Freakn' Cougar (6 page)

“I’m working on it,” Stu admitted. “I’m sure something will come to me.”

Ricky sighed. “Much as I hate to admit it, his methods, while crude, are perfect for keeping our cover.”

“Perfect if he gets a chance to actually search, otherwise he’s putting himself, and you, in jeopardy for nothing.” And for some reason she cared about that. She didn’t want to see Stu, or Ricky for that matter, injured.

“Puppy’s got more
cojones
than I would have given him credit for. As for getting rid of the warden for a few minutes, I got that covered. Just be sure when you handcuff the puppy to the chair that you don’t do so for real. I’ll take care of the rest.”

They hit the infirmary, the smell of antiseptic strong and unpleasant to those with strong olfactory senses. Patricia stood guard while the nurse, a plain-featured woman in her thirties, swabbed and cleaned the minor abrasions and declared them not in need of observation.

Thick skulls like theirs probably rarely got concussions. Patricia almost snickered at the thought. Alone again as she led them to the warden, this time the pair of them walked on their two feet, arms shackled behind their backs with cuffs. She prodded them for intel.

“Anything to report?”

Ricky, his voice a low rumble that vibrated through her whole body, spoke first. “There are two other shifters in this place. The longest running going on eleven years, the newest less than six months. I’ve managed to more or less talk to them, without letting on what was going on. I got nothing.”

“How do you ask them if they know of a psycho killer wandering around offing shifters without straight up asking?” Stu wondered aloud, which kind of mirrored Patricia’s thoughts.

“Played the newbie card, asking if any of the guards or staff knew what we were and how they kept it a secret. Especially on full moons when the pull to change is strongest.”

Anyone who morphed where humans could see was inviting instant discipline, usually of the fatal kind, from the shifter council. It also resulted in the humans getting subjected to a mind-altering drug to make them forget what they’d seen. The drugs weren’t something anyone liked to use given the side effects were rather unpleasant for the humans involved. Not to mention there was always the fear the drug wouldn’t work and they’d have to kill an innocent.

“That is a good question. What do they do? I don’t know if I can go a few weeks without shifting, let alone months or years like some of those guys.” Stu made a face, and again, Patricia found her thoughts in line with Stu’s. The mating bond looking for common ground or coincidence?

“Don’t forget, the cells are dark at night. It’s possible to let your beast out for a stretch between guard check-ins if you’re careful and quiet. Also, there is someone on staff called David, a shifter like us, who apparently does his best to give us turns down in some basement area to stretch our legs and exercise our wilder side.”

“And the inmates don’t take advantage of this and try to escape?”

“Have you seen David?” Ricky tossed Patricia a look. She shook her head. “He makes me look small.”

Given Ricky’s tremendous height and size, “Holy crap!” was her only reply.

They fell silent after that as they entered an area with more human traffic. As they broached the last locked set of doors, Patricia whispered, “We’re almost at the warden’s. What’s the plan to give Stu some time to snoop his computer?”

“Follow my lead,
bebé
. And do what I said.”

With no better plan, and the opportunity to get started on their search imminent, she did as Ricky asked. When she showed the two men into the warden’s office, she pretended to handcuff Stu to the metal-backed chair bolted to the floor, but before she could take care of Ricky, he lunged across the wide desk and head-butted the warden.

“I won’t go to solitary,” he yelled. “A man has a right to protect himself.”
Smack
. “And I demand better food!”

In between shouted demands and cries he was not at fault, Ricky banged his face against the warden’s, enough times to leave the man with a bloody lip and nose. Patricia hauled Ricky off the sputtering bureaucrat.

“Filthy savage,” spat the warden. “Take him to solitary while I deal with his accomplice.”

That wouldn’t do at all. Patricia thought fast. “But your face, sir. You really should get that taken care of first. At least some ice to prevent swelling, or you’ll have a wicked bruise later. This miscreant isn’t going anywhere,” she pointed out.

Dabbing at his fattening lip with a tissue, the warden turned a few entertaining shades of green. “Good idea. I’ll be back to mete out your punishment,” the warden promised, leaving the office with a stagger.

Frogmarching Ricky, Patricia hissed over her shoulder, “Don’t get caught.”

Somehow she was less than reassured by Stu’s ebullient, “Who me?”

Finally, a moment alone with his cougar. Of course, Ricky would have wished for a more romantic one where she wasn’t shoving him down a hall with his hands pulled taut behind his back in tightly placed cuffs, but then again, he did enjoy the fact the woman fate had chosen for him wasn’t some simpering wimp. He admired a woman with courage and character.

“We never were properly introduced,” he stated. “My name is Ricky—”

“I know who you are. I’ve read the file.”

And didn’t sound too impressed. “Yeah. I was a bit wild in my youth.”

“A bit?”

“I learned my lesson.”

“You now run an outreach program to redirect teens and young adults away from gangs and into more mainstream activities. I know. Like I said, I read the file.”

“It’s the least I can do, given the damage I caused before I learned any better.” It had taken him years to realize growing up in poverty without a father and a mother who worked three jobs did not give him license to steal, hurt people, and basically act like a jackass. Jail time, a beating by thugs who showed him he wasn’t the toughest shit around, and the fatigue, not to mention disappointment in his mother’s eyes, weren’t the only things that helped him turn his life around. He realized he needed to stop making excuses and to clean up his act the first time the cops dragged his brother home, stoned out of his mind with pending charges for assault on a senior. His brother had attacked an old lady for her wallet so he could buy drugs and saw nothing wrong with it.

Ricky laid into him. “What is wrong with you, robbing old ladies for their pension checks?”

“What’s the big deal?” his brother sneered. “You steal.”

He wanted to retort he did it from people who deserved it, but the words stuck in his throat. Who made him the judge of who earned their pay check? Who gave him the right to use his strength against those weaker than him? And how could he have set such a poor example for the kid brother he’d helped raise?

“No more.” Two simple words, yet he’d meant them. From that day forth, he turned over a new leaf. Ricky got a job, a shitty one washing dishes, and he began volunteering at the local outreach program. He went back to school, taking community classes to get his high school degree, and then he went on to get one in social services and sociology so he could better help and understand how to handle the kids he wanted to aid.

More than twelve years since his vow, he now split his time between his day job as a construction worker and that of a volunteer for a youth group aimed at keeping kids out of gangs.

It was hard, stressful at times, especially when dealing with some hard cases whose stories could bring a tear to even the most hardened, but he wouldn’t give it up. He just wished he could have changed his path earlier in life in time to save Joey.

But Joey had chosen another path. One that led to his untimely demise.

“What you did back in the warden’s office,” Patricia spoke, and he snapped back to the present. “While I appreciate that you did it to give Stu a chance to go snooping, you do realize being in solitary not only puts Stu at risk without you to protect him but leaves you vulnerable to the possible attacker. Not to mention, out of the loop for intel gathering.”

“I won’t be in there for long. The warden’s secretary likes me. She makes sure I don’t spend more than a day or so in there.”

“Likes you? Making
friends,
are we?” was her acerbic reply. Ricky almost grinned at the jealousy his cougar couldn’t hide. So he wasn’t alone in sensing the bond.

Good. It would make the next part easy. “Sheath your claws,
bebé
. She’s married to my second cousin. She’s going to be the one who makes sure Stu gets assigned to the library for his work detail and who will give him some passcodes to cut down his hacking time.”

“First off, we’re alone now, so you can drop the corny nickname. And second, this would have been useful to know before your whole attack on the warden. Had I known that, I would have never agreed to your half-assed plan.”

“You wound me,
bebé
. I think that went off perfectly. The young wolf is getting a peek at our dear warden’s machine, and even better, you and I get some alone time.”

“Why would we need alone time?”

Play dumb, would she?” Handcuffed or not, Ricky didn’t hesitate to act, whipping his body around and using his size to press her up against the corridor wall out of sight of people and away from the prying gaze of surveillance cameras.

Startled, she couldn’t help a gasp as her blue eyes met his. “What are you doing?”

“What I’ve thought of since we first set eyes on each other,” he murmured, dipping his head and stealing a kiss.

A jolt of rightness, along with a tidal wave of pure lust, ripped through him. If he’d harbored any doubts, they got washed away in the rightness of the moment.

Her lips softened under his, parted even, for the thrust of his tongue. Despite his tethered hands, he managed to grind his lower parts against her. He knew she felt the hardness of his cock, smelled her erotic interest, her desire moistening her pussy and scenting the air with sweet pheromones. He growled at his inability to take things further.

“Undo my hands,” he demanded in between nibbles of her lower lip.

“No.”

She denied him even as she kissed him back with just as much fervor.

“I need to touch you. Claim you. Fuck you until you scream my name.” He heard her breathing stutter at his words. He waited for her to comply, to release him so he could sink into her glorious heat and mark her as his.

She shoved him away, and he turned to give her his back so she could unlock his manacles.

Instead, she shoved her baton in his back and nudged him forward. “Move,” she snapped.

“Looking for somewhere more private? Good plan. We wouldn’t want to cause a scandal.”

Reaching the solitary wing, she fumbled with the key in the lock for the door, but Ricky didn’t laugh. Pride filled him at how his kiss affected her. It affected him too. It made him rage with hunger and lust and … disbelief.

She no sooner released him from his cuffs than the door slammed shut behind him, leaving him alone.

Alone? What happened to the plan to fuck until she screamed his name?

He pounded on the door. “Open this door.”

She slid open the viewing slot at the top instead. Her steady blue gaze met his. “No.”

“What do you mean no? I thought the plan was to finish what we started.”

“You mean what you started. I realize you’re chafing at the lack of female companionship, but I wasn’t placed on this job so you could have someone handy to screw.”

Say what? He couldn’t help the arch of his brow. “Excuse me? Is that why you think I kissed you?”

“You kissed me because you were horny.”

“I’d like to point out that you didn’t stop me and kissed me back.”

“You took me by surprise. It won’t happen again.”

Wouldn’t happen again? Like hell. “Oh, yes, it will
bebé
. You can’t stop what’s happening between us.”

“There is no us.”

“I don’t know why you’re pretending when we both know we’re mates, or will be once we complete the bond.” Not a man to mince words, he stated it starkly.

Still she tried to deny it. “Impossible.”

“What do you mean impossible? I might never have caught the mating fever before, but I’ve heard enough about it to know what I feel. You and I are meant for each other.”

“And I say bullshit.”

The vulgar word coming from her lips took nothing away from her femininity. On the contrary, he reveled in her tough side. He just wished she wouldn’t use it against him.

“I can understand how you might find this all very confusing. Trust me, I was just as shocked as you when I realized it. But you can’t fight destiny.”

“You can when it’s wrong. You’re not my mate.”

“How can you say that with such certainty?”

“Because I was mated before to a man I loved dearly. A mate who died. So you see, what you feel, what I feel, cannot be real. It just isn’t possible.”

With that final shocking claim, she slammed the viewing window shut. Not that it mattered. Rattled to his core, Ricky sat down hard on his pallet, mulling the disturbing news.

Not his mate? Absurd. The awareness, the insistence from his inner beast, the way his heart raced, how his cock reacted, the fact his whole soul vibrated when she got near screamed otherwise.

How could he be wrong? But, then again, if she’d already had a mate, then how could this be?

Perhaps fate has taken pity on my cougar and given her a second chance.
Just because they’d never heard of it didn’t mean it didn’t happen. How to convince her though?

The swollen tingle of his lips, a remnant and reminder of her passionate reply, was his first clue.

She can deny it all she wants. She’ll have to give in eventually. The fever has started.
Just like a forest fire ignited in a dry forest, their need for each other would burn and consume them until they had no choice but give in to the lust. The passion. He just needed to stroke—and caress—his cougar’s passion. Hunger would do the rest.

Poor Stu found nothing on the warden’s computer unless the man’s fetish for collecting Betty Boop memorabilia counted. Considering the male in question had run this particular establishment for the last five years and shown no indication of having traveled outside the province in all that time kind of struck him off the list of suspects. Which meant he now needed to turn his attention to everyone else on staff.