A Jaguars Touch (8 page)

“Murphy and Finn will leave last with Griffin. They’ll be transporting Dillon,” Tah said.

“I still say we should just snap the bastard’s neck and be done with it,” Murphy said.

Vic felt Gideon tense beside her at the mention of Dillon, and she squeezed his hand with hers.

“He has answers, and he will give them to us,” Tah said. “Until he does, Dillon will remain very much alive.” He looked over at Gideon. “And you’re more than welcome to come along.”

“We could use a man with your skills in the lab,” Abby added.

Gideon shook his head. “I’ll be moving on as soon as you do.”

Vic did her best to ignore the looks that came her way. She knew Gideon was leaving. His words weren’t a surprise. They were having sex, not a relationship. Hell, she’d only spent one night with him. One night shouldn’t be fucking with her head. She loosened her grip on his hand and barely contained her surprise when he squeezed her hand this time. She refused to glance his way, though. She couldn’t trust herself not to giveaway how much she didn’t want to be reminded of him leaving.

“Gideon is the reason we know more, now,” the Professor stated. “He’s rewritten several of our testing codes and we’re pulling out information we really need instead of trying to ascertain what we need from the more ambiguous tests we were running.”

“That will only work for so long,” Gideon warned.

“What do you mean?” Abby asked.

“You have two people working in your lab, running tests. You have no idea what you’re up against. The hunters you’re facing? Despite what you might have seen at the Blane Farms I heard you visited, hunters are a very well-organized machine with many sites specifically designated for research,” Gideon said.

“Tell us,” Tah ordered.

“I understand you know a bit about where the feral cat fever virus Dillon had access to came from,” Gideon said.

“Clara’s uncle brought it back with him,” Logan answered.

Gideon nodded. “Thomas was attacked and captured. They tortured him for days. Strategically placed cuts, puncture wounds, beatings. You name it. All to see how long it took to heal. To see what he couldn’t heal from.”

“Bastards,” Murphy muttered.

“I’ve heard of a time when they severed limbs just to see if they’d grow back,” Gideon added.

“Jesus Christ,” Reno muttered.

“Trust me when I say the hunters with guns who merely want to kill us are the least we should worry about,” Gideon informed them.

“Thomas wasn’t the only one captured,” Abby said softly.

Vic jerked her head to look at Gideon and knew Abby was right by the way he stood, the way he held his head.

“Those labs are hell on Earth,” Gideon said and finally tugged his hand free.

Vic watched him along with everyone else as he began pacing around the room.

“I was there when Thomas was captured and brought in,” Gideon said. “They kept us locked in cages when we weren’t being used for testing.”

“Cages?” Abby whispered.

“We’re animals to them. Not human,” Gideon stated.

“What tests did they run?” Tah asked.

Gideon shook his head. “Things that would give you nightmares. Things no man or animal should ever be submitted to. Feral fever is only one of their pet projects. They have an entire department devoted to discovering ways to biologically fuck with us.”

“Such as?” the Professor asked.

Gideon stopped walking and turned to face Vic. His gaze locked with hers, as if he needed the connection to keep talking. She wanted to go to him, to cross and wrap him in her arms, but her feet were rooted to the ground.

“For entertainment, they would inject us with different things and make us fight one another. Hallucinogens they were working on, adrenaline boosters, variations of feral fever—anything they wanted to test. Then they’d sit back and watch.”

“Until?” Vic asked, knowing there was more.

His gaze met hers. “Until one of us won.”

Chapter Six

Gideon scanned the room, taking in the faces of those around him. What would they think of him if they knew the whole truth? Thomas had been so afraid shifters would blame him for the things he’d been forced to watch and even participate in. But Gideon was tired of pretending to be someone he wasn’t.

“Oh, Gideon,” Abby said. “How long were you there?”

Horror—that was what he saw. And concern. There was no hate, not with these people. And knowing that made him wonder if he might be able to tell them everything. Maybe began to heal parts of him that had been broken for a long time.

“Two years,” he said.

“How did they get you?” the Professor asked him.

“I was young, cocky and arrogant. I walked right into a trap and didn’t even realize it until I woke up in a cage. They brought in a dozen more of us over the next couple days. And that was when the fun began.”

“There’s no shame in surviving,” Reno said, and it was as if the other man knew the things Gideon had been forced to do, the lives he’d ended.

“You left with Thomas?” Logan asked.

Gideon nodded. “They were planning to make us fight one another. They didn’t know I’d grown up in the same area as Thomas—that I knew him. They injected Thomas with fever, a new strain they’d been working on. Within minutes, he’d killed the three men with him and ripped my cage open to free me, as well.” He didn’t want to remember that time in his life. There were ghosts from then that still haunted him—bloodstains on his hands he’d never be able to wash off. He shoved the past back down. “We escaped and made it home.” Not exactly the story Thomas had told his family, but Gideon was telling the truth. It was more than time for it.

“When did Thomas get the vials of fever?” the Professor asked.

“Later, when he was captured again. Unfortunately, it wasn’t by the right group of hunters. So all he was able to get was the original strain of feral cat fever,” Gideon admitted.

“Are you saying Thomas allowed himself to be captured?” Logan asked, and Gideon could see the other man was pissed.

He understood why. Logan was Clara’s mate, and though the things Gideon, Thomas and Michael had done were needed, Clara had been hurt by them.

“Easy,” Reno said and put his hand on Logan’s shoulder.

The gesture reminded Gideon so much of Thomas and Michael. He could easily see himself and his best friends in Tah, Reno and Logan. Logan was so much like Clara’s father Michael that Gideon never questioned their mating. He wondered if she realized it, or if she’d lost Michael too soon to really know the man her father was. Reno was more like him while Tah was an unjaded version of Thomas. God, he hoped they made better choices than Gideon and his friends had.

“I’m saying we did what we needed to,” Gideon finally said.

“We? You and Thomas?” Abby asked, but Gideon looked away.

“Michael was part of this, too, wasn’t he?” Logan demanded, surging to his feet. “So Clara lost her father, and her uncle’s missing? For what? Some vials?”

“Clara’s lost a lot less than most,” Gideon all but roared. “Entire families have been wiped out.”

“Ease up,” Tah ordered, and though his voice was leashed, Gideon could hear the authority in it. It gave him hope for the future.

“You and Thomas were working with the fever, weren’t you?” the Professor interrupted, cutting through the tension with his question. “Dillon stole it, but he didn’t create it.”

Gideon nodded. “We were trying to recreate some of the variations they’d managed to make with it, to see if we could study them.”

“You were trying to find a way to make shifters immune to its effects?” Abby asked.

“That’s always been the plan,” Gideon said. He prowled the room. “We were close, so close. Thomas did most of the work with the samples, mixing them and creating new strains. I managed the tests, compiled data and watched for anything that might come close to the results we were looking for. One day, Thomas was late. I went to grab one of the samples and realized there were a lot missing, more than should be.”

“Dillon,” Murphy muttered.

“Yes,” Gideon agreed. “I didn’t realize he was drugging Lydia.” He shook his head, letting the guilt hit him. “Honestly, I didn’t think much of her, at all. She wasn’t important to me, and for that, I’m sorry.”

“What happened to Thomas?” Logan asked and Gideon was relieved they weren’t calling him out.

“I don’t know,” Gideon said. “I really don’t. He was acting strange the last few times I was with him. I thought we’d been working too hard. We were close, or at least, it felt like we were getting close. I had to leave for a bit. I told him to take off, go for a run. He wasn’t there when I got back, and I could tell something was up.”

“Did he plan to be captured again?” Tah asked.

“No,” Gideon said. “But that doesn’t mean he didn’t find the opportunity and take it.”

“Do you know what strain Dillon used on Lydia?” Abby asked.

“I have my suspicions,” Gideon admitted. “ And no, I can’t save her. I’m surprised she’s lasted this long.”

“You’re going after him,” Vic said, and his hellcat looked angry. “That’s why you brought Ariel and Griffin here. You weren’t searching for Clara. You knew where she was. You brought them here to leave them, as well.”

“The safest place for them is with this group,” Gideon said. He turned to Tah. “With you.”

“Gideon,” Vic said.

“I’ve told you all I can,” Gideon said, ignoring her and focusing on Tah. “I think my time here would be better spent with Diane in the labs.”

Tah nodded and, without glancing at anyone else in the room, Gideon turned and left.

Vic watched him walk out the door. She’d tried to catch his gaze, but he kept it diverted. Her heart was breaking for him. She wanted to follow him, to comfort him, and wasn’t that a shock.

“This is much bigger than we could have ever imagined,” Reno said into the hush that had fallen over the room with Gideon’s exit.

“Yeah,” Tah agreed.

“He’s going after him,” Vic said. “Gideon. He’s going after Thomas. That’s why he’s not staying.”

“I’d do the same,” Reno said. “For a friend. For a brother. Any of us would.”

“Damn straight,” Murphy agreed.

Vic was reminded of when they’d done just that. When Finn had gone off on his own and nearly been killed before Murphy and Zane had found him.

“Gideon’s the one who discovered the anomaly in Logan’s blood,” the Professor stated. “Diane and I both missed it.”

“What anomaly?” Vic asked, but she remembered Clara telling her Logan had recessed shifter DNA similar to Finn.

“Apparently, I have a shifter in my gene pool somewhere,” Logan admitted, finally sitting back down next to Reno. “That’s why the feral fever hasn’t left my system, yet.”

“Makes sense,” Vic said.

“Looks like Finn and I are in the same boat at the moment,” Logan stated. “No idea if or when our animals will emerge.”

“But we’ll be keeping an eye on it,” the Professor replied.

“Yeah, I know,” Logan groaned. “You’ll want more blood.”

Chuckles sounded and some of the tension eased from the room. Logan was good at doing that, always had been.

“At least, we have a better idea of what we’re up against, now,” Reno finally said.

“We need to get our hands on some of those vials of feral fever,” the Professor said.

“You would think that,” Vic said.

“He’s right.” Abby surprised her by agreeing. “Right now all we have to go on is how it works in the blood once it’s been injected. At that point, it’s diluted, mutated in a way that’s specific to the individual. There’s no way to test it outside of that. But if we had a vial of it, we might be able to do research along the lines of what Gideon and Thomas were working on.”

“We’ll see what options we have once we get to Riverton,” Tah said. “We’re going to stick with the current plan. We’ll re-evaluate once we get there.”

“We need more people,” Reno stated.

“Yes, we do,” Tah agreed. “Orsai can help with that. He said he’d spread the word among other shifters as he travels.”

“You want to let everyone know where we’re headed?” Murphy said. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

Tah sighed. “I think it’s time for someone to take a stand. No more running. No more acting like prey.”

“So we go to war,” Vic stated. War she knew, understood. War she could handle.

“No,” Tah said, and Vic watched his gaze move to linger on his mate and child. “We dig in. We make a home, not just for ourselves but for anyone who needs one. We train. We learn. We prepare. And the next time they come looking for us, we stand our ground.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Logan said.

“We have to be willing to be as cold-blooded as they are,” Murphy added. “No holding back.”

“I know,” Tah agreed.

“Don’t forget about Dillon,” Vic reminded them. “We move and open our doors, we need to be damn sure we’re not inviting the enemy in with us.”

“Exactly what I was thinking,” Reno agreed. “We need to remain cautious.”

“Our inner circle stays together,” Tah stated. “Abby and I, Reno and Amia, Logan and Clara, Zane and Diane, Holt, Kenzie, Vic and the Professor.”

“Ariel and Griffin?” Vic asked.

“Use caution for now. I don’t know them well enough to trust them,” Tah said. “And I won’t have my mate and child around people I can’t trust with their lives.”

“Agreed,” Reno said.

“What about Kenzie’s mate?” Abby asked. “What if Holt ends up mating? Or Vic?”

Vic shook her head, but Tah spoke before she could.

“We’ll discuss it if and when it happens,” Tah said. “As for Gabriel… I’d say he’s already proven himself with the job he does, with the way he protected Zane and Diane. We may not like the choice he made to leave Kenzie. But none of us have walked in his shoes.”

“What did he say when you spoke to him?” Vic asked. She didn’t know if the others had already heard about the conversation, but Kenzie was her friend, too. And she wanted answers. “Other than the information about Riverton, Oklahoma?”

“He asked me to make sure we looked out for Kenzie and kept her safe. I could see how much it was killing him to walk away from her. Zane noticed the same thing. And we both picked up on the fact Gabriel felt as if he didn’t have a choice,” Tah added. “I’m guessing we’re all finally starting to see why he felt that way.”