz followed Thea out, but pulled off next to the bar to pick up a load of dirty glasses.
A low rumble of voices filled the air as more people showed up after five o’clock to unwind at the end of the week.
Tarski didn’t like the noise or the smells.
Jaz would be ready to leave, too, once she found a lead on the male shifters who had visited this place multiple times. Those shifters had to be comfortable with the fact no one hunted the women for them to return so soon.
Thea could be a target.
She’d be more of one than Jaz once the wolf shifters took a look at both of them. Thea turned heads any time she walked through the bar where Jaz had a damaged face, clean but messy blonde hair, and baggy clothes meant for a man, which hid her shape.
None of this would have happened if she hadn’t decided to find Kaiser and maybe bring him to meet his mother. For years, Jaz had envisioned Kaiser as a sibling suffering from abandonment as she had, and still did.
Her plan had been so simple. Find Kaiser and take him to meet his mother.
Their mother. Her mother would be so excited, she’d finally admit she loved Jaz as much as the child she’d left behind.
Maybe she’d stop blaming Jaz for costing her Kaiser.
That fantasy crashed and burned with Kaiser’s death.
She’d bought Daisy time to escape while Jaz’s wolf stood over Kaiser’s animal as it bled out ... with Tanza as a witness.
Part of her wished she’d never left Kodiak.
We saved Daisy, Tarski argued.
Jaz replied, While you’re technically correct, it means nothing when Daisy probably ended up captured by the Blood King. Jaz had a gut instinct that Kaiser had been kidnapping female shifters for the Blood King. On her trip south from Alaska, she’d collected intel pinpointing the wolf king’s territory when she heard more than once that he had a place somewhere in North Carolina. His tentacles spread across the entire southeastern region and she had intended to avoid him at all costs.
She had to hunt for him now.
On her two-month trip on foot from Kodiak, Alaska to North Carolina, some of the shifters she met swore he was only a myth. Others claimed he turned into a real wolf shifter and ruled a dangerous wolf pack.
Or had a wolf shifter just decided to take that moniker?
Jaz had never believed the Blood King to be some all-powerful ruler. She figured the only way her mother could accept what she’d endured in captivity down here had been by claiming a mythological being had held her prisoner.
When right before he shifted, Kaiser had mouthed off at Jaz about screwing with the Blood King if she touched him, she realized she had to give some credence to her mother’s claim.
That was another reason Jaz had not wanted to kill Kaiser.
He could have led her to the Blood King to find other female shifters that had gone missing from his pack.
Now she had to hunt for a powerful wolf shifter, who her mother said warned all his people if they ever spoke his name he’d find them and eat their hearts while the organs still beat.
Her choices had been nonexistent.
She either ran or tried to convince Tanza the brother her father adored had been abusing Daisy while attempting to kidnap her for a mythological Blood King.
Laughable, if not so serious. Jaz needed Daisy to clear her name just as much as Daisy probably needed her right now.
Kaiser dead. Go home now. We were not sent for Daisy.
Her wolf could be so logical at times, but not overly sympathetic when it conflicted with logic.
We can’t do that, Tars, Jaz replied. Before her wolf asked why, she explained, No matter how many precautions I take to hide our trail, we’d end up leading killers to our Kodiak family.
They would fight with us.
She was tired of killing and death. It might be part of a shifter’s world, but once a Kodiak healer helped Jaz climb out of a dark place that had held her prisoner for too long, she decided to use her energy to heal.
Every death slashed a wound in her soul.
She told her wolf, I will not leave until we have been cleared of murder. I won’t live my life on the run or constantly trying to convince others the kill was justified. I also can’t leave until we find Daisy and have her in a safe place.
Tarski pointed out, Woman could be dead.
I know that’s possible, Tars, but I need to know for sure.
Her wolf sighed. What now?
Jaz smiled at the flip side of her logical wolf, who would not beat a dead topic. She told Tarski, We will come back after the bar closes again tonight and see if the male shifter has returned. If so, we’ll have a fresh trail to follow.
I agree, Tarski confirmed.
Jaz smiled to herself, always thankful for an animal who joined forces with her when some people fought their other half.
Like Adrian.
Where was he? Why should she care? Adrian had some association with a law enforcement group and would be a distraction, a sexy one she had no time for.
But that didn’t stop her from wondering who watched his back if he lost touch with reality again as he had when they fought together.
The door to the bar opened and closed softly and snapped her mind back to the present with her next inhale.
Two men eased over to a table in the left corner where they sank into chairs.
No one paid them any mind.
Above the smell of beer, fried food, and perfume from a woman at the bar, she scented jackal shifters.
Before she turned to leave the dining area, both men lifted their heads at the same time and zeroed in on her.
Their gaze paused on Jaz, then continued to her right.
She followed the direction of their attention to find Thea laughing with the three human men in plaid shirts as she took their orders.
When Jaz turned back to the shifters, one had his phone at his ear, dark eyes still fixed on her.
Could those be after Thea?
What if they weren’t the bad guys?
What if they were with SCIS?
Chapter 4
Adrian stood in a wooded area in Western North Carolina not close to any sizeable city. Lenoir would be the next significant stop another seventeen miles north. He’d been following Jaz’s two-day-old scent to this point where it merged with the scent of two wolf shifters and two humans.
Twilight gave everything a shadowy look at seven in the evening. He couldn’t believe it was Friday night. He’d thought for sure he’d have found her twenty four hours ago.
He’d tracked her from the last point he knew with certainty she’d been in Roanoke, Virginia, then nothing.
It was as if she’d flown away.
Then he got a break from a Gallize resource and her vanishing made sense. His contact had scoured the traffic cams for the six-hour period Adrian had estimated prior to her escaping the city.
At one point, the video showed a school bus converted to a personal camper with a luggage deck on top. The bus had been parked next to a one-story building at a fuel stop in town during a downpour.
Adrian had played the video snippet multiple times, finally convinced a woman’s shape had moved like a shadow from the top of the one-story building to that deck. She’d flattened her body as rain pounded her and the bus drove away.
From the tag number, they got the driver’s name and where he used his credit card for fuel.
With new information in hand, Adrian checked the next fuel stop where he picked up her scent when she’d abandoned the bus and followed it to these woods in the m
iddle of nowhere.
Was she headed to Blowing Rock?
He couldn’t figure out what happened with the two wolf shifters he scented, but they’d both bled and someone had fired multiple rounds. No smell of titanium rounds, which meant the humans hadn’t known the wolves were shifters.
What about Jaz? Had they shot her?
His gut clenched at that possibility.
His head throbbed.
One wolf, a shifter in animal form, had turned away from the spot where Adrian found human scents. That wolf had bled badly. With the heavy wolf scent surrounding the injured human, he’d bet the animal attacked a hunter.
He inhaled, keeping his eyes shut so he could focus on each scent. Jaz’s scent had also been all over the injured human’s.
Had she been part of the attack on the humans?
No, Mad Red answered.
Adrian had asked his wolf to help with this and Mad Red had agreed, but that hadn’t meant he intended to do any more than not force a change when Adrian needed to stay in human form.
He replied telepathically to his wolf, What makes you think she did not join the attack?
Her scent stopped before attack. She waited.
Peace was a rare event for the two of them these days. Adrian remained calm. He asked, Was she hunting someone?
Mad Red took his time. Yes.
Instead of asking more, Adrian waited.
After a few minutes, his wolf said, Golden wolf sat at last spot for long time. No scent of predator from her. Inquisitive.
Even now, his wolf could still surprise him. How do you know that?
I know golden wolf, Mad Red snapped back. Our energy speaks.
Adrian sorted through that strange comment. His and Jaz’s energy had allowed their wolves to speak?
That didn’t prove Jaz hadn’t been in attack mode, though.
At the risk of losing this moment of communication, Adrian asked, Is the golden wolf bad?
While his wolf decided to answer, Adrian swallowed hard. He’d been waiting to find out if Jaz had a reason for what she did, but his wolf had been intuitive about so many adversaries throughout the years. His stomach churned, anticipating Mad Red’s assessment.