by Alisa Woods
His mouth broke from hers, allowing her to gasp in air, but his urgent nips at her neck made her head tip back and her eyes roll up. Oh God, it’s been so long… and no man had ever touched her the way Jaxson River was right now.
His hand slipped under her shirt, where his fingers played electric fire on her skin. “Olivia.” He was panting against her neck. “Why do you taste so good?” The tip of his tongue flicked across her skin. “I want to touch every part of you.”
His words clenched the muscles tight and low in her belly. His fingers slipped inside her bra. Her breasts were large, but his hands were more than big enough to cup them. When his fingers found her rapidly hardening nipples, he growled a low sound, deep in his throat.
Yes. She dug her short nails even deeper into his back, feeling his muscles tense and flex through the thin fabric of his shirt. None of this made any sense. There was no reason for Jaxson River to want her like this—her of all people—but she wasn’t going to stop him. Even if it was just a quick tryst on her desk. She ached for every touch and panted whisper he would give her.
Footsteps sounded outside her office, followed by a rushed voice, saying, “Olivia, do you know where—”
The words cut off as whoever it was reached the door and swung to a stop inside. Olivia’s whole body jerked with the shock of being caught, and Jaxson suddenly stilled in his fervent explorations of her body. They both turned at once to look at the door.
Jaxson’s brother Jace stood there, slack-jawed, but with a slightly horrified look on his face. Olivia’s face flamed, but it was made worse by the way Jaxson shoved away from her so fast it was almost like he magically transported a foot away.
He was embarrassed. Caught making out with a human when he’s supposed to be looking for a female shifter mate.
Olivia wanted to sink into the floor.
A vacuum of embarrassment killed all sound in the room.
Olivia couldn’t decide if she should make some excuse for why Jaxson had her trapped against her desk with his hand up her shirt… or if she should just leave it to him. She had no explanation whatsoever for it anyway. Jaxson said nothing, silently adjusting his shirt and glaring at his brother, who was still standing in the doorway.
“Um,” Jace said, obviously also struggling for words. “Sorry to interrupt your… work…” He hesitated again, looking more perplexed than disapproving. Then he shook his head and swung a serious look to Jaxson. “We have a problem.”
“What is it?” Jaxson’s voice was flat and calm, completely in charge, as if he hadn’t just been caught making out.
For some reason, this flushed even more embarrassment through Olivia. She knew she was just some quick fling for him, but being thrust aside so obviously was… well, humiliating. She swallowed down the angry words that wanted to pop out and pretended to shuffle some papers on her desk. What was she doing, making out with her boss, anyway? Any fool knew that never worked out. Especially given the situation. She was impossibly stupid for even—
“Cassie Wilding is missing.” Jace’s voice cut through her barrage of thoughts.
Olivia looked up. “Wilding? Like the Wilding wolf pack?” She frowned and scoured her memory. She’d been focused on eligible mates for Jaxson, but the name did sound familiar.
Jace frowned at her, then strode the rest of the way into the room and dropped his voice when he reached his brother. “Maybe we should discuss this in private?” he asked quietly. He obviously meant Olivia.
She dropped her gaze to the floor. “I’ll just… see myself out.” She fumbled to grab her phone and wallet out of the drawer.
Jaxson took two quick steps to her side and stopped her with his hand on hers. She dragged her gaze up to meet his.
“This is a pack matter.” There was an apology on his face that he wasn’t speaking out loud. “But I’d like you to stay. You’re part of Riverwise now—you should know what’s going on.”
A pack matter. The politics between the packs had a heavy influence on Jaxson’s ideas of who to pick for a mate. That was the real reason why he wanted her to stay.
She nodded, short and fast, to show she understood. “I know how to keep my mouth shut.”
He gave her a small, approving smirk before turning back to his brother. “I’ll read Olivia in on this afterward, but first—what’s happened to Cassie?”
Jace had a deep frown for the whole interaction, but he quickly explained. “She was taken off the street. A white van just pulled up, and two men snatched her outside her school. She was staying late at some private academy the Wilding’s send their pups to—”
“Wait,” Olivia interrupted. “Pups? Is she a kid?” It was quickly coming back to her—there was a whole litter of young wolves in the Wilding pack.
Jaxson nodded to her. “Cassie is Terra Wilding’s younger sister. She’s about twelve.” He swung back to Jace. “How long ago?”
“Less than an hour.”
Jaxson scowled. “So you think she’s at the shelter.”
“She might be,” Jace said. “If we get there fast enough, we might be able to stop them…”
“…before they transport her away,” Jaxson finished.
“Exactly.” Jace grimaced in the direction of the doorway. Precious seconds were ticking away. “Jared’s back up in the mountains.”
“Dammit.” Jaxson curled up his fist and pressed it to his mouth for a moment. “All right, we’ll have to move without him.” His voice was back in full command mode. “We take whoever in the pack you can get hold of in the next five minutes. Then we move out. Time is against us.”
Jace nodded, already whipping his phone out of his pocket. “I’ll meet you downstairs in five. We’ll need supplies, too.”
“On it.” Jaxson turned to take Olivia by the shoulders as Jace raced from the room. “I’m sorry to drag you into this. But the Wildings may call while we’re out, and I need someone here to hold down the fort. Keep them calm. And reassure them we’re doing everything we can.”
She nodded quickly. “Fort-holding, phone-answering, and re-assuring. I can handle that. Only… what do I tell them? And shouldn’t we be calling the police or something?”
Jaxson took a deep breath and let out a slow, angry sigh. “The police aren’t much help to shifters, Olivia. I know that might not make any sense, but they figure it’s all turf wars and pack fights. And they stay out. Plus, once they know we’re shifters…”
“Oh. Right.” She knew about the laws regarding shifter registration. Once someone was a known shifter, they had to submit DNA samples in both shifter and human forms, in case they ever committed a crime. That way the police could tie them to the crime, even if they did it in shifter form. She’d never thought about it before, but it was pretty ridiculous to treat shifters that way—like they were sub-humans who were already criminals. But then she’d never kissed one before and realized just how human a shifter could be.
“The other packs already know most of the situation,” Jaxson continued. “We’ve been in talks about how to handle it with them, so I might as well brief you now on it now, so you’re not caught off guard.” His face was grim. “Shifters have been disappearing for a while.”
“Disappearing?” She frowned. “You mean going missing?”
He nodded. “At first, it was just lone wolves vanishing off the streets. Then a few from the smaller shifter gangs downtown went missing. Being in the security business, Riverwise hears things. For a while, it seemed random. Maybe some rogue witch at work, harvesting shifters for her Dark Arts.”
Olivia cringed. “But now you think it’s more than that?”
“It’s definitely more,” he said. “The pace has been picking up, plus we’ve begun to see some of the first wolves who disappeared show up again. And they’re pretty messed up. Sick. A couple have died since their release.”
“Release?” she asked, her face scrunching up in revulsion. “From where? Who’s doing this?”
“That’s what I was t
rying to find out when you interrupted me in the alleyway.”
She thought about the men, the ones using the cattle prods on Jaxson, and her stomach curled into one giant knot.
Jaxson gave a soft smile at her distressed look. “It’s all right. You were trying to do the right thing. I can’t fault you for that.” He traced a finger along her cheek that just stirred up feelings she really shouldn’t have for this incredibly brave and sexy man. But her lips were still swollen from his kiss devouring her only a minute ago. That didn’t exactly help.
She brushed all that aside. “I had a feeling something was wrong with that shelter. So you think whoever took Cassie might be taking her there?”
“The shelter’s a way-station of some kind,” Jaxson said. “The shifters were released near there. And some of the ones who disappeared might have processed through there at one point. If we move fast and if we’re lucky, we’ll find Cassie there before they move her on to wherever they’re holding the missing wolves. If we don’t find her there, I’m going to locate someone inside that place who knows what’s going on and persuade him to tell us where they’ve taken her.”
“Persuade.” She swallowed—she could easily picture Jaxson in his hulking, snarling wolf form. She wouldn’t mess with him, but these people… they might have guns. Then again, Jaxson was an ex-SEAL. They probably had more to fear from him than the other way around—no matter what form he was in. But she couldn’t help worrying. “That sounds… dangerous.”
The muscles in Jaxson’s cheek worked silently for a moment. “It takes a lot to kill a shifter, Olivia. And yet these people have practically destroyed full-grown gang members three times Cassie’s size. I’m not going to let them play with a twelve-year-old girl.”
She nodded quickly. Of course not. Because that’s the kind of man Jaxson was. She blinked back tears and impulsively threw her arms around his neck. “Go get the bastards,” she whispered, then pulled back just as quickly, nervous that it had been too much.
A crooked smile hung on Jaxson’s face for a moment, then he slipped one hand behind her head and pulled her in for a fierce and fast kiss. Before she could react, he was gone, hurrying out her office door after his brother. Off to save the little sister of a beautiful shifter female who would no doubt claim his heart when it was all done. Olivia could see it unfolding now… because if there was one thing she was certain of, it was that Jaxson River would rescue that little girl. Or die trying.
And Terra Wilding, his perfect mate, would be eternally grateful.
Jaxson held up two fingers to signal Jace to hold his position.
His brother echoed the command to the three members of the River pack behind him. They held still in the shadows of the alleyway next to the homeless shelter. Their clothes weren’t exactly suited for their mission—Murphy, Taylor, and Rich were still in their business casual from the office, Jace wore his usual jeans and grungy band t-shirt, and Jaxson still had on his silk shirt and dress pants from the disaster date. But they’d picked up enough guns, blades, and tech to fight their way through most situations… including breaking into a homeless shelter to rescue a shifter kid.
Only there would be more than warm soup waiting for them inside.
Jaxson edged to the front of the shelter. A light was on over the main door, but it was closed. There was no activity out front.
“All clear,” Jaxson said, low enough that his voice wouldn’t carry. “Let’s take the door in back.”
If they were in wolf form, they could communicate with their thoughts, but they were in the middle of the city, and even at nine-thirty on a Friday in this part of town, a pack of wolves roaming the streets would be noticed. There were no unmarked vans or other suspicious vehicles in back. Jaxson had parked a block away in order to approach on foot and catch whoever had Cassie by surprise.
He had his suspicions about who might be running this snatch-and-release program with shifters. The first possibility was the local Seattle PD, deciding to rough up some shifters to send a message to the gangs. But that didn’t make sense with the sick shifters that had been released. Shifters healed quickly unless you messed with the magic in their blood—that meant someone was tormenting shifters in a more substantial, long-lasting, and intentional way. Which spelled government operation to him. Either that or some sadistic bastard with a grudge against shifters who could afford to commandeer a homeless shelter. No, it had to be government-sanctioned—the only question was whether it was military or intelligence-based.
In the SEALs, he commanded an elite corps of men who used every ability—including their shifter skills—to take down the enemy whenever and wherever their CO sent them. Jaxson trusted his brothers-in-arms as much as his own pack, who were literally bound to him with their magical oath. But he’d seen enough unstable personalities sneak past the psych evals. Or go bad on re-integration, casualties of the battlefield, only with scars you couldn’t see. He understood that—his own brothers brought that lesson home to him. But the scale of this operation was more than one rogue military washout.
This was something put in motion by someone in power.
Which made his blood run cold.
Jaxson hugged the wall next to the back door. The others lined up beside him, close, ready to hustle inside once the door was sprung. He tested the door, quietly—locked. He waved over Taylor, who already had his electronic lockpick ready to go. He crouch-ran up to the door, tapped through the sequence, and they all held their breaths as the box cycled through the combinations.
The door clicked open.
They crept down a short hallway with storage rooms on either side. At the end, Jaxson held up a fist to signal the pack to stop. He listened—chatter came from down the hall to the right. Conversational and muffled, like through a closed door. On silent feet, they turned the corner and found the one back office room spilling light out from under the door. And laughter.
Jaxson edged closer and very slowly tested the doorknob—it turned minutely. He held up three fingers, made eye contact with his men, then counted down…three…two…one…
He whipped open the door. Murphy and Taylor led the way, storming the room with shouts and drawn weapons. Jace and Rich were right behind them. Jaxson swept the hallway, covering their backs and arriving last in the room, only to find it already secure.
Murphy stood over one beefy guy in overalls, but the man was knocked out. Jaxson shook his head, and Murphy winced an apology. They couldn’t get intel from the unconscious. Fortunately, Jace was holding back his blade from slicing the second man’s throat… although he looked like he wanted to. Badly.
In addition to the blade against his throat, the dark-haired man was being held by Taylor and Rich. Their prisoner looked like his face had been rearranged by more than one thug-fight. His stance was calm, body still, not resisting, no visible signs of fear. The man was almost certainly ex-military, possibly contractor ops—either that or the homeless shelter was hiring some serious badass employees.
Jaxson waved Murphy toward the door. “Sweep the center.” But he didn’t expect they’d find Cassie. If she was here, she would have been locked in with these two goons.
“Where’s the girl?” Jaxson asked Thug Life, not bothering with preamble.
He smirked but otherwise didn’t move. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Jaxson nodded and slowly walked up to the man. He was big, almost as tall as Jaxson, but even big men had something they feared. Not always pain, although enough of that could be persuasive. Something more primal was often more effective.
Jaxson lifted his chin to Jace, who eased off on the blade. Jaxson held up his hand, palm out, in front of the man’s face.
In a calm voice, he said, “Here’s how this is going to go.” He glanced at his hand and commanded it to shift, slowly growing five razor-sharp claws. They inched toward the man’s face as they grew. He leaned back, but his calm expression had evaporated. For non-shifters, the idea of being taken apart b
y claws and teeth often struck more fear than a blade or bullet. It wasn’t the pain so much as the horror of it. It conjured fears of being eaten alive, and the primal part of the brain—the part that had evolved a million years ago when man’s enemies had claws and fangs—had an instinctual fear of it built in.
“You’re going to tell me where the girl is,” Jaxson said quietly. “And you’re going to tell me now. Or I’m going to claw and bite the answer out of you, one chunk at a time.”
The man paled and blinked rapidly.
Jaxson might have to draw some blood, but it shouldn’t have to go much further than that. Only enough to convince the man that Jaxson was serious. And he was. Very serious.
Cassie didn’t have time for him to mess around.
Olivia would end up wearing a hole in Riverwise’s carpet with the way she was pacing her office. But she had to stay near the phone in case Jaxson called. Or someone from the Wilding pack. Or the hospital, saying that there had been a horrible tragedy at the homeless shelter and could she please come identify the bodies? Olivia sucked in a deep breath, dragged her hands across her face, and slapped her cheeks a couple times to stop that line of thought.
They’re going to be fine.
She snuck another peek at the local news on her phone, just to see if there was anything about a kidnapping or a shifter fight breaking out downtown. Nothing. Of course.
She slumped into her chair, thinking maybe she should try to do some work to distract herself, when a buzzing sound floated in from the front. Only when it was followed up with some banging did she realize it was someone at the door. She sprinted through the office to the frosted-glass entrance. She had to bang around with the lock a few times before she could spring it loose.
A gorgeous dark-haired woman brushed past her on the way in. “Where’s Jaxson?” she demanded but didn’t wait for an answer. She just strode around the corner toward the offices in back. A man hurried in after her. He was tall, well-built, broad-shouldered… and dark-haired gorgeous as well. He hardly slowed down and ignored Olivia just like the woman.
