Deceptions: A Collection (26 page)

I would have hauled the crap onto the front lawn if I thought it would accomplish anything.

It took a good twenty minutes before I managed to clear my mind enough to fall into my routine. Sweat dripped, muscles burned, and finally, my mind felt clear.

The sword that felt like a part of me sliced through the air.

Everglades.

Groups of them—

Just kids.

Children—

Child. Weak, ignorant child
—The crack of a whip slicing through the air.
If it kills me, I’ll make you something stronger
.

My breathing hitched in my throat.

Hold that weapon steady, Kitasa—useless waste. Oh, dear. You dropped your guard
—

I stumbled as her voice rang through my mind and I remembered the sickening, wet crack of my bones breaking. The ghostly ache danced up my arm.

“Shit.”

I stopped in the middle of the floor and brought my hands to my face. My right hand still clutched my sword and I squeezed it, tighter, tighter.

Get out of my head, you evil bitch
, I thought, half desperately.

“You know, whatever those demons are that are eating you up…”

I gulped in another breath of air and lowered my hands, ready to tear into him, ready to turn around and bury my blade in him and screw the consequences.

I turned around. Saw him standing three feet away. “Seems to me you managed to leave them far enough behind. If you can pick fights with vampires, crazy cats and entire packs of rats, I’d think you could deal with whatever those demons were, too.”

Then he went back to his weight bench.

“Bad vibes. I want you to know, going in, I’ve got a bad, bad feeling about this,” Colleen said when I called.

I had two cups of coffee and a pastry nearly as big as a plate in my belly and I suspected I’d need more sugar and more caffeine just to get through this. “I get nothing but bad vibes about this entire mess,” I said into the phone as I leaned in and studied the donut case.

Chocolate.

That was the ticket.

Pointing to one liberally smeared in it, I smiled at the lady behind the counter. She wasn’t paying any more attention to me than she had to. She gave me the donut and then went back to staring at Damon.

Human. Even if I hadn’t been able to tell just by looking at her, I would have figured that out after she continued to stare at him for the first thirty seconds and didn’t look away even after he pointedly shoved his sunglasses onto his head and glared at her.

Another shifter wouldn’t have done that with him. Hell, most of them would have been cowering the second he walked inside.

“Okay, we both have a bad feeling about this,” I said. “Glad we have that established. Now that we do…why am I calling you?”

“Three witches from one of the outer houses have seen…something.”

The outer houses were basically subsets of the main houses. Green Road was huge and its outer houses covered most of the south. “Oh? And how does this have anything to do with me?”

“All ties into kids. One of our girls went missing, but we were able to find her and get her back. She’s still in seclusion and I don’t know what all happened, but I thought it was kind of odd, especially after I heard another witch—unaffiliated—disappeared a week later. She hasn’t been recovered yet. She’s seventeen.”

My skin started to crawl. Unaffiliated witches didn’t practice with a house. It wasn’t common, but it happened. And it wasn’t a good thing, either. Witches were more vulnerable on their own. They pretty much
defined
the phrase
strength in numbers
. One or two witches alone, especially young ones, were easy targets. Warriors were far and few between. Now one warrior witch was a sight to behold, but still, even they needed to be trained.

Sitting up a little straighter, I braced my elbows on the table as Damon slid into the booth across from me. He had a massive pile of toast. Just toast. And milk.

“What else?” I asked, staring at those neat little triangles of bread.

“I heard from a contact that somebody from the wolf pack had a kid go missing, too. I can’t confirm, but…”

“I can.” Images of a boy’s battered face flashed through my mind.

Four teenagers. Wasn’t exactly a pattern, but…

“You can, huh?” Colleen made a little humming sound under her breath. “Curiouser and curiouser.”

“Well, I can’t confirm he was with the wolf pack, but I do know that a wolf kid was found. I saw his body the other day.” Made me think about the tests I had yet to see. Needed to log into my other email. While Damon sat there contemplating his mountain of toast and listening to my phone call, I pulled my tablet out of my bag.

“So four kids. All NHs,” Colleen said.

I thought of Keeli and murmured, “Maybe five.”

Hell, considering all the reports I had to go through, there could well be more. But no way to know yet. Yeah, decent parents would report the runaways, but despite what Damon said, not all parents were decent and that didn’t change just because somebody was a shifter. They were still people, and people often sucked.

Colleen continued to speak as my tablet powered up.

“The witches in the outer house are located near the Everglades.”

My gut roiled. “The Everglades.”

“Yeah. One of them thinks she saw the witch, the day before she disappeared. After I sent up an alert about the kid you’re looking for, I got a call. Came in late last night. The witch says she saw the boy you’re looking for.”

Damon’s cup clattered onto the table.

I saw him reaching for the phone and jerked up a hand to stop him.

“Saw him?” These were witches we were talking about. They could see them with their eyes…or other ways.

“That’s all I got out of her. She won’t tell me anything else. Says if you want more, you have to go to her.”

I blew out a breath as I logged into my email. “Okay. So I get the feeling I’m planning a trip to the Everglades.”

“Yes. And now…why aren’t you more surprised about that?”

Sourly, I stared at my donut. I wasn’t hungry for it now. “A little birdie told me.”

My e-mail loaded and I didn’t even have to skim through it. There was a bunch of junk, a bunch of spam, a bunch of old contacts. I’d changed the e-mail because of all the spam, junk and shit. But the one e-mail that I did need was right there at the top. Linc. Damn, the man really did know how to come through.

“I’ll be in touch, Colleen,” I said, disconnecting the call and putting the phone down.

I clicked on the e-mail and started to read.

“The Everglades.” Damon was staring at my bowed head.

“Yes.”

“Was that your witch friend?”

“Yes.”

Lab samples. Soil.

My gut churned as I read some of the notes Linc had thoughtfully thrown in. Several different kinds of dirt…soil. Whatever. The specialist who had done the tests thought it might be consistent with the sort found in the Everglades.

Spinning the tablet around, I shoved it at Damon as I drank the rest of my coffee.

A muscle worked in his jaw when he looked up at me. “Why am I reading lab tests on a dead wolf kid?”

“Because it appears he was down in the Everglades,” I said. “And because, as I’m sure you heard since you were listening in, one of the witches affiliated with one of the outer houses down there thinks she saw Doyle. A couple of the witch kids have also gone missing. All in that general area. There’s a connection, so it looks like we’ve got a road trip.”

“It’s a drive.” He nodded shortly. “We should get going.”

“We need to make a stop first.” I shouldn’t have had the coffee. My stomach was already pitching. The last thing I wanted to do was go back the rec club. “I need to talk to Marcus.”

“Why?”

“Too many coincidences. All these kids tied into the ′glades. I want to know if there’s a connection.”

Damon narrowed his eyes. “If there was, the kid would have said. He knows better than to lie when I’m around.”

“He might not have lied.” I shrugged as I slid out of the booth. “There’s a difference between lying and not telling everything you know. And he might have thought he was doing his friend a favor.”

“By not telling you what you needed to know to find him?” Damon was on his feet now, too, crowding into my space under the pretense of carrying on a private conversation in a busy place.

Instead of tipping my head back to stare at him, I busied myself scooping papers and reports into my bag, shutting down my tablet last. “Kids don’t always have that vaunted foresight. For all we know, the kid thought he was doing Doyle a favor by keeping quiet, even assuming he knows anything.”

“How does not helping bring him home protect him?”

Useless waste
—the sound of the whip whistling through the air. I turned around and looked up at him. “You know what the holy hell happened to my back? My grandmother did it to me. While my aunts watched. The first time happened when I was eight. The second, when I nine. It was a yearly, sometimes monthly, occurrence until I ran away when I was fifteen. And if somebody had tried to take me home? I would have either killed them…or myself.”

Slinging my bag over my shoulder, I headed outside.

Maybe the Queen Bitch hadn’t beaten that boy, but somehow I knew life at the lair hadn’t been easy for him.

I’d figured that out just by the look in Marcus’ eyes.

Marcus wasn’t at the club.

We found him at his house and his dad didn’t want to let me in.

If it wasn’t for the bruiser at my back, I knew I wouldn’t have gotten in, either.

“He’s starting to spike,” the man said, staring at me with narrowed eyes. “A human girl—a pretty one—walking in there isn’t going to help. Especially once she starts smelling scared.”

“I’m not going to freak out on him,” I said. “I just need to ask him a couple of questions about Doyle.”

“He doesn’t know anything.” The father shook his head.

“I think he might know more than he realizes.”

“Are you calling my kid a liar?”

Oh, for crying out loud. Mildly, I pointed out, “That isn’t what I said. I said, very clearly, I think he might know more than he thinks. I found out some information about some other missing kids and I need to ask him a few more questions.”

“And when he starts coming after you because you smell like dinner or sex, what are you going to do?”

“He’s not going to get within a foot of her,” Damon said, edging in front of me. “But, Conley, you’re going to let her in, and you’re going to do it now before I decide to get pissed off.”

A growl trickled from the father’s throat. “You can’t threaten me for protecting my kid.”

“She’s not a fucking threat to him.”

“She’s human! And when he scares the shit out of her—”

“She doesn’t have the sense to be scared,” Damon snapped. “Trust me, I’ve seen her in action. And I won’t let the kid get near her. Now let her do her job.”

I rubbed my temple as the headache pounded, ever close. This job was proving to be so much fun. Maybe Colleen could brew up some sort of tonic for the permanent headache I was living with.

It took a few more minutes and once Conley agreed, reluctantly, he looked me over with a critical eye. “Just how good are you with your weapons?” he demanded.

I cocked a brow. “Pretty damn good.”

“She’ll take them off,” Damon said.

Conley shook his head. “How is your control?”

Serenely, I smiled. “Well, unless it’s the jerk at my back…it’s generally flawless. I don’t draw down unless I absolutely have to. Don’t worry, I have no absolutely no desire to harm your child.”

Another thirty seconds passed and then he nodded. “Keep your weapons. If you’re a fighter, you’ll feel better with them on, meaning you’re not going to walk around in a cloud of fear. That automatically makes things better from the get-go. Just don’t draw them.”

I laid a hand on the sword, stroked the handle. “I’ll leave the sword someplace else…it’s the most obvious one.”

Behind me, Damon snorted.

Conley went to say something, but I shook my head. “It’s fine. And I appreciate the gesture.”

He shrugged. “I was one of the Assembly’s exterminators before I had a family—my wife was one of the Banner cops. She wouldn’t go anywhere without a weapon. I understand fighters.”

I left the sword on the kitchen table after he gestured to it. “He’s downstairs. It’s quiet. Dark. We soundproofed it for just this purpose after we found Erica was pregnant. The less stimulation a kid going through the spike has to deal with, the better. Keep this short and quick, Ms. Colbana. Please.”

I nodded.

Then he opened the door and slid through. “A few minutes with him first.” He looked at Damon over my shoulder. “You come in first and stay between them for the first couple of minutes.”

After the door shut behind Conley, I looked at Damon. “It gets tiresome having you constantly refer to me as being too stupid to be scared,” I said, focusing on that instead of what I was getting ready to do. Baiting him felt almost normal.

“Having you constantly refer to me as the asshole or the jerk gets pretty old, too. I’ve got a name.”

“You do? Damn. I thought for sure you’d introduced yourself as Lord Asshole the first day.” Sighing, I shook my head. “Your name must have slipped my mind.”

Turning away from him, I focused on the back window and let the minutes tick away.

Long, empty minutes.

Five of them. And then Damon moved, lingering at my back just long enough to murmur, “Do not come out from behind me until I tell you to, baby girl. You hear me?”

I glared at his back. “Excuse me? Baby…”

The door opened and he stepped inside.

Scowling, I reminded myself to yell at him later.

It was dark.

I smelled sweat.

The musk of cat.

Fear.

Automatically, my palm started to itch, but I ignored it. I was just going to talk to a scared kid.

“Stay up on the landing,” Conley called from somewhere in that black maw.

I followed the sound, or tried to, from what I could see around Damon’s wide back.

“Ask what you want to ask,” Damon said quietly.

“Marcus.”

I heard a weird little clicking sound.

“Hey, Marcus…I…ah.”

A panting sound. Something whipped by the ground just in front of the landing. Fast. Too fast. A big, warm arm came around me. I would not acknowledge that Damon’s presence felt a little comforting just then. No way, no how.

This was just a kid.

My heart is strong
—

“Marcus, I need to know if you know anything about the ′glades.”

A strange little growl came from below my feet. I looked down. Through the metal grate, I saw him.

Fur was sprouting on his face. Melting in. Growing back. An endless, odd little wave that was disturbing as hell to look at. Muscles rippled, bulged, out of place on his still-skinny frame. It was freaky as hell.

But in the dark, dank light of the room, I saw one thing clearly enough.

His eyes were still scared.

Sinking to my knees, I smiled at him through the metal grate. “Hey, kid.”

“Nugget.” His lips peeled back from his teeth. “You wanna come down here and keep me company?”

“Can’t. I’m still looking for Doyle.”

Damon sank down next to me, the caged energy of his presence wrapped around me, too close, too close—

Marcus closed his eyes and I watched as his nostrils flared. Breathing in the scents. “You don’t smell just human,” he said abruptly.

“That’s because I’m not. Doyle, Marcus. I need to talk to you about him,” I said gently. “Can you help me?”

“He had to run,” Marcus whispered. “Had to.”

Then he started to shake his head, fear entering his eyes as he darted a look at Damon. And the fear grew.

A knot settled in my gut.

There was something he wanted…maybe even needed to tell me, but he wouldn’t, not while Damon was there. And Damon wasn’t going to leave me alone with the kid. I knew that as well as I knew my own name.

“I’m going to hazard a guess,” I said quietly. “You don’t have to say if I’m right or if I’m wrong. You don’t have to say anything, and you’re not in trouble for this, because it’s just some stupid half-human running her mouth.”

I felt Damon’s body tense.

“He didn’t feel safe at home, did he?”

Snarling flooded the room and the blur tearing across the room didn’t stop until he was lost in shadows too thick for me to penetrate. “Okay, okay,” I said quietly as fear rose up thick enough to choke even me. “We don’t have to talk about that. But the ′glades. Marcus, I need to know if he ever told you about the ′glades. I think he’s in danger there. Other kids have gone missing.”

There was no answer.

Not in words, anyway. Not for a long, long time.

But he did start to whine. Low, weird noises, like a sob trapped in a throat that just couldn’t cry the way a human needed to.

“You’re walking a dangerous line,” Damon whispered in my ear as I unlocked the car.

“Had to ask.”

“And when Conley talks?”

Blowing out a breath, I jerked the door open. Or tried. I couldn’t back up enough to open it because Damon was still
right
behind me. “Why in the hell do you have to hover three inches away from me all the time?” I dropped my head against the car. “Don’t you people know what personal space is?”

“Yes. And I have this weird fascination with invading yours.” He brushed the hair off the back of my neck and I tensed as I felt the pad of his thumb slip over one of my scars. “You haven’t answered. What are you going to do when Conley talks?”

“He won’t,” I said shortly. “It serves him no purpose and the boy is already too scared to say anything. It would only risk his son getting hurt if he said a word about the boy suspecting the ward of the Alpha being unsafe in his own home. And if most of the cats really are protective of their young, I suspect it would be…frowned upon…for her to be abusive. Would be bad if he ran away from home because he was afraid of living with her, huh?”

“That’s not what the deal is.”

I snorted and turned around. “Like hell.” Glaring up at him, I said, “I don’t know whether you feel obligated to lie like that or if you really believe it, but she hurt him.”

The storm in his eyes spread over his face as he lowered it to growl at me. “I don’t lie, baby girl.”

Oh. Yes. “Stop calling me
baby girl
, asshole.”

Sidestepping away, I jerked the door open. It slammed into his midsection. He grunted a little and I smiled as I wiggled into the car through the narrow opening. “We need to get going. I want to go by my place and pack a bag.”

Somehow, I didn’t think we’d find all the answers we needed in a couple of hours.

Ninety minutes into the drive, the phone rang.

The ringtone was Aerosmith’s
Crying
. An old classic. I used to love the song, then I made the bad mistake of programming it for any and all numbers associated with Jude.

Sighing, I put it on speaker. Since Damon would hear the conversation anyway, I might as well keep my hands on the wheel. That way I wouldn’t have to fight with him for control of the damn phone if he decided to join in on the conversation as he’d tried to do several times.

Bad enough on city streets but when I speeding down the interstate at over ninety miles an hour? Even worse.

“Colbana,” I said.

“Kit…”

Jude. He’d deigned to call me himself. Wow. Wasn’t I special?

His voice rolled over me like a hand sheathed in a silk glove and I hated the fact that goose bumps broke across my skin.

“Hello, Jude, bane of my existence,” I said sourly.

“Darling Kit, the sweet nothings you whisper to me…I treasure each and every one.”

“Oh, bite me.” Then I snapped my mouth shut and mentally swore.

Next to me, Damon closed his eyes and shook his head.

On the phone, Jude laughed. “Kit, I count the days until I do just that. Tell me…is that miserable bodyguard of yours there? I hear another person breathing.”

“What do you want, leech?” Damon said, his voice flat.

“Pleasant as always,” Jude murmured. “Are you taking care of my Kit, Damon?”

“I’m seeing that a contracted employee of the Cats stays safe.” He shot me a narrow look. “I couldn’t care less about taking care of anything of yours.”

Ouch. “As much as I love being talked about like I’m a toy or something, can we please not? Jude, what do you want?”

“I sent Evangeline to your office to speak with you, but you weren’t there.”

“I’m often not there.” I cut around a truck and arrowed back into the right lane. “My job involves me leaving the office a lot.”

“
But I don’t feel you so strongly
…”

I hissed as I felt that whisper in the back of my mind. Faint. Very faint. But there.

“
How can I protect you when you don’t let me know you are leaving
…?”

I wanted to snarl at him. Wanted to hang up the damn phone and tell him not to call. To stay out of my damned head.

But Damon was staring at me oddly and Jude was talking—

“Are you going to be back in the office today? I had information about the upcoming job,” he said, his voice cool, polite. So very Jude.

“No. I’m out of town, probably for a few days.”

“
Where
?” Out loud, he said, “When can I anticipate your return? I need to get this information to you.”

Blowing out a breath, I said, “I’m following up a lead I received earlier about my current job. I’m not going to be available for your case for a while yet, so Angie is just going to have keep her britches on.”

“
You’re going south…very well. I’ll keep watch
.”

I curled my lip and disconnected the call.

“He seems a little too protective of you,” Damon said.