Authors: Coreene Callahan
There were so many. Young girls. Teenagers. But it was the ones in their late teens to midtwenties she concentrated on.
According to Rikar, a female didn’t come into her energy until then, so no use wasting time on those the Razorbacks wouldn’t go after. Or try to enslave. Angela grimaced. Nasty rogue bastards. They’d imprisoned two she knew about and tried to do the same to her. How many more had they kidnapped in the last week and a half?
Lifting the M25, she set the rifle down on the end of the tabletop—gently…Daimler would kick her ass if she scratched the glossy surface—and reached for the twin folders. Just as her hand closed around them, movement flashed in her periphery.
She glanced toward the archway into the kitchen. Daimler came roaring into the dining room, a plate piled high with cookies, eyes sparkling, a big grin on his face. Mac was right on his heels, trying to reach over the Numbai’s shoulder. The butler dodged the attempt, holding the plate out of reach.
“Hey, man…come on,” her partner said, the whine in his voice unmistakable. “Gimme some of those.”
“These are for my lady,” Daimler said, thwarting another of Mac’s sneak attack attempts. Angela bit down on a smile as she watched the pair, trying to wrap her brain around the
my lady
. Jeez, talk about prim and proper. The Numbai needed to move into the twenty-first century. “You may have some after she has taken her fill.”
Mac looked at her over the butler’s head, and she got hit with big puppy-dog eyes, the please-please-please unmistakable. She huffed, amusement spreading like a disease. Torture by way of cookie. How fun.
“Thanks, Daimler,” she said, denying him her treat.
Mac grumbled, giving her a dirty look.
She grinned at her partner. “You help me with the MP reports, and I’ll give you some of my cookies.”
“Extortionist.”
“You know it.”
“My lady!” Daimler’s high squeak brought her head around. Oh, crap. He’d noticed the M25. Pursing his lips, he gave her a stern look. “No guns on the dining room table.”
“Sorry.” Ditching the folders on the table, Angela scrambled for her rifle. She heard Mac chuckle as she scooped it off the tabletop. She glared at her partner, then turned apologetic eyes on Daimler. “Won’t happen again.”
His brows raised, the Numbai gave her a pointed look.
She crossed her heart. “Promise.”
The butler stared a second longer, then nodded, and set the plate down next to her stack of reports. His eyes back to twinkling, he tipped his head in Mac’s direction. “Don’t let him eat them all, my lady. They’re your favorite, after all.”
Yes, they were. Peanut butter chocolate chip, heavy on the chocolate. And oh, boy, did they smell good—like Saturday afternoons and snacks at the skating rink.
With a murmured “okay,” Angela set her gun in the black case beside the door and returned to the table. She grabbed a cookie, dug in, and…oh, wow. That was unbelievable. So good she hummed and took another bite. The second mouthful was even better than the first. She moaned in delight, playing it up for Mac.
He growled.
Her lips twitched, and mouth full, asked, “Anything new?”
“Other than the torture factor in here?” Almost drooling, he watched her chew. “Nothing’s come up yet.”
Angela waved her hand at the plate. Mac jumped at the invitation, swiping three PB and chocolates off the plate. As he shoved them into his piehole, her attention strayed back to the folders Sloan had brought her. Brushing the crumbs off her fingers, she flipped the first one open and scanned the contents. Name. Personal info—height, weight, eye and hair color. Address. Phone number and—
Angela frowned. Wait a second. Back up a step. She recognized that address. She’d seen it in another file.
“Hey, Mac?”
“Whatcha got?”
She shook her head and reached for the stack filed under
possibles
. “Don’t know…I’m just…”
Bingo. The one she was looking for. Tagged with a red sticker, the folder contained two MP reports. Roommates at Seattle U, the pair of twenty-year-olds had gone missing the same night. She flipped the report open and—
“Holy shit.” Her gaze bounced back and forth, confirming what she already knew.
“Tell me.”
“These two girls went missing sixteen days ago.” Holding up the two-week-old report, she bounced it in her hand. The newer file grasped in the other, she said, “This one? Two days ago. All three are roommates…they lived together. And they fit the profile…same victimology.”
“Jesus. It isn’t random.”
“Not even a little.” Open on the folds, she set the two folders aside and cracked the other one Sloan had brought. “Bingo. Proof positive.”
Mac glanced over her shoulder. “Motherfuck…twins.”
“The rat-bastard’s cherry-picking,” she said. “Hunting females that are related or are good friends.”
“Not a coincidence.”
“Nope. Are high-energy females attracted to one another?”
Mac raised a brow, his expression full of speculated interest. The kind that had nothing to do with being a cop and everything to do with being a guy.
She whacked him with the folder. “Not that kind of attracted, you big dope.”
“A guy can dream.”
“Oh, shut up,” she said. “I need to talk to Rikar. See what he knows about this.”
Mac might have murmured, but Angela didn’t hear him. Folders tucked under one arm, she was already moving, her focus absolute. Rikar. She needed to see him. If what she suspected was true—that the Meridian drew high-energy females together—the investigation into the missing women had just gone from shaky to rock-solid. With that information, Angela knew she could track them. Make connections. Find other women that might be targeted by the Razorbacks and thrown into their awful breeding center.
Wicked good intel. The kind that cracked a case wide open.
Although, to be honest, the break in the investigation wasn’t the only reason she pointed her boots toward the underground lair. Angela wanted to share more with Rikar than just information. Tonight was a muck-hole in the making. A potential mess that had death written all over it, and Angela refused to waste a second. She needed to make love to him again before night fell. Before the Nightfuries weaponed up and headed out to set the trap. It might be her last chance to hold him.
Angela picked up the pace. The work of minutes, and she stepped inside the Otis. She suppressed a full-body shiver. Elevators weren’t her favorite things anymore, not after taking a trip in one at the Razorback lair.
She hit the down button anyway. The doors closed, and she was on her way, headed into the depths of Black Diamond. Huge with a network of interconnected tunnels beneath the main house, the underground lair was pretty darned cool, fascinating in every way but one. The sucker was difficult to navigate. Especially when you didn’t know the layout. Not a problem for her, though. With her Rikar radar up and running, she knew exactly where to find him.
The gym.
Impatient to reach him, she shuffled her feet, scuffing the elevator floor with her boots, waiting for the stupid thing to open. Thirty seconds later, and instant freedom as doors slid to the side, dumping her onto the corridor. To the right lay the clinic. To the left? Her man. She could hear him now, his voice bouncing down the hallway as he yakked it up with another guy.
She jogged the last few feet, making a beeline for the gym. She crossed the threshold, getting an eyeful of high-tech cardio equipment, weight machines, and—
Holy crap.
Dragons.
Three of them. Horned heads nearly touching the high ceiling.
Angela stopped short, felt her eyes go wide as she got a load of the kick-ass trifecta. Rikar, she recognized. Almost pure white with gold-and-blue-tipped scales, his razor-sharp talons were curled around a vertical post in the shape of a cross. With a steady stroke, he drew one claw across the horizontal part of the contraption—a sharpening blade maybe? A horrendous sound echoed, like nails on a chalkboard.
She wanted to cringe, press her hands over her ears, and shriek along with the awful noise. And she would’ve if she’d been able to look away. No chance of that. She was too busy staring, being completely mesmerized.
Most women would’ve been scared brainless. Not her. Fear wasn’t her usual MO. Curiosity had always been her poison pill, sending her into investigation mode. As she compared each dragon, cataloging their differences, she took note of their mannerisms, enjoying the show, and…man, oh man. Rikar was beautiful in dragon form.
She remembered seeing him on the beach the night he’d come after her, but nothing came close to watching him now, when she wasn’t in pain and filled with terror. Gorgeous. No other word matched up to that one…or him.
No sloppy seconds, his companions were equally as eye-catching.
A midnight-blue dragon sat beside a second post. One paw raised, green eyes narrowed on his talons, he inspected each digit as though checking his handiwork, making sure his claws were sharp enough. The third was jet-black with amber-tipped scales and a golden gaze. Wick. It had to be. None of the other guys had eyes that color.
The first to notice her standing on the threshold, Wick snorted at her, smoke rings rising from his nostrils. As far as greetings went, it lacked a certain…umm, something. Angela didn’t care. She choose to spin it her way, took it as a hello and said, “Hey, Wick. Got ’em sharp enough yet?”
Wick’s lip curled off his fangs. A smile? Kind of, so she grinned back. He shook his head and thumped Rikar with the side of his tail.
Rikar looked up from his sharpening operation. The second he saw her, he purred long and low. “Angela.”
The deep-throated hum made her tingle all over. Oh, the anticipation. She L-O-V-E-D that tone, enjoyed the erotic pitch and rumble. Why? Every time he used it she ended up on her back. Not necessarily in his bed, either. So, yeah. The gym was fair game in the lovemaking department.
First things first, though. Privacy. She needed to get rid of the other Nightfuries.
Except Bastian and Wick handled that all by themselves. Shifting into human form, leather fighting gear in place, the pair strode toward the door. And her. Angela hightailed it out of their way, taking refuge beside a rack of free weights. Wick passed first, and naturally, snarled at her. She growled back. He blinked and tossed a load of WTF over his shoulder at Bastian. The Nightfury commander shrugged and, lips twitching, paused on the threshold.
He tipped his chin in his XO’s direction. “Meeting’s in an hour.”
Rikar nodded, iridescent scales shimmering in the low light.
Glancing away from his friend, Bastian nailed her with a no-nonsense glare. He held up his index finger, shook it at her. “One hour, Angela. You keep him beyond that? I’m coming down here to drag your ass up to the kitchen, and believe me when I say you wouldn’t like it.”
Rikar snorted, his amusement barely contained.
Her eyes narrowed on Bastian as she met his gaze head-on. Flipping guys…blaming her for the nympho circus over the last week as though she’d been the one doing the
keeping
. Jeez, Rikar had been insatiable. Way out of control in the do-me-now sex arena. Thank God.
Bastian’s eyes twinkled as he scowled at her. “Got it?”
“Got it,” she repeated, wanting him gone a minute ago.
The second Bastian turned his back and skedaddled, boot heels ringing in the quiet, Rikar wrapped his arms around her from behind. The folders hit the floor mats in a messy sprawl. Angela ignored them. The paperwork could wait. There would be time to tell him about her high-energy theory later. When she wasn’t enveloped by his scent, cocooned in his strength, and surrounded by an oh-my-God gorgeous male. ’Cause…oh, yeah. He’d pulled her favorite trick. The naked one in which he came to her wearing nothing but skin.
With a hum, Angela glanced over her shoulder and met his gaze. “Kiss me.”
“Bossy female.” Desire made his eyes glow as he dipped his head and did as he was told.
She sighed, accepting his taste as he delved in, mating their tongues. No preamble. No messing around. Nothing polite or nice about it. Just deep, intense, and fast…exactly how she liked it: him all over her. Deep in her mouth, he went to work, unbuttoning her BDUs, splitting the fly wide to slide beneath the waistband. His callused palm caressed her belly, then headed south, brushing over hypersensitive skin.
“Hmm, yeah…just like that,” she gasped against his mouth. Locked in her embrace, he raised his head, his gaze on her face as he sank into her curls and stroked deep. Pleasure rushed through her, streaming into her veins like a drug. “Rikar…”
“Christ, love…so wet already.” Showing no mercy, he amped her up, pushing the pants down her thighs while his fingers circled, the rhythm diabolical. And just like that, she rode the edge of orgasm, panting, gasping, begging for him without words. “Want me, do you?”
“Yes.”
“My way this time.”
Angela’s breath hitched.
His way
. God, he’d been trying to take her like that all week. She’d shied every time: afraid, not ready, beyond freaked out by the idea.
“Let me, angel,” he murmured, his breath hot against her ear. His hands stilled as he nuzzled the side of her throat. “Trust me, love. Let me love you that way.”
From behind. He wanted to—
A tremor rolled through her. “Rikar, I—”
“Please?”
Unzipping her jacket, he slipped his hand beneath her T-shirt, stroking gently as he drifted over her rib cage. The cotton snagged on his forearm, and cool air washed over her. Angela quivered. He growled and cupped her breast, burrowing beneath her bra to hold her in his palm. As she arched, he pressed in, molding his chest to her back, thumbed her nipple, and then plucked with delicious deliberation. Surrounded by him, his hands on her skin, his body hard against her, Angela shifted in his arms, uncertainty battling desperate need.
“It won’t hurt.” He kissed the side of her neck, sucked gently as he rotated his fingers against the top of her sex. As the stroke and withdrawal started up again, Angela moaned and pressed back, trying to get closer. He rolled his hips against her, the curl and release keeping time with his fingers. “Let me show you, Angela. You’ll like it with me. I’ll make it good for you.”