The cheetah briefly closed his eyes. “You swear you won’t touch her or send anyone after her if I tell you what you want to know?”
“I swear it,” Tate promised.
Taggart’s head jerked when the mamba’s tongue flicked his ear. He looked at Havana. “I’ll talk, I will, just get her off me.”
“But she looks so comfortable there,” said Havana. “It would be a shame to disturb her. She gets cranky when disturbed. So cranky she can just … lunge and bite.”
Taggart cursed again.
“Don’t look at Havana,” Tate told him. “You look right at me and start talking. The sooner you’re done, the sooner the mamba will slither away.”
Taggart took in a long breath. “I don’t know much about the jaguars, really. But I saw them one night when I was at a casino—Ace in the Hole, a place near the docks. Three girls were singing on stage. They weren’t very good, but one was hot as hell. Asian. A female jaguar. Long legs, big rack, purple streaks in her black hair. I bought her a drink after the show. We exchanged names. I told her she had a nice voice. She said I should tell her boss that because the old bastard had informed her that tonight’s performance would be her last—he was hiring a new act or something. Then, two guys showed up. They were jaguars, too.”
“Descriptions?” asked Alex.
Taggart reeled off quite detailed descriptions. Havana noted it all down on her cell phone’s notepad app.
“What happened next?” Tate asked the cheetah.
“The one with the ponytail got pissed and territorial, he told me to stay away from her. I apologized and said I didn’t know she was spoken for. He studied me hard, like he thought he might know my face from somewhere. Then he smiled and said, ‘Malcolm Taggart.’ He told me we had the same boss, said he’d heard good things about me from his boss and that I should keep doing a good job because it ain’t wise to disappoint him.”
Havana stilled, asking, “You know this jaguar’s name?”
Taggart frowned thoughtfully. “When he got all possessive, the woman tried calming him down. She called him Enrique. I don’t think they were tight. She looked kind of scared of him.”
Tate tapped his fingers on the chair. “Did you catch the other jaguar’s name?”
“No,” replied Taggart. “He never said a word. Not one.” He gulped, because the mamba chose that moment to curl up on his lap, her head perilously close to his inner thigh.
“What about the woman? We don’t wish her harm,” Tate quickly added when Taggart hesitated to answer. “We just need her name. We may need her help to find this Enrique.”
The cheetah sighed. “Lola,” he said, his voice low and defeated. “She introduced herself as Lola.”
“Lola,” Alex echoed. “Anything else you can tell us?”
Taggart shook his head. “That’s all I got.”
“So you don’t have even the slightest clue who your boss might be?” asked Tate.
Again, Taggart shook his head. “Not one.”
“I do,” said Tate. “You’ve been taking directions from Gideon York.”
Taggart’s face went slack. “That guy is dead.”
“No, the twisted fuck is just underground. And you’ve been serving a man who massacred an entire wolf pack and then killed most of his own loyal followers. Just thought you might be interested to know.” Tate slowly got to his feet and casually pushed the chair aside. “You were very informative, Mal. I appreciate that, I do. I like it when people are cooperative. But not enough for me to go easy on you. And let’s be honest, if someone did to your woman what you did to mine, you’d expect them to pay, wouldn’t you?”
Taking a step toward the cheetah, Tate felt his hands ball up. “You’ll pay for agreeing to kill my mate. You’ll pay for putting those bullets in her body. You’ll pay for almost taking her from me twice.” Tate leaned forward and said quietly, “And then you’ll pay all over again.” He slammed his fist into the bastard’s jaw.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
A while later, once their captive was well and truly dead, they fanned out around Vinnie’s kitchen to discuss what they’d learned from good ole Malcolm Taggart. Tate leaned against the counter with his arm around Havana’s shoulders, keeping her front pressed to his side and holding her arm around his waist. He needed the contact. Needed to breathe her in. Needed to have her close. His cat needed it. She seemed to sense that, because his not-so-tactile mate huddled into him without complaint.
Right then, Tate’s composure was a precarious thing. Because he couldn’t quite let go that he’d almost lost his mate. Again.
Taggart might no longer be breathing, but much of Tate’s anger remained, making him tense and edgy. His muscles were so tight he was surprised they weren’t cramping.
“I’ll contact River and have him look into Lola,” said Tate. “Even if she did lose her job, her address should be in the employee records—River can access them. If her address is shifter territory, we’ll know what pride she belongs to. But it would be a fair assumption that she belongs to Gideon’s family.”
“There are only three local jaguar prides,” said Luke. “We could quietly look into them and find out if any have a member named Lola.”
Tate nodded. “Do it. I’ll assign some cats to watch the casino for any signs of someone with Enrique and his friend’s descriptions. They might be regulars.”
“But if they only went to see Lola and she’s no longer an employee there, they probably won’t return,” Alex speculated.
“It wouldn’t hurt to have people stake-out the place just in case,” said Vinnie.
“We could question the staff, but I don’t think it would be wise,” said Tate. “If they’re friends of Enrique, they’ll tell him we were there. I don’t want Gideon to know we’re close to finding him.”
“He could cut and run,” said Bailey. “He could kill whatever loners he’s currently keeping captive for his auction.”
Tate nodded. “And we can’t risk that.” He took in a long breath. “So, in sum, I’ll have River look into Lola, enquire about the local jaguar prides, and assign some cats to watch the casino.”
“I can take care of the latter two,” Luke offered.
Tate inclined his head and then looked at Havana. “Do I want to know how you, Aspen, and Bailey got inside Taggart’s house without being detected by any of us?”
“It wasn’t that hard,” said Havana, but she didn’t elaborate.
Tate looked from Aspen to Bailey, who both steadily stared back at him. It was clear that he wasn’t going to get answers from their corner. Doubting that pushing them on it would get him anywhere, he decided to let it go. For now.
They all talked a little more about Taggart, the jaguars, and Gideon before finally choosing to head out.
Tate was able to coax Havana into going home with him. As they walked along the street, they were stopped several times by his pride mates. Nosy as hell, each of the cats fished for information, but they were clearly also concerned about him and Havana. Tate kept the conversations short, uncomfortable with having his mate out in the open after yet another drive-by shooting, even though he knew it was unlikely that Gideon would have someone strike again so quickly.