Thrown to the Wolves (Big Bad Wolf)

by Adhara, Charlie

  Simpson turned and walked away toward the counter. Cooper could easily take out his Taser now. Disarm the suspect, cuff him and wait here safely for Park to arrive with the warrant.

  But that wasn’t how the BSI did things, arrest first, investigate later. Not anymore, and that was a good thing. There was an order of due process to follow.

  Some pollen from a rare flower sold only in this shop had linked Simpson to the body of a man suspected of running a money-laundering scheme with an unknown partner. A partner who had torn his throat out rather than split the payday. A classic wolf kill. Simpson was a wolf. What’s more, a witness had placed Simpson’s car at the scene. That would have been more than enough to get him booked four months ago. Cooper’s last partner, Jefferson, would have Tasered and cuffed him before the bells above the door had stopped ringing.

  And that’s not all Jefferson would have done.

  Cooper swallowed the hot, acidic anger, guilt and shame that threatened to boil over and burn him alive there on the spot.

  Follow procedure. He, more than anyone, couldn’t step out of line. So far all Simpson was officially guilty of was acting a bit weird. He couldn’t be arrested for terrible customer service.

  Cooper straightened his jacket and didn’t take out his weapon. “Are you—Is everything okay?”

  Simpson was staring at some long-stemmed sunflowers and didn’t seem to hear Cooper’s question. He plucked a single yellow petal and rolled it between his fingertips. “I saw you,” Simpson said.

  “Sorry?”

  “Across the street. Watching. I know. I know who you are.” Cooper reached slowly for his badge, but Simpson continued, “He’s downstairs.”

  Cooper paused, then retracted his hand, leaving his badge in his pocket. “Who? Who’s downstairs, Mr. Simpson?”

  Simpson finally faced Cooper, who stumbled back in surprise. His face wasn’t a blank mask now. It was transformed with fury and pain. His irises were larger, the blue-gray bleeding out into the white as the wolf peeked through.

  “Don’t fuck with me!” he screamed, and shoved a display shelf of sprays proclaiming to keep flowers alive twice as long. The bottles rolled across the floor. “I know. I’ve known for weeks, and I can’t take it anymore, okay? So just take him and—”

  The discreet door behind the ferns opened and a short, burly, bald white man burst into the room. “Babe? I heard a crash. What’s—” He cut off and stared at Cooper, who stared back.

  Brian Fasser. The wolf who had come forward claiming to witness a silver sedan speeding away from the scene of the crime. Donny Simpson’s car. Simpson, who Fasser had claimed not to know. He’d lied.

  Cooper saw the exact moment Fasser realized he’d been recognized. Unfortunately, Cooper’s reflexes weren’t quite as fast. He was still reaching for his Taser when Fasser tackled him to the ground, pinning his arm between them.

  “Brian!” Simpson shouted somewhere beyond Fasser’s snarling teeth inches from Cooper’s face. “What the hell are you doing?” And then, “Brian?” he repeated, sounding appalled as Fasser lifted his right hand and extended his claws, four-inches long, sharp as razors and strong as steel.

  “Go lock the door, Donny,” Fasser said.

  “What? No! Who is this?”

  Fasser’s canines elongated and his eyes flicked back toward Simpson. “Just go lock the fucking do—”

  Cooper slammed his head up into Fasser, feeling the sick give of his nose. Fasser bellowed, reaching instinctively for his face, and released Cooper, who bucked him off and scrambled to the side on his belly.

  Fasser lunged after him, landing on Cooper’s legs while his claws tore through the side of Cooper’s jacket, snagging temporarily in the fabric. Cooper grabbed one of the fallen pesticide bottles and swung it in the direction of Fasser’s broken nose.

  Fasser let out a screech, inhuman and wet. His weight disappeared from Cooper’s legs. Cooper rolled to his back, pulled out his Taser and aimed at Fasser, who was struggling up to his knees while protectively covering his bloody, disjointed nose.

  “Hands above your head!” Cooper said. “Weapons away!”

  Fasser slowly put his hands up. His claws retracted, though his eyes were still all brown, no white, and shimmered a bit in the dim light of the shop.

  Simpson, standing in place in shock, seemed to rouse himself and stumbled forward as if to stand between Cooper and Fasser.

  “Sir, I need you to stay where you are,” Cooper said without looking away from Fasser, whose eyes narrowed. Cooper could practically see him smell an opportunity. He didn’t doubt Fasser would sacrifice Simpson if it provided the distraction he needed to escape. Whatever other issues Park and he had, these two made them look like relationship goals.

  “Who are you? Why are you doing this to us?” Simpson choked out.

  Cooper tried to keep his voice calm and soothing. Just because Simpson was too shocked to be threatening now didn’t mean he couldn’t rip Cooper apart the minute Cooper tried to take out Fasser. He was a wolf, too. Stronger, faster and deadlier than Cooper on his best day. And this, quite clearly, was not turning out to be his best day. “My name is Special Agent Dayton and I’m with the BSI.” He ignored Simpson’s sharp gasp. “I don’t want to hurt you, Mr. Simpson, so I need you to back up against the far wall while I cuff Mr. Fasser here on suspicion of murder.”

  “No,” Simpson said confidently. “Brian would never—”

  “Brian killed a man and tried to set you up to take the fall.”

  “No,” Simpson repeated, and took another step forward. Out of the corner of his eye, Cooper saw Simpson’s claws extending slowly. “You’re lying.”

  “Think about it, Mr. Simpson. How do you think I got here? How do you think Brian recognized me? He’s been using your store to launder money, not caring that it could be traced back to you. He ripped out his business partner’s throat and then claimed to see your car leaving the crime.”

  “Don’t listen to him, babe. The BSI just wants any excuse to round us all up and put us down.”

  “Shut up, Fasser,” Cooper said. “Mr. Simpson, you know I’m telling the truth. You suspected Brian was lying about something, didn’t you? But you thought he was cheating on you, right? That’s why you were so suspicious of me before? Well, this is what he was hiding. Why else would he have attacked me just now? Just let me cuff him and we can figure it all out.”

  “No,” Simpson repeated, though he sounded less sure now. Still, he took another step forward, effectively blocking Fasser.

  Cooper tried to shift quickly, still on the floor, but almost too fast for his eyes to see, Fasser slammed his hands into the back of Simpson’s knees and his claws shot out, slicing through jeans and into skin. He then sprang to his feet in one fluid motion, too smooth to be human. Simpson howled and toppled over toward Cooper, who rolled out of the way just in time.

  He fired his Taser at the now-standing Fasser from below. Fasser was back on the ground without a sound, unmoving and unconscious. A blessing, in Cooper’s opinion, considering the Taser prongs stuck to his groin. Cooper hurriedly cuffed Fasser’s hands behind his back while he could.

  “Brian!” Simpson yelled, and scrambled toward his boyfriend.

  “He’s fine. He’s just unconsciou—” Cooper began, putting a hand to Simpson’s shoulder, and was promptly knocked onto his back with Simpson sitting on his chest, teeth fully extended and irises dilated to a full luminous blue.

  Idiot, your boyfriend set you up. Twice, Cooper wanted to say, but with Simpson’s claws pricking at his shoulders, through his jacket, he decided calling the guy an idiot was not his best bet.

  “Donny, don’t do this. It’s over. You don’t have to go down with him.”

  Simpson took a deep breath somewhere between a snarl and a sob. “Why did he drag me into this? Why couldn’t he just talk to me? Why coul
dn’t he just tell me he didn’t love me anymore?”

  “I don’t know,” Cooper said softly. Simpson’s hands relaxed their grip until they were just resting against Cooper’s chest.

  “Did he really hate me that much?” Simpson’s voice cracked like it was too thick with tears, snot and hurt to fit in his throat.

  Cooper shook his head, reaching slowly for Simpson’s wrists. “I don’t—”

  There was a flash of movement to Cooper’s right, and then Simpson disappeared with a sharp whimper, knocked off his chest by a blur too fast to be anything but another wolf. Cooper scrambled for his gun and turned to see Simpson pinned to the floor with a man kneeling on his back, ass waving in the air and cuffing Simpson’s hands.

  Cooper left his gun holstered and flopped back on the floor with a sigh. He knew that ass. Knew it very well, indeed.

  “Cutting it a bit close,” Cooper said.

  He heard a huff. “Our Bat signals must have gotten crossed. I could have sworn we said we’d meet outside.”

  Park loomed into Cooper’s field of vision. Despite his light tone, Park’s face was not amused. His eyes were lighter than usual, a golden brown near-glowing themselves, and the corners were tense and wrinkled. He looked older than when they’d first met, Cooper realized, and far more tired. Perhaps that was what happened after four months of being partnered with Cooper did to a person. Or perhaps that was what happened after four months of...whatever their personal relationship was.

  “I know there’s a lot of green stuff in here, so it can get confusing, but this is actually inside.” Park held his hand out. Cooper grasped it and was pulled to standing. “You’re bleeding.” Park frowned, reaching tentatively toward Cooper’s face.

  “No, I’m not,” Cooper protested, and ran an exploratory hand over his face. Nothing hurt, but when he examined his hand, sure enough, there were smears of blood there. “Fasser must have snorted on me. Charming.”

  “Who?”

  Cooper gestured toward Fasser, just beginning to shake off the effects of the Taser. “Our killer, I think. He was going to blame poor Donny, his boyfriend, for everything.”

  Park didn’t even bother looking over at Fasser. Just raised an eyebrow and pulled Cooper toward him so he could inhale the side of his neck, something he seemed to do whenever he didn’t believe Cooper wasn’t injured. “Poor Donny? When I walked in, he was on top of you.”

  “He was just talking.”

  “On top of you?”

  “Like you can judge.” Cooper caught a hint of smile against his throat.

  “With his teeth out?” Park murmured.

  “I tend to have that effect on people.”

  Park stiffened and pulled away enough for Cooper to see his frown. “You really do. Which is why you should have waited for me.”

  “They were closing early. If I had waited, we might not have made the Fasser connection in time.”

  “You should have—”

  Cooper pulled out of Park’s grasp, putting some space between them. “I had it under control, Agent Park.”

  Park opened and shut his mouth, biting off whatever he planned to say. He looked away from Cooper. “Fine. Are you calling it in or am I?”

  Cooper didn’t have many fans in the bureau. He’d lost a lot of credibility after his last partner had taken a one-way trip to maximum security. Today, with two injured wolves on the scene, plenty of people would expect Cooper to try to keep his name away from a potential clusterfuck like this. Park was giving him that choice. Offering to take care of him. Which was exactly why he couldn’t take it.

  “I got this,” Cooper said. He turned away so he didn’t have to see Park’s expression of doubt.

  Don’t miss

  The Wolf at Bay by Charlie Adhara,

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  Copyright © 2018 by Charlie Adhara

  Acknowledgments

  Thank you to the whole Carina team for the opportunity to share these characters with others and to Mackenzie Walton for making sure they were the best they could be. Thank you to my family for believing I could and, more importantly, for being there when I couldn’t.

  Also available from Charlie Adhara

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  The Wolf at the Door

  The Wolf at Bay

  About the Author

  Charlie Adhara has always loved a good story and, on occasion, a bad one. After getting her degree in neuroscience, Charlie decided she’d much rather study the heart. She now writes contemporary, mystery, paranormal, queer romance. Or some assortment of that. Whatever the genre, her stories feature imperfect people stumbling around, tripping over trouble and falling in love.

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  ISBN-13: 9781488089381

  Thrown to the Wolves

  Copyright © 2019 by Charlie Adhara

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