by Jules Tyler
“Hey! I tried! He refused!” Jasper shouted from next to Desmond.
“It is payment enough to know that he is alive and well,” Desmond sipped his beer.
“I also heard, Jasper, that Desmond has threatened to toss you into one of the cabins and let these guys have their way with you. Seems to me that’s kept you in line pretty well,” Alicia teased.
“I don’t need their mayo launchers anywhere near me,” Jasper shook his head furiously.
“I doubt that they wou...” Alicia was interrupted by a nudge of Duke’s arm.
“Oh yes they would!” Everyone said in unison.
Alicia laughed and shook her head in disbelief. Apparently, there was no reasoning with Jasper and his gambling addiction. She made a mental note to use that to her advantage someday. She looked across the fire at Adrian and McKinzy and smiled. It made her heart feathers tingle, as Candi liked to call the warming of her heart, when she got to experience others building their bond. It wasn’t very often that shifters were able to find their intendeds anymore. With the government the way it was currently, there was no hope. They saw the shifter community as stray dogs. They had their uses, but they’d prefer to not have them around. The government tolerated them better than the Firebirds though, which was a good thing, or the shifters would have been exterminated a long time ago.
“Alright, guys, it’s an early start tomorrow. I’ve been easy on you the last few days while we sorted out the crap with Cole, but we all need to get back to work tomorrow,” McKinzy said as she stood and stretched.
“But McKinzy,” Elijah pouted, “I wanted to go to McCall tomorrow.”
“No ‘buts’ about it, Elijah. You want to go mate hunting, then you need to put in a formal request for a day off,” Adrian lectured.
“Fine,” he sulked.
“Let’s go, beautiful,” Duke murmured, sticking a hand out to pull her to her feet.
Alicia grabbed his hand and felt her stomach pitch to the floor as he threw her over his shoulder, “Duke! What are you doing?”
“Taking you home,” he smiled and swatted her on the butt, making her squeal in protest.
“Good night, guys!” She called as Duke walked through the door.
Duke started walking down the hallways towards the bedroom and Alicia thought about all the work she had left to do for the day.
“Okay, okay. Put me down! We’re home now,” Alicia laughed.
“I like that you’ve been calling this your home,” Duke smiled as he set her upright.
“It feels like home. I just don’t know how I’m going to get all of my stuff out here. My sanity and my fox won’t survive if I try to leave. It’s becoming pretty apparent that I’m supposed to be here,” Alicia shrugged.
Duke smile grew before he leaned down and kissed her, “Do you want to go for a walk? My tiger needs to stretch its legs. Plus, I have something I want to show you.”
“Sounds great to me. It’s probably time I give my fox my body for a little while anyways. I haven’t shifted in a while.”
“Good. Let’s go.”
They both undressed quickly and walked out the sliding glass door that was off the back of the bedroom. Alicia watched as Duke shifted first, as she had a thousand times before. With a few popping sounds of bones moving and shaping, she smiled at the sight in front of her. Orange, black and white fur. Gold eyes and a swishing tail, her mate was waiting for her.
With just as much grace, Alicia gave her body over to instinct. Feeling her fox close to the surface, she dropped to her knees and let the little vixen have her body. Her fox was beautiful. With full red fur and gold eyes to match Duke’s, she felt complete again. Duke’s tiger watched as she rubbed up and down his body. Breathing in his scent, she relaxed into this form and let go of her thoughts. It was time to run.
Duke took off at a sprint and Alicia followed close behind, mimicking his moves as they dodged around trees and jumped over rocks and logs. They ran hard for what felt like forever before they came to a stop at the edge of a clearing. There was tall grass everywhere with the base of the mountain on the other side where the trees began again. Alicia walked out into the middle of the clearing and rolled onto her back. Looking up, she took in the breathtaking view. The big, bright moon surrounded by a canvas of stars filled the sky. She felt the grass shift as Duke’s tiger laid next to her. They laid there awhile before Alicia shifted back into her human form and rolled onto her side to stroke Duke’s fur until he followed her lead and shifted back, as well.
“This is beautiful. I haven’t seen stars like this since you took me camping in the Ozarks when we first got back from tour.”
Duke’s face lit up, “When the pain from missing you would get bad, I would come here and think about that trip. It was the perfect pain killer, but it was only a temporary fix. Being here with you is better.”
Scooting closer to him, she touched her lips to his, “Thank you for sharing this with me.”
“Thank you for coming when I needed you most.”
Chapter Thirteen
Alicia sat and stared at the computer screen with her cup of coffee in hand. Everyone had been gone for about an hour already this morning, and she still couldn’t bring herself to open the files. It was different when you went through files about people you didn’t know, for obvious reasons. This was different, though. She wouldn’t be able to unsee anything once she looked. Thinking about what Duke had said the day before about her being the right person for the job, she forced herself to click on Michaelson’s file first.
Clicking through image after image, she kept waiting for a pattern to show up in the photos. Most of the time photos seemed to have a hidden purpose when people would take them, but these were all random. It was picture after picture of Michaelson walking, sitting, eating, smiling. The older gentleman had kind eyes. He sure didn’t seem like someone who would set McKinzy up to get hurt. At least, not on purpose.
The last thing on Michaelson’s file was a scanned note that read, Good luck finding him. Michaelson, Wyatt. Gone missing 10 May 2017. McKinzy read over that note three more times before printing it off. In red marker she wrote, where are you?? She pinned the note on the wall.
Sitting and staring at the note, she thought about the timeline. Whoever put that note in the file said that they lost track of him on May tenth. McKinzy was hired by Michaelson, or someone claiming to be him, on August fifth. It was now August twentieth. So, where was he? Everyone up here was under the presumption that he had retired. Had Michaelson felt he was being tailed? Did someone else snatch him and set this trap for McKinzy?
“Dammit,” she shouted. Too many things weren’t adding up. Taking a breath, she clicked on Elijah’s file next. One by one, she worked through each of the boys’ files until she reached Duke’s. She looked up at the wall where she had pinned other pieces of information that she felt might be useful. Different notes had things listed about everyone on them but nothing that seemed out of the ordinary or that she already knew about each of them.
Hesitating on Duke’s file, she opted to take a shower instead. She needed to clear her head, which was really more of an excuse to not have to look at Duke’s file yet. Walking towards the back of the cabin, something caught her eye in the corner by the door jamb. A little, teeny tiny black ball was stuck up in the corner where the two walls and the ceiling met. Odd, that kind of looked like something similar to the security devices she sold.
Turning back around, she went and walked around the rooms, making note of four more. In case they were what she thought they were, she opted to leave them alone until everyone got back. Who knows what would happen if she raised alarm to the person sitting on the other side of those cameras. Better to be safe than sorry.
Alicia’s skin felt like it was crawling, so she grabbed her boots and headed out to find Duke instead. Something wasn’t sitting right inside of her. Her fox was restless. Things weren’t adding up; there was something missing.
Chapter Fou
rteen
“Okay man, you’ve had that same mushy look on your face all morning. Was the sex that good last night?” Elijah nudged Duke’s shoulder.
“Huh? Oh, there wasn’t any sex last night,” Duke said distractedly. That was the truth too. It had been the perfect night. It was just them and the stars last night.
“No sex? No sex? What the hell kind of mating are you tied up with that doesn’t involve sex, dude? That’s not a mating. That’s a goddamned marriage, that’s what that is!” Elijah barked out.
“I took Alicia up to my spot last night. We needed to shift and let our animals out for a run, so that’s what we did.”
“I didn’t realize how much of a pretty princess you could be, Duke,” Elijah teased.
“Call it what you will. I’m just glad to have her back,” Duke smiled to himself as they picked their way down the hill towards the officer cabins. He could see Alicia wandering towards them, looking deeper in thought than she had looked when she left this morning.
“Watch out, Duke, it’s your lady now! Don’t want her knowing about all that kinky shit you told me you do,” Elijah called.
Alicia kept walking until she came to a stop in front of them, “Did you say something? Sorry, I wasn’t paying attention.”
Elijah frowned, “Why can’t anyone ever seem to listen when I’m being funny?”
“Because you’re not as funny as you think you are,” Duke teased.
“Whatever, man,” Elijah said, stomping off toward his cabin.
“Hey there, beautiful. What’re you so focused on?” Duke asked, tilting her head up so he could see her eyes.
“Hug me,” Alicia whispered.
“What?”
“Duke, I need a hug,” Alicia repeated herself.
Realization washed over his face. This was the code they had used in the field when they needed to exchange secrets or intel. Wrapping his arms around her, he bent down just enough where she could whisper faintly in his ear.
“Someone has set up cameras in our cabin. I think they’ve been there awhile. But I don’t know if the other cabins are bugged too. I also don’t know for sure if they’re ones like the ones I sell or not with my company. If they are, there’s audio in them too. Which means someone isn’t just watching everyone, they’re listening to our conversations.”
“How did you find them?”
“I was headed towards the shower and it just happened to catch my eye. There are five that I could find in the house. That’s not including what could be all over in the other cabins.” She explained, “The problem is, I don’t know what we can do to get rid of them without triggering some sort of negative reaction from whoever set them up.”
“Moves and countermoves,” Duke whispered before pulling away from their embrace.
“Exactly.”
“We need to tell the rest of the crew. Something has to be done. We need to make sure people aren’t talking too loudly about this. At all really, until we know more information about what we are dealing with,” Duke said.
Alicia nodded in agreement, “We need to move my office, too. I need to find somewhere I can set up that isn’t bugged.”
“You’re right. Shit. What if they’re already headed this way?”
“One step at a time. We need to figure out something else in the mean time to buy ourselves some time.”
Duke grabbed ahold of her hand and started walking towards the cabins again, “We need to talk to McKinzy and Adrian.”
“We need to set up a safe zone.”
Chapter Fifteen
A few hours later, McKinzy had scoured the trucks to make sure everyone’s vehicles weren’t bugged too, and Duke had placed notes in each of their refrigerators about where to meet. Together, the four of them had decided that it was safer to get away from the camp for the time being until they could figure out who or what they were dealing with. Alicia made extra copies of what was already hanging on the wall and printed off all of the pictures from everyone’s files. She was hoping that together maybe they could piece together this puzzle.
“So, where is it that we’re going exactly?” Alicia asked as she climbed into the passenger seat of Duke’s truck.
“We’re going off of the property. Adrian has a house that’s in someone from his old pride’s name. We’re going to go stay there until the guys can catch up with us. The men can fend for themselves for a day. I just want to get you and all of that information to a safer place. We need an element of surprise in our favor, and we won’t have it if we stay here where they can watch our every move.”
“How has Adrian kept this a secret from everyone?” Alicia pried.
“Adrian’s pairing to a lioness resulted in them needing a house off the prison land. The pride didn’t like the idea of a pregnant female that close to a bunch of rogues. Sure, once they got close to the baby coming they would’ve had to have Abby go back to the pride so they could help with raising the young. This was just an extra precaution. But Adrian and Abby never used it or talked about it, so there’s no way whoever has been watching us could know about it.”
“Well, that’s handy,” Alicia giggled.
“Yeah, it is. It’s downright useful that we had this up our sleeves. Sure, I don’t think this is a Hail Mary move. This will at least give us some sort of edge, though.”
McKinzy’s hand stuck out the window signaling for them to follow, and Duke eased the truck into drive.
“I’m not sure if this is the Firebird’s doing or not, Duke,” Alicia looked at him with wary eyes.
“What makes you say that?” Duke cocked his head in confusion.
“I mean, why the heck would they want to keep an eye on a prison camp and its staff? What is it that they have to gain by stalking all of you?”
“Well that’s the million-dollar question now, isn’t it?” Duke muttered.
“None of this makes sense. The only thing I can come up with is if this is the Firebirds’ doing, they’ve had this plot up their sleeve for a lot longer than the last year or two. Elijah and Jasper’s files even had lists of the girls they’ve hooked up with in Boise and McCall. This is more than just getting their hands on McKinzy. There’s something bigger at play. I just don’t know what it is yet.”
Duke grinned, “Yet being the operative word here, right?”
“Right. Hopefully having everyone look at the files together will help.”
“Did you get the chance to look over what is my file? I know earlier when we were meeting with McKinzy and Adrian, you mentioned mine was the only one you hadn’t looked at yet.”
Alicia chewed her lip, “No, I haven’t looked it over yet. I’m not sure if I want to know what’s in yours.”
“Okay. Well beautiful, you can’t avoid it forever. What if the answers to the missing links are in my file?”
“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Alicia whispered.
“Why are you afraid?” Duke’s mouth drew down into a concerned frown.
“I’m not sure if I want the answers to questions we have. What if there’s something bad they have on you in there? I’m not sure if I’m ready to read into that just yet.”
“Well, love, we’ll have to tackle that file together then. We can’t comfortably say we have all of the information without having read through all of the files first.”
Alicia sighed, “I know.”
Chapter Sixteen
“What do you mean, there’s a list of all the ladies Jasper and I have slept with between Boise and McCall?” Elijah complained. The poor pup was on the defensive.
“Someone was tailing all of you. They found things out. I don’t know what you’re so worried about when it comes to that. We have to figure out more important things first. Like, who the hell has been stalking all of us!” Alicia explained.
“I don’t know what the hell they have found about us that’s so interesting in the first place. I mean, what the hell? We’re a bunch of bachelors and a dragon that live in the woods and make s
ure other shifters keep themselves out of trouble. What is there to be so excited about?” Jasper slunk down on the couch.
“None of us know. That’s the reason we are here, Jas,” Desmond murmured from the couch on the other side of the room.
“From what I’ve gathered so far, the common factor in all of this is Michaelson is the reason all of you are here. That’s the only thing I can find that links all of this together. Then a few months ago, Michaelson told you guys he was retiring, and now the people following everyone seem to think he went missing.”
“So do you think Michaelson is to blame?” Adrian asked from his place on the floor next to McKinzy’s legs.
“I don’t know what to think. I guess what I’m wondering is if Michaelson was close with all of you?” Alicia shook her head in confusion, trying to force her brain to help her piece this together.
“The old wolf shifter was definitely quiet. But he still took care of all of us. Made us feel appreciated; made us feel like we were a part of something special,” Adrian replied.
“So we don’t think that he would set McKinzy up for a bait and switch, right?” Alicia asked the question that had been burning in the forefront of her mind since McKinzy had mentioned the job offer had come from Michaelson.
“I mean, I wouldn’t rule it out. But I don’t think he would do something like that. He had made his stance on shifters known to all of us. He was always upset that the government keeps us regulated, that we have to hide if we don’t want our families to be drafted. He was an advocate of equal rights for shifters, allowing us to be in the public without having any problems from the government at all. Everything will always be a mess if they’re involved. I don’t think he would willingly give over one of the last dragon shifters to the government or to any secret groups,” Desmond folded his arms and leaned against the table.
