The human entered the building. Hawke prepared to land and shift to his human form, but the man returned moments later. He strolled around the exterior of the building, his head swinging side to side as if to determine whether anyone watched.
I see you, and if you think you will hurt her, you are wrong.
The man came to the spot where Hawke already knew her balcony lay. He’d watched her come out onto it time and again and followed her movements beyond the sliding glass whenever she left the blinds open. Tonight she had left the door open to let in a light breeze. Hawke landed on the rail and looked down at the human. The man started at seeing Hawke.
Please come up here, so I can take out my frustrations on you.
The man hesitated. Hawke knew he appeared bigger than the average hawk, and he liked it that way. Having the reasoning ability of a human, he could take down any one of them or even a bigger animal shifter. His talons and curved beak would make short work of any enemy.
The human stepped back a pace and scratched his head. He took out a cell phone, and Hawke hoped he would use it so he could listen in, but the man tucked it away and turned back the way he came. When Hawke was sure the man had vacated the area, he spread his wings to take off.
“Oh wow, a hawk. How cool.”
Hawke froze at hearing Meechi’s voice. What was she doing out of bed, and why wasn’t she afraid of him? He twisted his head left and peered at her. She inched closer, holding her arm out. Bad move.
“Come here, boy. You want to sit on my arm? Don’t worry. I won’t hurt you.”
No! I would hurt you, damn it. Go to bed, Meechi. Of course he said none of that out loud, and he had no intention of sitting on her arm. A screech startled them both, and Stephanie darted out onto the balcony and jerked Meechi to her.
“What is that shape, Meechi? It’s so big. Get your butt in the house, and what are you doing up?” She shoved her daughter behind her. “Shoo, shoo!”
“It’s a hawk, Mommie. Isn’t it beautiful?”
“No, it’s not beautiful. They’re predators. It could have hurt you. Who the heck has a pet hawk around here? Shoo, damn it!”
If Hawke could have sighed, he would have. She’d said he wasn’t beautiful, and the disgust in her tone told him revealing his animal side any time in the future would be a bad idea. He took to the air and returned to the trees far enough that the humans couldn’t see him. Tonight, he would continue his watch, but tomorrow, he had investigating to do.
* * * *
“Meechi Ward is her daughter’s name,” Hawke’s friend told him on the phone, and he frowned. Stephanie had told him she and Meechi’s father were married, so why not take on the man’s name?
“What else can you tell me about her?”
His friend worked in law enforcement and had access to databases that were off limits to Hawke. Where his friend couldn’t get to, being bound by the confines of his job, Hawke could. Over the years, they scratched each other’s backs. While he and Jim were close, he didn’t trust him with the knowledge that he was a shifter.
“She’s a little heiress,” Jack told him.
Hawke’s eyes widened. “What do you mean?”
“Her father left her a pretty big stash. She’ll come into it when she’s twenty-one, but right now she gets a monthly allowance. If her mother wanted to dip into it, they could live in the lap of luxury. Looks like she barely takes any. The fact that he left it all to Meechi has been stuck in his family’s craw since the father died.”
Hawke spun the pin in his hand and tapped it on the desktop. “You get all that from your database?”
Jim laughed. “No, five years ago when the old man hadn’t even turned cold in the grave yet, the mother, Melanie Ward, sued Stephanie. She was backed by his two brothers and a sister. Stephanie won the case hands down because the will was iron-clad. Must have been a good guy to make sure his daughter was looked after.”
“Or he knew his family were all greedy assholes.”
“There’s that too.”
“Thanks, Jim. You’ve been a big help.” Hawke disconnected the call and considered all he learned. On the day Stephanie had her accident, with nothing better to do, he had looked into the circumstances of the wreck. The other driver, killed in the crash, had scarcely had enough alcohol in his system to swerve the way Stephanie claimed he had. He wondered if it had anything to do with Stephanie, but it seemed unlikely. Nothing happened since that incident, and he would know, since he kept watch over her. Maybe they were cowards at heart and lost their nerve after her severe injury. Having another thought, he sent off a text message to Jim and waited for the response to his question.
“No, the other driver had no connection to her dead husband or his family’s corporation,” Jim replied.
Hawke swore. No, this was a good thing. If the in-laws weren’t serious about getting Meechi’s money enough to kill Stephanie, then she would not be further hurt by them. Still, something was going on, and he intended to get to the bottom of it.
When his cell phone rang, Hawke glanced at the display and warmed at the sight of her name. He stabbed the connect button, not caring to let it ring more than once. “Hello.”
“Hi, Hawke.” The breathless quality to her voice stirred his desire, and his cock grew hard. He imagined kissing her full lips and sliding his hands over her lovely body. “Hey, are you there?”
He cleared his throat and brought his thoughts back to the moment. “Yes, sorry. You’re not calling to cancel, are you?”
“No, of course not. I wanted to see if you could come a bit early and take me to pick up Meechi from daycare.”
“Sure, what time do you need me there?”
“Is four okay? I don’t know if you can get off work sooner.”
“No problem.”
They hung up, and Hawke stood from his desk. The small office he rented was one he used upon occasion when not chasing down a lead for a case. Private investigations alleviated the boredom his life would be since he had no other obligations. As he took the elevator to the parking garage beneath the building, he wondered how great it would be to have a family of his own. Thoughts like that led him to think about Toron. A year and a half had passed since they last spoke. Did his friend have any more children? He knew Toron and Sienna had married because she’d sent him an invitation to the post office box he kept. Hawke hadn’t attended, nor had he contacted her, as much as it hurt. He respected Toron’s wish not to see him, and he couldn’t forgive himself for ever trying to take Sienna for himself when anyone could see she belonged to his friend.
After he showered and dressed, Hawke brought an extra set of clothes to his car. He slipped behind the wheel and started out toward Stephanie’s apartment. He arrived an hour early in his eagerness and had to sit outside. When the time came for him to go inside, he stepped from his vehicle, smoothed his shirtfront, and started up. Stephanie answered on the second ring, and he took in her beauty. She wore a teal dress that hugged her figure and stopped half way down her thighs, which were bare. Her full breasts were accentuated behind the thin material with a low cut at the neckline. They didn’t allow him to linger anywhere else, but he forced his gaze back to her face.
“You look beautiful,” he murmured and moved past her when she backed up to let him in.
“Are you sure? I usually get Meechi to help me, so I chose this dress because I know I can’t mismatch anything with it.”
Hawke didn’t know what came over him. She rambled because she was nervous and unsure of what he thought of her. All he could do was demonstrate the impression she made by sweeping her into his arms. He crushed her close to his chest and raised her chin. Pausing an instant to hear her surprised cry, he covered her mouth and forced her sweet lips apart.
He wanted to take the kiss deeper, but he waited to gauge whether he disgusted or frightened her. When he ran a hand up her side, and the soft curve of her breast invited his palm, he gave into it. His thumb impacted with her taut nipple, and
she arched into his touch on a soft moan. He dragged her tighter to him, up onto her toes and lowered a hand to her ass. So round and soft, it demanded that he squeeze and stroke it, but as soon as he did, Stephanie wiggled in his arms. With reluctance, he let her go, disappointed that he’d been so caught up in touching her he didn’t have the chance to push his tongue into her delicious mouth.
“I-I-We need to get Meechi,” she stuttered, fixing her hair.
He turned away. “I apologize. I shouldn’t have attacked you like that. We should go.” While she grabbed her purse, he adjusted his cock, which had gone hard in his pants. The woman couldn’t know how badly he wanted her or how long it had been since his last lover. Stephanie deserved more than a quick roll in the hay.
He escorted her to his car and pulled out. Stephanie sat with her head bowed somewhat, not looking out the window. When he had asked about it previously, she’d told him it gave her a headache to see so many colors zipping by because she had a tendency to squint. He didn’t tell her the many times she crinkled her nose squinting at him. He thought she was cute.
“So you’re okay with me meeting her?” he asked.
“Well, I’m a little nervous about it. I don’t bring men home, and we’ve been out only a few times, but I didn’t have much choice today. My neighbor runs me to get Meechi, and sometimes she babysits her like on the night we first met, but her son broke his leg snowboarding or whatever in Vermont. She had to pick him up from the airport.”
“Vermont, huh?”
She turned her head toward him, but he kept his eyes on the road. “Yeah, have you been there?”
“Once or twice.”
A half hour later, they pulled into the parking lot before a building that looked like it had lost a fight with a few buckets of brightly colored paint. Not that the building appeared disordered. Just that someone thought the more color, the better for kids. With what little he knew of Meechi, he imagined she’d view the place as being for babies. Stephanie had told him her daughter wanted to stay home after school, to which Stephanie had said no. He didn’t blame her.
Hawke hopped out of the car and went around to help Stephanie. She placed her hand in the crook of his arm, and then walked up to the door. As he allowed her to go ahead of him, he remembered what it felt like to touch her, so he held himself as far back as possible. This was not the place to have a rise in his pants because Stephanie turned him on.
“Ms. Martin, what are you doing here?” A thirty-something woman smiled as she rose from behind a desk and walked into the hall.
Stephanie went still. “What do you mean? I’m here to pick up Meechi.”
“But…” the woman began. “Let me get Ms. Turner.” She disappeared, and Stephanie clenched his arm until her nails cut through the shirt material and dug into his skin. The woman returned with another older one, and the concern on both women’s faces did not bode well. Hawke moved closer to Stephanie.
“Ms. Martin, we had a new girl working here this afternoon. She got off half hour ago, but I’m calling her now. The sign-in sheet indicates that Meechi’s dad picked her up. I know myself that her father passed away, so we will get to the bottom of this.”
Stephanie cried out. “How the hell could this happen? Where is my daughter? Meechi!”
Hawke removed a pen and a sheet of paper from his jacket. “What exact time did they leave, and give me a description of the man. Better yet, give me the number of the woman who saw him. I will call her myself.”
“I’m calling the police,” Stephanie blurted. Hawke saw that tears had already started down her face, and she fumbled with the display on her phone. He knew she had no idea what buttons she pressed.
“Come over here, baby, and sit down,” he instructed, taking her hand. If it weren’t for the situation, he would not have used the endearment. The word slipped out.
“I don’t need to sit down, Hawke. We have to find her, and I want someone to tell me how the hell they hired some person who doesn’t know what she’s doing? Meechi has been coming to this daycare for five years, damn it. Where is my baby? You know what, forget it. Hawke, let’s go look for her.”
He caught her hand and forced her to stay by him, and then turned to Ms. Turner. “The number.”
The woman rang her hands seeing Stephanie’s panic. “I can’t give you—”
“Two seconds to give it to me,” he said. “I work as a private investigator. I will find Meechi, but if you hinder me in any way, you will regret it.”
“Sir, there’s no need to threaten me. I’m not the enemy here.” He heard the tremor in her voice.
He waited a beat, and she gave him the number. He punched it into his phone, and with a dead calm that he knew was a lot more effective than shouting, he obtained all the information from the aide. The question was, at ten years old, why would Meechi go with a man claiming to be her father when she knew her father was dead?
He disconnected the call and pulled Stephanie close to him. She turned her big brown eyes up to him, and he felt his heart stir with a need to protect her and her child. “Does your late husband have a brother?”
Her eyes widened. “Yes, two of them. Why?”
“I’m guessing they look a lot like him?”
She frowned. “The oldest is a dead ringer.” She froze. “You don’t think—”
“I’m pretty sure. Give me his address, and you stay here to wait for the police.”
“I’m coming with you, Hawke. If that bastard has my baby, I’m going to crack his head open. Trust me.”
He kissed her lips briefly. “I do trust you. Now trust me to go. You will need to give a report to the police so they can begin their search. If he did take her, it’s possible he didn’t go home. The police will need to put an APB out on him.”
She didn’t appear to like it but acknowledged his logic. “Okay, but please stay in touch. I can’t bear sitting here, Hawke.”
“I promise. I will find her.”
He left the daycare on the run and jumped into his car. Rather than head over to the brother’s house that way, he found somewhere off the beaten track to park, where he wouldn’t be seen. If he flew, he would make it faster, but something told him Michael Ward didn’t take Meechi to his house, and the only solution in that case was a bird’s eye view.
Hawke shed his clothing and stuffed them in the trunk, and then he stretched his arms to the side and called to the animal deep inside. As easy as shedding skin, he shifted, his bones cracking and morphing, breaking down and then rebuilding until he became the hawk. With a loud cry, he took to the air, pumping his wings. After gaining a height of a mile up, he headed toward Michael’s house. Flying all over the city on a regular basis, he had a good grasp of the layout and knew which direction to go. Stephanie had given him a description of the car, but he saw few that would match in the area. A quick training of his vision on the couple of drivers told him they weren’t his targets. He had to keep moving, because the longer it took him to find Michael the bigger the gap to catching them.
On a hunch, Hawke took a scenic route out of town that few people used because it was at least five miles to get back to civilization. The moment Hawke crested a hill blocking the road, he knew he was on the right track. The golden Porsche 911 gleamed in the late afternoon sunlight like a beacon. The man had pulled over to the side of the road and was pacing. Hawke swung around so he flew over the right side of the car. Meechi sat in the back seat, her cheek tucked against her hand and sound asleep. Nothing could be more convenient for him.
In one fell swoop, Hawke landed, changed, and dragged the man up by his neck. Michael choked and struggled. His eyes grew wide.
“What do you think you’re doing with her?” Hawke snapped. When scarcely a croak escaped Michael’s throat, Hawke let up a little. “Speak!”
“I’m not going to hurt my niece, but I had to take her. I had to or—
Hawke shook him hard enough for his head to bob back and forth on his neck. Red stained the man’
s face, and it took almost as much self-control as Hawke had not to push until the fool passed out. “Or what?”
“Why are you naked?” Michael demanded. “Are you some kind of perv?”
Hawke drove his fist into Michael’s face and let him fall to the ground. The satisfying crunch and howl did little to lessen his anger. He bent and slapped a hand over Michael’s mouth.
“Keep it down, you idiot, or you’ll wake her.” He jerked Michael to his feet and assessed his size for clothing fit. Michael had enjoyed one too many dinners out having a slight paunch around the middle. “Take off your pants.”
“Don’t do this. I need to get out of here.”
“Oh you’re going to explain everything to me as soon as I’m dressed. Make no mistake about it. If you even think of holding any information back, I will gladly beat it from you. Now, off!”
In a few moments, Hawke was dressed in Michael’s pants. He put on the shirt and left Michael with his suit jacket and shoes. Barefoot, Hawke walked over to check on Meechi once more. She seemed okay, and now that he met the man face-to-face, something told him Michael wouldn’t hurt Meechi, just as he said, but someone out there would, or he wouldn’t be running with her.
Hawke leaned on the back of the car and crossed his arms over his chest. “Explain yourself, fast.”
Chapter Three
Stephanie fought nausea, panic, and myriad thoughts while she waited for Hawke. For what felt like centuries, she explained to the police about her husband’s family and about Hawke. “I don’t know why you’re standing here asking me the same questions over and over again when you could be out there looking for my daughter,” she railed at the policeman with the notepad. All she wanted to do was snatch it from his hand and throw it on the floor before she kicked him in the nads. That probably wouldn’t be a good idea.
“Ma’am, please calm down. You gave us the description, and we’ve called it in. We’re just trying to get all the details so we can do our job. So this man, Hawke Cooper, how long have you known him? Is there any possibility that he might have been involved with your daughter’s kidnapping?”
In Hawke's Eyes Page 2
