Walker (Bowen Boys) (19 page)

“He’ll be stubborn, Walker. He won’t
listen and he’ll try to do things his way. Please make him understand that I
know what I’m doing. He has to trust me.”

Walker knew she was right. Right about
Khan not listening to them, and also that he had to trust her. But he wouldn’t.
And Walker was terrified that Khan would get them both hurt.

“I’ll tell him. I’ll even threaten him.
But you have to be ready for that, all right? You have to be ready for him to
be the Khan we all know and love.” She laughed and pulled away. “I know, you
have to get going. But tell me again that you love me.”

“I love you. Now get dressed, we have to
go.”

He drove this time and loved the way her
truck handled. When she turned off the radio he glanced over at her. She had
her phone out and was tapping on the screen. Suddenly, the cab of the truck was
filled with voices.

“Okay. I want team one to be at the
place where I’m supposed to go and team two at the warehouse.” She winked at
him. “Walker and I are on our way to your parents’ house to tell them what we
know. Are there any questions?”

The phone was on speaker and he could
hear his brothers laughing and making several suggestions on what they wanted
to do to the men they were going after. They were nervous; he could hear it in
their tones and the way they didn’t seem to want to take this seriously. But he
knew that they would once it was go time.

The meeting with his parents was short. They
needed to get going and they both seemed to know it. When his dad hugged
Caitlynne, she hugged him back and Walker realized that his cat didn’t seem to
mind. When he purred along his skin Walker wrapped his arms around both his
parents as well as Caitlynne and knew that both he and his cat needed this.

“Bring him back to me, dear. I want him
here so I can kick his bottom for getting caught so we had to do this.”

Caitlynne nodded.

“And you had better come back to us as
well. I want to see grandchildren. We want to bounce them on our knees before
we’re too old to enjoy it.”

“I will. I’ll make sure that he comes
back to you whole and his usual sarcastic self.” Caitlynne gave a short bark of
laughter. “Maybe he might like me after this. Who knows?”

When they were about a mile from the
warehouse they parked the truck. She opened the seat up, handed him a Glock,
and took out two for herself. She helped him out by showing him how to keep it
on him and not get a track cut when he had to use it.

“When this is done I’m going to make
sure all of you know how to use a gun. You may not ever need it again, I hope
not anyway, but if we stick around here, I don’t want them to freak out when I
come in the house armed.” He nodded. “I don’t want to have to quit my job,
Walker. I’m really good at it and I love it.”

“Why would you even think that I’d want
you to? You are good at this, and I’m reasonably sure that someone is going to
have to run the program now that Garrett is gone.” Walker wanted her home, fat
with child, but he didn’t know what he’d do if someone told him he couldn’t be
a doctor. “You get my brother out safely, and you as well. We’ll talk about
places to live, jobs, and other things later.”

“And kids? Do you want them too? We
never talked about that.”

He kissed her instead of answering her
and she turned to the building. “Go. Go and finish this. I have a desire to
take you to bed again and make love to you all night.”

She turned to walk toward the building,
but came back. Her mouth covered his and he pressed her against the truck. He
loved this woman and didn’t know what he’d do without her if something went
wrong in there.

Chapter Fifteen

Khan woke, but kept his head down. He
hurt in more places than he thought there were names for. Listening to the
sounds around him he realized that he wasn’t alone. There were at least two
other humans with him. He tried to judge just how far they were from him and he
couldn’t with all the other sounds going on in the room.

He thought they were in a large
warehouse. And from the sounds and smells, he’d say it had been closed for some
time. He could smell dirt and neglect. And the two men with him had a scent of
death and sex. He tried to focus on what they were saying, but he hurt too
badly. Letting his body go, he slipped away from them and deep into his cat to
let him heal too.

The next time he woke he knew that at
least one of the men had left the area. Khan could smell burgers and greasy
fries on top of the odor of something more. Beer or something close to it. He
felt his belly rebel at the smells and tried to take deep breaths in his nose
so as not to be sick. But he had figured out one thing, the man was in front of
him about ten feet away.

Khan took an inventory of his injuries. He
wasn’t hurting nearly as badly as the first time he’d awakened, but he was
still hurt. He could see the white plastic strips around his wrists and when he
tried to move his feet, he could feel them biting into his flesh there as well.
With them being so tight around his wrists and ankles he couldn’t shift. If he
did and they didn’t break, he would sever off one, if not all, of his
appendages.

He raised his head slowly when he heard
a soft snore. The man was sleeping in a chair with his head resting on the
table in front of him. There were several fast food bags in front of him and
some of his food had hit the floor and two rats were grabbing up what they
could. Khan quietly snarled his cat at them and they took off quickly. If only
he could do the same for the man.

There was a window to his right that
showed him it was twilight out. He reached for one of his brothers, but the
pain in his head was too great and he had to stop. Looking around the rest of
the room, he saw a door as well as a large garage door. He had an idea where he
might be, but without seeing the outside of the building, he couldn’t be sure. When
the door opened he dropped his head again and listened while the newcomer
yelled at the other man for sleeping.

“What the fuck does it matter? He’s
still out. I told you not to hit him that hard, that we should have just shot
him to bring him down.” The laughter of the two men had his skin crawl. “He
sure is a big one. I’d hate to fuck with him man to man. He’s probably fucking
McCray hard, don’t you think?”

He didn’t much care for them talking
about his brother’s mate that way. He didn’t like her either, but no one messed
with his family. He started to raise his head when he smelled cat. Panther.

The door opened with a bang and there
she stood as if brought to life simply by talking about her. Khan didn’t want
to be impressed by her, but she looked like she could kick ass and still want
to know where to go for dinner. She looked over at him and winked. He nearly
looked behind him to see who she was looking at.

“Hello, honey. Are you all right?”

Khan nodded, not sure what else to do
when she asked.

“Good. These nice men are going to let
you go and then we—”

“I don’t think so. You stay away from
him.”

Khan hadn’t realized that she’d been
moving toward him until the fatter man had stopped her.

“And he isn’t going anywhere until
you’re right where we want you.”

At first, Khan tried to ignore the touch
of his mind. He was too busy trying to figure out how to save the dumbass woman
in front of him and get them both out alive. When he realized it was Walker, he
snarled at him to leave him the fuck alone.

“She’s trying to help you, you jackass.
Now listen to me.”

Khan told his brother she was going to
get them killed when Walker laughed.

“Not likely. She wants to know if you
have anything wrapped around your ankles or feet. She can’t see them.”

“Plastic strips like at my wrists. I can’t
shift.”
He waited for Walker to say something like he was coming to get him when he
spoke again.

“She said when she comes toward you not
to snarl at her, but to act like you’re me. Those men think that they have her
lover and they told her that they’re going to trade you for her.”

“She’s not thinking she can take these
two on, is she? She doesn’t even have a gun on her, and they have…”
He counted.
“They
have five guns on them that I can see.”

“You may not like her, but she’s the
only hope you have of coming out alive. And when she helps you, she said not to
move until she tells you to. She said to tell you that she doesn’t have time to
make sure you’re not killed while she’s taking care of the bad guys
.” Walker
laughed.
“Actually, she said humans, but I didn’t want to piss you off.”

He was pissed. Pissed to think that she
of all people thought she could save him. When she started toward him again, he
saw her body move and knew that she wasn’t armed at all. She leaned to him and
her mouth was a breath away. “Don’t move.” Her hand moved along his wrist and
he felt the pressure of the plastic let go. Then she slipped something into his
freed hand. When she moved her mouth close to his, she whispered again. “For
you.”

The kiss was brief and he felt her slip
something into his mouth. He didn’t know what it was, but it had a metallic
taste. Khan put it in his cheek and waited. When she stopped in front of him,
he looked down at the small knife under his hand.

She’d cut his tie and had given him a
way of getting free. When she didn’t move but continued to talk to the idiots
in front of them, he reached over and cut the other strip. He wasn’t sure how
to cut the ones at his ankles when she moved from out in front of him.

“Caitlynne said to tell you to not move.
She said if you do, you could get both of you killed.”
His brother
sounded terrified. He didn’t blame him; so was he.

“Where are you and when are you coming
in to save us? She can’t possibly think that she can do this on her own.”

Walker laughed.
“She does and she
will. We’re close, but not inside the building. She doesn’t know how to tell if
someone is human or not. I can’t tell from here.”

Khan felt the hair on his arms dance and
his cat snarl at him when the men aimed their guns at her.
“They’re going to
kill her. I have to do something.”

“No.”
His brother wasn’t there; he
couldn’t see the danger she was in.
“Khan, you’ll get her killed.”

He watched them speaking and reached
down and cut the strips from his ankles. When they were cut, he put his hands
back on the armrests and waited. When Lynne turned to look at him, one of the
men raised their weapons and pointed it at her. Khan moved just as she did.

Khan hit the floor when Lynne’s body
slammed against his. He looked at the two men and saw that one was leaning
against the wall with blood trickling from his forehead and the other man was
lying down as well. Neither of them moved when he dumped Lynne off him.

“What the fuck were you doing? I told
you to stay still.”

He walked over to the two men and checked
their pulse as Lynne continued to berate him.

“You fucking bastard, you were told I
had this under control.”

He turned to look at her and saw she had
been shot. “Christ. What the hell happened?”

“What the fuck does it look liked
happened? I had to move so you wouldn’t get your dumb ass killed. You couldn’t
die.” He looked at the two dead men and back at her as she loaded another clip
into her gun. “They were going to kill you when you moved and I promised your
mom I’d bring you back.”

The blood was pouring from her chest. Her
abdomen too. She’d leapt in front of him, he remembered, and not behind him
like he’d screamed at her to do. The one in her chest would have caught him in
the heart had she not—

“Look at me, Lynne. You need to pledge
to me. Right now, you need to pledge to me.” He jerked her face to his when she
closed her eyes. He could hear her heart slowing and she was losing blood fast.

“Now? I don’t think so. I’m tired. Tell
Walker I’m sorry.” She was sounding far away and he was afraid for her.

“Pledge to me. Now.” She looked at him,
her eyes fading. He could hear her breaths slowing. “Please, Lynne, now, or I
can’t bring your cat to save you.”

“You can’t save me, dickhead. Why would
you want to?”

He looked up when four cats entered the
room, one of them a large white Bengal. Khan looked down at her as Walker came
toward them as a human with a medical bag in his hand. Khan was terrified it
was too late for anything he might have in that bag.

Her voice was low, but he heard it. With
those two little words, he commanded her cat to come forth. It was a horrible
and extremely painful way to shift, but she would have a chance if she shifted.
When her cat began to appear he watched her still. He just hoped he wasn’t too
late.

~~~

Warren looked at the man sitting chained
to the table. He wasn’t much of a man, short and thin, but he had a wealth of
information. He glanced down at the yellow pad that he’d been taking notes on
then back at the man.