Here Kitty, Kitty! (24 page)

“So, Sugar, your tattoo.  When did you get it?”

“During my out-of-control youth.  For protection.  Your grandmother would understand.”

“You were up to all sorts of stuff back in the day, huh?”  He finished taking care of her wounds, moved the first aid supplies off the bed, and settled in next to her.

“You have no idea.”  She threw her arm over his chest, her head against his shoulder.  “But that was a long time ago, Hillbilly.  I’m a different person now.”

He pushed her wet hair out of her face, “What made you change?”

“Fear of prison.”  She sounded drowsy and he knew she’d be asleep soon.

So he found the sudden roaring coming from the woods behind his house really kind of annoying.

“Go.”

“What?”

“With your brothers.  That’s them, isn’t it?”

Not even close, but he wouldn’t expect her to know that and he didn’t want her to worry.

“Go.”

“You sure?”

“Are you going to France?”

“What?  No.”

“Then fuckin’ go,” she spoke without any malice or anger.  Instead, she rolled on to her back, wincing a bit as the sheets rubbed against her wounded ass.  “Go.  Do.  Whatever tigers do at night.  When you get back, I’ll be here.”

She didn’t cling.  She didn’t need him to hold her through the night until she fell asleep.  In fact, he got the feeling she wanted some time alone.  It suddenly occurred to him this woman didn’t need him.  She wanted him, but she didn’t need him.  She didn’t need him to survive.  She didn’t need him to make her life better.

Angelina Santiago where have you been all my life?

***

Nik straddled her hips, “You’re amazing.”

She stretched, enjoying how he looked at her.  Really enjoying how he felt on top of her.  “Aren’t I though?”

He kissed her and for a second she thought he wouldn’t be going anywhere.  He pulled away, giving her one more kiss on the neck.  “One sweep around, maybe a deer, then I’ll be back.”

“A deer?”

“I told ya.  I get hungry after that kind of fuckin’.”

“Charming.”

“Yeah.  You are.”  He kissed her again.  Then shifted.  Right on her lap.

“Okay.  If that becomes a habit, you’re going to start freakin’ me out.”  Nik licked her cheek, dived off the bed, and out the window.

Angie turned over, the sheet wrapped tight around her.

Well, she’d gone and done it.  Fallen for a shapeshifting hillbilly who had no desire to attach himself to one woman.  And since she didn’t share…

Whatever…she wouldn’t worry about that now.  Not with that hand slapping over her mouth.  And she barely had time to struggle before they sprayed her face with something smelling like peppermint.  The last thing she saw…eyes reflecting at her in the darkness.

***

Nik followed those growls.  He smelled tiger, but he couldn’t place it as any kin or even a neighbor.  Something wasn’t right, which meant Angie wasn’t safe.

He hadn’t gotten far from the house when he found it.  A top-of-the-line portable CD player with surround sound and next to it a modified scent dispenser.

Staring at it for only a moment, Nik turned around and started back to the house.  But he didn’t get far because they came out of the trees.  Quietly.  Moving as if they had all the time in the world.  She-wolves.  Smart.  Mean.  And one look at them told him they were as vicious as they come.

They didn’t move on him, though.  They watched him as he watched them.  But he couldn’t ignore that scent.  Not the wolves.  Not even the manufactured tiger scent.  Something else all together.

A gestating female.  A human one.

He spun around.  She stood there.  A black girl.  Cute.  Short.  She looked familiar.  And in front of her a good-sized black wolf.  It took him a moment to realize scars covered one side of the she-wolf’s face.

“Hey, sunshine.”  The black girl shook her head, causing her mass of shaggy curls to drop into her eyes.  “All I can say is… your boys snatched the wrong girl.”

She raised a rifle.  Nik let loose his threatening growl, charging the wolf protecting her, preparing to drop them both on their asses.  But like Angie said, her friends were fast and brutal.

An explosion in his brain flipped him back.  Then nothing.

Chapter Sixteen

She forced her eyes open.  Her head throbbed.  Her back hurt.  She felt a slight pain in her upper shoulder.  She sat up, slowly, and kept her eyes turned away from the large windows that had bright morning light streaming through them.

She waited until she felt like she could look around without throwing up, then she took in the room.  It was her room.  In Sara’s house.

“I’ll kill her.”  She’d kill them both.

She dragged herself out of bed, stumbling as soon as her bare feet touched the carpet.  Leaning against the bed frame, she took a few seconds to let the nausea pass.  Who knew what wacky, untested, non-FDA-approved shit Miki Kendrick had used on her.  She reached up and touched her head. 
Thank God.
  She still had her hair.  She glanced down at herself.  Gold sweatpants and T-shirt.  Well, at least the bitches got the color coordination right.

She took several steadying breaths.  Once she had herself under control, she walked out of her room.

Angie didn’t have to seek her friends out.  She only had to follow the yelling.  Not surprisingly, they were in the kitchen where the wolves seemed to congregate.

No one noticed as she walked in, so she let the swinging door close, and leaned against the doorjamb.  She waited.

“Tell me where he is, Sara.  Now!”

Angie recognized that look on Sara’s face.  Her “I’m not budging” look.  Zach could yell until he was blue in the face, but it wouldn’t make a difference.  Sara wouldn’t tell Zach anything until Sara wanted to.

Conall slammed his hand on the kitchen counter.  “Tell him, Miki!”

“I said I don’t know!”

Zach turned on her.  “How could you not know?”

“
Cause I don’t know
!”  Miki wasn’t lying.  Angie could tell.  Sara kept her out of at least that much so this wouldn’t blow up between her and Conall.

Zach ran his hands through his hair as he paced around the kitchen.  “If you two think tigers are an easy take down, your nuts.  And they protect their own.  Trust me when I say they’re headin’ this way.  Now…
tell me where the fuck he is!”

“I said I don’t know! 
And stop yelling at me!”

In exasperation, Conall turned away from his mate and toward her.  In surprise, “Angie?”  They all turned to look at her.  “How ya feelin’, hon?”

“Like I’ve been drugged.”

Conall’s face turned red as he swung on Miki.  “
Miki!”

“Hey!  You said I couldn’t drug you.  You didn’t say anything about drugging anybody else.  Besides, I invented a cool new aerosol.  It smells and tastes like peppermint!”

Zach snarled.  A sound that made Angie want to back up out of the room.  Even Miki didn’t test him.  Only one woman existed who thought it just fine and dandy to play with the man…

Sara stood up, the chair scraping against the floor.  “Don’t think for a second I don’t know the part you played in this.  And don’t think you can scare me.  You want the motherfucker so bad, you be a fuckin’ bloodhound and track his ass down.”

Angie didn’t believe this.  What the hell was Sara thinking?  How the hell could she do this to Nik?  What if he were lying somewhere really hurt?  Did she take him somewhere or did she kill him?  Question upon question swirled through Angie’s brain.  Questions she didn’t have answers for.  And the more unanswered questions that came up, the angrier she got.

Years of anger management went out the window as she launched herself at Sara.  Her hands wrapped around her throat and Sara snarled, lips drawing back over bright white fangs.  Sara drew her fist back to punch Angie in the face, but before either female could do even a modicum of damage, Zach had Sara and Conall dragged Angie back.

The two women glared at each other, both taking in deep gasps of air.

Zach looked at Conall.  “Let’s everybody calm down…”  He released his hold on Sara as Conall let her go.  Within seconds they were back at each other.  Hands wrapped around each others’ throats.

Then Miki was there.  Short she may be, but the woman knew how to handle two crazy bitches in a fight.  She took handfuls of hair and snatched them both down to her level.

“Listen to me, cause I’m only saying this once.  You two bitches back the fuck off or you’ll both wake up tomorrow completely hairless…you remember how that feels, don’t ya, Ang?”

“Yeah, but she…”

“She started this…”

Miki yanked their hair harder.  She had them both twisted in such a way that neither of them could turn to snap her little neck.

“Maybe I wasn’t fuckin’ clear…,” she twisted her fists tighter.

“Okay!  Okay!”

She shoved Sara away.  “Go run or do whatever dog thing you need to do, but when you get back here, you better be fuckin’ rational.”

Sara opened her mouth to argue.

“Hair,” Miki barked.

Growling, Sara threw open the sliding door, shifted, shook off her clothes, and ran.

Miki released Angie.  “Could you guys please excuse us.”

Stunned and a little wary, both men left.  Angie rubbed her head where her best friend almost ripped her hair out.

“She…”

Miki held up her hand.  “Before you even start, let me say one thing to you.  When Zach first showed up to get Sara, the Alphas thought about taking her.  Just taking her and turning her.  If that had happened…what would you have done?  Honestly.”

They both knew the answer.  They both knew Angie wouldn’t have rested until she made sure every shapeshifting bastard in the Continental United States ended up dead for taking her best friend.

Angie took a deep breath.  Then another.  “Just tell me…is he alive?”

Miki nodded.  “Of course he is.  She wanted to make a point.  Not murder anybody…at least, ya know, not anymore.  So he’s definitely alive.  But I don’t know where he is.”

Angie walked out of the kitchen, leaving Miki standing there.  She went back to her room and grabbed up her cell phone.  They’d taken all her stuff when they snatched her back.  Her new clothes dumped in a corner the way dogs will do.  They even brought her baseballs and bat.

A man answered, “Yo?”

“Derek.  It’s me.”

“Hey, beautiful.  Haven’t heard from you in awhile.”

“Been busy.  Look, I have a job for you.  I need you to find something for me.  Something big.”

***

Nik slowly opened his eyes.  His head throbbed.  His entire body throbbed.  He hurt all over.

He glanced down at himself.  He was still tiger.  He hadn’t shifted back.  And he didn’t think he’d be able to.  At least, not for awhile.  Nor was he dead.  When that crazy wolf-lover pulled the trigger he thought for sure he was dead.  But instead she tranquilized him with something. 
Damn geniuses
.  They should keep them in special homes were they could do the least damage.

And where the hell was Angie?

Nik pushed himself up, but his back slammed into something.  He blinked, forcing his eyes to focus.  He looked around.  Blinked again.  Then looked around again.

I can’t be…they wouldn’t…

“Well, well.  Look who’s up.  How ya feelin’, big fella?  I bet you’re hungry.”

Nik turned his head toward the male voice trying to soothe him.

“Man, you’re huge.  It’s going to cost us a fortune to feed you, huh?”

Nik closed his eyes.  He couldn’t look at the man anymore.  Not because of the man, but because of the shirt he wore.  The shirt with “Northport Zoo” etched over the front pocket in bright orange.

Those crazy bitches put me in a zoo.

***

Angie looked at her phone, but realized she’d heard a knock at the door.  Her frustration mounted as the day moved on.  She couldn’t find any of Nik’s kin.  None of his siblings answered at the numbers Nik programmed into her phone in case of emergency.

She didn’t want to panic.  Because with her, panic would lead to anger.  And the last thing she wanted to do right now was stab her friend in the face.

“Yeah?”

Zach stuck his head in, “You okay, Ang?”

She nodded and motioned him in with a wave of her hand.  “The question is, are you?”

He shrugged as he leaned against the wall.  Angie could see how much Sara’s anger hurt him.  True, the pair seemed to argue all the time, but always with a smile or a grope.  But Sara had no teasing smile now.  No soft caresses on the back of his neck.  Nope.  Sara was really and truly pissed off.

“I’m okay,” he lied.

“She’ll get over this, Zach.”

He winced, “You sure?”

“I know the crazy bitch.  Whatever she’s got going on, she’s gotten it out of her system.  We both have.”