Beast Denied (11 page)

“You’ve done nothing wrong,” Caleb said sharply, then, with a pointed look at Tynan, said, “Nobody has. This hacking attempt was aimed at the community in general, not specifically at us. But let’s backtrack a minute, make sure we cover those bases. This specialist, the one who asked you about the placement. How long have you known him?”

“Years. I trained under him at one stage. He’s a well-respected member of the North London pack. A first born. He was a medic, badly injured during Desert Storm.” She cast a glance at Tynan, who watched her closely. “When he recovered, he decided to specialize in conflict trauma.”

“I’ll check him out,” Nathan said. “Let me have his details.”

Naomi didn’t much like squealing on colleagues, but she supposed it was necessary. Protection of her pack was paramount, even if it meant investigating members from other clans.

Caleb turned to Tynan. “I agree with your decision to start routine overhauls for any security systems involving pack interests. Until we know for sure we’re not being targeted, we don’t take any chances.”

Tynan nodded. “Got it.”

“Where are they now?” Naomi asked, trying to temper the queasy feeling in her stomach. “Stoltz and Hortner.”

“Uncertain.” Tynan leaned forward and clasped his hands between his knees. “Nothing popped when I checked hospital treatment for facial injuries, but I’ve got a lock on their spending. Using their cards in Truro, mostly, and taking out large sums of cash. No online activity.”

“It’s almost like they already know you’re on to them.” Talia said and smiled. “That makes me feel a lot better. Okay.” She stood. “Supper should be ready to serve up about now. I hope everyone’s hungry.”

Naomi didn’t think she could eat a thing, but once the meal was served up, her stomach began rumbling in appreciation. Yet the moment she tried to swallow, her throat closed up. Guilt swam around the edge of her thoughts and, despite Caleb’s reassurance, she couldn’t shake the feeling that she had brought this on the pack. Surreptitiously, she pushed slices of roast lamb around her plate.

“Is everything okay?” Talia asked, her eyes wide with concern. She wasn’t known for her culinary skills, and Naomi’s lack of interest had obviously worried her.

“No, it’s lovely, really.”

The men mumbled in agreement, each of them tucking into their meals.

Determined not to insult her friend, Naomi made herself eat. She ate small mouthfuls of vegetables and cut potatoes into tiny pieces.

“Not hungry?”

She glanced up at Tynan, seated next to her. “I’m trying to think back on everything I said to them that night. Whether I might have made things worse in some way, apart from pushing Stoltz across the room.”

Tynan’s smile was placating. “We don’t know what’s going on yet.”

“Those men interacting with me? Trying to hack into the hotel, the hospital? Two and two make four, don’t they?”

“Seth called me in before you even met those assholes.”

While she appreciated Tynan’s support, it didn’t entirely allay her concerns. “It seems strange that this happens right after I take on a medical student.” Thankfully, the others were engaged in conversation, so she leaned in. “Maybe those men followed me to Seth’s hotel. Maybe they invited me to join them because they wanted to find out more about the pack.”

“That’s a lot of maybes. And they were at the hotel before you arrived, right? Plus, they didn’t ask you any pertinent questions about us.”

She looked down at her plate, speared a piece of lamb and pushed it around in the gravy. “But they were asking about me. Trying to find out who
I
am. Why would they do that if I’m not central to this?”

“It’s more than likely you are.”

Caleb’s voice boomed across the table, and Tynan almost launched to his feet. “Shit, Cal. I thought we said…”

“She’s a right to know what you’ve found out. I was wrong agreeing to keep it quiet.”

Naomi glanced from one man to the other, the looks on their faces adding to her escalating sense of foreboding.

“We’ve decided it’s best that you’re not on your own right now.” Nathan sat back and folded his arms. “You need to have one of us around at all times.”

Naomi started to respond, but the clatter of Talia’s fork hitting her plate brought her up short.

“You think they might harm Naomi?” Talia demanded, her eyes meeting Caleb’s.

“They’ve been asking around. Trying to find out who she is.”

Talia rolled her napkin between her hands. “You didn’t tell me that. You didn’t say Naomi might be at risk.”

Caleb placed his hand over his wife’s. “We’re not sure she is. But Stolz and Hortner are asking around. It’s possible they just want to scare her, to make her own up to what she did to Stolz that night. As a precaution, Ty’s got someone on her, making sure she’s okay.”

“You’ve had someone following her?”

Since Talia’s question was aimed at Tynan, he cleared his throat. “One of our security detail. Best man we have.” He moved his gaze to Naomi. “But now there’s no way you can be on your own in that apartment until this is over.”

Again, Naomi opened her mouth, but this time, Caleb got there first. “It’s precautionary. Until we know what we’re dealing with.”

“She can move into my place,” Nathan said, his eyes firmly on Tynan.

“We’re closer to town,” Talia said to Caleb. “It’s best she stays with us.”

“It makes sense she stays with me.” Tynan all but glared across at Nathan. “I can take her to and from the surgery. I’ve got to do that major overhaul of their system anyway.”

At the thought of being in close proximity to Tynan for heaven knew how many hours in the day, Naomi finally found her voice. “I’d appreciate if you all didn’t talk about me as if I’m not here. I can take care of myself, and I don’t need babysitting.”

“It’s nonnegotiable,” Tynan snapped.

“I can take care of myself,” Naomi repeated, her temper rising. She addressed Caleb. “You said I may be central to all this. That I should know what you’ve found out. Is there anything else?”

Tynan scrubbed a hand through his hair. “Shit.”

Caleb’s tone was appeasing. “Tell her, Ty.”

He heaved in a breath. “Before they went off the radar, I got a hit on one of the trackers. Online. Seems they managed to hack into the vehicle licensing records.”

“I don’t…”

“Your car was in the hotel lot that night. It was there for more than three hours after we left. Someone at the hotel must have alerted them to the fact it was yours.”

Chills rippled along Naomi’s limbs, and she rubbed her arms. “Does that mean they might know where I live?”

“It’s another possibility we can’t rule out.” Concern lay thick in Tynan’s tone. “We need to take precautions, to make sure you’re safe.”

Nathan handed the wine bottle to Tynan who topped up Naomi’s drink. She stared at the glass. How could all this have happened? If only she hadn’t wanted that damn threesome.

Her head began to throb, and she reached for her glass to take a fortifying swig. Glancing up, she locked eyes with Talia.

“I’m going to get dessert and put some coffee on,” Talia said, raising her eyebrows.

Naomi took the invitation. “I’ll help you.”

On legs that were shaky and unsteady, she made it to the kitchen. Talia closed the door. “None of this is your fault.”

“It feels like it is.” Naomi wrapped her arms across her chest. “It all started with me wanting that bloody threesome.”

“It started before that. Don’t forget it.” Talia filled the coffee maker. “The basis of it, why those men are here, had nothing to do with you. It wouldn’t matter where you’d gone, or even if you stayed at home every night. The reason they tried to hack into Seth’s system is not on you.”

Naomi rubbed her upper arms. “Damn it. I’m the most boring person I know. All I do is work.”

Despite the tension permeating the air, Talia gave her an elbow nudge. “You’ve got the opportunity to change that. You’ve got two men out there almost ready to lay into one another for the chance to have you stay with them. And if you still want to experience that threesome…”

Naomi was so taken aback, she actually laughed. Some of the tension in her chest disappeared, and when Talia smiled, she realized that had been the point of her friend’s comment. “That’s not going to happen. Not ever going to happen.”

“Why not?” Talia asked, retrieving cups from the cupboard. “They’re pretty good specimens of manhood in my book.”

“No denying. But, Nathan aside, I don’t fraternize with males from the pack. It’s the whole mating-and-marking thing. From my experience, they’re too possessive and arrogant.”

“No argument there. My man is the quintessential possessive, arrogant male.” Talia poured cream into a pretty jug painted with tiny blue flowers. “So Nathan isn’t into the mating-and-marking thing?”

“Not with me, he isn’t. We negotiated what we wanted from our…arrangement before we even got naked. Admittedly, we were both the worse for too much booze that night—Shelley Doyle’s engagement party, remember? I was bemoaning my lack of action in that area, and Nathan offered to lighten the load. We talked it through, realized neither of us wanted anything more. That it would just be sex. God. Does that make me sound like a slut?”

Talia made a sound in her throat. “It makes you sound like a woman who knows what she wants and takes steps to get it.” She bent down and removed a pie from the oven, decidedly singed around the edges. “Tynan seems pretty keen to have you move in with him while this is going on. You never did tell me why you and he are always so uptight around each other.”

“We had a thing before I left for London. We were too young. It was a mistake.” She thought about Tynan’s categorical statement to that effect. “Since then we’ve basically given each other a wide berth.”

“I’m thinking he’s not too happy about your booty calls with Nathan.”

“That’s his problem.” She slipped onto a stool at the breakfast bar and watched Talia slice the pie. “I’m guessing Caleb knows about me and Nathan.”

Talia smiled. “You told me in confidence. Luckily for me, Caleb already knew, so I didn’t have to struggle with my vow never to keep secrets from him. Besides, to be honest, I’d already worked it out before you told me. Must be something to do with those instincts that sharpened up like steel when I mated with Caleb.”

It had always amazed Naomi how fast Talia had integrated into the shifter community. As a human, it would have been a shock to find out she’d fallen in love with a shifter. Her threesome with Caleb and his brother must have caused her a little trepidation and embarrassment, but you would never have known it. She seemed to take it all in her stride now. Being hopelessly in love with Caleb probably helped.

The door opened, and the man himself walked through with a stack of dining plates in his arms. Naomi almost smiled at the sight of the pack’s tough and uncompromising leader performing such a domesticated duty, but only when Tynan and Nathan came up behind him, their arms full of the rest of the dining table remnants, did she allow herself a smug grin.

“Something funny?” Tynan asked.

“It’s just not something I ever thought I’d see around here.”

Caleb’s eyebrows rose. “Worked out pretty fast that if I wanted to eat, I needed to learn to clear the dishes. My wife’s pretty hot about equality of the sexes around the kitchen.” He grabbed Talia around the waist and pulled her back against him. “Happily, that doesn’t apply to every room in the house.”

“He thinks he’s funny.” Talia laughed up at her husband. “Why don’t you really impress Naomi and show her how you can load up the tray with cups and take it through to the dining room. And you two,” she said, nodding at Tynan and Nathan, “you can take in the dessert plates and coffee.”

The men dutifully got down to business, and Naomi’s chin almost hit the floor. In all her days, she’d never expected to see three such blatantly masculine men doing such mundane chores at the command of a woman, and a human to boot. Which just went to show how much power and charisma Talia had brought to her role as pack leader’s wife in such a short time.

“Listen.” Talia touched Naomi’s arm before she could follow the men into the dining room. “Don’t let them bully you into doing something you really don’t want to do. I know how intimidating and persuasive every one of them can be. And it’s not that long ago you were giving me advice to not let Caleb boss me around, remember?”

Naomi nodded. “It’s easy to give advice when you’re not in the thick of it.”

“I know. But you also need to keep in mind that the men are right, we don’t know what we’re dealing with yet, so you need to be careful. I suppose what I’m trying to say is, take their advice but on your own terms. Does that make sense?”

“Yes. And while I’m not trying to be foolhardy or difficult, I just don’t want to let someone else take over my life, however well meaning. I need to be in control of this, which means staying at my own place.”

“Then tell them that.” Talia grinned. “But be prepared to compromise.”

Chapter Seven

Naomi had compromised, Tynan reminded himself as he drove to Nathan’s for a strategy meeting. The trouble was, he couldn’t keep from thinking that it made sense for her to move in with him until they figured all this out. Regardless of how much he’d argued the point during after-dinner coffee, Naomi had dug her heels in and steadfastly refused to move out of her apartment. She had accepted that having a security detail made good sense, agreed to let him change and upgrade the locks at her apartment, and let Nathan install a security system.

He supposed that would have to do. Damn stubborn woman.

After parking, he let himself into Nathan’s and followed the light source through to the office at the back of the house.

“Help yourself to a drink,” Nathan said, not looking up from his laptop. He hooked his thumb toward a bottle of whisky next to some empty tumblers on the side. “Pour me one while you’re at it.”

“You got Naomi’s system loaded up on that?” Tynan asked, reaching for the bottle.

“Yeah. If she so much as breathes on that panic button, the noise from the bells and whistles will pull me from a coma.”

It didn’t entirely put his mind at rest. He might be overthinking this whole thing, overreacting even. But he had a bad feeling, and his feelings rarely let him down.

“Where is she now?”

Nathan nodded to a screen off to the right. “Still at the medical center. Late shift. Got our best man on her.”

“She won’t be too happy we’ve put a tracker in her car.”

Nathan grinned. “She’s going to be even less happy we’ve put one in her bag.”

“If she wants to be obstinate, she has to face the consequences. Maybe I should put something on her personal laptop.”

“Pour that whisky is what you should do. And stop acting like a lovesick puppy. You’re making me nervous.”

Shit
. Was he giving out desperate signals? Okay, his cock came alive every time he came within spitting distance of Naomi, but he prided himself on being able to disguise his feelings. “What the fuck does that mean?”

“It means you get a hard-on every time her name is mentioned, that’s what it means. What I’m wondering is why the hell you don’t do something about it.”

Since there was no point denying it, Tynan just shrugged. “Not an option.”

“You’ve got a dick, haven’t you? What else do you need?”

“It may come as a surprise to an emotional philistine like yourself, but some of us need more than a dick to get past first base with a woman.”

“Never stopped you in the past.”

No, it hadn’t. He’d never had cause to complain about his prowess with women. But Naomi was different. She fucking knocked him back at every opportunity.

He poured two whiskeys and walked across to the window, where he looked out into the darkness of the moor.

“There’s something that’s been puzzling me,” Nathan said.

Without turning, Tynan sipped his drink. “And that would be?”

“Why you suddenly have a problem with me banging Naomi.”

His chest went tight. “Who says I have?”

“In the past, you’d have made your feelings clear with a fist to my chin.”

The fingers of Tynan’s free hand curled into his palm. He might have had to swallow Nathan’s arrangement with Naomi, but that didn’t mean he wanted to talk about it or have it shoved in his face.

“She knows what she wants. If that’s you, so be it.” Tightening his grip on the glass, Tynan slugged back his whisky. “None of my business.”

“You were never one to back down from what you wanted. When did you turn pussy?”

Tynan squeezed the glass so tight, his knuckles went white. It beat throwing the crystal against the window. His heart thumped, blood firing through his veins. He stared unseeing at the moor beyond the window. “You keep winding me up, I’ll show you just how much of a pussy.”

Nathan laughed. “And there’s the real Tynan we know and love.”

Tynan came away from the window and cracked the glass down on Nathan’s desk. “Are we going to talk strategy for the DeMuthe job?” he asked, referring to the large security reorganization they’d landed for a military base. “Or are you planning on continuing to push my fucking buttons?”

Nathan laughed again, but his eyes went soft. “In the absence of a willing woman to quash some of that tension pulsing off you, my friend, I’d say we to need to run first.” He stood and placed a hand on Tynan’s shoulder. “What say you we take off for an hour or so. The strategy planning isn’t going anywhere.” He looked over his shoulder back at the screen. “And neither is Naomi.”

Because Nathan had hit it straight on, Tynan didn’t even consider arguing. He was so damn wound up, he felt he needed to punch something…and Nathan’s jaw was looking pretty damn tempting right now.

He strode out of the room and through to the kitchen. On the patio, he stripped out of his clothes. Nathan followed and did the same.

Without a word, the two men walked out onto the moor, and, once beyond the perimeters of the house, they shifted and ran.

Tynan knew his friend tempered his speed because of Tynan’s injury, and the realization caused his already frayed temper to hike. He didn’t want anyone giving him the benefit of the doubt where his abilities were concerned, especially not the man beside him who was currently screwing the woman he wanted.

Maddened, he ran faster.

Right then, he was finding it hard not to blame himself for the attempted breaches in security at Seth’s hotel and the hospital, despite the assurances to the contrary from Caleb and Nathan. It was his job to protect his pack, to keep them safe in the only way he knew how. By making sure their security systems held strong against outside attacks. The recent attempts might have been foiled by the integrity of his programming, but the fact that they’d even made a dent clawed at the heart of Tynan’s fear of not doing his duty.

He drew air deep into his lungs, pushed energy through his limbs, and when the surge of power fired through his muscles, he upped his speed and set a punishing pace.

Determined to push himself beyond his usual limits, he thundered out across the moor.

* * * * *

Naomi pulled up at Nathan’s. She was furious about what she’d found in her purse, and there was no damn way she was going to have her life put under a mirror, her every move recorded and scrutinized. It was discomfiting enough to know she was being followed by one of Tynan and Nathan’s lackeys and having her whereabouts reported back to them. But this?

She noted Tynan’s car in the driveway. Good. She could kill two birds with one stone. Or rather two arrogant cats with one single swipe. Damn cheek of them.

Since the front door was open, she marched right on in. There was no sign of the men, so she went into the kitchen and made herself coffee. She spotted the bundles of clothing on the patio. It was a good thing they’d taken themselves off for a run, because it gave her the chance to calm down. If there was one thing she’d learned from her father, it was that words driven by rage had the ability to wound more than actions ever could. Sticks and stones, and all that.

Not that she was prepared to let these two off the hook. No way in heaven was that about to happen. But cool and steady would likely be far more effective.

She was finishing her second cup of coffee when voices came from the patio. Remaining where she was, she leaned back in her chair and waited. A few moments later, she lamented her decision when she was suddenly confronted by two strapping naked men in the doorway. They both held their bundled clothes, but neither made any attempt to dress or to hide their male attributes. Instead, they stood there, looking at her, their skin gleaming from the exercise, hair mussed and unkempt. Muscles rippled and chests heaved from the after-effects of the run.

The breath hitched in her chest and her blood ran hot. Too aware of Tynan, she kept her gaze firmly on Nathan, who raised his eyebrows.

“How long have you been here?”

“I’m surprised you have to ask,” she said with mock sweetness. “I would have thought this would tell you everything you need to know about my whereabouts.”

She held up the tracker she’d found in her bag while searching for her keys. “Who do I have the pleasure of thanking for intruding in my personal life this time?”

She hoped Nathan admitted to it, because if Tynan did, she’d have to look at him, and her heart was already beating too damn fast. She was painfully aware of him at the best of times, but when he stood there stark naked and mouthwateringly masculine, she wasn’t sure her nerves could take any more assault.

In unison, the men shrugged into their jeans, both going commando. It was Tynan who spoke first. “If you’re not going to be reasonable, you have to expect that we’d take matters into our own hands.”

Feeling a trifle safer now his essential man parts were covered, Naomi looked at him. “I think I’m being perfectly reasonable, thank you. By the way, your man is still outside waiting for the all clear from you.”

“I’ll see to it.” Nathan tapped his forehead in salute and left the kitchen.

“I assume it was your bright idea to plant an illegal device in my bag?”

Tynan went to the sink and poured himself water. “It’s for your own good.”

Tynan couldn’t know it, but his words were like knives plunging through her center. Reminding her of all those years when her father had uttered those very words and she’d had no choice but to succumb to his wishes. Well, no more. Choices were hers to make now, and good or bad, she would own them, fight for them.

“I’m the only one who makes the decision about what’s good for me.”

Tynan didn’t appear even remotely fazed. “Then maybe you’d prefer we made this a Council matter. Get Enoch involved. Perhaps he’d be able to talk some sense into you.”

As he’d no doubt anticipated, the possibility of that happening instantly overrode her protests. If it came before the Council of Principals, her grandfather would find out. Worse, her proclivities for adventurous sex would be revealed to all.

“Bastard.”

Tynan’s eyes gleamed. “Which leaves one option, doesn’t it, sweetheart? You suck it up.”

“I’m not a child you can boss around and talk to however you please.”

Tynan slammed the glass down on the worktop. “Seems to me that’s exactly what you need, because right now you don’t seem to grasp the severity of a situation which could put you at risk.”

As Naomi launched herself forward, Nathan stepped back in. “Okay. Why don’t we all calm down here?”

“I am calm.” Although her heart thumped painfully against her ribs, her blood stormed through her veins, and—damn it—her hormones raged as Tynan’s male scent flooded her nostrils.

It stirred up memories…

“Look, Tynan doesn’t like the necessity of having to put a tracker in your purse any more than you do, okay?” Nathan smiled. “He just wants you safe. We both do. Maybe we should have told you, I get that. But Ty’s right about you having to let us do what we think best. If not, there won’t be any option but to call that Council meeting.”

Bloody blackmailing bastards.

She took a moment to steady herself, knowing that she was well and truly over a barrel and that any further argument would prove futile. “I don’t want that.”

“Then let’s all sit down and talk about this like sensible adults.”

With some reluctance, she sat, ignoring Tynan, who took a seat diagonally across from her at the oblong table.

Nathan poured coffee. “This whole thing would be a lot easier on everyone if you’d move in with one of us.”

“I’m not doing that.” She held up her finger as both men made to protest. “Think about it from my position for a moment. If it was one of you going through something like this, how would you feel being tracked and monitored and told to move out of your home?”

“Wouldn’t be turning cartwheels,” Nathan muttered and glanced over his shoulder at Tynan. “She has a point.”

“Maybe.” Tynan shrugged but kept his eyes on Naomi. “What’s certain is that things can’t stay as they are. There is another solution.” He held her gaze. “You let me move in with you.”

No way in hell. She couldn’t afford seeing Tynan walking around with his shirt off any more than necessary. “This is getting ridiculous.”

“This whole fucking argument is ridiculous,” Tynan steamed.

Nathan laughed. “You keep getting under his skin like this, and he’ll need another run to cool down.” He placed a hand on Tynan’s shoulder. “Why don’t you go take a cold one, bro?”

“And let her wheedle her way into twisting you around her finger while I’m gone? No way. You’ve got two options,” Tynan said, pointing a warning finger at Naomi while his nostrils flared. “One, you move in with me. Two, I move in with you. That’s the deal. No further negotiation. So pick an option and let’s just get the hell on with it. Do as you’re fucking told for once.”

A red haze shimmered in front of Naomi’s eyes, and her chest squeezed. She took a couple of steadying breaths so that when she spoke, her voice was even. “Do as I’m told? Really?”

She saw the moment he clicked in. Saw the apology in his eyes. He of all people knew just how much she’d done what she was told, and how she’d been under the influence of her bully of a father. Not that he could ever know the full extent of it.

He stepped forward. “I know this is difficult, but it really is for your own good.”

For your own good
.

The words shot her backward in time, piercing the core of the independent woman she’d become through years of hard work and a fierce determination to bury the past.

“I’m sending you away for your own good, girl. You’ll do as I say or face the consequences. I can ruin that boy just as I can ruin you. What will you do if I throw you out to fend for yourself, eh? You’ve brought shame on me. Shame on this family. You’ll go to your aunt’s until you give birth to that bastard growing in your belly.”

She stood, the sudden weight in her chest threatening to engulf her. “I suggest you take that shower,” she advised Tynan. “When you come back, don’t expect me to still be here and taking any more of your crap.”

She made a grab for her bag, but Tynan’s hand shot around her wrist. He pulled her up sharp against him. For long moments, they stared at each other. Without warning, she was back to that night on the moor, lost in Tynan’s penetrating gaze and the dreams of what she had hoped lay before them. Dreams of her first time with the man she wanted, the man she had longed for. The man who filled her with a need that had entrenched itself so deeply in her soul. Suddenly she wanted to weep for what she—what they—had lost.