Kingpin Bear (A Paranormal Shape Shifter Romance) (The Agency Book 4) (7 page)

***

What did you just say? Did you just ask how you could help him fight a war? Are you stupid?

Nadia wasn’t sure what to say to her own questions. There was an immense feeling of guilt that she was keeping bottled up inside of her, until she could find the right time to tell Jared the complete truth. But how did that become her volunteering to help him end a war?

Because you owe them. It’s the right thing to do. You’ve already thrown your lot in with them; might as well try to help them out.

“Nadia, that’s not something you want to ask,” he said gently, trying to let her down, she thought. “These guys do not play nicely. If they find out you’re helping us, they’ll go after your family to get to you.”

She took a deep breath. “That’s not a problem.”

The shifter’s eyebrows rose questioningly.

“I don’t have a family. My parents and older sister were killed when I was a child. There is nobody for them to go after. I don’t even know of any cousins.”

There was a strange glint in his eye as she revealed that fact.

“What?” she asked.

“I’m sorry,” he told her, his voice thick with emotion. “I truly am. I know how that must have been, growing up without anyone around you.”

“Something tells me you know that better than most,” she said slowly, looking deep into his eyes and finding the pain she thought she would see there.

“I do,” he said, his voice a whisper. “And I’m so sorry you had to go through that as well.”

Nadia was forced to clear her throat before she could respond. Her chest rose with the long, slow inhalation of air.

“But even with that, I don’t know where you might be able to help us,” he said. “Right now things are in complete disarray. The raid on our base was completely unexpected, and put our plans to assault their base on hold, possibly indefinitely. Surely it won’t be until we are able to regroup.”

As if in cue, the laptop behind him dinged, the soft chime more than loud enough to startle the two of them. Jared practically leapt to the seat to read the messages.

“Who is it?” she asked.

“Three members, safe and sound together,” he said, pride infusing his voice at the knowledge that some of his team had escaped unhurt.

“That’s great!’ she said, happy to hear it. She knew Jared had been trying to hide just how worried he was. His efforts had been far from successful, but she recognized after massaging his shoulders that his worries weren’t going to go away until people started reporting in safe.

Something changed in his posture, however.

“Jared?” she called when he didn’t immediately say any more. “What’s wrong?”

He turned to look at her, and his face could have been made from stone for all the emotion that showed on it.

“They got away cleanly, but not immediately. Someone got taken,” he told her. “They tried to rescue him, but were chased off before they could.”

“Do they know where he was taken? Maybe all of you can go after him,” she suggested.

He nodded. “Yes. But they had to go all the way to the other side of the city and go to ground just to escape. So they aren’t available to help in time.”

“Is there a time limit?” she asked, confused why that would matter.

Jared was already moving, looking at his gear and checking that his boots were tied.

“Yes. If we wait, they’ll drain his blood like the others. My team is composed of Alpha shifters. We’re bigger, stronger, and faster than most bears. If they were to create a serum from his blood, who knows how powerful it would make the Agent it gets injected into.”

“Oh. That’s not good,” she said, rising from the couch.

“What are you doing?” he asked as she made her way to the door as well.

“Is there a vehicle hidden away here somewhere?”

“Yes,” he said, saying it slowly enough that it elongated into several syllables.

“I’m driving,” she said, giving him her best “Don’t argue with me, you’ll lose” voice. “You need to concentrate on your mission. Besides, I’m far less conspicuous than you are,” she said dryly, looking him up and down.

To her surprise, Jared cracked a smile. She had expected a protest, with him trying to be heavy-handed to protect her and saying it wasn’t her fight. But instead, he respected her desire to help, and simply gave her an acquiescing nod.

“Very well,” he said. “But you stay in the car, and you don’t do anything stupid, heroic, or anything besides sit there and wait for me to come back out.”

“Deal,” she said. “I want to help, but I’m not stupid. I know that getting in the middle of fighting shifters is not the path for long life. I want to help, but I also want to live.”

It still astounded her that she wanted to help, that she was willingly putting herself into harm’s way. It was as if her brain were making these decisions for her, without consulting her. Was she letting her physical desire for him entice her into making stupid decisions? Or was she doing what needed to be done?

“I want you to wear this,” he said, pulling a baseball hat off the nearby rack. “Put your hair up into it.”

She arched an eyebrow at him.

“Please?” he said. “For me? It will make me feel better about all of this. Those long brown locks of yours are a little too identifiable for me.”

She smiled at the compliment of sorts, and took the cap from his hands. “Very well,” she said, tucking her hair up and putting it on. “How’s this?”

“Perfect.”

“Don’t get used to it though,” she said. “I like my hair down.”

“Me too.”

“I’ll bet,” she replied swiftly, without missing a beat, enjoying the flirty banter far more than she should have.

Jared shook his head and led the way up the stairs, pulling the trap door aside.

Jared

“You’re sure this is the place?” she asked, the car cruising down the street.

Jared shifted, his big frame cramped in the little two-door hatchback. It wasn’t ideal, but he hadn’t wanted to leave a big shiny truck hanging around the run-down safe house either. So he had bought the old car and hoped he would never have to use it.

Next time I’m getting the four-door. Never again. This is too small.

He tried to stretch his legs, hoping that they wouldn’t cramp the instant he emerged from the vehicle. That would not help his already vague plan.

“Yes,” he said out loud, trying to hide his discomfort from Nadia. “The others who followed him saw him taken into a house on this street. Number 3488.”

“Okay, I think I just saw a 28-something,” she said. “So keep going?”

He nodded, flexing his legs and twisting his back to loosen it up.

“Jared, I’ve been thinking.”

The urge to flinch at that phrase came to him, but even he’d wanted to, he probably couldn’t have because of his cramped conditions.

Perhaps the tiny car wasn’t so bad.

“About?” he asked, keeping the caution out of his tone. Mostly.

“This plan of yours,” she replied.

Jared did his best not to sigh in relief. They needed to talk, but now was most definitely
not
the time for it.

“What about it?”

“Um, well, if three of your team were chased away, that means there was enough bad people here to scare them off, right?”

“Yes. My team is brave, but not stupid.”

“So why are you being stupid then?”

He sat as upright in the car as he could, the action banging his forehead off the roof. “Ow,” he said, following it up with several more curses.

“Stupid?” he asked after a moment, shutting the mild pain out. It was more of a distraction than any true injury.

“Yes. Think about it,” she said with exasperation. “There were enough people to chase off three of your team. Yet now you’re going to go in there and fight on your own? How is that not stupid?”

“I’m banking on them not having all come back here, but instead spreading out in search of everyone.”

Nadia’s eyes came off the road as she looked over at him with an incredulous stare. “You’re joking, aren’t you?” There was a pause. “No, no, you aren’t joking.”

“No, I’m not,” he said seriously. “Drive four more houses, then stop. That was it back there,” he said.

Nadia did as he commanded, pulling the car up to the side of the road and killing the engine.

“And what if they are all back?” she asked nervously.

He reached out and touched her shoulder, and then without thinking, caressed her cheek.

“In addition, there is one other factor you haven’t included in your calculations,” he said softly, reaching out and planting his lips where his fingers had been, bringing an instant redness to her face.

“And what’s that?” she asked just as quietly.

“There’s a reason I’m the leader,” he said, his voice becoming a hardened growl as his bear rumbled within him, coming to the surface ready for battle. His eyes swiveled outward as he exited the car, limbs creaking slightly as he strode toward the house that contained his man.

The pain from being cramped up no longer registered.

The odds against him no longer mattered.

All that concerned him was ensuring his entire team was safe.

The length of his stride increased, and his muscles rippled as he flexed them.

The neighborhood was a fancy one, with enough space for another house between each existing building. This gave people living there plenty of privacy, as large trees and shrubs grew up between the properties.

I’m coming, Justin.

He hadn’t wanted to speak his name aloud around Nadia. He knew he was becoming interested in the woman, but there was still something she was hiding that made him want to do the same. Perhaps after they had known each other for more than a few hours, he would feel more comfortable talking to her about everything going on.

If only his bear would hold off that long. It had been insistent, yanking him toward her every chance it could. When Jared let his guard down for a split second, its yearning to be close to her, to touch her and caress her was almost more than he could withstand.

Jared shook his head, focusing back on the task at hand. In this, he and the wild animal within him were in agreement.

It was time to kick some ass.

He strode up the front walk, acting unconcerned, as if he belonged. The darkness hid his features from the two guards long enough for him to come close to within striking range.

“Hey! You—” the man’s voice cut off with a strangled sound as he crumpled to the ground, his throat crushed by a vicious sideways chop from Jared’s hand.

The other guard reacted swifter, throwing an off-balance punch from where his hand had been resting at his hip. The speed of it caught Jared off guard. Instead of evade it and end up off balance himself, he spun with the blow. As he did he stepped backward and drove his elbow hard into the guard’s stomach. His hand became a fist as he rotated his arm until his fist pointed upward, and then he extended, his fist catching the stunned guard in the chin.

His jaw snapped together and his eyes glassed over, but Jared wasn’t done with him yet. A flurry of punches broke several ribs, followed by a forearm that broke the guard’s nose. Somehow the Agent was still on his feet.

The front door started to creak open—it was now behind Jared as he’d worked over his opponent. Without thinking, he grabbed the man’s neck and pants, spun, and hurled him
through
the open doorway.

The improvised battering ram hit with such force the door slammed off its hinges, taking the third guard behind it to his back. A fourth guard was hit square in the torso by the flying missile of his comrade and they went down together, momentarily dazed.

Jared stepped through the doorway, pausing only long enough to deliver a booted kick to the guard under the door, snapping his neck violently enough to ensure he would never rise again.

The fourth guard shoved the dead body of guard number two off of him just in time to receive a knee to the stomach as Jared dropped his entire weight onto the man’s midsection, cracking ribs and more as he did. Reaching down, the big Alpha Sentinel punched the hardwood floor until it cracked and he could rip off a foot-long chunk.

Before the guard could react he thrust it up and into the underside of the man’s jaw and into his skull.

“Any more takers?” he growled, rising slowly to his feet as shouts sounded inside the house.

Another pair of Extremis Agents emerged from a doorway that led to the lower level. Their expressions were grim as they looked at the carnage around them.

“Don’t take too long now,” Jared taunted them from the middle of it all, his shoulders slightly hunched as he controlled his breathing. His head was tilted slightly downward as he looked up and out at his foes.

The pair looked at each other and split up.

“First mistake,” he said, and his right leg flexed. The body that had been resting on his foot shot up and at the Agent to his right. Before it even hit its target Jared planted his kicking foot, pivoted, and threw a snap-kick out at the man on his left.

He had judged this man as the more dangerous of the two, and the way he ducked under the kick told Jared he was right.

But the kick had been a diversion. Jared had pulled it almost as soon as he launched it. He recovered before his opponent and closed to within striking range.

The Agent rocked backward under a shot to the chin, but he didn’t go down. Jared heard the second man throw aside the body and scramble to his feet behind him. He had time for one more move.

The sound of a knife clearing its sheath reached his ears.

That was the move then.

Jared waited a split second, then reached forward. Instead of trying to hit his opponent, he grabbed him by the neck and spun, taking the smaller man with him. He turned and thrust the angry Agent into the path of the knife held by his friend. The blade entered the Agent’s back.

Jared opened his hands, dropping the man even as he began to scream from the wound in his back. If the knife was coated with the same healing-resistant stuff that he had seen from the Agency before, his target was likely dead. The knife had penetrated him near his heart. He would bleed out before anyone could help him.

He wasn’t done though, as the last Agent recovered from the shock of stabbing his friend and tried to prepare to face Jared alone.

The Alpha’s face was set in stone as he stepped over the dying Agent, his eyes focused intently on the remaining guard. “You had better not have hurt my friend,” he snarled.

The last Agent didn’t respond with words, but with his fists instead. Jared knocked aside the blows, stepping forward relentlessly as the Agent backed away. The man’s strikes grew more and more frantic as they seemed to have no effect on the hulking whirlwind of death in front of him.

That wasn’t entirely true. Jared was feeling them. This man was Extremis, and a strong one. He was just so angry he shrugged most of the pain aside.

Finally finished toying with the man, he grabbed his arm when the next punch was thrown and forced it down, snapping the man’s forearm over his knee.

To his credit, the Agent didn’t scream, though his face twisted into a pained grimace and sweat broke out on his forehead. He swung with his left hand, and Jared caught this one as well, spinning it around and dislocating it from the man’s socket with some quick moves.

Then he took out the man’s knee. As he fell, Jared stepped behind him and snapped the man’s neck with a twist of his powerful arms.

He waited, but no more guards came.

That doesn’t mean there aren’t more. They’re probably waiting for you downstairs.

Jared moved to the entrance he had seen the final two Agents emerge from. As he suspected, it lead downstairs. Unfortunately, it also took a right turn halfway down, meaning he couldn’t see what was waiting for him. Going charging down there was probably not a smart idea, but he needed to do it.

Perhaps it doesn’t have to be me they see first though.

All Jared needed was a moment’s hesitation from the guards at the bottom. Then he could be among them, and doing what he did best.

He decided to rely on the same tactic he’d been using all night.

His diversion in hand, he crept down the stairs, trying to take a slow, measured pace.

“Jankowski, is that you?” came a voice from the bottom. It was mostly strong, but tinged with a bit of nerves.

Jared tried to keep his voice as flat and neutral as possible. “Yeah,” he said, injecting a bit of pain into it, which was easy enough to do. He hurt all over.

The other man started to respond just as Jared turned the corner.

“See, I told you it was—”

The body Jared had been holding in front of him went flying forward. The guard at the bottom
oomph
ed as it hit him, but Jared didn’t pause to watch. Even as his arms thrust the body one way, his legs propelled his own body another. He tackled the second guard in the stomach, and the pair went down heavily.

During the roll though, Jared saw a
third
guard already charging down on him from the rear. There was no time to play fair, though he did feel a mild sympathy as he drove his knee between the guard’s legs. The strangled scream that came from the man’s throat was cut off abruptly by a giant fist.

Thick arms wrapped themselves around his waist and Jared was lifted off his feet by the third guard, who began to squeeze tightly. He struggled, trying to hit the man from behind. Even though his arms were free though, he couldn’t land any blows solid enough to break the grip.

Something popped in his chest and pain lanced through him.

The other guard was recovered now and came straight at Jared, fist cocked back.

The Alpha shifter tucked his legs up under him and kicked out hard. The movement sent the oncoming shifter flying backward, with the added effect that Jared flipped up and over the Agent holding him, breaking the grip. He landed in a crouch and rose quickly, blocking the leg that was aimed at his head.

“Enough,” he rumbled, his angry voice filling the downstairs area.

He lunged at the man, opening his mouth to bite him.

The guard looked so surprised he almost laughed.

The looked died as Jared’s bear emerged and the jaws snapped closed around his throat, ripping it apart in a spray of blood.

His bear continued to maraud through the basement as he chased after the final guard. Furniture and even some walls simply disintegrated as he hit them, spraying dust and woodchips into the air.

He finally caught his last opponent, his claws hooking onto the man’s pants and sending him tumbling to the floor. Jared was upon him before he could recover, and just like that, the fight was over.