What he couldn’t figure out, why he’d been shot in the first place? And why the hell was this bad ass woman after his ass? He hadn’t done anything lately. Well, not that he could remember.
But there was nothing he could do about it now but sleep.
Sometime later, Kerr rolled over on the hard floor and hissed.
What. The. Fuck?
He’d shifted back to his human form in his sleep?
Snatching up the pants he’d left in a messy pile near his head, he retrieved his phone and gasped. The thing claimed it had been several hours since he’d passed out. Even though he’d shifted and his body had rejected the bullet, the site where he’d been struck was still red, puckered, and stung like hell.
And now he had to pee, but didn’t have the energy to get up off the floor.
Maybe he’d been tranquilized? Nah, that would have simply knocked him out rather than sapped him slowly, right? Maybe he should go see the doctor that some of his cousins had kidnapped from Clan Comyn? Simon-something-or-other, he thought his name was. Maybe the doc would know what was going on with his whacked out body.
He dragged himself across the floor, glad no one from his pack was here to witness this. A strong alpha wolf crawling across the floor, bare-assed naked with his balls swinging in the wind? Fucking insulting.
Finally he made it to the staircase that led up to the small living area of his special little space and, one step at a time, hauled himself up on his hands and knees.
By the time he reached his bed he was exhausted. But it didn’t stop him from cussing a blue streak, laced with vows of revenge as he again slipped into oblivion.
He didn’t expect to dream, but he did…of a tawny eyed goddess with the biggest fucking gun he’d ever seen, aimed right at him…and all he wanted to do was kiss her.
Yep. He’d lost his mind, along with pints of blood, somewhere out on the highway.
* * * * *
Lakota Phillips walked out of the Dark Moon roadhouse shaking his head at himself. How the hell did Bhric always know shit that he shouldn’t? How did he know to call Lakota down here to meet a person that no one should know was headed their way? In fact, Bhric wasn’t even in town right now, so how the hell had he known that a bounty hunter would be riding in within the next five minutes?
Derria Sozi worked with the Shifter and Were Armed Tactics agency…but not a soul within five hundred miles of this place should know such a thing. The moment he’d received intelligence that Derria Sozi was indeed a real person and a fellow agent, he’d requested details on her assignment, as well as authorization to assist as needed.
Part of him was peeved that he’d learned through back channels that an agent was headed his way. On the other hand, perhaps Bhric had served as his “heads up”. Either way, Lakota couldn’t decide to fume or tilt his head in bewilderment, as the conversation he’d just had spun crazy circles inside his head.
Ten minutes prior…
Lakota stared at his phone, then put it back to his ear. “You called me to arrange a meeting with some woman?”
Bhric’s deep laugh boomed through the phone as Lakota sat in his favorite spot in the Dark Moon roadhouse. The bartender had slid a cold mug of beer his way. It stopped right in front of him without a single drop spilled.
“This particular chick,” Bhric said as he suddenly sobered, “you definitely need to meet. Never seen or heard of her before, but from what I understand, she’s got shifter written all over her. Rides a bad ass sport bike, too. A real crotch rocket.”
“So?” Lakota responded and took a sip of dark ale. Reminded him of tar.
“So, I have a feeling she’s the snooping kind. I was hoping, given your special line of work, maybe you find out who she is.”
Now that took ‘Kota aback. Special line of work? With another swallow of his beer, he’d forced his body to remain loose and his voice even, though the other man had thrown him for quite the loop.
“Special line of work?” Kota asked.
“Well, it’s technically a secret,” The words delivered with enough snark to choke a stand-up comedian.
And then the other man rocked his world with no hesitation. “I know you work for the Shifter and Were Armed Tactics agency, man.”
Without confirming or denying the conclusion, Lakota stood, left a tip for the bartender and headed out to the parking lot. No way he wanted any of the rest of this conversation overheard. Damn shifter hearing.
Bhric repeated, “You’re with S.W.A.T., ‘Kota.”
Still, Lakota kept quiet and waited for the other man to give him an idea where this was going.
“No one in the Dragon knows but me. And it’ll stay that way.”
“As long as…?” Kota asked.
“No conditions. I’ll take it to the grave. But I still want to know who this woman is that’s rolling in as if she’s the mistress of Hell itself. From what I understand, she gives off the same vibe you do.”
“And what vibe is that?”
“The cop kind.”
And all those close to Bhric and his band of miscreants knew that the last thing anyone wanted nosing around was an outsider shifter cop, regardless of species.
As he finished up the strangest conversation he’d had lately, came the deep rumble of a powerful engine just as the sun sank below the tree line.
Now here he stood as he came face to face with who must be Derria Sozi. And the woman looked pissed.
Lakota had to be nuts, considering her expression promised death to whoever she was after. And it flipped his switch like a strike of lightening to the head. Shaking his head at himself, he made his way over to the sexiest woman he’d seen in an age as she straddled a machine that any biker would orgasm over.
Still waiting for a response to his request for information from his superiors, Derria’s purpose might be unknown, but her presence here was not. If Bhric and Lakota knew she was here, he began to wonder who else was aware. And more importantly, how was that possible given the security protocols in place at S.W.A.T.?
Lakota smelled a rat…and the stench wasn’t coming from the piece of perfection staring at him as if he’d grown a horn from the middle of his forehead.
Chapter Two
Derria shut off the purring engine of her custom ride and hopped off. She grabbed her gear bag and headed toward the front door of an old, two-story, wooden building with a worn sign that said “Dark Moon Roadhouse.” This place looked like a tornado-tossed barn from the old television show, Wild Wild West.
She expected a man with a cowboy hat and a banjo to run out and greet her. Once she was closer, it was a surprise to hear the blare of some serious old time rock-n-roll. Maybe it was her kind of place after all.
Off to her right, the man who’d been watching her as she’d pulled into the parking lot began to move her way. She hoped he wouldn’t harass her because she wasn’t in the mood for any bullshit. One wrong word and she’d just have to kick him in the brain and go on about her business.
All she wanted was a hot shower and a bed, to go with the delicious smelling baguette and roast beef she’d managed to grab from the local bakery in town. She’d happened in right as they were closing and totally lucked out. The owner, a cheerful woman named Sienna, mentioned that she had some leftover cold cuts from the lunch crowd that she’d have to throw out unless Derria took them off her hands.
Starving and chilled from the rain shower she’d ridden through, Derria didn’t need to be asked twice to accept such hospitality.
Unfortunately the little bed and breakfast she’d passed was booked up, but thankfully Neesia had already told her about the Dark Moon. Hopefully she’d luck into a room for the night.
She took a deep breath and released it as she prayed for patience. The man was now right behind her as her hand closed over the door handle. She turned to give him the stink eye and went still. The moment her gaze met his, the hair on the back of her neck started doing the hustle.
What the hell
?
She sucked in a gasp and hoped it didn’t sound as shocked as she actually, truly felt.
“Good evening,” he said as he flashed a smile that was both friendly and strangely smoldering. How did a man even do that? Her lioness suddenly sat up and paid very close attention indeed. This guy had said all of two words to her, yet the timbre of his voice echoed in her head. He moved like a shifter, all graceful and shit, but most shifters, in her experience couldn’t tell one of their kind from a human unless that particular shifter had gone rogue. And when that happened, they called Derria and her cousins to round them up or put them down.
The stranger held out his hand. She looked down at it, then back up at his face. Her ability to paint on a cool demeanor served her well just now because the intense expression in the greenest eyes she’d ever seen sent a wiggle down her spine.
It wasn’t fear she experienced at the moment. No, this was something else. A something she’d never encountered before that made her antsy for no apparent reason.
Suddenly she wondered what he smelled like.
Girl, what the hell is wrong with you?
Thankfully he stood downwind, otherwise if she’d caught his scent just now, she might just drop her helmet and gear in the mud and start sniffing him about the collar.
Good grief, Derria, get your shit together.
He still held his hand out to her as he said, “I’m Lakota Phillips, Clan Gunn and council liaison.”
Okay, so her thoughts of him being a shifter were confirmed as soon as he’d said the word “clan”. But how in the hell did he know to share such a thing with her? She could have been a human for all he knew.
She took his bare hand in her gloved one and shook it once, twice and then pulled away.
“I’m Derria.”
“Nice to meet you, Derria. Buy you a beer?”
“Nope,” she said, intending to leave him standing there. Suddenly her mouth said, “But I’ll take a hot toddy. It’s cold as hell out here.”
He motioned toward the front door and they headed on inside.
It turned out to not be as big of a dump as she’d expected. They’d missed the memo on dark wood being out of style, but otherwise, it was clean and neat. A couple of pool tables were off in a far corner, and there were plenty of places to sit and eat at the tables spread about.
Derria immediately spotted the bar in the dim lighting and headed for it. Hyperaware of the presence of Lakota next to her, she ordered her toddy with extra lemon. It arrived in a thick, warm mug with steam wafting upward. Smelled like maybe there was a hint of ginger as well. After a couple of sips of the spicy, perfectly blended mixture of honeyed whisky, she turned to see Lakota handling a beer.
“Have you eaten?” he asked.
“Nope. Dinner’s right here.” She held up her baguette and meat-in-a-bag and plopped it on the counter. Thankfully, Sienna had thought to put her paper bag inside a plastic one to keep the rain out.
“I see you found our little bakery in town. Sienna makes a mean muffin.”
“It’s just bread and meat. I caught her as she was closing,” Derria said, and wondered at herself for falling into such easy small talk with a stranger.
To her surprise, he snatched up her bag off the bar and tossed it into the air. The guy who’d made her toddy caught it as Lakota said, “Hey, Gage, mind turning that into a hot sandwich?”
“No problem. Want fries with that, ma’am?” Gage asked, looking at her with the same warm smile as Lakota’s…minus the whole “I might want to lick you” thing.
“Fries? Hell yes,” she replied, genuinely thankful to get her fried-food fix. It wasn’t something Neesia did at home very often. Another sip of sweet whiskey goodness and she turned her attention back to Lakota. “Thanks.”
“No problem. Southern hospitality is second to none.”
“So are you the liaison to all the clans, Lakota?”
“I am. I spend a good chunk of my time here in the Neutral Zone playing middleman between outcasts and their former clans, when needed. Sometimes I do have to run interference between the councils themselves, or my Guardian…”
“Guardian?” she asked.
“Yep. The enforcers of the law for Clan Gunn.”
Perfect. Exactly what she needed. But she had a question first.
“So how did you know to share your status as a shifter with me? I’m just some chick off the street.”
“But you’re not a human chick off the street, are you?”
“Not human? Says who?” she demanded, as her voice dropped an octave and pushed the words out as if she hadn’t a care in the world.
“Your scent tells me exactly what you are.”
Da fuck?
“What do you mean by that, exactly?” she asked, sounding more bored than she had a moment before.
“You’re a lion shifter. We can tell up here in the Dragon.”
How. In. The. Hell?
“And,” he continued, “There are no humans in here. Didn’t you know?”
No, damn it, she hadn’t.
Okay, Dare, note to self—tell Kotara and Koreas that the shifters up here can smell non-rogues.
Every shifter she’d ever met outside of these mountains was indistinguishable from any other person. It was the reason that shifters ran in such tight circles. Keeping their status hidden from humans meant some serious discretion. And those who outed another of their kind would find S.W.A.T. agents on their ass in a blink.
A shifter walked into a bar…
Here she was, in the middle of nowhere and the first person she’d met knew exactly what she was packing? She needed to control and contain this situation, and quickly.
“I’m here in an official capacity. I need a place to sleep for the night as well as a guide who can take me to pay my respects to your elders. Can you help me with any of that?”
The man took a sip—the only sip—of his beer, and set it down with a quiet thunk on the top of the highly polished bar.
“I can surely help you with that. Mind if we take this elsewhere for a bit of privacy?”
Her brows dove down into a frown as the suspicion radar in her head beeped like crazy. But before she could begin to ask questions, he cut across her.
“I’ll get all of your questions answered, but trust me, you don’t want that to happen in here. Room first, then talk.”
In that moment, Derria knew this was more than just any liaison to some council. This guy was either a spy or a cop. She had better figure out which one quickly, because the last thing she needed was for her quarry to get wind that she was already close on his literal tail.
* * * * *
With the key to her room in one hand, and her gear in the other, Lakota led Derria up to her room. He almost felt bad about pushing her buttons downstairs, but his training as an agent meant he had to discern her weaknesses and strengths in the most pragmatic manner possible.
He knew that outside of this place, most shifters couldn’t tell one from the other. Being able to scent one’s species seemed to be something very specific to the Tail of the Dragon. If she couldn’t, it was a weakness and made it dangerous for her to hunt here because other shifters would know in a heartbeat exactly what she was, while she wouldn’t know what she was dealing with unless it was a rogue.
And now her thoughts spun at a mile a minute. He practically felt them boring into the back of his head as he led her to where she would crash for the night. It was almost as if her mind was just on the other side of a thin veil that he was trying to peer through…which made no sense whatsoever.
He’d just met her, but something about this woman was indescribable.
Outside in the wind and rain, he hadn’t been sure. Inside at the bar, he’d caught a whiff of her distinct fragrance, but cooking oil and wood smoke competed with his nose.
But now, in the clean hallway that led to the private rooms, the woman’s scent hit him hard. She was salted caramel, overlaid with cloves and cream.
/>
Mate.
He stopped so fast that Derria ran into his back.
“Hey, you okay? Something wrong?” she asked.
“Uh, no. I’m, uh, fine.”
“I know I just met you, but you don’t sound fine, dude.”
He’d been around shifters all his life. Hell, he even worked for an agency that was responsible for shifters that weren’t under the jurisdiction of the councils here in the Dragon. But Lakota had never had the natural odor of a woman pull on his insides until it felt like he’d been punched in the gut repeatedly…and he liked it.
I’m a damn sadist.
Moving on down the hall, he stopped at her door and handed her the key.
She looked down at the little piece of metal in her palm and back up at him. Just that little bit of connection, of their gazes taking in one another, brought gut punch number two, three, four and five. Left him almost breathless.
Holy shit.
“I thought we needed to talk about plans for tomorrow?”
“Something’s come up,” he lied. “I’ve got to run. I’ll pick you up in the morning for breakfast at seven.”
And he was gone.
But not before her whispered, “What the hell was that?” reached his ears and made him smile.
* * * * *
Breakfast had been a quiet affair. Derria and Lakota had inhaled their breakfast while a busy Sienna ran back and forth serving bakery customers. A strangely tense Lakota hadn’t done any of the talking he’d said they needed to do before they headed over to the first council meeting.
Her brain had kept shorting out, overloading on brief flashes of…something. She hadn’t been able to tell if it had been thoughts, emotions, or what. But one thing she’d been sure of—whatever caused the constant buzz had lit up her inner cat. And that made for a super restless agent. The longer they’d sat at the bakery, the more she was convinced that the bolts of energy emanated from Lakota Phillips. The man had been hiding something, Derria had been sure of it. The question was, did she want to know what it was?
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