Foxy on the Run: Book One, Supernatural Bounty Hunters Novellas (5 page)

The tourist’s eyes went wide and giving Jackson a fearful look she screamed and ran out of the bathroom screaming ‘police’ over and over.
He roared and roughly pulled Carly to her feet, dragging her behind him he made for the door only to collide with two very big, very burly security guards.
A bull and a bear.

“Help me!” Whined Carly.

The bull gave him an alarming smile. “Let go of the girl.” He rumbled, secretly hoping Jackson wouldn’t.

Luckily for the bull Jackson didn’t take orders very well.
He clutched her arm more tightly. “She’s with me, I gotta take her...”

Carly interrupted him.
“He said he was taking me back to his compound to become wife number seven! He said my new name would be Sunday and that I was going to give birth to his pups!” She screeched.
Watching TV really did pay off, if she didn’t watch so many cop shows she’d never have come up with that on her own.

The bear started waving a baton with wild abandon. “Attempted kidnapping eh? Maybe we ought to teach you a lesson.”

Jackson and his wolf were now snarling. There wasn’t much point in arguing, not that Jackson would have, these guys were angling for a fight and it was going to happen no matter what. These were the guys who were too brutal to make it into the police force, so instead they took their violent natures out on pickpockets and drug pushers who hang around the bus station.

Jackson grunted at the bear.
“Fuck you! I’d like to see you try wide load.”

The bear roared in fury and lunged at him. Jackson pushed Carly out of
harm’s way and went down under the weight of the huge bear. They rolled around the ground wrestling. The bear was a lousy fighter, preferring to rely on size and strength. Luckily Jackson was a good fighter.
He had to be, growing up in his pack
.

The bear flailed around trying to get Jackson in a head lock but
the wolf was too fast. Jackson gave him a few short punches to the kidneys before slamming his knee into the bear’s stomach. The bull edged around them keen to get into the fray but worried about hurting his partner.

Finally at seeing the bear coming down on the losing side of the fight he
rammed a taser toward them. Jackson dodged it and instead the taser made contact with the bear. The bull’s eyes went wide as his friend juddered and drooled.

“Jesus! Shit! Christ!”
Yelled the bull dropping the taser.
It was the first time he’d used it; it was brand new out of the box that day!

Furious the bull threw himself over the other two men
; they were a tangle of arms and legs twisting together. A third security guard ran in and groaning began trying to pull them apart.

Carly cast
Jackson a look of regret before grabbing her backpack and slinking out of the bathroom. She hurried through the bus station to the exit, keeping her head down. Thanks to him she’d missed her bus, and now he would be looking for her at all the bus stations. Damnit
how had he found her so easily?
Still, he wasn’t exactly having a good time of it right now...

She felt bad, really she did.
She didn’t actually want Jackson to get beat up, but her life was at stake here! Her beast yowled in fury at her as she quickly made her way back to the motel.
Maybe one day she could find a way to make it up to him...

Chapter Six

Jackson scowled as the bear and bull smirked at him. Two hours they’d been holding him.
Two long fucking hours.
God only knows where Carly was by now!

The security guards quickly turned their expressions blank
, to match their brains thought Jackson nastily, when their boss entered the room. Jackson was being held in their generously named ‘control room’. It was a dingy windowless room with a few flickering monitors, some fold up chairs and a mini fridge.

Their boss
Aaron was significantly smaller than the two monsters in his employ but they were terrified of him nonetheless, and rightly so.
He was a witch.
Luckily one who belonged to the same circle as Alma otherwise things could have been a lot worse.

Jackson had been beating the two monsters when he had noticed Carly slinking away. Man and wolf were enraged that she was getting away again and he
was distracted. It was then that the witch blasted him with a spell and knocked him out.

The wolf was whining about losing Carly again.
Jackson was just mad as hell
.

If he wasn’t so mad he would actually laugh. She was a lot more slippery and had a lot more ingenuity than he gave her credit for.
Either that or he really was just a lot dumber than he realized.
In his defense ever since he met her there really had been insufficient blood in his head,
it had migrated south and seemed to be there to stay...

When he came to he had found himself handcuf
fed to the radiator waiting Aaron’s decision on what to do with him. He had found Jackson’s bounty hunter license and decided that he must be telling the truth. That being said Aaron was still pretty pissed about the fight.

In the end Aaron
had called Alma. As she strolled into the laughable control room the bear and the bull, taking in her long legs and taut body, both straightened up and tried to look intelligent.
Waste of time in their cases.

Alma
ignored them disdainfully, which made them want her even more. Alma had that effect on boorish men. She gave Jackson a look of displeasure before snapping her fingers, the handcuffs snapped off. The bull and the bear jumped before looking at her in adoring awe. Jackson rolled his eyes;
he wasn’t impressed by Alma’s parlor tricks
.

She held up her car keys jangling them as if he were a baby. “Go and sit in my car
, don’t touch anything, don’t try and take the car, just sit there. Do you think you can manage that?”

“My truck...” He growled.

Alma gave him a patronizing glance. “Has been towed because you parked in a loading bay.”

In irritation
he snatched the keys and stomped out. “See you soon wide load.” He spat out as he left, the bellows and roars following him.

When he got to Alma’s P
epto Bismol pink jeep he surveyed the damage in the mirror. All just superficial, a few cuts, a few bruises, two black eyes, he’d heal soon enough. Not that it mattered; even two broken legs wouldn’t keep him from chasing that devious little fox. When he found her there would be no more tears, no more flirting, no more of his damn wolf whining over her, she was going straight to jail.
End of story!

Alma
calmly got in the car and breathed deeply. She glowered at him. “You owe me for that.”

“It wasn’t my fault...” Jackson
protested loudly.

Her eyes flashed bright green in warning. “You made me look like a complete idiot in fro
nt of a member of my circle!”

“Those two fucking ogres just attacked me!” He roared as his teeth and claws lengthened, his wolf pushing forward.

“The only way I could get Aaron to promise not to press charges was to agree to go on a date with him!” She spat.

Jackson stopped short.
“Seriously?” He asked incredulously. He didn’t know what was more mindboggling, the mild mannered looking Aaron blackmailing Alma into dating him or Alma actually agreeing to it to save Jackson’s butt.

“Just remember, you owe me. Hugely! One day I will ask you for a
favor, you won’t see it coming, you won’t like it, but you will do it. No. Matter. What.” She gave him a soul piercing look.

“
Seriously?
”

Alma
sniffed and started the engine quickly pulling out into traffic which miraculously parted for her.

“I take it this whole incident was caused by the fox shifter.”

Jackson grunted unintelligibly as he stared out of the window moodily. She cackled spitefully.
Wicked witch
.

“
Well you need to buck up your game, work is piling in and Marcus is pissed that you haven’t already found her. Her bond was not cheap and he wants her in police custody by the end of tomorrow at the latest. Or else.”

“Or else what?!” Demanded Jackson crossly, not liking
her domineering tone at all.
Yep, he definitely had a problem with authority.

Alma’s thin lips curled as she cut in front of a Driver’s Ed car.
“Or else my fluffy little puppy Marcus wants me to give the skip to someone else.”

Maybe it wouldn’t be a bad
idea for Logan to take the case, or one of the other hunters like Adam or Zara would also be... acceptable.
Apparently Jackson wasn’t bringing his A-game
. But the idea of any man or woman chasing his little fox sent his wolf wild. Jackson fidgeted uncomfortably at the thoughts racing through his head. No, he had to find her, no one else was allowed to touch her.
No one!

“So unless you want Viktor taking your skip...”

Jackson and his wolf snarled. No way in hell was that fucking vampire taking one of his skips! No way was he going to allow that corpse anywhere near his beautiful fox! She’d probably turn up at the cop station minus two pints of blood...
if she turned up alive at all
.

Viktor only took on cases now and again
. He didn’t need to work, after a couple of centuries he had amassed a decent amount of cash. He chose to take on skips now and again for fun. Employing Viktor had its benefits, he was a lot faster and stronger than shifters and witches but he did have a little trouble with sunlight.
Why he chose to live in California was a complete mystery
. And he wasn’t exactly a people person,
more of a rip into people’s throats and ask questions never
.

Jackson hated him.
To a massive degree
. Ever since Viktor swooped in and sniped one of his skips three years ago when Jackson first started working at Blau’s. Jackson almost had the witch cornered; there was no reason for Viktor to steal the job from him, just because the witch was trying to turn him into a toad... Jackson could handle it!

It certainly explained why Alma was so keen to help him. She had briefly dated Viktor and it had apparently ended quite badly.
Viktor was just lucky to still have his boy parts
.

“Well? Do you wan
t Viktor to take your skip?” Alma asked impatiently.

“Fuck no!” Jackson
roared.

She nodded in
approval. She wanted him to be at the emotional level she was at that moment.
Fucking pissed.

“And you’re going to find her right? And have her trussed and delivered to the cops by the end of tomorrow right?”

Ice cold doubt flowed through him. He was sure he could find her, getting her to the cops was another thing though. “Ugh... well I’ll do my best.”

Alma flashed him a look of fury
, her eyes glowing and her face thunderous.
Alma could be truly terrifying when she wanted
. “Goddess give me strength! She’s a fat little fox who probably boinked her boss to death, she’s not an evil genius, she’s not a career criminal, she’s a fucking receptionist! How hard can it be?!”

Jackson roared as his eyes flashed to amber.
“I’ll find her!” His wolf was fuming at the thought of Carly with another man. Damn right he’d find her, and then he’d make sure she hadn’t been sleeping with her boss. And if she had, well...
then it was lucky for him he was already dead! Sort of...

“Good.” Alma’s countenance returned back to her normal pretty
, serene looking face.

She pulled over;
Jackson looked round blinking away the red mist of anger. “Wha...”

She gave him another
patronizing look and sighed. “We’re at the impound lot dummy. Go get your truck and as a little favor to help you along I found out that the fox’s car is also here. It was picked up this morning on Shelley Street.”

“Really?” His wolf stirred, Shelley Street wasn’t in the best
neighborhood but it was adjacent to a number of cheap, sleazy motels.
Which was a good place to start looking
.

Alma tapped her nails against the steering wheel.
“Don’t let me down wolfboy, I refuse to listen to that asshole walking corpse gloating that we can’t run the agency without his help. I’d rather kill us all!”

Fuck that must have been one bad break up
. He hoped she was kidding.
Damn she really could be terrifying.

Alma
made a shooing motion with her hand and he got out her jeep. “No go on boy, go get her! Good boy!”

She drove off hooting with laughter. He barely noticed, too preoccupied with thoughts of the tricky little fox.
With any luck she’d be too afraid of trying to catch a bus again, and if she had any sense at all she wouldn’t even bother with the train station or airport.
Far too many cameras
.

Hopefully she’d just hunker down in a seedy motel.
He’d find her. Then he’d tie her up and throw her over his shoulder. The wolf got very excited,
and then they would take her back to his place and ravish her senseless
. No! Then they would take her to the cops to get her rebonded... if possible.
Then they would ravish her senseless.

Easy peasy
.