by I. T. Lucas
Still, appearances had to be kept up, and he needed to act like a Doomer would.
“Shut up, Grud. I’m doing this for all of us. I’m trying to sweet talk her into letting me out of the chains.”
“Right, as if you needed her to release you. You could’ve gotten free a long time ago. What’s the matter, Dur, you need a female to come willingly? You don’t have the stomach for good old-fashioned rape?”
Fighting for self-control, Anandur closed his eyes. “In fact, I don’t. There is nothing sweeter than a willing female. But I guess an ugly bastard like you can’t get it any other way.”
Grud waved a hand. “The bitches love it. I give them a few minutes of hard fucking, and they get wet for me. The next time they know to come willingly. Especially after a good beating.”
Shaveh snorted, saving Anandur from having to respond, which he wasn’t sure he could’ve done without snarling. “They get wet for you because of the venom, not because you know what to do with your dick.”
“And you do?” Mordan asked.
“Naturally. Never heard any complaints.”
As the crude banter between the three Doomers continued, Anandur jumped up and grabbed the cage’s top horizontal bar. There was nothing like physical exertion to drive away the demons and help him get the rage under control.
Fifty chin-ups or so later, he was in a better mental state. It lasted for about five minutes. Evidently, the ratio of chin-ups to calm minutes was ten to one.
Not a good ratio.
And it made the stench worse.
He stank, the Doomers stank, and it was getting to him. The irritation was growing worse by the minute, primarily since he was well aware that he wouldn’t have been in this stinking situation if he were less of a fucking romantic.
None of his fellow Guardians would have chosen this course of action. They would’ve been out of there as soon as the first opportunity presented itself.
If Wonder continued with her indecision, he would have no choice but to knock her out, get her phone, and call Brundar.
Enough was enough.
It was one thing to rough it out when on a mission or on the battlefield, he had done it plenty of times, but doing so voluntarily and for no good reason was another.
Tomorrow, he was going to sleep in a clean bed, after brushing his teeth and taking a two-hour-long shower. He would scrub himself clean using up an entire bar of soap, and wash the stench out of his hair with a whole shampoo bottle. He would even use conditioner. But before that, he was going to eat half a cow’s worth of steaks with a side of mash potatoes the size of a mountain.
He was so damn hungry.
Brundar would have never been as patient.
If he had even an inkling of a suspicion that Wonder knew where Anandur was, he would have no qualms about torturing the information out of her.
Fates, he hoped that wasn’t what was holding her up. He would hate to beat the shit out of his brother for trying to find him. It would be a grossly ungrateful thing to do.
But no one harmed Wonder without paying for it, not even Brundar, and not even with the best of intentions.
52
Brundar
“What floor is she on?” Brundar asked as they entered the lobby of the building where Rosalie had an office.
“I forgot to ask.” Magnus walked over to the board and scanned the list of names and their suite numbers.
With the help of the facial recognition software and the woman’s first name, William had found out who she was.
Rosalie Sanchez was an accountant and she had her own office.
This morning Magnus had called her, introducing himself as a police detective, and scheduled an appointment.
“Found her. Third floor. Suite three hundred and two.” Brundar started walking toward the elevators.
As they followed a leggy woman in a tight skirt inside, Magnus leaned over her and pressed the floor number. “Pardon me, miss,” he said with an exaggerated Scottish twang.
She smiled. “What a lovely accent. Are you Australian?”
Brundar rolled his eyes. This was no time for flirting.
“Come on.” He gave Magnus a shove out as they reached the third floor.
When he found the right suite number, Brundar knocked and then walked in and flashed his fake badge. “We are here to see Ms. Sanchez.”
“Good morning,” the receptionist greeted them. “Please take a seat. I’ll let her know you’re here.” She picked up the phone. “Rosalie, your ten o'clock are here.”
As the accountant opened the door and walked over, Brundar knew he had the right woman. She was Anandur’s type. A sturdy build, a pretty face, and a welcoming smile.
“Detective Magnus McBain?” she asked.
“That’s me.” Magnus pushed to his feet and shook her hand. “This is my partner, Detective Brad Wilson.”
“Can we talk in your office, Ms. Sanchez?” Brundar asked, ignoring the woman’s offered hand.
Since Callie, it had gotten easier for him to touch others, but he still preferred not to.
“Yes, of course. Please come in.” She motioned for them to follow her inside, and then closed the door.
“What is it all about?” Rosalie asked as the three of them sat down.
Brundar pulled out his phone and chose one of the few pictures of Anandur he had. It was good that Callie liked to snap photos and share them with him. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have any.
“Do you remember this man?”
Rosalie took the phone, looked at the picture, enlarged it with her fingers, and then shook her head. “He looks vaguely familiar. But I don’t remember where I’ve seen him.”
That was odd. Anandur sucked at thralling, but even he knew how to erase the memory of the bite without erasing everything else. Unless, he’d wanted the woman to forget him completely, which wasn’t like him at all.
“You were seen with my partner two nights ago at Club Nirvana,” Magnus said. “You left together with him and then returned to the club alone. No one has seen or heard from my partner ever since.”
As Magnus kept her occupied, Brundar peeked inside Rosalie’s brain, quickly sifting through her recent memories. She’d been telling the truth, Anandur wasn’t there, as well as a big chunk of other memories. Someone had done a shitty thralling job on her.
A Doomer, no doubt.
Rosalie blushed. “I seriously can’t remember any of it. In fact, I don’t remember much about that night at all. I was there with a friend. Maybe she remembers your partner.”
“Can you give us her name and phone number?”
“Sure.” She took a post-it note and wrote the information down. “Here you go. I remember getting home and feeling drunk, which was strange since I only had two drinks, and they weren’t loaded. I expected to wake up with a headache, but I didn't. Could someone have slipped me a roofie?” She cast an accusatory glance at Magnus.
“If someone had, it wasn’t my partner. I can assure you of that.”
Brundar got up. “Thank you. We will be in touch.”
“If you remember anything else, please call me.” Magnus handed her his business card.
“I will. I’m so sorry I couldn’t be more helpful.”
“You’ve done your best.” Magnus offered her his hand. “We will let ourselves out. Good day, Ms. Sanchez.”
Brundar nodded and followed Magnus out.
“So what do you think?” Magnus asked as they stepped out into the corridor and headed for the elevators. “Was she lying?”
“No. Someone did a piss poor job on her memories. Anandur wouldn’t have erased himself completely. Someone else did it.”
“Doomers?” Magnus asked as they exited the lobby.
“That’s the most logical assumption. They either followed him and the woman from the club to the alley, or they happened to be there with their own catch for the night and seized the opportunity. After all, that same alley serves several clubs, pubs, and restaurants
, though I doubt Doomers pick up their victims in restaurants.”
Magnus shook his head. “If this is so, Anandur is screwed.” He clicked the rental’s doors open.
Brundar got in the passenger seat and dropped his head against the headrest.
Something in this scenario didn’t add up.
As soon as the Doomers arrived at the club, Anandur would’ve felt them.
Brundar knew his brother well. Anandur wasn’t rash, and he wasn’t the type to jump into a situation. He would have never taken the woman outside.
What he would’ve done was get out himself and call Magnus to come back. Together they would’ve waited for the Doomers to exit and engaged them away from the humans.
As for getting jumped in the alley, that could’ve happened only if Anandur was too preoccupied with the woman. Knowing Doomers, though, they would’ve knocked her out as well, instead of bothering to thrall her. Capturing a Guardian was too big of a deal for them to risk taking the time to thrall Rosalie. She would have been found either unconscious or dead in that alley.
Except, what other possibilities were there?
The bouncer knew something she wasn’t telling, but Brundar couldn’t begin to guess what it was. He’d tried to take a peek at her memories while she’d been busy with Tim, but the girl’s mind was impenetrable. She was either too cautious to lower her mental shields, or she was an immune.
Some humans couldn’t be thralled. There were those whose brains were too powerful, like Turner, and there were those whose suspicious nature made them unreceptive, like Alex’s Russian crew. Wonder didn’t strike him as overly bright, so she must’ve been the second type.
On a hunch, he’d followed her last night, hoping to uncover something about her that would substantiate his suspicions, but the girl had gone home and stayed there.
After waiting for a couple of hours to see if she would get out and drive somewhere else, he’d wised up and headed for the nearest twenty-four-hour Wal-Mart. Given that there was nowhere he could have gotten a tracking device in the middle of the night, he’d done the next best thing, buying a throwaway cellphone, including activation and an extra battery pack.
Anandur would have a good laugh about it when he got back. The discount store was his go-to shop for everything destination, and for years Brundar had looked down on him for being a cheap bastard. However, there was something to be said for the convenience of finding most everything in one spot, especially late at night.
With William’s help, the improvised tracker Brundar had taped under Wonder’s car chassis was transmitting her location to the tail she now had.
The moment she did something suspicious Brundar would know.
“Did you get the list of places Wonder cleans during the day?” he asked.
Magnus nodded. “Yeah, I texted the addresses to Liam.”
The strong smell of cleaning products she’d been covered with yesterday had been so overwhelming, that Tony had felt like he needed to explain that Wonder had another day job as a cleaner for a commercial real estate maintenance company.
That was most likely what Liam would find out. But on the remote chance that there was more to her than met the eye, the Guardian should follow her until her shift at the club began. Once there, another undercover Guardian would monitor her activity and then follow her home.
After all, it wasn’t as if Brundar had any other leads. At least not yet.
The guy with the dogs, or The Finder of Lost Things, was finally coming at four in the afternoon. Who would’ve thought that a service like that would be in such high demand? Brundar had to offer twice the asking price to be put ahead of the other clients on the guy’s schedule.
53
Wonder
First thing Wonder did when she woke up was to look out the window. The car from last night wasn’t there, but that didn’t mean that it wasn’t hiding behind the corner or somewhere further down or up the street.
She would soon find out.
Lying awake in bed for most of the night, she’d finally formed a plan. It wasn’t foolproof, and it wasn’t going to provide her with the measure of certainty she would’ve liked, but it was the best one she could come up with.
Wonder had made a list of questions, and she was going to fire them at Anandur one after the other. That way, he wouldn’t have time to come up with lies between one question and the next. He’d be forced to either tell the truth or refuse to answer.
Unless he was an extraordinary liar, one who could make up stories on the spot, it would be difficult for him to fool her.
But first, she had to make sure no one was following her.
Fifteen minutes or so later, Wonder was dressed and ready for some evasive maneuvers. As soon as she pulled out of her parking spot, she checked her rearview mirror for the white Ford.
There was no sign of it.
So far so good.
Nevertheless, Wonder drove to the supermarket first, got inside, and then spent a good ten minutes peering through the window to see if the Ford showed up.
“Can I help you, miss?” one of the employees asked.
It must’ve seemed odd for a customer to stand by the front window and look outside, especially one that was stretching up to her tiptoes. If Wonder were a few inches shorter, she wouldn’t have been able to see anything over the stacks of merchandise lining the front of the store.
“No, thank you. I’m waiting for a friend.”
“If you need anything, let me know.”
“Thank you.”
She waited a couple more minutes before hitting the aisles for supplies. To feed her prisoners, she usually bought a twenty-pound bag of rice, a five-pound bag of black beans, another the same size of pinto beans, and a few seasonings to vary the taste. They kept complaining about the food, but given the quantities they consumed, it was all she could afford. And it wasn’t as if she was eating anything better. Wonder’s lunch was the same dish of rice and beans she served them daily.
Today, though, she splurged, buying a few extra treats for Anandur. If he thought she was into him, his guard would be down, and he would talk more freely.
And how was that for an excuse?
The sad truth was that she was into him for real. In a different universe, where she and Anandur had met under different circumstances, she would have loved to treat him to tasty things. She would have fed him the small morsels with her fingers like she’d done before.
For some reason, it had been oddly arousing, maybe because his lips had been so close. He had such kissable lips. Thick and fleshy.
Wonder closed her eyes and imagined herself wrapped in Anandur’s strong arms, kissing him, him kissing her back.
Would he be a gentle kisser, or a covetous one, or a ravenous one?
All she had for reference were movies, and the few kisses she’d found exciting to watch. Most looked so fake it was obvious the actors weren’t into them. But there had been a few she’d seen that had stirred something inside her. It wasn’t about how handsome the male lead was, or how beautiful the female, and it wasn’t even about the kiss itself. It was more about the chemistry between the actors.
Sometimes it looked so real.
There was no lack of chemistry between her and Anandur. In fact, there was so much of it that it was practically explosive. Unless she was imagining it and it was all one-sided.
Did he want to kiss her as much as she wanted to kiss him?
Stop thinking about stupid kisses!
Her life might be on the line, and instead of planning an interrogation, she was fantasizing about lips. Well, in her defense, there was a connection. Anandur would be using those to answer her questions.
Right. She was so full of dumb excuses today.
Adding a few snacks to her cart, including a six-pack of cola in addition to the beer, she headed for the cashier.
Before stepping outside though, Wonder peeked through the front window again, scanning the supermarket’s parking lot for the wh
ite Ford. There was one, but it had a rack mounted on its roof. The one from last night had none.
“Do you need help outside, miss?” asked the same employee from before.
“No, thank you. I’m fine.”
The guy eyed her big sack of rice. “Are you sure? This looks heavy.”
“I’m sure.” She pushed the cart out the door.
The guy followed. “It’s really no trouble. It’s my job to help customers with their groceries.”
Why was he so insistent?
He must’ve been new because she didn’t remember seeing him there before. Maybe he needed to help her because his boss was watching?
Wonder knew all about wanting to impress an employer in order to keep a job. “Fine. That one over there is mine.” She pointed at her car.
He took the cart from her. “I’m Scott.” He pointed to the tag attached to his apron.
“Are you Scottish?”
He frowned. “No. Are you new around here?”
“Not really. I’ve been shopping at this supermarket for a while, but I didn’t see you before.” She eyed him suspiciously. Why was he asking her questions?
“I just got the job. It’s part-time. I’m a student.”
“That’s nice.” Wonder used her key to open the trunk. Hers was an old model that didn’t come with a remote.
“Are you a student?” Scott asked as he hefted the sack of rice and dropped it inside.
“No, why are you asking?”
The guy tilted his head. “Isn’t it obvious?”
“Not to me.”
He shook his head. “Where have you come from, a convent? Don't tell me you never had guys hit on you. Not with that face.” He gave her an appreciative once-over. “And not with that body.”
Wonder relaxed. Scott was coming on to her, that was all. It didn’t happen often, but it had happened before. She should’ve recognized it for what it was.
Except, her head was somewhere else, imagining secret agents impersonating supermarket employees and trying to get information out of her.
