by Terry Spear
As they got ready for their new plan, Tammy slipped into her bikini and grabbed a bottle of suntan lotion, sunglasses, and a hat.
David paused to get an eyeful of Tammy’s front.
“Hot damn, the teens don’t know what they’re missing if they aren’t watching the bungalow’s porch this afternoon.”
“Just you remember what you’re supposed to be looking for.”
“Some jobs are a hell of a lot tougher than others. I’ll go out the back way through the outdoor shower room if you want to lock up after me.”
“Gotcha.”
She followed him out but nearly ran into his back as he abruptly stopped. “We had visitors,” he said.
She moved around him to see what made him say that. The pineapple and bananas were sitting on the table by the shower. Her skin chilled. She was certain the kids were trying to reach out to them, but she was creeped out by the way they were sneaking in without her or David’s permission. They really needed some adult guidance.
“Gate’s locked,” David said, examining it. “One of them had to have leaped on top of the wall as a jaguar, jumped down, shifted, and unlocked the gate for the other one.”
“I think they like us. So this is a good sign,” she said, despite her misgivings about the way they were going about this.
She grabbed the bananas and pineapple, meaning to carry them inside where it was cool, but something that had been tucked behind the fruit fell off the table. She peered down at the small plastic tiger, which was like the kind for sale at zoo gift shops.
“What is it?” David asked, crossing the patio to see.
“A tiger,” she said.
“A clue.”
“Most likely. But what’s it telling us? Our missing jaguar’s at a different zoo? Why a tiger? The toy was the closest representation of a big cat to a jaguar that they could find at the gift shop?”
“Hell if I know. Or maybe it’s at a zoo where they have tigers. I’ll call it in. Lock the gate after me.”
“Yeah, like that really keeps anyone out. If the bad guys are agents in one of our shifter branches, they can do what the teens did.” With her hands full of fruit, Tammy couldn’t grab the toy tiger, too. “Can you tuck the tiger under my arm?”
“I’ll do better than that.”
She thought he was going to offer to carry something in for her. Instead, he scooped up the small tiger and slipped it under her bikini’s top strap. He grinned at her as he called Martin.
After she returned to the patio, David said, “Couldn’t get hold of him.” He looked her over again. “I don’t know about the boys, but if I saw you rubbing lotion all over that body, I wouldn’t be sitting in a tree watching. I’d be here in a flash, offering to cover every inch of you.”
“Maybe another time.”
“You mean it? Like another scheduled date? Not just going out to dinner and the theater?” He didn’t wait for her to say no, just pumped his fist in victory and headed outside so she could lock the gate.
She laughed, his cockiness and sense of humor growing on her. With sunscreen in hand, she went out through the front door and began covering herself with the lotion at the slowest pace she could in case the boys were watching and David could get the jump on them. She topped the lotion with insect repellent, and she was all set.
She hoped she wasn’t just putting on a show for a couple of toucans sitting in a nearby tree, their bright green, orange, red, and blue-colored bills making them stand out against the green foliage.
Settling down on the chaise lounge on her stomach, she hoped that if either of the boys was watching her, they weren’t in human form with a camera in hand. And if they did take pictures, she hoped they wouldn’t post them on the Internet.
She could imagine the ribbing she would get from fellow agents if any of them saw the pictures. “Thought you were on a job.” “Hell of an assignment, Anderson.” “This is what you call working a case?”
A howler monkey screeched in the canopy, making her heart skip a couple of beats. She kept thinking about the toy tiger the boys had left them…
The teens had packed David’s and her bags. Had they left any clues inside their luggage?
Chapter 12
If David could locate the teens, he had to speak with them, so he searched for them in his human form. Moving as a jaguar, he could be stealthier and much quicker—he could chase one of the boys down if they were in their cat form—but they wouldn’t feel as safe as they would if he approached them as a more vulnerable human. Unless they believed he was armed.
He made a lot of racket in human form as he followed their scent trail, wanting to prove that he had no intention of sneaking up on them. He wanted to allow them the option to retreat, if they’d rather, or stand their ground if they felt safe enough around him. Smelling their scents, he knew they’d been spending a lot of time in the area, watching the resort, him, and Tammy. Hell, and their scent was combined with his aftershave!
When he finally saw a golden jaguar lying on a branch of a mahogany tree observing him from above, tail still, blue eyes meeting his gaze, he stopped. Instantly, he was relieved to see the boy. Maybe this was their chance. He was certain from the cats’ recent scents that his brother was close by, eyeing David, ready to protect his brother if David made a threatening move. Like pulling out a gun.
David climbed into an adjacent tree, the process slow and tedious compared to jumping into it when he was in cat form. He made his way up the branches until he reached a high enough one where he could see the bungalow…and Tammy stretched out on her back in all her glory. Tiny scraps of metallic pink fabric covered only part of her breasts, and the bikini bottom was just as enticing.
He wished only he was observing her. Once he was settled on his branch, he kept his focus on Tammy as a way of being less intimidating than if he stared at the jaguar. Cats often perceived eye contact as a threat or challenge, and David didn’t want to get off on the wrong foot before he even started. Well, that was only part of the reason. The view of her was too damned enticing not to watch her. And he was keeping an eye on her for her safety—since he was her partner.
“First,” David said to the jaguar, “are you Alex?”
The cat nodded.
“Okay, great, Alex. We’re the good guys. I understand you know something about the missing zoo cat, and all we want to do is return it. A Mr. Thompson, affiliated with the Oregon Zoo, told Maya Anderson, my brother’s wife, all about the case. She asked her cousin, Tammy Anderson—the she-cat lying out on the chaise lounge—to see if she could find the missing cat.
“I was following you and your brother because my boss is interested in having you work with the agency.” David figured he might as well spell it all out so the boys knew just where he was coming from.
For all David knew, the teen had already vacated the tree and hadn’t heard a word he had said. That would be just his luck. Making a big speech to an empty tree. David glanced in the jaguar’s direction. He was there, but he wasn’t watching David. He had his eyes glued on Tammy. He couldn’t blame the boy one bit.
“My boss also said there could be an agent on the take. He thought you and your brother might have been trying to tip the agency off about it indirectly—and that you might be worried Tammy or I was crooked.”
The jaguar grunted.
David smiled. “My boss wants to work with you and your brother. Just like he worked with me and my brother, Wade, when we were your age.” David told the teen about his mother dying and his dad going off the deep end and some of the stuff they had pulled when they were the teens’ age. “Martin took us in and now we get to go on all kinds of dangerous missions and high-risk adventures, but we’re helping our kind out, instead of risking our necks for no good reason. And…getting paid for it. Can’t beat that.”
He looked back down at Tammy and sighed. “On som
e missions, the perks are well worth the risk.”
The jaguar growled.
David nodded as if he could read the boy’s thoughts. “Yeah, I know. I told her she should return home. I don’t want her here if it gets too dangerous. She’s trained more as a police officer than as a Special Forces agent like me.” He glanced at the jaguar. “Like you could be. The training’s rigorous as hell, but it’s worth it in the end.”
David refocused on Tammy, her skin glistening in the sun. “My boss sees the good in the two of you—and that’s saying a lot. What do you say to that? Are you willing to talk to us?” He again looked at the boy, but the jaguar was standing, his tail flicking back and forth, his ears alert, hair ruffled, his gaze focused on Tammy—anxious. He growled low.
David twisted his head around to see what was wrong. The towel wrapped around her nearly naked body, Tammy was talking to two men, a dark-haired one and a blond. What the hell?
David immediately started to scramble down the tree as fast as he could, attempting not to break his neck in the process. Once his booted feet hit the ground, he took off running through the dense rainforest for the bungalow.
***
Tammy heard the wooden steps leading to the deck creak, and though she couldn’t smell who it was from the way the breeze was blowing, she didn’t think it was David, or he would have warned her he was coming. Was it one of the boys? Maybe while David was looking for them, they had come to see her instead. Like David had remarked—to be the ones to spread the lotion on her.
She didn’t want to startle the boys if that’s who had joined her. On the other hand, her Enforcer instincts urged her to get up and face the threat, if there was one.
She opened her eyes and turned her head. And stared at the two men, shocked to see them here. Weaver—his hair black and eyes amber, an interested smile on his smug face, and Krustan, blond-haired and blue-eyed, wearing the same stupid smile.
She quickly stood, grabbed her towel, and secured it around her bikini-clad body. “What are the two of you doing here?” She hadn’t meant to sound so annoyed, like she felt guilty about what she had been doing or that she was embarrassed that they’d nearly seen her naked. She normally only wore the bathing suit to lie out on her back deck at home in total privacy.
“We had a mission a couple of hours away. Sylvan called and said you might need our assistance. We can’t stick around, but we’re not too far away,” Weaver said. He was the one who always took the lead when the two of them worked together.
“Sylvan did?” She was surprised that their boss had sent anyone to check on her without telling her first.
She really didn’t like that the two agents had seen her spread out on the chaise lounge, looking as though she was having fun at the branch’s expense.
“Yeah,” Krustan said. “Looks like you’re hard at work.” He glanced in the direction of the jungle. “Having any luck?”
That was odd. To him, it should have looked like she was only tanning. Why would he ask if she was having luck with that? She did wonder if he had guessed what she was attempting to do with regard to the kids. Even if Sylvan told them about the mission she was working on, how would Weaver and Krustan know David was looking for the missing teens?
Instead of answering him, she asked, “What are you working on?”
That got Krustan’s attention. He gave her an odd smile. She’d dumped both of the men early on the assignments she’d worked with them. Krustan had obviously seen her more as a potential date than a fellow agent who could actually help solve a case. That’s why she’d ditched him and found the missing jaguar-shifter toddler they’d been tasked to find on her own.
Weaver’s idea of trying to locate a missing shifter teen was to frequent shifter clubs. She wasn’t sure why he loved them so much. He didn’t drink heavily or dance that she’d ever seen. But the missing teen never went to the clubs, so Tammy had followed leads on Facebook where he’d corresponded with friends in a covert way and discovered where he was staying with a friend. With Enforcer intervention, he was reunited with his family.
As far as she was concerned, neither agent could help her with this case or any other.
Krustan finally said, “We’re looking for a couple of runaway teens.”
“Down here?” She prayed to God they weren’t the Taylor twins’ friends trying to meet up with them in Belize. The more of the kids there were in the same place, the greater the chance that whoever might wish them harm could locate them.
“Yeah, they’re wild. The boys come down here with their parents all the time, so they know the area well,” Krustan said.
Alex and Nate? Her boss wouldn’t have sent Weaver and Krustan to look for the same two brothers. Not that Sylvan had sent her to chase down the teens, either. Her assignment was to locate the missing zoo cat. Of course, that meant using whatever means she could, and if that necessitated bringing in a couple of wayward teens the JAG could take under its wing at the same time, so be it.
She recalled what Martin had said. He had a couple of JAG agents looking for the other boys. Had Sylvan also sent two Enforcer agents? It wouldn’t be the first time that one branch was clueless about what the other was doing.
Feeling a little paranoid, she wondered if these two agents might be corrupt. “What are the boys’ names?”
Weaver smiled—a little evilly, she thought. “You know, Anderson, you got us both into hot water on the cases we worked with you because you solved them and didn’t inform us.”
Which served them right.
“You just went right into Sylvan’s office and told him how you had taken care of the missing kids’ cases. So you think we trust you? You have your own assignment to take care of, and the next thing we know, you might be itching to solve our case, too, and attempt to show us up again.”
She smiled just as evilly back. “Well, I don’t know how you’re going to solve your case if you don’t have a shifter club to check out, Weaver. But I’d watch out for Krustan. He couldn’t keep focused on business with me around.”
Krustan’s smile broadened. “Hell, Anderson, you think I could get one lick of work done with you parading around in a string bikini? I still want to know…” He paused and looked around at the jungle again. “Where’s your partner? Did you ditch that JAG agent already?”
“He’s working.”
“She has dumped him,” Weaver said, laughing, but he glanced in the direction of the thick jungle foliage as if he was afraid David might be out there watching them.
She hoped he was.
“Here are our cell numbers,” Krustan said, handing her a piece of paper with both numbers written on it. “If you need our help, just call. We might be out of pocket, running around as jaguars from time to time, you know, but keep trying, and we’ll drop everything and be on our way.”
“Oh, so you want to help me with my mission but don’t want my help with yours? Typical,” she said. But something was off. He sounded earnest, she thought. Like they were really worried about her. Not just here to hassle her or because their boss made them come to check on her.
“Why were you at the jail?” she asked again.
Krustan looked at Weaver, as if waiting for him to give the green light.
Weaver folded his arms and looked down at her. “My TV was stolen. Had to fill out a police report, if you have to know the truth.”
“Yours…too?”
“Yeah, yeah. Don’t let it get around.”
She almost smiled. Weaver had bragged about having one of the best security systems on the planet, poking fun at her when her own TV had been stolen. No one would ever break into his place without paying for it, he’d said. She was so tempted to ask if they caught the burglar.
As if he knew just what she was thinking, Weaver frowned at her. “After what you pulled with us, you don’t deserve anything from us. You know that,
right?”
“Yeah, but…”
“Still think you can do it all on your own?” Weaver asked. “Not this time, Anderson. We know how you are with kids. You like them. You don’t think any of them would lead you astray. But these kids…” He shook his head. “All I’ve got to say is don’t trust them. They could get you killed.” He turned to his partner. “Come on, Krustan. Let’s let Anderson get back to her job. She looks like she really needs to concentrate on it so she can solve her case.”
“Hell,” Krustan said, “you sure you can do your mission on your own, Weaver? Seeing as her partner is conspicuously absent, it sure looks like Anderson could use a good man to watch her back.”
“And front,” Weaver said, slapping Krustan on the back. “Come on. We’ve got work to do.” They both sniffed the air and headed off the porch. “Later. Oh, and that shimmery pink swimsuit looks real good on you.”
“I’ll say,” Krustan added, giving her another long look as if he could see it beneath her towel.
As soon as the men disappeared into the jungle, Tammy took a deep breath. She didn’t trust them one iota. Something wasn’t right about them being down here. She was certain of it.
***
If the men speaking to Tammy meant her any harm, David would never reach her in time. He had to remind himself that she knew hand-to-hand combat. But he didn’t even want to think of how she’d manage that in that teeny-weeny bikini.
He was nearly out of breath when he reached the edge of the jungle and the bungalow. Tammy was nowhere in sight, and his heart was thumping his ribs at breakneck speed. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw two jaguars. Both the boys were hiding among the trees, having moved much more swiftly than he had in his human form, ready to come to his aid if he’d needed backup. Fearless and intelligent, they’d make damn good agents someday if they were willing to take some training and listen to the boss. And it looked like they were willing to trust Tammy and him a little.
