Astrid joined him at the table and dug into her burger. She looked up and caught him staring. “What?” she asked. Wearing no makeup and with a glob of ketchup smeared in the corner of her mouth, she was still the sexiest thing he’d seen. He was in big trouble.
Luke adjusted the napkin on his lap and then forced out a slow grin to hide his reaction. “Looks like you were hungry. You’ve got ketchup on your face.”
“Thanks.” She wiped her mouth with the napkin and kept eating.
He reclined in his chair. “Let’s continue our earlier conversation.”
Astrid took a big bite out of the burger and chewed demonstratively, pointing at her cheek to show her mouth was full.
“It’s okay,” Luke said. “You eat and I’ll talk. Just nod or shake your head if I ask you a question.” She frowned at him, but he pretended not to see her irritation. “These creatures obviously want very badly to capture you. They’re not going to give up.” He paused.
Astrid nodded.
“Let’s talk strategy then. You basically have two options.” There were probably more, but not if she wanted to resolve this quickly. He’d thought it through. His Marine instincts would be right in this situation.
She paused mid-chew and raised her eyebrows.
Luke leaned forward and snagged a fry from her plate. He chewed slowly, dragging it out to see how long she would hold out before speaking. He didn’t have to wait long.
Astrid finished chewing her bite too quickly and started coughing. “What two options?” she choked out. He pushed his glass of water toward her. She took a deep swallow. “What options?” she insisted.
Luke reached for another fry, but she slapped his hand away. “It’s basic battle strategy,” he said as he pretended to nurse the hand she’d hit. “Either you wait for them to come to you, in which case you set an ambush. Or, you go on the offensive and attack them at their home base.”
A fleeting shadow passed across her face. “I don’t know where they hang out.”
He’d love to know what she was thinking right now. “Find out.”
She cocked her head, studying him like he was a new species she’d never seen before. “How?” Her voice trembled a little.
He waited a breath longer than necessary. “Let me help you.”
Astrid just kept looking at him. “How will you find out where their home base is?” Skepticism practically dripped from her words. Did she really have that little faith in him? He would enjoy proving her wrong. If he could get her to partner up with him, that was. And that was a big “if.” But he could tell she wanted this badly. She was holding herself too still and trying hard to keep her voice steady.
Luke shrugged. “I’ve got resources.” He grabbed several fries from her plate. Whalert would shit ducklings when Luke requested to use DTU’s computers and databases, but he’d come around eventually. He wanted to flush out these covert labs as badly as Luke did, just not for the same reasons. Whalert wanted to put a stop to the domestic terrorists they brewed up through their illegal genetics program. Luke’s reason was personal. He wanted revenge for Donovan.
Astrid didn’t seem to notice the theft of the fries this time. “What kind of resources?”
“I can’t tell you that,” Luke said. “Let’s just say I’ve got a way to find things.” Well, the government did. Big Brother was watching and listening intently everywhere.
Astrid picked up her burger again, but put it back down before taking a bite. “Okay, let’s say we find where the wolverines hang out. Then what?” She looked up, her green eyes as clear as a forest lake.
“What do you want to do? Blow them up? Capture them?” He almost held his breath. What she chose would tell him a lot about why the creatures were after her.
She looked away. “They have something I need.”
Money? Guns? Drugs? Luke’s mind reeled with possibilities. “I need more than that if I’m going to help you with this.” His pushed some authority into his tone of voice. This game they were playing was taking too long.
“Okay,” she nodded. “I came to Denver to retrieve something—someone.” She was finally sharing. But who had she come to pick up? A boyfriend? The thought bothered him more than it should, and he pushed aside the alpha instinct to demand answers. Instead, he waited for her to continue. “The wolverines somehow kidnapped him before I could pick him up.”
So it was a he. Luke forced his voice to remain even. “Someone important to you?”
She traced the table’s lattice iron pattern with a fingertip. “Someone important to…Daisy.” She looked up, studying him closely.
The relief he felt was immediate. “Daisy’s boyfriend?”
“Would that bother you?” she asked in a dry voice.
Why the hell would he care who Daisy—Naya, whatever the hell her name was—dated? “Why would it?” He frowned. What crazy tangential path had they gone down now?
Astrid looked him straight in the eye, as if his next answer would be very important. “I thought the two of you had a thing while you worked together.”
Was that what had made her bolt into the bathroom earlier? “Ms. Driscoll and I had a strictly professional relationship.” Naya was attractive, but he’d never been drawn to her. Not like with Astrid. She’d practically shone like a beacon on the dance floor the first time he saw her. He had spent the whole night staring at her. Plus, he’d always known that Naya was involved with the covert labs. A brief glimpse of her was on the security tapes from the North Dakota explosions. What was left of the footage, which wasn’t much. Naya had been his mark from the beginning.
Astrid muttered under her breath, but he couldn’t make out the words. Before he had a chance to ask, she spoke again. “Daisy’s engaged to someone else.”
“The guy who was upset with her when you came to find her at the club?”
She nodded. “The guy I was supposed to pick up is her brother.” She looked away. “I should never have lost him.”
Luke grabbed her hand and was ridiculously pleased when she didn’t pull away. “Don’t beat yourself up. You couldn’t have known.” He still wanted to know what this guy meant to her.
She looked him straight in the eye. “But I should have known. I should have been more careful.” Pain filled her gaze. “He’s not well.” She swallowed. “What if they’re hurting him? Daisy will never forgive me.”
Was she talking about torture? So, this brother knew whatever Astrid was keeping from these creatures. And Naya was connected to all of this, as well as to a lab like the one that had destroyed Donovan’s life. Excitement rose in Luke’s chest. He was so close. After all these years, would he finally get revenge for his brother? He forced himself to concentrate and not let his emotions trip him up. He couldn’t give anything away now. “We’ll find him.”
Astrid nodded. “We’ll get him out.” Her voice dropped lower. “And then we’ll kill all of those miserable wolverine bastards.” Chills ran down Luke’s spine. She must have noticed, because she looked at him, a cold smile on her lips. “Sorry, I can get a little bloodthirsty.”
A little?
* * *
Luke found Broden in his office on the second floor of the Denver FBI field office. The modern building was made largely of glass and located in the east part of the city, where the old airport had been. Broden’s office had large windows, but for some reason he had the blinds drawn. “It’s too bright and freaking hot when the sun shines straight in,” he explained when asked. “Plus, I don’t like the view of Walmart and Sam’s Club across the street.”
Luke took a seat. He’d called Whalert before heading over. The special agent in charge had grumbled for a while but finally given his consent to Luke using the Denver office’s resources. “I need your help,” Luke told Broden.
The field agent watched him from across the desk. “So I’ve heard. Your boss cal
led my boss, and here we are.” His tone wasn’t exactly unfriendly, but his body language said he wasn’t too thrilled about the request. Great, another person Luke was going to have to cajole into trusting him. When he’d left Astrid back in the hotel, she’d worn exactly the same skeptical expression that Broden’s face bore right now.
“My mark had a run-in with some bad…people. I need to check last night’s security footage from the parking garage at the train station.”
Broden quirked an eyebrow and picked up his phone receiver. He punched a button, and when someone picked up on the other end, he issued a few short commands. Slipping the receiver back in its cradle, he nodded to Luke. “They’re pulling the feed and preparing a viewing room for us.”
Oh shit. No way he could watch that creature with Broden in the room. Talk about freak-out in the FBI. “Some of the information on there could be of a sensitive nature. I’m not sure you have the security—”
Broden slammed his hand down on the desk. “Don’t give me that shit about security clearance. Unless your girl has her top off and is blowing the president while he’s reciting secret missile codes, I’m watching that footage with you.” He took a breath. “And even then, I’d just watch it after you left. Maybe with the sound off, but I’d watch.”
Luke’s mind raced. He had to keep Broden from seeing that fight. “Look, I’ve been working this case for eighteen months. I can’t risk it falling apart just because you have your panties in a twist and want to watch a movie with me.”
“How would me seeing security footage from a parking garage make your case fall apart?”
Well, he had Luke there. Maybe he’d just have to knock out the agent before the wolverines showed up on the video. “I don’t know, but it could happen.” He sounded like a petulant teenager.
Broden raised an eyebrow. “Are you doing something illegal in that garage?”
Luke shook his head. “No.” Technically, he had attacked first, but considering the creature had claws, he didn’t think anyone would hold that against him. They’d be too busy freaking out about the monsters walking among them.
The phone on the desk buzzed. A tinny male voice announced that viewing room two was set up for them. Broden stood and motioned for Luke to proceed out the office door.
They walked down a corridor where skylights brightly illuminated walls painted in yellow and blue. Broden squinted against the light. Maybe he was a vampire. Or maybe he was just hungover. At the end of the corridor, they took two flights of stairs down to a narrower hallway. Green and red lamps hung over closed doors. Broden opened one where the green light was on and ushered Luke inside. He entered a small room with two executive office chairs placed in front of a wide desk with oversize screens resting on top.
Broden sat in one of the chairs and typed on a keyboard on the desk. The screens came alive, displaying a numbered list with columns of dates and times. “Alright,” the agent mumbled as he tapped the keys. “Let’s see if I remember how to do this.”
Luke took the chair next to Broden’s and watched as the data scrolled past on the screen. Broden selected several rows, right-clicked, and selected “map” from the drop-down menu. A 3-D model of the parking garage showed up on the screen.
“What floor do you want to view?” Broden asked.
“Three,” Luke answered, fascinated by how the agent rotated the image of the garage. He pointed at some blinking circles on the screen. “Are those the cameras?”
“Yep. Which location on third?”
Luke peered closer on the screen, not sure if he was relieved or disappointed when he discovered Astrid’s parking spot was in a dead zone. He pointed at the screen. “This is where her car was.”
Broden swore under his breath. “The city did a piss-poor job of covering this garage. There aren’t enough cameras. Probably wanted to save money on the setup.”
Luke silently agreed. Even the cameras that were there seemed poorly placed. Naya would have done a much better job. His club had no corners to hide in after she’d placed cameras according to her security plan. The absurdity of asking Naya to come up with a plan for Denver so he could spy on Astrid made him smile. “What about entrances and exits?”
A few more taps on the keyboard, and Broden had split the screen between the double entrance and exit drive-ups Luke had used when chasing after the wolverine creature and a lone exit ramp on the side of the building. They watched the footage on triple speed. The cars zoomed in and out of the garage like angry, yet slightly confused insects, stopping and going with jerky movements.
Luke’s subconscious recognized something on the footage from the camera displaying the lone entrance. “There.” He pointed. “Go back and let’s watch that again.” On the film, a white van exited the garage, and Luke saw what his instincts had picked up on before his mind could catch up. The driver of the van tried to keep his face from being captured on camera, but even in profile there was no mistaking his broken nose. Swollen and misshapen, it stood out even in the grainy resolution of the security footage. “That’s the guy. Zoom in on the license plate.”
Broden did as asked and then cursed. “The thing is so dirty I can’t make out the numbers.”
“Can you get someone to clean up the picture for us?” Luke leaned forward in the chair, peering closer on the plate even though he knew there was no use.
“I doubt it,” Broden said. “Not only did they save money on the number of cameras, but with this resolution, the picture would just get blurrier if we tried to zoom in on the plate.”
Luke sighed and thought for a moment. “The guy comes back later, but he’s on foot.”
Broden turned toward him. “You’re thinking he might have parked on the street?”
Luke nodded.
“It’s not a bad idea.” Broden faced the screen again. “He would have parked off-site to not to draw attention to himself, but not so far that he couldn’t reach the vehicle if he needed a quick getaway.”
They fast-forwarded a few hours until they saw the creature enter the garage again. The camera picked up the butterfly bandages across his nose as white bright spots on the grainy gray footage. Broden returned to map mode and zoomed out the image so the three-dimensional model now included streets and structures outside the garage. His fingers tapped on the keys and switched between several street-view cameras in quick sequencing, all displaying the same time stamp as when the creature walked up to the parking garage.
They both noticed the parked white van at the same time and scooted forward in their seats. Broden enlarged the image and then grunted triumphantly when the camera caught the rear license plate and the registration number showed up clear as could be. “Got ya,” he exclaimed and reached for the phone. After he’d asked for a BOLO alert on the registration, he turned toward Luke. “Shall we see if we can do some more sleuthing and figure out where it came from?” His eyes glittered.
Luke sat back in the chair. “Go for it.” He watched as Broden’s agile typing manipulated the software to quickly search through footage via a street-by-street view in ever-expanding circles radiating out from the parked white van. As the time stamps counted down, they were able to trace the van’s route backward from the parking garage to wherever it had started out.
Broden muttered under his breath the entire time, but he obviously knew the software tool well and was enjoying himself. Luke’s respect for the field office agent grudgingly grew. At the same time, he felt slightly creeped out by the idea that Broden had such an excellent view of Denver’s citizens from this small room and seemed to excel in voyeuring. At least when it came to traffic patterns and parking. Hopefully, Broden only used his powers for good.
Chapter 7
The inside of Astrid’s thigh itched like crazy, and she tried not to fidget in the passenger seat of Holden’s car. She’d pulled out the stitches that morning, using nail clippers and tweezers. Not th
e ideal tools for removing sutures, but they were all she had and she couldn’t afford to wait any longer. Her skin regenerated too quickly and had started to absorb the thread. It was either remove them or have them become a permanent part of her.
Holden yawned widely as he drove and took another sip out of the paper cup of coffee he’d insisted they buy at a drive-through coffee place. She wondered how much sleep he’d gotten. Before they left, Astrid had booked another hotel room for herself using the phone in Luke’s room. She’d then strolled through the hallways and the lobby wearing only the hotel robe, but nobody had so much as raised an eyebrow. They must have thought she was on her way back from the spa or the pool.
Once she got to her room, she’d sent a quick text to Naya so she wouldn’t worry. Astrid had felt guilty then, and a quick pang of unease hit her now too. Although the guilt hadn’t kept her from sleep. As soon as she hit Send on the message, she’d crashed and been out for straight twelve hours. She felt remarkably rejuvenated after that. Even the berserker seemed more alert and yet calmer. It hadn’t spoken again and wasn’t restlessly pacing like it had for the last few days. Since the train-station garage allowed overnight parking, she wasn’t too worried about having left the car there. The locked weapons compartment was well hidden in the floor of the chassis. And the car had an inline fuel shut-off valve. If someone tried to steal the car, they’d only be able to drive it a few feet. The fuel supply was shut off unless the engine was started with a key.
“It’s not much farther now.” Holden put his cup back in the holder. “Golden is just twenty minutes from Denver, and the building I think the freaky creatures are in is only a few miles past town.”
Astrid studied her phone. According to her Internet search, Golden had been founded in the late 1850s when gold was discovered in the mountains surrounding the town. Only a decade or two later, Adolph Coors had shown up and started his famous brewery. Miners and beer, a winning combination. She figured Adolph had ended up with more gold in his pocket than the men who’d dug it out of the mountain and panned the streams.
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