by A. C. Arthur
Bas stood then, his six-foot-three-inch height unfolding, his gaze holding steady with Ezra’s.
“The situation has changed,” he spoke, an edge to his voice.
Priya stood quickly, coming to stand just a few steps in front of her mate, her focus on Jewel.
“What he’s saying is that Captain Crowe is obviously looking for you. After you were taken away last night I started thinking about why now and how they knew you were here after all this time. On a hunch I had the front desk print out the guest list for the last six months. It took a while to cross reference them, but Dyson and I finally got through all the names. One of them was under a company booking. A private investigation firm. We pulled the guy’s ID and Syfon said he’d seen him at the resort hanging around the loading area the night before last.”
The night Ezra had watched her run from her car like someone had been chasing her. He couldn’t hold back his rage; he cursed, fists clenching at his sides.
“I was out there. I should have picked up his scent. I should have known,” he spat.
“So someone was following me. I knew they were. I could tell,” Jewel said. “He always said he would find me. He told me I could never leave him. But I did.”
Priya stepped closer, reaching for Jewel’s hand. Ezra thought she was going to pull away, the same way she had with him. She didn’t. Apparently that reaction was reserved solely for him. His shoulders tingled with agitation, heat swirling at the base of his neck.
“He doesn’t have a goddamned choice!” he barked. “He’s not getting another shot at her. Not if I have anything to do with it.”
For a split second Bas’s returning glare was quizzical, then it changed and a muscle ticked in the shifter’s jaw. Bas didn’t give a shit. He was pissed off as well. He’d had that bastard within arm’s reach and he’d let him go. That was definitely not going to happen again.
“This is my resort,” Bas told him. “My territory. I will handle this situation, but first I will know the entire truth.”
“She’s told you the truth! What else do you want her to say? Or do you want to hand her over to Crowe and his suspicious authorities?” Ezra had always been hot-blooded and quick-tempered. As he’d grown into a man he’d learned to temper his emotions, to act instead of react. The training he’d received from his grandfather and from the tribal leaders and soldiers they’d had the privilege to work with all across the world had been more than beneficial to him. He’d been sure to implement all the techniques he’d learned.
Until now. Until Jewel.
There was no breathing. No counting up or down from one hundred. No mental distractions he could employ at this moment. Nothing that would keep him from thinking of one thing and one thing only—keeping Jewel safe, even if she was an admitted diamond thief.
“Let’s just take a breath and wrap our minds around what’s actually going on here. Jewel ran from this man for a reason. She took something that didn’t belong to her, but I’m guessing there’s a good reason for that as well. We can stand here interrogating her, or we can look to the bigger picture. Who the hell is Captain Lawrence Crowe and how does he possess the power to pay off an entire police department, and is he really going to all these measures just to get some measly diamonds back?” Priya asked, looking from her mate to Ezra and then back to Bas again.
Jewel cleared her throat and added, “Just to be clear, it’s four-point-five million dollars’ worth of diamonds.”
Chapter 12
“Where is this ADAM now?” Rome asked via the speaker banked in the center of the long, glossy conference table.
They’d left Jewel’s room after her comment about the diamonds because Bas had received a call notifying him that the Stateside Assembly Leader would be initiating the conference call twenty minutes earlier than had been planned. Bas wasn’t happy about the change, but wisely kept his disagreements to himself as he moved quickly out of the room.
“Ezra, you come with me,” he’d ordered without looking back at the spot where Ezra had stood. After opening the door and entering the hallway, passing Syfon, he snapped, “She goes nowhere without me knowing.”
When Ezra heard the FL speak the words, he felt a burning anger centered in his chest. He kept his mouth shut and followed them into the elevator and down the hall, but not without thinking that this was not how things should be. Jewel was his responsibility, his to protect, to claim, to … His temples throbbed with the thought of what else this woman had come to be to him in such a short amount of time. His shoulders slumped slightly at the realization of what she could never be.
“He’s being detained in the bunkers,” Bas replied.
Ezra sat in the first seat on the right side of the table, while across from him Jacques looked from the FL to the console at the center of the table. Paolo, Dyson, and the veterinarian, Tereza, sat in seats spread along the length of the table, all listening intently, most likely wondering how Rome was going to react to all that had happened last night.
“You don’t know what it is but you’re able to detain it?” Rome asked.
Bas looked to Tereza. “We were able to sedate it. We have a vet here to manage the high dosage to keep it stable.”
“And we know for sure this thing originated from the Comastaz Labs?”
“The flash drives Ezra obtained from the lab contained files that detailed studies of several prototypes. All under the name of the Genesis Project. All previous prototypes were abandoned and were never named. Except ADAM.” Bas finished giving the reports that he’d obtained from each of the shifters in this room.
“It’s unlike anything we’ve ever seen before in the world, Rome. And even in the jungle,” he concluded.
Ezra stiffened at those words.
“You’re telling me that we’re dealing with some unknown creature, possibly developed from this government lab. And it appears to be like us.”
Ezra could just imagine the look on the Leader’s face. He’d known Rome for years, knew his calm and steady demeanor on the outside covered a vicious cutthroat personality when provoked. He’d watched the shifter fight his mating to the First Female, Kalina, and stand by his best friends and Lead Enforcers, Nick and X, when their lives had spiraled out of control and their mates had been discovered.
The Leader would be sitting at the head of his cherry-wood conference table, similar in length and style to this one in Perryville. Standing on either side of him would be Nick and X. His twin, Eli, would be standing close to Rome. The First Female would be sitting next to her mate; Jax, her personal guard, in a seat closest to her. All faces would be grim, all cats lurking close to the surface, ready for battle. Similar to the way it was here.
“With all due respect, Assembly Leader,” Dyson began, stopping briefly to clear his throat and look to Bas for approval to continue. He continued once receiving the go-ahead nod. “Not only does ADAM look like us, his DNA is pretty similar to ours.”
“Who are you and how do you know this?” Rome inquired.
“I’m, ah, I’m Dyson More, sir. I work for the FL as a programmer and analyst. Ezra sent me some files from the lab that he couldn’t get into. I was able to hack into those files last night, or more like early this morning.”
Dyson sat up straighter, flipping open a file he had in front of him. He looked down at the papers he had neatly stacked in a file folder, shaking his head as he continued to speak. “It looks like they’ve been running elaborate tests on a DNA sample. After seeing that thing last night I figured it had to be connected to us somehow so I used X’s shifter database, looking at all the rogue files that have been compiled. I ran a comparison sketch and after going through several filters was able to isolate two possible matches.”
Ezra had been staring intently at the young shifter as he’d been talking. All of this information was new to him, even though he’d exchanged several texts with the kid for a couple of hours after Jewel had fallen asleep last night.
“It’s either a Lormenia
or a Serfin. Genetic markers definitely indicate the Sierra Leone region. The Lormenia and Serfins are the only ones with these strands.”
“You’re saying this thing is a Shadow Shifter?” Jacques asked.
Through the speaker, low curses and even a couple of growls could be heard.
Dyson shook his head. “There are some gaps, but yeah, I’m saying that this ADAM thing has a lot of Shadow Shifter in it. I’m not a scientist so I can’t really pinpoint every marker, but it has an awful lot of shifter combined with its DNA. Which, ah, kind of means…” Dyson’s voice trailed off.
Tereza sat up, a long braid curling around her right shoulder. “It means we’ve got a hybrid being out there with a couple of pretty deadly cat traits mixed inside. And from what I’m guessing Dyson hasn’t figured out yet, there might be more.”
That brought complete silence and a heated glare from Dyson to Tereza that Ezra recognized but decided to ignore.
“Hybrids and unknown ailments,” Rome said quietly. A curse followed and everyone in the Perryville conference room raised their brow.
Roman Reynolds did not get angry easily, but when he did …
“I want your top scientist on this. Find out what the hell this is and where it came from, then kill it!” the Leader said vehemently. “We just found out Shya’s going to need more intensive treatment. Nick and Ary and Dr. Papplin are with her now but we have to figure out what’s going to be the next step. I need you to get a handle on this, Bas, and quick!”
The Leader seemed ready to say something else but there was a sound so loud Ezra’s ears instantly began to ring, and everything around them shook, the lights blinking on and off, then on again. Bas stood immediately, gathering Priya up from her seat. Paolo had stood also, his hand to the gun at his hip, while Jacques had been jolted but not thrown completely from his seat. The Enforcer quickly stood and was headed for the door.
“South wing.” Jacques turned to Paolo.
Paolo nodded, pulling his gun free. “I’m on it.”
“Get the entire blue team down there. Call Syfon and tell him I need Jewel on the floor in the main lobby to deal with the guests,” Bas instructed, walking toward the door, his arm tight around Priya.
“No!” Ezra immediately replied.
“It’s her job,” Bas said over his shoulder. “Regardless of what reason she has for being here, she has a job to do.”
“She’s not the manager of this resort, he is,” Ezra continued, pointing to Jacques.
He circled around the table and was headed to the door, pushing past Bas and Priya, when there was another rumble. Smaller than the first but powerful enough to knock the landscape pictures from the wall, cracking the glass on the long stretch of windows.
“I’m going to get Jewel,” Ezra told Bas after the movement around them had ceased. “You want to stop me, shoot me.”
* * *
“I’ll be there this evening. If you could please make sure he’s ready to go,” Jewel said into her cell phone.
On her bed, her two suitcases were packed. Moving to her dresser she picked up her clutch purse, unzipping it to check the passports she’d put in there only moments before. She had to make sure she didn’t forget anything. There was no coming back.
There were no sad feelings, she would not feel homesickness once she was gone and settled in their new place. Emotions like that had no purpose in the life she knew she’d need to lead from here on out. Those weren’t officers who had taken her away last night; she’d realized that the moment they entered the empty police station. She hadn’t been booked or read her rights, nothing, simply shoved into that cell. Minutes later that big bulky guy had walked past. He walked back and forth a number of times. She figured he was guarding her, making sure she didn’t leave until Larry came. So she didn’t look at him anymore, didn’t keep track of how many times he passed the cell.
Then all hell had seemed to break loose and she was once again free. Now, she thought, after closing the clutch and leaning over to pick up her Land’s End backpack that had been stuffed with more clothes, her toiletries, and the diamonds, she would make sure she and her father remained free for the rest of their lives.
Jewel moved to the window, the one that would lead her to freedom and paused, her entire body going still, her heart slowing until she almost wasn’t breathing. Four military vehicles drove through the front gate of Perryville Resorts.
Larry was in the military.
After the first four, big trucks covered in fatigue tarps followed, one full of soldiers, guns in hands. She shook her head, closing her eyes and letting her forehead rest on the glass.
“No. No. No,” she whispered.
The next seconds were crucial to her survival, she knew this without any doubt. If Larry got into this building … when he got into this building, because with the amount of men and firepower he had with him, he was definitely getting in. It would be over at that point. He’d search every room, every hole in this place until he found her and then …
“You’re nothing without me, you know that, don’t you? Nothing but a second-rate whore shaking her ass to make a quick buck. You were living in a trailer when I found you and that’s all you were ever going to have out of life. You should be thanking me.”
Larry had said those words to her, while she’d been on her knees, the flat of his foot pressing down on the small of her back until she’d whimpered. She couldn’t fall, couldn’t falter, or break, or even beg for help. He hated when she begged for help. All she could ever beg for was him.
And he wasn’t all wrong. She had been performing the private dances for money. She’d needed at least two hundred and fifty thousand and the manager of the club had shown her how to get it. Her father had needed that money for his medication and the private nurse, and then she could pay the rent for a nice two-bedroom apartment so she wouldn’t have to worry about them having to sleep in a trailer again. That money would have gone such a long way. Larry’s appearance at the club that night had been planned. The duffle bag of money he’d shown her the moment they were alone in that room and the offer of more were all the incentive she’d needed to dance for him throughout the night.
The building rocked at that moment, jerking her until she fell onto her knees. Her brow started to sweat as she remembered this position. She hated it. Hated each time Larry had pushed her down his way, had forced her to stay down in this subservient position while he did whatever pleased him at the time, whether that was stepping on her, or masturbating to the sight of her spread open like this and waiting for him, spurting his release all over her back. She flinched at the thought.
Or had it been that follow-up noise and jerking of the building? She didn’t know and she wasn’t waiting another second to find out. Instead, Jewel reached for the handle of the backpack, unzipped it, and made sure the black velvet pouch she’d wrapped in a hair scarf and then stuffed into a ziplock bag was still there. She pushed her purse inside and re-zipped the bag. Then she threw it over her shoulder and slid the door to the balcony open. Down below the soldiers had already started jumping out of the parked vehicles, running to the front doors of the building, some of them going around back.
Something else could be going on, she thought fleetingly. There could be some type of national issue, maybe there was a storm coming and the governor had declared a state of emergency and possibly called in the National Guard. Or maybe, no, she knew who and what it was. She knew exactly what was going on and as she touched her hand to the railing she knew she had to go. Now!
She had just been about to launch herself over the railing so she could climb down the drainpipe, covered almost completely by the ivy that roped along some parts of the building, when a strong arm grabbed her elbow, holding her still.
Chapter 13
Smoke alarms blared throughout Perryville Resorts. Every overhead sprinkler in the building had engaged, so that water showered down to the floor, producing even more thick smoke that had guests and employ
ees alike choking. They held cloths to their faces as they followed the staff’s lead out of the building. It was utter chaos and it was about to get worse.
Lifting an arm, he shot straight through the door of the room he was told belonged to Sebastian Perry. More smoke and sparks etched the gigantic hole that the UK—short for UK79865—that had been given to him by a very close friend had created. It was a deadly weapon with spot-on precision from any distance. Up close it would probably blow a man’s head off, which was exactly what he planned to do if this Perry character gave him any problems about getting back what was rightfully his.
A couple of his men went in before him knocking over crap, breaking probably stupidly expensive stuff. Crowe stayed focused, looking for anyone human, anyone that could tell him where Dawn was.
“Empty, boss,” someone yelled from the bedroom.
“They’re running around this place like lost animals,” another soldier joked. “All of’em scared of a little C4 and a bunch of guns,” he continued.
At that moment, shots came through the window in the room closest to the door. Crowe had just entered the bedroom to assure himself that no one was there. Now, he shrugged. “Guess all of them aren’t lost animals,” he quipped, lifting his gun arm and heading out into the living room to find out who was bat crazy enough to shoot at him and his men.
As he stepped into the room, he saw at least nine men running through the now-broken-to-shit windows, guns drawn, shooting whatever they could. He simply lifted his arm, let off three shots, and watched three of the men closest to the one in the middle drop to the floor. His soldiers picked off another five of them, leaving the middle man, the one Crowe wanted. It was a gut feeling he had, but Crowe suspected this one was the leader, or at least a high-ranking official by the different-color uniform he wore and the air of authority this one had exuded as he’d made his way into the room. Not one to second-guess a gut instinct because he was rarely wrong, Crowe turned his gun directly at this one.
