The Tiger’s Ambush

by Tate James

  My foster-father narrowed his eyes at me briefly, then pasted his fake smile back on. “Very well then. River, I trust you can make necessary room arrangements with housekeeping? Perhaps the twins can share so that Kit will have her own room.”

  Caleb snorted, then covered it with a cough when Jonathan speared him with a glare. “Gentlemen, let me remind you that I am still the Director of Omega, and despite me allowing you certain liberties when they pertain to my daughter, I will not tolerate insubordination. Is that perfectly clear?”

  A chorus of “Yes, sir” came from all four guys, and Jonathan nodded his approval.

  “Right then. Caleb, please show Kit where her classes will be held starting tomorrow morning; the instructors are waiting to meet her. Then report to my office.” Jonathan stayed seated, and it became pretty clear we’d just been dismissed.

  Shit. Looked like I was going to need more coffee until we could get back to the apartment and, um, recharge.

  “C’mon, Kitty Kat.” Caleb held out a hand to pull me up from the couch. “I’ll buy you a coffee on the way.”

  “So long as it’s not this vegetable flavored crap,” I muttered, placing the empty bottle of pumpkin spice latte down and taking his hand. The sooner we could get this meeting over and done with, the sooner we could get back. Maybe even work out what effects my magic might have had on Caleb and Wesley.

  Meeting with the Omega instructors was nothing short of painful. They all seemed to be making a less than subtle point that they didn’t care whose daughter I was and that I would have a lot of work to do to catch up. They made it sound like I’d missed months, not two weeks, but I did as was expected and nodded, smiled, and shook their hands politely.

  “See,” I whispered to Caleb as we walked out of another classroom. “I can be tactful when needed.”

  He snorted a laugh and slid a hand around my waist. “Sure you can, Kitty Kat. Let’s see how long that lasts, huh?”

  “I’m not that bad. I’m just irritable when I’m exhausted. Are we almost done? You promised me coffee, remember?” I pouted up at him in my very best sad-puppy face.

  “I did. We have one last stop to make, but I have a better idea than coffee.” He gave me a mischievous wink, then looked around to make sure no one was watching before steering me through an unmarked door.

  “Cal... what are we doing in a janitor’s closet?” I raised an eyebrow at him as he closed the door behind us and flicked a light on.

  “Kitty Kat, you’re exhausted, and we both know it’s from low magic, not lack of sleep. Coffee is not going to fix it, and this next instructor is known for his chatter. Will you let me help you? If I can, that is...” He ducked my gaze and inspected his shoes in a rare display of shyness.

  “What do you mean, if you can?” My brain never did work particularly well when I was tired, so I was missing the point.

  “Well, your dianoch are a choice, not fate. I don’t want to assume that you’ve chosen me or even if you’ve chosen at all. You know?” He shrugged his broad shoulders but still dodged my eye contact.

  “Oh my God, Caleb King...” I cupped his cheek in my palm and brought his face back up to meet my gaze. “You’re freaking adorable.”

  Pulling him closer, I caught the small smile on his lips right before they met mine in a searing hot kiss. My hands wrapped around his neck while his circled my waist, his body pushing me back until I was pressed into the door. His mouth slanted over mine in a possessive kiss, his tongue slipping between my lips and meeting mine while little lightning bolts of excitement shot through me.

  Are we seriously doing this in the janitor’s closet at what was turning out to be my new school?

  Obviously. It wasn’t school. But it was Spy School, and the whole layout of the classes, campus, and teachers—sorry, instructors—made it very much seem like school. Which made what I was doing with Caleb all that much hotter.

  “How far does this need to go?” Caleb asked, a little short of breath as his hand slipped under the fabric of my T-shirt and caressed my waist.

  “Um, usually just depends on how much magic needs replacing? But... this is sort of the first time I’ve known that is what’s happening so... I don’t know.” I shrugged. “Why? How far did you want to go?”

  Caleb pulled back from me an inch or so and cocked a brow. “Seriously, Kitty Kat?”

  A smile crept across my face at his expression, and he ducked forward to kiss me once more. Hard. He pulled back and peered at me in the dim light.

  “Okay, Instructor Green is still expecting us, so we need to be quick, but... Kitty you used a lot of magic. Judging by these bags under your eyes, you didn’t get far with Wes before you got interrupted, huh?” He stroked a gentle thumb under my eye, and I nodded. “So we’d better be quick? But... thorough.”

  “Sounds perfect,” I grinned and met him halfway as he leaned back in to kiss me again. This time, it was with a little more urgency, given our time constraints.

  The need to rush was actually making me all the more excited, and my breath was coming in short gasps as we quickly stripped each other of our clothes. One of the guys had left a bag of clothes in the bedroom for me, so I’d been able to dress in fresh clothes before speaking to Jonathan, but they were just standard issue Omega sweats, and took no effort at all to remove.

  “Fucking Christ, Kitty Kat,” Caleb whispered, running his hands down my body, cupping my breasts and rolling my nipples between his fingers before continuing on. Over my belly then circling my waist, the feeling of his rough palms on my skin made me want to moan, or purr, or something.

  “Don’t tease, Cal,” I replied, giving him a taste of his own medicine by trailing my nails slowly down the muscles of his broad back. “Quick but thorough, right?”

  “Who am I to argue?” he gasped as I circled one hand around to his front and grasped a hold of his rock hard shaft. “What was that about teasing, Kitty?”

  I grinned and shifted my grip back to his shoulders. No words were necessary as he slid his palms under my butt, lifting me and slamming my back against the door at the same time as he slammed his cock home into me.

  “Oh, fuck,” I groaned, the stinging pain of his abrupt entry fading into an almost overwhelming pleasure as he pumped into me a couple of times, only pulling back the slightest fraction before crashing back in.

  “Kitty...” he panted as my mouth found his neck. “Babe, you feel... incredible. Like you were made for me. Us. Fuck, why is the idea of sharing you such a goddamn turn on?”

  “I blame the magic,” I joked, kissing up the side of his neck while he thrust long, hard strokes into my aching pussy.

  “That’s so not it, but I’ll take it.” He snickered, tilting his head down to grab my lips once more in a scalding kiss. With my legs crossed behind him, I tried to pull him closer with every thrust, even though he had total control over our pace.

  Fuck meeting teachers; this is a way better use of time.

  “Gotta be quick right?” Caleb murmured in my ear as he broke from our kiss, then gently tugged my earlobe with his teeth.

  “I guess,” I gasped, rolling in waves on waves of pleasure as he nailed me against the door with his solid frame.

  “Remember that time when we were escaping Blood Moon?” he whispered into my ear, and I frowned, confused why he’d be asking about our past brushes with death at a time like this. “And we hid in a janitor’s closet, just like this?” Okay, I possibly see where this is going... “You were pressed in between me and Austin?”

  Oh fuck. Yes, I damn well did remember that moment. Vividly. Not only had the twins just saved my ass in a big way, Caleb had made some joke about a Kit sandwich. Before I could stop it, my orgasm crashed over me, and my sheath clenched Caleb’s cock hard while I came, coaxing him over the cliff with me until we both ended up limp and panting. The only things holding me up were Caleb’s still-pulsing dick inside me and his hips pinning my body to the door.

  “I knew it,” Caleb whi
spered, giving me a small smile of victory. “You’re into him, too.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I lied, slowly peeling my legs from around his waist and finding my feet. Of course I knew what he was talking about. I’d just come hard picturing myself sandwiched between the King twins. Naked.

  “Sure, Kitty Kat.” Caleb almost reluctantly stepped back from me and looked around the small closet. “Here,” he grabbed a roll of toilet tissue from one of the shelves and handed it to me.

  “Thanks.” I laughed, taking the paper and doing a speedy cleanup before pulling my clothes back on.

  “Feeling better?” he asked, running a hand through his messy top section of hair, and I bit back a sarcastic response. My natural reaction was to poke fun at him for being a cocky male, but in this case it really had been to make me feel better. And I did. Unbelievably so.

  “Thank you,” I told him sincerely, leaning up to kiss him softly.

  “Anytime, Kitty Kat.” He grinned, opening the door for me and winking. “And I do mean any time.”

  Biting my lip to hide the giddy, lovestruck smile, I linked my fingers with his and let him lead me down the hall to our next meeting. My skin was buzzing with fresh energy, and I felt like I could climb a mountain, wrestle a bear, or run a marathon.

  The world was my oyster when I had my guardians by my side.

  6

  Caleb needed to run an errand, so he left me at the lobby of the housing building. When I got back up to the apartment, our apartment, only Cole was there, sitting on the edge of the coffee table as he tied his sneakers.

  “Vixen.” He smiled as I came into the room, and I smiled back brightly. “You look considerably better. I take it you and Caleb found a spare moment on your tour of the training facility?”

  “We did...” I trailed off and bit my lip, not totally sure how okay the guys all were with our unusual relationship.

  “Lucky fucker,” Cole muttered, finishing tying his shoe, then he stood and grabbed me for a kiss. “This is going to take some getting used to, but we’re in. One hundred percent. Never doubt that, Vixen.”

  My eyes narrowed. “How did you just know what I was thinking? Oh fuck, do not tell me you can hear my thoughts or something now!”

  “As much as I’d kill for that ability…” He pondered for a moment. “No, I can’t. Yet. Ever since you healed me though, I’ve been able to kind of feel your emotions. Like right then, I could feel you were nervous.”

  “Ah, I see. So when the car crash happened, you could...” I trailed off as I thought this new development over.

  “Feel your pain?” he finished for me. “Yeah. I imagine Vali could too, which is why my phone has been blowing up all day.”

  “It has? How come you haven’t answered?” I pulled back from his embrace and scowled at him while he looked unapologetic.

  “Because he’s an asshole, and it’s going to take way more than a black eye to mend shit between us.” He grabbed his phone off the coffee table and tucked it in his pocket. “Come for a run with me, and you can call him back.”

  “Why not now?” I asked curiously, but he just shook his head.

  “Go change. There should be clothes for you in the closet through there.” He pointed back through to the bedroom I had woken up in with Wesley.

  “Fine, but can we call Lucy too? I just want to make sure she’s still safe. That Finn guy being one of her therapists cannot have been a coincidence.” I started to make my way to the bedroom, but Cole grabbed me by the hand and tugged me back to him for another kiss.

  “Of course we can. Now hurry up; I want to be back when the guys are.”

  I sighed and rolled my eyes, but once again I could feel that same dazed sort of smile on my face, like I was a loved up schoolgirl with her first boyfriend. Boyfriends. As if finding out I was a Ban Dia wasn’t confusing enough, now I had to remember to pluralize “boyfriend” in my own head.

  “Okay,” I huffed when Cole eventually stopped. “Why did we have to go so damn far before calling Vali back?”

  The Omega Headquarters was not technically in Seattle like the guys had said; it was on the outskirts, surrounded by some hundred and fifty acres of forest and fields. Definitely the perfect location for a spy facility and training ground.

  “Because we are at the headquarters of the leading private security firm in the world, Vixen. Surveillance tech to spy on our calls is a given.” He stretched out on the grass beneath a huge oak tree and looked up at me.

  “Private security, huh?” I teased. “That what we’re calling espionage these days? And why would being out here be any different? We’re still on Omega property and it’s a cellphone, so wouldn’t it still be tapped?”

  “This isn’t Get Smart, Vix. Our phones aren’t tapped. There is a system in place that allows Omega to listen in to any phone conversation within a certain radius, regardless of whose phone it is. That way we don’t have to go to the trouble of tapping every phone that enters the premise.” He yawned and folded his arms behind his head, causing his colorfully inked biceps to bulge.

  “You totally just said tapped, too,” I grumbled, “But I assume we’ve come this far to be outside the, um, field?” I was going to need to brush up on my spy terminology if this was my life now.

  “We have. Given my older brother’s profession, I thought maybe it wasn’t a good idea to have his calls recorded.” Cole scowled when I looked at him in surprise. “I’m not a total dickhead, Vixen. Just because Vali and I have our differences doesn’t mean I want to see him put in jail for our father’s crimes. I have it on good authority that he’s actually working to legalize all of the Balaur income streams.”

  “Balaur?” I repeated, and he grimaced.

  “It’s the name of Vali’s organization, which was founded by our grandfather back in Romania and brought to America by our father when we were just kids. It means “dragon” in Romanian. The dragon was always on our family crest, and when we were little our grandmother used to tell us tales of how our family was descended from dragons.” His lips quirked in a half smile. “Guess that doesn’t sound so crazy now.”

  “It sure doesn’t, but it is an awfully large coincidence, don’t you think?” I sat down under the tree and leaned my back against it, catching the phone that Cole tossed to me.

  “No such thing as coincidences. Make your call; he’s in the contacts under Dick. I’ll give you some privacy.” Cole pushed up off the ground in a stupidly impressive body roll and stalked off into the forest.

  Tapping the phone against my palm, I watched him walk away and thought about what he’d just said. He was absolutely right. Given everything going on, with the Blood Moon testing, the Ban Dia, the magical plague... there was no such thing as coincidences. So how did Jonathan and Omega Group play into it all?

  My thoughts were broken by the phone vibrating in my hand, showing an incoming call from Dick. I smiled at the stupid insult Cole had saved his brother under and answered the call.

  “Andrei, you little shit! Why haven’t you been answering your goddamn phone?” Vali’s polished, international accent clipped angrily. He had the type of accent that couldn’t be placed anywhere, which was probably a result of moving from Romania as a kid.

  “Well hello to you too, Dragomir,” I teased and was met with a long pause.

  “Dragă, you have no idea how relieved I am to hear your voice. I have called my dickhead brother some fifty times today, and he hasn’t picked up. What happened? Why were you in so much pain?” His voice came down the line in a rush of concern, and I was struck by how much he genuinely seemed to care.

  “I’m fine, Vali. It was nothing. Just a little incident with a truck hitting our car on the way from the airport.” That was easily one of the most ridiculous sentences I had ever said.

  “Was anyone else hurt?” Vali asked, in a quiet voice.

  “Caleb and Wes. I needed to heal them both, or they would have died. The driver did die.” I suppressed
a shudder. That poor man could have been any one of us.

  “Ah, that was the exhaustion I felt from you then. I am, of course, assuming this isn’t news to you? Cole must surely be having these same... side effects?” he asked tentatively, and I chuckled.

  “Side effects? Yeah, he mentioned it. You could have told me sooner, you know?” My tone was scolding, but I wasn’t all that mad. We hadn’t really had a huge amount of time to shoot the breeze over pizza and beer.

  “Yes, absolutely, I do apologize for that. So you’re all okay? Everyone is... whole?” he clarified, and I smiled again to myself.

  “Everyone is whole. Except River, who looks like he has a broken arm but hasn’t let me heal him yet.” I huffed a little at this. Damn stubborn man. I’d need to corner him when I got back to the apartment.

  “I’m not surprised.” Vali snorted, and in the background there was the muffled sound of voices. “Dragă, I do apologize, but I must go. Business calls.”

  “Oh, of course. Totally understandable,” I said, and there was another pause on his end.

  “Will you—” he started, then had to answer someone in the background in Romanian. “Would you maybe call me again when you get your own phone? I wish we had gotten you one before leaving Alaska.”

  My teeth caught the edge of my bottom lip, and I tried to hold back that damn goofy smile that kept appearing on my face all of a sudden. Our departure out of Harrow had been so quick that there had been no time to buy a phone for me, even if there had been somewhere to buy one, but I’d assumed Jonathan would have one for me.

  “Of course. Um, tomorrow night okay? I have to start classes with the recruits tomorrow.” I tried to sound upbeat about it, but I really wasn’t looking forward to being the new kid. At least I’d have one of the guys with me, though.

  “Tomorrow night is perfect. Please remember though, dragă. I almost got on a plane to that damn headquarters myself today when Andrei wouldn’t call me back.” He laughed as he said it, but I had no doubt he was telling the truth.