Perfect Reflection

by Jana Leigh

  “Anyway, he wants to meet Jewel so he is coming back,” Ret said and shrugged.

  Lex rolled his eyes. “What he means is that his father is flying back right now to make sure he is okay, he wants to meet Josh if we find him, however, he knows that is a lost cause.”

  “Then why?” Vander shrugged.

  “He is in shock, I think when he realized one of his sons was raised by that crazy bastard he felt bad, I told him it was too late for that. Nature vs. Nurture and all that shit. I am just glad he got the psycho bug and not me.” Ret frowned.

  “Oh don’t worry, you are plenty crazy,” Jewel said and patted his cheek.

  They talked like this the entire way to Atlanta. It was a good avoidance tactic Jewel thought and hurried to the car that met them. Detectives had been sitting on the house watching. Josh was in there.

  ***

  He looked out the window; the same car had been there yesterday. It was time to move. He grabbed his bag. They would never find him; he laughed and went to his garage.

  Dumbasses could sit out there all they wanted; he was not leaving that way.

  “Hey, honey, I am home,” Jewel called out as he bent over the lid to the tunnel that he was going to escape by and flipped it over. Shit.

  Josh turned and looked at the five people who were standing in the garage doorway, he never even heard them open it. Assholes. Three of them had guns pointed at various places on his body and he rolled his eyes.

  “Hey crazy, ex-wife,” Josh said and grinned.

  “Yeah, well whatever, so you running? Move away from the tunnel,” Jewel said.

  “Nope, just waiting. So you gonna take me in?” Josh said laughing and holding out his arms, taking a few steps away—he could play for now.

  Vander looked at Jewel before throwing a set of cuffs on the ground. “Here.”

  Josh frowned. “How the hell am I supposed to put them on myself?”

  “Nah, I just want you to reach for them, you see right outside there are about thirty policemen waiting to blow your head off if you make a wrong move. I don’t want Jewel to lose any sleep over it so just make the right move, man,” Vander growled.

  “Dude, you were supposed to be my bestie, I am hurt,” Josh pouted.

  “Yeah, we can hug it out when you are dead,” Vander snapped and then stepped to the side. “Seriously, do everyone a fucking favor and let them kill you. Save us the cost of the fucking meds it would take to kill your ass.”

  “Hey, I know. Van, do you want to meet my mate, she is awesome. Jewel, did you find her?” Josh said eagerly. When she shook her head, he smiled and almost crowed. “I really wanted to have you at the ceremony.”

  “Why the fuck would I go to your ceremony.” Vander laughed loudly.

  “I hate to let such a nice surprise out, but since we seem to be at an impasse. What the hell! Your mother is my mate.” Josh laughed when he saw the shocked look cross Vander’s face. Jewel paused, looked at Vander, and growled a warning. He was baiting them to try to shot him.

  “I don’t think so,” Vander said and held up his gun higher, aiming for the man’s head.

  “See for yourself.” Josh laughed and threw a picture on the floor. Vander glanced down and swore. It was a picture of his mother and Josh standing in front of a chapel.

  “Were is she?” Vander ground out.

  “Waiting for me,” Josh said smugly. “You remember what a good little whore she was, right?”

  Fuck you,” Vander yelled.

  “Wow, I am really hurt. How about you, brother? You want me dead, too?” Josh said and shuffled a little back, if he could just distract them for a second, he would be home free.

  “Don’t care either way, asshole, and there is no way you are my brother,” Ret said and pulled Lex to him. “He is a bastard.”

  Josh made a little tsking noise with his mouth, looked at Benny, and smiled. “Hey, old man, how about you?”

  “Fuck off.” Benny snarled and held up his gun. One more step and he was gone.

  “Damn, that is all you can say?” Josh said and braced himself to jump.

  “What is your name? No bullshit this time,” Vander yelled.

  He smiled and shook his head. “The Redeemer, now if you don’t mind,” he said and made his move.

  “Yep, I do mind, you mother fucker,” Jewel said, fired her gun, and held it on Josh while he crumpled and fell on the floor screaming in pain. She had shot him in the upper thigh. Of course, she thought about shooting his dick off, but she did have mercy.

  Epilogue

  Vander looked around the room stunned. It was fucking creepy. He turned to his partner, Jewel, and said, “What the fuck is all of this? I mean, think about all the crazy shit he has done, my mom, you, Ret, his dad. All of the lives he brought together for what?”

  “His murder room. This is where we will find the answers to our questions. We just have to think butt ass crazy like him,” Jewel said slowly and looked at one wall first, it held her wedding picture to him, and Lex at work, and Ret dining out. All of their movements documented down to the their daily schedule. Shit, he had been watching since he faked his death.

  They moved from wall to wall until they got to the last one. Vander stepped back and looked at his picture in the center. Kane, Ret’s Head of Security, was next to him, and then there was a woman. None of them recognized her, but there was a heart drawn around the woman’s face.

  Shit, what the hell did this mean?

  “Well shit,” Jewel heard from the back of the room. She turned and saw her mate, Ret, with his Head of Security, Kane, looking down at his toes.

  “What?” Vander said, looking at the pair suspiciously.

  “Kane just told me, sorry, we were going to wait outside, but he insisted,” Ret said and pushed his friend with his shoulder.

  “What?” Kane said and Jewel laughed when the shifter turned red. “Oh yeah, sorry. I…ummm…that is…I know this will come as a shock. I wanted to wait until the case was over and all, but Vander is my mate. And if I am not mistaken, she is our other one.”

  “The fuck you say?!” Vander said and looked around the room at the wolves who were laughing.

  “Looks like we are staying in Atlanta for a few more days, guys,” Jewel said smugly and then walked to the stairs. “Let the lab crawl through this and then send the report, we need to find out where the real asshole, Campbell, is and fast, our mystery woman is in danger.”

  “How many followers do you think he has?” Benny asked from the corner and looked at the picture. It was what nightmares were made of, a picture of women and men, all in a state of undress, cut and bleeding. Sick bastard.

  “I don’t know, but this is far from over. We have to find out where the real Josh Campbell is,” Vander said and walked to the stairs, looked at his friends, and smiled. “Pony up, cowboys and girl.”

  Books by Jana Leigh

  Denver Pack Series

  Alpha's Mate

  Tey's White Wolf

  Devon: The Beta's Double Trouble

  Cloe: Two for the Bite of One

  Reggie: A Wolf's Changing Heart

  Blaine: A Wolf's Second Sight

  Lacy: Seeing Double

  Jordan's Misunderstanding

  Trinity: Heart of the Shifters

  Argus: Meeting the Challenge

  Trace: Following His Destiny

  Shea: The Last Hope

  Denver Pack Twelve 1/2

  Chosen Wars Series

  Cat’s Choice

  Dante’s Dream

  Book Three – Coming Soon

  Other books include

  Dangerous Series

  Dangerous Trio

  Dangerous Two

  Dangerous Finale

  Dangerous: Working Against the Clock

  Dangerous: Off Limits

  Dangerous: All Bark No Bite

  Cassidy Family Series

  Playing With Zack

  Killing Jared

  Holiday Surpr
ise

  Drekinn Series

  The Mating Call

  Healing Cherri

  Mob Moms’ Christmas

  Reaching Rissa

  Kiki’s story – coming soon

  New Series Coming 2013

  Cowboy Seal’s Elite

  Co-authoring two New Series

  Meridian Warriors Series with Zach Collins – coming soon

  Shifter Justice with Bryce Evans – coming soon

  I would love to hear from you!

  Website: www.janaleighauthor.com

  Email: jana@janaleighauthor.com

  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/#!/janaleigh731

  Excerpt from Reaching Rissa

  Book Three in the Drekinn Series

  by Jana Leigh

  Prologue

  Rissa snuck out the window of her room. Who really gave a shit that it was on the second floor of the main home on the compound of the Drekinn Packs hideout? Who cared if she was going to have to jump into the thick bushes that surrounded the house? Who cared if her friends were going to kick her ass, and her mother would yell at her from the embarrassment of it all? Who really cared, because Rissa was not going to be mated to a crazy fucking psycho, they all assured her over the last month that he was not who or what he seemed. However, she wasn’t stupid. She watched television. There are men all over the world who lure their victims into a false sense of security, and them BAM! He kills you!

  Well, not her—Mr. Twisted Mate had been the phantom strange man they chased for the last few years. There was no way he wasn’t exactly what they thought he was, a fucking weirdo, she saw the tapes. However, no, she refused to make him pull his pants down and find out if he had a birthmark like the one she had to stare at when she endured watching the surveillance videos. The videos were just wrong. However, it was not the strange sex he seemed to enjoy that scared the piss out of her. She thought a tap or two on the ass would be enjoyable. No, it was the torture she’d watched that made her shiver in disgust.

  She knew what she saw, and the man who appeared in front of her at Christmas suddenly had been the man who she saw electrocute and cut several Magical Beings in the last few years. As members of the Drekinn Agency, they were honor bound to uphold the laws of the Regulation Community.

  The Community was made up of humans and only two shifters. One was the head of the Drekinn Agency, which at the time was Ms. Praton, and Brooks, her right hand man. Now they were banned, since everything went to hell in a hand basket a few months ago. The situation was just so confusing when it actually happened. However, right now, she had to deal with the present, she had to get the hell out of there.

  Rissa told her friends she was not going to mate with the sick bastard, but they had both laughed at her. She was pissed, her friend’s betrayal was just enough to push her right over the edge, see if they get this message. Rissa already had to endure a lecture from her mother, and if that was not scary enough, Vivi, Calli’s mom, actually gave her pointers on how to deal with a dominant man. Rissa grimaced and closed her eyes, which was a nightmare in and of itself. However, that added to the Treacherous Bitches, Rissa was done.

  She packed a bag with supplies, clothes, and food. She was not completely inept as her friends thought. She knew she couldn’t go back to New York, shit she was like on the most wanted list. DEAD OR ALIVE… FORMER MEMBERS OF THE DREKINN AGENCY. Her mother loved it. However, it did put a bit of a damper on meeting a normal man, which is what she wanted. That too was completely fucked up, Rissa thought.

  Picture it, Christmas morning, opening presents, and having fun with family and friends, the first fun they had for months. They were on the run from the whole fucking world, and in their own little compound, a sliver of joy had been there. Rissa loved Christmas, now it was the bane of her existence because she would always remember the day she found out her mate was a psychopath murderer, on her favorite holiday.

  They teased her mercilessly for a month and thus, the reason for her escape. The dreaded holiday if you didn’t have a date or a mate—Valentine's Day. She refused to acknowledge the fact that they were mates, so therefore she did the only thing she could, planned her escape.

  For the last few weeks, she hoarded food slowly in her room and then she made sure she dug around and found simple camping gear and other supplies. Now she was ready. Thankfully, it was right when she knew the Twisted Mate was set to appear. He supposedly was undercover with the Ulfer. Right, as if he could have been undercover for the last few years while the Bondi King tortured and killed many of their own—Shifters.

  Rissa paused and waited, listening closely to make sure no one was lurking in the corridor waiting. She knew her friends had been making plans for her and the Twisted Mate to meet again. The meeting had gone so fabulously before, you know, however, they thought it would work now. Rissa snorted, her friends were just this side of fucking nuts themselves, especially if they thought she would go quietly.

  Rissa peered over the windowsill again and took a deep breath. She could do this, if not, she would probably be bound and gagged by her friends tomorrow, that’s when they set the whole meeting up. Well, she was not going to be there. For the last few weeks when she shifted and ran, Rissa scoped out a place for her to hide. She found one by the south border of the compound’s land.

  To make a long story short, Calli, Cherri, and herself had been employees of the Drekinn Agency. The Agency was developed to monitor and regulate the Shifter and Magical Community with the humans. Nowadays, the world's infrastructure was a lot different. Each of the countries had an ambassador, and they sat on the World Assembly Congress, or the WAC. In July 20, 2236, the WAC was formed because the economic crisis finally reached epic proportions and all the countries collectively declared bankruptcy. It was a tremulous time, and all due to the war they had waged on the Breyting, although no one would admit it. Each country tried to round up the Breyting and cage them. None of them realized that it was impossible to round them all up. Some humans had the DNA strand and didn't even know it. Basically, they shot themselves in the foot, and then the Breyting helped them reorganize.

  Callie and her friends had wanted to be a part of the Drekinn Agency from the first day they saw Ms. Praton announce she was heading up the Agency for the regulation of the Breyting and Ulfer world. The humans had no clue how to deal with them, so they quickly handed it over to Ms. Praton. There were positive and negatives to that. Basically, if everything was running smoothly, then the WAC patted them on the back for thinking of letting the animals police themselves. However, if a highly public Ulfer incident happened, they tried to flex—it never worked. Ms. Praton was one scary dragon when she was pissed, well, her name was actually Pilar, but that was another story.

  For years, they had done their job, making rank, and rising in the company until they were all at the top of their field. Calli was the Head Enforcer, Cherri the Lead Medical Advisor, and Rissa was the Head of the Technological Section. Then it all went wonky when Calli’s mate showed up. Rissa loved Kade, however, he was the catalyst of sorts when it came to this whole prophecy drama. Who the hell knew what they were supposed to do, other than survive?

  The Ulfer were shifters who for one reason or another had a missing gene in their DNA, it made them just a bit crazy, and the head of the crazies was a man called the Bondi King. Mr. Twisted Mate was the Bondi King’s right hand man. The Ulfer wanted to use the humans for their own gain. They basically thought that humans were the inferior race. It really was a mess. Humans couldn’t regulate the magical community so they had the Drekinn, now somehow all of that changed. The contract was taken away from the Drekinn and given to another company, the Prentiss Agency, which was led by the Bondi King, even if the humans were unaware of it. Rissa and her friends were on the run, labeled as Most Wanted, because they refused to be nice, little sheep and follow.

  They all escaped New York City to a huge compound hidden right inside New York State and they could still go into the city, althou
gh in disguise. Rissa refused to hide in the city alone—it would be stupid. In addition, she thought as she climbed out the window, balanced on the ledge, and looked around, stupidity did not run in her family.

  Walking through the main halls was not going to be possible, because they would notice she was carrying the huge backpack containing all of the items she needed in order to survive in the wild for a few days—she hoped. Now here she stood on a ledge, looking down, wondering how her life had taken such a wrong turn.

  She knew it started all those years ago when she met Calli and Cherri. It was their fault; it would totally serve them right if she never spoke to them ever again—which could certainly happen, if she broke her neck jumping down from the second story of the compound’s house. Taking a deep breath Rissa got ready to jump when she heard Calli and Cherri’s voice coming from inside her room.