I’d thoroughly screwed up my chances with my mate, and I’d thrown away my career to boot. What else could go wrong?
A leaking water pipe in the apartment above mine.
If Laleesha had still been in danger, it would have been a no-brainer. Water damage to my stuff or not, I wasn’t leaving her. But she wasn’t in danger, and she didn’t want to see me. I’d smelled her fear and disbelief when I told her I was a bear.
Hanging around town for no other reason than the hope of glimpsing her in the store window when I walked past wasn’t moving my life forward. Dealing with the water damage would at least give me something productive to do.
Besides, I needed to pack up anyway. There was nothing for me in the city anymore.
The property manager had warned me she had to enter my apartment. She hadn’t told me the full extent of the damage. My sofa, ruined. The area rugs, likewise. What the hell had the upstairs neighbors been doing, filling their living room as if it were a swimming pool?
I loaded up everything worth salvaging in a U-Haul truck and took it to Arquinta, where I rented a storage unit. It was close enough I could get to it if I needed it. The big if. Because everything was up in the air until my mate was able to come to terms with shifter reality. She might still want nothing to do with me, but I was counting on things going my way.
After all, she’d practically begged me to claim her. The memory of her saying “Fuck me” gave me a happy ending pretty much every night. I could wait as long as it took for her to come around. And if she never did—well, I couldn’t face that possibility yet. Just the thought was enough to leach all the color from my world.
So I got my belongings stashed away and took care of my financial business. I’d worked for Bear long enough I didn’t have to worry about finding another job unless I wanted to work. At the moment my job was keeping an eye on my mate.
It took longer than I expected, but finally I made it back to Nowhere, rolling in late one night after dark. It was a good thing I’d kept my cabin at the B&B rented. Otherwise I’d have had to roust them out of bed.
All during the drive I’d been on edge. Too many days without sight of my mate, I told myself. I didn’t want to think there might be some actual reason for my uneasiness.
An adrenaline burst shot through my veins when I drove past the market and the lights were still on. Of course I pulled in next to the mayor’s SUV to see what was up.
The front door was unlocked. The mayor and her wife huddled with Sophie behind the sales counter, the three of them staring at the cash register. While the mayor gave me a “what the hell was I doing there” look, Sophie broke off what she was saying and turned to me. “Laleesha’s gone.”
“What happened?” I asked crisply.
My years of investigative work took over: Get the facts before coming to any conclusions. My bear wasn’t having it. He was certain Laleesha was in trouble and wanted to tear out after her, even though he had no idea where that was. Ignoring him, I tended to the matter at hand.
“I left Laleesha minding the store.” Sophie waved her hand at the register. “I came back to this. And Laleesha’s gone.”
The antique cash register was open. All the bills had been taken. The coins had been left.
“Did you check in the house for her?” I asked.
Sophie’s eyes turned in the direction of the house as though she had x-ray vision and could see through walls. “No.”
Without waiting for her, I ran through the store, stopping only to check that the restroom was empty before running across the gravel driveway and barging into Sophie’s house. The rooms were silent and void of Laleesha’s presence. I didn’t need to do a visual check to know she wasn’t there, but I took the extra thirty seconds anyway. Skimping on standard procedure was a bad habit to get into.
The house looked like it hadn’t been disturbed. Sophie trailed me inside and confirmed my suspicion.
“When’s the last time you saw Laleesha?” I guided her back to the store.
Perhaps getting the idea to search from me, Dalya was stalking up and down the store aisles. The mayor stood guard over the empty register.
Sophie huffed a bit, thinking. “This morning when I drove out. I went to my niece’s for her son’s first birthday party. Laleesha promised to take care of the market while I was gone. If I’d known…”
“Do you believe she took the money?” I couldn’t believe it, not my mate. But I had to ask.
“No,” she said immediately. “Never.”
I breathed more easily. “Has anyone suspicious been in the store recently?” My thoughts flashed to that alpha wolf.
“No one.”
“What about new people in town?” I asked casually.
“There’s just you,” she said positively.
Ouch.
“Has Laleesha gotten any disturbing letters or phone calls?”
“Maybe.”
“Which?”
“A phone call. I didn’t ask his name.”
“When was this?”
She fidgeted, avoiding my eyes. “It was after she made that phone call.”
“What call was this?”
“It was a personal call. I didn’t listen in, but I thought it might have been her family.”
Fucking hell. What did she do that for? I’d read the reports. Her mother’s boyfriend was no one to be messed with.
“And after that she got a phone call,” I prompted.
“A couple of hours later.” Her eyes flashed. “I should have told him he had the wrong number. Whatever he said, she was nearly crying afterward.”
That was it. My bear growled agreement. It didn’t always pay to listen to hunches, but the coincidence was too strong. I went behind the counter, ostensibly to view the register more closely. What I did was sniff out unknown scents. Finding Laleesha would be easier if I could ID her abductor.
Laleesha’s scent was strongest, even though it was several hours old. Another scent was layered with hers. I sniffed more deeply, caught by an unexpected note. Interesting. My hackles rose at the harsh male scent. I’d know him anywhere now.
If they’d gone back to Arquinta, we’d probably crossed on the way. I cursed my bad luck at missing her. But it wouldn’t happen again.
I strode to the door.
“Where are you going?” the mayor asked.
Silly question. “I’m going to get Laleesha back from that lowlife scum that took her.”
My anger cooled on the drive down the mountain. Emotion led to mistakes.
I reviewed what I knew about Laleesha’s mother’s boyfriend. He’d been in prison in his early twenties. No big deal, people made mistakes. Except his crime had been particularly violent and bloody. The victim could only wish he’d died instead of being tethered to a wheelchair with a hole in his belly that wouldn’t heal.
The boyfriend was released early after the person whose testimony put him away recanted. The witness later died in a hit-and-run accident. The driver was never found. A couple of times after that, he had been picked up for various crimes, but he always had an alibi, sometimes more than one.
That was the man who moved in with her mother when Laleesha was ten years old.
Previously I’d loaded the address of Laleesha’s mother into my cell phone contacts. Her phone number, too. But I wasn’t going to give them any warning.
On the outskirts of Arquinta I stopped to gas up. While I was stretching my legs, I set the coordinates of my GPS app to her mother’s house and studied the route. Getting back into the car, I set off.
They were on the opposite side of town. It was still hours before dawn when I drove down the street where Laleesha used to live. Streetlights shone dimly. The houses were small and squat, the yards weedy patches of dirt. A few houses showed some care, like tended flowerbeds or a shiny new swing set behind a chain link fence.
Laleesha’s house had a late-model Mercedes parked on the lawn. The interior of the house was dark.
I drove around the block. Typical layout, houses on one street backing up to houses on the next street. On the street behind Laleesha’s house, a couple of houses were for sale. One of them looked vacant. I parked in front of it and got out, pretty sure its backyard was kitty-corner to Laleesha’s.
I peered over the weathered fence. Right again. There was Laleesha’s house, still dark.
Raising my head, I sniffed. No dogs in the yard. However, the male I’d scented at the market was here—and so was Laleesha.
My bear was ready to rip out of me. I made him settle down. He couldn’t come out here unless he was needed.
A light flicked on in one of the windows. It looked like the bathroom. I waited for it to go out. It did, but some other light shone dimly from another room into the bathroom. Voices sounded.
I leaped over the fence and ran across the tiny yard. Crouching under the window, I listened. The voices were clearer, a woman and a man.
“What are you doing out here?” she asked suspiciously.
“Got the munchies. Damn, don’t you have anything decent to eat?”
“There’s no fridge in the hallway.”
“Am I in the hallway?”
I tuned out the rest of their conversation, certain Laleesha was in one of the bedrooms. I prowled around the perimeter of the house, sniffing each window in turn. When one quietly slid open, I flattened myself against the siding.
The screen popped out and fell to the ground with a thump, too faint for the couple arguing in the kitchen to hear. All was still, and then a face appeared at the window.
Laleesha, of course. Her delicious scent was merely a confirmation.
I said her name softly. She froze, her eyes seeking me out. I stepped into view and held out my arms. Taking my hands, she climbed into the window opening, and I lifted her down.
I couldn’t resist crushing her to my chest. Her arms wound around my neck.
When her face tilted up to mine, I was lost. My lips descended on hers. It had been too long since I’d held my mate.
The voices in the kitchen got louder. The man shouted, “I’ll do whatever the fuck I feel like doing.”
Laleesha broke away from me, her eyes wide and startled.
A bang, like an opened door hitting the wall, sounded from the room she’d just left. “Where you at, babygirl?”
Conflicting urges fought inside me. That degenerate lowlife needed to be wiped off the face of the planet. At the same time, Laleesha had suffered enough. Much as I wanted to confront him, this wasn’t the time. Later I’d have to remove him from Laleesha’s life permanently. She’d never feel completely safe otherwise. But for now, Laleesha first, my bear and I agreed.
Sweeping her into my arms, I sprinted across the yard and jumped the fence, not stopping until we reached the car. I tucked her into the front passenger seat, and we headed home.
A successful rescue, right? But she should never have been endangered, not if I’d been doing my job. I wouldn’t leave her unprotected again.