"I'm astonished you'd say that." Hawke pressed a hand to his heart. "I'm just proud of my soon-to-be-new packmates."
Shaking her head, Mercy gave in to her smile as she continued to go through the miniature pieces of clothing, all of them SnowDancer branded . . . except for the last set, every one of which had "Pupcub" written across the front, above a cartoon of an adorable half wolf-half leopard pupcub drawn by Toby.
The thirteen-year-old had shown it to Sienna, who'd shown it to Hawke.
The rest was history.
Mercy's face lit up. "Riley! Come look!" She held up a little yellow jumpsuit that came complete with a hood that sported two pointed ears.
Cheeks creasing in a deep grin, Riley said, "Perfect."
The other lieutenants hadn't seen the gift pack, came over to go through it together with Riley and Mercy, all of them laughing as they debated their favorites. Including Riaz. The dark-haired lieutenant with eyes of beaten gold had been in one hell of a good mood for the past month, stayed that way throughout the working dinner--where Mercy told them what Nathan had said about the terrible error in building Trinity on a foundation of exclusion.
The words hit hard, made them all think.
Hawke was still chewing over the implications when he and the others left Riley and Mercy's home in the rugged SUV they'd driven down in together. Reaching SnowDancer territory, they decided to park the SUV in a lower area and run the last section home. It was such a clear night, the stars crystalline, that the wolf wanted to throw back its head and howl, but Hawke stayed in human form for now, as did the others.
It was easy enough for him to fall in beside Riaz, while Indigo and Judd ran ahead. "The idea of giving former enemies a way to prove their good intentions is never going to make sense to my wolf."
"It took a human to stop the Territorial Wars for a reason," was the lieutenant's answer. "I'm fucking impressed Lucas was able to fight his own instincts enough to put the proposal together."
Hawke was quiet for a while, the wind cool against his face as they ran. "Having a cub, being responsible for that vulnerable life, it changes a man." He'd seen it in Lucas, only now understood the depth of that change--to give Naya an undivided world, Lucas was willing to battle even his panther's most primal urges.
Because the cats? They were as possessive and as territorial as Hawke's wolves, and they did not forgive anyone who'd harmed their own. "Five years is a long time," he mused. "Plenty of room for people to fuck up if they're trying to game the system." Arrogant bastards like Ming LeBon would never have the patience to stay "clean" that long.
"And just because an asshole signs the accord doesn't mean we have to work with them." Riaz's voice was familiar in the night, as familiar as the dark woodsmoke edged with citrus that was his natural scent. "Open communication doesn't mean open access."
"Yeah." Hawke pushed his hair off his face, decided the adjunct proposal was one he'd have to sleep on. This would not be an easy or uncomplicated decision. "In other matters," he said to the man who ran beside him, "you're scaring people with your happy."
Riaz's laugh was all wolf, his eyes night-glow in the darkness when they met Hawke's. "You've figured it out, haven't you?"
"I've got some clue. You want to tell me if I'm right?"
"You know how I had that mating tug toward Lisette?" Riaz asked. "Like she was meant to be my mate?"
Hawke nodded, aware that lingering remnant of a relationship that had never been and never would be, had deeply frustrated Riaz. Wolf and man, both parts of Riaz had chosen Adria, loved the senior soldier with a furious passion.
"It's gone." Riaz's tone was jubilant. "Like it stretched so thin it just broke."
Hawke's wolf opened its jaws in a lupine grin. "I'm guessing this doesn't worry you."
"Are you kidding? It bugged the hell out of me. I love Adria, and that tug, it was like a splinter stuck under my skin."
Hawke could hear Riaz's scowl in his voice.
"Lisette and I had a chance once, sure," the lieutenant added, "but that chance passed. Adria's my woman, the only one I want. The suggestion that it might be otherwise pissed me off every fucking day."
"I get it." A predatory changeling who truly loved, loved all in. "People have always wondered what would happen if a changeling found his mate but chose to walk away."
"I don't know that my experience would apply to everyone," Riaz said after they'd navigated around a large rock in their path. "I mean, the whole situation was messed up. Lisette being human and madly in love with her husband, for one. That would've never happened if she'd been changeling. It was all off from the start."
"Yeah, you're right." If a changeling was in love, the mating bond couldn't come into play with anyone else--it was a law written in stone. Hawke knew of no exceptions. "You just did things backward," he said in realization. "Your love for Adria pushed the possibility of the mating bond with anyone else out."
"Damn straight." Riaz's tone held wolfish satisfaction.
"Hell, Riaz." Hawke whistled. "You're going to give the philosophers enough meat to chew over for years, if not decades. What, for example, happens to two changelings who try to walk away from a bond when neither is attached to anyone else?" Hawke couldn't imagine why anyone would walk away from the other half of their soul, but the philosopher types tended to think up ridiculous questions like that.
Riaz shrugged. "I don't think that would happen unless they were at war, like this couple Dalton told me about who were on opposite sides during the Territorial Wars. Even then, it'd be a two-way pull--I can't see how that'd give you enough breathing room to fall in love with anyone else. With me and Lisette, it was a dual repudiation."
A sudden grin as the lieutenant turned to run backward for a minute so he could face Hawke. "But really, I don't give a fuck about the philosophers. They can philosophize all they want. I just want to love the woman who owns my heart, the empress whose name is on my fucking soul."
Nothing more needed to be said.
*
RIAZ caught the scent of crushed berries and frost the instant he entered the den. Adria had passed by this way recently, as had several others. Skin aching with the need to touch her, he followed the scent--and realized Indigo and Drew were following along right behind him. SnowDancer's tracker had met his lieutenant mate at the waterfall, run the rest of the way back with them.
Riaz stopped. "Don't you two want to go to bed?" he asked pointedly.
Throwing one arm around Indigo's shoulders, Drew grinned. "Nope. Wide awake here."
Indigo's smile was less aggravating. "I wanted to ask Adria about one of the older pups under her authority and I keep forgetting. Promise it won't take more than a couple of minutes."
"Two minutes," Riaz said with a scowl. "Then scat."
"Gee whiz, Riaz, impatient m--oof." Rubbing at his abdomen, Drew made a pitiful face toward his mate. "Your elbow's really sharp, Lieutenant."
"I'll kiss it better." Indigo's tone was dry but she had her hand on Drew's back, was probably petting him under his T-shirt. "Now stop provoking Riaz. He hasn't seen Adria since this morning."
Drew's expression turned sympathetic, that of a man who understood what it was to adore a woman. Riley's younger brother might be the most irreverent wolf Riaz knew, but under the playfulness was a man who knew what it was to love, what it was to be loyal. "Best behavior," the tracker said. "I swear."
As it turned out, Drew hadn't needed to make that vow. Adria was up and awake and at an impromptu party thrown by the senior soldiers to celebrate the birthday of the man who held the leadership position among them. Elias was grinning and having a beer when Riaz walked in, his mate Yuki by his side. The hard-nosed lawyer had her hair down and was dressed in a white shift dress with wildflowers on it. Her eyes were only for Eli.
"Hey, how come we didn't rate an invite?" Drew groused while Riaz made a beeline for Adria.
"Riaz." Eyes of deepest blue-violet filled with delight. "Did--"
&nb
sp; He cut off her question with a hot tangle of a kiss that made her claws dig into his nape as a moan formed in the back of her throat. A split-second later and his possessive lover was kissing him back with equal hunger as her scent heated up.
The others around them were predictably whistling like a feral pack of wolves when Riaz and Adria came up for air. A few had thrown back their heads to add a howl into the mix.
Ignoring the lunatics, he savored the taste of the strong woman who was his by taking another kiss, his heart thundering in his ears. "Drew's right," he said afterward. "Why no invite for us?"
Lips swollen and pupils dilated, Adria ran her hands down his body to the bottom of his T-shirt, so she could slip her hands underneath. He shivered.
"We threw it together after you'd all already left for Riley's," Adria told him with a smile that cut him off at the knees. "D'Arn found out it was Eli's birthday and sweet-talked Aisha into baking a quick cake."
"Sakura with friends?" Eli and Yuki's pup was a little slip of a girl.
"She's having a sleepover with Marlee." Leaning up, Adria nuzzled at his throat. "How was the meeting?"
"Good to see Riley and Mercy." He told her about the baby clothes Hawke had gifted the couple, drank in her pleasure. "Rest was business." A nip at her lower lip. "We can talk about it once we're in our quarters." No one expected mates or couples in committed long-term relationships to keep secrets from each other, and Adria was senior enough to have a right to the information he'd share regardless.
"You must be tired," Adria said with a soft, luscious brush of her lips over his. "Ready for bed?"
The golden-eyed black wolf that was Riaz's other half wanted to growl an assent. Wolf and man, Riaz's intent had been to steal Adria away, lick her up in the privacy of their quarters, but he could taste her own wolf's happiness in this gathering of those she worked with most often--the maternal cabal's lures notwithstanding.
And Adria's happiness was Riaz's.
"Let's stay," he said with a smile, his hunger sated enough to take the edge off. "I'll pet you later."
The gold streaks in her eyes going night-glow as her wolf rose to the surface of her skin, she grazed her claws teasingly over his neck. "Deal."
Indigo and Drew came over shortly afterward, and while the two women spoke about a teenager Adria was supervising as part of her secondary maternal dominant duties, Riaz and Drew went across to wish Eli a happy birthday.
Not surprisingly, Hawke, Judd, and their mates turned up bare minutes afterward, as did a number of others, word clearly having gotten around that a party was in progress.
Riaz was with Hawke a quarter of an hour later when his alpha's phone gave a sharp ping. "It's time?" he asked.
Hawke nodded, his husky blue eyes holding the wolf's hunger for the hunt. "BlackSea's going in."
PART 5
Chapter 39
AS PER THE plan he'd worked out with Miane's team, Vasic teleported in alone to the compound that might hold the vanished BlackSea woman. The location he arrived in proved to be as perfect as the neighboring lynx pack had stated: a corner of the property swathed in shadows because of large trees the owners had probably left up in order to further shield the back of the property.
There were lights on the fence but they didn't penetrate much deeper than a few feet. The house itself was only lit up in one discrete section. Between the house and this spot lay a large area of lawn and foliage. Teleporting right to the house would've been easier, but he had no way of knowing what security measures were in place; it was better to be patient than to set off a sensor.
Having pulled on his night-vision goggles, Vasic was calculating the best route to the house when he felt a telepathic scan pass over him.
Psy guards.
They wouldn't have picked up his presence. Arrow minds were too well shielded--but this wasn't a one-man operation. Miane hadn't been arrogant about BlackSea's involvement, had told him that if he could pull out Leila or any other captive on his own, then he was to do it. However, once Vasic did a scan of his own and realized the number of guards, he 'ported back to BlackSea's floating city.
Then, he, Miane, and Malachai overhauled the plan in light of his reconnaissance. It took precious time and he could feel the changelings straining inside their skin, but they forced themselves to remain calm and controlled. Every member of the team knew that this would be no empty substation in the wilderness but a heavily guarded fortress they'd have to breach with stealth.
"Close in," Vasic said after everyone in the team had been briefed on the updated plan; he then teleported without delay.
The first part was simple--to get to the house without alerting or harming the perimeter guards. It would slow their progress but give them longer to search the property before an alarm was raised--because the instant that happened, if Leila was here, she might either be harmed or moved.
Upon arrival, the team split up as agreed and each individual made his or her way to certain points. Four of the changelings would remain outside, ready to pick off guards should they come running in from the perimeter in response to an alarm. Vasic was already using his telepathic abilities to conceal their presence from a psychic sweep.
He, Miane, and Malachai would go inside.
The plan was to do it as quietly as possible, to confirm this was the right place and these were the right people, before they made any lethal calls. There was, after all, a chance that the house was, in fact, occupied by a celebrity or plain old drug dealer or another individual with a need and/or desire for extreme privacy.
Psy bodyguards were all the rage in certain quarters.
In the darkness, the BlackSea people became ripples of black against black. Vasic saw them, but he was highly trained at night ops, and from what he could tell, most of the property's guard complement was far from well trained. Good enough to guard an isolated home. Not good enough to spot men and women who knew how to move in the dark.
Part one went off without a hitch.
Meeting at the closest entrance, from beyond which Vasic could pick out no light, he and Malachai waited while Miane tried the old-fashioned door. It was locked. The BlackSea alpha pulled something out of a thigh pocket, used it on the door. The next time she twisted the handle, it opened. No audible alarms.
Instead of rushing inside, Vasic used a miniature low-beam flashlight to check for any electronic beams or signs the door was wired for a silent alarm.
Nothing.
The other two moved at his nod to clear the room; the three of them had worked out their responsibilities and tasks back on Lantia. Entering behind them, Vasic closed the door so it would remain a viable exit should Vasic be separated from the others and unable to 'port them to safety.
If no one knew they'd come this way, no one could lock it on them.
"It's an office," Malachai said in a near-subvocal whisper, his bulk behind the black wedge of a desk.
Flicking on a narrow-beam flashlight of his own, he ran it over the papers on the desk. "Shit, it's all decades old. Must've been left here when the property went into foreclosure."
That explained the leaves Vasic could feel underfoot, the damp in the air. "They didn't bother to clean up this section."
"Let's go," Miane said, already at the other door.
Vasic did a telepathic scan of the corridor beyond, indicated for them to go. He wouldn't have sensed someone as highly shielded as himself, but he doubted there was anyone with that level of mental discipline here. He was proved right. The corridor was lined with a moth-eaten carpet and empty of all life. They went quicker now, checking any rooms they passed but aiming for the section of the house that had been lit up when they arrived.
Vasic caught the first hint of voices almost five minutes later; the sounds were followed by whispers of light. He and the changelings crept right to the edge of the light, listened. Vasic knew that if BlackSea changelings had the same level of hearing as terrestrial changelings, then Miane and Malachai had to be picking up
far more than him, but he picked up enough.
". . . on the road. Barring any unexpected delays, she'll arrive at the drop-off point in twenty-four hours."
"You're sure she's broken?" A male voice. "The damn fish held out forever."
"Broken and ours," confirmed the second speaker, a female. "All she needs is time to regain full physical health, and she'll be primed and ready to hit whichever target we point her at."
Vasic knew the three of them could've backed off, allowed this place to continue existing so they could use it to track down the other vanished, but that wasn't the changeling way. They wouldn't sacrifice one for the many. The squad functioned the same way.
"Male speaker is Psy, female is human," he said in a tone so low he could barely hear himself. "First is protecting the mind of the second, and he's strong enough that I'd have to kill him to neutralize him psychically. The backlash might take out the female.
"A telekinetic hit could put them out of commission, but there's a slight risk the male will have a chance to blast a telepathic warning to his guards or to his superiors." Telepathic communication was near impossible to block. "Do you want me to strike?"
Miane's back was a furious line in front of him as she shook her head. "Mal."
"Be easier if one or both moved this way."
"Keep the human alive," Miane ordered. "Psy is too high a risk."
"I'll get them out into the corridor," Vasic warned before he teleported some distance back down the way they'd come and deliberately knocked over an old vase.
It didn't take long for the Psy male to start down toward the noise. He was being stealthy, but he was focused on the origin point of the noise, far down the hallway. Vasic 'ported back in time to watch Malachai rise up behind him and snap his neck. Miane was already moving toward the room from which the dead male had come.
By the time Vasic walked in, she had the human female facedown on the ground, her knee on the other woman's spine and the woman's arms wrenched behind her back. Miane's gun was pressed to the back of the woman's head, explaining the woman's silence.
A small communications unit lay on the ground. "She didn't get out an alert," Miane said in a voice as cold as the frigid darkness at the bottom of the ocean.