Turning Payne (2 page)

Riley couldn’t breathe as the lion took another menacing step towards the tall, dark stranger. His silvery blue eyes locked on her like a homing device, the scowl on his handsome face almost as frightening as the animal behind him.

She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out.

"Don't make any sudden movements." His voice was low and steady.

Her attention darted back and forth between the lion and the man. A small cry escaped her lips, and she covered her mouth with her hands.

The animal crouched lower and a deep rumble resonated from its throat.

"I said don't move."

Riley's knees went rubbery. God, what if the animal had attacked her sister? She needed to get to the bedroom. Needed to make sure Kiera wasn't hurt. "I ne-need to find my sis-siter."

The lion's head snapped up and looked at her. A vibrating hum replaced the savage snarl. It watched Riley almost curiously.

"Riley." The man's voice jerked her attention back to him. He had his shirt halfway unbuttoned before she knew what he was doing. With slow subtle movements, he removed the white button-down and let it fall to the ground. "Whatever happens, I need you to remain calm. Can you do that for me?"

Riley sucked in a deep breath at the sight of the bronzed flesh covering his tightly coiled muscles. The sudden rush of air into her lungs left her lightheaded. "Wha-What are you doing?"

The lion's ears flattened against its head as the man began unbuckling his belt.

His pants, as well as his Georgio Armani boxer briefs, dropped slowly to the ground. His gaze never left hers. "I need you to trust me."

Trust him? Was he serious?
Heat scalded her cheeks and surged through her. Blinking at him, she shook her head and took a step backwards.

The lion growled and leapt through the air, teeth and claws bared.

A deep roar that sounded like a freight train echoed around her. 

She screamed and stepped back, and tumbled over the coffee table. She spread her arms, trying to catch herself. Her head smacked against something metal and the room went black.

* * *

Turner was ready for the attack. As the animal pounced, he shifted into lion form. Bones and sinew snapped and reformed, but not quickly enough. The lion sank its teeth into his right shoulder, and he let out a roar.

Across the room, Riley lay unconscious. The smell of fresh blood tickled his nostrils.

He needed to get control of the situation before things got more out of hand. Why hadn't he grabbed the stun gun out of the trunk before entering the house? How many rules had he already broken? It didn't matter. When the Council found out, he was going to be in deep shit.

The animal bared its teeth and paced, golden eyes locked on him. Its nostrils flared and ears flattened. It moved towards Riley, and he blocked its path.

He wasn't worried about her attacking the woman. The victims seemed to retain enough of their memories that they knew their loved ones. But the instant he had walked into the house, his own scent had alerted her already heightened emotions. He was an alpha lion on her turf.

Kiera.
He tried to touch the animal's mind with his own.
I don't want to hurt you.

She stopped for a moment and looked at him, confusion in her eyes.

Good. The animal hadn't fully consumed her. There was still a chance to reach her.

By the time he or any of the other Therian agents had reached previous victims, too much time had passed. Their minds had been taken hostage, trapped in purgatory.

Kiera. I know you're scared, but you need to listen to me. I can help you.

He sensed the surprise and uncertainty warring within her. She tilted her head and glanced at Riley.

When she looked back at him, she growled low in her throat.

Where the fuck was Chase?

Riley was still out cold. If something happened to her, the Council would have his head.

He really didn't need this shit right now. He hadn't slept in two days, and now, here he was in Richard Boyd's living room, one daughter bleeding and unconscious and the other ready to rip his throat out.

As much as he hated Boyd, Riley and Kiera were innocent. As far as he was aware, neither woman knew about their father's cruel and deranged research, or the enduring pain it had caused Turner and his family.

His gut tightened as another growl tore from Kiera's chest. If she attacked him again, he would have to take her down, and he didn't think he could do that without hurting her.

Anger darkened his vision as she swatted at him, her claws drawing blood and just missing his eyes. He charged her, rolling her over, and pinned her to the ground. She struggled to throw his weight, but it was useless. In his lion form, he outweighed her by a good two hundred pounds.

The front door flung open. Chase entered, stun gun aimed and ready to fire. He let out a string of curses as his gaze darted between the unconscious woman, and the two lions. "You've got some fucking explaining to do."

Put her down before she takes another piece out of me
. Turner pushed into his brother's mind.

Shaking his head, Chase shot Kiera with a tranquillizer dart.

She roared, baring her teeth and stumbled sideways a few times, before landing with a thud on the floor.

Her pupils dilated in fear. 

We're going to take you somewhere safe
. Turner tried to reassure her.

In less than a minute, she was unconscious.

Chase picked Riley up and laid her on the couch, then placed a pillow under her head. 

Turner shifted back into his human form, a growl rumbling low in his chest as bones and sinew snapped and cracked back into place. He wiped the beads of sweat from his forehead, and shrugged his pants back on.

Running his hand over the four puncture wounds on his shoulder, he sucked his breath in sharply and clenched his teeth against the pain. Warm blood seeped through his fingers. He healed fast, but it still hurt like a bitch.

Chase knelt over Riley, and pushed her hair back, exposing a goose egg that had formed under the small gash above her temple.

His brother turned his hard blue gaze on him. "Want to tell me what happened here?"

He knew it looked bad from where his brother sat, but the last thing he wanted to do was go through the whole fucking nightmare one more time.

Turner shrugged. "Wrong place at the wrong time."

Chase muttered something inaudible under his breath and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Did she see you shift?"

Turner glanced at Riley and shook his head. "I don't know."

"Dammit, Turner, your obsession with Boyd has gone too far. You'll be lucky if they don't suspend you permanently for this."

That's what he was worried about.

"I need you to keep it under the radar for a bit. Give me a couple of weeks. Let me dig around—"

"The Council will want answers when you bring her in." Chase gestured to the mound of golden fur that lay motionless across the room. "How do you plan on keeping this a secret?"

"I was kind of hoping you could keep her at your place for the time being."

A grimace tightened Chase's features. "You want me to babysit a three-hundred-pound lioness, while you go searching for ghosts?"

"There's something here. I can feel it in my bones. You know as well as I do that if I take them to the Council, they'll erase Riley's memory, and I'll never get what I need from her. Not to mention what they'll do to Kiera. She'll be locked up with the others, with no chance of ever shifting back. I was in her head. She's still in there. Maybe you'll have better luck than I did getting through to her."

Chase sat back on his heels and exhaled a long frustrated breath. "One week. I'll give you that before I bring her in." His hard gaze returned to the redhead who lay unconscious beside him. "And what about her?"

"I'll deal with Riley. I may need her if I'm going to get to the bottom of these random morphings."

"You really think Boyd would infect his own daughter?"

Turner gave a short, sarcastic laugh. "You have to ask? You read the files. The man was certifiably insane. A psychopathic killer with no regard for—"

Chase held up his hands. He stood, crossed the room and gripped Turner's uninjured shoulder. "Boyd's dead. I don't know who or what is behind this, but it's not him."

"You're wrong. I can feel it."

Chase dropped his hand and frowned. "One week."

Turner nodded. "One week."

He would find out who was behind this mess, and if he had to use and manipulate Boyd's oldest daughter to get that information, so be it.

It was time Riley knew what kind of monster Richard Boyd truly was. 

Turner sat on the edge of the couch and placed a cool cloth on Riley's forehead. She'd been unconscious for less than ten minutes, but it was enough time to load the lion's body into Chase's truck.

Riley stirred beside him. "Kiera." Her moan was weak, a small cry of pain filled with confusion.

She was going to have one hell of a headache when she woke up.

How was he going to explain this to her? If she thought she was tripping earlier, she was in for one reality-shattering revelation when he informed her that her sister was currently stuck in lion form.

He picked up a silver-framed picture from the floor. It was a candid shot of the Boyd sisters, laughing and holding long, plastic daiquiri glasses somewhere on the Vegas strip. Unlike her redheaded bombshell of a sister, Kiera was petite, her dark hair and big blue eyes giving her a look of innocence. 

Fucking Boyd. Despite what Chase thought, Turner was convinced the lunatic was behind this. It was too much of a coincidence that his youngest daughter had been infected. But what kind of bastard would do something like this to his own child?

With a heavy sigh, he placed the picture on the coffee table.

Riley whimpered and her eyelashes fluttered open.

Crouching beside her, he removed the cloth and pushed a damp piece of hair off her cheek. "You hit your head pretty hard. Don't try to sit up yet, or you'll be sick."

Her unfocused eyes went wide. She rolled over, placed her feet on the ground and tried to stand up. "I have to fi-find my sister."

She stumbled forward, and Turner gripped her shoulders to stop her from doing a head dive onto the floor.

"You need to lie down. Kiera's fine."

"Where is she?" Beads of sweat broke out over her brow, and she groaned. "I-I need to see her."             

He pushed her back onto the couch. The last thing he needed was puke all over his brand new Gucci jeans. There was a reason he'd taken them off before shifting.             

Her gaze darted around the room.

Taking her chin between his fingers and thumb, he forced her to look at him. "I need you to listen to me."

Her gaze drifted down to the four puncture wounds on his shoulder. "You're bleeding." Her eyes went wide and she jerked back, pulling her knees up to her chest. "Whe-where is it?"

Shit, she was going to lose it again if he didn't do something fast. In his human form, his psychic abilities were restrained, but he needed to try. He grasped her hands and held on when she tried to pull away. Concentrating on her face, he focused on the energy around them.

Heat infused them, and her expression softened as the warmth he created flowed through her like a natural sedative. Her shoulders dropped, and she let out a deep, levelling breath.

"The lion's gone." He glanced down. The delicate, pale skin of her hands was a sharp contrast next to his calloused, sun-bronzed fingers. "Kiera is safe. She's with my brother."

"Your brother?" Her green eyes swam with tears and she shook her head. "I don't understand. Who-who are you?"

Was he really prepared to tell her?
If the agency found out what he was about to do he'd lose more than his job. But if he was ever going to prove Boyd's hand in all this, Turner needed Riley's cooperation.

"My name's Turner Payne. I work with an organization that handles these type of…
situations
." He hesitated. "There's a lot I need to explain to you, but you have to be willing to believe me. Can you do that?"

She bit her lip and gave a slight tilt of her head. He took it as a yes.

"You studied biology at Penn State, right?"

Her frown deepened. "I did my Master's degree in evolution and genomics. How did you know that?"

Because he'd kept a close eye on her and Kiera over the past four years. He had multiple files filled with detailed information about her life, but he wasn't about to tell her that. He could feel his control slipping, the energy starting to give way to her frayed nerves.

"You know that hominids have continued to evolve over the millennia, and that there have been subspecies that have lived side by side in relative peace with modern humans."

"Neanderthals and Denisovans." Her brows furrowed. "But what does that have—"

"There's another subspecies that has evolved alongside humans. Classified as Homo sapiens metamorphs."

"Metamorphs?" She gave a nervous chuckle.

"Their genome is characterized by several mutations, specifically affecting the fourteenth and twentieth chromosomes. Normally mutations of this magnitude would be debilitating, but in the case of metamorphs, the anomaly is a strength instead of a weakness," he explained, using the Therian Council's classification of shifters. He didn't know what half the shit meant, but with her background in genetics, he assumed Riley would. She closed her eyes and leaned back on the couch. He continued, "Based on the amino acid sequence on chromosome fourteen, the metamorph has the ability to shapeshift into a specific animal form."

A high-pitched laugh escaped Riley's lips and she sat upright. "You're talking about werewolves?"

Why the hell were people so obsessed with werewolves?
They were cheats and liars, the lot of them. Wolves weren't much better than their coyote cousins.

He exhaled a frustrated breath. "Or
werelions.
"

She stared at him for a long moment. He could almost see the gears working in that pretty little head of hers.

"Werelions?" Her intelligent green eyes were rimmed with red, her face too pale. The shock of everything that transpired clearly etched on her features. "Are you trying to tell me you think the animal that was here—in my living room—was actually a human, somehow
magically
turned into a lion?"

"It's not magic, it's genetics. And yes, that's what I'm saying." Now for the real kicker. "And that wasn't just any werelion. It was Kiera."

"As in my sister Kiera?" She closed her eyes briefly and took a deep breath. "And I thought I was the crazy person here."

She pulled her hands free of his, breaking the aura he'd created around them.

"Riley, listen to me—"

Standing on unsteady legs, she pushed past him and called out Kiera's name as she rushed to the bedroom. With a frustrated sigh, Turner stood slowly and followed her.

When he got to the bedroom, Riley was standing over Kiera's bed, holding what Turner could only assume was the remnants of the nightgown and underwear Kiera had been wearing before she shifted.

"Where is she? If you've done anything to her…" Her voice was soft, but he could hear the tremor of dread that resonated in each word.

He took her by the shoulders, turned her around and wrapped his arms around her. It was an uncharacteristic gesture. He knew he would regret it later, but the look of despair beneath those emerald green eyes wrecked him.

She sank against him and her body trembled against his.

Tilting her chin up with his thumb, he gave her what he hoped was a reassuring smile. "I know it's difficult to believe, but what I told you is the truth."

"Okay." She pushed away from him. Still holding the shredded material, she paced the small room. "Say I believe you. How do you know all this?"

Turner rubbed the back of his neck. He'd never told anyone his secret before. It was prohibited, a breach in protocol for a Therian agent to expose himself to anyone other than his mate or another metamorph, and Boyd's daughter was neither. Sure, he was attracted to her. Any breathing male with two eyes in his skull would be, but Riley Boyd was not, and would never be, his mate.

But if he had any hope of convincing her to help find the bastard responsible for this, he needed her to believe him.

Screw protocol.
"I know about it because I'm a carrier of the metamorph genes."

Her eyes widened and her jaw went slack. "You want me to believe you're a werewolf?"

Turner growled low in his throat. "A werelion. There's a big fucking difference."

She put her hands up in defense and took a step back. "Okay, so you're a
werelion
. I'm supposed to believe this because…"

Damn, the woman was stubborn. If she wouldn't take his word for it, then he would have to show her. Unbuckling his belt, he shimmied out of his pants.

"Whoa, again with the undressing. Is there a reason you keep stripping in front of me?"

"I like these pants, and as far as I can tell, you don't have anything my size to change into if they get shredded. Move back."

Riley took two quick steps back until her legs touched the edge of the bed. The mattress squeaked as she sat down.

When he started to remove his boxer briefs, her cheeks turned a deep scarlet and she looked away.

"You ready for this?"

Her eyes averted, she mumbled something incoherent.

Hoping he wasn't about to make the biggest mistake of his life, he shifted.