Prey (25 page)

“Wow,” Dan said, and I glanced up to find him watching me from the doorway. “Too bad Marc was never implanted. If he hadda been, we could probably find him with no problem, huh?”

I had to admit that my bladder was screaming in that moment, and I was already on my feet, ready to kick Dr. Carver out of the restroom. But before I’d even tossed the phone to Jace, so he could continue the conversation in my absence, I froze as what Dan had said sank in.

“Son of a bitch!”

“What?” Dan’s forehead furrowed, and he arched his eyebrows expectantly.

“Marc
does
have a chip! We’re all a bunch of idiots!” I sank back into the desk chair and swiveled to face them both, the phone still pressed to my ear.

“Speak for yourself,” Michael said, following another gulp of whatever he was drinking. “I had no
idea
Marc was implanted.”

“He wasn’t.” I glanced at Jace to see if he was following, and he was right there with me.

“Marc has Eckard’s chip,” he said, a smile turning up both sides of his mouth. And finally his dimples peeked out at me for the first time during the longest, most hellish day of my life.

“Hell, I forgot about that,” Dan said, as Michael groaned over the phone. We’d
all
forgotten about that.

“So, if we had one of those signal readers, we could track him?” Dr. Carver asked, edging past Dan and into the room.

“Or anyone else with a functioning chip,” Michael said.

Jace stood, looking almost as excited as I was. “Assuming Marc didn’t destroy it.”

“He didn’t.” There was no doubt in my mind. “He’s trying to bring it to us as evidence, so he’d keep it intact.”

“I hope you’re right,” Michael said into my ear, and over the line springs squealed as he rose from the desk chair. “And I hope you know where to get your hands on a handheld tracker. Because they cost eight thousand dollars, and require six to eight weeks for shipping.”

I frowned, but Jace only grinned. “Surely Kevin Mitchell has one. If he’s the one implanting strays for his father, he’d need to be able to test the chips to make sure they’re working.”

“Let’s hope.” I spun around to face the desk again and powered on Marc’s printer, then poked the Print Screen button on the keyboard. The printer hummed to life, then scrolled a blank sheet of paper through the slot. “Thanks for the invoice, Michael. Hopefully it’ll be enough to make Ben Feldman talk. And I’m willing to bet he’s going to want a few words with the tom responsible for the illegal body-tapping.” I paused, already heading for the hall, and the bathroom. “Can
you fill Daddy in? Tell him I’ll report after we talk to Feldman.”

Michael agreed, and I flipped my phone closed, then shoved it into my pocket.

“Jace, give Vic a call and catch him up. We’re leaving in five minutes.” With that, I jogged into the bathroom and kicked the door shut at my back.

“Well, I didn’t expect to see you again so soon.” Ben Feldman watched me through his screen door, his gaze flicking only momentarily to Jace and Dan over my shoulder. Dr. Carver had stayed behind to get everything set up to treat Marc, now that his return looked more probable.

I smiled and did my best to look affable. Which wasn’t hard, considering the miraculous lead we’d just stumbled upon. “What can I say? I’m stubborn.”

“As am I.” Feldman scowled. “My answer hasn’t changed. I won’t hand Kevin Mitchell over to you without proof he’s involved in the microchips.”

My smile widened as I pulled a folded piece of paper from my back pocket. I unfolded it patiently, then pinned it to the upper glass half of his storm door with my entire palm. “Look at the name of the buyer.”

“Milo Mitchell…” Feldman read, then leaned to one side to meet my gaze around the paper. “I assume this Milo is somehow related to Kevin?”

“His father.” I folded the invoice again and slid it back into my pocket. “And Alpha of the northwest territory. ”

Feldman’s eyes closed briefly, and the muscles of his jaw bulged. Then he met my gaze again and nodded. And opened his door.

“Thank you.” I stepped into the warm living room, but the guys had to edge past him carefully, because the stray refused to back up to give them more room—an Alpha move if I’d ever seen one. I couldn’t help smiling. Feldman was a good tom to have on our side.

When he closed the front door behind us, after a quick glance and sniff outside to be sure we were alone, I gestured to Jace with one hand. “Ben Feldman, this is Jace Hammond, one of my fellow enforcers, and another friend of Marc’s.”

Feldman nodded curtly at Jace, then waved a hand at the couch. I claimed the same cushion I’d occupied last time, and Jace sat next to me, while Dan perched on the arm of the couch. I opened my mouth to speak, but Feldman cut me off.

“Just because his father’s name is on that invoice doesn’t mean that Kevin has anything to do with the microchips.”

I nodded. “Especially if you believe in massive coincidences. But I don’t. Let me give you a little background on Kevin Mitchell. He was a member of our Pride for nearly a decade after losing a job as an enforcer to Marc. Then, a few months ago, he was exiled for breaking a very serious Pride law. He applied to be readmitted to his birth Pride, but his father—Milo Mitchell—was humiliated by his son’s disgrace, and refused to take Kevin back. So Kevin’s
been here—exiled and humiliated—ever since. And I think he’d do anything to regain his place in Pride society. Especially if that anything included bringing misery to Marc, whom he’s hated for the better part of ten years.”

“Circumstantial…” Feldman said, but I could tell he was listening.

“Yes,” I agreed, elbowing Jace gently when it looked like he might interject. He had built no rapport with Feldman, and would better be used as silent backup until he had. “But enough to warrant a little investigation, don’t you think?”

Feldman nodded hesitantly. “What do you have in mind?”

“A joint effort for solid proof. If Kevin’s involved, there will be evidence in his house.”

“And if he’s not?”

I grinned, but my pulse raced. “Then we owe you a huge apology. And as a gesture of our good intent, we’ll give you everything we’ve found out about the company that manufactures these chips.”

“But by then you’ll already have gotten what you wanted—Kevin—even if you were wrong.”

I nodded, momentarily at a loss for how to reply. Fortunately, Dan was not.

“We’re not wrong, Ben.” He held Feldman’s gaze, and I was impressed with his nerve. “There was one o’ those chips in my back, too. And think what you want about Marc—he’d never do that to me, even if he was gonna do it to everyone else. He’s saved my ass a bunch
a times. Why bother, if he was just gonna hand me over to the Prides anyway?”

Feldman studied his fellow stray for a moment, taking in his every movement, and likely his scent, as he judged Dan’s honesty. Finally, he was satisfied. “Fine. Tomorrow we’ll go to his house together. But if there’s no evidence that Kevin is involved, I don’t ever want to hear from you people again.”

“Fine. I promise.” I nodded eagerly. “Except for one thing. We have to go tonight.”

“Why?” Feldman frowned at me in suspicion. “What’s your hurry?”

I glanced at Dan and Jace in turn, seeking their opinions, and when they both nodded, I sighed and met our host’s gaze again. “Mr. Feldman, there’s part of this whole thing we haven’t told you yet.”

Feldman nodded, with no hint of surprise on his strong, dark features. “I gathered….”

I hesitated, then plunged forward, as if the words burned my tongue. “Adam Eckard didn’t kill Marc. It happened the other way around.”

Feldman went stiff in his chair. “What the hell are you talking about?”

I inhaled deeply, then continued. “Remember me saying we’d found a scar like yours on another stray’s back? Well, that stray was Adam Eckard. We found his body in the woods. Marc wasn’t dead when Eckard took him, and we’re not entirely sure how it happened, but Marc killed Eckard and it looks like when he took Eckard’s clothes for warmth, he found the scar, which he’d
already seen on Dan. He put the pieces together and dug the chip out of Eckard’s back with his own pocketknife.”

Feldman blinked slowly. “Adam Eckard is dead?” I nodded, and he continued. “And Marc Ramos is alive, carrying Eckard’s microchip.”

“Yes.” I nodded again. “And we need Kevin’s GPS tracker thing to find Marc.”

“And once we have, Marc can tell you exactly what really happened,” Jace said.

Feldman’s eyes went hard, and for a moment I thought he’d kick us out without another word. Instead, he stood, digging his keys from his front pocket. “Let’s go. I’m driving.”

W
e wound up taking two cars—Jace’s and Feldman’s—because Jace and I did not know Feldman well enough to close ourselves into such a small space with him, and he felt the same way about us. Which was perfectly understandable, considering his general distrust of Pride cats. And the fact that he’d probably already heard what we’d—okay,
I’d
—done to Pete Yarnell by then.

So I rode with Jace in his Pathfinder, following Dan and Feldman in a white, late-nineties-model Camry across two small, neighboring towns. It was ten-thirty by the time we pulled onto Kevin’s street, and for the most part, his neighborhood already seemed to be sleeping.

Dan called from his cell when we turned onto Kevin’s street, to give us the address, and both vehicles made a slow, quiet first pass, taking everything in.

Except for the house number flaking off the curb
on the right side of his short, cracked driveway, Kevin’s house was virtually indistinguishable from its neighbors. White clapboard with black shutters. Four foot square concrete porch, with no rail and no plants. Small windows, tiny lawn, neat but bare. There was no garage, and the carport was empty. Two cars were parked on the street across from the house, but neither was the car I’d last seen Kevin driving four months earlier.

“I don’t think he’s home,” Feldman said over Dan’s open phone line, flicking his right blinker on as he came to a four-way stop a block past the house. “Wanna get a closer look?”

“Absolutely.” We drove around until we found a neighborhood playground two streets over, where we parked both vehicles side by side beneath the lone streetlight. Then we headed down the walking trail in the direction of Kevin’s street. If anyone stopped us—and that wasn’t looking likely; the whole town seemed to be sleeping peacefully—we’d say we were out for a little late-night exercise.

We snuck between two houses, then crossed the road quickly, as far as possible from the nearest streetlight. After tiptoeing past a sleeping cat in a fenced-in rear lawn, we could see the back of Kevin’s house, two lots down. Trees provided excellent cover in the dark, and we stepped carefully into Kevin’s backyard less than ten minutes after we’d parked at the playground.

All manner of normal family racket came from the house to the east: television violence, loud country music,
the soft hum of a dishwasher. Kevin’s house was silent—a very good sign—but we went carefully anyway.

Jace and I went right and Dan and Feldman went left, checking each window. Most of them were covered by miniblinds, but all of those blinds were at least a decade old and had gaps through which we could easily see. There were two bedrooms, a living/dining combo, and a kitchen. I assumed there was also a bathroom, but that one had no window.

“Well?” I whispered when we met again beneath a tree in the backyard.

“Nothing.” Feldman shrugged, and when he stopped moving and talking, he faded so thoroughly into the shadows I could easily have overlooked him. “He’s not here.”

I agreed. “Let’s go in.”

“Will the lock be a problem?” Dan asked, and I shook my head. It was just a knob twist-lock—typical security for werecats. We had little reason to fear intruders, because even if the potential thief had a gun, chances were good that a werecat could disarm him before it went off. Humans are slow and noisy.

Of course, in Marc’s case, that theory had backfired….

I hesitated briefly, well aware that if we were caught, we’d get arrested. It was the possible consequence that gave me pause, not the moral dilemma of the act itself. I was
sure
Kevin was working with his father—and possibly Calvin Malone—on the microchip conspiracy, which was more than enough to justify a little breaking and entering. “Okay, let’s do it.”

Jace popped the lock on the back door with one quick twist of the knob. The screen door wasn’t even locked. We were inside in under two seconds. While most werecat characteristics carry over in human form to some extent, on two feet, our eyesight is our weakest sense. Fortunately, Kevin had left several lights on, so we could see pretty well without having to flip any more switches.

Obviously, Kevin would know we’d been there the moment he got home, from the broken doorknob and our scents lingering on everything we touched. Though by the time he got home, a little B and E would be the least of his worries. But at least this way no curious neighbors would cut our little snoop-fest short. Or call the police.

“What a slob!” Jace whispered, eyeing the sticky countertop and sink full of dishes.

“Like you’re one to talk.” The guys
could
sterilize an entire house from carpet to ceiling in less than an hour. But they rarely put forth so much effort unless it was truly necessary. Not that I could blame them.

We snooped quickly, opening drawers and reading mail, pawing through Kevin’s fridge, his trash, and his one file cabinet as carefully and as quietly as possible.

The first bedroom held a bed, dresser, and a chest of drawers with a twenty-four-inch television on top. The bathroom was…too gross for words. But the room off the hall, the one that should have been the extra bedroom, held a computer desk and chair, with all the usual complements: printer/scanner/fax combo, telephone, external hard drive, etc….

But there on the desk, in front of the flat-screen monitor and to the left of the optical mouse, sat a palm-size device with a short, thick antenna and a two-and-a-half-inch display. My heart began to gallop as I sank into Kevin’s desk chair, and it bobbed briefly beneath my weight. Could we really be so close to locating Marc?

“Think this is it?” I picked up the device and turned it over while the guys gathered around me. It was thicker and broader than my phone, but weighed about the same, and would easily slip into a good-size pocket. There were three buttons on the sides and top edge of the machine, but none on the face. It was a touch screen.

“It has to be.” Jace reached around me, and his arm brushed mine as he pressed a flush-set button on the side of the device. The tracker beeped, then the screen blinked to life, showing a logo I didn’t recognize. A couple of seconds later, the logo dissolved and a start screen appeared, in full color, asking for a five-digit tracking code. “We need a code,” Jace said, reading over my shoulder. “It looks like each chip has its own tracking number. What’s the dead guy’s name again?”

“Adam Eckard.” I turned to see Dan already heading for the filing cabinet. “Look for a code associated with Adam Eckard.” On second thought… “Pull anything with the name Calvin Malone, too.” Just in case. Because we’d have to be able to prove the connection to make it stick.

Feldman stood completely still in the center of the room, his face frozen in an angry scowl. “May I see that?”

I spun in the chair and handed him the tracker, watching his reaction closely. He examined the device, turning it over in his huge hands and finally pressing a couple of on-screen buttons. Then he handed it back and met my eyes. “You were right. I apologize for not believing you.”

“Don’t.” I hoped he could see the sincerity in my eyes. “You had no reason to believe us, and I’d have done the same thing in your position.”

He shrugged broad shoulders. “Still, I’m sorry. And when I find Kevin Mitchell, I’ll kill him.”

“Um. We kind of need to take him alive,” Jace said, laying one hand on the back of the chair I sat in. “Especially if we don’t find proof that any of the other Alphas are involved. We’ll need his testimony. And we don’t have permission to execute.”

Feldman’s frown deepened and he started to reply, but Dan spoke up from a squat beside the bottom file drawer. “Speakin’ of proof, there’s nothin’ here.”

“You sure?” Jace crossed the room toward him as Dan stood.

“Nothin’ but a bunch of old receipts and check duplicates. ” While they went through all the papers again, I turned back to Kevin’s desk and searched the cubbies in the hutch over the computer monitor. I found staples, rewritable CDs, a box of business envelopes, a stack of printer paper, some empty manila envelopes, and an unopened printer cartridge. The drawers held various computer cables and wires. But I found nothing with any kind of five-digit number on
it, much less a convenient list of strays’ names and corresponding codes.

“Maybe he took it with him,” Feldman suggested, turning from the small closet he’d been searching when I threw my arms up in frustration.

“Why would he take the list, but not the tracker? What good would the numbers do without it?”

Dan shrugged and dropped an old check register into the top file-cabinet drawer. “Maybe this one’s an extra.”

“An extra eight-thousand-dollar piece of equipment?” I held the tracker up for emphasis. “Kevin works in retail. At least, he did last I heard. There’s no
way
his pockets are deep enough for redundant systems.”

Jace shoved the bottom drawer closed and pushed himself to his feet. “His pockets aren’t even deep enough for primary systems. But we’re not talking about
his
pockets. We’re talking about his
father’s
bankroll. Because even if Cal is involved, his
money
probably isn’t. Stingy bastard.”

Jace’s stepfather was not exactly rolling in cash, even though he required the highest Pride dues of any Alpha in the country—a full quarter of each of his Pride cats’ earnings. My dad only took ten percent,
all
of which went to pay the enforcers and to cover the expenses we incurred in the line of duty. I had no proof that Calvin Malone was misappropriating funds, but I would not have been surprised to learn that was true.

Milo Mitchell, however, had no reason to bother—
he was high up in the executive ranks of a medical sales company in Washington State. He wasn’t fabulously rich, but his mid-six-figure annual salary no doubt generated enough cash to cover the cost of a few extra state-of-the-art GPS tracking devices with which to subvert the civil rights of an entire population of strays.

Which only supported my opinion that money is most often wasted on the wealthy.

“Okay, so he might have an extra tracking device. But only the one list he took with him?” I sighed and let my hands fall onto the arms of the swivel chair. Had we wasted twenty minutes of Marc’s life searching for a list that wasn’t even there?

“Surely he’s not the only one with a copy of the codes,” Feldman said, leaning against the back wall with his arms crossed over his chest. “If Kevin’s really working for his father, wouldn’t this father have a list, too?”

“Probably.” I spun slowly in the chair, my eyes closed, thinking. “Unfortunately, Milo Mitchell lives in a suburb of Seattle, so our access to his filing cabinet is kind of limited.”

Feldman cleared his throat pointedly, and I opened my eyes to see him smiling, one brow raised. “Kevin’s access would be just as limited, right?”

I nodded slowly. Then more eagerly, as his point sank in. “So Kevin would have e-mailed the list…” I spun the chair around and caught the corner of the desk with one outstretched palm to halt my turn, then punched the power button on Kevin’s CPU. His
computer was newer than Marc’s and his Internet connection was much faster, so in under a minute and a half, I had Kevin’s browser up and running.

And that’s when we caught a couple of big breaks in a row. First of all, Kevin’s in-box was set up as his homepage, so we found his e-mail account with no problem. Beyond that, the computer was set to “remember” him, so we didn’t have to mess around with guessing his password. If I’d known he was that careless, I’d have checked the computer first.

Unfortunately, his in-box was empty, except for four messages that had come in that morning. Two were spam—porn, based on the subject lines—and the other two were advertisements from
Popular Mechanics,
which made Kevin sound smarter than he was, and a video-game site. He clearly kept his in-box cleaned out pretty well.

Not so with his Sent folder and his virtual trash can. Among the messages Kevin had recently deleted, I found one from his father, dated three days earlier. I opened it and scanned the contents, while all three of the toms read over my shoulder. It was in response to an e-mail Kevin had sent his father several hours before—along with a Word attachment titled “Updated tracker codes.”

Jackpot.

I opened the attachment while Jace turned on the printer and checked the paper tray. I printed four copies—one for each of us—then forwarded the message to myself, my father, and Michael, just to make
sure that the evidence of Milo Mitchell’s involvement was well disseminated, in case something went horribly wrong and none of us came out of the hunt for Marc alive.

“Shit, Dan!” I glanced at him with both eyebrows raised, the paper still warm in my hand from the printer. “Your name’s top on the list. They implanted you first.”

Dan frowned and started to say something. But then Jace cut him off. “Eckard’s fifth from the top,” he said, and I skipped down five entries on the list. And there it was. Adam Eckard—tracking code 44827. I rolled forward in the chair and reactivated the tracker, which had gone into power-save mode, then typed in the five-digit code. Within seconds, information flooded the screen, including the current longitude and latitude of Adam Eckard’s GPS microchip.

At the bottom of the screen was a virtual button reading Map View. I pressed it, and a satellite image map appeared, showing a densely packed forest surrounding a glowing green dot—presumably Marc, carrying Eckard’s chip.

“There he is!” I shot up from my chair with the tracker in hand, and was already halfway to the hall—eager to get going now that we had a target to shoot for—when Jace called me back, his voice oddly strained, as if his throat wanted to close around the words as he spoke them.

“Faythe, look at the last name on the list.”

Irritated by the delay, I pulled my folded copy of the list from my back pocket, where I’d hurriedly shoved
it, and skipped to the bottom of the page. The final entry read: Marc Ramos—tracking code 44839.

Shock raced through me so fast I got light-headed, and the edges of my vision darkened. “Marc’s been implanted? When? If they could track him, why would they try to kill him?”