by Terry Spear
He suspected that Chris had helped set up the situation where Meara would be alone so Cyn could meet her and have dinner. But if that was the case, what was the motive? Chris obviously felt something for Meara. Why would he willingly make it easy for Cyn to have dinner with her?
On a hunch, Rourke returned to the file cabinet and opened the drawer containing Chris’s personal financial files. He began systematically going through the sub-leader’s bank and credit card statements.
He found the charge for the plane ticket to Pompano Beach and a check made out to Cyn Iverson in the amount of $50,000. What the hell?
Not wanting to risk staying any longer and chance being discovered, he grabbed the additional paperwork and hurried out to his vehicle. He drove north, thinking to go to Dave’s place, but then changed his mind and turned his vehicle around to head south. What if Dave was also involved? The pack had mutinied once on Hunter. What if his sub-leaders both had been involved?
He’d go to Hunter and Tessa’s house. It was only about a mile south of Meara’s, where Chris was checking into the cabin-renter squabbles, but Chris would never suspect that Rourke would stow away in the pack leader’s vacated house.
Rourke pulled out his phone as he drove down the coast road, intending to warn Hunter of Chris’s involvement, although Rourke only had circumstantial evidence. When his phone rang in his hand, he nearly dropped it on the floorboard.
He glanced at the caller ID. Unknown number.
“Yeah?” he said evasively. Might be a wrong number. He hoped to hell Chris wasn’t already on to him. But he knew it would be too soon. His nerves were frayed.
“It’s Meara,” the caller said, and Rourke sighed with relief. “I’m using Finn’s phone because my own is out of commission, but Dave called and said you wanted to look more into the attempt on Allan’s life. Dave tried to call Hunter to get his okay on it, but his line was busy. So Dave called me. What is this all about?”
Dave must be one of the good guys, which relieved Rourke no end. “Chris is involved,” Rourke said. He tried to keep his voice on an even keel, but the repercussions of learning such a thing made his heart race and his voice sound desperate. “I found tarot cards at Chris’s house, but the Knight of Swords was missing,” he quickly added. “And I discovered a plane ticket that put him in Pompano Beach, Florida, at the same time that Allan was shot. I’m on my way to Hunter’s house. This whole situation with Allan has to do with Chris.”
Meara didn’t say anything. Had the mountains cut their reception?
“Meara? Are you still there?”
“Are you sure?” she asked, sounding shocked.
“Yeah. I’ve got the plane-ticket receipt and the remaining tarot cards right here,” he said, relieved she’d heard him right. He patted them resting on the console, feeling like he’d just discovered a case as big as Watergate, at least as far as the pack was concerned.
“What exactly did he say?”
“He’s in it with Cyn Iverson, Meara. The guy Hunter didn’t want you to date. Chris took a photo of you dining with Cyn at that restaurant when you were supposed to be shopping for romance books in Sacramento. He lied about it. He told Hunter he hadn’t a clue you’d been with the guy.”
Silence.
“Meara, are you okay?”
She cursed under her breath. “Anything else?” she asked. This time her voice was hard.
“He paid Cyn $50,000.”
She didn’t say anything for a moment, then asked, “How far are you from Hunter’s place?”
“Twenty minutes.”
“Finn and I will be there in thirty. Was anybody else in the pack involved?”
“I don’t know. As soon as I picked up the evidence at Chris’s place, I took off.”
“All right, all right. I’ll get hold of Hunter. Stay low until we get there. Don’t call anyone else. I don’t want to tip off the other pack members if anyone else is involved.”
“I’m sorry, Meara.”
“Yeah, so am I.” Meara ended the call. She tried to get hold of Hunter but only got a busy signal.
“What’s up?” Finn asked, his voice dark with threat.
“Rourke, the new guy, found evidence at Chris’s house.” Meara set his phone in the cup holder.
Finn’s brows rose.
“Apparently Chris is involved in this whole sordid mess.”
“Where’s the evidence?”
“Rourke’s got it. He’s bringing it to Hunter and Tessa’s house.”
Finn let out his breath and reached over to rub Meara’s arm. “Are you okay?”
She shook her head. “Chris has been with our pack since the early years. How could he be involved in something so hideous?”
“I don’t know. Right incentive, maybe mad at Hunter over some slight? I don’t know.”
Meara grabbed the phone and tried calling Hunter again. No luck. “Can you drive faster?”
“What exactly was the evidence?”
“Rourke has the tarot cards, minus the Knight of Swords that was left with Allan. And he discovered a plane-ticket receipt for Pompano Beach.”
“Pompano Beach? Hell, don’t tell me it was around the time that Allan got shot.”
“Yeah, same time. Then, too, Chris wasn’t supposed to know that I was having dinner with Cyn that time I was shopping in Sacramento. But Rourke found a picture of me eating dinner at the restaurant with Cyn.”
“So Chris knew all about it.”
“Yeah. Rourke left Chris’s place in a hurry before he was discovered.”
“So Chris was the one who shot Allan? I’ll kill the SOB myself. How did Rourke even begin digging into this stuff?”
“He’s an investigative reporter.”
Finn smiled. “Sounds like he’s a good addition to the pack.”
“Yeah,” she said, still fuming about Chris and wishing that they’d trusted Rourke more to do what was right. “Sounds like you’re right. Chris is a dead man, though,” Meara promised.
“Where is Chris now?”
Meara looked at Finn. “My house.”
“That’s not far from Hunter’s place.”
“A little more than a mile. He won’t suspect any of us are there. Hunter’s supposed to be wherever we are at some safe house, as far as Chris knows.”
“Yeah, but you know how well-laid plans can go awry.”
* * *
Rourke parked some distance down the road south of Hunter and Tessa’s house, hiding the car in the woods since the place didn’t have a garage. He could just envision Chris driving by the pack leader’s place, seeing Rourke’s vehicle parked in front, and wondering what the hell he was doing there since Hunter wasn’t home.
Rourke locked his car doors. Then with the evidence tucked under his arm, he bolted through the trees to reach the house. When he got there, he went around to the back door and picked the lock, memories flooding him of when he’d stayed there to help Hunter protect Tessa during a winter storm, electrical outages, and fights with bad guys. And how he’d wanted Tessa, but the SEAL had won out. Who could compete with a SEAL who was a wolf on top of that?
Now Rourke would help Finn to protect Meara, which was almost the same scenario. Only Rourke wasn’t interested in Meara the way he’d had a crush on Tessa. Meara was too… unpredictable for him.
He locked the door to the place.
Rourke glanced at his wrist and then remembered he no longer wore a watch as a werewolf. It was one of the hardest things he’d had to get used to. At first, he’d fought the idea—until he’d stripped out of his clothes, forgot his watch, shifted, and lost his prized watch in the woods.
Meara and Finn should be here by now. They were probably hiding their vehicle like he had done and were on foot in the woods, headed in this direction.
He was damned thankful his need to investigate the situation had prompted him to search Chris’s house. Never in a millennium would Rourke have believed that Chris had been involved. Without the evidenc
e, they all might have been clueless about Chris’s involvement until it was too late.
He heard a noise on the back patio, and thinking Meara and Finn were trying to get in, Rourke headed for the back door to open it for them.
His heart thundering, Rourke stared at Chris, who stood at the back door looking in through the kitchen window. When Chris caught Rourke’s eye, he cast him an evil smile. Chris walked over to the back door and tried to unlock it with a lockpick.
“You know, Rourke, you’re supposed to be at your apartment,” Chris said through the door.
The lockpick twisted some more. Rourke’s skin chilled.
“You’re not supposed to be driving your vehicle, either.”
Twist, grind, twist.
“You’re supposed to be waiting for me until I pick you up to take you to the newspaper office.”
Click.
“Why are you here at Hunter’s house? Don’t you know that’s illegal? Breaking and entering? Hunter will not be pleased.”
Rourke raced back into the living room and shoved the incriminating papers underneath the couch cushion. Should he shift? He had no weapon on him.
“So, what are you doing here? Dave said you wanted to speak to me about investigating this situation further concerning Allan’s shooter. What was it you wished to ask me?”
Rourke bolted for the guest bedroom where he’d slept before and locked the door behind him. He was beginning to shuck his clothes when he heard the back door squeak open.
He should have brought the evidence of Chris’s involvement in here.
“You’re not hiding from me, are you?” Chris asked. “You’re supposed to be a big bad wolf now, not a rabbit, Rourke. Are you still a rabbit?”
Rourke swore under his breath as he stood naked in the guest room, unable to the shift.
“Are you in one of the bedrooms?” Chris asked, heading down the hall. “Hmm, only one door closed. Are you hiding behind Door Number 1? The big question is why?”
“How did you know I was here?” Rourke asked, hoping that he could delay the inevitable so that Finn and Meara would have a chance to arrive.
“I just happened to be leaving Meara’s house when who should I see roar lickety-split down the road in his truck past the place but my buddy Rourke, who was supposed to still be at his apartment. So I followed you here. Found where you hid your vehicle and gave the order to disable it, if you thought to leave again anytime soon. You weren’t supposed to be driving, you know.”
Someone else was with Chris? Hell, he’d never get out of this alive. “You said that already, Chris.”
“Yeah, well, you seem to need more direction. So why are you here, and why, when you saw me at the door, didn’t you let me in? You didn’t think I’d just go away, did you?”
“Hunter’s on his way here.”
“Really. Well, a little birdie told me he’s having a rough day of it on his own. I’d planned to oversee operations at the safe house, but… well, this seemed like something that needed looking into right away.”
Rourke’s heart was beating so hard that he figured Chris could hear it through the door. But no matter how many times he tried to tell himself to shift, it wasn’t having any effect. “How did you learn where Hunter is?”
“That’s the wonder of a mate who wasn’t a wolf. She was worried about Hunter and called Dave to see if he could check on him. Since Dave is in the middle of a crisis, trying to track down a runaway teen, he asked me to look into it. That’s all I needed to wrap this up. The location of the safe house.”
If Chris managed to kill Hunter because of Tessa’s mistake, she’d never be able to live with herself.
Again, Rourke tried to will himself to shift. Nothing. Hell, why was it that just when he thought he had the shifting down pat, it eluded him?
“So exactly why are we having this scene?” Chris asked with an odd tone to his voice. Like he was ready to end this now. But Rourke figured Chris was dying to know what Rourke had learned and possibly who he had told.
A lockpick was shoved in the bedroom door lock, and Rourke glanced from the door to the window, wondering what he could do even if he escaped that way when he was naked, when he heard the familiar click that told him the door was unlocked and ready to open.
Rourke expected Chris to open the door by throwing it aside. But instead, he did it in his usual quiet manner, slowly, no doubt listening to see if Rourke was a wolf ready to pounce. Rourke figured Chris probably hadn’t shifted himself yet.
“Rourke,” Chris said, his voice low and cold, testing to see if Rourke could still respond as a human.
But Rourke wouldn’t ease Chris’s mind one bit and kept silent, while he kept praying he’d shift.
Chris didn’t push the door open wide enough to allow Rourke to see him. Then Chris moved away from the door. “Just for your information, Cyn should be here any minute now. The supposed squabble that cabin renters were having at Meara’s place? Really just me and Cyn making some last-minute plans. He’s the one who is sabotaging your vehicle. He wanted a piece of you, too. He doesn’t like newly turned wolves at all and reporters in general, but I’ve waited long enough for this, and you’re all mine.”
Rourke heard Chris’s zipper slide down. Chris was going to strip and shift.
Rourke cursed his inability to shift at will. He really loved being a werewolf, but he wouldn’t be one for very much longer if he couldn’t summon the ability to become a wolf like—now!
A tingling started rushing through his veins, heating him to the marrow of his bones, the muscles stretching, welcoming the wolf side of him, and for a moment, he felt relief. But just as he shifted and looked up from the floor, Rourke saw Chris standing in the doorway, a wolf ready to rip him to shreds, his amber eyes and mouth wickedly smiling.
His fur standing on end, his heart thundering, Rourke figured maybe he should have thought this out a little more. While he’d still had the chance, maybe he should have attempted to flee out the window, and then shifted and run like hell until Finn showed up.
It was now or never. Chris growled with a second of warning, then lunged at him.
* * *
Finn figured the reason Meara couldn’t reach Hunter, Anna, or the rest of the SEAL team on the phone was because they had shifted into their wolf forms and were possibly in a fight. Meara was trying not to show how anxious she was, but he was certain she was even more worried about Rourke than she was about her brother or the others. They were trained in combat. Rourke was not. And he was alone.
“Does he still have problems shifting?” Finn asked, not having been around newly turned wolves much.
“Yes. That’s why he’s always got to have a mentor when he’s out. He’s not supposed to be driving until he can prove he’s got this shifting business under control.”
Finn hadn’t even thought of that. He could just imagine a newly turned wolf trying to drive, getting the urge to strip and shift, and veering off the coast road into the Pacific Ocean.
Meara suddenly stopped, and Finn grabbed her arm as he heard a man’s voice at the house.
“Chris,” she whispered, her voice fearful.
“Stay here, Meara. I’ll take care of it.”
“No.” She pursed her lips. “I’ll speak with him. He supposedly wants me. I’ll distract him. Then you can get the drop on him. But if you just go in, he could kill Rourke first.”
“It’s too risky. Stay here.”
She ground her teeth, knowing that Finn was used to operations like this, but she still thought her plan had merit.
Finn stripped off his clothes shifted in record time, and looked back at Meara as if doubting his decision to leave her alone. When she motioned for him to go, he turned and raced through the woods toward Hunter’s home.
As soon as he was nearly out of sight, a twig snapped behind Meara, and she swung around and gasped.
“You want me to shoot Finn, I will, Meara,” Cyn warned, his hair longer than she’d remembere
d it, his amber eyes gleaming with power, his voice threatening. “Come here,” he growled.
She moved away from the cliff and toward Cyn as slowly as she could without aggravating him further.
“You and your damned brother ruined everything for me,” he said, his voice low and menacing.
“I don’t understand,” she said. “I thought you wanted to date me. But I guess that wasn’t the master plan, was it?”
He snorted. “As if it would ever have worked out with your brother running things. My sister wasn’t supposed to die the way she did.”
She knew it. He would kill her for revenge because his sister was dead. But why would someone have changed the location of the meeting on the beach? If the team had gone to the other location, they would have all died and so would have the hostages.
Knowing the answer to the question, she asked anyway, wanting to hear him say it. “Why do you want me dead?”
“Hell, Meara, I wanted you. Period. I genuinely liked you. But you told Hunter you didn’t wish to see me. That I wasn’t good enough for you like I wasn’t good enough for Hunter’s precious team.”
She scowled at him and folded her arms at her waist. “That’s not true. I told Hunter I wanted to see you.”
He turned to look in the direction of Hunter’s house where they could hear the sound of growling wolves. “Damn your brother for lying to me.” He looked back at Meara. “I thought you decided I wasn’t worthy to see you. Hunter told me as much and then said the same thing about including me on his team.”
“It wasn’t so.” And knowing Hunter, he wouldn’t have said anything so cruel. She figured that Cyn had heard what he wanted to hear. “Why did you want to be on the team so badly? To save your sister?”
He laughed mercilessly. “She was human, you know. And she’d overheard my plans as I was talking to one of my men over the phone. She was suspicious of me. Knew something was different about me after I was turned. So we used her as one of the hostages. She was worth a hell of a lot more than a ransom to me.
