Shifter Wars Complete Series

by Sarah J. Stone

  I turned to leave, and Agent Helmsley followed after me, her short steps clicking as she struggled to keep up.

  "You can't do that!" she said. "Don't you need…I don't know, a warrant or something?"

  "What do you think this is, the NYPD?" I asked, stopping and turning. "We get the information we need by whatever means necessary."

  "But you can't just break into a shifter's apartment."

  "I can and I will. Now, let me grab some sleep before we head out. Finish your debriefing."

  I walked off briskly, making it clear that I didn't want to be followed. She was right that breaking into someone's apartment wasn't looked upon with high regard. Maybe a human, sure, but a member of the shifter society? That could have some serious blowback. Agent Helmsley might tell Ms. Delahunt, but even if she did, I think I could get her to look the other way. But I was counting on Agent Helmsley feeling a sense of obligation to help.

  I ducked into my usual spot in one of the supply closets on the second floor, a quiet little place where I tended to grab quick naps when I needed to get an hour in here and there. But I couldn't close my eyes. I couldn't stop thinking about what Agent Helmsley had said about the man who stopped her. I wanted to write it off as some random guy, but the description she gave: the eyes, the strange appearance…it all sounded like…a dragon. And if a dragon was a part of whatever the hell was going on, then this whole operation was about to get a lot more complicated.

  Before I knew it, my phone alarm went off, alerting me that my hour had passed. And I hadn't gotten so much as a wink. Realizing that sleep wasn't going to happen, I left the closet and found Agent Helmsley at the small desk in the office that had been assigned to her. Face after face appeared on the screen, and I could see that she was looking up information on dragons.

  "Don't bother," I said. "Don't you know that dragons are secretive little fuckers? Nearly all of the ones in our records are just suspected dragons."

  "There's…nothing about any of them," she said, clicking through the pictures, strangely beautiful face after strangely beautiful face appearing on the screen.

  Then, she hit another key, a familiar face appearing on the screen. The world seemed to disappear around me as I looked at the man on the monitor who stared at me with those blue eyes that I'd come to hate, a little smirk on his lips.

  "Anandrox," I whispered, the blood boiling in my veins.

  "What?" Agent Helmsley asked.

  I was tugged back into reality, the din of the office filling my senses once again.

  "Nothing," I said. "Let's go."

  I was eager to get back into the field. Stepping out of the office and onto Madison Avenue, the cool, fall air hit my face and woke me up just enough to regain my focus.

  "Where are we going?" Agent Helmsley asked, toddling after me.

  "Harlem," I said. "Listen, Nadine, I'm-"

  "Nadia," she said, her face turning stern.

  "Nadia," I repeated. "This little op we're about to do is going to require some serious discretion. So no distractions. Stay focused."

  "Okay," she said, that newbie eagerness returning to her voice.

  "We'll catch the train. Don't want to deal with having to park again."

  A half hour later, we emerged from the A train stop in West Harlem, near the corner of Central Park. I followed the address and soon we were at the foot of the tower where Emmanuel lived.

  "How do we know he's not here?" Nadia asked.

  "If he took a train out of town, he probably isn't. But we'll have to make sure."

  "And when we get up there, what're we looking for?"

  "Anything that might suggest that Emmanuel's involved with anyone he shouldn't be."

  "Like who?"

  "Some shifters like to get involved in the drug trade as a little supplement to their income. As you know, we come down hard on that, and that's who I'm suspecting. A flashy little fucker like Martin is just the type to think he can live in the shifter world and the human world at the same time. Probably got a lifestyle that only two streams of income can supplement."

  "But…what about the man at the station?"

  "What about him?"

  “Don't you think that he might be involved in some way?"

  I sighed. "I'll tell you what, you see a nice little eight-by-ten glossy of that guy in Emmanuel's apartment, you let me know."

  Truth be told, there might be something to what Nadia was suggesting. A man like the one she described showing up the way he did…my gut told me that it was some dragon shit. But I suppose I was hoping that it wouldn't be anything like that. Drug-running was a major crime, but it was…more prosaic. Just greedy humans working with greedy shifters. But if dragons were involved, who knows what kind of shit we'd be getting into. The affairs of dragons were none of our concern, at least, so we'd been told. Messing with their business was an easy way to get your life ended quick, Sapien or not.

  And if anyone understood that, it was me.

  I cast a glance over at Nadia, and her nervousness shone through in her small fidgets and tense frame.

  "You ready to do this?" I asked, feeling the adrenaline rush of an impending mission running through my veins.

  A nervous smile on her face was her only reply.

  Good enough for me.

  CHAPTER 4

  NADIA

  "Um, I'm here to see Emmanuel Martin," I said, standing at the front desk of the luxury condo building.

  "And you are?" the employee asked, his expression and tone both haughty and prim.

  "Um, Stef…anie…Wood..row," I said.

  Hey, I'd never had to come up with a fake name on the spot—cut me some slack.

  "And what's your business here?"

  "Just…a friend," I said, trying to make my voice a little flirty to give the hint that I was just another one of his girls, like the ones that I'd seen him with.

  The man looked me up and down, undoubtedly noting that I wasn't dressed like his usual women. Regardless, he picked up the receiver and dialed a number.

  "I don't believe he's in, but I'll give him a call. One moment, please."

  I stood there awkwardly, running my fingers through my hair. Casting a side-eyed glance at the rest of the expanse of the lobby, I looked for Jack. I didn't see him, and hoped that he'd been able to make it through to the back service door without being spotted, as was the plan.

  "He's not in," said the doorman. "Would you like to leave a message?"

  "Um, no," I said. "I'll, uh, just come back later.”

  With that, I scampered from the desk and back out to the front of the building. Jack was nowhere to be found. Looking as non-descript as I could, I hurried around the building, ducking into a small alley behind it. Eventually, I came to a service door that had been propped open. Glancing at it, I saw that Jack was standing near it.

  "Finally," he said.

  "Sorry," I responded, "lying to doormen and sneaking into buildings isn't something that I have a lot of experience with."

  Jack snorted. "Square."

  Before I could come up with anything clever to say, Jack was off, hurrying down the gray, sparse service hallway and coming to a stop at silver elevator doors. "Well, unlike you, I've broken into enough of these places to know that they've all got service elevators that lead directly into the apartments."

  "Very fancy," I said.

  "So," Jack said, hitting the elevator button, "we get in there, find out what we can, and get out. Easy as apple pie."

  "And if they come back?"

  "We'll know. A chime or something will sound. In that case, run to the nearest closet or whatever's closest and hide."

  "Umm," I said, not convinced of the wisdom of this plan.

  "Trust me," he said, the elevator opening with a ding. "I've done this plenty of times before. Best way to get leads."

  Apprehensive, I stepped into the elevator, the doors sliding shut behind me. I watched as the red numbers ticked up, taking us to the levels of the city where
the rich resided. The number stopped at sixty-six and the doors slid open. I gasped as the apartment revealed itself to me. It was a beautiful home with a wide-open floor, the ceilings high and the tall windows looking out over the lower half of Manhattan, Central Park to the right.

  The décor, however, left quite a bit to be desired. The colors were gaudy purples and pinks, the furniture like something out of a period piece about seventies cocaine dealers, and the walls decorated with African art made by someone who had to be on some kind of hallucinogen or another. The colors were so off-putting that I almost felt a little sick to my stomach looking at them, though that may have also been the anxiety.

  "Nice pad," Jack said. "Too bad about the décor. Waste of a decent apartment."

  "Yeah," I said, surprised that I agreed with Jack about something.

  "No sense in wasting time," he said. "Get to looking. And set your phone for ten minutes. We don't want to be in here any longer than that."

  I set an alarm and got to searching. Moving through the living room, I still wasn't sure what I was looking for. Jack made his way to the bedroom, opening the door slowly and stepping in.

  "Oh, God," he said, standing at the threshold.

  "What?" I asked.

  "Uh, let's just say that quite a lot goes on in the bedroom."

  I shuddered at what this implied and turned my attention back to the living room. I'm not sure what I expected, but the place was spotless. Aside from whatever Jack had found in the bedroom, there wasn't a thing out of order. As I looked, I had to keep myself from getting distracted by the magnificent view. Life sure was good for the higher-ups in the shifter world, and I couldn't help but wonder if I'd ever step in a place like this again, let alone live in one.

  "Anything?" Jack called out.

  "Nothing," I said, not raising my voice too loud. "It's clean in here."

  "Same," Jack responded. "Aside from the…uh, what I won't mention, it's spotless."

  I'd never been on a case before, let alone one like this, but my gut told me that something was amiss. Jack came back into the living room, shaking his head.

  "This is strange," he said. "There should be something lying around, even about his above-the-board business with the Tigers. It's like it's purposefully clean, like if there is anything, it's hidden."

  "What do we do?" I asked.

  "Keep looking. I don't want to waste this opportunity."

  I turned my attention to the other side of the room, noting a strange door-shape outline peeking out from behind one of the larger pictures.

  "What's that?" I asked, walking toward it.

  When I'd gotten near, I ran my finger over the indentation. It was a straight line cut into the wall that went up about six feet, stopped, and went at a right angle behind the painting. Looking up, I noticed that the painting wasn't hanging on the wall. The nails were to the left, above the door. Instead, the painting was leaning against the wall, as though it'd been taken down and not put back in its proper place.

  "Look at this," I said, stepping back.

  Jack approached and ran his finger along the indentation.

  "Door," he said.

  He glanced around, making all the same observations that I had. But rather than wait for permission, he moved the painting further to the right, revealing the rest of the door.

  "How does it open?" I asked. There didn't appear to be a handle or anything else on the shape.

  "Maybe…" Jack slipped a multi-tool out of his pocket and withdrew a long knife.

  He stuck the knife into the indentation, worked it around, and pulled back. Sure enough, the door fell backward—it was just a panel.

  "Take a look at that," he said.

  The room it revealed was small but packed full of books and notes. The space was dominated by a long desk topped with three computer monitors that had been turned off.

  "What is this place?" I asked, stepping in after Jack.

  "Looks like a room where Emmanuel was doing some research that he didn't want to be found out."

  "What kind of research would a tiger like him be doing?" I asked. "He doesn't really strike me as the science enthusiast."

  Jack stepped to the desk and scanned the notes and folders.

  "Information about the heads of the wolf clans," he said. "Lots of recon."

  "So, he's doing research on the wolves?"

  "Seems that way," Jack said. "That means he's likely thinking about war, just like I'd assumed. But that doesn't explain why he'd keep it hidden like this. It's not like he'd be having any wolf elders over who might stumble onto them."

  "Maybe he counted on a couple of Sapiens breaking in and looking around," I said with a smile.

  Jack didn't respond, instead busying himself with the information strewn about.

  "Information about dragons here…" Jack said "This is odd."

  "Dragons? Why?"

  "No idea. But it's odd. He's got potential places where some dragons live. It's like he's trying to keep tabs on them. And…"

  Jack stopped mid-sentence, picking up one of the sheets of paper from the desk.

  "No way," he said, looking it over.

  "What is it?" I asked, stepping over to him.

  But before I could reach him, a low chime sounded throughout the apartment.

  "Shit!" Jack said. "Someone's coming."

  Jack pulled out his phone, snapped several pictures of the documents on the desk, and turned toward the entrance to the small room. Grabbing me by the wrist, he pulled me out and into the living room.

  "Help me put this back," he said.

  With a heave, we both lifted up the panel leading to the secret room.

  "Service elevator, now!" he said.

  But before we could even start toward it, the elevator sounded another chime. Spotting a door to a bedroom nearby, Jack opened it and pulled me through. I didn't even have a moment to react.

  "Now what?" I hissed.

  But Jack only held up a finger to his lips, his eyes focused on the crack of the door.

  "Good to be fuckin' back!" a voice from the living room called.

  I immediately recognized it as Emmanuel's—it matched the booming, honking laugh I’d heard before perfectly. I poked my head in front of the crack and watched. Sure enough, it was him. A beaming smile on his face, he kicked off his gaudy boots, pulled off his suit jacket, and plopped himself onto the couch, a long, contented sigh sounding as he did. His back was to us, and all I could see was the dark half-circle of the top of his head. The service elevator was clear across the apartment. There was no way we'd be able to make it there without him seeing us.

  Then, he raised his phone in front of him and dialed a number before placing the phone to his ear.

  "Hey, Monsieur Hilan, this is Emmanuel," his accent was the typical French-inflected of the Tigers, their modes of speaking owed to their Haitian ancestry. "Mhmm. Yeah, they were following me. I mean, I had no idea at the time. How was I to know? Mhmm. Of course. My little friend let me know…right…it's the Sapiens, I'm sure of it…Who the hell knows why? I've been covering my tracks, don't you worry…"

  But before the conversation could continue further, a thudding sounded through the apartment, like something knocking on glass, hard.

  "You will have to pardon me, Monsieur—I have, ah, an unexpected guest."

  Another series of bangs sounded from inside the apartment. But the apartment had an elevator that led directly to it. I wondered where the banging could be coming from.

  "What is that?" I whispered, turning to Jack.

  But his only response was a hard, cutting glare, one that said "be quiet!" without needing to utter the words. I clasped my hands around my mouth, fearing a single peep would leave my mouth.

  Another series of bangs sounded.

  "Coming, coming," Emmanuel said.

  Then there was the sound of a whooshing of air, as if he'd opened a window. Then it stopped. My eyes darted around the small sliver of view I had of the living room.
I couldn't see much and hoped that Jack had a better position.

  "Good evening, ah, mister…what was it you wanted me to call you again?"

  "Mr. Ax is fine."

  Upon hearing the voice of the guest, my hair stood on end. There was something about it, something bizarre, as though some sort of strange vocal filter had been put on it. The tone was full and rich, as though being spoken by a Shakespearian actor on a stage with excellent acoustics.

  It was…otherworldly.

  I gasped, thinking of the man at the train station.

  "You've gotta be fucking kidding me," Jack said. The words slipped out of his mouth and dripped with anger.

  "What?" I asked, clasping my hands over my mouth once again as soon as the word slipped past.

  "Well, then, Mr. Ax, it's a pleasure to see you again. Though I can't help but wonder what brings you to my humble home."

  "Go for a little trip today?" Mr. Ax asked.

  "Why, yes," Emmanuel said. "I had to drop a few friends off in Jersey. Why do you ask?"

  A moment passed. "You're getting sloppy," Mr. Ax said, after a time.

  "What do you mean?"

  "You had agents following you today. Two Sapiens, one of which had been on your tail for the better part of the day."

  "What?" Emmanuel blurted, his tone suggesting he was more than a little surprised by this. "That is impossible!"

  "'Impossible'?" Mr. Ax asked. "With as much attention as you manage to draw to yourself, I'm shocked that it hasn't happened sooner."

  "Well, all's well that ends well, isn't that you say in English? If it was a problem, then I would be in custody, correct?"

  "The only reason you're not in custody is because I managed to distract the agent who was tracking you onto the train."

  My heart skipped a beat—it was the man from the station! I struggled to get a look at him, but Jack wouldn't budge. His eyes were locked the pair, and all I could see from where I sat was small snatches of Emmanuel as he moved through the living room.

  "That is why we are working together, is it not? To, ah, watch each other's backs as we see this little operation through?"

  "You're mistaken," the strange voice said. "The purpose of this arrangement isn't for me to clean up your mistakes. If you're going to ascend to the Tiger elders, then you're going to have to be far more careful. I grow weary of throwing others off the scent because you have such difficulties being discreet."