“You don’t mean that,” Sofia said. “You don’t want to be a werewolf. I don’t want to be one,” she added in a bleak whisper.
Nathan let Cathy go and laughed at Sofia’s fear. “You’ll get used to it.”
“You haven’t bitten her yet, have you?” Cathy asked.
“No,” he told her. “I’ll let you do the honors to prove you really want to be part of the pack.”
“Come the moonchange, I’ll be delighted,” Cathy said.
She didn’t think he believed or trusted her for a moment, but he did finally hand her the coffee. She downed it in three gulps. “That almost helps the headache.”
“Where are we?” Sofia demanded. “How did we get here?”
Cathy stood up. “Don’t mind her,” she told Nathan. “She’s a whiny little thing who’s never going to be a pack alpha.” She approached Nathan. “I can see a pine forest beyond that barred window. It looks like the perfect place for our kind to run free.”
He grinned. “It is.”
“Why not take me for a walk?” She put her arm through his. “Show me around the place.”
He didn’t relax his guard, but he didn’t say no. “There’s food on the table,” he told Sofia before leading Cathy outside. “And a guard on the door.”
Once they were gone, Sofia returned to a conversation she’d been involved in since she fully awoke from the long, drugged ride. So far, she’d found out that they were being held in a large compound in a remote part of Oregon that was surrounded by an electrified fence. It was patrolled by armed guards. Their Hunyara relations and several other captives were locked up in a large central barracks, which was also guarded. The place was quite the fortress.
Am I as bad an actress as I suspect? Because Cathy’s really good.
Are you sure your cousin’s acting?
Please! This was all her idea. After a heavy silence filled her head for a few moments she went on, Do not try to get me paranoid, Cage.
All I’m saying is that sometimes you can’t trust the ones you care for the—
All right, all right! I shouldn’t have tricked you. How many times do I have to say I’m sorry?
Once.
Oh. Haven’t I—
No.
Of course I’m sorry I hurt you. I just couldn’t think of another way.
You could have asked me to let the Clan Prime go in my place. We could have talked it through.
Well…yeah. It didn’t occur to me to be reasonable at the time. I was pretty hysterical that night. Sid said all the psychic turmoil was messing with everybody’s brains.
And I’ve found out that Lady Juanita was messing with yours, Jason said. Matris are born matchmakers. She saw suggesting you keep me in bed as a bonding gift to us. Due to all the blood we shared then, she pretty much arranged that we’d pass the point where we could ever leave each other.
I don’t want to ever leave you!
Nor I.
But you’d been thinking you might have to. I’d been thinking I might have to let you run off and hide with your people and stay away from you to cover your trail. We can’t do that now. We didn’t want to anyway.
Do you forgive me? Sofia asked. I promise never to do it again.
You’d better not be promising never to have an orgy again. I liked that part.
So did I. And if we want to do it again anytime soon, I suggest we get on with the rescue.
I agree. All our players are in position—even your Dad has shown up. I’ve been working with him on his wolf taming; he’s rusty but talented.
I’m glad.
Okay, we’re coming in. You and Cathy can do your thing now. See you soon.
I love you.
Love you, too. Get to work, Mrs. Cage.
Chapter Forty-nine
W hile talking to Sofia, Jason had been careful not to show her how worried he was for her. He kept reminding himself that she was brave and strong and resourceful, and he wanted her that way. But he would much rather lock her up somewhere safe and luxurious and keep her there. He couldn’t follow those protective impulses with a wolf tamer for a bondmate, but that didn’t stop him from having them.
He’d been terrified ever since he found out that she expected him to find her, no matter where she ended up or what condition she landed in. Everyone involved had assumed he’d follow the psychic trail to her, which he had. So her confidence had been well placed, but he’d still been scared he’d screw up. Now he intended to get her out of harm’s way, and keep her there for as long as possible.
Coming up beside him, Mike Bleythin said, “Pashta’s group is ready. Let’s get this over with. I want Cathy out of there right now.”
“I’m glad I’m not the only one thinking like a protective male.”
“Our mates are altogether too tough for our own good,” Mike answered.
Jason nodded his agreement as Laurent and Eden came up to them. The four of them gazed down from their hiding spot to the encampment below.
“I want to get my hands on the computers in there,” the mortal woman said. “We need to find out what’s really going on.”
“I just want to kick some ass and get home to our kid,” Laurent said. “Let’s get moving, before the deodorant we confiscated from these jokers wears off.”
“Roger that,” Eden answered.
A second later, a hideous scream sounded in the compound below. They took this as their signal to move forward.
“I think Cathy’s responsible for that,” Mike said proudly as they ran for the fence.
The limitation to being a wolf tamer in this situation was that not everybody in this nest of dangerous lunatics would be a werewolf. When Sofia had mentioned the possibility of mortal bad guys, Cathy had come up with a solution. Everything now hinged on finding out what type of enemy was guarding her prison. Sofia stepped up to the door.
She wiped everything else from her mind and concentrated on the job at hand: she was supposed to be scared. “Supposed to be scared?” She managed to make herself cry and rapped on the door with both fists. “Help! Help!” she shouted. “Let me out! Somebody please help me!” She tried to mentally project that she was fragile and not a danger to anybody.
The man outside yelled for her to shut up. When she continued shouting and banging, he finally opened the door. “I told you to shut—”
She sniffled and wiped the back of her hand across her cheek. When he reached out to grab her shoulder, she looked him in the eye and latched onto a werewolf’s mind. She’d taken him too much by surprise for him to put up much of a fight.
“Take me to the other prisoners,” she told him.
With the guard as her escort, she crossed the compound to the barracks Jason had told her about. No one questioned their progress. When Cathy made her move, everyone else in the compound rushed to find out what Nathan was screaming about. With this diversion under way, the attack from the outside began.
Sofia couldn’t worry about the sudden gunfire from the defenders, or the huge truck that came careening down the hillside and crashed through the fence into one of the buildings. She only hoped nobody was driving it.
She had the werewolf under her control hold his weapon on her, and pretended to still be a scared captive when she went into the barracks. There, she saw five prisoners being watched by two guards. The prisoners, three men and two women, were each handcuffed to a bed frame set into the concrete floor.
“What’s going on out there?” one of the guards asked. “Why’d you bring her in here?”
“You’re both needed outside,” her guard said, as she’d ordered him to. “Go on. I’ll take over in here.”
The men must have been bored, because they didn’t question this order but ran out to join the excitement. Sofia hurried toward the prisoners after they left. “I’m here to rescue you,” she told the staring prisoners. “If any of you is a werewolf named Hunyara, Uncle Pashta wants your help outside.”
Two of the men raised their free hand
s, and one said, “You’re cousin Sofia.”
She nodded. “Help me free them,” she ordered her werewolf.
He didn’t have the keys to the handcuffs, but solved the problem by carefully putting a bullet through the chain on each prisoner’s cuffs to break the links.
“Go to sleep,” she ordered the werewolf when he was done.
She gave his gun to one of her cousins, and they went to join the fighting. “Stay here,” she told the others, then ran outside, anxious to find Jason.
Once inside the compound, Jason headed straight toward Sofia. He moved too fast for any of the shooters to take aim at him, but bullets still buzzed dangerously close, hitting the dust as his feet flew by. He ignored them and happily tossed aside all those who tried to physically attack him.
Sofia’s presence drew him like a beacon to the central building of the complex. She came through the doorway when he was just a few yards away, and her face lit with a smile that sent his heart soaring.
She didn’t see the gunman taking aim at her.
That was all right, because Jason was on top of the shooter before he had time to fire.
When he let the body fall to the ground, Sofia looked at him with very wide eyes. “There was a time when I would have found that profoundly disturbing.”
Jason grabbed her hand and took her back into the barracks, where they exchanged a quick, fierce kiss. “The operation’s winding down,” he told her. “Stay here until I come for you.” Surprisingly, she didn’t argue.
When he returned, he brought a crowd with him. Eden carried a confiscated laptop, and she and Cathy sat down to have a look at what was inside. Pashta and the other Hunyaras gathered around the three freed prisoners. Laurent and Mike stood guard over Eden and Cathy. Sofia’s father stood back and warily watched everyone else, looking a bit lost amid all this activity.
Jason took Sofia aside. “You can debrief and take part later,” he told her. “But first—”
Her mouth covered his, and they shared a long, lingering kiss. He held her close and she put her head trustingly on his shoulder.
“We’ll have more adventures,” Jason said. “But I promise you we’ll always end up like this.”
She looked up at him, her smile filled with joy and confidence. “Together.”
“Together.”
After they’d spent a few quiet moments holding each other, Jason asked, “So, how do you feel about working with animals?”
Chapter Fifty
Two months later
S ofia stood before the dressing room mirror and nervously assessed her brief, skintight costume.
George and Gracie restlessly stalked back and forth behind her, as if eager to return to the stage. The dressing room was overflowing with flowers sent by friends and family for her debut. The scent of the jasmine from Lady Juanita filled the room, blending sweetly with the yellow roses from Sid.
Jason stepped up behind her and put his arms around her narrow waist, which was emphasized by the boning in her scarlet and black costume. “How are you feeling, my beautiful lady?”
She met his gaze in the mirror. “I’m damned glad I spent the last two months sweating with a personal trainer to get into this outfit, since I’m going to be seen in it in public tonight.” Jason pulled her closer, and the reaction she picked up from her bondmate warmed her all over. “I can feel that you want to tear it off me, which isn’t helping to keep me calm.”
He ran his hands down her waist and around the curve of her hips. “I can’t help myself. You’re gorgeous.”
She thought he was the gorgeous one, with the skintight pants that showed off his muscular thighs and the open white silk shirt that revealed his chest and emphasized his broad shoulders. It was enough to make her limbs go weak with lust—if they weren’t already weak from stage fright.
“I’m going to be jealous when we go out there and all the women start screaming.” The moment of truth was nearly here and Sofia was scared to death. “I was crazy to agree to this after your assistant e-mailed that she and her new husband had decided to buy a boat in Bora-Bora and sail around the Pacific. Anyone could have replaced her onstage.”
“But it is a good job opportunity for you here in dull, mundane Las Vegas.”
She smiled shakily. “Only a vampire would call Sin City dull and mundane.”
“A vampire and a wolf tamer, you mean.” He hugged her close again. “You and I know what real excitement is. Once you’re onstage, it will be easy.”
She had to admit, this should be much easier than chasing down evil werewolves bent on world domination. Since she’d begun rehearsals with Jason, her father had stepped into the role of main Hunyara wolf tamer.
“Did your father decide to come?” Jason must have sensed her thoughts.
She nodded. “Along with every Hunyara that Cathy and Uncle Pashta could dig up. I’ve learned that we used to be circus people. So in a way, I’m returning to my roots with this job.”
“All of the Bleythins and many from the Wolf Clan are also in the audience to cheer you on.”
“I’m delighted. But Sid sent her regrets from Los Angeles. She and Joe still aren’t talking, by the way.”
After an embarrassed moment, he asked, “Did she find a sire for—”
“Yes. I don’t know the details though.”
“And I don’t want to know them.” Jason turned her to face him. “I’m afraid I’m going to mess up your beautifully applied lipstick, my love.”
A knock on the door and a call of “Ready for you” stopped him from kissing her. They touched noses instead.
“Come along, Mrs. Cage,” he said, taking her hand to lead her to the stage. “The tigers are waiting.”
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