“Son of a bitch. Which one is missing?”
“Wrath.”
Tiger frowned. “Who?”
Tim sighed. “You called him 919. I ordered them to pick names and that’s the one he chose.”
“Wrath?” Tiger pushed back anger that something had gone wrong and fear for the safety of his males. “What happened?”
Tim quickly explained what the mission had been. “The woman called in on Brian’s phone to alert us all hell was breaking loose. Brian is one of my men assigned to your guys. She’s in the wind too now, wasn’t on scene when we arrived, and to be honest, I’m playing catch-up. Your men didn’t run this by me first or I would have sent more backup, Tiger. I just pulled the damn notes Brass made so I know what the hell was going on and who this woman is. No one was there when we got to the address. The entire office was abandoned. We found our SUV around the corner and some blood on the ground where she said Brian was injured.”
“You think the woman stole them?”
Tim sighed. “She alerted us to something being wrong. Otherwise we wouldn’t have known to activate their tracking devices until they didn’t report in. That would have been a few hours. We’re assuming she’s friendly at this moment and was taken with the team.”
“Got it. So a human female is missing too? What is her name? Did 358 pick a name too?”
Tiger wrote it down. “I’ll alert my people. Maybe whoever has them wants a ransom. Call me back the second you close in on those signals.” He hung up.
Tiger spun and raised his voice. “Everyone, we have a situation. We have three missing Species males, a human male and a human female. Our males were on a retrieval mission with the human male driver from the task force and a human female who was helping them locate the target. Our men missing are Brass, 919 and 358.” He paused. “Sorry. They picked names. 919 is going by Wrath and 358 is going by Shadow.”
Saturn suddenly cursed and stood. “Did you say Wrath?”
Tiger fixed his gaze on Saturn.
“Would the human female’s name possibly be Lauren?”
Tiger strode across the room toward him. “Yes. Lauren Henderson.”
“Shit. She called us but I thought she was a crackpot. I hung up on her twice. She’s got Wrath and wanted us to help him but I didn’t believe her.”
* * * * *
Lauren grew more alarmed as time passed and Wrath didn’t wake. She had borrowed clothes from Amanda, changed into something more comfortable, and stayed by his side. Amanda had tried to convince Lauren that he’d rest easier if they removed Wrath’s shirt. Lauren shook her head at her best friend.
“Give it up. We’re not stripping him down.”
“But he’d be more comfortable.”
“Not when he woke up and needed a shower from you drooling all over him.”
“I’ll get a drool rag and tie it around my neck.”
Lauren laughed. “For the last damn time, no! You aren’t taking his clothes off.”
“You removed his boots.”
“Well, that’s just his feet. He’s sleeping. No one should do that with their boots on.”
“He’s got big feet and hands. Think that saying is true?” Amanda grinned.
“It is in his case.”
Amanda’s eyes widened. “You peeked when I was changing, didn’t you? God, you’re such a bitch. You are supposed to do everything with your best friend.”
Lauren hesitated and decided to just tell her friend the truth. “I didn’t peek while you were changing. I’ve showered with him.”
“No! Get out! You’re lying just to make me jealous.”
“We spent last night together.”
Amanda let her eyes roam up and down the man on the pink inflatable mattress. Her gaze returned to Lauren. “You are my hero, girlfriend.”
Lauren stood and entered the kitchen. “I’m getting hungry. How about you?”
The doorbell rang. Lauren instantly felt fear as she spun and her gaze flew to Amanda’s. “What if it’s the jerks from my work?” she whispered.
Amanda hesitated, paled, and whispered back, “How would they know where I live?”
“We work in real estate. Duh! We do title searches all the time.”
“Do they know my last name?”
Lauren shrugged.
Amanda rose to her feet and tiptoed closer to the door. “I’ll peek.”
Lauren grabbed the largest knife in the kitchen and a rolling pin. She ran for the door too, ready to do battle if they tried to break down the door to steal Wrath. Amanda frowned and glanced at the things Lauren gripped in her hands, before rising up to peek out the tiny hole in the door. Amanda jumped back, spun, and looked terrified as she met Lauren’s gaze.
“Two really large men wearing all black with sunglasses are out there. They look huge,” she whispered.
“Lauren Henderson?” The male outside spoke loudly. “You called the NSO. We are here as you requested. We know you aren’t a crazy female anymore and we’ve come for our male. Will you please allow us in to see Wrath? We mean you no harm.”
Lauren eased closer to the door, rose on tiptoe and peered through the tiny hole. The two men were really large but the glasses and prominent bone structure assured her they weren’t trying to trick her. She dropped back.
Amanda gave her a questioning look.
Lauren nodded at her. “Let them in.”
Amanda shook her head. “Did I mention they are really badass looking and huge?”
“Open the door. Damn it, Amanda. Wrath needs help.”
“Fine but I am going to annoy the shit out of you in the afterlife if you get us killed.”
Lauren rolled her eyes. Amanda unlocked the door and slowly opened it. She jumped back, almost tripped, as two very tall, wide men wearing all black stepped into the room. They had long hair, down past their shoulders, and were wearing identical sunglasses. They closed the door behind them.
One of them frowned and slowly reached up to remove his sunglasses. Lauren was shocked when she met a pair of catlike eyes. He blinked at her before his attention dropped to her hands.
“Are you going to cut us or try to beat on us with those?”
Lauren realized she was still holding the knife and wooden rolling pin. She flushed and put them down on the nearest table. “I’m sorry. We were afraid you were the men from my work. Wrath is over there.” She pointed.
They had to walk around the couch to see the unconscious Species. The man who’d spoken to Lauren suddenly laughed. “Is that a pink castle?”
“It’s my niece’s,” Amanda admitted. “She loves to sleep in my room so I bought her that. It’s got a princess under him.”
The man grinned. “I’m Flame and this is Slash.”
Slash was as tall as Flame, about six foot three, but he had streaked, light-brown hair with silver highlights. He removed his glasses. He had the same catlike eyes and they were an odd shade of blue. The man nodded at Lauren and Amanda.
“What happened?” Flame focused on Amanda.
“Talk to her. I’m just the getaway driver. I didn’t know what he was or I might have at least bitched more on the drive here but she’s my best friend so what else could I do? She said to drive and I put the pedal to the metal.”
Flame turned to Lauren. She quickly explained everything that had happened and retrieved the dart she’d saved, handing it to Flame.
“This was what they stuck him with. I kept it in case you could test it to tell what drug they used.”
Flame took the dart and sniffed it. He cursed. He dug out a cell phone and quickly dialed someone. “We need a helicopter out here now. Wrath has been tranquilized with a heavy dose of sedative and a paralyzing agent. There’s a park half a block from here. We’ll meet it there.” He hung up and stared deeply into Lauren’s eyes. “You did really good, human female. The sedative lasts longer with the paralyzing agent. It’s a trick those bastards discovered to stop our bodies from working through their drugs as quickly. His heart could stop if they overdosed him.”