Tempted by the Jaguar #4: Infiltration (Riverford Shifters) (5 page)

“I’m sorry about that,” Hunter said as they left the wolf clan’s secret
den a couple of long hours later, his voice still tight with suppressed anger.

“It’s okay, really,” Kylie insisted. “We knew they had questions for
me. It’s not really surprising that they thought I could help ‘awaken’ some of
their Deadends.”

“It was beyond rude to put you on the spot like that, even worse to
bring out that little boy. I just hope to God they didn’t tell the kid why they
wanted you to take a look at him. Having his hopes crushed like that would’ve
been too cruel.”

“I would say their timing was just as bad given the reason we were even
there, but they probably thought it would be their only chance to ask and went
for it. Being a former Deadend myself, I can understand the parents’
desperation.”

Kylie couldn’t help but think that it was a good thing Hunter was such
a naturally calm person. They needed the strength and unique talents of the wolf
clans, and storming out in anger, no matter how justified, would have been an
utter disaster. As far as she was concerned, a little discomfort on her part
was well worth the numbers the wolf Elders had pledged for the rescue in the
end.

“I suppose so,” Hunter said with a sigh. “It’s just, you didn’t see the
stricken look on your face. As if you didn’t have enough shit to deal with
already.”

“Well, maybe now the fact that I can’t magically trigger an awakening
will make the gossip rounds, and I won’t ever have to deal with that awkward
scene again.” She broke off as a yawn threatened to split her face in two. “Are
we going to see your bobcat friends now?”

“No. We’re going back to the clinic. For now, I can just talk to them
over the phone. We can just meet with them in the morning if it becomes
necessary, or have them meet us at Southern Glacier.”

Kylie hoped that none of her relief showed. She was currently running
on fumes, but she would have sooner cut her own tongue off than complain.

Once they arrived back to the clinic, Kylie insisted on peeking in on a
still-sleeping Paul before allowing Hunter to usher her up to the room they had
made love in what felt like years ago instead of hours.

She had been more than a little worried that Donald Gaither would be
waiting to ambush them, but the Elder was nowhere to be seen, and nobody had stopped
them to relay a message on their way up. It seems they had managed to avoid
that potential landmine for the time being, but she couldn’t help but worry
that their evasive behavior was making him suspicious. The last thing she
needed right now was to make the Elders want to look more closely at her past
more than they already were. She didn’t want Hunter or Maxim in the middle of
that kind of fallout.

After changing into her nightgown, Kylie climbed onto the bed and
slipped beneath the sheets to snuggle against Hunter. He had stripped down to
just his t-shirt and boxers and was already propped against the headboard and
talking on the phone to what was probably one of his bobcat friends. Without
missing a beat, he slipped an arm around her and pulled her snug against his
side. Kylie wrapped an arm around his middle and used his chest as a pillow. It
was almost scary how good it felt to simply be held like this, how
right
,
but luckily she was too exhausted to scrutinize her feelings. She closed her
eyes with a sigh. She could always freak out about it in the morning.

***

“Time to wake up.”

The words sounded as though they had been spoken somewhere in the far
distance, but they were enough to jolt Kylie out of a dream that involved
arguing with a group of people whose identities were already beginning to elude
her. She was incredibly warm and comfortable and was loathe to move, but she
had never been one to allow herself the indulgence of lounging in bed, not when
there was always,
always
something that needed to be done.

However, the moment her eyes cracked open and a very familiar face
blurred into view only a few inches from her own, she was suddenly wide awake.

“Did something happen?” she asked anxiously, pulling away in order to
sit up, somewhat wobbly, onto her knees. Her eyes immediately zeroed in on the
cell phone in his hand.

“Needles just texted me,” Hunter replied as he sat up as well. “Your
father’s awake and asking for you.”

“Is he okay?”

Hunter nodded. “I think he was just worried about your current
whereabouts. This floor has a communal bathroom if you’d like to get cleaned up
before seeing him. I can check in with Maxim while you shower.”

Kylie’s eyes fell to the clock on the nightstand on Hunter’s side of
the bed. Eight AM. She’d slept longer than she had thought.

“I fell asleep while you were still talking to your bobcat friends,”
she said as she walked over to grab one of the duffle bags sitting on the
dresser. “I hope things went well.”

Hunter snorted. “As Maxim predicted, they were more than happy to help.
We can expect at least twenty shooters from their clan. After we visit with
your father, we’ll head over to the club again to go over any new intel and
start planning the next step.”

Twenty minutes later, Kylie was showered and drying her hair as Hunter
took his turn in the bathroom. She glanced over at one of Paul’s bags,
wondering if she should take it to him now, when Hunter’s phone abruptly rang.
She stared at it for only a second or two before she ran to the nightstand
where he had left it and scooped it up. It was Maxim’s name on the screen, so
she decided to answer.

“Kylie?” Maxim said hesitantly after her greeting.

“Yeah,” she replied. “Hunter’s in the shower right now. Should I go
fetch him?”

“No, no,” he said, a little too quickly. “Just have him call me when he
gets out.”

Kylie was instantly on high alert. “Maxim—if it’s something bad, just
say so. You don’t have to tiptoe around me, especially if the bad news has to
do with me.”

Silence greeted her for a long moment, then she heard him sigh. “Fine,
but I would rather tell you in person. Don’t bother to have Hunter call me.
Just come to the club as soon as you can.”

“We will, and thanks, Maxim.”

“What will we do?” Hunter suddenly said from directly behind her,
nearly causing her to jump out of her skin for what seemed like the millionth
time in the last twenty-four hours. She had been so focused on the call that
she hadn’t even heard the door open.

She whirled around. “God, don’t sneak up on me like that!” she scolded.

“A strange thing to say for a jaguar,” he remarked with a shake of his
head.

“I don’t think so. I’m still getting used to being a shifter, after all,”
Kylie huffed defensively.

“Of course,” he agreed affably. “What did Maxim want?”

“Something’s happened, but he didn’t want to tell me what over the
phone. He said to come to the club as soon as possible.”

Hunter sat on the bed and began pulling on his boots. “Then we’ll just
go talk to your dad and leave straight after. I had hoped we would have time
for breakfast, but I guess we’ll just have to grab something on the way.” He
looked at her sternly. “I
know
you haven’t eaten anything in a while. I
would rather we not face any more disasters today on an empty stomach.”

Kylie made a face. “The thought of eating, even now, is—ugh—but I’ll
try.”

The clinic’s halls were virtually empty as they made their way down to
her father’s floor. Seeing Paul’s face light up the moment they stepped into
his room made Kylie instantly feel guilty. She really shouldn’t have left him
alone last night, but…

“You’re looking so much better,” she said, leaning down to give him a
careful hug.

He laughed. “I actually don’t feel too bad, all things considered. I’m
just a little tender. I’m glad to see you looking more rested than I expected.”
His eyes flickered over to Hunter who was standing silently behind her. “Thank
you for taking care of my daughter last night.”

Hunter shook his head. “No thanks needed.”

“On the contrary. Kylie can be quite stubborn,” Paul said, looking at
her fondly.

Kylie flashed Paul a look of outrage, which quickly transferred to
Hunter at the sound of his laughter.

She sank into the chair beside his bed. “If you two are quite finished
teasing me, I have something serious to tell you.”

The amusement in Paul’s eyes instantly vanished. “Did something else
happen?” he demanded. “Is Karen and Mitch all right?”

Kylie mentally winced. She had hoped to put off telling him about
Karen’s possible betrayal just a little longer.

“They’re not hurt,” she replied slowly. “At least I don’t think they
are, but something—unsettling has come up.” She paused, unsure how she should
tell him.

Hunter placed a hand on her shoulder and squeezed gently. “Before that,
you might want to explain about your friend, Molly, and the possible ties to
your attack,” he suggested.

Kylie flashed him a grateful smile and turned back to Paul when he said
in a surprised tone, “Molly?”

“Tara called me last night,” she said grimly. “Someone broke into
Molly’s apartment, and she, and maybe even Ty, are missing. Hunter asked some
of the shifters on the police force to investigate, and they found some
spatters of blood and the smell of an alligator shifter inside her apartment.
Hunter’s friend, Maxim, has some of his people looking for her, too, but so far
they haven’t found any other leads.”

Paul ran a hand agitatedly through his hair. “I’ve never heard of any
alligators allying with
any
clan, much less the lions, but the timing is
much too suspicious to be coincidental.”

“If the lions
are
behind her abduction, then I suspect we’ll be
hearing from them soon,” Hunter said. “It may be a ploy to get Kylie to reveal
herself. That lioness came after her because she thought Kylie was a rogue lion,
and the lion clans hunt Rogues just as relentlessly as they do Polyshifters and
the families that flee their tyranny.”

Paul frowned. “And you think the lions are now targeting Karen and
Mitch in the same way?” He reached out and grabbed Kylie’s upper arm urgently.
“Have they already been attacked again? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?”

Kylie squirmed under his intense, worried gaze. “I—” She broke off and
exchanged a troubled glance with Hunter. Despite that damning security video,
she really couldn’t say for certain if Karen had
not
been attacked and
delivered an ultimatum before the scene in the hospital occurred. For all they
knew, the lions may have already kidnapped Mitch, too. She suddenly realized
that they just didn’t have enough evidence either way to completely condemn or exonerate
Karen.

“I’m not sure,” she admitted, feeling Hunter start beside her. She
hastened to explain before Hunter could speak, “When I last talked to her, she
told me that Mitch was doing fine and they had gone into hiding, but…Maxim
knows a shifter who works security at Riverford Regional. He sent some footage
from yesterday afternoon to Maxim that shows Karen meeting up with two men,
cougars, that have been identified as probable Sniffers. Her body language was
pretty relaxed, like she was talking to a couple of friends. She left the
hospital with them on foot.”

Paul’s fingers went lax around her arm. His expression was stricken.
“She would never…after what happened to Steven…!”

“That’s the very reason she would,” Hunter said quietly, his eyes
sympathetic, “but Kylie’s right. At this point, we don’t know nearly enough
about what we saw to condemn her. Maxim’s people are trying to locate her and
Mitch as we speak. In fact, Maxim called this morning wanting us to meet him to
discuss something important. For all I know, it could be something about the
Wilsons.”

“Then you should go see him, now,” Paul said firmly. “Kylie, just
promise me that you’ll call me the moment you hear something,
no matter how
bad
.”

“I will,” she promised solemnly.

“And for God’s sake, be careful! I don’t want you coming back here on a
stretcher—either of you.”

It wasn’t until they were on their way to Southern Glacier that Kylie
realized with dismay that she had completely forgotten to tell Paul about the
very promising lead Jack had given her on her mother. He was so going to kill
her, but it was too late to go back now.

After stopping for a few breakfast burritos and coffee at a nearby cafe,
Kylie found herself once again following Hunter into Maxim’s club. Without the
loud thrum and pulsing of the club’s music filling the air, the empty halls
felt a little disconcerting and forlorn.

From the rumpled state of Maxim’s clothes, the same ones he had worn
last night she was quick to note, the tiger shifter had either slept in his
office or not at all. His eyes certainly looked tired enough to be the latter.

Hunter handed Maxim one of his bags of food and one of the coffees as
Kylie sank down into one of the chairs in front of the desk. “You look like
shit. I hope you at least got a couple of hours of sleep.”

Maxim sighed wearily. “I stretched out on one of the couches upstairs
for two or three once we closed the club, but then the phone calls started to
come in.”

“You can eat and talk about the latest disaster at the same time,”
Hunter said, looking pointedly at the still-unopened bag in Maxim’s hand. He
sat down next to Kylie and began pulling burritos out of his bag and placing
them on the desk. He pushed a couple towards Kylie. “That goes for you, too.”

Maxim chuckled and complied, moving to sit behind his desk. “Thanks.”
He unwrapped his burrito and took a couple of bites before fixing his eyes on
Kylie. “As you know, I have several of my friends that live in the Panhandle
region watching the ranch along with the wolves their Elders sent. One of them
called me about an hour ago to report that a couple of SUVs entered the
property.” He turned his monitor around to face them. “Here’s the pics he sent
me of the people getting out of one of them.”

Kylie experienced a moment of dread before she put down her food and
focused on the screen. Unlike the slightly fuzzy security footage she had
viewed yesterday, this picture was sharp and clear in all its horrifying
detail. The image was of the back of a fairly ordinary two-story brick house
with an attached four-car garage. Two black SUVs were parked side-by-side in
front of the still-closed garage door. There were four people standing next to
the left-most vehicle, three of them men with the fourth a
very
familiar
redheaded woman clutched between them.

“Oh my God,
Molly
,” Kylie whispered in horror.

She could just make out that her friend’s hands were bound behind her
back as well as the expression of absolute fear on her face. Conspicuously
absent was her boyfriend Ty. Rather than feel relieved, her dread doubled. If
they had not kidnapped him, too, then where was he? She couldn’t imagine that
Tara or the cops wouldn’t have been able to get ahold of him by now if he had
just forgotten to charge his phone.

“My security guys questioned the lioness into unconsciousness as soon
as I saw the pictures and made the connection,” Maxim said, his eyes hard, “and
still not a word. Even so, with this, there is no longer any question. The
lions have infiltrated Riverford far deeper than we feared. I imagine Kylie
will be receiving an ultimatum, most likely through Karen Wilson, soon.”

Kylie didn’t think it was possible, but his eyes hardened even more
until she could barely see the blue of his irises. The tiger shifter was
pissed
,
dangerously so. She could taste his desire to rend, to
kill
, in the air,
and she suddenly had to grab the arms of her chair tightly as her muscles
rippled and the urge to shift almost overwhelmed her. She wasn’t sure, but she
thought she might have hissed as well.

“We have to make our move before that happens.”

Hunter’s calm proclamation washed over her, as out of place and potent
as a clap of thunder in a silent room. The small spasms in her muscles that she
had been struggling against ceased in response to the calm he was projecting. She
felt his hand glide over hers in a soothing motion, and the urge to shift also
began to fade.

She took a shuddering breath and smiled at Hunter gratefully, but he
wasn’t looking at her. His eyes were fixed on Maxim, intense, watchful. It was
then that Kylie realized with a sinking feeling that the taste, the smell of
violence was still very much present. She stilled, almost afraid to even
breathe, as the two alpha predators stared at each other, each as still as a
marble statue.

Then Maxim blinked, and the suffocating tension in the air seemed to dissipate
all at once.

“I’m okay, now,” he said roughly, though his eyes still smoldered with
anger.

Hunter nodded. “Your tiger’ll get his chance. Both of us will get our
taste of blood soon.”

Although his words should have disturbed her, something deep inside of
her understood them well, wanted to join them, even. Kylie hastily pushed those
feelings to the side. It was best to deal with them later, when she wasn’t so
on edge and in danger of losing herself to her jaguar. Hunter and Maxim had
enough to deal with without having to chase after a rampaging Returner.

Maxim took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Call the bobcats and
the wolf Elders and have them come to the club. I think it’s time to plan an
infiltration of our own.”

***

Still reeling from the discovery that Molly, minus Ty, was now a prisoner
in a place that had done unspeakable things to God-only-knew how many others,
Kylie sat silently beside Hunter on one of the many couches in one of the VIP
sections of Southern Glacier and listened while the large group of assembled
shifters strategized.

“One of my guys has managed to learn the identity of one of their
scientists, a geneticist from the LA lion clan,” Maxim said, bringing up a
photo of a blond man who looked to be around sixty onto the flat-screen on the
wall before them. “He’s also learned where the lion stays within Amarillo when
he is not at the ranch.”

“I recognize the bastard,” one of the wolf Elders from Parker Grove
spoke up. “He was in the news not too long ago—something about analyzing the
mitochondrial DNA in some recently discovered Denisovan bones.”

“If they’re mucking about with DNA, do you suppose they are trying to
develop some kind of biological weapon at that ranch?” another wolf asked.
“Something that is only affective on shifters?”

Maxim’s expression hardened. “That’s the very reason why this needs to
be an infiltration rather than an all-out assault. We need to do this as
quietly and covertly as possible to not only give us a chance to rescue our
loved ones unharmed, but to also steal as much of their data as we can get our
hands on. The last thing we want is to go in guns blazing…” He leveled a
look
at the group of bobcats. “…and risk them killing all their captives and
destroying all their data. We need to be inside the complex and down in the
lower levels before they even realize they’re being invaded. We’ll back them
into a corner of our choosing. While rescuing our people will be our priority,
we need to find out what the bastards are up to just as badly, especially now
that we’re finding more and more of the bastards in our city.”

“We can use the geneticist as our distraction,” Hunter said, looking
meaningfully at Kylie, “catch him as he’s heading back to the ranch and use his
vehicle. We can have the bobcats take out all the perimeter guards
simultaneously with tranqs while their attention is turned to the geneticist’s
arrival.”

Maxim nodded. “I can also have some of my guys hack into their security
system. It should buy us enough time to get a couple of rescue teams inside. I
wasn’t able to locate any schematics, so we’ll be moving pretty much blind from
that point on. We only have the intel Jack Bray has provided us of the interior
and its personnel. We’ve constructed a partial floorplan based on what Jack’s
recollected.”

The picture of the geneticist was replaced with the ranch’s partially
constructed floorplans. Kylie frowned as she noticed several underground
floors. How in the world were they ever going to find all the captives, much
less rescue them from such a structure, especially when they had such a small
window of time to do it?

“One last thing.” Suddenly a picture of Molly Maxim had probably swiped
from one of her social media accounts appeared on the flat-screen next to the
ranch’s floorplan. “This woman’s name is Molly Johnson, one of the lions’ most
recent victims. Although human, she is a friend of Kylie Moore’s and was taken,
we think, to use as a bargaining chip.”

Suddenly all eyes were on Kylie. She could feel her back stiffen as she
struggled not to fidget. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to remind everyone
that she was a Returner. There were a lot of different clans present, most with
shifters she had never met. She didn’t want a repeat of the awkwardness she’d
had to endure last night with the wolves once the meeting was over.

“As you well know,” Maxim continued, capturing everyone’s attention
again to Kylie’s relief, “the lions have always coveted Returners. Thus, it’s
crucial that we relieve the bastards of such a precious coin. Also, before
Molly was taken, she wasn’t aware of the existence of shifters, so use caution
when approaching her should her ignorance still be true. The last thing we need
to throw into the mix is a terrified, hysterical human who thinks the tiger or
wolf trying to save her is there to eat her.”

“Which city and location are our various groups to meet up?” the wolf
Elder, Glen, asked.

“Lubbock,” Maxim replied. “I will be flying in ahead with a few people
as soon as our business here is concluded in order to meet with my contacts who
live in the area and to start coordinating our attack. One of my cousins has an
estate on several hundred acres on the western outskirts of the city. It is
remote and will draw no attention as it’s located on a private hunting range
and often hosts large groups. We’ll discuss our final plans in more detail once
everyone has arrived at the estate.”

“Are we going with Maxim?” Kylie whispered into Hunter’s ear as several
people began to ask Maxim a few more questions.

“Yes,” Hunter whispered back. “He has a private plane, a six-seater
Cessna.”

“He has a pilot’s license?” she asked, impressed.

Hunter nodded. “Everyone in his family does. It’s a tradition.”

Movement in the corner of her eye had Kylie instinctually turning her
head. A young, blonde girl that could have been anywhere between sixteen and
twenty was striding towards Maxim, a harried look on her face. Kylie caught the
scent of tiger as she passed by their couch with a curt nod to Hunter and a
curious glance at her.

Maxim instantly stiffened when he caught sight of her. She stepped
right up to him and began whispering into his ear.

“Who is she?” Kylie asked.

Hunter’s smile was half amusement, half worry. “That’s Sasha, Maxim’s
little sister.”