by Ann Gimpel
“Have they?” Max held his breath, secretly rooting for an infusion of more shifters to fight for the cause.
“Not yet, but that whole serum thing could blow up on us just like it did in Berkeley. Law enforcement here was a little behind the eight ball. Didn’t start taking it until about ten days ago—”
“It’s one of the things that’s in all those documents,” Audrey interrupted. “Once we sit down, I can fill you in.”
“Okay. Let’s get moving.” Max met the security officer’s brown gaze. “Sorry—” he eyed the man’s badge, “—O’Hare. You must be new.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Where’s the officer working with you?”
The man looked momentarily startled. “Uh, what other officer, sir?”
“Didn’t Loren agree there’d be two of you at all times? I distinctly remember him acquiescing to that plan when he showed up with six of you this morning, and I felt stampeded.”
“If he did, sir, no one told me. Would you like me to ring for another guard?”
Max thought about it. The extent of the security around him was ridiculous. “No. We’re fine. I assume we’re heading for the garage.”
“That would be correct, sir.”
Max gestured at Audrey to go ahead of him. They walked to the elevator, waited, and rode it down several levels to the parking garage. Max’s sensitive nose twitched. The guard smelled…odd. Fear sweat. Surely things weren’t so desperate in downtown Sacramento that the man would be afraid.
Running on instincts that had rarely failed him, Max pushed the Stop Car button. He whirled to face O’Hare. The man’s face turned white. “What are you doing, sir?”
“I’m not certain. Hand over your identification.”
The guard patted his back pockets. A frantic look washed over his face, but it was gone in an instant. “Don’t seem to have my wallet with me, sir. I must have left it upstairs. Maybe on your secretary’s desk.” He smiled weakly.
“Fine.” Max pushed the button to return them to the building’s next-to-the-top floor. “You can retrieve it. Audrey, text the security company. Ask them if they’ve ever heard of this guy.”
As they neared the top floor, the odor rolling off the guard intensified: aggression mixed with fear. “I want you in front of me,” Max snapped. “Now.”
O’Hare—if that was really his name—lunged. Max was ready and heaved the stack of papers right at him. Audrey bit back a scream. She sounded like a hissing kettle. O’Hare’s brown eyes blazed hatred. “You’re a shifter,” he snarled. “Dirty, fucking traitor.” He sidestepped the paper blizzard and grabbed his gun.
The elevator door opened. Audrey didn’t wait for instructions. She dove through it and raced for her desk. Max judo chopped O’Hare’s gun hand. The weapon clattered to the elevator’s tile floor, and Max kicked it half way across the room. He engaged the button to close the elevator’s door, trapping them inside. Max needed privacy. This was as good a way as any to get it.
O’Hare threw himself at Max, teeth bared. Max grappled with him and drove a knee into the man’s groin. O’Hare grunted and doubled over with pain. Max linked to his supernatural shifter strength and delivered a blow to the fake security guard’s neck designed to sever his spinal column. Breathing hard, he stood watch over the body until he was certain the man was dead.
It hadn’t been a contest. Not really. He’d never been in any real danger. His identity was a much bigger problem than O’Hare’s feeble attack. Max engaged the elevator to take him back to Audrey’s level. He’d been compromised. The only question was how many people knew about him.
Christ! What the fuck do I do next?
Chapter 2
The elevator door whooshed open on Audrey, standing in a shooter’s stance clutching a highly illegal laser stun pistol. Much of her hair had escaped its bun and spots of color rode high on both cheeks. She looked so captivating it took his breath away. He could almost imagine her head thrown back, neck corded with passion as she shrieked her delight at all the things he could do to pleasure her. He blinked hard and refocused. Death was licking at his heels. Now was not the time to indulge in sexual fantasies.
“Put that down,” Max barked, “before you kill me by mistake.”
“I-is he…?” Eyes wide, she looked at O’Hare’s body sprawled on the elevator floor.
“Yes.” Max bent, got a hand under each of the guard’s armpits and dragged him out of the elevator. “Did you call Loren?”
“Uh-huh. On his way.” Her voice held a frantic note he’d never heard before.
Max straightened. “Did Loren have any idea what happened to whoever was supposed to be on duty?”
“I, uh, didn’t think to ask. Sorry, sir.”
Max took a closer look at Audrey. She was shaking, and her eyes had a wild cast. He moved to her side, took one of her arms and guided her to a nearby chair. She fell into it. “Take a few deep breaths, dear.” He held out a hand. “Give me the pistol. Where do you keep it?”
“Bottom drawer of my desk.”
He walked behind her desk. The drawer stood open. He engaged the safety, stuffed the pistol behind a stack of paperwork and a few pots of makeup, and closed the drawer. “Where’d you get that?” She didn’t answer, so he pulled up a chair next to her. “I’m not going to turn you in. I was just curious.”
She shook her head as if to clear it. More strands of red-blonde hair fell out of her bun and curled around her face, softening her austere features. She’d be quite the head-turner if she just let it hang loose. “My brother gave it to me when I got this job. He said I might need it.”
“He’s a cop, right?”
“How’d you know?”
“Simple. Law enforcement are the only ones authorized to carry those. Nice gun, by the way. Do you know how to use it?”
She opened her mouth to answer, but the elevator door slammed open. Loren, flanked by three hatchet-faced men, rushed into the foyer. “Thank the good Lord you’re all right, sir.” Loren kneeled by O’Hare’s side and felt for a neck pulse. “Looks like a clean kill. No blood.” He straightened and eyed his boss speculatively. “What’d you do?”
Max shrugged. “I’ve had martial arts training. I hit him in the neck. Got lucky.”
One of the other guards, a solidly build redhead, whistled. “I’ll say. That’s not an easy blow to get right.”
“Get the body out of here,” Loren growled. “I’ve got to figure out where Brady and Hennet are.”
Two of the guards grabbed O’Hare, while the redhead punched the elevator button and said, “I’ll stay with you, boss, until you can scare up a few more of us.”
Max pushed to his feet and held out a hand to Audrey. “Still think you could manage dinner? Or at least a drink to calm you down?”
She nodded and rose unsteadily. “Sure. That would be nice. We need those files. Should have thought to rescue them when you brought O’Hare’s body in here.”
“Was that what was scattered all over the elevator floor?” Loren asked. When she nodded, he said, “I’ll help you gather them up and drive you to wherever you’re eating. Once I get a couple of guys to watch over you, I’ll come back here and see where my two men are.”
“Sounds like a plan.” Max jabbed his chin toward the elevator. “After you.”
The elevator doors opened. The guards, with O’Hare suspended between them, started forward; Loren held up a hand. “Wait until I get these papers together,” he told his men. “No point in getting any more footprints on them.”
Max eyed the guards and the dead man. “How about if you haul him out via the roof. You could use a hovercraft, and there’d be less chance of anyone seeing anything.”
“Good idea,” Loren said. “I should have thought of it. I’ll radio for a craft.”
“You got it, sir.” The redhead jockeyed the stairwell door open and helped the other guards maneuver O’Hare through it, before moving back to Max’s side.
“I’d l
ike to get my secretary out of here. She’s not used to dead bodies.” Max gave a snort of a laugh. “Neither am I, actually. This whole thing’s been deucedly unsettling.”
“Sorry,” Loren murmured, straightening with his arms full of file folders and loose sheets. He shook his head. “Damn if I know which of these went with what—”
“I do,” Audrey cut in. “I’ll take care of them.”
“You can do that later,” Max said. “For now, let’s just get out of here.” He picked up O’Hare’s gun and handed it to Loren and then hustled Audrey into the elevator.
* * * *
Loren double parked the electric car outside the restaurant and shadowed them inside, along with the redheaded guard. “Looks pretty good.” Loren eyed the private, sound-shielded room. “I’ll be right outside, and John will be here, too, just as soon as he takes care of the car.”
“Once reinforcements arrive, feel free to go hunt for your men,” Max said. “You must be worried about them.”
“Thanks, boss. I am. Go sit down. I’ll scare up a waiter to at least get you a bottle of wine or something. John’s going off-shift in an hour, so there will be two new guards outside when you’re done eating.”
“Thanks for letting me know.” Max pulled the door shut and walked to the table. Audrey had already seated herself and was sorting through the stack of papers, arranging them into piles. “It’s all right if you don’t work for a few moments,” he said, taking a seat across from her.
“It’s better if I have something to, uh, take my mind off what happened. You asked if I’d gotten a chance to practice with the gun. The answer is yes. My brother sort of smuggled me into the cop shop gun range in the middle of the night a couple of times. But I’ve never been around anybody who was dead.” Her voice cracked. He saw her swallow hard. Max’s estimation of her edged up a few notches. Audrey was one tough cookie, even though she might not realize it. Most women would have dissolved into hysterics.
“You did fine. Good thinking to be in front of the elevator door with your gun.”
“Really?” She met his gaze with lovely hazel eyes that were shading toward green at the moment and rested her chin on an upraised hand. “I wasn’t certain what to do. I thought I should call the elevator back, but I didn’t want to subvert whatever you were doing. Then I wondered if I should take the stairs to a lower floor, but that wouldn’t have helped if you were still in the elevator…Ach.” She rolled her eyes. “Don’t mind me. I’m babbling.”
“You did fine,” he repeated just as the door opened, and a waiter swooped in with a silver bucket holding a wine bottle and two glasses.
“Good evening, sir and madam.” The waiter bowed slightly. He was in his fifties with a bald head and merry blue eyes. “The gentleman outside thought you could do with a spot of something relaxing. How does a cabernet strike you? If you’d rather have something different, I haven’t opened it yet.”
“I’m sure it will be fine.” Max held out a hand for the bottle and inspected the label. “What’s on the menu tonight?”
The waiter rattled off a series of dishes while he opened the wine. Max glanced at Audrey. “What sounds good to you?”
She smiled warmly. “I’m used to whatever my ration coupons will buy. If it’s not too expensive, I’d love to have a steak.”
“How would madam like it cooked?” the waiter inquired, arching a brow. He poured a jot of wine into a glass and handed it to Max.
“Rare.”
“Salad and rice or potatoes?”
“Salad and potatoes, please.”
“I’ll have the same,” Max cut in and took a sip of what was a very good wine. Rich and oaky, it had an enticing bouquet. “The wine is perfect,” he told the waiter, who immediately poured some into a glass for Audrey and added more to Max’s.
“This is really quite wonderful,” Audrey said once the waiter left. “Everything. Not just the wine. I can’t remember the last time I ate out at anything but one of those diners where I flash my wrist computer at the glass cases, and it debits credits from my account.”
“Enjoy it.” Max smiled. “You deserve to be pampered after what happened. I can still barely believe…” His voice trailed off. He needed to be careful not to say too much. “Um, what’s in those documents that’s so important?”
She leaned toward him. Her scent was even more intoxicating than the wine. He caught himself inhaling deeply and pulled away, aware of a pressure against his trousers where he was suddenly hard.
Audrey wriggled in her seat. She bit her lower lip and blew out a tense breath. Finally, she lowered her voice and murmured, “I probably shouldn’t do this, but I need to be honest with you. It’s all in my employment records anyway, but since I was here long before you were governor, well, you may not have looked at them…Cripes! I’m blathering like an idiot.”
“Whatever it is, just go ahead and tell me.” Max felt oddly protective toward her, though he didn’t understand quite why. Worse, the moment his cock had gotten hard, his wolf had begun a steady patter of lewd side remarks that made Max want to throttle him.
“There’s no easy way to do this,” she went on, her knuckles so white against the wineglass, Max hoped it wouldn’t shatter from the pressure. “If you decide I can’t work for you afterward, well…” she set down the stemware and spread her hands in front of her. “Not much I can do about it. I have shifter blood. Roughly 35 percent. Some of my relatives have been killed in this purge, so I’m not the most ardent supporter of the governmental edicts to round up shifters and imprison them.”
She sucked in a ragged breath and raised her gaze so she looked right at him. A combination of defiance and pleading etched fine lines around her eyes.
“Miss Westen. Audrey. I’m not going to fire you. It’s all right. Thank you, for trusting me.” Deep inside, Max felt the wolf push him to say more, to tell her about the serum. To offer it up, for God’s sake. He resisted. “You told me that for a reason. I assume it’s related to the documents. Could you walk me through what’s in them?”
She nodded. “Sure. It’s intel about something called the shifter underground.” Her eyes flashed. “Frankly, now that I know about them, I’m on their side, but don’t worry, I wouldn’t ever say that publicly.”
Max listened as she relayed the story he’d lived for the past couple of days. Everything was there, including the serum that pushed cops with a low percentage of shifter blood into full-blown shifters. Before the series of intravenous infusions that law enforcement had forced on their elite tracker task forces, a person needed 50 percent shifter blood to morph into their bond animal. After the infusions, 10 percent was sufficient. Max had gotten unutterably excited by the prospect of thousands of new shifters to swell their ranks and perhaps turn the tide of the war in their favor.
Another set of nationwide reports detailed those same cops betraying their oaths and going rogue. Predictions about anarchy ran wild. By the time Audrey was finished, Max was ecstatic, but he couldn’t let it show. Everything he’d assumed would happen was playing itself out like a well-oiled machine. He couldn’t wait to let the underground know.
“Well?” Audrey raised her gaze from the stack of papers and gathered them together.
“Interesting material. I understand why it was classified top secret.” Max tried for a neutral expression. Just because she’d confided in him was no reason to let his guard down.
The door to their private dining room opened. The waiter pushed a cart laden with wonderful smelling dishes. Max’s mouth watered. He hadn’t eaten since breakfast, and it was pushing nine at night. For the moment, his sexual hunger receded, and he tucked into a succulent, barely cooked piece of meat.
“Where do they get this?” she asked, cutting into her steak and chewing slowly. “None of the shops where I exchange my ration coupons ever have anything but ground or processed meat products.”
“There’s a black market,” he replied around a mouthful of salad.
; Her brows drew together. “So it’s real,” she muttered. “I never paid much attention.” Her mouth curved into a smile. She set down her fork and knife. “It’s so good, I feel like I should save what’s left and take it home. I’ve already eaten far more than I usually do.”
“I can ask the waiter to box it up for you.”
“That would be wonderful. Thank you.” She glanced at him shyly through long, dusky lashes. “You’ve taken the worst day of my life and turned it into something special.”
He wanted to move to her side of the table and gather her into his arms. Not only was Audrey one of the most stunning women he’d ever seen, she was level-headed and seemingly oblivious to how gorgeous she was. Max put himself on a tight leash. He had bigger problems to attend to than his non-existent love life. At least so far, Audrey hadn’t asked about O’Hare’s accusations in the elevator. Christ! Maybe she thought he was tossing the shifter epithet at her.
Max nodded to himself. It made sense. Likely, that was why she’d fessed up about her shifter blood.
“Penny for your thoughts, boss?” She focused her alluring hazel gaze on him. In the low light, her eyes held a violet cast.
“Nothing. Are you about ready to head home?”
She nodded. “I suppose we should. Tomorrow morning will come around early.”
He laughed. “Right you are, Miss Westen. It always does. It’s all right with me if you take a few hours off—”
She waved him to silence. “Nothing happening at home. The neighborhood’s gone to hell. I can’t even go out for a walk anymore. All I do is sit barricaded behind a bunch of deadbolts.”
Part of him wanted to bring her home with him, to his uptown mansion where she’d have gated grounds to roam. He cleared his throat before something untoward slipped out. “Let me find the waiter.” He realized he was still hard and pulled his jacket around to shield the evidence as best he could.
As if the waiter had been waiting right outside and could read his mind, the door opened before Max had gotten up. “Would sir and madam like anything else? A touch of dessert perhaps?”
