His heart froze in his chest.
What had he almost done?
He was about to commit a grave mistake. If he forced her back like this, it proved that he was being a selfish monster, not because it was what they both needed. He had sworn to protect her, and it was clear that right now, the only person she needed protecting from was him. What a lecherous bastard he was. His parents didn’t raise him to behave like this. He should be a better boyfriend. A better person…
Trent clenched his hand into a fist and brought it to his mouth. He bit down on his knuckles until they bled. The shot of pain jarred some sense into him, sobering him even more. Control your damn beast; he could hear his late father’s voice in the back of his mind. He had been a slow learner compared to his brothers. He managed to rein in his tiger most of the time, but facing his current dilemma, it was easy for him to slip.
He slowly sucked air through his teeth. He had to leave before he slipped again and did the unthinkable.
Slowly he got back to his feet, then climbed to the side of the building and vaulted to the roof. He took another glance in her direction—he couldn’t see her—before he vanished into the early morning light.
~~~
Arielle had only been walking for an hour—she saw the clock at a twenty-four-hour diner—but it felt as if she had been walking for miles. She wiped her tears away and wondered why she let herself be reduced to this state? No problem in the world was without solution and this one was the same. She questioned why she became upset in the first place. Was it because he was a shifter or because he kept that fact hidden from her? Was it because he had betrayed her trust by not telling her such an important fact before they started dating? Was it really a deal breaker that Trent wasn’t fully human?
Did she overreact to this whole situation? So what if he wasn’t entirely human. Was that so bad? Whatever he was, Trent was still the same on the inside. She knew he loved her.
And she loved him.
That thought made her stop in tracks.
A twinge of ache stirred deep inside her chest once she was honest with herself.
Yes, I love him. I love that he’s a sweet and gentle guy, but he can be a demanding and fierce lover. He’s funny and polite and he never leaves the toilet seat up. He’s the man every woman has been dreaming their entire life.
He never criticizes me. Never belittles me.
He respects my space and boundaries and he’s always there when I need him the most.
I would be crazy to let him go.
That man’s a keeper.
She pushed down the hood of her sweatshirt and looked up to the sky. The cloak of night still shrouded the new day, but at the edge of the horizon, a splash of dawn slowly made its presence known with every passing minute.
Beautiful, she thought. The day gets bright so early in the summer. When was the last time she appreciated the little things like she was now? She’d been so wrapped up in her problems, she’d forgotten to take a breather once in a while. And Trent had taught her to slow down and appreciate what life had to offer.
I can’t imagine life without him now.
The very thought scared her. No. She didn’t want to lose him. Just when she finally met someone who made her happy.
She took a deep breath and everything became lighter. She looked around, taking in her surroundings. Good lord, she didn’t even recognize where she was anymore. She definitely wasn’t in the Village.
She’d better head back.
But first, she had to call Trent. He must have been worried. Especially considering the way she left. She searched in her pocket for her phone and realized she had forgotten to take it with her. Geez. Why do I keep forgetting that damn thing? She walked around and found a pay phone by a bar at a small intersection. Come to think of it, pay phones were a rarity in the city now; she was kind of shocked to find one at all. Worst of all, she didn’t have a single dollar on her, so she was deeply relieved when the dial tone worked. After wiping the receiver on her jacket, she pushed “0” for the operator. Her heart leapt with joy when someone answered on the end of the line.
“Um, hello? I’d like to place a collect call to Trent Alexander, please. The number is…”
Chapter Ten
Trent brooded in the living room of the apartment. His mood was getting darker by the second since he got back. The suspense was killing him. Would she come back? Would she leave? Was she so repulsed by him that she wouldn’t want to see him again? Not knowing what would happen was slowly chiseling away his sanity.
He jumped when his phone rang and answered without checking the caller. “Yes? I’ll accept the charges. Arielle? Where are you? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” she said. “I think I’m lost and I forgot my phone.”
“I’ll come and pick you up.”
“No, you don’t have to do that. I’ll just hail a cab when I see one. Listen, Trent, I want to apologize for what I did earlier. I acted irrationally and that must have offended you, and for that, I’m sorry. I was so surprised, I freaked out.”
“I’m the one who should’ve apologized to you, Arielle. I should have never deceived you in the first place.”
“I probably wouldn’t have believed it if you’d just told me. I understand why you kept that from me. But I think we can work this thing out, Trent.”
A flicker of hope lit from the depth of his uneasiness. “So, you’ll stay?”
A quiet laugh. “Yes. I’m not going to give up on you that easily, Trent. You didn’t give up on me. You’ve been there when I needed someone, when no one else was there to help me. My world is better with you in it.”
At that very moment, the heavy burden in his chest vanished. She was staying. She wanted him! Trent felt like laughing out loud.
“Naturally, I have a lot of questions I want to ask you,” she added. “And I don’t know where to begin.”
“You need to come home first.”
“I know. I don’t see a taxi around…”
“I’ll pick you up; just tell me where you are.”
“Um, I’m not quite sure. I don’t see a street sign…”
Trent waited. “Arielle?”
He heard men’s voices in the background and the sounds of scuffling. Then, the sound of the receiver hitting the pavement.
Trent jumped from the sofa. “Arielle? Answer me! Arielle? Arielle!”
The line went dead.
He almost hurled the phone into the wall from frustration. Damn! What happened to her? Was she being mugged again? That woman was a magnet for trouble. He stared at his phone, waiting for her to call again. He fidgeted. His instinct told him she wouldn’t call back. She was in trouble.
“Fuck!”
Wasting no time, Trent put on his sneakers and headed for the roof. He jumped from one rooftop to another, racing to the place where he saw her last. He lurched from the gutter and jumped down the sidewalk without too much noise. When he decided to stop stalking her, she was under this balcony, crying. He paced around trying to get a fix on her scent. It was there, but only faintly. In a city this big, a person’s scent could easily be corrupted by others, not to mention the smell of the city itself. The warm weather didn’t help either. A dozen yards away, he caught the stench of someone who had just urinated in a bush. Ugh. Trent wanted to kill that person. Stalking someone via scent was easy to do when the person was around. Stalking that person’s after-scent in the city was damn-near impossible.
He was torn.
This whole business would be easier had she gotten lost in the woods or a remote place that wasn’t populated with many humans. Which way did she go? Forward or backward? He read somewhere that a person was psychologically inclined to go in the direction of one’s dominant hand. Arielle was a righty. Forward, then.
He rushed ahead while he tried harder to keep hold of her scent. If he could just transform into his alter animal, his sense of smell would sharpen tremend
ously. Damn. Bad timing. At this hour, cars and the occasional pedestrian were already lining the street. He couldn’t just shift willy-nilly.
In the meantime, her scent had begun to fade until he couldn’t smell it at all. Did she take this street? She called him from a pay phone. He scanned his surroundings for one, but he didn’t see any. She didn’t call from this area. Far further. He was already home for half an hour when he received her call.
He should return to his starting point and check other streets, but time was of the essence. He couldn’t waste any more of it.
Grinding his teeth, he grabbed his phone and dialed Quinn’s number. His brother was going to be pissed at him for calling this early, but it was an emergency. After the third ring, Quinn finally answered.
“Quinn,” Trent growled urgently. “I need your help.”
~~~
Arielle sat in a daze in the back seat of a car, wondering if what had happened in the past ten minutes was real.
She was being kidnapped.
Two scary-looking guys had grabbed her and wrestled her into a dark sedan. She had been stunned, so she didn’t put up too much of a fight. That was just great. Reality was different than TV. She should be kicking and screaming, but instead, she was as meek as a lamb being led to the slaughter. Her hands were cold. Her knees were weak. If she were forced to stand, she’d collapse from fright.
Why? Why have these men kidnapped me? What did I do that was so bad, someone wanted revenge?
The answer came from nowhere, hitting her straight between the eyes.
Why, of course. Who did I piss off recently?
Frank Darbo.
I’ll get that bitch one way or another, he had said.
Damn. She guessed he wasn’t just braying an empty threat, that slimy bastard. She didn’t think he was the kind of guy who’d follow through, though.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked the driver. Both men sat in the front. A little quiver tinged her voice. She tried to be brave, but she couldn’t shake her fear. Dozens of dreadful scenarios played in her mind, each more devastating than the last, increasing her already paralyzing terror. Darbo had connections to the mob. She could end up neck-deep in cement. Or she could become a special ingredient in a meat grinder at a slaughter house somewhere.
Ugh. She felt like she was going to throw up.
From the rearview mirror, the guy who grabbed her flashed a hair-rising smile. He didn’t gag her—thank God for small favors. He only bound her wrists with duct tape.
“Just going to take a little ride, Ms. Winter,” he said.
Well, at least he was polite. Wasn’t he nice?
“Is Frank Darbo the one who ordered you to do this?” she asked.
The guy didn’t answer, but he winked in the rearview mirror.
She shuddered inwardly. What was up with that? Her creep o’ meter hit an all-time high. “Next time, tell him to make an appointment if he wants to see me,” she said, mustering every last ounce of her bravado to sound tough.
This time the driver glared at her and her wit instantly evaporated. The man looked scary to boot. She wasn’t a defense attorney so she didn’t know how to interact with colorful individuals.
They drove for a short time before they finally pulled into a dark alley. Her kidnappers herded her into the back door of a building that turned out to be a gentlemen’s club. There was a stage with poles. Two cages hung from the ceiling. Oversized LCD screens mounted on the walls. The gaudy place was deserted; not a customer was in sight. As they walked further in, a surly bartender who wiped down the counter eyed her with suspicion.
“Where’s Rob?” asked the driver.
The bartender gestured with his chin.
The kidnappers pushed her into a dressing room. When a burly man resembling a Rottweiler came to her, she suddenly understood where she was now; Darbo’s club where she first tried to serve him.
“You again?” she said to him dismally.
He motioned for her to sit on a chair.
When she didn’t do it, the driver grabbed her shoulders and pushed her to sit down.
“Don’t touch me,” she snarled. “I don’t know where your hands have been.”
The other door in the dressing room opened and a man with a squirrelly face flounced in. Frank Darbo was as unpleasant as she remembered. A woman with a skimpy outfit followed him, looking terminally bored.
“Ah, the lawyer gal.” Darbo pointed at her with the cigar in his hand. The acrid smoke from it added an even more unpleasant smell to the room. “You caused me so much trouble.”
“What do you want? Are you going to kill me?”
“Kill you?” Darbo laughed boisterously. “That’d be too easy. If I wanted to kill you, you’d be dead already.” He grabbed a chair and sat on it. “Despite how I look, I always play fair.”
“Is that so?” Arielle gave him a dirty look. “If you always play fair, our client wouldn’t have sued you in the first place. She got injured while working in your club.”
“Bitch was clumsy; ain’t my fault. But you—you caused me lotsa grief. You humiliated me in front of my esteemed colleagues.”
“Is this about you getting beaten up by John Alexander?” she asked. “Weren’t you the one who threw the first punch? Why are you taking this out on me?”
“Because of you, I was humiliated, and I don’t take that kind of embarrassment lightly. So in return, I will give you a taste of your own medicine.”
“What do you mean?”
Darbo only laughed. “You’re gonna dance on that stage and we’re gonna take a few pictures. For your boss and her clients. Maybe we leak a few on the internet. And we’ll see after that if you still have a career in law.”
“Over my dead body.”
Darbo leered with a toothy smile. “That can also be arranged.” He snapped his fingers and the two men who kidnapped her held her to the chair. The Rottweiler produced a syringe from his jacket pocket.
A new terror washed over her. “What is that? Let me go!”
“It’s something to make you relax. Don’t worry, you’re gonna feel good and cooperative.” Darbo signaled his bodyguard.
“No!” She watched helplessly as the Rottweiler secured her arm and stuck the needle into her vein. The effect was immediate. Her head was light and bubbly. Her eyelids were heavy. She felt as if she was floating among the clouds…
Chapter Eleven
John arrived at Quinn’s apartment while Vanessa was working her magic, tracing Arielle’s call to Trent’s cell phone. Trent rushed over to Quinn’s place after he told the alpha his problem. Quinn then woke Vanessa for help. She was a genius with computers and had a connection with some hacker group. By the time Trent arrived at Quinn’s place, Vanessa was already hard at work behind the computer screen, talking with her hacker friends via the deep web. Ten minutes later, John showed up. Quinn had also called him over.
“What happened? Aren’t you supposed to be having sex right now?” John said with a laugh.
Trent growled, almost losing it. He wasn’t in the mood for jokes. He was worried sick. Knowing that Arielle was in danger, he couldn’t think rationally. His actions were driven by pure instinct. Years of experience as an intelligence officer in the Air Force, where he was conditioned and trained to act calmly with full composure in difficult situations, all went down the drain in an instant. His alter beast raged inside him, demanding immediate action. His patience was wearing thin with every second that ticked by.
“Stop goading him. You’re not helping,” Quinn chastised John.
“Sorry. What happened?” asked John, reverting to his best behavior.
Quinn went through the story one more time while Trent paced back and forth in Quinn’s home office. He was losing the battle against his tiger. It felt like he could fully transform at any time. His nails elongated into claws and his upper arms sprouted with fur.
“Maybe I should just go to
the police,” Trent said, impatient. “I also have a friend in the FBI and he could put a trace on my phone.”
“Hey! We’re almost done,” said Vanessa from behind the screen. “Just give us a few more minutes. Hacking into your phone provider isn’t easy, you know?”
“Be patient, Trent,” said Quinn.
He couldn’t. He shouldn’t have let her go out alone. He should have followed her from a distance. If he did that, none of this would have happened.
“Can you think of anyone who would want to hurt her?” Quinn asked Trent. “Did she have any enemies? Someone who has a grudge against her?”
“I don’t think so. She rarely talks about her cases. Besides, she isn’t practicing anymore. She works behind the scenes.”
“What about that guy she served? Frank Darbo. Remember, the night you saved her from the chimney?” asked John.
“What about it? She told me her boss is going to settle case. You think he might do something like this?”
John wrinkled his nose. “Darbo is a scumbag. It’s common knowledge in our circle.”
“Then we should check his place. Do you know where he lives?” asked Trent, antsy.
“Calm down.” Quinn clamped his hand on Trent’s shoulder. “Nobody leaves until I say so. Especially you, Trent. In times like this, you need to keep your cool.”
Trent growled unhappily. The Alpha’s order was absolute.
“We got it!” shouted Vanessa from behind the screen.
They all rushed to look her at findings. Trent scanned the computer screen, trying to visualize the location on the map where Arielle had made her phone call. He didn’t think Arielle had walked that far. She had meandered more than five avenues.
Quinn read the street address and told Vanessa to jot it down.
“What are we waiting for? Let’s go,” said Trent.
“Wait,” Quinn halted him. “Even if we get there, can you get a lock on her scent?”
“I’ll try.”
Animalistic Galley Fin Page 10
