by Celia Kyle
Declan soon followed and paused at her side, speaking low. “Grant said we’re clear straight to the rendezvous. He’ll meet us there.”
“Is there a medic for Cole?” Neither side of her could stand seeing the badass tiger hurting.
“Yeah. Got agents waiting.” Declan nodded. “Teams Three and Seven are backing us up. Let’s move.”
She usually wasn’t one to listen to orders, but she’d do whatever it took to remain at Cole’s side. She wasn’t going to examine why the need to stick with him was so strong that the idea of leaving him nearly tore her in two.
Exhaustion pulled at her, the unfamiliar half shift draining both halves of her. As soon as she had clothes, she’d push the cat back and reclaim her human skin. Because she sure as hell wasn’t running naked through the forest.
Declan and Pike fisted Cole’s fur, propping the large cat up between them. Cole’s feet dragged, but he continued to move, his shuffling steps a harsh contrast to the strong male she knew.
The sounds of fighting surrounded them, but the battles were far off, away from their group, just as Declan had promised. Which meant it didn’t take long to reach the crowded beach. Men—shifters—in black formed a protective line across the sand, guns in hand and fangs on display. They were ready to shoot or fight their way across the private island.
They shuffled past the row of barely restrained violence and headed toward the beach. A man came out of the shadows, jogging their way, his stride loose. The glow of the moon illuminated him, revealing that Birch drew nearer.
The moment he was within shouting distance, he issued orders. “You three”—he pointed at Pike, Declan, and Cole—“are in the CRRC with Ethan. I got a medic from Seven with you. Push off as soon as you’re loaded.”
Stella took a step forward to follow, cat unwilling to let Cole out of her sight. But a touch on her arm had her swinging her attention back to Birch. “You need to either go human or go cat, Stella.”
She tilted her head, eyebrows furrowed. She didn’t understand what he was talking about until he gestured at her body. Right. She was still half shifted after helping Cole. “Do you have something I can wrap around…?”
Birch reached back and whipped his T-shirt off, handing it over. “Just make sure you shower before you visit Cole. That tiger can be a possessive sonofabitch.”
She tugged on the thin black shirt, fighting to ignore Birch’s smoky scent. Her cat hissed its objection, hating that they now smelled like the grizzly bear shifter. Well, it was better than strutting around butt-ass naked in front of a bunch of total strangers. The jaguar hissed once again, hating that Stella actually made sense, and then retreated. Fur receded fully, claws slipped back into her flesh, and teeth were blunted once more. Her face returned to its heart shape, no hint of feline jaws in sight. Back in her human skin, she rolled her shoulders and cracked her neck, shrugging and stretching as hairless flesh settled into place.
“Good,” Birch grunted. “Let’s go. You’re with me and Grant. He’s tying down his equipment, and then our CRRC will be ready to move out.” He turned away from her and strode across the sand, not even glancing back to see if she followed. Hell yeah she was following. She wanted to watch out for Cole and get the hell off the island filled with crazies.
“CRRC?” she called out to the SHOC team alpha.
“Combat Rubber Raiding Craft,” he yelled back, but didn’t glance her way. Just kept walking toward a small boat.
Birch jogged a handful of steps and joined Grant in shoving a black boat into the water. One that held Cole. Stella kept her eyes trained on the boat as it disappeared into the night, the lack of running lights making it difficult to see.
Birch looked to Grant. “We’re taking her on ours. Move your ass.”
Once more the grizzly left, now leaving her in Grant’s capable-ish hands. She had her doubts after hearing some of Cole’s stories. He was a jokester, lighthearted, the funny guy. Would he take this situation seriously?
“This way, Stella.” Grant held out his hand, palm-up, waiting for her. “The quicker we load, the quicker we get to Cole.”
All hesitation fled, and she placed her hand in his, using his hold to steady herself on the uneven ground. They tromped through the sand, soft granules giving way to damp, compact ground. The wet sand sent a chill racing through her, and the wind whipped and tore at her shirt, threatening to fly high and expose her.
Grant paused beside a black boat much like the one Cole had been in. “In you go. Hold on to me. Don’t fall.”
The moment a person tells another not to fall, they want to fall. The only thing that saved her was Grant’s sure grip. Well, he saved her from getting hurt, but not from flashing everyone behind her.
“Lovely view. Is this Cole’s weekend entertainment? Is there a reason she’s here?” The sickly masculine voice rolled through her, and Stella shuddered. If mildew and rot had combined, their voice would sound exactly like that man’s.
She tugged her shirt down to cover her pink bits and turned around once she had her balance. When she did, she discovered two things: a black-haired, dark-eyed stranger dressed much like Birch stood nearby, and that stranger’s hand was wrapped around the arm of a restrained James Walters.
Chapter Twenty-five
Stella didn’t think Grant would let her tear James to shreds, but that didn’t stop the craving for blood. He stood not ten feet from her, his roughed-up body bleeding, while bruises coated his skin in swaths of purple and blue. The stranger holding him captive didn’t matter to her—just another SHOC agent—but James was a prize.
“Hartley,” Grant murmured, climbing into the boat and moving until he’d positioned himself between Stella and the other guy. “What do you want?”
“Transport to the primary com center. Warn them I’ve got Walters and I need a room. The director wants me to begin interrogations as soon as we board.” Hartley seemed way too excited about the prospect of interrogating someone.
“Sure.” Grant reached back, and Stella grabbed his hand, allowing him to lead her to a different seat. He dropped his voice when he next spoke. “That’s the team alpha for Three. He’s a twisted sonofabitch and the director’s brother. Sit here. Don’t look at him. Don’t say a word.”
She risked a glance at Grant, and what she saw there made her breath catch. His words hadn’t been a request, but an order. A flat-out life-and-death order. There was so much meaning in his gaze, a warning and a plea in one. And Stella would listen to him. She’d glanced at Hartley only once, hardly meeting his eyes, but that’d been enough. Enough for her to never want to repeat the process. Something dark lurked inside him, something feral and wicked.
Evil.
But maybe that was because he was part of SHOC? Cole had told her that the men of Shifter Operations Command did bad things for all the right reasons. All that darkness had to weigh on a soul. Even if what they were doing was honorable, it still had to tear at their psyche, right?
The boat rocked as Hartley stepped aboard, James tripping after him. The human caught himself on his bound hands, but only just. His face still struck one of the bench seats, a new bruise forming with the others.
Hartley hissed and yanked on James, pulling until the human sat upright beside him. That hiss…She couldn’t smell the other agent, but instinct told her he was a snake shifter.
She flicked her attention to Hartley’s face for a split second, cataloging his features once again. Yeah, danger clung to him, covering him in an invisible blanket of darkness.
James swayed in his seat, wavering back and forth, as though he was woozy and unable to sit upright by himself.
“Hartley.” Birch snapped out the agent’s name as he emerged from the night.
“Birch.” The director’s oily lips pulled back to form a wide smile. Somehow it managed to look more like a threat than an expression of happiness. “It seems”—Hartley released James, and the human slumped forward, a string of drool escaping his lips—“I mana
ged to do what you could not.” He gestured at the human. “I have James Walters secured. You have an injured agent and wasted SHOC resources. My team had to come in here and save your asses.”
Birch clenched his jaw and fisted his hands, knuckles turning white. That was one pissed-off grizzly.
“Save us? Or are you here to make sure we failed, Hartley?” Grant’s voice was smooth, with no hint of accusation, though his words told a different story.
Hartley’s stare slithered over her to land on the werewolf. “You got something to say, Grant?”
Birch stepped forward. “Maybe your big brother didn’t share this with you, but our mission objectives stretched beyond the apprehension of James Walters.” Birch’s eyes went full black, no hint of white surrounding his irises.
Stella watched Hartley out of the corner of her eye, tracing the path of his blood as he flushed red. Anger was carved into his face, and his grip tightened on James.
Before the snake shifter could say anything, Birch leaned to the side to speak to Grant. “Get us moving.”
With those three words, Birch bent and placed his hands on the bow. He shoved and roared at the same time, voicing his anger while he got them fully in the water. He soon leapt over the side and joined Stella, Grant, Hartley, and James Walters.
The engine rumbled and transformed into a roar, Grant sending them bouncing over the waves and farther from the shore. The echo of gunshots and screams chased them, the fight still ongoing back on Serene Isle. Though it wasn’t so serene any longer, was it?
Worry churned in her gut, the constant ache and edge of panic about Cole that just wouldn’t be brushed aside. But they were headed to him. They followed Ethan’s path and soon she’d be with Cole. She could hold his hand and know that he was still breathing. She refused to examine why that seemed so important to her and her cat.
She split her attention between the human she hated more than anything and the sea beyond their boat. Though with James so close, he stole a little more of her focus.
Another string of drool dripped to soak his pants, and she noticed that his lips were moving as if he spoke. Too bad the boat was too loud for her to hear him. She hoped he was begging for his life or admitting all of his sins. Or maybe praying.
She stared at Walters, eyes focused while she sought to read his lips.
“…he…no warning.”
“…relationship not working…”
“…good money…heads up.”
“…call bullshit.”
The wind buffeted them, the boat jerking sideways for a moment before Grant straightened them out once more. She snatched a safety handle and used it to regain her seat, but when she tried to read James’s lips once more she found him slumped over, face hidden. She darted a look at Hartley and met his dark stare. Goose bumps rose on her arms, and more than a hint of fear filled her veins. This shifter—this snake—scared the hell out of her. Scared the hell out of both halves of her—human and jaguar alike.
Lights in the distance caught her attention, an expanse of glowing dots along the profile of a yacht. They drew closer with each passing second, the boat’s engine straining to push them onward toward the finish line. Cole had to have arrived by then. He was probably already undergoing treatment.
It wasn’t much longer before they bumped up against the yacht. Two agents on the launch grabbed the bow and slid them beneath the yacht itself to hide them from view.
Birch grabbed Walters, hauling him from the small boat before Hartley even moved a muscle. Then the director’s brother disembarked, straightening his T-shirt and brushing lint off of his camouflage pants once his boots were on the stable surface. While everyone else who’d been on the island was covered in sweat, sand, and dirt, Hartley didn’t have a hair out of place.
How had he managed to do that while capturing Walters?
Hartley turned to face Stella and extended his hand as if to help her. She’d rather do anything but touch the snake. Thankfully Grant saved her.
“Aw, thanks so much for helping me, Hartley. ’Ppreciate it.” Grant grunted as he hefted a case and presented it to the other man, handle first. “These are my babies. Be careful with them.” He kissed the sandy case. “Be good, children.”
Stella bit her lip and closed her eyes, fighting the urge to laugh. It was just…Hartley looked at Grant as if he were a bug. No, even lower than a bug—slime. And Grant had a goofy yet totally serious expression on his face.
Hartley dropped his hand and spun in place, stomping across the launch area and following Birch, who was still dragging Walters along. When the snake reached Birch, there was a low hiss and a tug-of-war that Hartley eventually won, pulling James up the nearby steps while Birch followed in his wake.
And Stella…
“C’mon, kitty. Let’s find a place to put you.” Grant jumped onto the dock, and she used his extended hand to balance herself as she joined him. “There’s gotta be an empty bedroom somewhere.” The wolf smirked at her and waggled his eyebrows. “Unless you want to stay with me.”
“Um…”
Grant sighed and shook his head. “You don’t know what you’re missing. I could show you the moon! The stars! The kitchen!”
That brought a smile to her lips, and she couldn’t suppress her laughter. “You’re a dork.”
“I’m also hungry.” He rubbed his flat stomach, the cotton leaving nothing to the imagination. Like the others, Grant was all heavily carved muscle.
But not as sexy as Cole.
They tromped up a set of narrow, steep steps, traveling through a maze of hallways and past numerous SHOC agents. It was controlled chaos, the men and women of SHOC working together for a common goal—the safety of shifters.
Grant strode up to a metal desk, legs bolted to the deck, and knocked on the hard surface. “Yo, Meowses. Need a room.”
The man at the desk slowly lifted his head, amber eyes narrowed at Grant with the promise of pain. “It’s Moses.” The asshole was implied. Then she was the focus of that intent gaze. “You can do better than him. Hell, I’m gay and we could have a platonic marriage and that relationship would still be better than hooking up with him.”
“Obviously he’s a delicate flower,” Grant murmured not so quietly and then spoke to Moses again. “We’re not rooming together. She belongs to Cole. I’m just taking care of her until he gets off his ass.” He snorted. “I swear, you’d think he got shot or something.”
Then Grant winked, flashing her a small grin while they both suffered beneath Moses’s glare.
Finally, Moses dug in a drawer and tossed a key at Grant. “Room fourteen. Not far from the med bay.”
Grant didn’t even say thanks to the agent. He just took off down the hallway. Stella paused long enough to toss out a murmured “thanks” before rushing to catch up. They were back to the unending maze, dodging people while hunting for her room.
And then they’d arrived, a gold plaque with the number “fourteen” etched onto its surface. Grant quickly unlocked the door and pushed it open, glancing around the space before stepping back to let her in.
“There should be some clothes in the dresser. Probably big on you, but at least it’ll be better than Birch’s shirt. Shower, dress, and while you do that I’ll check on Cole. See if there’s any news on that front.”
She nodded, overjoyed that he was going to do what she couldn’t—demand answers. Stella was a nobody as far as most of these agents were concerned. She mattered to only one person—Cole. Though even that wasn’t guaranteed. There were so many emotions tied up in the weekend that it was hard to figure out which were real and which were fake.
“Thanks, Grant.” She laid her hand on his forearm and gave it a gentle squeeze. “I really appreciate what you did for him—us—this weekend. Thank you for taking care of me when it went sideways.”
Grant shrugged. “Part of the job.”
Her lips twitched, and she gently shook her head. “It wasn’t. Which is why I appreciate your help
even more.”
“Well—”
A siren screeched through the air, lights flashed, and an unknown voice came over the speakers. “Code Oscar. Time check engineering. Code Oscar. Time check engineering.”
“Fuck.” Grant cursed and pushed her into the room.
“Grant? What’s going on?”
“There’s a bomb in the engine room, and someone has gone overboard.”
Stella froze in place, staring at the werewolf. Then she was staring at a closed door. One that let out an audible snick a moment later.
Someone was overboard. There was a bomb on the yacht. And Stella was locked in her room.
Chapter Twenty-six
Grant
Grant stared at the small screen, the monitor showing Stella still sitting at Cole’s bedside. The high-definition camera and sensitive microphones picked up everything in that room—Cole’s every breath and Stella’s every sniffle.
She’d stayed strong through the evac from Serene Isle to the SHOC yacht. He hadn’t liked how Hartley had looked at her, but then other shit had taken precedence. She’d been only a little rattled when Grant had locked her in her stateroom. Of course, when he’d let her out, that’d been a different story.
No one knew how—the investigation was still underway—but James Walters had managed to plant a bomb in engineering and then launch himself over the side. He mentally snorted. Right. Of course. The guy who was half-concious, drooling, and barely able to speak was able to put together an explosive device and then jump into the sea and disappear.
He shook his head…Fucking Hartley.
When Grant had told Stella, it’d taken every ounce of smooth talking to keep her aboard the yacht. She’d wanted to chase after him. Even if that meant doing something stupid like shifting and diving into the sea to swim after the human. He’d redirected her intense concentration to Cole, her worry for the tiger pushing aside her need for vengeance.
