Turning Payne

by Chantel Seabrook

  Turner stiffened. "It is."

  Silence stretched between them. An uncomfortable, tension-filled silence.

  Turner's arm was still wrapped intimately around her waist, and despite the heat that radiated off his chest, Riley shivered.

  Marcus glowered at her for a moment before turning to leave. He hesitated at the door, his hand hovering over the knob. He looked over his shoulder and pinned Turner with a knowing stare. "Good thing you didn't get a ticket for parking on the street overnight. Cops are constantly patrolling this area."

  Gripping her tight against his body, Turner pushed her hair off her neck and nipped at her ear. "Must have been my lucky night."

  Riley felt her face flush at the double innuendo and tried to ignore the other areas of her body that burned from the heat of his touch.

  Marcus breathed out roughly before opening the door and slamming it behind him.

  She let out a slow breath in relief.

  "He'll be back," Riley said breathlessly.

  "Then I'll deal with him," Turner murmured, his mouth still near her ear.

  He held her close. So close she could feel every rigid, well-defined muscle, including the one that was currently pressed against her backside.

  A small sigh escaped her lips before she could stop it. What was wrong with her? Her sister had turned into a freaking lion and all she could think about was lion-man's long fingers, stroking over—Enough, Riley.

  She shook her head. "He's gone. You can let go of me now."

  His hands lingered a moment before he finally released her and took a step back.

  She walked to the door and twisted the deadbolt. When she spun around Turner was watching her. Wavy black hair fell across his forehead and framed the perfectly sculpted features of his face. High cheekbones, thick inky lashes surrounding mysterious silver blue eyes, well-molded lips, and a body that Narcissus would be jealous of.

  He was gorgeous. And, he was also werelion. Not to mention that as far as she knew, he was the only person able to help her sister. She should've been terrified of him, but she wasn't.

  She took a deep breath and rubbed her bare arms. "So…What do we do now?"

  "Go have a shower. Get cleaned up. We'll talk about it when you put some clothes on."

  Clothes, yes clothes were a good idea. Especially on him. "But, Kiera's all right? If you can change back and forth, then she can too?"

  The look that he gave her made the hairs on her arm stand on end.

  "It isn't that simple."

  "But you can help her, right?"

  "We're working on it." He let out a frustrated sigh. "The Council has everyone working day and night to solve this fucking mess."

  Riley paused, not understanding. What Council, and what mess? "If she's a shapeshifter, then why can't she shift back?"

  "She's not a shifter. Not technically anyways."

  "But you said—"

  "Look, it's complicated. We don't know why or how these people are shifting, but we're trying to figure it out."

  Riley felt the blood drain from her face. "Kiera's not the only one?"

  "We have scientists trying to figure out how to reverse the process. Until then…"

  Riley's head spun and she had to place a hand on the wall to keep her balance. "She's a lion."

  Chapter 5

  Turner did a sweep of the house while Riley showered. He found nothing that proved Boyd was still alive or connected the bastard to the recent spontaneous shiftings.

  Standing in the middle of the basement office, Turner rubbed his palms over his aching eyes. Maybe his brother was right—he was chasing a ghost.

  But who, other than Boyd, had both a warped mind and the knowledge to fuck with genetics in such a way?

  He picked up a glass trophy from the large mahogany desk. Encrusted in gold print, it read: American Society of Human Genetics, Advocacy Award, Dr. Richard Boyd.

  Turner snorted and shook his head.

  "What are you doing down here?" Riley stood in the doorway, her plump pink lips turned down in a frown.

  God, he was losing it. He hadn't heard her come downstairs, but her scent hit him now like liquid fire, and his cock twitched uncomfortably as she approached. His animal senses seemed to be fuddled today, almost muted.

  He feigned a look of innocence, held up the trophy and gave her a smile that he hoped would take her mind off the fact that he had been snooping through her things. "Just looking around. Lots of cool stuff down here."

  Riley tucked her damp hair behind her ears. With her face clean of make-up, the dusting of freckles across the bridge of her nose was visible. "My father won that the year he died," she said, taking the trophy. Her mouth tilted up in a sad smile as she ran her fingers over the engraved letters

  Her breasts rose and fell beneath the thin blue tank, and the tight jeans she wore accentuated her small waist. His gaze followed the gentle curve of her hips, down and back up her long, perfectly sculpted legs. The lion inside him growled and paced, wanting nothing more than to possess her.

  How many nights had he spent going over pictures and video surveillance of her, hoping to find some evidence that Boyd still lived? None of those photos or videos had captured her innocent sexuality or the intoxicating pheromones that flooded his senses now.

  Get a grip, Payne. She's more than just a hot piece of ass. She's Richard Boyd's fucking daughter.

  He sat on the edge of the desk and studied her, making sure to look no lower than eye level. "Did he talk much about his work?"

  Riley shrugged and placed the trophy back on the desk. "Keira and I used to joke that he loved his work almost as much as he loved us. He was married to it in a way. I suppose it's why he never remarried after our mother passed away." A shadow of pain darkened her green eyes. "It was his passion for genetics that made me go into biology. I only wish I'd had the chance to work with him, before…"

  Before I killed him. Turner dragged his fingers through his hair and exhaled a shaky breath. "Do you have any of his work here?" It was a long shot, but he had to ask.

  She shook her head. "There was a fire—an explosion—in the lab he worked at. It destroyed everything."

  "I'm sorry," he said. Not for Boyd's death, of course. The man deserved to die. But he was sorry for the loss Riley experienced. It wasn't her fault that her father had been a psychopathic killer, intent on dissecting and dismembering metamorphs as if they were nothing more than lab rats.

  Neither of them spoke for a long moment. Tension hung in the air, and he could see the questions and uncertainty that raced across her expression.

  "So…" She swallowed hard and wiped her palms on her pants. "You can help Keira? Make her…human again?"

  Shit, right, he'd almost forgotten why he was there. Being around her dulled his brain. "I need to ask you a few questions about your sister."

  "I'll tell you anything if it will help her."

  He was banking on that.

  Turner went through the checklist of questions he was required as a Therian agent to ask a victim's family, but nothing Riley told him gave him any new information.

  "So you can't think of anything unusual, out of the ordinary? No new acquaintances?"

  "No. Kiera's an introvert. When she's not working at the art studio, she's either painting or reading."

  "What about the jackass from earlier?"

  "Marcus DuPoint?" She shrugged. "He's always been around. He was a graduate student under my father—"

  "Wait." Turner growled low in his chest. "You're telling me the asshole who's been stalking your sister used to work with Boyd?"

  She flinched and took a small step away. "Yes, but—"

  He pulled out his phone and sent a quick message to Chase. He needed any information the agency had on Marcus DuPoint.

  "You think Marcus has something to do with this?" She stared at him, innocent and wide-eyed.

  He didn't think, he knew. If the man was connected to Boyd, he was sure to be bad news, and it co
uld be the lead he was looking for. "If he is, I'll find out."

  Her bottom lip trembled, and she looked at him as if her entire world had just come crashing down around her. He supposed it had. But if he was right about Marcus, things were only going to get worse. If the man was responsible for turning Kiera, what was stopping him from doing the same to Riley?

  A possessiveness he'd never felt before gripped him, followed by a sense of dread. Was he prepared to destroy everything Riley thought she knew about the man who had raised her?

  He didn't realize how intensely he watched her until she shivered under his gaze, her pupils dilating in either fear or arousal. Maybe both.

  He cursed the universe for fucking with him, once again. It had been months since he'd been laid, and years since the animal within him had stirred.

  Ignoring his unwanted desires, he cleared his throat and pushed himself away from the desk. "I talked to my brother when you were in the shower. He has Kiera in a safe place."

  "Can I see her?"

  Combing his fingers through his hair, he turned his back on her. He needed to get out of there before he did something he would regret. "I've got some business to take care of, but I'll come back this evening and pick you up. You can see her then."

  "Turner?"

  He stopped in the doorway, but didn't turn around. "Yeah?"

  "How did you know my name? Out on the street. You knew who I was. How?"

  He wasn't prepared to tell her the truth, and she sure as hell wasn't prepared to hear it. He sighed and closed his eyes. He was the king of bullshit, but for some reason the thought of lying to her any more than he had to, left a bad taste in his mouth.

  "You were in the local newspaper a few months back. Recognized your face."

  "Oh." Her voice trembled on the single word.

  He looked over his shoulder. She looked so vulnerable that he had to stop himself from taking her in his arms and comforting her. He shook his head and pushed the unwanted thoughts out of his mind. "I'll be back around eight."

  Chapter 6

  Turner winced as he entered the Therian Agency control center. The buzzing of monitors and incessant clicking of multiple keyboards made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. He breathed in the stuffy air and cringed at the scents that permeated the room. Stale coffee, overheated plastic, combined with the body odor of multiple metamorphs, he grimaced. He'd never understand why anyone, especially a metamorph, would choose a job that required one to be caged in a cement prison, day in and day out.

  Jacob Oliver turned from the young woman he'd been speaking with, and trained his gaze on Turner.

  Fifteen minutes late. It wasn't unusual, but he knew it drove Jacob bat shit crazy. If the man wasn't more like a brother than a boss, Turner might be nervous by the dark, dominant look the man gave him as he crossed the room.

  "Where the hell have you been?"

  He shrugged and handed him the file he carried. "Got caught up on the I-80."

  Jacob flipped open the case report. His eyes widened as he scanned the pictures Turner and his team had taken of the scene.

  "Everything's been taken care of." He sat on the edge of a desk and winked at a petite brunette who walked by. She was attractive, but nothing compared to Riley's exotic beauty. He wiped his hands on his pants and looked back at Jacob. "We ran into a bit of resistance with the local police, but I handled it."

  Jacob shut the folder, sighed and dragged a hand over his face. The man was in his early thirties, but already his black hair was streaked with silver, and there were lines around his eyes and mouth that hadn't been there a year before.

  Turner glanced at the monitors across the room, one of which broadcasted a live news report from Central Park. "Any word on the New York case? I heard about it this morning on the radio. Did you already send a team?"

  Jacob stared vacantly at the closed file. He shook his head and glanced back at Turner. "It's out of my hands. If we attempt to acquire the animal, it would raise too much suspicion."

  Turner frowned. "They'll end up putting him in a zoo, or worse, euthanize him. There has to be something we can—"

  "The media's all over it." He exhaled roughly. "There's nothing we can do."

  "Agent Oliver." Reece Maverick, werebear, and investigative supervisor approached, his face red from the exertion of walking across the room. His large belly pressed against the white fabric of his shirt, straining the buttons.

  The stench of onion and bacon tickled Turner's nose. God, he hated it in this dungeon. The smells alone would make him insane.

  "What is it?" Jacob asked.

  Maverick glared at Turner, then looked back at Jacob before responding. He clutched a manila folder in his meaty fingers. "The progress report, sir."

  "Tell me you've got good news."

  Maverick gave a sharp nod. "Our geneticists believe they've found a correlation between the victims. According to the DNA analysis, they were all carriers of"—the man paused as if for effect and puffed out his chest—"a recessive metamorph gene."

  "Holy shit." Turner grasped the folder Maverick carried, but the man's beefy fingers clamped down. With another insistent tug he pulled it free. He flipped it open and thumbed through the report. The document could have been written in Chinese for all the sense it made to him, but he understood the significance of Maverick's words. The morphings weren't as random as they originally thought.

  Jacob cleared his throat. "Why are we just learning about this now?"

  Maverick's face molted red and pink. He reached for the file and Turner let it go, and put his hands up in surrender.

  "They've only just identified the gene." Maverick turned his attention back to Jacob. "But from what I understand it's a mutation that only occurs in the offspring of a human and a metamorph."

  The victims were all half-breeds. Damn, that complicated things. If Maverick was correct, what did that say about Kiera? About Boyd? It had to be a mistake. He'd studied the victims’ files inside out, only a small handful of them had any relationship to the metamorph community.

  "None of the victims had metamorph parents. We would have known if they—"

  "Not every metamorph is documented," Maverick said, tucking the folder securely under his arm.

  Jacob scrubbed his hands over his face. "We need to inform the Council."

  "I realize the implications that this could have, but there are thousands of carriers across the globe, and we've only seen a couple hundred cases of spontaneous morphings, all within a contained geographical location." Maverick lowered his voice and glanced around the room. The sweat from his palm stained the file he held. "There's no sense causing panic until—"

  "No." Jacob let out a frustrated breath. "Until we figure out who or what is causing this, every person who carries the gene is at risk. How many of our kind have taken human mates? Every one of their offspring who aren't metamorphs are at risk."

  Turner leaned against the wall and crossed his arms over his chest. He hated to admit it, but he agreed with Maverick. There was no sense alarming people until they had a way to control the situation.

  "We don't even know how this thing is spread." A large vein pulsated on Maverick's temple. "If you make it common knowledge, you'll just cause unnecessary fear and we'll have a—"

  "They have every reason to fear." Jacob handed Maverick the file of case two-thirty-eight, which contained the photos of the massacred cheetah.

  Maverick opened his mouth and then shut it. He winced and looked away. "Point taken, sir, but I still think we need to keep this information classified until we know more."

  Turner's mind spun. Boyd was human. A sociopath and psychotic killer, but still human. And his wife had died of cancer—a disease that didn't affect metamorphs. If both Kiera's parents had been human, how had the woman inherited the recessive gene?

  It didn't make sense. Was it possible the gene could be passed down through generations? If so, the implications could be catastrophic. It also meant that R
iley could also be a carrier.

  Turner clenched and unclenched his fists, and forced himself to ignore the sudden threat that had his animal raging inside. He had to get back to Riley. His animal paced within him, and an unnatural urge to protect her wrapped around his heart, until he could barely catch his breath. He had to keep her safe. There was no chance in hell he was going to let her succumb to the same fate as her sister.

  "Agent Payne, is there something you'd like to share with us?"

  Jacob's deep voice broke through his sense of panic.

  Maverick's face distorted in a scowl. "You're more out of it than normal, Payne. What's your problem?"

  Maverick was right, he was losing his cool. The woman had turned his brain to mush and if he didn't recover quickly, it would be his ass the agency would wipe the floor with. He needed an excuse, and he needed it quick.

  "Sleep deprivation will do that to a person." It wasn't exactly a lie. He gave what he hoped was a cocky-ass grin and looked down his nose at Maverick. "Unlike you, I've actually been working."

  Maverick opened his mouth to retort, but Jacob raised his hand to silence him. "Go home and get some rest. I need you back here first thing tomorrow morning."

  More fucking paperwork. He ground his teeth together. "I'll be here."

  "On time," Jacob warned.

  Turner rolled his eyes. Like that would happen. "Right."

  Jacob reached out and gripped Turner's arm before he could make a beeline for the door. Thankfully Maverick had moved on and wasn't witness to the death stare Jacob now gave him.

  "I don't know what's going on with you, but if you do anything to jeopardize your position here, I can't help you again."

  Too late, buddy. There was nothing Jacob or Chase could do when the shit with Riley hit the fan. He was screwed. It was only a matter of time before they placed the noose around his neck.

  One week. That's all he had. He peeled Jacob's fingers off his arm. How much easier would his life be if even one person at the agency believed him when he told them Boyd was still alive?

  Not even his own brother believed him.