by V. A. Dold
Doug steeled his spine for the hard slap of fried meat, oil-laden air, and the clamor of conversations as he opened the door of the Burger Hut. Humans were very noisy. A cacophony of voices surrounded him, friendly greetings and waves welcomed him, and the smell of fast food wafted through the air.
Halfway to the counter, he stopped short. Krystal was in a booth with a male. The tiger in him roared in outrage, prowling the cage of his mind. A male that wasn’t him was lunching with his djairi.
Still oblivious of him, Krystal continued to chatter, waving a French fry to emphasize what she was saying. The male noticed him immediately and watched him with the eyes of a predator who was unafraid of his challenge. This was a male who knew his strengths and how to use them to his advantage.
About to bite the fry, she no longer waved, Krystal stiffened and lifted her nose. She knew that mouthwatering, lemongrass, and sage scent—Sheriff Doug Dansby. Leaning out of the booth, she glanced at the door and spotted him. Only, he wasn’t just walking in or headed for the counter. No, he was like a heat-seeking missile on target, coming their way. As if she had expected him, he lifted a hand and smiled. Her stomach dipped into her shoes, and her throat went dry. It was one thing to tell her cousin about Doug, but a whole other thing to introduce them.
Doug strolled forward, hips rolling in the loose limbed walk of his tiger. His stride looked lazy and slow, when in fact, he could move with blurring speed. Though his gaze locked on her, she knew he was aware of every human in the restaurant. Shit, that meant he was aware of her cousin. This lunch was their first meeting in years and years. He’d only just returned home from his world travels. Her cousin was the best secret keeper when he left, but all of the life experiences he’s had could have changed him in a myriad of ways. She wasn’t sure if Rylon would keep her situation quiet until she was ready to make her move. Steeling her spine, she readied herself to head the impending train wreck off at the pass.
Not stopping until he stood above her, Doug shocked the breath from her lungs when he planted a passionate kiss on her lips. After several seconds, he let her come up for air and all but purred, “Krystal. I wasn’t expecting such a lovely pleasure when I stopped for lunch. Who’s your little friend?” The infuriating man emphasized the word little.
Equally embarrassed and turned on, Krystal sputtered, unable to form comprehendible words.
Laughing, her cousin got to his feet and offered his hand. “I’m Lucas’s youngest brother, Rylon. It’s nice to meet you, Sheriff.”
Doug’s brows popped. His tiger fell back on his haunches, as taken aback as Doug was. Now that he knew the man’s identity, he searched for a family resemblance and found none. As a matter of fact, Rylon looked and smelled more like a Pleiadian than an Earthling shifter. “Brother?” he questioned, using a subvocal voice.
Rylon used an equally quiet tone, “I’ll explain later. It’s a closely held family secret.” With a quick, meaningful glance, Krystal’s direction, he added, “Only my Earth parents know.”
“Got it. Come by the station later, and we’ll talk,” he whispered back. Then loud enough for Krystal to hear, he said, “Rylon, it’s nice to meet you.”
Rylon waved a hand at the booth. “We just sat down. Would you like to join us?”
“I’d love to. Give me a minute.” Doug hurried to the counter without appearing to do more than stroll. His long stride came in handy every once in a while. Two minutes later, he was crowding his djairi, soaking in the heat radiating off her body.
Doug quickly decided he rather liked Rylon. The man had a great sense of humor and reminded him of home. Pleiadians often lived among his people. As space travel goes, the two-star systems were in the same neighborhood. Although, he was disappointed to learn that Rylon was only visiting the ranch and would return to Louisiana in a few days.
Lunch ended much too quickly, and he found himself scrambling for an excuse to remain in Krystal’s presence. Finally, he pushed out of the booth and stood. “Walk you to your car?”
She glanced up at him, uncertainty in her gaze. His breath froze in his lungs as if the very air waited as expectantly as he did. Would she accept or turn him away yet again?
“Sure. We’re parked just outside the door,” Rylon answered for her. Escorting both Krystal and her cousin wasn’t part of his plan. Throwing a glower at Rylon, the man just smirked back. Krystal’s cousin may find that paybacks were a bitch. He didn’t know when or where, but he’d pay the Pleiadian back.
When Rylon took a second or two too long to fish his keys from his pocket, he considered offering Krystal a ride home. But before he could utter the invitation, his new frenemy held up his keys and jangled them for good measure. Yeah, paybacks would definitely be a bitch.
“Was there something else?” Rylon asked with a glint in his eye.
Doug flashed his elongating teeth. “No. Call you later, Krystal?”
“Sure. I’ll be home around seven.”
After a quick peck on her cheek, he forced himself to walk nonchalantly away. No way was he giving her cousin the satisfaction of knowing he’d bested him.
Glancing over the bed of his truck, he watched them leave the parking lot. Only when they were out of sight did he climb into the cab and force himself to return to the station. He didn’t follow them home or make sure Krystal was safely inside. But he wanted to.
Thirty minutes after watching Rylon Le Beau drive off with his djairi, the blasted man walked through his office door. “Long time no see, Sheriff,” Rylon said with a grin.
“You certainly got to the ranch and back quickly.”
Rylon held up his hands. “I didn’t break the speeding laws once, Sheriff. But I did drop my cousin off and turn right back around. I promised you an explanation. I’m here to give that.”
Doug sat back in his chair. “Yes, you did. So, tell me, how a Pleiadian came to be a member of the Le Beau family?”
Sighing, Rylon pulled out a chair and sat down. “Luperca approached me when I was a child. My parents had just died in a skirmish with the Reptilians, and I was alone. She wanted to speed up the process of finding our missing females. I knew the odds of finding my djairi on my home planet were slim to none, so when she told me my companion was living on planet Earth, I jumped at the opportunity.
“It was a deal where we mutually benefitted. The wolf shifter program, where our males incarnated on Earth to find their women was a slow and often fruitless process. Because of that, she sought other options. I’m her first attempt to speed things up.”
Doug frowned. “You found your djairi? I’m surprised Lucas hasn’t mentioned that.”
“No. I haven’t found her yet. As I said, I was Luperca’s first attempt.” Rylon grinned and a wicked gleam flashed in his eyes. “But now, she has other plans. That being said, I know my djairi is somewhere on Earth, I can feel her. I just haven’t found her yet. But given enough time, I will.”
“I see. And your brothers don’t know you’re an extraterrestrial?”
“They know that something is different about me that suppresses my ability to shift. But I have other gifts that make up for that. Only, my Earth parents know the truth of what I am. Luperca asked them to keep her secret, and they have.”
Doug nodded. “And so will I. I have no reason to blow your cover or betray Luperca. Your secret is safe with me.”
Standing, Rylon held out his hand. “Thank you, Doug. I appreciate it.”
Doug shook his hand. “You’re welcome. It was nice to meet you, Rylon. It’s nice to know I’m not alone on this planet.”
“Yeah, you won’t have to worry about being alone much longer.” With that cryptic comment, Rylon left the office.
Thirteen
“Hey, Krystal,” Jojo called as she exited the dining hall.
“Hi, Jojo.”
“Lucas asked me to tell you that he has the rest of today’s events covered. He’s taking all of the guests on a hayride,” Jojo
added with a gleam in her eye.
“Let me guess, there’s a cute cowboy you have your eye on, and he’s tagging along to help out?”
“Of course, and all those hunky guys who came with Sheena are going too. It’s a hottie smorgasbord,” she said cheerfully with a flip of her hair as she headed back into the dining hall—no doubt to rejoin her newest cowboy crush.
Wow, an entire night to herself, she wasn’t quite sure what to do with herself. Krystal grabbed her purse as she considered her options. She never did get her fuzzy slippers and Hallmark movie night. Decision made, she headed home for a long, hot shower and her jammies.
Beware, Stefanie warmed, he is close by.
The cabin’s locked up. We’re good, Krystal assured.
He is very close, Stefanie insisted before fading out.
Krystal rolled her eyes. How did she end up with a crazy spirit guide? Shrugging, she continued with her shower. She loved her long hot showers. After shampooing and conditioning her hair, she could stand under the hot spray forever. Alas, the hot water eventually gave out.
Stepping from the shower, she wrapped her hair in one towel and grabbed a second to dry her body. Turning to hang the towels to dry, she caught a glimpse of the vanity mirror out of the corner of her eye. Where there should have been nothing but a steamy reflection, letters were written.
You are out of time.
Come to me now, or your sheriff dies.
An address she was unfamiliar with was added at the bottom.
A quick check of the bathroom door showed it was not only unlatched, it also was opened an inch or so. She knew for a fact she’d shut that door. That meant this message wasn’t from the last time the stalker violated her space. No, this was new and happened while she was naked in the shower. That realization flipped her fear switch to pissed off.
Wrapping a towel around her body, she moved silently toward the living room without turning on the lights. She was a wolf. Darkness made little difference to her. Pausing just short of the end of the hallway, she glanced around the corner. Her minimalist lifestyle was a bonus right now. If something were missing or moved, she’d know.
Yet another bonus was the lack of places large enough to hide an adult in her tiny beloved cabin. A quick glance told her that no one was in the open space that made up the kitchenette, dining room, and living room.
She moved on silent, bare feet across the room, taking care to stay near the walls and away from the open area in the center of the space. Her brothers taught both her and her sister self-defense when they hit puberty. Le Beau men were relentless, and one of the lessons was, watch your back. Keeping a wall behind her did just that. In less than a minute, she knew that nothing had been messed with in this part of her house.
A twist of dread tightened her gut. That left her bedroom as the only place he could be hiding. Creeping up the hallway, she peeked into her room. The closet door was flung blessedly wide open, exposing every inch of the interior. She’d never been so thankful for the lack of a walk-in closet.
Unless he had stuffed himself under the bed, she was alone in the cabin. Relieved to find herself alone, she took her first deep breath and froze. Her room was saturated with the stalker’s scent. Her wolf’s hackles rose as it growled in warning. It both enraged and creeped her out that he’d been in her room, her house long enough to leave so much scent. What the hell had he been doing?
Cautiously, she made her way into the room, afraid of what she might find. She took another step, and a musky stench assailed her nose. Unwilling to believe her eyes, she stepped back and flicked on the light. Krystal bellowed as her wolf lunged in outrage.
Every panty, every bra, even her nightgowns were strewn across the mussed bedspread. Moving closer, she picked up a pair of balled-up panties for closer examination. For some reason, the satin held the unnatural shape as if it was glued. That was when she noticed the crusted white stains and flung the panties from her. Bile rising, Krystal pressed her hand to her mouth and ran for the bathroom.
When she was sure she could move without vomiting, she grabbed her phone and called Doug. Her first choice was Lucas, but he was doing that hayride, so the second choice it was.
“Hello, Krystal,” he purred as he answered the phone.
“Doug, I need you right now.”
“Oh, um… okay. I’ll be right there,” he said, obliviously.
Krystal glared at the phone. “Not that way, you idiot. I need sheriff you.”
“Oh.” Disappointment filled that word to bursting. “Oh! Are you okay?” Her meaning having finally gotten through his male brain.
“I am, yes. My underthings, not so much.”
She yanked the phone from her ear when a roar all but deafened her. “I’m on my way.”
Glanced down at the towel she still wore, she headed back into the war zone to find something to wear that hadn’t been defiled by the stalker.
Ten minutes later, Doug was at her door. The man must have broken a land speed record. Opening the door, she was pulled into his arms before she could utter a greeting.
“Can’t breathe,” she gasped.
“You might want to let go now. She’s turning a little blue,” Lucas said from the porch area.
Doug loosened his hold but kept his arm around her. Krystal glanced at him, unsure what to do with an enraged, possessive Doug Dansby. His behavior was too strange to think about right then, so she turned her attention to Lucas instead. “What happened to the hayride?”
“Joe rode out and told me the Sheriff had been called. He took over the wagon.”
“I see.” She glanced sideways at Doug again. Still silent and more than a bit stiff.
Lucas frown at the sheriff as well. It seemed he was just as perplexed. “Why don’t you tell us what happened?”
“The intruder was in the house again.”
A growl rumbled in Doug’s chest.
Ignoring him, she continued, “This time, he was in my bathroom while I showered and left a little message on the mirror.” Krystal froze when a tiger’s roar shook the window panes. “Then…” she paused and wiggled out of Doug’s hold and took two steps back for good measure. “Then he had a party with my panties on my bed.”
It was a good thing she’d put space between her and the temperamental feline because a massive tiger now filled her tiny cabin.
“Take a breath, and get control of yourself, Sheriff. I need you human for a few minutes,” Lucas demanded in a voice filled with more alpha command than Krystal realized he had. Where had he been hiding all of that?
Lucas headed down the hallway and didn’t look back. That was telling. Only an alpha who fully expected his command would be heeded behaved in such a manner.
Just when she was sure she couldn’t be any more shocked, Doug, a fifth density non-terrestrial shifted back and obediently followed her fourth density cousin to the crime scene. Krystal sat down hard on the couch, staring after the men. She was in the twilight zone. That was the only explanation.
“Krystal?” Doug called from the bathroom, uttering his first word since arriving at her house.
“Yes?” She thought about going to them to see what they needed and immediately changed her mind. She did not want to be in the same room when Lucas and Doug saw her bed.
“You said there was a message?”
“Steam up the mirror,” she called back, tucking her legs and feet close to her body on the couch cushion.
A minute later, a tiger chuff came from the bathroom. It seemed Doug’s tiger thought as little of the stalker as the man did.
Krystal stiffened her spine in preparation of the explosion about to take place in her bedroom. Three… two… one.
Lucas turned the air blue with every cuss word he knew. His bellow was matched by a second tiger roar in less than five minutes. How the heck did his massive tiger fit inside her bedroom? He must have done a partial shift. Oh yeah, she was glad she was on the couch.
Doug must have shifted back because the next thing she heard was him using his own blue vocabulary as he declared the stalker was sick, and she wasn’t safe in the cabin alone.
She heard Lucas respond, but his words were muffled, no doubt, so she wouldn’t hear. Lucas whispering never boded well for her. A minute later, the two red-faced men joined her, Doug sat beside her on the couch and Lucas took her favorite chair.
“Krystal, I’m sorry, but it has to be said. If this guy was sent by your mother, he’s gone off-script. Not even your mother would sanction his behavior.”
She couldn’t argue with that logic. Her mother was many things, but she also had her own warped standards.
“I need to have the crime scene team go over both rooms before the… mess can be cleaned up.” The tiger rose to the surface and growled with each word Doug spoke.
“And Krystal…” Lucas paused until she looked at him. “I want you to move to the main house until this bastard is caught. His actions have morphed into malicious sexual threats.”
“All right. When the crime team is done, I’ll pack a bag.” There was no sense arguing with him when she agreed with his assessment.
Lucas nodded his approval and turned to Doug. “Do you need to stay here until the crime team arrives?”
“Yeah, I’d better. Why?”
Lucas waved his hand toward the bathroom. “The message. I’ll check out the address and see if I can catch the idiot waiting there.”
“Thank you, I was trying to work out the logistics. I’m good, but I can’t be in two places at once.”
Twenty minutes later, Doug had his team bagging things inside the cabin. They didn’t need him in the way, so he went looking for Krystal. He found her huddled on the porch swing, her arms wrapped around her knees.
She looked tiny wrapped in a fluffy blanket to ward off the cooler evening temperature. She may look small and helpless, but he knew she was anything but. If the stalker was stupid enough to challenge her face to face and think he could easily subdue her, he had a shock coming.
