Lover Claimed (4 page)

The news hadn’t reported anything that could
be described as a sign left behind, but would they? What if the
police were holding that information secret while they researched
the sign and what it meant? Meisha couldn’t wait around hoping for
information to be leaked to the media.

She crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m
going with you.”

He crossed his arms too. “You aren’t going
anywhere.”

Chapter Four

“Yeah, right. Stay behind,” Meisha muttered
to herself. She’d jumped on her bike as soon as he’d left. It
wasn’t like she didn’t know where he was going.

She took a left at the light and peeled down
the city strip. While Thursday night wasn’t as busy as Friday was,
cars were still flooding the streets with people on their way to
parties or just hanging out. There was plenty to do if you were
young and loved the nightlife. Meisha had grown out of that phase
of her life a long time ago. Right now the only thing that was on
her mind was maneuvering her Yamaha R4 through the throngs of
traffic so she could make it to Hollander Enterprises before
Lajos.

She didn’t know Lajos, but if he thought
poking around Trudy’s office was worth the effort then he might be
on to something. If in fact he found a clue that would link the
murderers to his company, she’d breathe a sigh of relief. But if he
was wrong and she found the Yaruzi gang sign or any other
indication that this was their handiwork, she’d do what was
necessary to get her family and Trudy away.

At a stoplight she put down her booted feet
on the pavement, waiting for it to turn green. It was hot, too hot
for the black leather riding outfit and leather boots she wore, but
she’d rather be hot and safe. In an accident, where she was sure to
slide across the pavement, without the protective covering she
wouldn’t stand a chance of surviving with all of her skin
intact.

The car next to her blared out a popular rap
song. She looked over at the driver, a young African-American man.
He nodded up at her and smiled, flashing a mouthful of gold teeth.
“Hey, shorty. You lookin’ good tonight.”

She shook her head and broke eye contact,
focusing on the red light. The driver had no way of knowing how she
looked. Her outfit was tight, but that was for safety reasons and
her hair was in a long braid down her back. She also wore her black
Nitro N-PSI Pump helmet and, just like the name implied, it was
pitch black and prevented him from getting a look at her face. The
driver only saw a chick on a bike. When the light turned green she
peeled off down the road, leaving the car and the driver in the
dust.

As she approached the five story building
where Trudy rented an office, she turned into the empty parking
lot. Either Lajos hadn’t made it yet or he was doing as she was,
parking somewhere else.

She went through the parking lot and around
the brick building to the back, where there were a few parking
spaces for deliveries. She led her bike to a row of dumpsters and
parked behind them, shielding it from view. She didn’t need any
officers coming by and getting nosey, wondering what a motorcycle
was doing parked near a building that was closed.

After shutting off the engine and getting off
her bike, she took off her helmet and set it on the seat. She
started to pull off her riding gloves but thought better of it.
Since she was going to snoop around a crime scene, it would be best
to leave the gloves on while she did it. No point in leaving her
fingerprints behind.

She trotted over to the back door. She didn’t
know how Lajos planned to get inside. Trudy may have even given him
a key, but she doubted he would be willing to let her go through
the front door with him. He’d already told her—firmly—to stay
home.

If she tried to go through the back door she
assumed some type of alarm system would go off. She looked at the
closest window to her. There were bars on the window. In fact there
were bars on all the first floor windows.

She took a few steps back and looked up. She
could use the grooves between the brick to scale the wall. The
second floor didn’t look that far away. If her hunch was right, the
first floor windows would be the only ones protected by an alarm.
There wasn’t really a need to put alarms or bars on the second
through fifth floor windows.

She put her gloved hand on the building. Nice
brick wall, which was always good when someone wanted to do some
scaling. Wood walls were a pain to climb and aluminum siding was
virtually impossible.

Easy-breezy.

She jumped to the first window. She brought
her foot up and placed it on the top of the window and, with a
small grunt, used her thigh muscles to help push down on her leg
while lifting the rest of her body up. She pressed close to the
wall and found the grooves between the bricks. Good thing her
leather boots weren’t the bulky kind. She’d stayed away from that
kind on purpose. The movies always showed bikers in big hulking
boots. She thought it was because the media always portrayed bikers
as bad-asses that went around stomping faces. If someone wanted to
do some head stomping, heavy boots would do the trick. But she
never was the head stomping type. She was the head kicking type and
for that she needed light feet.

She stuffed her toes between the bricks and
lifted her hands up to find another good spot. Once she found one,
she hauled herself up, continuing to scale the wall until she
reached the second story. She pushed on the glass, trying to open
the window. It wouldn’t budge. She tried again. Still no movement.
She peered at the lock.

Damn. Why the hell would anyone lock a
second story window?

Uh, dummy, so people won’t break in through
it.

She was too far to turn back now. She would
need to break it or try another window. She looked over to her
right. That window was closed, but it might be locked too. She
looked up. The window above was slightly open. She looked down.
While the second story didn’t seem that high off the ground, the
third story definitely was. If she fell she would be in some
serious pain, but unless she wanted to add vandalism to her rap
sheet, the third story it was.

It took her all of four minutes to make it up
to the third floor window. She undid the screen and let it drop to
the ground. On Monday it would appear as if a big gust of wind blew
out the already rickety screen. With that out of the way, she
climbed inside and looked around the dark room. Turning on the
light wasn’t an option. She didn’t need anyone seeing the light
from the street.

Once her eyes adjusted to the darkness she
was able to make out the desk and the rest of the office furniture.
She crossed through the office and opened the door slowly. She
peeked out to the hall—empty, which she expected. She trotted to
the end of the hall and opened another door that led to the stairs.
She ran down and went through the door with the number two on it.
She peeked down that hall again. Nothing.

She trotted down the hall and stopped in
front of Trudy’s business’ entrance. Someone had propped the door
up on its hinges and put up yellow tape to block the doorway. All
of which wasn’t enough to stop Meisha from entering. She pushed the
door aside and maneuvered under the tape and into the office.

The scene that greeted her was gruesome. Even
with just the street light coming in through the windows she could
see blood splattered across one of the desks and on part of the
wall. There was a dark stain on the floor. If she turned the light
on she was sure it would be red—blood red.

The thought of her best friend being trapped
in her back office, listening to someone get killed a few feet
away, made Meisha shudder. Trudy was so sweet. She’d never even
been in a fight before. But while Trudy was innocent in the ways of
torture and death, Meisha was the complete opposite.

Her dad had told her stories about how the
Yaruzi tortured their victims. Most people would find it odd that a
dad would tell his daughter stories of torture and death, but her
father had a reason behind it. He wanted Meisha to understand what
would happen to her and her family if the Yaruzi ever got their
hands on them again. He also taught Meisha how to take care of
herself in the event that they ever came after her. She didn’t have
any qualms about what she would have to do if they ever found
her.

She would kill them.

A hand grasped her shoulder. Her instincts
kicked in. With quick reflexes, Meisha brought her elbow across her
chest and then back, as hard as she could, and slammed it against
something solid.

“Holy fuck!” Lajos thundered. The elbow in
his chest hurt like hell. He reached for Meisha but she’d already
side-stepped out of the way.

She whipped around and jumped into a
defensive pose, standing with one foot behind her and holding her
tiny fist up, blocking her face.

He should be mad—real mad. Meisha had
attacked him in her apartment and, if that wasn’t enough, tied him
up after she’d knocked him out. He wasn’t going to tell anyone
about that or about how she’d planned to roll him out into her
courtyard for a public humiliation session. Andras would be able to
pull those thoughts from him, but as far as Lajos was concerned he
wouldn’t think about that ever again.

Plus, why would he focus on that when all he
could think about was how good she looked right now? Good maybe
wasn’t the right word. Fine. That was the right word.

She had smooth, light-brown skin and
black-as-night hair that fell to her breasts. She wore an all-black
leather outfit that hugged her petite frame. She was shorter than
he usually preferred his women, but she still had curves—the body
of a woman. At first glance she appeared to be a light-skinned
African-American woman, but by looking at her eyes he could tell
that she was mixed with something else, probably Chinese or
Japanese. Her eyes completed her exotic look, and they were trained
on him with a deadly glint.

When she saw it was him she relaxed, putting
her hands down.

“You attacked me—again,” he said.

She shrugged as if what he’d said wasn’t that
important. “Sorry, you shouldn’t be sneaking up on me.”

“I wasn’t trying to sneak up on you,
especially since you weren’t supposed to be here.” His rib cage
hurt like hell, but he wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of
rubbing the sore area in front of her.

She squinted, looking him up and down. “Hey,
your face and fingers. They healed.”

He ran a hand over his face. The broken nose
and fingers were minor injuries to his kind and didn’t take any
time at all to heal. He hadn’t expected to see her again. If he
knew she was going to come, he would’ve never stopped at that gas
station and wiped the blood from his face. He would’ve left it in
place for visual effects. “It wasn’t as bad as you thought.

“Humph. I know my skills. You had broken
bones.”

“Well, obviously you’re wrong.” He moved
passed her so she couldn’t focus on his old injuries anymore. “What
are you doing here anyway? I thought I told you to stay home,” he
said, changing the subject.

She followed him. “You did.”

“And?” he asked over his shoulder.

“
And
since you don’t own me, I decided
to do whatever I want.”

Chapter Five

“This is too dangerous. You shouldn’t go
around sticking your nose in matters that don’t involve you.”

“Sorry, nose firmly planted.” She walked past
him and over to where blood was painting someone’s desk red. “Do
you see all this? Whoever killed Mark sure did a number on him
first. Tru said they were torturing him, but damn.”

Lajos rubbed the side of his face. He needed
free rein to do his job and he hardly thought having a woman
snooping around would allow him to do that. He could tell her to
leave, but he doubted she would listen. He could push her to leave,
but he hated to do that to someone—even her. He’d started to at her
apartment but wanted to first try to reason with her and, though it
had taken forever, she’d finally untied him.

She looked down at her boot and then lifted
it to inspect the sole. “Ew, gross. I think I stepped in some of
it.”

He pulled her out of the puddle of blood.
Without the light on, her human eyes wouldn’t be able to see all
the blood on the floor. “You do know this is a crime scene don’t
you?”

“Yeah, one that the police have already
combed over.”

He looked down at the carpet. There were
tiny, blood-stained footprints from where she’d been walking. “Why
don’t you leave before you make a mess of things? You’re just in
the way. Plus you don’t know what to look for.”

She snorted. “Like you do.”

He raised a brow. “I oversee the security of
a multi-million dollar investment firm. I think I know what I’m
doing. What do you do?”

She turned away from him and crouched,
pretending to look over some papers on the floor. “I’m an online
teacher.”

“Wow. Go home.”

She shook her head. “Not until I find out who
is after Trudy and why. You said there might be clues here. I’m
here to find them.” She stood and glared at him. “So live with
it.”

She’s stubborn as hell. I have to push her
to leave.

He mentally prepared himself for the task.
His wolf whined.

What’s the matter with you
? he asked
his wolf.
You’ve been absent all this time. She kicked our ass,
tied us up and was about to kick our ass again and you’re upset
because I asked her to leave?

His wolf sent him pictures of Meisha in a
bed, her hair spilling around her face and shoulders. Her perky
breasts full and round, with erect brown nipples.

Lajos’ breath picked up a notch.
Why did
you have to go and do that?